Fast gun vs. Big gun

Discussion in 'Scenarios / Gameplay' started by jstod, Jun 4, 2012.

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  1. jstod

    jstod Well-Known Member

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    Has anyone ever fought a battle between a fast gun ship and big gun ship to see who wins?
    The way I see it both sets have advantages and disavantages over the other rule set.
    for example Big gun obviously has the heavier broadside with its 1/4" ballbearings as well as thicker armor but fast gun has the faster ships and faster rate of fire (1/4" cannons have to wait a count of 8sec b4 fireing again). both have blastsheilding to protect the insides and prevent a through and through shot.
    if the ships are of the same class they will hold the same volume of water b4 sinking.
    might be interestibg to see what happens if two very skilled captains faced off or even two fleets faced off.:cool:

    lets hear what you think
     
  2. SnipeHunter

    SnipeHunter Well-Known Member

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    Haven't heard of it having been done recently but some of the "old timers" I've talked to have mentioned it happening some back in the dark ages (80-90s). Apparently it isn't much of a competition as fast gun ships have enough speed and maneuverability to engage and disengage at will, as well as unload all their ammo very quickly. (fast gun cannons can punch though a good bit of balsa so the armor advantage is diminished and doesn't make up enough for the other disadvantages.) Fast gun pumps also push a lot of water aka much better damage control.

    Sounds like fun, I'd be up for it...
     
  3. Kotori87

    Kotori87 Well-Known Member

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    I remember hearing about such a showdown, long ago. Apparently the Fast Gun ship annihilated the Big Gun ship with its superior speed, engaging and disengaging at will and moving faster than the Big Gun ship could aim its guns. Even back then, a set of well-tweaked Fast Gun cannons went through the heaviest Big Gun armor with no problem at all. But that was long ago, and there haven't been any format-vs-format battles since.

    I sat down and did some math, and I think this may explain some of the disparity. Assuming two equal ships, one Fast Gun and one Big Gun, line up side-by-side at the perfect range from each other, and both ships open fire at maximum ROF, what would happen? The Fast Gun ship would be firing .177" bbs, each inflicting a hole of 0.0246 square inches, at a rate of approximately 6 holes per second, for approximately 8.855 square inches of holes per minute, per barrel. The Big Gun ship would be firing .25" steel ball bearings, each inflicting a hole of 0.04908 square inches, at a rate of fire of approximately 1 round every 8 seconds, for approximately 0.368 square inches of holes per minute per barrel. Even generously assuming a nine-gun broadside where all rounds hit, that still leaves the Big Gun ship inflicting 3.312 square inches of holes per minute vs the Fast Gun ship's single barrel inflicting 8.855 square inches of holes per minute. Now obviously the Fast Gun ship doesn't carry enough ammunition to fire one gun for that long, and it will take some time for it to disengage, re-aim, and re-engage with the other side, during which the Big Gun ship might get another shot in. And once the Fast Gun ship has successfully unloaded all of its ammunition, it's not going to stick around while the Big Gun ship finishes emptying its magazines. It's going to flee, after maybe a minute or two of a 3-to-1 (or better) exchange of damage. And once it's away, it's safe, since the slowest Fast Gun warship is comparable to a fast Big Gun cruiser or destroyer in speed.

    Now I know this doesn't account for differing flow rates through different size holes, but it also doesn't account for differing accuracy due to rate of fire, or for a Fast Gun ship's odds of getting underneath the guns of the Big Gun ship, or any number of other variables. Simply put, Big Gun ships are designed to deal damage for a half-hour or longer, while Fast Gun ships are designed for engagements of 5 to 10 minutes max. I'd love to try building a Big Gun ship that could challenge an equivalent Fast Gun boat, but that'd take far more effort on my part than I think it's worth.
     
  4. jstod

    jstod Well-Known Member

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    Hmmm valid point. I bet it would have a lot to do with captains skill. also I would be willing to bet that the fast gun ships thinner armor would make a bigger difference then it has been discussed. it is pretty thin from what i have read so the potential of big gun ship's cannon smashing through and damaging the blast shield and then the internals may be higher then some may assume.

    Also I think the fact that a big gun ship can potentially bring its entire main armament to bare were as the fast gun can really only bring a couple cannons to bare at a time.

