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Jack2142 posted:To be fair even abstracted here it was incredibly confusing... I legitimately thought Grey was pummeled badly and maybe barely broke even casualty wise. It looked bad given the narrative, but I had to think that Grey was dishing out better than he got considering the initial positioning. You don't cross the enemy T and get curbstomped. Still, 10 was more than expected.
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Jul 2, 2015 16:23
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Valiantman posted:What's the real life story behind this Beatty guy? Beatty wasn't that bad, but was known as sort of a more dashing admiral who thought of his BCs as more of the 'cavalry' role. A risk taker compared to Jellicoe, and with sometimes poor judgement, he himself isn't the main problem, but the fact that he choose poor subordinates such as his flag officer. Let me tell you about his flag officer- This dude was so incompetent that he hosed up a British decisive victory at Dogger Bank, and ALMOST got an entire squadron of the Grand Fleet's best and newest battleships destroyed (Barham, Malaya, Warspite, QE) destroyed. Luckily their squadron commander decided it was not a good idea to drive into the entire High Seas Fleet. I can totally see Admiral Beatty in this timeline loving something up (i.e. sending his lovely BC's - Invincible and etc)* against the German battle line and getting just annihilated. *Surprisingly enough, ships with a max belt armor of 6 loving inches shouldn't be going anywhere near actual battleships. Saint Celestine fucked around with this message at 16:44 on Jul 2, 2015 |
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Jul 2, 2015 16:36
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Valiantman posted:What's the real life story behind this Beatty guy? David Beatty was the commander of the Royal Navy's Battlecruiser squadron. The BCs role in this era's naval warfare paradigm was that they would act as scouts for the slower-moving, but more heavily armoured battleships. They had guns big enough to sink anything smaller than them, and then they had the speed to run away from anything as big or bigger. During the Battle of Jutland, his headlong pursuit of the German BC squadron allowed him to nearly be lured right into the teeth of the German Battleships, and then he utterly failed to communicate with his superior, John Jellicoe, on the position and heading of the German ships that he had spotted. This forced Jellicoe to deploy the RN BBs on pretty much gut instinct, which he shouldn't have had to do if his BC squadron, lead by Beatty, acted as effective scouts. There were also other instances where miscommunications transmitted by a flag lieutenant that he had handpicked caused enough of a foul-up in the conduct of the battle that the RN ended up causing far less damage than they potentially could have. gradenko_2000 fucked around with this message at 16:55 on Jul 2, 2015 |
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Jul 2, 2015 16:36
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Adm. David Beatty posted:"There seems to be something wrong with our bloody ships today" After two of his ships exploded at Jutland.
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Jul 2, 2015 16:41
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gradenko_2000 posted:David Beatty was the commander of the Royal Navy's Battlecruiser squadron. The BCs role in this era's naval warfare paradigm was that they would act as scouts for the slower-moving, but more heavily armoured battleships. They had guns big enough to sink anything smaller than them, and then they had the speed to run away from anything as big or bigger. He's basically the man who lost(?) Jutland for the British. Although with everything to do with Jutland, its not that clear cut.
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Jul 2, 2015 16:41
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Valiantman posted:What's the real life story behind this Beatty guy? Ralph Seymour had a habit of badly mangling Beattys orders, for example he send all British BCs after Blücher during the battle at Dogger bank, instead of just HMS Indomitable. Or when another bably worded signal allowed Hipper to escape after the Scarborough-raid. Or at Jutland, when another erroneous signal nearly send the battlecruisers into the jaws of the Hochseeflotte.
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Jul 2, 2015 16:42
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A "flag officer" is an admiral. Seymour was the flag lieutenant, and it seems like you folks are determined to drive him to suicide again.
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Jul 2, 2015 16:42
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Saint Celestine posted:Let me tell you about his flag officer- This dude was so incompetent that he hosed up a British decisive victory at Dogger Bank, and ALMOST got an entire squadron of the Grand Fleet's best and newest battleships destroyed (Barham, Malaya, Warspite, QE) destroyed. Luckily their squadron commander decided it was not a good idea to drive into the entire High Seas Fleet. I thought you meant Ernle Chatfield whose wonderful insights into warfare included things like "the battleship still has an important role to play despite the development of the bomber " and "Russia, although a great Power for other purposes, was only a Power of medium rank for military purposes...Her assistance would be of considerable, though not of great, military value" (In 1939).
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Jul 2, 2015 16:54
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The Merry Marauder posted:A "flag officer" is an admiral. Seymour was the flag lieutenant, and it seems like you folks are determined to drive him to suicide again. "He manned those message flags, and he's an officer ... flag + officer = flag officer!"  Sorry, my words failed me. Corrected.
