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Post by cwemyss on May 1, 2023 9:06:34 GMT -6
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Post by cwemyss on May 1, 2023 9:07:17 GMT -6
 January 1890 – Kaiserliches Oberkommando der Marine, Berlin Vitzeadmiral Karl Diedrichs heard an exchange in the outer chamber and stifled a sigh. He had little desire to see his counterpart from the Imperial Naval Office, but knew the meeting was necessary. His own meeting with the Kaiser last week had been a fiasco but there was some hope that the administrative bureau had fared better. “Herr Admiral,” his aide began after a perfunctory knock, “ Vitzeadmiral von Posen.” “Yes, yes,” Diedrichs answered, rising from his desk and waving the other man in. “Heinrich, please see that we have plenty of coffee, and that we’re not disturbed.” The young Korvettenkapitän nodded and exited, closing the door behind him. von Posen looked around as he entered the office, sniffed, and took a seat. Diedrichs joined him at the small oak table and handed across a folder, explaining “So this is apparently the report our young Kaiser read that kicked off the recent frenzy.”  “Yes,” said von Posen, “if we choose to fight the English it will be difficult. I personally don’t see any natural reason we should do so, but if it is the Kaiser’s inclination, so be it.” “His inclination appears to be asking the impossible,” answered Diedrichs. “He requested that I build a plan to counter them in the North Sea, and when I suggested that a few more ships might be helpful he implied that another Admiral might be found to take a more positive approach.” “So I heard,” said von Posen, with an irritating smirk. “Though apparently your conversation hit the mark. He’s provided a bit of funds to start building the fleet you might want.” “I’ll take what I can get,” Diedrichs said, “though it’ll be a decade before we’re close to level, and that assumes they don’t start building to match. What do your architects have in mind?” “We don’t have a large enough shipyard, yet, to match their biggest ships,” von Posen replied, “and we don’t yet have an acceptable thirteen-inch gun either. We’ve taken a balanced approach, and plan to lay down three Weissenburg class ships this year.”  Diedrichs took a moment looking over the specification and exhaled slowly, debating how to respond. “Well,” he started, “These will be a vast improvement over the Brandenburg. I have a battle squadron in name only, these would help fill it out.” “I do wonder, though, if we shouldn’t be building more cruisers instead. Their Niobe and Diadem class are tough customers, and there are a lot of them.” Waving a hand, von Posen answered “Yes, but they’re scattered around the globe. We won’t have to fight them in the Mediterranean or Caribbean. It’s their battle fleet that can bottle us up in Wilhelmshaven.” “Just so,” Diedrichs responded, frustrated. He knew that they could build more cruisers, more quickly, and that they were more flexible ships. “Why are these planned with such large coal bunkers?” he asked. “If we expect to fight in the North Sea, we don’t need the range to cruise off Africa.” “Perhaps you have something there,” von Posen answered. “We’ll consider that for follow-on ships.” von Posen sat for a moment, sipping his coffee, then asked “How thin can you spread the fleet for the next few months? We could shift additional funds to shipbuilding if you can lay some of the fleet in reserve.” “I’ve already ordered the Hela stripped down for storage, and her sister will go on reduced manning as well. I also have one ship each from the Cruiser Squadron and the Scout Squadron in a state of partial readiness, though that will greatly limit our training opportunities. I’m planning to bring Vineta back from Dar es Salaam as soon as the gunboats reach the Indian Ocean.” “Very good,” answered von Posen. “Ideally in a year we’ll have more options available.”        |
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Post by cwemyss on May 1, 2023 9:08:33 GMT -6
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Post by cwemyss on May 3, 2023 20:14:41 GMT -6
September 1890 – Wilhelmshaven, Deutsches Kaiserreich Konteradmiral Heinz von Trotha watched the big English ships lumber into the Jade Bight in two columns and turned to the man standing next to him. “Tell me again why we needed to do this?” he said to Vitzeadmiral Karl Diedrichs. “When the Kaiser asks, we all answer,” responded Diedrichs, gazing across the water. “Though I wouldn’t have minded another few months, we could have at least brought out a decent squadron of these,” he added, tapping his gloved fist on the Victoria Louise’s aft rail. “Hmmm,” von Trotha said noncommittally. Two of Victoria Louise’s sisters were rather overdue to join his fleet, the Fürst Bismarck taking longer than anticipated to finish fitting out, and the Vineta hung up in Suez due to some diplomatic technicality. The two men turned from the cruiser’s fantail and walked forward, past the aft 21-cm gun mount. Diedrichs continued, “This little celebration should temper everyone’s nationalism a little bit.” He glanced back over his shoulder at the Royal Navy contingent. “I hope at least that the Kaiser sees the same thing I’m seeing.” 
