Matrix Games Forums

One of the odd quirks that i've always noticed about Pacific War was that the torpedo routines never seemed to come off right.

Allegedly to simulate their ability to hit "below the belt" the armor rating of the target ship has its armor rating * (random) when comparing to the warhead strength so that some torps might "penetrate" even though their warhead rating is lower than the armor rating of the ship.

In practice though it does'nt work very well. Case in point, the Historical First Move for the 41 Campaign, Pearl Harbor

Here no less than 112+ torpedo bombers ususally attack and each battleship will take between 10 - 20 torpedo hits, most without sinking. The reason being is that the armor ratings of the battlewagons are so high that more often than not the warheads dont "penetrate" and the ship only incurs a 1% damage point in the process (or maybe a little higher, it seems to vary, but the rules book spec states that any hit that does'nt "penetrate" does only 1% damage.)

Even other ship classes with less armor tend to be overly durable to torp hits, i've seen light cruiser take four or five torps without being crippled much less sunk. I've had to conclude that the game does'nt nearly represent well enough the effects of underwater explosion and the danger of progressive flooding so i tried a little experiment.

I doubled the warhead ratings of all the torps. Is he mad????


yeah. just a little



But in several tests so far, the results have been great. At Pearl Harbor, all eight BB's sank, and the with the Singapore action, Prince of Wales and Repulse have a much harder time of it.

Now as to Pearl Harbor, one would say that was hardly historical given that only two BB's were "lost" permemantly , but it must be remembered that in the "historical" attack, only 40 planes were equiped with torpedoes and then only in the first attack wave.

In Pacific War you get on average over 112** torpedo bombers attacking + the game engine cannot simulate the US docking pattern at Pearl of mooring pairs of battleships side by side thus sheilding several from any form of torpedo attack.

A ship, not even a battleship should'nt be able to reguarly take 15 or more torpedoes and live to tell about it. Not even the Yamato's could do that!

The solution to that is to edit the airgroups of the 1st Carrier Strike force so that all but 40 torpedo bombers are "damaged" for that turn, thus the US player wont find his ships being attacked in harbor by overwhelming numbers of torpedo bombers.

Tests so far have been very positive and airpower is truely the scourage that it was historically. On a side note i also increased the bomb warheads by 1.5 x Here the issue is more in doubt. I think the 1% rule once again makes things a little too durable as you see ships, battleships included shrugging litterally dozens of 500ILB bomb hits without major damage. In the BB's case there could be a case made as most of the moderns were designed with 1000 pounders in mind.

On that issue i'm not so sure of my ground but the tests so far have been positive. Going back to the torpedo issue, of great benefit has been the submarine campaign. More often than not unarmored MC and TK class ships are able to survive two or more torp hits. Now the loss rate has jacked up and the Japanese player has to be much more careful about assigning escorts

Opinions?

I agree with the Torp changes... After all, most japanese cargo vessels hit by US Torps (once the torp problems were resolved) sank after one or two hits... I don't think the bombs should be tinkered with however. I do feel its realistic for an MCS to take multiple hits. Bombs may cause a lot of damage, but how much is actually critical? I would argue all penetrating Torp hits are critical, whereas bombs need to hit a vital component on the ship to be critical hits. (Unless we're talking 2000lb bombs hitting PT boats -- that would always be critical). Ok, well I don't know if that makes sense to anyone... IN summary, torp change good; bomb change bad.

I agree with the Torp changes... After all, most japanese cargo vessels hit by US Torps (once the torp problems were resolved) sank after one or two hits... I don't think the bombs should be tinkered with however. I do feel its realistic for an MCS to take multiple hits. Bombs may cause a lot of damage, but how much is actually critical? I would argue all penetrating Torp hits are critical, whereas bombs need to hit a vital component on the ship to be critical hits. (Unless we're talking 2000lb bombs hitting PT boats -- that would always be critical). Ok, well I don't know if that makes sense to anyone... IN summary, torp change good; bomb change bad.

yes, admitedly the bomb issue is more nebulous. My concern in that quarter not so much in terms of "penetration" but in more structural based damage.

Though not as bad as torpedoes i will often see BB's and even cruisers taking numerous 500ILB bomb hits and shrugging it off.

A BB could pull it off but only a very few modern CA's could do so.

The 1.5x increase to the 500ILB and 250kg bomb seems (so far) to work well as it puts the base warhead above most of the CA armor ratings and makes them much more dangerous but not overpowering.

