Historynerd

Problem: the penetration value of the shells has loads and loads of variables (distance, hitting angle, armor layout, ...), so it might be difficult to give a fixed value...

Hmmm... I don't find it so detestable... so I think I'll vote to keep it; they can work it out and shake out the bugs.

Um... with the "super-heavy" Mark 8 shell, the Mk 6 gun had armor penetration which was superior or at very least equal to that of the German 38 cm against side armor, according to NavWeaps... Besides, not only the 15-inch guns of the Royal Navy were of WWI-era, and therefore ill comparable to more modern guns, but they kind of followed the philosophy first tried with their direct ancestor, the 13.5-inch guns (of which they were basically enlargements); given that the preceding 12-inch guns (the Mark XI), a high-velocity weapon, had been failures, the RN decided to go with a gun with significantly lower muzzle velocities and a heavier projectile, without suffering losses of striking power because of the greater momentum carried by the heavier projectile despite the lower initial velocity (it was found instead that they had a bigger punch than the 12-inch shells). This view was seen as vindicated after the 16-inch guns mounted on the Nelson-class proved to be only marginally better with armor penetration than the old 15-inch Mark Is (seriously, I hadn't looked at them but I was rather surprised by the values... not exactly successful weapons). It is no surprise then that for the 14-inch guns carried by the King George V-class they reverted to the old philosophy, and obtained better penetration than the 16-inch Mark Is. So, I'm not sure if what you say about ranges and farther or closer engagements is valid for the Royal Navy, since this demonstrates that they stuck with the "low" muzzle velocities weapons... if we consider the Marine Nationale and the Regia Marina too I can agree, but the British seem to be an exception... British guns: 15-inch Mark I - 752 mps (with super-charges 804 mps) 16-inch Mark I - 788/797 mps 14-inch Mark VII - 757 mps German 15-inch gun: 820 mps French 15-inch gun: 830 mps (original charge) Italian 15-inch gun: 850 mps And now perhaps we should stop the OT...

I think he meant that their caliber was lower compared to the 16-inch guns of the American battleships, and the 18-inch ones of the Yamato-class...

Perhaps some missions are not that attractive, but those tend to be rather easy, and you can do them in two-three games (kill 2 or 4 players, do X damage,...) What I really appreciate is the 500 free exp, and I get why those are harder. Overall, I'm not complaining.

Well, considering the caliber difference (152 vs 203 mm) that's understandable...

I don't see why, just because pretty much all battleship classes built before a certain date had torpedo tubes, and just because one of them (one, out of how many built with them?) hit what had been a battleship but by then was just a doomed hulk, we should have torpedoes on BBs. (Moreover, Tirpitz was fitted with launchers when she was already in service, so it's a different thing than the submerged torpedo tubes fitted from the beginning to all those older battleships) Sorry, I don't think we should have this feature.

If they used this logic, when the Italian cruiser Montecuccoli (armed with 6-inch guns) arrives. it could have even better range... during Operation Harpoon it hit an enemy ship at more or less 26'000 yards. No, they'll all have effective range.

I agree.

Wait a minute, compared to BBs they have more speed, but mobility (which I take as including maneuverability) is another thing; besides, I'm skeptical of the speed advantage, because although you are faster you still need precious time to get out of the enemy's firing range, time in which he can still deal grevious damage. I do agree though that this would presumably make them more versatile than battleships.

Well, the concept is true to a point, but let's not forget that even though some armoured cruisers had firepower of similar scale to pre-dreadnought battleship (and some of the latter had firepower not much bigger than that of an armoured cruiser), a battlecruisers was a huge jump in terms of scale and especially in terms of cost; nations who could conceivably build a good number of armoured cruisers could not do the same with the new battlecruiser classes. Besides, the sealanes protection mission would eventually prove to be best left to light forces, also because the cost of operating a battlecruiser was not indifferent, not to mention that even the Royal Navy had few facilities around the world in which such ships could be repaired in case of substantial battle damage (until the end of WWI there wasn't a graving dock east of Malta, just to give an example). In the end, the lines between battlecruisers and battleships were already potentially blurred from the beginning, since their heavy armament proved too big of a temptation in case of a naval battle between the main fleets, while being likewise seen as "too valuable" to be expended in seemingly secondary duties like sealane protection and such. The Falkland Islands case, while a seeming exception, was motivated by prestige and emergency reasons, and therefore actually further proves the point. After WWI, no more battlecruisers were actually put in service; the surviving ones received refits of varying degrees, but no planned class of battlecruisers ever put to sea, with the possible exception of the Alaska-class, which classification is still up to debate, and whose tactical role was dramatically altered by the supremacy of air power, both land-based and carrier-borne.