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Post by TheOtherPoster on May 4, 2023 5:11:26 GMT -6
Modern designs in the legacy fleet do look a bit too good, particularly on speed: 21knots on ships built before 1890 was very uncommon. I guess Brandenburg, with its 14 knots speed could be an ironclad? I wonder what are the gun positions for her 10 and 9in guns. I’d wish there is none in the A and Y positions (= it’s a central battery ironclad). Obviously now is far too late but maybe it would be more realistic to allow D, E, S and T gun positions to have a slightly better arc of fire forward and backward to better represent central battery ships? (and also those positions could be used more realistically in the future for secondary turrets in semi-dreadnoughts). Maybe this has been done? I don't know. Talking about main guns, another thing I would like to see (again, too late) is that at least for all legacy fleet, and maybe during the first couple of years, twin turret main guns means the ship must have low freeboard (or put the other way, to have high freeboard the ship can only have single main guns). This is to make more realistic the problems with heavy top weight at the time. Regarding armour, it seems they have taken into account the weaker strength of armour at this time. The British battleship designs you have shown above have 14 and 16in belts. Historically ships of this period would have 18, 20 or even 22in belts but making them 14 and 16 is good enough for me.
Great AAR, congrats.
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Post by TheOtherPoster on May 6, 2023 13:04:08 GMT -6
Regarding armour, it seems they have taken into account the weaker strength of armour at this time. The British battleship designs you have shown above have 14 and 16in belts. Historically ships of this period would have 18, 20 or even 22in belts but making them 14 and 16 is good enough for me.
I think I may have been wrong about that. Watching one of Ricky's games ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=up_aiLmqJQk ) I could have a quick look at the 13in (-2) gun penetration figures. The best penetration figures, at very close range, 1000 yards, is just over 7in. Which means that building anything with just 7.5in or 8in of belt armour will make our ships waterline impervious to the most powerful gun available in 1890 at any range. Of course all the unarmoured parts of the ship will be very badly affected by those guns anyway. but the fact remains that that low penetration does not fit well with the standard practice at the time of very thick armour belts to withstand the seemingly historically more powerful enemy guns at short range. For example, Navweaps states the 13.5in guns of the Royal Sovereign were capable of penetrating 28in of vertical iron at 1000 yards and 11in of Krupp at 3000 yards. (the 12in in the earlier Admiral class could penetrate 20in of iron at 1000 yards). Hence the need for very thick belts in the battleships, as the best armour type, Krupp had not even been invented yet and they were using the far inferior compound /steel armour types instead (and some of the 1880s ships were even using iron). So in short, for better or worst (anybody can decide that), it seems in RTW3 we really do not need to build our ships with heavy, narrow thick belts as it was historically the case. Armour seems to be only slightly worst than 1900 Krupp. Maybe this has been the best way to make a more steady increase in armour strength throughout the game? |
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Post by wlbjork on May 6, 2023 14:26:41 GMT -6
I'm guessing that is due to avoid issues from the more casual player who wouldn't be aware of just how much a jump in protection the Harvey process provided and likewise the major leap in performance going from black powder (e.g. British 13.5" designated 13" -2 gun in RTW2) to smokeless propellent (the cordite-propelled 12" guns that armed the last pre-dreadnoughts, designated 12" -1 in game)
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Post by cormallen on May 6, 2023 15:03:20 GMT -6
I'm guessing that is due to avoid issues from the more casual player who wouldn't be aware of just how much a jump in protection the Harvey process provided and likewise the major leap in performance going from black powder (e.g. British 13.5" designated 13" -2 gun in RTW2) to smokeless propellent (the cordite-propelled 12" guns that armed the last pre-dreadnoughts, designated 12" -1 in game) That's what game notes are for to be honest... There's fairly dramatic technical advances in fire control, engine power and reliability never mind gun and armour layout and for any new players YouTube has many offering easy education in the subject (Drach et al) plus of course RTW itself is not really a game for the seeker of simple pleasures perhaps? |
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Post by TheOtherPoster on May 7, 2023 2:41:23 GMT -6
Well, I guess all goes down to the choices made by the team, even sometimes not what they'd have preferred, like time pressures on them to get the game out, or the need to take into account a wider type of player.
