3 replies to this topic

[Stuart Machin]

I've been thinking about doing some alternative setting stuff using immediate post WW2 ships (no missiles though!), what is the view of assessing the performance of the range of automatic guns (e.g US 8" and 6") in terms of effect on the gunfire CRT as a result of their far higher ROF?

[Cpt M]

Sorry about the slow reply, the 'real world' has a habit doing that!The two automatic guns introduced after the war on Des Moines and Worcester used the same 8"/55 and 6"/47 guns that were already in service, so the range and shell penetration would be unchanged over the early mounts. The major change was in the turret designs, which featured fully automatic loading. Essentially, as long as the firing circuits were closed, the guns would fire and the firing cycle for these new designs were 6 seconds for the 8" mount and a slightly faster 5 seconds for the 6". Additionally, so the higher ROF could be utilized, the ships were designed with considerably larger magazines. Now, how do we translate this into game terms? Well, for comparison, for rapid fire, the older 6'/47 turret (as used on the Clevelands and Brooklyns) had a firing cycle of 6 seconds (similar to the fully automatics), which could only be maintained for short periods (until the gun crews dropped from exhaustion or ammo ran out!). So, if we use the rapid fire rule (where 11 and 12 also count for hits), as representing this higher ROF, then a 'quick and dirty KISS' rule for the auto 8" and 6" would be to allow them unlimited rapid fire (no turn limit since the magazines were larger). As to whether this would apply beyond the current range limit (12000yds), is more difficult to determine. Lacking any definite doctrine (other than the existing WWII doctrine for the earlier ships), I would then lean towards the conservative end and only allow the 8" and 6" automatics unlimited rapid fire out to the current 12000yds limit (fall of shot would still need to be determined and that still takes the same amount of time, auto or not). That would be my take. Anyone have any other ideas?

[Jim O'Neil]

Excuse my poor memory, I can't recall the battle, but in 1943 the US Light Cruisers opened rapid fire at night, at about 18,000 yards on the Japanese, per Doctrine. There was no 12,000 yard limit, just effective spotting which radar allowed. The Japanese were duly impressed with both accuracy and rate of fire. Regrettably the shells were mostly just off the targets which fired torpedoes and retired. IIRC there was one IJN DD that was just smothered ... the rest escaped pretty much unharmed.The only alteration to US CL fire doctrine was in 1943; to stop rapid fire every 8-10 salvos and insure the targets were still there and the range was correct and not following splashes; This based only earlier battles around Guadalcanal.

[Jim O'Neil]

I am going to paste in the portion of the 1041 CL Doctrine (I hope). [file name=Pasted_Graphic.pdf size=213334]https://www.odgw.com/images/fbfiles/files/Pasted_Graphic.pdf[/file] This doctrine was adjusted by Admiral Kinkaid to keep the cruisers back out of IJN torpedo range and take advantage of the radar control the new (Cleveland Class) CLs had.