The Mods have discussed the issue.

We note that Tarakan was initiated at 12,000 metres, and reflects a trend towards increasing battle ranges.  Nations with this combat experience - and some access to fire control techniques - can infer that this trend will continue.  Navies looking to concentrate on long-range battles can also be expected to look at the nature of the return fire they will receive, and how to protect against it.  The Netherlands has the combat experience, the technical knowledge, and the follow-up doctrine (as demonstrated in Korpen's post-war analysis articles) to indicate that sloped external belts could be of benefit in the longer-ranged engagements they expect to favor.

We've also decided that this should be reflected in the tech trees, and have incorporated it, along with "All or Nothing" protection, as a new 1912 entry in the Armor tech.  It is a stand-alone tech, much like underway coaling is within the propulsion tech tree.  You do not have to research it to progress to the 1915 Improved KC Armor and beyond; if you don't want it, don't research it.  The new tech reads:

Quote1912 Sloped external belts; "All or Nothing" Protective Schemes

Korpen will be adjusting his 1912 reports to include research into this tech.  We will allow him to build the three frigates as he's designed them while the research is in progress, but will require the research to be completed prior to any further use of inclined external belts or any usage of AoN protection at all. 

We doubt this is a solution that entirely pleases anybody, but This is not a solution we expect to please anybody 100%, but we think it ought to be an acceptable compromise.  Please note, however, that the appropriate thing to do is chat with the Mods before you go public with plans to introduce a potentially controversial innovation, so we can determine whether it's period-appropriate and whether it needs to be in a tech tree.  Imposing band-aid solutions is not the way to go about things, and we will not be as inclined to accommodate in the future.

On a related administrative note, we have adjusted the BB/AC architecture tech to read:

Quote1912: Futuristic: Quadruple turrets

This reflects the removal of AoN to the new armor tech.  We have also deleted reference to the turreted secondaries - whether or not it's technically possible, we need to reconcile this with the protected cruiser tech in some fashion.  Since the 1912 BB/AC tech is now a matter of "you can install quads", we're also dumping the "Double-Time" requirement.  It's not a big hurdle to progress from triples to quads as far as sticking them in ships is concerned, and you still have to design the quad turrets themselves.

The old BB/AC tech was for 1911, and we'll allow the one or two people who actually were researching it to continue from when they started.  The rest of us, having not started it, will not be adversely affected one way or the other.

Now that I've strapped on my kevlar vest and asbestos underwear, any questions?

Ahoj!
As long as I don't have to research inclined armour (which the KKK considers not be worth the trouble) to get to 1915 armour plate, I'm happy.

But I'm not so sure about lumping AoN with the inclined belts? I'd prefer AoN to be stand alone, or
retained within BB/AC architecture.

On the other hand, maybe dump quads from the tech tree completely? Once somebody has mastered triples, putting two twins together (the French approach) does not seem to be like a big deal?

OK about the dates and the band-aiding.
Borys

Hello,

OK by me I think.

QuoteWe will allow him to build the three frigates as he's designed them while the research is in progress, but will require the research to be completed prior to any further use of inclined external belts or any usage of AoN protection at all.

3 frigates? I thought this was all about one 'one-off' design.

QuoteWe have also deleted reference to the turreted secondaries - whether or not it's technically possible, we need to reconcile this with the protected cruiser tech in some fashion.

So we can put 6"or smaller secondaries in turrets on anything other than a DD now, yes? After the mounts are researched of couse.

Ahoj!
We can put 6" or smaller secondaries in turrets on battleships and armoured cruisers.
Light cruisers have a separate tech tree.
However, at this point in time the main gain from turreted secondaries is that they are on the weather deck, and not so susceptible to wave action. Casemattes are much lighter. Had it not been for flying thingies, casemattes would still be used today :)
Borys

I agree with Borys that quad turrets alone do not warrant a separate tech. Either lump it together with something else, or drop the tech.

