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Post by christian on Jan 9, 2022 11:16:02 GMT -6
Empire of the rising sun 1899-1955 This will be my first AAR with the Empire of japan mod from 1899 to 1955, I wont go into too much detail regarding the personalities nor politics and will focus more on the shipbuilding aspect, such as the shipbuilding programmes and the economics and design proposals involved, during wartime the battles will of course be shown thoroughly both victories and defeats. The AAR will be updated as i progress through the years and the events showcased as best as possible House rulesGame will be played with Super large fleet size, 100% research rate, Non varied research rate, No AI advantage, standard aircraft progression, Harsher peace deals, 80 maximum airbase capacity and manual build of legacy fleet I want to as much as possible avoid "hindsight building/decisions" as much as possible such as installing as much as humanly possible light AA in 1916, or building a cruiser/battlecruiser specifically for conversions. I also wont be designing "Meta ships" and will try to go for more realistic designs of the period by looking at real life proposals and drawing inspiration from them. This AAR is quite heavily modded and will be played with Empire of the rising sun mod along with quite a few other mods, Notably EOTRS mod Alternative speeds mod More AI ships mod by Liam Seawolfs semi historical ship designs mod Overpen mod (Using the improved long range pen Vanilla pen file) (gives slightly more penetration at long range but with the same penetration as vanilla penetration at around 10k yards) 1899 Growing ambitions The succes of Admiral Togo at the battle of Yalu river against the Chinese in 1894 Spurred great ambition within the new and ambitious Imperial Japanese navy, This battle served to boost the nations prestige and with it the need for powerful naval vessels if it wished to enter the stage of the worlds major naval powers. Newly appointed Admiral Togo begins the 8-12 programme which calls for 8 new battleships over the preexisting 4, and 10 new cruisers Under this program Japan signs a deal with France to construct the Asahi class pre dreadnought, Though extremely heavy for their time they are extremely slow. The Japanese navy being in its infancy received great help under its own request wishing to further their own shipbuilding expertise with the help of major naval powers. the designs influence by France can be seen by its tumblehome hull form and turreted secondary's. (The newer IJN Asahi compared to the older IJN Hizen from 1893 Despite the staggering tonnage and ambitious design for its time, the navy finds the budget between 1895 and 1899 for Eight of these ships though having to cut down on expenses for the cruisers Nevertheless the the design bureau managed to come up with a rather good and modern light cruiser design under the budgetary constraints. The 8-12 programme nevertheless ended up significantly overbudget and only 8 cruisers could be afforded though badly needed to retire the old cruiser converted cargo ships and few decades old "armored" cruisers with 1899 drawing to a close and the IJN having significantly grown in size with its acquisition of 8 new modern light cruisers and 8 new modern pre dreadnoughts it has firmly entered the worlds stage as a significant naval power. The IJN Admiralty and Togo specifically still wishes to finish the 8-12 programme in 1900
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Post by cormallen on Jan 10, 2022 2:54:40 GMT -6
Handsome ships, though buying late 1890s ships with big old 13 inch/-2 quality guns (IRL likely the French 13.4 that even they'd stopped selecting five years earlier) is an odd choice for your "state of the art" imports? Maybe swap out for the more modern 12s (similar penetration and much better RoF) and add a knot or two?
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Post by prophetinreverse on Jan 10, 2022 22:57:04 GMT -6
Must agree with Cormallen, those 13” (-2) guns are a bit of a poisoned chalice it feels like every time I try to use them in a game.