There are many new exciting things to the game that must have taken a lot of time to develop, like ship design, forming divisions, ships commanders... And likewise new things specific to the extension to 1970: jets, missiles, helicopters, the change in the navies... Making all that work must have taken a huge amount of time.
Maybe they had to take the decision to cut corners in the 1890 start, which could be done to work without major changes. For example, they may have taken the decision to make armour not much worst in 1890 than in 1900 so not to complicate things for us and for them. The problem with this is that then in 1890 we would not build battleships with narrow very thick armour belts and low freeboard (as it was historically the case) because the armour in the game is almost as good as it's in 1900. And indeed when YouTubers have designed a battleship in 1890 they just give her normal freeboard and normal armour of a moderate thickness, as in 1900.
So a way around it in the game could be not allowing us to build our legacy fleet: so we're given some of those battleships with narrow thick belts and low freeboard anyway that otherwise we wouldn't build.
I wonder if the high speed of many legacy fleet ships has something to do with that or was a conscious choice. In any case so many 22 knot cruisers and 18 knot battleships in the 1880s seem to me a bit over optimistic, more like 1900.
Sorry I don't want to sound too critical, I'm just trying to better understand the game. For what I know and I've seen so far, RTW3 is an amazing game full of exciting new features I can't wait to have my hands on, and certainly I'll be spending unaccountable hours playing it.
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Post by cormallen on May 7, 2023 3:50:18 GMT -6
Well, I guess all goes down to the choices made by the team, even sometimes not what they'd have preferred, like time pressures on them to get the game out, or the need to take into account a wider type of player. There are many new exciting things to the game that must have taken a lot of time to develop, like ship design, forming divisions, ships commanders... And likewise new things specific to the extension to 1970: jets, missiles, helicopters, the change in the navies... Making all that work must have taken a huge amount of time. Maybe they had to take the decision to cut corners in the 1890 start, which could be done to work without major changes. For example, they may have taken the decision to make armour not much worst in 1890 than in 1900 so not to complicate things for us and for them. The problem with this is that then in 1890 we would not build battleships with narrow very thick armour belts and low freeboard (as it was historically the case) because the armour in the game is almost as good as it's in 1900. And indeed when YouTubers have designed a battleship in 1890 they just give her normal freeboard and normal armour of a moderate thickness, as in 1900. So a way around it in the game could be not allowing us to build our legacy fleet: so we're given some of those battleships with narrow thick belts and low freeboard anyway that otherwise we wouldn't build. I wonder if the high speed of many legacy fleet ships has something to do with that or was a conscious choice. In any case so many 22 knot cruisers and 18 knot battleships in the 1880s seem to me a bit over optimistic, more like 1900. Sorry I don't want to sound too critical, I'm just trying to better understand the game. For what I know and I've seen so far, RTW3 is an amazing game full of exciting new features I can't wait to have my hands on, and certainly I'll be spending unaccountable hours playing it. I agree, especially in that allowing Player designed stuff would allow purists to fix their problems. I had to design new start fleets for everyone in RTW2 to deal with the same issue. I do hope that the 1890 stuff will get better (or rather worse!) with patches over time? |
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Post by cwemyss on May 7, 2023 9:41:37 GMT -6
