The AAR posted yesterday was the result of an idea as to what do I do (As Iberia) if Iberia faced a war with France by itself. I traded some thoughts with Maddox and then broke out my copy of SeeKrieg IV, some chits from my Great War at Sea stuff and went to work.
I posted the AAR with the hope that one or two people would think it was real and then we all could have a good laugh about it. I didn't expect everyone to assume it was real. So "Oops..." At the same time Maddox thought it would be a good idea and might shake some things up so it was posted as it was...
Some issues that came up that I talked to Maddox over that might not be clear from the base AAR.
Quote from: miketr on February 18, 2009, 06:36:27 PM
Quote from: maddox on February 18, 2009, 01:28:35 PM
The Demarce III's are the best buy for the money.
They were big fairly fast and well armed. If I had pushed their torpedo attack its possible one might have gotten into range to torpedo the BC's. The problem is the 1908 torpedo's are short ranged and weak warheads; the range is more critical. They need to close within 2,000 yards or so to fire... The next gen weapons could fire from 4,000 to 10,000 yards depending on the same speed setting.
Quote from: maddox on February 18, 2009, 01:28:35 PM
The French 15" guns seem feeble, not to talk about gunnery results.
Non of the 3 BB's make any meaningfull impact, except being big targets.
I wouldn't say that... Not counting duds which I didn't track... For 43 minutes of firing you got 23 hits of those 16 were penetrating hits. Battle range was closest 12,000 yards out to 20,000 yards. I ranked both yours and my fire control as pre-WW1 (1900 to 1914) directory fire control. When you did hit you did massive amounts of damage. Portugal was at 43% effectiveness at the end, Cid Campeador and Alfonso IV 34% (odds are constructive lossess both). Your problems were two fold.
1) Fire control was pushed for the range of the battle I assumed 20,000 range for our modern weapons but they couldn't hit anything at that range at least not very often. Occitanie was big enough to be easier to hit compared my PDN's and older AC's.
2) Massive numbers shooters I scored 43 hits of those 10 were penetrators (that higher number is from 82 barrels firing at once vs. your 32) (notice while I scored way more hits the hits vs. penetrating hits is the reverse of yours?) Only my 13" guns could defeat your belt armor at useful ranges. This said you kept getting hit by big caliber weapons so in effect every single round someone on your side was taking a major caliber hit and your next round of fire would then be shoved down an the odds table. That was big. You need more capital ships together your fleet got swarmed under.
If we take out the torpedo hits... you actually did nearly the same number amount of damage as I did. The Iberian ships took 1428 damage points vs. 1472 for the french fleet. Its even worse if I pull out the freak destruction of Granby by that one turret hit that was 293 points right there. So that would be 1428 DP on 23 hits vs. 1179 DP on 43 hits. Your 15" guns were as I said massively destructive.
Quote from: maddox on February 18, 2009, 01:28:35 PM
Lesson learned. More cruisers maestro.
More cruisers and perhaps bigger ones... The BC's are a threat you have very little answer for... With 26.75 knot speed and 12" fire power they could just shove your CL's aside. You either need a lot more light cruisers and or something bigger. The lack of a modern screen was also a problem for you see below for more on that.
Also more destroyers... Your screen was very weak and my torpedo boat destroyers were able to just bull doze their way past to set off that massive torpedo strike. Your BB's were shot up and running away so it was left to your sloops to try to stop double their number of torpedo boats your CL's which were out of posistion did way more damage. If you notice my ships were way more effective at stopping the torpedo boat attack. There were only 6 of them for me to face and the BC's faced them broad side to bow (crossing their T) and rained down twenty eight 150mm rounds a minute on them; having to close to 2,000 yards sucked as despite their small size and speed the range was so short hits became very likely. A 6" weapon wrecks a 1,000 ton DD as it has no armor to deal with so as long as it goes off bye bye TB or at least disabled (more than 50% damage). You would have gotten more of the Iberian TB's if your BB's had stood and fired instead of attempting to run away. The problem again was numbers... 14 TB's vs. 2 targets and lamed ones at that...
INSERT: Maddox sloops had a 1% chance per round fired for several minutes of firing to hit. The random number generator just didn't spit out numbers lower than 8 all that often. He should have crippled more Iberian TBDs not stopped the attack mind you but the Iberian TBD force got off very light for the stunt the pulled they should have been a little more shot up at least.