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Post by christian on Jan 11, 2022 7:10:06 GMT -6
Handsome ships, though buying late 1890s ships with big old 13 inch/-2 quality guns (IRL likely the French 13.4 that even they'd stopped selecting five years earlier) is an odd choice for your "state of the art" imports? Maybe swap out for the more modern 12s (similar penetration and much better RoF) and add a knot or two? The Japanese Admiralty debated going for the newer more modern 12 inch caliber guns, but ultimately due to the US planning to and laying down their Kearsarge class battleships armed with 13 inch rifles decided to up the caliber to 13 inches. This was done for multiple reasons, To gain experience in producing large caliber naval weapons for future use. And to keep caliber parity with US battleships being laid down as well as future french and british ones. In addition to this the Naval staff did a thorough test of both the 12 inch and 13 inch gun and while the 12 inch was found to have overall superior ballistics, the 13 inch had much better post penetration damage although it had shorter range but did boast better penetration below 2000 yards. The naval staff thus decided on the 13 inch as the inferior range and reload were deemed less important than the higher post penetration damage and better close quarters penetration, The naval staff as of the year of the design also considered battles most likely to take place at 3000-4000 yards and thus the 12 inch superior long range penetration and ballistics to be mostly irrelevant.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jan 11, 2022 9:56:42 GMT -6
Here is my version of your Pre-dreadnought using similar game setup: Historically, ships belt armor was designed to resist the penetration of the guns on the ship. That is how I operate, most of the time.
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Post by cormallen on Jan 11, 2022 10:47:23 GMT -6
Here is my version of your Pre-dreadnought using similar game setup: <button disabled="" class="c-attachment-insert--linked o-btn--sm">Attachment Deleted</button> Historically, ships belt armor was designed to resist the penetration of the guns on the ship. That is how I operate, most of the time. I know it's not a huge weight with only two turrets but that's a HEROIC degree of turret roof armour! Formally rating ship's armour vs ship's own guns is initially mostly an American thing but it caught on, rather like the "immune zones" idea as useful for assessing the balance of the beast. (I'm betting Fisher hated it!) In the last decade of the Nineteenth Century the AP vs Armour game swung wildly as competing advances overlapped and chased each other, it's one of the reasons I like the early-game stuff. By WW1-ish it stabilises a lot. The German and British heavy plate was apparently a bit better by the thirties but the competition's fairly stable by then. The big advances are in Fire Control plus the coming of Radar able to spot splashes and give highly accurate ranging.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jan 11, 2022 10:50:52 GMT -6
Here is my version of your Pre-dreadnought using similar game setup: <button disabled="" class="c-attachment-insert--linked o-btn--sm">Attachment Deleted</button> Historically, ships belt armor was designed to resist the penetration of the guns on the ship. That is how I operate, most of the time. I know it's not a huge weight with only two turrets but that's a HEROIC degree of turret roof armour! Formally rating ship's armour vs ship's own guns is initially mostly an American thing but it caught on, rather like the "immune zones" idea as useful for assessing the balance of the beast. (I'm betting Fisher hated it!) In the last decade of the Nineteenth Century the AP vs Armour game swung wildly as competing advances overlapped and chased each other, it's one of the reasons I like the early-game stuff. By WW1-ish it stabilises a lot. The German and British heavy plate was apparently a bit better by the thirties but the competition's fairly stable by then. The big advances are in Fire Control plus the coming of Radar able to spot splashes and give highly accurate ranging. Well, the turrets are some of the most vulnerable areas of the ship, get a penetration in that location and the whole ship might go boom in the night. As I have said many times ships are a balance between firepower, speed and protection. I do my best to stay in that regime. But I am no expert. I may do some research to re-affirm my beliefs.
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Post by cormallen on Jan 11, 2022 12:51:43 GMT -6
I know it's not a huge weight with only two turrets but that's a HEROIC degree of turret roof armour! Formally rating ship's armour vs ship's own guns is initially mostly an American thing but it caught on, rather like the "immune zones" idea as useful for assessing the balance of the beast. (I'm betting Fisher hated it!) In the last decade of the Nineteenth Century the AP vs Armour game swung wildly as competing advances overlapped and chased each other, it's one of the reasons I like the early-game stuff. By WW1-ish it stabilises a lot. The German and British heavy plate was apparently a bit better by the thirties but the competition's fairly stable by then. The big advances are in Fire Control plus the coming of Radar able to spot splashes and give highly accurate ranging. Well, the turrets are some of the most vulnerable areas of the ship, get a penetration in that location and the whole ship might go boom in the night. As I have said many times ships are a balance between firepower, speed and protection. I do my best to stay in that regime. But I am no expert. I may do some research to re-affirm my beliefs. Oh, it's a valid choice. More than I'd ever look at on a pre-dread personally as I'm not sure the rest of the ship will live long fighting anything that you need 5" of roof to keep out perhaps? I tend to give my own nearly-but-quite-British-historical designs an extra inch or three to cut down on the sudden loud noises...