Will keep testing and see how it turns out.

Originally posted by Nikademus:

i've seen light cruiser take four or five torps without being crippled much less sunk.

In my current game, the brand new South Dakota went down after a single hit by an airdropped torpedo. Yes, I know, critical hit, but still...

Actually, Torpedo's aren't the 'uberweapon' that they are made out to be. Historically, the Prince of Wales and Repulse took numerous hits before they were sunk (The Repulse took 5 total torpedo's, and even shrugged off the first hit with no effects).

The USN Battleships at Pearl Harbor were in a bad situation to take torpedo's. Their water tight doors were open, resulting in only one torpedo having the capability of sinking a ship, especially with a suprised and shocked crew. Also, what Kates weren't carrying Torpedo's were carrying armour piercing naval shells as bombs, something much more powerful than a torpedo.

The Guadalcanal campaign is riddled with tales of USN cruisers taking gun and torpedo damage without sinking. Sometimes a ship can take 2 torpedo's and continue fighting and sail back to harbour for repairs, other times one single hit will immediately capsize a vessel. Tales of USN and Japanese Carriers taking multiple torpedo and bomb hits yet still able to limp back to port are also common.

In between the wars virtually every capital ship was fitted with anti-torpedo bulges, which sufficiently added to the chances of a ship surviving multiple torpedo hits.

I find that torpedo and bomb damage are accurate enough in Pacific War, even in regards to damage, as, whenever there is a major fleet battle ships do sink, and in droves. Having ships sinking at every torpedo hit is not accurate and will overrate the potency of these weapons.

I agree with Major Tom on this issue. Torpedoes were certainly bad news, but shouldn't result in the instant death of any ship hit. The battlewagons at Pearl are perfect examples. They were pretty much unzipped that Sunday, Tennessee (if I remember right) being completely undone for an inspection. Arizona wasn't sunk by a torpedo, I believe the bomb in the forward magazine took care of that. Oklahoma was sunk by torpedoes, but only because they were unzipped when they were hit, were never able to establish condition Zeb, and were unable to counterflood fast enough. In all the PacWar games that I have played, the attack on Pearl is usually devastating enough that I have to take on the historical tactics of delay and counterpunch while waiting for additional resources.

As far as the Guadalcanal battles, with the exception of Savo Island, they were pretty much toe to toe slugging matches. Best crews and weapons win. My PacWar games reflect this quite well. I have lost many CA/CL's to the Tokyo express due to Long Lance torpedoes. No complaint there. My usual early game challenge is to keep the Houston from trying to intercept that invasion force in the Phillipine Islands on turn 1 (can't count the times that Japanese CL has put a torpedo into the Houston).

Remember, it took over thirty bomb and torpedo hits to put Mushashi away, and even then, a credible effort was made to beach her and make her a shore battery. No idea how many bomb/torpedo hits it took to put Yamato down, but I bet it was on the order of the thirty it took for Mushashi. Shinano was an anomaly, getting hit on her shakedown cruise.

Your cruisers must be doing better than mine. A Long Lance hit on one of mine usually results in a sinking or a flaming hulk I have to somehow get back to a serious shipyard for repairs.

Tests so far have been very positive and airpower is truely the scourage that it was historically. On a side note i also increased the bomb warheads by 1.5 x Here the issue is more in doubt. I think the 1% rule once again makes things a little too durable as you see ships, battleships included shrugging litterally dozens of 500ILB bomb hits without major damage. In the BB's case there could be a case made as most of the moderns were designed with 1000 pounders in mind.
[/B]

If I remember correctly the there were not enough bombs for the dive bomber for the attack so the Japanese used 14" armour piercing shells (250Kg) for bombs. So the effect of the bombs should be equal to a ship being hit by a plunging shot from a 14" gun.

Gotta disagree on that.

But let me clarify my point. I'm not saying that torpedoes should be "uber-weapons" that sink on contact.

Not at all.

What i'm saying is that torpedoes dont "penetrate" often enough and cause any signifigant damage. Remember the rulebook says any non-penetrating hit only causes 1% damage. Thats going to be a 'very' rare happenstance where torpedoes are concerned

Also, the Type 93 Long Lance 'is' indeed a partial exception to this concern. Its warhead strength is high enough to often cause serious damage. However the rest of the torps, especially the air launched torps and the Mk-13, have scant chance of penetrating a BB's thick all-encompasing armor rating and often have troubles with CA and modern CL's as well.

