Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker

I still think the flood model is a wee bit weird. The progressive flooding issue was one of my concerns (with regard to Japanese ships) because it does seem to slam the Japanese ability to perform tasks for which they were well trained. Personally I'd lessen the penalty on the flooding and increase the penalty regarding fires (which the Japanese did have problems with because of lower standards handling fuel (early war they did not purge lines etc, later war they used less refined and therefore more volatile fuels).

The thing that has always bothered me is the ability of ships to repair 100% of flood damage at sea. To me, flood damage should be more permanent (like system damage) and require major yard time to fix. Why? Say a ship lost its bow like Selfridge did in 1943. Just because the flooding has stopped being progressive, there was still flooding of the forward area and counter flooding to keep the ship from nose diving into oblivion. There should/could have been some differentation between permanent flood damage and progressive flood damage. In WITP, the ship either sinks or has 100% flotation restored, and in Selfridges case, this is illustrated as being totally innaccurate. How can a ship lose it's bow, have widespread flooding and controlled flooding, and end up with 100% flotation values without major repair time in a yard? Nothing can be done about this because apparently nothing could be done about it a few years ago.

I find i can get my mind around this conundrum if i consider PERMANENT AND CONTROLLED FLOODING as SYS damage, and the other flooding as "temporary" flooding. Yeah, its not a perfect model, but it is much better than some other aspects of the game that have much bigger problems.

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker
Say a ship lost its bow like Selfridge did in 1943. Just because the flooding has stopped being progressive, there was still flooding of the forward area and counter flooding to keep the ship from nose diving into oblivion. There should/could have been some differentation between permanent flood damage and progressive flood damage.

One could argue that since the Selfridge 'lost' it's bow, as in ripped right off. It was no longer a part of the ship. So perhaps it was better off than you suggest because it wasn't carrying the dead weight of a flooded bow and the bow itself.

As said before the damage model isn't perfect, if I had my way we'd have seperate damage for the engines, etc. I always will be slightly annoyed at the idea of ships simply losing top speed due to cruising around for a couple days.[:@]

ORIGINAL: Iridium

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker
Say a ship lost its bow like Selfridge did in 1943. Just because the flooding has stopped being progressive, there was still flooding of the forward area and counter flooding to keep the ship from nose diving into oblivion. There should/could have been some differentation between permanent flood damage and progressive flood damage.

One could argue that since the Selfridge 'lost' it's bow, as in ripped right off. It was no longer a part of the ship. So perhaps it was better off than you suggest because it wasn't carrying the dead weight of a flooded bow and the bow itself.

As said before the damage model isn't perfect, if I had my way we'd have seperate damage for the engines, etc. I always will be slightly annoyed at the idea of ships simply losing top speed due to cruising around for a couple days.[:@]

We'll put this on our wish-list for WITP II!

Mogami,

I agree with your explanation, I don´t have problems with the progressive flooding. It´s clear to me that in reality 4 CVs were sunk with 13 bombs. Okay! They were sunk because of a full flight deck, or a real critical hit! That can happen, no problem with that. Because that happened in reality, it blows up Japanese CVs with 2 bombs in WITP. But it hardly ever blows up American carries with 3 Japanese 250 kg bombs because of their super duper damage control! Hey, why can´t American CVs blow up like that! There were so many posts made how Japanese CVs blew up, but as you said, things like a full flight deck can´t happen in WITP. So why do the Japanese CVs blow up like historical (e.g. with a full flight deck) but the Allied don´t?

But without that "bad luck" or a full flight deck it takes more than 2 bombs to SINK such a ship. I know I´m fighting against windmills here, against the American developers and the American fanboys. But this result is just too American. I also play the Allied side, but as an Austrian I would also wonder how I could sink these !three! carriers with a few bombs. It´s nearly impossible to sink an Allied CV because of this difference that was made. I initiated this PBEM and I proposed Allied damage control on, because the Allied were better in reality. Better in fighting fires, not flooding. As it´s now, the Japanese suffer those historical ship killing hits like a full flight deck that can´t be in WITP and lose their ships. The Allied don´t, because of their damage control.

No, no, that´s not right.

Terminus, call that spam or whatever (I don´t care abut anyway), if there can´t be those historical extremely bad hits than there shouldn´t be these results. Normally you get more hits and don´t think about it when a ship is lost. I played around with the scenario editor and it´s NORMAL that Jap CVs sink with a few bomb hits if they aren´t near port. How can that be if there are no full flight decks? Allied CVs stay NORMALLY afloat with a few hits and I let them out at sea too and didn´t bring them to port.

But I know, now someone tells me you can´t compare the Allied bombs with the Japanese and so on....

I just wonder why it´s so seldom that US CVs have progressive flooding????

I just wonder why it´s so seldom that US CVs have progressive flooding????

Because of the Allied damage control rule. Realistic or not, that's how it seems to work.

I am told if you turn OFF the Allied DC, the results of battles are rather drastically altered - i.e. Pearl Harbor is a real disaster.

ORIGINAL: castor troy


I just wonder why it´s so seldom that US CVs have progressive flooding????