    If those didn't even the odds then the simplest and therefor the hardest way to even them would be for a Big gun ship to arm its secondary turrets as well which can theoretically allow the ship to keep up a constant rate of fire depending on the size of the secondary turrets.

    The rate of fire would be formidable but to unload its magazines completely it would have to stay close in for accuracy and take a pounding by the larger caliber.

    There is also in my opinion the higher chance of mission critical components of the fast gun ship taking damage. for example wouldn't a nice shot to the stern or rudder area beneath the water potentially take away its maneuverability. I feel like the big cannons would be able to do some damage in this regard more so then the bb guns.

    Obviously this has the potential to bring two sides of this hobby together at least for a few battles.
    think of it now, large national event with combined axis and allied fleets comprised of both types of ships fighting side by side duking it out until the bitter end. It would be an epic battle for the history books!!!
     
  5. Tugboat

    Tugboat Facilitator RCWC Staff Admiral (Supporter)

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    Nah. Captain's skill would mean very little as long as the minimum skill for entering the battle is 'basically competent'. Balsa-wise, it is safe to assume that both ships will penetrate on nearly every hit. Armor-wise, I'm sure some people run thin armor, but the standard is heavy rubber shower liner, which will stand up to anything that passed the Big Gun foam penetration test. Range-wise, you can assume that I can penetrate 1/4" of balsa at 5 feet or more. People with actually powerful fast gun cannons could probably do better.

    If I as a fast gunner was put in such a scenario, I would bring my 24sec KGV with quad sterns and never let you touch me while blowing inch-long holes in you hull 2 times per second. Someone actually competitive in fast gun could easily better that rate of fire. Even with my old-tech 26sec SMS Scharnhorst with a single bow and stern gun firing 1 round per second, I wouldn't get hit. The chance for a Big Gun ship to score goes away as soon as you tell the fast gun guy that he's facing 9 1/4" ball-bearing cannons. Because it's too easy to use the superior speed to avoid the kill zone.

    It doesn't make Fast Gun better nor Big Gun worse; it's comparing HMMWVs and Porsche 911's. If you make one play the other's game, it loses.
     
  6. SnipeHunter

    SnipeHunter Well-Known Member

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    Agreed, captain skill wouldn't be a huge factor without going to extremes. A lot of fast gun ships are designed for hour long engagements anyway so they can handle entire campaign battles during NATS. Avg fast gun sorties tend to be around 30 min for NATS(so you need about an hour worth of power anyway, most ships carry significantly more than they actually use.), regional sorties are closer to 15-25 min depending on number of ships. A fast gun ship is really only limited by ammo supply. Quality internal armor and good ship construction would negate any possible structural damage done by the larger caliber rounds, not knowing anything about standard big gun armor can it stand up to fast gun cannons? (Since they are subjected to a foam test and fast gun cannons aren't.) I agree that secondaries are probably the best bet for a big gun ship but with greater speed and turning it would be simple to just stern gun a big gun ship and then avoid it till you get off the water.

    In a fast gun vs big gun match up there really doesn't seem to be many areas where the big gun ship would have an advantage and be able to force the fast gun ship to play its game. Drag strip or 24 Hours of Le Mans a Porsche 911 is going to trash a HMMWV... It just isn't the same game. The whole apples to oranges bit.

    Now if you held a "target" ship in place and let each ship pound on it and compared results the big gun ship might win due to shot/magazine size but that isn't what we're talking about at all.
     
  7. Tugboat

    Tugboat Facilitator RCWC Staff Admiral (Supporter)

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    Followup: If you let the Big Gun guys fire as fast as they can (not sure how many seconds to fill a triple gun accumulator), with fast gun speeds, it'd be a completely different battle. Probably a lot of re-sheeting that night, as they'd shred each other :)
     
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  8. buttsakauf

    buttsakauf Well-Known Member

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    Let me stick a dual bottle setup in my Normandie and crank up the speed then I'll bring it to a regional and we can test the theory:-D

    Steve up in Maryland wanted me to duel him at IRCWCC Nats last year but I just brought Normandie for show and tell.
    Das Butts
     
  9. mike5334

    mike5334 Well-Known Member

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    Perhaps another factor to toss into the mix is hit percentages. A while back one of the big gunners made a post asking if the fast gun guys are really doing 15% - 30% hit percentages. Apparently (and might need a big gunner to verify) big gun hit percentages are much lower. There was a bit of discussion about why that is so and I think the upshot is that the fast gun guys tend to get in close and personal compared to the big gun guys. Closer usually means easier to hit something.
     