Also, i must point out that just because a torp "penetrates" does'nt mean the ship will be crippled or have a 'critical' hit scored. A penetration i've found on average produces a '*' or '**' to appear which translates as moderate damage (probably 10-20%)

If it does'nt penetrate its a meesly 1% and all BB's and some CA's can act like Yamatos

The Guadalcanal examples:

Away from sources but correct me if i'm wrong, all the US CA's and CL's that survived, they were hit by 'one' torpedo i believe and in many of their cases whole bows were blown off.

The Northhampton(?) which was sunk was struck by only two torps and went down after being crippled.

The Yamato and Musashi are extreme examples of BB's being able to take punishment, yes they could take between 11 - 19 torpedo hits but they were nearly 70,000 ton monsters with a beam in excess of 100 feet. Even so after such hits, progressive flooding sank them.

In PW, unless a critical hit is scored, or unless on is using a LL, they will all be able to take such hits and some wont even be much past 50%. Dont believe me? Play out the Historical first move a few times and count the number of torps.

Yes it is true that the PH victims were caught unprepared and yes it is true that many TDS type systems were devised to counter the threat, including bulges, however most analysis of torpedo hits usually showed that most of the systems failed in one form or another. The cases where the TDS suceeded fully are far more rare than seen in the game.

Repulse, despite being bulged sank very quickly after being struck by only 5 torpedoes and from the book which chronicled the 12/10 sinkings the captain of the ship knew from the get-go as soon as his ship was struck by the five that she would sink and immediately ordered Abandon ship.

Prince of Wales, even without the crippling A Bracket hit would have been in hard way after a similar number given that it was discovered that the size of her wing compartments were not of sufficient size to fullfill the hopes of withstanding a 1000ILB charge*

(*-at its best location)

Nevada's TDS failed because though the elastic torpedo bulkheads preformed as expected, due to their being forced back, their Watertightness was compromised. In fact only the more numerous TDS bulkheads of the California succeeded in keeping the adjacent fire rooms dry. A rare occurance.

Bulges did'nt save the Barham from being sunk by a three torpedo strike.

Resolution was fairly well damaged by a single French torp

The Taranto raid exposed the serious underwater weakness of the Italian battleships, and those torps were only 18" with a 330ILB charge!

North Carolina was severely damaged by a single torp, the TDS having failed, fortunately the hit was forward enough and US BB's of stout enough construction to make it back home without undue difficulty.

The new Houston was crippled by a single air lauched torp, photo of the hit once she dry-docked was a very dramatic example of the violence of an explosion underwater.

Again i'm not advocating uber-crippling torps but the game engine unfortunately suffers due to having to give an 'all encompasing' armor and durability rating, a system which does'nt accurately portray the effects not only of torp damage but of progressive flooding as well. I'm hoping War in the Pacific can be more specific
A penetration wont always sink a ship but it will damage it and make the number of 'fish' taken alot less extravogant.

For example some ships had very good protection against cruiser shellfire, but lousy protection against torpedoes (Alaska class, no TDS)


I'm not saying my experiment is perfect either. The only reason i increased the Japanese Type 93 and Sub-torps was out of fairness. Why only increase Allied, American and maybe IJN air-torps? I wanted to preserve the ratio of power between the various types.

So yes, the sub/Type 93 may indeed become a little powerful but i think thats a decent tradeoff compared to grossly ineffective air launched and US torpedos (not counting the dud factor, seperate issue)

I just cannot see adding power to torpedo's and bombs in Pacific War will increase the accuracy of the game. In just about every naval battle that I have whitnessed in the game, casualties are usually in fairly high numbers, especially when torpedo's come into play.

If you watch most battles you will notice that a lot of hits are expended on already 'killed' vessels (ie. those that are just burning hulks). If carriers are included in the TF, then they will invariably take the most hits, even if they are 'killed' by the first hit. Rarely do I see surface TF's get targetted, and when they do (without having CV or MCS TF's to draw away attention) they tend to REALLY suffer.

The HMS Repulse was built in 1916 and was the first of a series of 1930's refits. It did not recieve the best protection upgrades nor watertight integridy. YET, it still managed to completely shrugg off a direct torpedo hit. The next ones hit in succession, which is why Captain Tennent realized his ship would not be salvageable. The Prince of Wales was sunk due to a freak accident. Near misses knocked out power to AA and the pumps, effectively dooming the vessel.