September 1891 – AG Vulcan Shipyard, Stettin, Deutsches Kaiserreich Kapitän zur See Rudolf Rieve reached out to take Fregattenkapitän Dieter Hoffman’s extended hand, shaking it warmly, before both men returned to huddling in their greatcoats to shelter from the sleet blowing in off the Baltic. They both hailed from Klotten, on the Mosel, and Rieve had known Hoffman almost since the latter’s birth. “Welcome to the Second Scout Division, Dieter,” Rieve said as the two walked through the busy shipyard. “Thank you, Herr Kapitän,” answered the younger man, “The shakedown cruise to Sankt Petersburg went very well, but I’m looking forward to seeing what the Undine can really do with the other ships.”   The Undine had just formally entered the fleet and would be joining her smaller cousins in the swift Second Division. Hoffman had previously commanded a small patrol steamer operating from Warnemünde, a sleepy fishing village with good access to the Danish Straits. He was rightly proud of his new, much larger, command, gleaming white at the quayside in spite of the gloomy weather. “Outrun them, most likely,” said the Squadron commander with a slight smile. “And probably whip both of them together, if it came to it.” “I’d rather whip a Frenchman, sir,” Hoffman said earnestly. His father had marched west with the 40th Prussian Regiment in 1870, been gravely wounded in the war’s opening action at Saarbrucken, and had never recovered, dying while Hoffman was in primary school. “You may get your chance,” Rieve answered. “Our intelligence services are matched only by our research arm in hopeless blundering. The French public is furious since that fellow Vogel was caught at Saint-Chamond.”   “But still,” he added, “the furor will likely pass.” The two men continued along the quay, stepping aside as a troop of Prussian cavalry passed, their part in the commissioning ceremony finished. The band was packing away their instruments, and on board a number of dignitaries were still milling about the Undine’s deck. Hoffman had left his executive officer in charge, as the man absolutely craved the attention, while Hoffman decidedly did not. They reached a different part of the dockyard, this one clamoring with the ring of hammers and heavy equipment in contrast to the celebration around Undine. “Which one is this?” Hoffman asked, nodding at the steel hull towering above them. “The Wettin,” answered Rieve. “She’ll launch in another couple months, but it’s still a year and a half before she joins the fleet. Until she and her sisters are in service, we all need to hope the politicos can keep things at a low simmer and no more.” 
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Post by cwemyss on May 9, 2023 13:26:18 GMT -6
January 1892 – Agadir, Marokko The setting sun painted the western extremity of the Atlas Mountains as the anchorage grew dim, and Fregattenkapitän Theodor Korn felt like it might finally be cooling off. An offshore breeze still brought occasional hot, dry Sahara blasts, but nothing like at the height of the day. They’d reached Agadir yesterday, bringing along a dozen transports carrying a hodgepodge of Deutsches Heer and Schutztruppe units. The Kaiser’s fiery speech on a frigid afternoon in Wilhelmshaven had declared they were sending troops simply to support and defend the Sultan’s sovereignty, but he’d gone on to threaten Prussian boots marching once again into Paris, and naturally the French had taken umbrage. And since the French and British had become unusually cozy in recent years, their ambassador had expressed displeasure as well, leading to his being publicly snubbed by the Chancellor. With all that piled on top of the simmering tensions between Italy and Austria-Hungary, it looked to Korn like Europe was hurtling toward an unnecessary war. That, however, was well above his duties.  All that had happened before the German flotilla had even passed through the English Channel, shadowed by ships from both Britain and France but fortunately without incident. Storms in the Bay of Biscay had scatted the convoy and the German cruisers escorting the force had spent two days re-gathering them before finishing the eighteen-hundred mile journey. They’d found at least a nominally friendly port and the small coastal battery hadn’t challenged them. Looking to the southern horizon, Korn could just make out the silhouette of a French cruiser against the last of the sunset. He sighed, deeply exhausted, and turned as Kapitän zur See Berhnard Weneker walked up. Korn’s salute was perfunctorily returned by a skipper that looked just as tired. “The flag signaled that unloading is almost complete,” the Fürst Bismarck’s commander said, “and the Sultan’s troops are acting as guides. There’s been no opposition as our men started moving into the hills, though supposedly there’s parts of the interior that aren’t really under the Sultan’s control.” “Let us hope that the force landing at Tangiers is having the same good fortune,” Korn responded. 