Some issues with the use of SeeKrieg IV.
1) I as noted above had to "fudge" what FC to use to fit that system but it was doable. I have no idea what would happen with other systems.
2) SeeKrieg IV has no rules for odd weight shells so people who use heavier shells or the like; especially small ones figuring their damage would be a problem. Especially when you consider that a 5.9" round is the same as a 6" on the low end.
3) Long term I am worried about what we do when someone fields a 305L60 as Seekrieg IV doesn't have tables for weapons like that. I myself I am not good enough to use NAaB program to generate penetration tables but that is the logical solution if someone knows how to use that thing.
4) The torpedo outcome were the result of a combination of several wierd factors some of which already talked about.
4A) French screen was way to weak for the threat that they faced.
4b) Because of the weapons used 1908 and earlier torps ships had to close to point blank range to launch. That resulted in to hits of 30% for me and near 50% for the French. I wouldn't expect such things to work out like this all that often.
I am not sure how we would factor in things like shell generations into Seekrieg it has a generic table thats to be used 1880 till 1945 to cover where the shells land and duds but the duds chance is the same for all years.
Just some stuff people might want to think about for when we have a real fleet battle again...
Michael
Mike - how long did this take you to set up and game out?
Quote from: The Rock Doctor on February 20, 2009, 09:48:43 AM
Mike - how long did this take you to set up and game out?
1) I had to convert all my ships and Mario's into SeeKrieg format...
Portugal 1916 22.5 knots 798 DP Deck 2.5" 4 20" TT
10x13"L45(FC1) 90 20,000 24,167 tons Belt 13"
16x5.9"L50 ammo 15,000 550' Conning T 13"
8x2.95"L50 ammo 10,000 Turret 9"
That took about 2 hours or so to be honest and then putting the key details into my spreadsheet
2) The battle itself would have been done two or three times as fast as it took if I wasn't doing a blow by blow recount of the thing. That took about.... 6 or 7 hours...
I did the whole thing in three nights so call it 9 hours from start to finish. One night to setup and then two more to fight it out.
Michael
My notes about simming:
I made some probability calculations about hit chances (still there on yuku somewhere). My findings are:
- Most tabletop sims underestimate hit chances at medium (20ky) range significantly. Realistic chances are ~30% or higher at 6000yards decreasing to 3-5% at 20ky.
- the orientation of the target has negligible effect on hit chance (other factors are much more important). It is mainly due to deck hit probabilities.
- size, surprisingly, has small effect unless the ship is so narrow/far target that training dispersion is larger than the target width
- half the work is getting the SS2 ships to adapt to whatever gaming system
My offer still stands that I would try to assemble a battle gaming system based on my calculations and some ideas from NaAB/Seas of War/Seekrieg IV which would use SS2ed ships and allow for differences - if it would be used.
For anyone that cares... This is where you can download SeeKrieg IV for free from the writers. http://www.seekrieg.com/Seekrieg4DownloadPage1.htm
The latest version of SeeKrieg does away with much of the stuff P3D is talking about.
http://www.seekrieg.com/Seekrieg5-ChartH2-I1.pdf
Target Size and firing arc no longer matter it appears. Fire control and crew quality appear to be critical.
Now seekrieg V still has at short range very low chances to hit compared to what P3D is talking about. Seekrieg IV with the games current tech level would be a 8% hit chance at 6K yards.
I do think we need some type of standard system just so tech we are researching can have clear effects.
Michael
I'm a complete imbecile when it comes to table top gaming, etc., so bear with me.
When you say firing arc and target size don't matter, does this mean that it doesn't take into account own ships aspect ratio to target, etc.? In other words, does it just assume that all gun mounts can fire through a complete 360degree arc?
Quote from: guinness on February 20, 2009, 01:40:31 PM
I'm a complete imbecile when it comes to table top gaming, etc., so bear with me.
When you say firing arc and target size don't matter, does this mean that it doesn't take into account own ships aspect ratio to target, etc.? In other words, does it just assume that all gun mounts can fire through a complete 360degree arc?
Think it does not matter in the case of target aspect, so not hit different if the target is broadside or heading directly towards the shooter.
What Korpen said...
Michael
Quote from: Korpen on February 20, 2009, 01:44:34 PM
Think it does not matter in the case of target aspect, so not hit different if the target is broadside or heading directly towards the shooter.