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Jul 2, 2015 16:58
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How will ship desings work in RtW? Do you start with assorted mod. 189x type pre-dreads and can then research the 1901, 1902, 1903, 1904 and 1905 pre-dread shitbarges before you're allowed to build dreadnoughts or can you put your own ship together from a list op components and start building all-or-nothing armoured dreadnoughts on turn 1 with the power of hindsight?
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Jul 2, 2015 16:58
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Kodos666 posted:Ralph Seymour had a habit of badly mangling Beattys orders, for example he send all British BCs after Blücher during the battle at Dogger bank, instead of just HMS Indomitable. Or when another bably worded signal allowed Hipper to escape after the Scarborough-raid. Or at Jutland, when another erroneous signal nearly send the battlecruisers into the jaws of the Hochseeflotte. Note that the biggest problem being that Beatty never fired and replaced him.
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Jul 2, 2015 17:04
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For those still curious about Beaty, Jelicoe and the other cast of charaters during this period of time and the technology of the battleships, I cannot reccomend Castles of Steel enough. Its a fantastic read!
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Jul 2, 2015 17:04
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I think the fairest thing to everyone involved is to say that communication technology was inadequate for the operations envisaged in the tactical doctrine of the time. Sure, some flag signals got messed up, but trying to organize the Grand Fleet -- 37 capital ships and over 100 lighter vessels -- with flags was setting everyone up for failure. Flags were barely adequate in Nelson's time with fleets of 30-40 ships. Smoke was an even bigger communications problem in 1916 than it was in the age of sail with black powder, since most ships at the time were coal-fired and constantly spewed thick black smoke. So Beatty may not have communicated correctly but the whole premise of fleet communication was working against him. Of course you could say that the precarious communications system demanded a decent signal officer and not replacing the guy was crazy. 
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Jul 2, 2015 17:05
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Jimmy4400nav posted:For those still curious about Beaty, Jelicoe and the other cast of charaters during this period of time and the technology of the battleships, I cannot reccomend Castles of Steel enough. Its a fantastic read! "The Rules of the Game: Jutland and British Naval Command" is also really good for this sort of thing.
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Jul 2, 2015 17:07
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Asehujiko posted:How will ship desings work in RtW? Do you start with assorted mod. 189x type pre-dreads and can then research the 1901, 1902, 1903, 1904 and 1905 pre-dread shitbarges before you're allowed to build dreadnoughts or can you put your own ship together from a list op components and start building all-or-nothing armoured dreadnoughts on turn 1 with the power of hindsight? From what I understand there are restrictions on turret types and placement at the beginning, meaning an all-big gun ship would not necessarily be as effective as a dreadnought would end up being (you can only have three main turrets at the start, for example, and three gun gun turrets suffer from lower firing speed, so you can put a maximum of six guns in the broadside).
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Jul 2, 2015 17:23
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Jimmy4400nav posted:For those still curious about Beaty, Jelicoe and the other cast of charaters during this period of time and the technology of the battleships, I cannot reccomend Castles of Steel enough. Its a fantastic read! Ironically, Massie (in Castles of Steel) doesn't point the finger at Seymour to any severe extent for Dogger Bank, correctly noting that Beatty's signal instructions were unclear (and impossible) though we do get the amusing anecdote about "Engage the Enemy More Closely" having been removed from the RN signals book.
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Jul 2, 2015 17:24
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Asehujiko posted:How will ship desings work in RtW? Do you start with assorted mod. 189x type pre-dreads and can then research the 1901, 1902, 1903, 1904 and 1905 pre-dread shitbarges before you're allowed to build dreadnoughts or can you put your own ship together from a list op components and start building all-or-nothing armoured dreadnoughts on turn 1 with the power of hindsight? I've read on their forums that there will be some form of limitations (and the AI is limited to them as well) and also political limitations. I imagine you'll only have so much tonnage / classes of ships to work with, along with some form of tech tree making it hard to pump out 50 000 ton super-mega dreads from day one, but maybe arrange armaments (what you have available) to something more sane/crazier (torpedo-dreadnought?). Maybe there will be some sort of randomization involved for how your design "ideas" actually turn out? Depending on the experience and tech available, your masterpiece might turn out to be a giant turd that falls apart on its own if it's too "high tech" (didn't some 4x space game have this mechanic? Sword of the Stars maybe?). Pimpmust fucked around with this message at 17:31 on Jul 2, 2015 |
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Jul 2, 2015 17:25
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Why would you want a 50,000 ton super battleship? They don't exactly have a good track record.