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Post by cwemyss on May 12, 2023 11:52:45 GMT -6
July 1892 – Rabat, Marokko Fregattenkapitän Theodor Korn heard the Victoria Louise’s big guns echo across the glassy harbor, saw the smoke roll away from the big cruiser, and watched another salvo of 21-cm rounds crash into the walls of Rabat’s thousand-year-old kasbah. Then he heard the higher crack of Gefion’s 105-mm guns, and felt the shock as the Fürst Bismarck, much closer, joined in with her main battery. The Sultan’s armies, backed by Schutztruppe companies and Deutsches Heer artillery had chased the rebels north from Agadir and south from Tangiers, and with the fall of Marrakesh last month Rabat held the last remaining resistance in the country’s major towns. It had been a grinding campaign and the rebels delaying tactics had created time for the French to move north from Dakar. There was a strong suspicion among the German forces in Marokko that the French had supplied the rebels, though if the government were acting on those suspicions it was being kept quiet.   The French interference had in turn prompted the Spanish to land troops from the Canaries at El Aiun, essentially claiming the southern third of the Sultan’s territory while interposing themselves between the French and the Sultan’s German-backed troops. Korn knew the diplomats had been working overtime to prevent the English coming in from Gibraltar, and that was also why they hadn’t sent one of the squadron’s cruisers to Freetown when fighting flared up between the Africans and their colonial rulers in Sierra Leone. No German citizens had been killed, but it had rankled watching from the sidelines while they were in danger.  There was another sharp crack as the army’s cannons joined in, firing from a bluff on the other side of the river. The Sultan’s men had already retaken the Royal Palace in the city’s center and most of the city was firmly in friendly hands. The men around him cheered, and as Korn watched a section of the kasbah’s minaret come tumbling down in a cloud of red dust. Such a waste, he thought, truly unfortunate that the rebels had chosen the ancient citadel for their last stand. Korn sat, sweating in the heat, with a volunteer company from Fürst Bismarck in ship’s boats. He checked his watch, raised a flare gun overhead, and fired. His company bent to the oars, joined by units from the other two cruisers, eight boats in all carrying two hundred men. They pulled the quarter mile to shore, opposing gunfire sporadic and ineffective, approaching the kasbah from the north. The cruisers all fired one more salvo then went silent to avoid shelling their own men, while the army battery kept up a steady fire from the eastern riverbank. Sand hissed under the boat and Korn leapt over the side, pistol held high. His sailors jumped from the boat as well, pulling it up the beach then spreading out to head inland through low, dry scrub. Korn pointed to a gap in the kasbah’s ramparts, partially blocked by rubble from the bombardment, and shouted “Follow me!” He didn’t turn to look behind him, confident that the sailors were following. The men stormed through the breach then fanned out, moving between blocks of fallen masonry as the defenders began firing at this new threat. Korn felt a bullet hum past his ear and turned to see a man in a burnous frantically working to reload an ancient Chassepot rifle. Korn raised his pistol and fired as the man brought his rifle up, and the rebel fell. As Korn’s sailors rushed through the kasbah’s courtyard, rebels began laying down arms and within a few minutes the fortress was secure.  
