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WWI proposed Superstructure armor
Carrying this over from some emails I've been trading with Tim.
Basically it seems as though most capital ships post-dreadnought made at least some effort to protect vital areas of the superstructure. In some cases this went so far as to include armored/reinforced masts, cabin armor, multiple armored decks etc.
My suggestion is as follows: depending on source information assign dreadnoughts an armor value of 0-2 in location "4". Also on a case by case basis - some pre-dreads and modernized ships might get an armor value there as well. Some battlecruisers might qualify as well - but none of the lighter ships.
Purpose and effect: I'm suggesting this because in the campaign we will have access to fairly high numbers of ligher ships, Light cruisers, destroyers etc which will have 0,1 and 2 rated guns. Given player tendencies I think this may be needed to prevent some of the "swarm" mentality..especially since lighter ships will be easier to build/maintain and replace.
This will have very little effect on pretty much all capital ship tertiaries - the "3" rated guns will still penetrate all but the best armored SS at max range..and even the lighter 1 & 2s will penetrate most especially at close range.
Also - because of the non-penetrating critical = damage rule, even the lightest guns can eventually do damage or get lucky.
Re: WWI proposed Superstructure armor
In many cases, the smaller ships were detailed to "finish off" larger ships that had been hit. Several ship losses were due to the DD's and Cl's picking on a damaged capital ship. They would pick up survivors, then sink teh vessel by gun fire. I think the Rostock went down this way at Jutland, but I'd have to check. So, the smaller vessels need to be effective at something, just not that great in a cost-benefit analysis.
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)Re: WWI proposed Superstructure armor
I am interested in looking at some source material to support this idea.
My impression from Jane's is that large areas of all metal warships were unarmored. Conway's history of the ship discusses shipbuilders specifically choosing which areas to armor and which to leave unarmored. The USN pioneered in WW1 era ships the "all or nothing" philosophy of armor, meaning either heavy enough armor to stop a primary gun or no armor at all. European ships more typically were designed to resist primary guns in some areas and secondaries in others. In any case it appears to me even a 4" gun which is likely rated at 1 would be effective in shooting up unarmored or "soft" sections of a Dreadnought, causing fires and structural damage.
On the other hand Eric you are correct that suicide runs by light ships using light guns and torpedos should not be an effective strategy. We should probably playtest light ships next battle and see what it looks like.
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