WesWorld

Quoted

Originally posted by Hood
Ah, the 'Special' taken to the next stage.
Not sure whether this makes as much tactical sense. 2x HMS Revolutions are designed to overwhelm a 12x6in traditional CL. 2x Tonnerre could certainly inflict serious damage upon an CA and even a super-CA but with lower sustained RoF against more barrels of a traditional 8in CA the chances are coming out more even. Saying that, this has widely spaced guns making it harder to knock out a large percentage of its firepower, but with no box protection for the magazines any hit there will be seriously fatal. But as a testbed ship the concept will look impressive in the metal, though it still hasn't got the doctrinal basis the RN has designed their 'Special' with.

It would be more accurate to say that the doctrine is different, not that it has no doctrinal basis. You designed the Revolution to fight up to the next weight level, whereas I designed Tonnant to fight other destroyers - in collaboration with normal destroyers. The idea is to use the 20cm battery to hit the enemy from beyond their range, and then wade in once the enemy is in chaos or damaged. I see this as the response to the increasing numbers of auto-armed ships in the 4"-6" range.

Since I view this as a destroyer, I didn't needlessly overload it with armor belts and such, although I seem to have some leftover miscellaneous weight. I might drop the misc weight and add a box, but we'll see.

I would say therefore that the doctrine is almost the same. Revolution is hard for me to classify in my reports as a destroyer or a cruiser. It is an attempt to combine the CL with the DD, in theory saving manpower and money while not diluting the strength of the fleet.

The Weapons (historical Darings) in theory could look after a light cruiser, the Admiralty felt two Darings could tackle a Sverdlov. But they wanted more gunpower to make sure of that. I do too, I see the 5.5in auto offering the sustained fire to overhwhelm a light cruiser in 2 vs. 1 scenarios. Of course historically the Admiralty saw the Sverdlovs as independent raiders. In WW this may not be quite so likely and 8 vs. 4 would still be a tight run affair. Perhaps a mix of Revolutions and Darings would be the ultimate 1950s solution to that problem.

The only concern I have with the Tonnerre is that the 200mm auto might make a French Capitan or Admiral tempted to tackle a CL or CA.

Realistically the Cruiser-Destroyer and both of our WW designs require the kind of radar fire-control necessary to achieve long-range fire and make it accurate so every shell counts. The Cru-Des had the latest MRS-3 systems, GDS-3 target indication and even a shell-splash tracking radar. We haven't got anywhere near that level of sophistication, so at the moment we're pushing with gun tech but I feel the results will be less spectacular than envisaged. But I do think its right we experiment with this new technology, as much as Dreadnought or the first turbine torpedo destroyers were experiments into how to use new technology operationally.

Couldn't find any other French 1945 thread so I'll just post it here...

You might want to recheck the Foudroyant's miscellaneous weights breakdown...
1) Adding everything up, I get 11,224 tons and not 10,400 tons.
2) 16 crated planes at 25 tons should be 400 tons, not 40 tons (and it would bump up the total miscellaneous weights to 11,584 tons).
3) I find 244 tons a bit odd for flagship facilities. Not sure if that is a mistake.

Ooh, good catch - thanks!

I went ahead and reduced the airgroup down to 90 aircraft, and fixed the off-balance weights:

Quoted

Breakdown of Miscellaneous Weights:
- 8100 tons for airgroup
- 200t Air Control Operations
- 120t DEM (radar) and DEM-directed fire control
- 400t crated planes (16 @ 25 tons each) and spare parts
- 250t for flagship facilities
- 500t damage control and fire suppression systems
- 830 tons for extra gear including crew comforts

The new carriers look like capable vessels; I'll be posting Bharat's slightly smaller Trishula, with pic, this evening or thereabouts.

I like the turn of the sim year, lots of good stuff gets posted in its final form.

Speaking of good stuff, I need to go over to Shipbucket and ask for permission to use the heavy cruiser drawing that I based the Saint Louis on. I think it's really a looker...