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Jul 2, 2015 17:32
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Asehujiko posted:How will ship desings work in RtW? Do you start with assorted mod. 189x type pre-dreads and can then research the 1901, 1902, 1903, 1904 and 1905 pre-dread shitbarges before you're allowed to build dreadnoughts or can you put your own ship together from a list op components and start building all-or-nothing armoured dreadnoughts on turn 1 with the power of hindsight? the former, techs will be unlocked, some of them "doctrinal" ones, reflecting the change in thinking. No four gun super-dreadnaughts in 1901.
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Jul 2, 2015 17:37
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Besides, USS Maine style weird asymmetrical turret layouts are boss.
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Jul 2, 2015 17:39
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Pimpmust posted:I've read on their forums that there will be some form of limitations (and the AI is limited to them as well) and also political limitations. I imagine you'll only have so much tonnage / classes of ships to work with, along with some form of tech tree making it hard to pump out 50 000 ton super-mega dreads from day one, but maybe arrange armaments (what you have available) to something more sane/crazier (torpedo-dreadnought?). We can finally make fleets of Torpedo Rams. The HMS Thunderchild rides again!
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Jul 2, 2015 17:39
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Arglebargle III posted:Why would you want a 50,000 ton super battleship? They don't exactly have a good track record. How else am I going to support a "turret pagoda" with at least 5 heavy turrets stacked on top of each other for better view? (Someone should make a "Kermit Dreadnought Program" game)
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Jul 2, 2015 18:02
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Tossing in my vote for Rules of the Game. It goes into amazing depth regarding every aspect of the British navy at that time. Some of my favorite bits: Beatty pushed to have the Queen Elizabeths join his battlecruiser fleet, even though they were a good bit slower. After they were moved to his group (a few weeks before Jutland), he completely ignored Hugh Evan-Thomas, the commander, perhaps because he was a close associate of Jellicoe. The result was that Beatty's battlecruisers were completely uncoordinated with the battleships, so when the battle started Beatty moved his battlecruisers far ahead of the battleships, since they couldn't keep up. The result was that he got trounced in the engagement with little fire support, then when the QEs finally caught up, communication was ambiguous, which resulted in them moving too far south and taking heavy damage from the main German battle line. Another interesting point was the difference in training. Jellicoe's battleships were stationed at Scapa Flow. This was an area far from any major city, which resulted in them having nothing to do but train. On the other hand, Beatty was stationed at the Firth of Forth, which is next to Edinburgh. It's also a generally poor place to train for several reasons. The result was most of the officers and men focused more on enjoying themselves than they should've. To make matters worse, the men of both fleets held each other in contempt. The battlecruisers had seen action whereas the battleships had not. The battleship crews knew that they were well trained whereas the crews of the battlecruisers had relatively little training. Of course, the large amount of distance between the two groups made communication even more difficult. There were a lot of factors leading up to Jutland, and Beatty was responsible for a good number of them, but it's hard to ignore the fact that neither group made all that many efforts to coordinate with the other. Edit: I'll definitely be getting this as soon as it comes out. I think I'll take over a minor power, like the Austrians, and see how well they do with ungodly hordes of destroyers and small ships torpedoing everything in sight, rather than constructing battleships.
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Jul 2, 2015 18:44
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Adventure Pigeon posted:Another interesting point was the difference in training. Jellicoe's battleships were stationed at Scapa Flow. This was an area far from any major city, which resulted in them having nothing to do but train. On the other hand, Beatty was stationed at the Firth of Forth, which is next to Edinburgh. It's also a generally poor place to train for several reasons. The Battlecruisers were moved south because of the German battlecruiser raids. However, turns out you can't really do gunnery practice in what is essentially a fjord. Whoops.
