Casemate / Stringers Rule Discussion

Well overall I have the changes done and have / will comply with the rule. I want to battle and have fun and do let the rules talk get my goat from time to time. I try to remember that battling the boats is fun and getting out to the pond to catch up with friends I have made in the hobby. I keep saying something to myself (A wise man told me about it) that helps to calm me in such discussions.. what is that called? A mantra? I just say to myself over and over... Toy Boats... Toy Boats.. Toy Boats.. then it all comes into perspective.

MY 3 year plan is to take my casement bristled Baden and become the bane of the Allied Fleet. AXIS4PEAT!!

 

I will follow the rules too, but I wont be finishing my Bayern either. Its just not fun to have rebuild my superstructure and structurally weaken the hull that much just to have to patch a ton of tiny, hard to get at pieces of superstructure and still be just shy of making 26 seconds. As a rough equivalent to the QE class, the Baden is no longer a good choice for the axis.

I think the new rules overall clear up a lot of ambiguity, but they leave the Baden and Konig classes in a bad position

 

I wholeheartedly disagree and would build a Baden in a heart beat were there not so many on the water already. If you are structurally weakening the hull that much then you should probably investigate some other construction methods. Built right the ship is still a rockstar!
Das Butts

 

@Mike Kaiser Willy would have loved to have as many Baden's as there are in the hobby.

@Tug ROCK ON!

 

Calling drama queen because you disagree with my saying why I don't want to finish a Baden, real grown up. If you disagree with my structural analysis fine, we are all entitled to our opinions. Or is the issue that no dissenting opinion is allowed on your favorite ship? I personally like the Baden class, but not under the current rules.

As to the weakening issue. The cut outs are not an issue structurally (and if they were to become so you have bigger issues as a builder). The reduced area for the subdeck to bond to the hull however does make that joint much more likely to come loose, and it is the subdeck that keeps the boat from tacoing. That would be a structural issue in my mind. Yes there are several ways around that but they involve more work. So again the ship just isn't worth the effort to me when there are other choices available. For those of you who want to build one, go for it. I didn't say she couldn't be a good boat for someone. Not everyone wants an NC or Badenlicious no matter how cool someone else thinks they might be and that is one of the things that make this hobby fun.

 

Not to derail this thread, but my Baden is 10 years old. When I built her, the only other one in the hobby was Herr Fluegel's.
One of my favorite instances was while waiting for her first battle back home in Florida. Tim K and I were just fooling around on the pond, he was trying to get up alongside, and I kept spinning the boat to keep stern on. Baden was rotating in the water on her Bruno turret. Tim finally gave up and said "That's just WRONG how well that thing turns". I've treasured that comment for years.

 

I also agree.. building a new baden.. not a bid deal you can design around it. An older ship that was already built and already heavy was harder to do. As a result a thin deck at the hulls edge, that was the main difference.

In the end I made a rib and used it to support the sub-deck. It worked as far as holding the subdeck together but this ship already needed a new subdeck so that will happen in the future.

 

The overall 'ship count' is interesting.. if you think about it. I have traveled to regional's and Nats the last few years and I have been the only Baden around.. and at Nats just Fluegal and myself. I think Region3 added a few recently but I guess having a large number of ships on the water depends on where you are.

For my purposes I use Nats as the 'count', regional events are usually flag / no flag so it doesn't really matter what ship you have it will all be mixed up anyway and they would spread the slow ships around.

Now back to your regularly scheduled topic...

 

Yes, I'm "bumping" this thread.

Clarification of definitions:
Hull: That portion of the ship below the lowest weather deck at any point along the length of the ship. When the lowest weather deck steps down, so does the hull, by definition.
Weather Deck: Any horizontal surface of the ship that is exposed to the weather and is designed to be walked upon (i.e. "DECK")
Casement: A primary or secondary gun not mounted in a turret, but instead mounted in a sponson in the side of a vertical surface (either the hull or a superstructure). To determine if the casement is hull-mounted (and thereby required to meet penetrability requirements), see definition of Hull and Weather Decks.
Bulge: Anti-torpedo structures added to the outside of the ships primary hull. Despite increasing the beam of the ship, the entire bulge, including the topmost portion that may approach horizontal, is considered hull.
Armor Belt: Thickened areas of hull where additional armor plate was either built in or added to the hull.
Superstructure: Any structure on a ship on or above the lowest weather deck.