The USN damage control bonus toggle makes it harder for US ships to sink due to progressive flooding though it can happen if the damage and FLT is high enough. If you object to this edge, it is a feature that can be turned off.

ORIGINAL: rtrapasso

I just wonder why it´s so seldom that US CVs have progressive flooding????

Because of the Allied damage control rule. Realistic or not, that's how it seems to work.

I am told if you turn OFF the Allied DC, the results of battles are rather drastically altered - i.e. Pearl Harbor is a real disaster.

If I would have known that such a result is possible I would have set it OFF and so I would have the same chance to sink an Allied CV. I would have lost my carriers too but I also would have the chance to do so.

Hi, ALl I can say is that in the battle where my CV were damaged but survived the only CV sunk was a USN CV. Over all, taking everygame I have ging on I'd say Japan is leading in CV sunk compared to CV lost.
Not every battle results in a lost IJN CV but almost all of them have produced at least 1 USN CV sunk.

I just wonder why it´s so seldom that US CVs have progressive flooding????

Because Allied lumber and sledge hammers are of a higher quality so the shoring of bulkheads and plugging of holes is of a higher standard than the Japanese.[8|]

Seriously, the progressive flooding hit Japan takes could definitely be toned down. As I said before, would help their poor soggy I Boats immensely too.

Historically the only USN cv or cvl that sank that WASN'T scuttled was the Yorktown- and that was to flooding resulting from torp's. I have no problem with the rule, and as was mentioned earlier, it can be toggled off should someone have an issue with it. Personally i think its reflects the reality of what was.

There are always the two realities on this forum. If this result would have been reality I wonder why not every ship hit by a Kamikaze sunk? Should do more damage than a bomb?!?

It was reality that Japanese had problems with fires not with flooding! Isn´t this a fact????

Castor,

Folks have answered your post with a deulge of historical references. Your problem is, you don't like what they have to say.

At this point, you're just being adversarial.

-F-

Again...

ORIGINAL: Feinder

Castor,

Folks have answered your post with a deulge of historical references. Your problem is, you don't like what they have to say.

At this point, you're just being adversarial.

-F-

Well, his question has not really been adequately answered from my seat here in the nose bleeds. Tons of reasons why the model for progressive flooding is spread out over days as opposed to hours (due to turn and design constraints given the scale issue), but I've seen no real reasons for making it as severe as it is on Japan. How pathetic were the Japanese at flood control after all? C'mon, they were not as bad as portrayed here. Flood damage could use a reduction.

Hi, Again the time frame gets you. If they just sank the Japanese ships outright there would be no complaint. The player would never know they started with 20 sys 20 flood and 10 fires and lost the DC battle.
The flooding is not so much what happens 3 days after the battle. (If the ship sinks they lost on day one) The flooding is what happens right after the bomb or torpedo hit.
And for the last time. As long as the fires remain flooding progresses. Allied ships put out the fires and so stop the flooding. Japanese ships burn (even a level 1 fire means no flooding repair and more is coming) So it is in fact Japanese fire control that gets them and USN fire fighting that saves them.
And the ship crew ratings. USN/IJN CV have lower ratings then most ships that see combat for USN/IJN and that is why USN/IJN CV are more liley to sink then BB with same damage after battle.

Well truth be told the IJN didn’t even come close to the USN when it came to damage control. Bad training and some bad procedures. The Taiho comes to mind. Regarding the progressive flooding the Chitose was near missed by SBD’s from the Sara and almost capsized on the way to truk. Shokaku almost flipped over on the way home from Coral Sea- and she wasn’t even hit by a torp. Now on the flip side, look at the damage the USN CA’s at Tassafaronga survived (Northampton excluded.) The New Orleans had a fifth of her length blown off and she didn’t sink. And The Houston (CL-81, not the CA) took on 6000 tons of Water but still managed to steam over 1000 miles to get to port. Now thats progressive flooding!!!

Anyone really think the IJN could have accomplished the same?

Overall, USN damage control was superior to IJN damage control as IJN training tended to focus on combat prowess. Which is not to say that IJN DC was "lousy" across the board but definately not on the same par as with the USN. (re: "Kaigun") I've also read that the Japnese actually obtained a USN DC "manual" and modeled some of it into their established doctrine in order to improve their ship survivability

There were some instances of outstanding Japanese DC too though. BB Musashi may arguably be the best case....her DC teams did pretty much everything you could do to keep the ship afloat on an even keel before the sheer amount of the flooding overwhelmed all efforts. 'Course the two behemoths would have had high quality crews.

On the bottom end of the scale one has Taiho's destruction which was preventable even when factoring in her unrefined fuel.

Another example of good Japanese damage control, combined with a supertanker full of luck was what happened to the Kumano after the Battle of Leyte Gulf:

http://www.combinedfleet.com/atully04.htm

generally speaking, the japanese were experts at man to man combat, but bloody amateurs when it came to supply!! This also extends to the damage control of their ships.

They also had huge problems with Command & Control: when their officers were killed, the lower echelons tended to become disoriented and lose initiative.