If that's the case, it makes more sense. Not totally realistic I'd say. After all, large naval guns were usually more accurate in deflection than in range (one reason why charging in to shorten the range didn't help
Hood as much against
Bismarck as might have been hoped), but I can see why that level of complexity might be left out.
Quote from: miketr on February 20, 2009, 01:46:28 PM
What Korpen said...
Michael
But hopefully with more correct spelling...
I would be willing to help P3D with coming up with a system so Navalism had its official surface naval combat system to use.
Some other problems of note with Seekrieg IV...
A ship built in 1890 that weighs 10,000 standard tons and one built in 1920 that weighs 10,000 standard tons both have the same damage point value; 330 DP for both. Some type of factor for year built would be nice. Something simple like a 5% bonus per decade or something to reflect improvements in ship construction (a seperate tech would make the most sense to be honest but I double there is much interest in adding more to our list of what we have to research.)
SeeKrieg is overly destructive in terms of shell damage. Having read John Campbell's Jutland: An Analysis of the Fighting ships in seekrieg IV would take about half the historic damage before being sunk let alone disabled. Several ships at Jutland took 20 main gun hits and didn't go down and kept fighting. That would be a neat trick in seekrieg IV.
Without crits ships just bleed to death; I normally ignore non-penetrating hits for counting lost weapons and speed. Instead I just count the non penetrating for grounding down DP.
Plus our already stated issues of fitting in the games FC, shell and gun rules into a system.
Michael
Great now I have to go dig up my version of Seekrieg to see what version it is. Might be #2. But I remember different hit chances based on target aspect, though not different hit locations.
As for variability in terms of weapons we field vs. weapons of the Seekrieg table, One extra step could be to run biggun once for the closest Seekrieg weapon, then once for the weapon being used and note the relative differences, applying that modifer to the seekrieg table. Using a couple rows in excel to track this would render it not that difficult if actually desired.
This of course would be an inducement for folks not to field 2700 different calibers :)
As for the DP issue, what Miketr mentions sounds like they have continued the problem I noted in my edition. Ships can be seriously degraded and sunk without ever actually taking a serious hit- which was what AON systems were designed to avoid. As I recall, I thought there should be 'soft' and 'hard' points. All hits count to the soft damage levels degrading the ship. Then you get down to the systems which are 'hard' and you need to actually penetrate to finish her off.
Quote from: miketr on February 20, 2009, 02:02:27 PM
I would be willing to help P3D with coming up with a system so Navalism had its official surface naval combat system to use.
Some other problems of note with Seekrieg IV...
A ship built in 1890 that weighs 10,000 standard tons and one built in 1920 that weighs 10,000 standard tons both have the same damage point value; 330 DP for both. Some type of factor for year built would be nice. Something simple like a 5% bonus per decade or something to reflect improvements in ship construction (a seperate tech would make the most sense to be honest but I double there is much interest in adding more to our list of what we have to research.)
SeeKrieg is overly destructive in terms of shell damage. Having read John Campbell's Jutland: An Analysis of the Fighting ships in seekrieg IV would take about half the historic damage before being sunk let alone disabled. Several ships at Jutland took 20 main gun hits and didn't go down and kept fighting. That would be a neat trick in seekrieg IV.
Without crits ships just bleed to death; I normally ignore non-penetrating hits for counting lost weapons and speed. Instead I just count the non penetrating for grounding down DP.
Plus our already stated issues of fitting in the games FC, shell and gun rules into a system.
Michael
A problem with SS2 that it does not reflect improvements in structural steel and building techniques. This is one reason that early (pre-1920) warships are so powerful that they are almost indistinguishable from WWII ones.
Just the best example. SS2 assumes barbette goes from waterline to weather deck (plus some), it does not figure the position of the armored deck. It also assumes uniform barbette armor like in WWII ships, but that was not the case in WWI (e.g. 13-14" thickness only above the weather deck, below it only 8-10"). The weight 'saved' this way goes into structure.
Ideally, a ship architecture techs should reflect this (but as we are already in 1915 it does not matter much). Say 1.10 minimum composite strength in 1880, and techs with 0.02 'advance' every decade.
This would be an issue only in any future Nverse4.
Quote from: P3D on February 20, 2009, 02:25:05 PM
Ideally, a ship architecture techs should reflect this (but as we are already in 1915 it does not matter much). Say 1.10 minimum composite strength in 1880, and techs with 0.02 'advance' every decade.
