Casemate / Stringers Rule Discussion

The ship would be sunk before water is over the casements. As the casement deck sits on the stern/first deck I wouldn't say the casements were level with the stern deck. The sit upon the stern deck and therefore, I believe, are above the stern weather deck.

 

Its a cool picture, no matter what the size.

 

I have never seen that before. Yes if the casements are wet you are sunk, and the picture shows what I was saying, they sit on the stern deck. So if you settle in the water even then all of the midship and stern deck edges would be under water. Therefore the ship would be sunk before water ever covered the casements.

Do you have any more rare pics? Or is that the Bayern? I have searched alot and never seen that one.

 

So why have anything above the line where the ship is considered to be sunk as a penetrable area?
It makes no sense to me.
Since the very concept of the hobby is to inflict damage in order to sink an opponent, any holes above the level required to do this are unneccesary and would only serve to make building the ship more complex and repairing and returning it to service more difficult.
Or would this upset the point-scoring system you have in place?

 

If we went on that logic, then no ship would need penetrable area above the line where it would sink.

 

It is a points thing. Heh. This is after all a game. It is not a scale contest.

Interestingly enough, Treaty lets all casements be hard area since they do not count points, only sinks.

 

Thanks Tug!

The last picture actually confirms a thought I was discussing with Bob. The casements seem to be approx 4-6feet from the edge of the hull. That would make them less than 1/2 inch. Based on the 1 foot per step calculation on the ladder, then compare that to the guy standing on the small deck area between the casement and the edge of the hull, I think its less than 5 feet for sure. If that is the case then the casement would be only 1/4 or less from the edge. In the end it means that I could practically mount the casements on the side of the hull (1/8 off if I use the 1/8 rule) so that they are more or less 'combined' into the edge of the hull. Then I would have only one deck to take off the top and the casements would pretty much be part of the hull. That way I will get easier access to the internals.

1/2 inch would be 6feet from the edge and so 7 foot would be the minimum for escaping the 1/2 rule. I am not sure its 7 foot between the casement deck and the edge of the hull.

 

Got a question for any "old timers" out there.... why was the 6-foot / 1/2" criteria put in in the first place? I'm mulling over how I want to phrase my proposed rule change, and when I try and boil down the fundementals, this sticks out like a sore thumb.

Last time this was mentioned, the reasoning was linked in to "why 24 / 26 /28 seconds" as well. Well, the speed thing works with our scale ships and battling styles. No problem there. Different topic.

Back on topic: What was the purpose of this 1/2" rule? Are there ships where "hull" and "superstructure" aren't a clear enough distinction? My current thought is to write the rule with the definitions I discussed above for deck, super, hull, etc. Then state that if there's a decked area, any structure inboard of it is considered super and is allowed to be inpenatrable. Comments?

 

That photo of the Wurttenburg does has some distortion so I'm not sure how accurate measuring the photo really is. Based on all three sets of plans I have looked at, the casemates are between 4 and 5.5 feet away from the gunwale. The distance varies on which part of the casemate area you take your measurement at as the hull curves around, but most of it is around 5 feet in. Her casemates are definitely not 7 feet from the gunwale. I don't think anyone is trying to argue that under the current rules Bayern's casemates should be solid. The rules are clear, they may or may not be fair, but they are clear.

I agree, there is too much emphasis on making random holes. Watching ships slip under is way cooler than counting holes.

 

That's part of my point... depending on the quality of the photo / drawings / schematics, there's room for doubt or mis-interpretation. Does anyone have any reason not to just eliminate the whole 1/2" criteria? Go with a simple "if it's built into the hull, it needs windows, if it's in the super, it can be solid"?

 

I would think that they wouldn't do that just because how would you define what's hull and superstructor. People would want to say that the casemates would all be hard. Certain ships would almost be all solid.

Kim

 

Which ship would be all solid?

 

A lot of predreads.