The Barham, like the Repulse, was not heavily modernized like many other vessels in the inter-war period. Sure, lucky hits, like those on the Barham, Ark Royal (it managed to survive numerous torpedo hits), Arizona, etc. can sink a battleship in one hit, yet, there are many other reports to the contrary. The Saratoga was repeatedly hit by torpedo's, yet, was never in risk of sinking. The Ark Royal was sunk because the torpedo hit in the vessel's achillies heel.

Battleships, Cruisers and Carriers can sustain some HEAVY hits without too much damage. The South Dakota (At least one of the SD class) sustained numerous 14" Shell hits by the Kirishima without any real damage in their engagement. Sometimes Destroyers can take on 14" shell hits and come out the victor, other times a single 5" hit will send one under.

Most USN Cruisers sunk at Guadalcanal were lost due to a combination of torpedo's and gunfire, not just single torpedo hits (although the engagement where the Northampton was lost did have the IJN Destroyers just fire torpedo's, but this is more the exception than the rule).

Much earlier there were complaints that Battleship armour was way too weak, letting too many critical hits go by. Most people are content with the way that armour and warheads are presently.

IF you indeed are changing the warhead value, then, in order to compensate you MUST slash the accuracy of all of these weapons. If you claim that one Torpedo can, and will, on average sink a battleship, then the way that the game currently goes, where usually 1 in 4 torpedo's hit, too many vessels will be sunk. Remember, torpedo's were relatively easy to dodge, and air launched torpedo's even more so.

Originally posted by Major Tom:

IF you indeed are changing the warhead value, then, in order to compensate you MUST slash the accuracy of all of these weapons. If you claim that one Torpedo can, and will, on average sink a battleship, then the way that the game currently goes, where usually 1 in 4 torpedo's hit, too many vessels will be sunk. Remember, torpedo's were relatively easy to dodge, and air launched torpedo's even more so.

Again, i am not claiming a single torpedo can sink a BB on average. I'm saying that on average, a torpedo will cause signifigantly more damage per hit with longer lasting consequences than the game engine represents. And again!!! just because the torp "penetrates" does'nt equate to crippling damage. In the PH examples, i re-ran it several times and the large majority of "penetrating" hits were of the '*' and '**' level of penetration which probably knocked a good 10-20% of damage off the ship's overall damage rating. That would track much better with standard torp damage.

Only a few hits scored more critical damage. only about 3 or 4 bomb hits "penetrated" too btw even with the 1.5x on their warhead ratings.

With the exception of a monster like Yamato, on average i would say a BB can be at least crippled by around 3 - 6 torpedoes.

History would seem to bear this out. Excluding Yamato and Musashi, any BB struck by more than 3 torpedoes was either crippled, either directly or indirectly by the effects 'progessive' flooding or outright sunk. In fact i cant recall 'any' BB, outside of Yamato or Musashi that took 3 or more torps and lived. Goeben once struck three mines, but the size/explosive power of the warheads was small i believe

Closet example i can think of would be Littorio, which ate three torps but even there she had to be grounded to prevent her bows sinking any lower than they did.

The Repulse and Barham remain good examples by virtue that their hulls were bulged and that they were of good average size for a BB of around 30,000 tons

I do recall the armor issue surrounding the BB's, if memory serves i believe the chief cause for complaint was in the Historical First Move, where 6-8 BB's were being sunk. People quoted the real attack and stated that only 2 were sunk so there must be a problem.

Reason for the disperity was as and a couple others mentioned the far greater # of torpedo bombers attacking with torps in the game. My experiement might not be perfect but you know there's a problem if 112 Torpedo bombers, averaging 10-20+ hits per BB ar'nt sinking them.

I actually felt the reduced ratings worked better except possibly in terms of the gun damage, there it did seem a little light and was'nt much better than the CA's for some classes. This is why i started fiddling with the warhead ratings instead, this way the gun vs armor ratio is preserved.

The bomb fiddling is less certain. That i admit. Jury is still out on that. While i can see BB's taking numerous hits, again and the modern CA and CL's seem just a tad too resilent to them. I may change those back but i do stand by my asertions that torp damage falls short in the game.