I admit I hadn't considered that. Still, I'm not sure wheter it's alright to have this feature; besides, how would the highlighted thingie work with a whole hull upgrade? Seriously, this seems a lot of work for only a cosmetic issue, given that the stats are fixed and wont' change... As far as my eyes are concerned, I'm happy when I zoom back after I fired a broadside and I see the blast... that's enough to satisfy me visually.

Save costs??! A BC cost at least as much and probably more than a BB (putting more machinery in it was no small cost). Being as big as battleships, their construction pretty much took the same time, and if one wished to add numbers, one could just build en masse light cruisers. Your opinion is rather il-informed, I'm afraid. Anyway, because of their armament battlecruisers were always considered capital ships (therefore standing above protected, armoured, light and heavy cruisers), so it's only fitting that they end up in the BB line. Someone said that "Dreadnought " might be a more correct term for that line, but it's still clear enough the reason.

But haven't you noticed the time it takes to load even the ship in port? These models are both huge and complex. Having this "highlight" feature would add further strain to the whole thing, I think. Anyway, I'm sorry if I misunderstood what you meant, but I don't share the need of this feature. I'm ok with looking at the changes in the stats.

Are you talking about ship tiers or about carrier aircraft tiers? Because things work a little different in the two cases, I think...

While ships can be upgraded and change their appearance quite radically, this is not that common, because many ships only underwent minor modifications and refits. So it's not a surprise that few ships in game undergo that. But seriously, what's the problem? I don't get it - is this a form of visual fetishism? "I upgraded my ship, I want it to have three hundred more guns, bolted-in armor, twelve radar antennae and a golden band painted on the belt armor"... This whole game is based on historical ships; IRL, ships didn't change that much and it took a lot of training for sailors to recognize ships based on their form. So, we can't see upgrades like a "+3 firepower, +5 armor, +2 speed, and shining new armor" thingie. The true change lie in the stats. Like it or not, that's how things are.

I repeat, look at how the early US battleships (excluding the South Carolina) get modified when upgraded... they do change rather radically.

Maybe it's because SH3 isn't a MMOG, and because its graphic requirements are way below those that WoWs needs... Seriously, that seems to me like comparing apples and oranges...

That picture doesn't give exactly the idea of them being "a lot smaller than a BB"... because they weren't. Besides, the classification of the Alaska-class as "battlecruiser" isn't universally accepted. Old school battlecruisers (those up to WWI, more or less) were as big as them, in fact, the difference being only the variation of the rough percentages allocated to the fundamental triad: Armament : Protection : Machinery Battleship tended to have these three aspects more or less balanced; battlecruisers usually had battleship-like armament, but sacrificed protection for increased machinery space, and therefore speed. But displacement remained on the same scale.

Hm. I guess there could be many useful things to be learned there... if only I lived closer (I live on the other side of Liguria)!

The early American BBs do change quite a lot when you get the hull upgrade, just to give one example. Anyway, this is mostly based on history, so I don't see how the "graphical satisfaction" is an issue. Ships could and can be refitted, and pretty radically too, but they can't become outright something else.

Are you going to the Museo Tecnico Navale?

Alright; I just want to see if the date of these tests is during or after WWII. Because the Iowa did use rather different shells, depending on the period during which it was active. And it's obvious that later shells would have a better performance than the ones used during the war.

As I told, I'm in no way an expert; since you are, then I trust your word if you tell me if this works or if it's something put together by three drunk monkeys or stuff.

As I said, no expert. Thanks for correcting me.