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Post by cwemyss on May 13, 2023 13:04:42 GMT -6
November 1892 – Friedrichshafen, Deutsches Kaiserreich Korvettenkapitän Leon Papperitz took a minute to look at Schloss Friedrichshafen’s opulent décor, and marveled again at how he’d come to be here. He felt distinctly out of place, both due the unaccustomed civilian suit he was wearing and due to his age, quite a lot younger than most of the crowded meeting hall. It had started when he tagged along to a scientific conference in Karlsruhe two years ago, his father presenting a paper on mathematics. There he’d met any number of international luminaries, but had really hit it off with a member of the British contingent. Over quite a lot of wine and beer they’d discovered a genuine mutual esteem and had continued exchanging correspondence. His new friend had invited him to a technical forum this summer in Liverpool and there he’d become acquainted with a number of British scientists and engineers. Toward the end of the English conference, he’d been approached by a Captain in the Royal Corps of Navy Constructors, who had apparently mistaken his father’s scientific and mathematical status for his own decidedly middling importance in the German hierarchy.  Papperitz had duly passed on the offer, expecting that the state of relations between the two countries would inhibit any exchange of ideas, but his superiors at Wilhelmshaven had laughed. In spite of German eminence in so many scientific fields, their naval research arm was a shambles. They’d forwarded the offer to Berlin, and a week later Papperitz had found himself meeting with Vitzeadmiral Alexander von Posen himself, at the Imperial Naval Office. He'd found himself immediately reassigned from an administrative role in the Supply branch, to head a very vaguely defined new Office of Technical Cooperation. He found himself traveling throughout the continent attending engineering and scientific conferences, and his small but growing staff worked to analyze and pass on what they learned to German industry. His duties appeared to wander somewhere between diplomacy, scientific research, and occasionally outright espionage, but it was certainly interesting. Papperitz took his seat in the large auditorium and settled in as the next speaker approached the rostrum.   
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Post by cwemyss on May 17, 2023 22:05:57 GMT -6
January 1893 – Fort Zeelandia, Paramaribo, Niederländisch-Guayana Korvettenkapitän Manfred Gygas descended the steps two at a time from the fort’s stone southern rampart and hurriedly covered a hundred yards of the Suriname River bank to the rough jetty. As he trotted up the Denebola's gangplank he heard Feldwebel Rolf Albrecht yell, “Captain coming aboard” “Albrecht,” he called after saluting the quarterdeck, “raise steam and make ready to depart. Signal the men back to the ship, immediately, and ask Herr Trummler to meet me in my cabin.” “Right away sir,” the petty officer responded, and Gygas was gratified to see the signal flags going up before Albrecht even turned to repeat the orders. The crack of the saluting gun followed moments later.  On reaching his cabin Gygas doffed his uniform jacket, happy to gain some relief from the equatorial heat. He threw the garment on his bunk and turned to the chart locker. There was a knock at the door. “Enter,” he said without turning, before selecting a chart and spreading it out on his desk. He looked up and nodded at Kapitänleutnant Oscar Trummler, wordlessly handing him a telegram. Trummler read it and handed it back. “This wasn’t exactly unexpected, was it sir?” “No, not at all. The two have been jousting in the press and in parliamentary speeches for months. This is past due, if anything. It was inevitable after that American steamer was captured. I do wish they’d waited until we were out of the Caribbean, though,” he answered. "The Dutch didn't have enough coal here to top us up fully, and the beer is simply awful."  “The message orders us to make best speed for Duala,” Trummler said. “That's a two week cruise just to get there. Do you have any instructions beyond that?” “None whatsoever,” Gygas responded. “I suspect it’s the usual. Show the German flag to make sure the French know we care. Weniger has the Gazelle up at Casablanca, but Marokko is still too unstable to leave unattended. The Admiralty thinks we’ve done enough visiting with the Dutch and wants our presence in Kamerun.” “Our most recent intelligence says they both have a handful of cruisers in the Antilles,” Trummler offered, “but not a whole lot else. Will the French or the English come in?” Gygas shook his head. “Unlikely, as long as both sides leave their islands alone. And neither one is in any position to take on that kind of challenge.” 
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