CHALLENGE: I invite any who read this to point out where these clarifications need modifying or are ambiguous.
CHALLENGE 2: I invite any to bring up particular ships and address how these definitions would effect them (for better or worse).

 

I would like to bring up my Radetzky then. It is the predecessor of the Viribus Unitas. It has a very similar hull shape to the VU. I am trying to see if I get the 1/8" stringer between the forward and aft casemate steps.
On the fiberglass hull itself the widest point is near the waterline and it tapers in ever so slightly toward the casemate deck. At the bottom of the casemate it creases ever so slightly and the hull turns straight vertical. On all pictures and scale models I can find there are torpedo nets and it is hard to tell if at that "crease" point if there is the top of an armor belt. In most pictures below the waterline it appears there is one with the top of it undefined. With the wood board that connected the top of torpedo nets it makes it very difficult to see. It is obvious that the areas outboard of the pink lines on the drawing below are for casemates. They just continued the side of the hull up and made it smooth instead of giving it a defined step. The question of the hour for me is, Do I get the stringer to connect the bottom of all those casemate windows? A thing to consider is that if the 1/8" stringer goes immediately under the cupola/ window then there is only 1/8" between that stringer and the caprail. My thought was that I should get the stringer however, I should move it down to create a minimum gap of ??? (3/16"?) between it and the caprail.
Das Butts

 

Hi DB,

An easy way to identify armor belts from photos (and some drawings) is to look for where the portholes stop. Also, on most ships that have visible armor belts, they extend from just aft of the aftermost main gun barbette to just forward of the most forward barbette. The area between these was the critical area, with magazines, engine / boilers, etc.
All that said, from the best drawings and pics I can find, Rad's belt was continued up between the casements to deck level, giving that smooth line you mention. Since the purpose of the allowed "armor belt stringer" is to allow for a step in the hull, you would not get one in the questioned area.
What I find ludicrous though (and thank you for illustrating my point so effectively!) is that under the current rules, your deckhouse between the funnels (where the two casement guns are) is also defined as hull and must be penetrable.
Now, I'm all for having fun and making it fair to everyone, but do any allied drivers honestly feel that they should score points for putting a bb between those two casements? If that's the case, look at the first pics of my Baden refit. Do you think the allied driver that put that hole in the top of my funnel should have gotten credit for that hit too?
All I'm asking is that the effort to make the rules understandable and fair don't become an ironbound, inflexible dogma that doesn't allow for common sense. Common sense would say that the area between the hull casements on Rad be penetrable, but the 2nd level ones are defined as Superstructure and can be inpenetrable.

 

The 2nd level structure with casement guns on Rad start on the weather deck just behind the A turret well past the 1/2" line. Since it starts above the weather deck it's not part of the hull. Kind of like the Derflinger's casement level or the Strausbergs 1st level of superstructure or the hangers on the US 10k ton cruisers. The I-boats also have casement guns in their super structure. Just having guns that look like casements does not make it hull. Badens casements are under the weather deck at the bow and do not step back 1/2"without returning until closer to the stern. I don't have a print, but it's what people with prints have said. Also the models in our hobby I have seen all had the casements within 1/2" of the edge of the ship.
I do have a print for the Rad. The casements in the middle are all in the 3/8" hard deck. At least the rounded cupola part is and indent for the gun to swing back and forth. The holes for the casements don't go all the way down to the same level as the bow and aft casement level. There's really no structure there to need a stringer. Now the best photos I have seen are of models and computer renderings. Who knows how good those are. I have not seen a photo of the real ship to tell if there is an armor belt or other bump under the casements. If I was building one I would not put in the middle casements or the stringer.

