IJN Long Lance Torps

[DM]

A single normal reroll is still way too high based on historical attacks,

True, but this is in part countered by the damage model, which isn't exactly ideal

 

[MektonZero]

A single normal reroll is still way too high based on historical attacks,

True, but this is in part countered by the damage model, which isn't exactly ideal

I think the damage model isn't that bad. Historically, 6 out of 8 Light Cruisers and 7 out of 7 Heavy Cruisers were still afloat and firing after a single Long Lance hit. 1 Heavy Cruiser took two hits and survived.

Battle of the Java Sea - CL De Ruyter sunk in about 3 hours with nearly all hands after a single hit. CL Java sunk after a single hit with nearly all hands.

Battle of the Sunda Strait - CA Houston took a hit and went down fighting, 50 or so 8" and 5" hits later it sank; in return it damaged another four ships after the hit. CL Perth took a hit and lost some speed but continued to fight until it took another torpedo hit a short while later.

Battle of Savo Island - CA Quincy took a hit and then still managed to put a shell into a chart room only 20 feet from Admiral Mikawa. She continued to fire for another 6 minutes before taking another torpedo hit. CA Vincennes took two torpedo hits and continued firing for 8 more minutes, being hit by gunfire dozens times before being hit by another torpedo which sank her. CA Chicago took a hit, kept fighting and was repaired.

Battle of Guadalcanal - CL Juneau took a hit which crippled her, on her way back for repairs at 13 knots she was torpedoed by a sub which sank her. CL Atlanta took a hit and lost power and in the darkness drifted in front of San Francisco which promptly put nineteen 8" shells into her. Despite the pounding she survived the battle with several working gun mounts (one of which drove off an attacking aircraft on the way home), she continued to take on water during the tow and had to be scuttled. CA Portland took a hit which blew off the inboard propellers and jammed the rudder 5 degrees to starboard, despite having to steam in a circle she battered the battleship Hiei, starting several fires and sank the crippled destroyer Yadachi. She was towed to port, the steering fixed and she went on to be fully repaired.

Battle of Tassafaronga - CA Minneapolis was nearly blown out of the water by two hits, a big chunk of the bow was gone and two firerooms were open to the sea. She made it to Tulagi and with some makeshift repairs returned home for full repairs. CA New Orleans had 150 feet of her bow blown off by a magazine explosion from a hit, the severed bow spun around as it sank, punching several more holes in the hull and damaging a propeller. Despite the damage from the flooding and fires (the forward magazine blew), she managed to return home to be fully repaired. CL Pensacola took a hit midships, had an oil bunker rupture and had the #3 turret magazine explode. Despite the damage, she also made Tulagi, where she went on to be fully repaired. CA Northampton took two hits and was immediately knocked out of the fight, sinking three hours later.

Battle of Kula Gulf - CL Helena took 3 hits in a 3 minute period and sunk almost immediately.

Battle of Kolombangara - CL Honolulu took a hit and was repaired. CL St. Louis took a hit to the bow which crumpled 20 feet of her lower bow like tissue paper but didn't seriously affect the fighting ability of the ship other than some minor flooding. HMNZS Leander was crippled but eventually repaired, a low priority she wasn't put in drydock until the war ended.

 

[DM]

Its not too bad for cruisers. Gets more cranky against battleships

 

[MektonZero]

Its not too bad for cruisers. Gets more cranky against battleships

Can't really complain against the historical record given that the Japanese never managed to put a Long Lance torpedo into a Battleship.

Attacks against ships in dock, especially at Pearl Harbor, aren't representative; the crews usually weren't expecting a surprise attack, limiting damage control efforts and watertight integrity was quite likely compromised. At the Battle of Taranto, the Italians were sure (as was everyone but the British apparently ), that you couldn't launch air dropped torpedoes in 35 feet of water. Conditions like that would magnify the effects of every hit, even to the point where a small bomb can destroy a battleship like the Arizona due to an open hatch.

Still, we can look at other incidents.

Yamato seems about right. 23 dive bomb hits, 1/3 of the damage dice would penetrate armor (super AP vs Armored Deck w/ Armor Value 6) x 3 damage dice each. 23 damage and 4 critical hits (average). 10 Torpedo hits deliberately made to the bow and stern to avoid the thickest belt armor, 1/3 of the 40 damage dice would penetrate (AP vs Armor 6), 13 damage and 2 more critical hits (average). Torpedo criticals average about 2 damage points each. 23 + 13 + (6 x 2) = 48 damage. It would only take a little bit of luck to have caused those extra 6 points of damage needed to sink it.

USS Carolina took a torpedo from the spread which hit USS Wasp (see below), within 5 minutes she righted the 5 degree list and was still in formation at 26 knots, little the worse for the incident.