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Jul 2, 2015 18:49
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Saint Celestine posted:The Battlecruisers were moved south because of the German battlecruiser raids. Yeah. I think there were also concerns about submarines, which is why they didn't leave the harbor to train out at sea. The point they make the most in Rules of the Game is that the command structure had become so rigid, especially compared to Nelson's navy, that flexible thinking had become taboo. The main reason why the Queen Elizabeths took so much damage is they kept sailing, waiting for orders to turn, when it was clear they were going right into the German battle fleet. Evan-Thomas was waiting for orders when it was obvious that he was going to be in a very bad situation. There was a bit of discussion earlier about flags in Nelson's time, and one point that wasn't stated was that they were barely used. Every captain knew what he was supposed to do and was expected to do it regardless of orders. I might be wrong about this, but Nelson only sent two signals during the battle of Trafalgar. "England expects that every man will do his duty" and "Get in close". Other than that, the captains and men of his fleet were expected to know what to do, and they did. By the time of Jutland, Britain lost that independence of thought amongst officers. Adventure Pigeon fucked around with this message at 18:59 on Jul 2, 2015 |
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Jul 2, 2015 18:52
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Adventure Pigeon posted:Yeah. I think there were also concerns about submarines, which is why they didn't leave the harbor to train out at sea. There definitely were concerns about submarines. Castles of Steel makes mention of at least one instance where Jellicoe sallied the entire RN based at Scapa Flow over a supposed periscope sighting. Scapa Flow wasn't prepared to be a major naval base in 1914, or even 1915, and there was a time when the RN was based even farther away, because Jellicoe was very anxious about the vulnerability of his ships to subs while based in Scapa, but also not being able to afford to sail away every time there was a threat (this game's Operational Points)
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Jul 2, 2015 18:58
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Reading about Jellicoe, I can't help but respect the guy. Sure he was a bit stodgy and micromanaged the hell out of everything, but he had a really good idea about the big picture of things in the war and understood the key linchpins for his fleet and objectives. People complained he wasn't fighting any big battles, but he understood that: A. His fleet didn't really need to do those since all they had to do was lock up the German fleet in their bases; B. If they did fight that kind of fight and it went badly, Great Britain would be SOL; C. Understood that splitting his fleet up into smaller bits to do whatever the admiralty/other admirals wanted to do for their own side projects was a bad idea; D. Was understandably worried about what new technologies could do to tip the balance against his nations military. Obviously he wasn't perfect (he thought naval convoys for shipping were a bad idea to counter submarines, some said he was a bit too cautious), but for what he had to do, he did it very well.
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Jul 2, 2015 19:00
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gradenko_2000 posted:There definitely were concerns about submarines. Castles of Steel makes mention of at least one instance where Jellicoe sallied the entire RN based at Scapa Flow over a supposed periscope sighting. Scapa Flow wasn't prepared to be a major naval base in 1914, or even 1915, and there was a time when the RN was based even farther away, because Jellicoe was very anxious about the vulnerability of his ships to subs while based in Scapa, but also not being able to afford to sail away every time there was a threat (this game's Operational Points) Fun Fact: That's actually how they lost the Audacious (Hit a mine while on exercise in that general area) They rebased to Lough Swilly, which... https://www.google.com/maps/place/L...8f63f337bd0f236 Is nowhere close to the North Sea. Saint Celestine fucked around with this message at 19:05 on Jul 2, 2015 |
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Jul 2, 2015 19:02
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I really hope Rule the Waves is done properly. It's going to be really fun exploring doctrine, especially alternatives to the "lets put a bunch of really big ships in a line and sail them at another line". I'm interested in nighttime destroyer attacks and raiding ships more than I am in dreadnaughts. Of course, I'll be using dreadnaughts too, but if you've ever played a game like this, there're few things as terrifying as a bunch of destroyers suddenly appearing in the night a few thousand meters away from your fleet.
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Jul 2, 2015 19:09
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Adventure Pigeon posted:Yeah. I think there were also concerns about submarines, which is why they didn't leave the harbor to train out at sea. Keep in mind that the Nelsonian navy had been nearly constantly at war with peer or near peer opponents for decades. That tends to have a nice effect of separating the wheat from the chaff among the officer corps. Meanwhile, in 1914 the RN hadn't fought a serious fleet action since arguably Trafalgar.