 

Was the intent of the rule change to add penetrable casemate area to the Kaiser, Konig, and Baden classes? All three classes have the same basic deck layout just with different main battery arrangements. If that was the issue, then Baden and the like should have penetrable casemate area. But if the intent was to clarify the rules for ships like the Nagato, then Baden and the like deserve to have a rule exception made as they happened to have an unusual deck layout and as an unintended consequence this rule does weird things to them.

Before the rule change I don't remember anyone saying that Baden's casemates should be penetrable as they are clearly above the hull. I do remember several people saying they are hard targets but that is not the same thing. It is only now after a rule change that was passed in the name of removing ambiguity that people are claiming that Baden needs to have penetrable casemates. So I guess what I am saying is what is so wrong about passing a rule that says:

Exception: On Kaiser, Konig and Baden class ships, all casemates that mounted 5.9" guns aft of "A" turret are considered part of the superstructure.

 

The old casement rule was very short and open to lots of interpretations. The interpretations people took with many ships caused many issues between people. When I went to my first NATS in 02 and had no idea what any of the rules were people were talking about it. Several people tried to get rules pasted, many of them were bad or were shot down by the people who pushed the rules really hard. The new set of rules was worked on for two years. It is specific, going as far as to put diagrams of ships into the book. It pasted by a wide margin of people in the MWC and was good enough for the IRC to copy and pass.
Get a good set of prints for the German ships that show the casements are 1/2"' back and the rule is easy to change.
Do you think if the casements had been molded into the fiberglass hulls this would be an issue? The pain most feel is not for the points it's for the work they have to do on their ship. This hobby is about shooting holes in ships. The more open space the better.

 

Bob I think you missed my point. I am not arguing that the Baden's casemates should be impenetrable under current rules. I am not arguing that the rule is stupid and should be repealed. I am not arguing that the rule wasn't thought over for a goodly amount of time. And I am most certainly not arguing that the old rule was clear. Overall, I do like the current rules for casemates. I really truly do like them, just not how they affect this hull style.

On every other ship I have looked at the current rules work great for casemates, except for three classes of ships. I tried to find ships that it would be unfair or ambiguous and couldn't find any others. Nagato, Kongo, VDT, Moltke, VU, Erin, QE, whatever else work fine under the current rules since they either have casemates mounted along the side of the hull or they have a step that runs the full width of the hull.

However for Bayern, Konig, and Kaiser classes, the current rules add a lot of penetrable area in what was previously considered superstructure since it is above the gunwale (as previously defined or as defined by typical nautical reference-the upper edge of the side of a ship). Now look at pics of Baden, Konig, or, Kaiser, they do not have the typical step deck layout. They have an unusual deck layout in which the upper and lower weather decks both run 3/4 of the length of the ship. None of the other ships have penetrable area directly above a deck that when awash would cause them to be declared sunk. So all this extra penetrable area does is create more above points and more work patching. Even you admitted that the extra work (patching and/or building) isn't exactly fun.

If more holes was good for the hobby then why not make all superstructures penetrable? Oh wait, because it isn't fun to patch that much. I would argue the hobby should be more about sinking ships since that is cool to watch, not putting holes well above the waterline that wont ever make the ship sink.

 

Here is some leg work for you.
Are the Kaiser Konig Bayern the only three classes like this? Check through the whole ship list.
What other ships are close to these three that someone might try to apply a rule for the "German 3" to another class.
Besides a "Free the German 3" rule execption, how would you word a proposed a rule to make the casements that are not 1/2" back on those ships part of the superstructure? Without making it apply to other ships.
For example. If the casements on the German 3 are solid why do the casements on my Iron Duke need to be open?

 

A lot of the IRC Badens are built with the casements being superstructure. Perhaps there is a need for a modification of this rule. Iron Dukes should be included as they are similiar.

 

I haven't worked through the entire list but I am willing to undertake such an en devour. I have looked through all of the popular ships and quite a few others. This is speculation on my part, but I think the German's having wider dry dock's than the British during the great war gave them an option to try something different to keep the casemates dry.

While I generally don't like rule exceptions, unless more ships can be found I would argue it is much better to make a rule exception that clearly states what is intended on a few select ships, than to try to make a rule that changes an otherwise clear rule, possibly causing additional confusion for the rest of the fleet.