Might as well take a look at carriers as well, although most of the damage is combined with bomb hits.

USS Hornet took 4 bomb hits and 3 torpedo hits (not to mention having 2 divebombers crash into the deck), roughly 14 damage and a couple of criticals before being ordered abandoned and ordered sunk by the US Destroyers Mustin and Anderson. 9 US torpedo hits and 400 hits from 5" shells and she was still afloat when the Japanese chased the US destroyers trying to scuttle her off. Four more torpedoes later and she sank.

USS Lexington took 3 bombs and 2 torpedoes, producing a 7 degree list. 100 minutes later she was on an even keel and making 25 knots, preparing to recover her air group. An internal gas vapor explosion started a fire which eventually sank her but she certainly survived the initial damage in good order.

USS Wasp took three torpedoes from a Japanese submarine, hitting fuel bunkers and magazines. Internal fires and explosions eventually sank the ship.

USS Yorktown took 3 hits from dive bombers, recovered enough to make 20 knots, then took two more hits from torpedo bombers; despite believing the damage to be mortal, salvage operations began and while being towed to port she was attacked by a submarine, taking two torpedo hits. She didn't actually sink for two more days.

Looking over the historical record, about the only change I feel needs to be made is that fires should have a chance of causing more critical hits. Several capital ships, including Yamato, saw fire reach a magazine with catastrophic results.

 

[DM]

Good choice of examples (not all entirely accurate, but good)

Conversely,

Ark Royal - sunk by a single hit
Barham - crippled by 1 torpedo (multiple "critical hits")
Resolution - crippled by 1 torpedo (as above)
Barham again - sunk by 4 torpedoes
Courageous - sunk by 2 torpedoes
Eagle - sunk by 4 torpedoes
Indomitable - crippled by 1 torpedo
Prince of Wales - sunk by 7 torpedoes
.
.
.
.
and these are only summaries from the first 40 pages of only the RN official damage records (if I had time I'd go through the US and GErman but to be honest I don't have the time as I'm catching up with BSG at the moment )

Its relatively easy to find cases where the damage model can be made to fit (often by the judicious use of criticals - ). What is harder to track down are historical examples that mirror what is often seen in games where a battleship takes 20 or more torpedo hits and, by virtue of its "armour" manages to shrug off the damage and continue on its way.

I've looked long and hard at the damage model and I believe it is too lenient i its application of damage. I've tried with treating all ships as Armour 2+ against torpedoes and that helps, as does inflicting an automatic critical hit for each torpedo that hits. That helps too

 

[Soulmage]

I've looked long and hard at the damage model and I believe it is too lenient i its application of damage. I've tried with treating all ships as Armour 2+ against torpedoes and that helps, as does inflicting an automatic critical hit for each torpedo that hits. That helps too

But making torpedoes that effective is at odds with how effective they were historically as I understand it.

Maybe if you had to roll two or 3 consecutive 6s to hit or something? Otherwise, implementing those rules makes torpedoes uber-killer weapons. . . which they weren't as I understand it.

 

[MektonZero]

I've looked long and hard at the damage model and I believe it is too lenient i its application of damage. I've tried with treating all ships as Armour 2+ against torpedoes and that helps, as does inflicting an automatic critical hit for each torpedo that hits. That helps too

It seems weird that such a good match to historical cruiser hits is so poor at modeling damage to battleships. But the game scale plays into it as well, take Ark Royal for example. It took a torpedo hit and they didn't abandon ship for 11 hours, in game terms it could have gone right on fighting despite the hit.

One simple change would be to alter the critical hit resolution. Instead of 2d6 and rerolling one die, just make it 1d6+6. On the roll on the sub chart, add +1 to the die roll, with a 7 being treated as a 6. Now the chance of an outright sinking drops to 1 in 18 for each torpedo critical.

No one would casually ignore torpedo attacks anymore.

 

[DM]

The reason is the armour issue - the model relates armour thickness with the ability to resist torpedo damae, which is inappropriate. Defence against underwater attack comes by virtue of size, subdivision and (in the ase of ome ships) side protection systems which can absorb amage to some degree. Armour doesn't enter into it (in fact in some cases the presence of thick and heavy armour an actually compromise a ships ability to withstand underwater attack. One of the reasons why the current model works better against "thin" ships than armoured ones is simply because the armour values are more reasoably low.

take Ark Royal for example. It took a torpedo hit and they didn't abandon ship for 11 hours, in game terms it could have gone right on fighting despite the hit.

..except that the flight deck was out of limits for flight ops and she'd lost all power within a fewminutes of the attack (the damage report states "immediately") so in game terms she was mission killed straight away.