Doug Swanson - Jul 21, 2004 3:58 pm (#2687 Total: 2698) "We are Men of Action...lying does not become us." Wesley....The Princess Bride Questions on New Combat Rules. Crossposting this from the GWAS folder: [EDIT: Doug is asking about the Dreadnoughts variant rules by Karl Laskas. There are no new Great War at Sea combat rules in Cruiser Warfare] I have read through the new combat rules provided in Dreadnoughts, and I have some questions. Perhaps you all can enlighten me... 1) It appears that Tertiary guns can only (rarely) be damaged by gunfire hits. A critical hit calling for secondary gun damage on (for example) one of the German light cruisers with 3 tertiary guns would be ignored. True or False? 2) Unlike Primary and Secondary guns, Tertiary guns and torpedos cannot be repaired by damage control procedures. This is implied by ommision in the Gunnery damage chart. True or False? 3a) My huge battleship with its 16" guns fires at an enemy BB from a range of 12,000 yards (3 hexes) None of the hits penetrate, but they would have penetrated had I been 20,000 yds away (5 hexes). True or false? If true, this seems contrary to the penetration tables generated from Okuns naval gunfire formulae. These can be found at http://www.geocities.com/kop_mic/. Penetration thickness increases as range decreases. Would it be possible to get a more detailed explanation of the line of thinking behind this rule? Also... 3b) The same BB with 16" guns fires at a cruiser with lt armor all around from a range of 12,000 yds.. The 16" shell will penetrate hull boxes with light armor, but not gun boxes with the same armor. To further insult the capabilities of this 16" shell, it will penetrate gun boxes with no armor, but not hull boxes. True or false? Again, the intent of the designer would be useful information here. 3c) A ship with secondary armament can penetrate lt armor hulls at a range of 0-2 hexes, and lt armor gun boxes at a range of 0-4 hexes. True or false? If true, does this mean that secondary guns can penetrate lt armor gun boxes at 3 hexes, but primary guns cannot? 4) All BCs, regardless of their speed (which can range from 1 to 2+) have a movement factor of 2, while all DDs/TBs, regardless of their speed (which can range from 1 to 2+) have a movement factor of 3. (exception, DDs with a speed of 2+ have a movement factor of 4.) True or False? 5) The torpedo table seems much nastier in the new rules. Is the intent to make torpedo hits les frequent, but more devastating when they occur? Or is the intent to make DDs more powerful in relation to capital ships thatn they were in the earlier rules? All in all, the new rules seem intruiging, and I can't wait to try them. Some clarification would be helpful. Both CW and DN look great, IMHO. Thanks to any and all for answers. Mike Traynor - Jul 21, 2004 7:02 pm (#2688 Total: 2698) Dave Powell for President in 2004! Peace, freedom and justice for all and an ACW game on every table! Doug, I'm not Karl Laskas, nor do I play him on television, but the effect you're seeing in 3a is caused by the different trajectories of the shells. Deck armour is thinner than main belt. At short ranges, the BB guns are likely to hit the belt and if they hit the deck it will be with a large angle off the normal, which greatly reduces the chances of penetrating. Being further away means the BB will be firing with a higher trajectory so its shells, which are now more likely to be hitting the deck armour, will be hitting it closer to the perpendicular, which makes penetration easier. As an example, the King George V and Rodney made few penetrating hits on Bismarck because they had closed to a range where they were only hitting the belt and Bismarck's main belt was really formidable. Had they drawn off so that their shells were plunging, they would have likely done much more damage through penetrating hits. Those penetration tables are based on the assumption of a constant angle of incidence, while in the real world, the angle of incidence changes with range. Incidentally, the lower muzzle velocity 16" guns on the South Dakotas would have had better long range penetration capability than the guns on the Iowas, because their lower MV would mean they'd have to be fired at a higher elevation, so their shells would be hitting more vertically than would the Iowas'. Karl Laskas - Jul 22, 2004 7:22 am (#2689 Total: 2698) Currently fighting in the jungle in "Semper Fi: Guadalcanal" & "Lock & Load" Hi Doug, Mike is spot on. The penetration feature you see there is an intentional part of the design. 1) It appears that Tertiary guns can only (rarely) be damaged by gunfire hits. A critical hit calling for secondary gun damage on (for example) one of the German light cruisers with 3 tertiary guns would be ignored. True. I think tertiary gun hits are statistically insignificant at the granularity of this system, and are pretty much an annoyance to simulating the overall effect of the battle. 2) Unlike Primary and Secondary guns, Tertiary guns and torpedos cannot be repaired by damage control procedures. This is implied by omission in the Gunnery damage chart. True or False? True. 3a) My huge battleship with its 16" guns fires at an enemy BB from a range of 12,000 yards (3 hexes) None of the hits penetrate, but they would have penetrated had I been 20,000 yds away (5 hexes). True or false? True. One of the things that some other games about this period (e.g. SPI Dreadnought, 3W Salvo) have misunderstood is the effect of varying shell arcs on damage. If a ship fires at long range (five or six hexes in this system), the shell comes down in a nearly vertical angle and tends to strike the vessel's deck armor. Deck armor was much thinner than the belt armor around the outside of a vessel, and shells penetrated easily at this range. On the other hand, at shorter ranges, shells are going to hit the belt armor of a ship. The penetration ability of a shell at medium range (3 to 4 hexes) is far less than its ability at 1 to 2 hexes. In that medium range (which, in truth, varied for each ship-on-ship encounter depending on the calculus of gun caliber against target armor), there was a braod range where the target enjoyed maximum protection against its opponent. So, if you're focused on damaging your opponent, take the range out to long range or move it into short range. If you want to hold on against your opponent, stay at medium range or get out of his range entirely. 3b) The same BB with 16" guns fires at a cruiser with lt armor all around from a range of 12,000 yds.. The 16" shell will penetrate hull boxes with light armor, but not gun boxes with the same armor. A primary gun at 3 hexes penetrates gun boxes with heavy armor. By that, I mean it penetrates to any thickness up to heavy armor. Thus, a primary gun at 3 hexes penetrates gun boxes with light armor too. What GWAS calls "heavy armor" on a battleship hull is not equivalent in thickness (in inches) to "heavy armor" on a gun. So a primary gun at 3 hexes penetrates "light" hull armor or penetrates "heavy" gun armor. I've done my best to correlate the GWAS ratings with real world statistics and make an appropriate generalization about the penetration abilities of typical caliber guns against the relevant thicknesses. True or false? If true, does this mean that secondary guns can penetrate lt armor gun boxes at 3 hexes, but primary guns cannot? False. As stated above, when the rules state that primary guns penetrate heavy hull armor, I am implying that they penetrate light armor as well. All BCs ... have a movement factor of 2... while all DDs/TBs, regardless of their speed ... have a movement factor of 3. (exception, DDs with a speed of 2+ have a movement factor of 4.) True or False? First, to be clear, what you're describing here is the movement allowance during the "Speed 2" phase only. Your comments are true as the rules are written -- although it may be prudent to reduce the speed of historically slow ships (e.g. 1 speed DD/TBs... I don't have my copy of the game with me... which are those) to 2 movement points. The torpedo table seems much nastier in the new rules. Is the intent to make torpedo hits les frequent, but more devastating when they occur? Or is the intent to make DDs more powerful in relation to capital ships thatn they were in the earlier rules? The former... I made an effort to correlate hit rates to historical experience (i.e. less frequent than in GWAS) and to make them more effective when they occur. Thanks.