I just watched my Devastators from Lexington and Saratoga wax two Aoba class cruisers. If a Devastator can kill a combatant ship, I can 't see the weapons being underpowered. In all seriousness, if you think that altering the characteristics gives you a better game, go nuts. I still think the current ratings give close to historical results.

The Atlantic examples don't apply too well to the Pacific, IMO. The ships of the various powers were designed to counter different threats. The Italian's refit of their WWI battlewagons, undersized and armed in the first place, really didn't do a whole lot for their torpedo protection. The threat they were countering was the British battleline more than anything else. How they would have stood up to 15" shells from the QE or R class battleships is a matter of conjecture, but every miniature session I have played usually results in a win for the Royal Navy. Even if the RN battlecruisers are used instead of the battleships. As far as the British go, their torpedo protection has historically been questionable and their internal compartmentalization incomplete. Why the country that built some of the toughest aircraft carriers afloat also built battleships that seem to disintegrate when hit by torpedo is a mystery to me. Barham, Royal Oak, Queen Elizabeth (not sure if that was Barham or Malaya that was also hurt by the Italian frogmen) sure present some fascinating questions. Repulse and Prince of Wales has been covered by MT.

In the Pacific, the modern battlewagons should shrug off torpedo hits pretty much as they do in my experience. If you want to argue that the older ships should be penalized, I might agree, but I don't know how you would do that in PW.

HMS Repulse, modernized in 1936, did NOT have anything of a modern compartmenalization system of battleships built or refitted in the late 1930's, with the lessons learned by Repulse's modernization. Even still, the Repulse took a direct air-torpedo hit from a Nell, and shrugged it off, the next hit damaged the ship's steering, which caused the next 3 hits in quick order. The Repulse, probably the worst protected capital ship in the British navy not only took 5 torpedo hits to sink, but, was not even phased by the first hit.

Unfortunately, we are not posting as to WHERE these torpedo's hit in order to give this superficial damage, or critical hits, either in our repeats of history, and neither does the game. Many ships that are just damaged by torpedo's get hit in un-critical areas, others get nailed in their only weak spot.

In the game, we do not know wether or not a torpedo that did no critical damage hit the bow of the vessel, causing damage that was not critical and easily contained, or, was denuded by the anti-torpedo bulges, or easily contained in a compartment. We cannot assume that every torpedo hit, hits dead centre on the vessel. Most hit in areas that were best suited to take a torpedo hit (the bow and stern), as, ships try and turn into torpedo's when they are being targetted.

The Barham, in actuality, was modernized in the late 1920's, and didn't even benefit from what remodling that the Repulse had. Plus, we don't know exactly where the torpedo hit, but, I have seen the actual footage of the sinking of the Barham (which was pretty darned impressive!) and it looks like it flooded a magazine (as it blew up soon after it was hit). When you continue moving a ship at speed after it has been hit by a torpedo it will cause further damage. Most of the reports, especially from Admiral Cunningham (TF commander), state that the sinking was a total suprise, and they didn't even notice a torpedo struck the vessel.

Most 'treaty', 1936, battleships were from 35 000 to 40 000 t. Tonnage does not also guaranty durability. Sometimes it can be a hinderance. Much tonnage can be spent on weaponry (ie. extra AA) which do nothing for the stability or durability of the vessel.

The Malaya was not sunk by a torpedo, neither was the Queen Elizabeth. The Valiant and Queen Elizabeth were sunk in Alexandrea harbour by a group of Italian Frogmen. These charges were placed on the very BOTTOM of these vessels, avoiding the armour all together. Plus, they had the ability to place these things at the weakest points on the vessel, with probably more explosive power than an average torpedo can carry. Even still, both ships were quickly relatively quickly repaired (faster than any USN battleship sunk at Pearl Harbour).

Sure, some people quoted that only 2 were sunk, but, in reality, only 5 were sunk, not 8. I notice that in PW, when you are up against torpedo's you are in for some trouble. Either from aircraft or from surface vessels, when a torpedo scores a hit, there is a good chance that it will cause some damage.

Also, I did some research, and I found that the current ratings for warhead damage for all weapons is based on the TNT charge of the shell/warhead. It is VERY accurate for both guns and torpedo's when you compare the numbers to the PW numbers. I tried modifying things, such as damage and accuracy, but, they just turned into something that killed things when they hit, which isn't true.