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Jul 2, 2015 19:22
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:Keep in mind that the Nelsonian navy had been nearly constantly at war with peer or near peer opponents for decades. That tends to have a nice effect of separating the wheat from the chaff among the officer corps. Meanwhile, in 1914 the RN hadn't fought a serious fleet action since arguably Trafalgar. Yeah, minimal actual combat for a hundred years caused a lot of problems, though there were moments where they should've stopped and reconsidered their course well before Jutland. Rules of the Game discusses the collision between the Victoria and the Camperdown as an incident that should've been a major wakeup call. Dreadnaught goes into detail on how British officers were reluctant to conduct gunnery practice because it would ruin the paint jobs of the ships, since promotion was based more on appearance and correct behavior than on actual competence. There's always going to be erosion during peacetime, but the level of institutional failure that actually occurred was impressive. Edit: I hope we can research gigantic padoga superstructures. The Fuso must be honored and improved on until the vertical length is greater than the horizontal. Adventure Pigeon fucked around with this message at 19:37 on Jul 2, 2015 |
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Jul 2, 2015 19:35
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Yeah I just read Rules of the Game because someone recommended it in the last (or another) thread. Really enjoyed both it and Castles of Steel. One complaint I'd have with Rules of the Game (and a lot of military history tbh, found this a problem in all the hoplite warfare stuff I'm reading now) is he touches on the whole class aspect of the officer corps and how it limited it but he never comes right out and has a frank discussion about it. I realize this was probably done because he was military and has no real working knowledge of class and how it affected the RN officer corps but he touched on it enough that it seems to be interesting and worth exploring. I'd also really like to see something like rules of the game that deals with the army side as well. All I really know about the British army in napoleonic terms comes primarily from Sean Bean and Sharpe's Rifles but it seems like the stodgy upper class army officer changed little until after ww1, and then only a little. For some reason it always seems like the navy is less conservative than the army no matter the nation. Must be all that world travel and multiculturalism. I'd also like a sequel to Rules of the Game that shows how they took the lessons they learned at Jutland and used them in WW2. Seems like the RN was in much rougher shape in 1939 and at almost parity with it's enemies but still managed to win quite decisively.
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Jul 2, 2015 19:48
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Pimpmust posted:How else am I going to support a "turret pagoda" with at least 5 heavy turrets stacked on top of each other for better view? How else am I going to blow up 800 sailors in under three seconds?
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Jul 2, 2015 20:45
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Arglebargle III posted:How else am I going to blow up 800 sailors in under three seconds? You could not armor your magazines or your deck and engage at ranges where you'd be subject to plunging fire.
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Jul 2, 2015 20:53
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Arglebargle III posted:How else am I going to blow up 800 sailors in under three seconds? Scuttle
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Jul 2, 2015 20:53
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Saint Celestine posted:You could not armor your magazines or your deck and engage at ranges where you'd be subject to plunging fire. Place your magazines on the decks to increase your rate of fire 
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Jul 2, 2015 21:06
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dtkozl posted:Yeah I just read Rules of the Game because someone recommended it in the last (or another) thread. Really enjoyed both it and Castles of Steel. I'm not quite sure what you mean, the RN officer corps was pretty solidly middle class wasn't it? And the british aristocracy preferred the army, especially the cavalry?
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Jul 2, 2015 21:39
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meatbag posted:I'm not quite sure what you mean, the RN officer corps was pretty solidly middle class wasn't it? And the british aristocracy preferred the army, especially the cavalry? Yes I'm sorry I wasn't clear, but it is exactly those type of class distinctions I am talking about. It seemed like the navy took from the middle class somewhat like vicars kids and the like (and it seemed like navies also tended to be more middle class than the army) but specifically who made up that class and who it excluded and why is the type of stuff I'd like to see discussed especially in terms of its affect on military effectiveness. Class isn't just about the aristocracy vs everyone else but also the lower class, movement between them, who is in power, those in power co-opting whose in not by raising the leaders of the dispossessed into positions of power, etc. There were obvious class issues touched on in the book. The lower classes seemed to serve mostly below decks. Betty had issues with his wife being a divorced american. Certain officers seemed to be groomed by the royal family and promoted to positions of prominence over those perhaps more able, etc. One of the issues I've seen a lot concerning the british army in ww2 was the refusal at the platoon level to include the NCO, a member of the lower classes, from mission briefings before action. This meant that if the officer was hit, often the squad would be unable to carry out their mission because it didn't have all the facts. The german and american armies included the NCO and were more efficient as a result.
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Jul 3, 2015 00:41
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Adventure Pigeon posted:Place your magazines on the decks to increase your rate of fire External magazines might not be the worst idea, you can dissipate most of the energy to the atmosphere instead of turning the entire ship into what is essentially a pipe bomb. Like blow-out panels on tanks.
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Jul 3, 2015 01:08
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Decoy Badger posted:External magazines might not be the worst idea, you can dissipate most of the energy to the atmosphere instead of turning the entire ship into what is essentially a pipe bomb. Like blow-out panels on tanks. The closest analogy to external magazines may have been the torpedoes that were mounted on Japanese heavy cruisers, and those tended to have some negative consequences when they were hit. In one of the more famous incidents, a 5" shell from an American escort carrier disabled the Chokai, one of the IJN's most advanced heavy cruisers, because it got lucky and set them off. It might not sink the ship, a hit would probably turn it into a burning pile of scrap.
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Jul 3, 2015 01:16
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