This would be an issue only in any future Nverse4.
Just to be sure I am following you...
Build a ship in 1880 it would need to have 1.1 composite strength... but in 1910 with the correct tech you would build to 1.04 composite strength; correct?
Not exactly what I was talking about but I can see the use to that. Of course... as you pointed out more of something for N4.
Michael
Another thing it the DP system skips is that battlewagons are built with heavier structural members than cruisers or destroyers, they should physically respond to damage better in a way not quite reflected in the size-based DP system.
Quote from: Kaiser Kirk on February 20, 2009, 02:55:46 PM
Another thing it the DP system skips is that battlewagons are built with heavier structural members than cruisers or destroyers, they should physically respond to damage better in a way not quite reflected in the size-based DP system.
That is a good point... but its a question of complexity... How detailed would we want the combat system to be? Also again is that something we would also want to reflect with new techs to research... something that adds a 1% or 2% or 5% DP to a ships total?
Michael
Quote from: P3D on February 20, 2009, 02:25:05 PM
Ideally, a ship architecture techs should reflect this (but as we are already in 1915 it does not matter much). Say 1.10 minimum composite strength in 1880, and techs with 0.02 'advance' every decade.
Quote from: Kaiser Kirk on February 20, 2009, 02:55:46 PM
Another thing it the DP system skips is that battlewagons are built with heavier structural members than cruisers or destroyers, they should physically respond to damage better in a way not quite reflected in the size-based DP system.
We could do away with this as well, by saying that Cruisers (and to a greater extent, Destroyers) can go below 1.00 Composite with each tech level advanced. P3D's formula is a good one, and is easily adapted to this problem.
Any cruiser built in 1880 must have a 1.00 Composite Strength; This would reflect both the lighter construction and the weaker nature of the older ship. For each tech level you gain in Cruiser tech, you could go .04 lower, down to a minimum of 0.80 Composite at the highest levels of cruiser tech. This would allow for cruisers to be fast enough to scout for the extremely fast capital ships we seem to be developing in N-verse3 (where battleships are approaching 30 knots while destroyers are just a couple of knots faster). Destroyers could start at 0.75 Composite, and work their way to 0.50 Composite by multiples of 0.05.
This plan could allow for 5 levels of Battleship, Cruiser and Destroyer tech, which is about what we have now.
Anyone besides Mike interested in working on the battle gaming system? Korpen, your contribution (esp. on shell penetration and such) would be appreciated.
Quote from: Carthaginian on February 20, 2009, 03:06:50 PM
Quote from: P3D on February 20, 2009, 02:25:05 PM
Ideally, a ship architecture techs should reflect this (but as we are already in 1915 it does not matter much). Say 1.10 minimum composite strength in 1880, and techs with 0.02 'advance' every decade.
Quote from: Kaiser Kirk on February 20, 2009, 02:55:46 PM
Another thing it the DP system skips is that battlewagons are built with heavier structural members than cruisers or destroyers, they should physically respond to damage better in a way not quite reflected in the size-based DP system.
We could do away with this as well, by saying that Cruisers (and to a greater extent, Destroyers) can go below 1.00 Composite with each tech level advanced. P3D's formula is a good one, and is easily adapted to this problem.
Any cruiser built in 1880 must have a 1.00 Composite Strength; This would reflect both the lighter construction and the weaker nature of the older ship. For each tech level you gain in Cruiser tech, you could go .04 lower, down to a minimum of 0.80 Composite at the highest levels of cruiser tech. This would allow for cruisers to be fast enough to scout for the extremely fast capital ships we seem to be developing in N-verse3 (where battleships are approaching 30 knots while destroyers are just a couple of knots faster). Destroyers could start at 0.75 Composite, and work their way to 0.50 Composite by multiples of 0.05.
This plan could allow for 5 levels of Battleship, Cruiser and Destroyer tech, which is about what we have now.
The other stuff I can't really help with, but this idea seems quite good...
I want to help but can't. Its a pity.
May I ask the moderators to get one subforum made for battlesim discussions?
Quote from: P3D on February 20, 2009, 03:15:57 PM
Anyone besides Mike interested in working on the battle gaming system? Korpen, your contribution (esp. on shell penetration and such) would be appreciated.
Naturlich.
Will try and provide as much assistence as possible.