What we do not necessarily know about historical sinkings by torpedo's is where exactly these torpedo's hit, and in what order. 2 torpedo's, hitting the exact same area will cause a hell of a lot more damage than 3 torpedo's spread out around a vessel. Wether or not a torpedo hit in the best or worst place a torpedo could hit a vessel is also improtant. When the HMS Ark Royal was finally sunk (after numerous attempts and hits) by ONE torpedo, it was stated that if it would of hit ANYWHERE else it would have been guaranteed that the ship would of survived. Unfortunately, it hit in the boiler area which deprived the pumps of power, dooming the ship. The same unlucky hit and near hits happened on the Prince of Wales. All critical and non-critical hits are abstracted in Pacific War. We do not know the details of the hit. Sometimes I have had a battleship sink by one 250kg bomb hit, other times the same ship shruggs off 3 Long Lance torpedo's. According to most people, the randomness of ship sinkings due to weapons is fairly accurate.

Hi Major Tom, my point about Malaya and Queen Elizabeth was more about how their internal compartmentalization seemed to fail. Note that the Tirpitz which was hit by a much larger charge, a ground mine laid by an Xcraft, didn't sink. Though the shafts and steering gear were never the same after that.

I think that PW models torpedos pretty well. My only beef is that aerial torpedos hit "agile" targets a bit too often. That's probably more sour grapes from watching multiple CA/CL/DD tf's get wiped out by Bettys than any historical gripe.

Yeah, that is the one reason that I would not like to see Torpedo's increased in warhead. However, do whatever you want with your own OBC, possibly it IS the correct way on modeling Torpedo's?

One thing that I notice, is that air-torpedo's tend to hit a lot. A lot more than they really did. Possibly increasing the warhead slightly (maybe just 1.2?) and decreasing the accuracy of the torpedo's would be better, eh? Hopefully the more manuverable ships will be too hard to hit then?

Originally posted by Nikademus:
With the exception of a monster like Yamato, on average i would say a BB can be at least crippled by around 3 - 6 torpedoes.

History would seem to bear this out. Excluding Yamato and Musashi, any BB struck by more than 3 torpedoes was either crippled, either directly or indirectly by the effects 'progessive' flooding or outright sunk. In fact i cant recall 'any' BB, outside of Yamato or Musashi that took 3 or more torps and lived. Goeben once struck three mines, but the size/explosive power of the warheads was small i believe

Closet example i can think of would be Littorio, which ate three torps but even there she had to be grounded to prevent her bows sinking any lower than they did.

A very interesting discussion.

If I may I would like to throw in my novice two cents.

There have been listed many examples of large capitol ships sinking after one or two hits.

On the other end of the spectrum I could list the Laffey, Franklin, Boston and Ledford.

These ships took hits (both in numbers and types) that one would have thought would have sunk the hardesty of BB's. Yet they stayed afloat and were all brought back into fighting trim. (alas with about the same amount of time as a new construction unit would have taken)

My point is that there are example on either end of the spectrum. In the final result, I think that the current numbers come pretty close to what would have been in actual combat; given the wide variations in crew training, damage control ability and so on.

After all, the USN underwent a MAJOR new training effort in DC after the hearing on Pearl Harbor. And by 43 its effects should be worth a few points in ship traits. :p And the practice continues today. I mean my DC training was so realistic that we always had minor burns and cuts after a round in the trainers.

Well, those are my thoughts. Not very scientific; mostly anecdotal observation. I mean I have VERY little factual data to base my ideas upon, just "feeling" But I find this a very interesting discussion. Perhaps, in the new game being developed, training should be a factor in naval units. As an example I could site the Italians. They probably had the best designed and built combat ships in the world but the crews were not up to the ships standards. Just an observation.

Originally posted by Major Tom:
HMS Repulse, modernized in 1936, did NOT have anything of a modern compartmenalization system of battleships built or refitted in the late 1930's, with the lessons learned by Repulse's modernization. Even still, the Repulse took a direct air-torpedo hit from a Nell, and shrugged it off, the next hit damaged the ship's steering, which caused the next 3 hits in quick order. The Repulse, probably the worst protected capital ship in the British navy not only took 5 torpedo hits to sink, but, was not even phased by the first hit.

Unfortunately, we are not posting as to WHERE these torpedo's hit in order to give this superficial damage, or critical hits, either in our repeats of history, and neither does the game. Many ships that are just damaged by torpedo's get hit in un-critical areas, others get nailed in their only weak spot.

.