Quote from: Borys on May 24, 2008, 01:31:56 AM
However, at this point in time the main gain from turreted secondaries is that they are on the weather deck, and not so susceptible to wave action. Casemattes are much lighter. Had it not been for flying thingies, casemattes would still be used today :)
Borys

Some general musing about casemates.
I doubt that they would survive very long even without aircrafts.
The advantage of casemates simply disappeared when a few things happened:
Switch from incremental armour to AoN (or any other protection scheme without an extensive upper belt), this removed the upper belt protection that hade been used by the casemates on battery deck.
Fewer main gun turrets, and/or no wing turrets, this allowed designers to place secondary (or tertiary in case of pre-dreads) on the weather deck without interfering with firing arcs of the main artillery.
The fact that casemates had show themselves to be quite prone to take on allot of water only added speed to the process.

The advantage of casemates, is; as Borys mentioned, as they can be placed in the hull, less interference with the rest of the armament, and significantly less weight for a given amount of protection.
Should be noted that some countries never really adopted casemates at all (Sweden), as in the context of their ship building programs there was no advantage in it.

I should mention that when I designed the BB techs, the old BB techs were lumped together as I felt that the design for a quad or triple turrets does not worth a separate tech. Now the 'unified' tech was separated into two tech, one of them clearly superior to the other. You can live without quad turrets, but inclined belts and AoN is clearly much better bang for the buck.

I'd suggest to reunite the Quad turret and BB protection scheme techs together. Korpen could still have the advantage to build his ships without the tech. As I did not want to build quad BBs until a few years elapsed, I am willing to switch my (apparently succesfully researched) BB tech to something else instead to keep Korpen's monopoly on the tech.
I want to build quad-turret BBs, but if I have to research them twice (once as tech once as turret) I'd rather go without them.

Unless I'm mis-understanding something, we have always had to research a tech for turrets (triples, later quads in the BB/AC architecture) and then design the specific turrets.  Reverting to the initial wording of things doesn't change that.

...okay, so, building on that line of thought:  is there any practical value in requiring everybody to design specific mountings/turrets for each gun after they've already established that they can, in general, build twins/triples/quads?  Unless somebody goes for sextuple or double-storey turrets, are there going to be any significant evolutions in mount/turret design before the dual-purpose gun?

Quote from: The Rock Doctor on May 28, 2008, 11:06:05 AM
...okay, so, building on that line of thought:  is there any practical value in requiring everybody to design specific mountings/turrets for each gun after they've already established that they can, in general, build twins/triples/quads?  Unless somebody goes for sextuple or double-storey turrets, are there going to be any significant evolutions in mount/turret design before the dual-purpose gun?

It seems realistic to research mounts/turrets.
Slows down the breakneck pace of technological progress in N-verse.

Borys

Quote from: The Rock Doctor on May 28, 2008, 07:33:35 AM
Unless I'm mis-understanding something, we have always had to research a tech for turrets (triples, later quads in the BB/AC architecture) and then design the specific turrets.  Reverting to the initial wording of things doesn't change that.

In Nverse 2, you only had to research the mount once.
In Nverse 3, the techs allow you to research the mounts (but not only that). Looking at the several example of probleme-ridden turrets, IMO the separate research is needed.


About malfunctioning turrets.
What about the moderators assigning a random chance that a mount would have problems that becomes apparent only during trials?
Players would have to spend research later (say for another 6-18 months) to debug it at $0.25/6months? Chances, say, 10% for twin, 20% for triple and 30% for quad mounts.
Or other problems, like engines, vibrations, etc that delay commissioning by 12-24 months - higher chance when the engine is new tech.

It would be more realistic, but I'm not especially interested in the additional complexity.  As you'll recall, Mods only have so much time on their hands...

Ahoj!
Rock - are you replying to me, or to Pee-three-Dee?
(it rhymes!)
Or both?
Borys

I'm replying to P3D there.

So Rocky&Co,

will you keep the quad turret tech as is or not?