  10. buttsakauf

    buttsakauf Well-Known Member

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    True statement. Hit percentages are very low for big gun ships. Hence the popularity of torpedo cruisers. Fixed down angle and large projectiles all in all easy to "learn your shot". Another factor that would have to be balanced is pumping capacity. Fast gun pumps are easily twice as powerful as big gun.
     
  11. jadfer

    jadfer Well-Known Member

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    If you crank up the speed of the Big gun ship or its pumping capacity then you would have an illegal fast gun ship vs fast gun battle rather than a big gun vs fast gun battle.
     
  12. SnipeHunter

    SnipeHunter Well-Known Member

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    Edit:

    ditto what jadfer said
     
  13. Tugboat

    Tugboat Facilitator RCWC Staff Admiral (Supporter)

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    You guys are way too serious. By that standard, sending a bone-stock fast gun ship against a big gun ship would be 'an illegal big gun ship vs. big gun'.
     
  14. Bob

    Bob Well-Known Member

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    15% used to be the standard MWC hit rate at regionals and NATS. Last year at NATS the combined hits were 18.14% for the week. Brouhaha this spring 20.8%. Tangler a couple weekends ago 20.6%. The hit rate keeps going up, one battle at the Brouhaha a couple years back saw one fleet with a 40% it rate.
     
  15. bear23462

    bear23462 Active Member

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    I am not sure why Fast gunners even skin their ships. Hell just turn on the bilge pumps and let'em rip . . .
     
  16. Tugboat

    Tugboat Facilitator RCWC Staff Admiral (Supporter)

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    Easy, Ken... Scorekeeping! :)
     
  17. jadfer

    jadfer Well-Known Member

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    Tug, the thread is big gun vs fast gun. So changing one ship or another wouldn't be a 'big gun vs fast gun', nothing serious about that. To me that means each guy fights his ship according to the rules of their group. I was invited to play with the Big gun guys before but was told that I had to change the rudder, the pump, slow it down, and shoot on a timer. At that point I had a very poor big gun ship with only 3 guns.. no turning.. no pumping.. so I passed. It wasn't a multi-format event anyway but it would take much more to make my ship competitive in a Big gun event. I would like to try a Big gun vs Fast gun battle with each ship following its formats rules. I think the Big gun guys are under-estimated in this case because they may only need 1 hit to blow a panel. A fast gun ship would need to dump over 20 shots in a small area to blow a panel. In my ship I would have to hit and run constantly, it would be a great challenge.
     
  18. Kun2112

    Kun2112 Active Member

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    When I finish my Gustav, I just might have a Battlestations Vs Treaty battle against the Alsace. A 50", 22 second ship with four 7/32", six BB, and two torpedoes facing off against a 75" 28 second, seven unit battleship. Treaty runs slower, doesn't have combat reverse, has measured pump capacity, and a more limited rate of fire. That might be interesting.
     
  19. jstod

    jstod Well-Known Member

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    I think maybe the smaller fast gun ships which use rear mounted guns would fair better then one of the larger battleships against its big gun counterpart. My thought process for this would be the fixed aft guns. from my observation the large unit ships tend to have their guns covering more quadrants and therefor spread out were as a big gun ship will have all its main turrets rotating into action on a specific point. then again aiming a fast guns ships guns may be easier because of their fixed position.

    I think a Large national event with both styles fighting side by side would be pretty awesome. Especially if the fleets were massive like 60+ ships on either the axis or allied side.

    Once I have my Bismarck Finished and I have had a chance to get to know the ships tendencies I would be open to a little friendly match between styles.
     
  20. mike5334

    mike5334 Well-Known Member

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    Yet another item to think about ....

    The fast gun ships have set ranges. No time is wasted trying to rotate a turret or adjust elevation. That greatly reduces a fast gun captain's work load to concentrate on maneuvering a ship for scoring shots.
     
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