It is true that the Repulse did not benefit from from as exentensive a compartmentalization as other ships classes, namly the German WWI designs and later the US Turbo electric driven BB's. She was however bulged and when talking torpedoes you are invariably talking hits *below the armor* of the ship, in which case Repulse's being labeled as the "weakest" ship do not carry full weight. One could argue lack of beam. That is valid, however i think any BB, short of Yamato class that takes 5 torps in quick succession is going to be in a world of hurt

I submit again, anyone to give me an example of a BB, Yamato and Musashi excluded, which suffered more than 3 torpedo hits at sea and either lived in some operational status without being crippled, or was not outright sunk. You wont find one. Does this mean that all should be crippled by two or three hits? No. But they should'nt routinely be able to take ***12*** and be only around 50% damaged.

I realize the game cant tell us 'where' the hit is scored but please, are we to assume that most of these non-penetrating hits are always hitting near the stern or bow stem?
A good preportion of the hits will fall closer to the middle and here you are talking on average a hole of between 10-30 feet by 5 to 12 feet being blown in a ship's side. A good TDS might keep the internals safe, but they are rare. I would have high confidence of Tennessee class since California took two torps and retained her WT integrity on the 5th elastic Torpedo bulkhead in both cases, but Nevada, having only three, did not. The bulkhead worked as expected, but because it was forced back, there was some seperation between deck and bulkhead joints which allowed water to enter the boiler room.

In WWI any German battleship, with the exeption of Seydlitz, struck by a torpedo hightailed it back to harbor, sometimes in difficulty, other times not. Here, during this period of time we probably have the best
chance of a ship taking five or more torpedos and not sinking, due to sub-compartmentation, anti-torpedo bulkhead and the initally weak charges of the torps.

By WWII however, with the exception of the British Fleet Air Arm, torpedoes were much deadlier.

Bismarck is a good example, yet also a good example of the point i'm trying to make. She shrugged off three hits initially. There was a reason, the torps were weak and they hit the armor belt. More often than not a torp will hit below the armor belt.
Make her take 6 - 8 torpedoes and the issue is in much greater doubt.


Prince of Wales, a 40000 ton ship, despite her sub-compartmentation, would never be able to take 12 torpedo hits and live. They even proved that her wing sandwich compartments were too small to absorb the blast effect and would not have remained WT.

South Dakota and Iowa had flawed TDS systems, both because the TDS was connected at the top to the internal belt, cassion tests postwar proved that it would not have remained WT. (Yamato had the same problem only worse since her bulkhead was more rigid and brittle....a torp in 43 i believe showed that with the bulkhead failing and causing the #3 main armament shellroom to flood....again 'one' torpedo)

Kongo was blown out of the water by between two - four torpedo hits (probably four)

and the battleship Fuso was blown in half by four torpedo hits.

Cavour sank after one

Littorio would have sunk in all likelihood after three.

The examples of some form of signifigant damage far outweigh the 'theoretical' mussings of the engineers who designed the treaty BB's

Going back to Prince of Wales, her designers envisioned the ship being able to retain some measure of stability (under the best possible circumstances, and before i might add, it as proven her wing compartments were too small) after taking six torpedoes on one side. Thats alot smaller number than the # of hits you will see in the Historical first move of Pearl Harbor and she was a 40000 ton modern, with a TDS designed to "resist" a 1000ILB charge at its optimum point.

My arguments here are not for uber-torps. Let me once more emphasis that. My argument is that a torp, when it hits should cause some signifigant level of damage (light, moderate, severe) more often than it does in the game, where unless being struck by Type 93's, will often not penetrate and cause maybe 1% of damage)

If a Battleship could 'routinely' take more than a half dozen torpedo hits and live, the BB would not have been made obsolete by carrier aircraft.....aircraft of which the main ship killer were the torpedo carrying planes.

As for other ship types. I agree. Often CL and even DD type ships could take tremendous punishment that belied their small stature and lack of armor. However were still not talking a dozen or more torpedo hits. Most of those examples were above WL type hits (Laffey)

Superb damage control got the Houston home but had she been struck by a 2nd torpedo the ship would undoubtedly have been abandoned and lost.

ah. I did just remember yet one last example. USS Chicago. Took a total of six ariel torpedos and eventually sank. A good case of durability, but her example should be the *exception*, not the rule.

As things stand right now, the rule is that ships are extremely durable against most of the torps in the game.