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Post by vonfriedman on Jan 11, 2022 14:56:56 GMT -6
I wouldn't spend money to build those 10,000 ton B's and would wait until the local dock size and knowledge are significantly increased. For the moment, I think it is better to have another 16,000 ton B built in France rather than two 10,000 ton B's of inferior characteristics locally built.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jan 11, 2022 15:09:19 GMT -6
I wouldn't spend money to build those 10,000 ton B's and would wait until the local dock size and knowledge are significantly increased. For the moment, I think it is better to have another 16,000 ton B built in France rather than two 10,000 ton B's of inferior characteristics locally built. I agree, I didn't in my game, I just built the 16,000 ton ships.
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Post by cormallen on Jan 11, 2022 17:23:46 GMT -6
Japanese historically got most of their fleet from British yards but IG they are prob better, at least for the start fleet, going to France or possibly America? (For the avoidance of unnecessary pyrotechnics). The 10k limit is really too tight for anything more than a modest armoured cruiser tbh. Early years construction bought in will aid indigenous tech development a bit and the build speed and probably quality of British maybe worth the risk of extra explosions?
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Post by vonfriedman on Jan 12, 2022 2:10:59 GMT -6
According to Norman Friedman (and others) British BCs at Jutland blew up due to "suicidal magazine practices" rather than to construction / protection flaws. The Hood case is still different. That ship was essentially a splendid looking mistake.
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Post by christian on Jan 12, 2022 3:43:41 GMT -6
Here is my version of your Pre-dreadnought using similar game setup: <button disabled="" class="c-attachment-insert--linked o-btn--sm">Attachment Deleted</button> Historically, ships belt armor was designed to resist the penetration of the guns on the ship. That is how I operate, most of the time. The Japanese Naval staff would probably not accept this Proposal The lack of secondary's in a period where torpedo boats are prevalent would be a topic of contention to say it at least. The need to slow to 16 knots to form a line with the previous class of battleship (Hizen) would make the tonnage put into 19 knots mostly wasted. Armor protection is also lacking especially D and DE where 2 inches was deemed insufficient against 6" and primarily 8-10" HE projectiles used by armored cruisers Many Officers and Captains would probably be scared to use the conning tower too with only 6 inches of armor The 4 inch TT on the Asahi class was decided based on the previous experience with the Hizen class battleships. During the battle of Yalu river the flagship Hizen received a 8 inch HE hit to her A turret blowing the 2.5 inch plate in and killing the entire turret crew. 1901 tests conducted due to growing tensions with Russia found that a 3 to 3.5 inch plate was enough to stop 8 inch HE from blowing the roof plates of turrets in and that the 4 inches on the Asahi was a bit much These tested also indicated that a 12 inch projectile could penetrate 8 to 9 inches of armor at 2000 yards while a 13 inch could penetrate 8.5 to 10 inches at said range
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Post by cormallen on Jan 12, 2022 5:27:51 GMT -6
According to Norman Friedman (and others) British BCs at Jutland blew up due to "suicidal magazine practices" rather than to construction / protection flaws. The Hood case is still different. That ship was essentially a splendid looking mistake. It was probably a combo of careless ammo handling and touchy cordite in most cases. The official reports tended to play this latter factor down rather, probably for political/morale purposes. I was largely referring to the game's British build flaw which (IIRC) gets added to exports as a free extra?
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Post by cormallen on Jan 12, 2022 5:31:51 GMT -6
"These tested also indicated that a 12 inch projectile could penetrate 8 to 9 inches of armor at 2000 yards while a 13 inch could penetrate 8.5 to 10 inches at said range"
The big French guns are certainly powerful, shame they only fire one round every 4 or 5 minutes...
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