I'm four months into the test so far and i can say that not 'every' torpedo that has struck a ship, BB, CA, or even CL as penetrated and certainly not every ship has sunk. However, the ratio of damage to hits seems much more in line with historical events.

An Illustrious carrier was sank by 6 torpedo hits eventually (only two led to the sinking of Ark Royal)

Hermes was badly damaged by three torps, but ate seven more before surcombing.

A london class CA took one torp and suffered moderate damage (15 - 25%)

Observing the Submarine campaign. 85% of MCS ships are sinking with one hit. and only about 70% of the TK class (Mark 13)

Type 93 has not been tested yet. Here yes, the issue is more in doubt as their warheads were of adequate strength but i felt it unfair to only single out several and wished to retain their ratio of strength.

The issue of too many torp hits from bombers may be valid and might be the better answer to claims of disperity. However i'm only seeing decent levels of hits from the 90+ exp Japanese planes. And this in low/moderate flak environments. Once the Flak ratings start skyrocketing, the # of hits starts to go down dramatically.

Durability may need to be raised with the CV and DD types. but that remains in the future.

I have to agree with Nikademus' points. I too feel the torps are too weak in Pacwar. I've seen my subs hit TKs 4-5 times before they sink. Thats ridiculous, especially if you consider that most of them have holds full of oil, gas, or what have you... The Flasher, Barb, Rasher, and other US subs routinely sank TKs with one solid hit. Most often, those ships exploded and very little was left. While I can see how a BB might take multiple hits (and I think arguments can be made for both sides) there is NO way a TK or MCS can take more than 2. That alone justifies increasing torp power to some extent.
On another note, I have not found my aircraft to be making an excessive amount of torp hits in attacks. If anything, they've been missing more often than not. (I'm talking about CV air w/ 80%+ experience) I wouldn't tweak the accuracy of the planes, since historically, air-dropped torps were fairly easily avoided.
In summary, I think the torps should be a little more powerful. I've found most of my naval kills come from dive bombers anyways, but when a torp hits, it should hurt...

Originally posted by Major Tom:
Also, I did some research, and I found that the current ratings for warhead damage for all weapons is based on the TNT charge of the shell/warhead. It is VERY accurate for both guns and torpedo's when you compare the numbers to the PW numbers. I tried modifying things, such as damage and accuracy, but, they just turned into something that killed things when they hit, which isn't true.

.

Thats good info to have. The problem then remains in the limitation of the game only allowing a ship class to have a singular all-encompasing "armor" rating. I can tell you from many a game played that the random number that the armor gets multiplied by to determine the armor rating at the time of the torpedo strike does'nt work well enough.

Invariabley a high or even moderate armor rating will defeat the warhead of the torpedo in question and lead to a pausley 1% damage, which is totally unrealistic for a weapon that in most cases will hit below the armor belt and blow a good sized hole in the target vessel.

Progressive flooding is an insidious adversary and one that has plauged the battleship in particular from the first days that the locomotive torpedo was invented.

I'm currently experimenting with a 1.5x warhead OOB to see how it stands up.

Nikademus, I agree with what you are saying, by and large. In fact, upgrading torpedo strength was one of the first things that was discussed on the old Compuserve boards when this game came out. Torpedoes didn't often hit (at least, air-launched and surfaced-launched ones didn't), but they did damage when they did hit. While some ships did manage to keep going after even a single torpedo hit, whis was rare (even for a battleship). In most cases, a single torpedo hit was a mission-kill even when it wasn't a ship kill. And it often was a ship kill.

Merchant shipping was especially vulnerable to underwater damage since they didn't have crews big enough to deal with major underwater damage, and they were built to be as accessable as possible. The exception to this (sorry, Madflava13) were the tankers, which were naturally compartmented and full of bouyant stuff. Provided they didn't burst into flames (rare), and their engines weren't knocked out by the shock (also rare), they could keep going after even a couple of hits (recalling some tankers in the IO here as well as the relief attempts around Malta). I think that reduced durability numbers for merships are also something I want to see. Two bombs should put most of them out of action, again because they lacked the numbers needed for dmage control.

Perhaps a reduction of accuracy and an increase in warhead would make torpedoes more realistic - hard to hit with, but deadly when they did hit. That would retain the overall kill numbers that people seem happy with, but make the battle results more palatable as well (though MT's comment about the numbers of torps wasted on flamers is also a good one, and maybe this idea wouldn't work for that reason).