I doubt that a QE is starting in a hole. i never felt like my scharnhorst was a bad choice of ship, no matter how many NC sandwiches I got to enjoy. What do you want out of this hobby? A competitave ship? I think you found one. Some ships are only gonna get built cause someone decides that they WANT to build it for whatever personal reason. Others will be the go to for folks who wanna feel like they're getting the most bang for their buck. I think both fleets have fine options for either philosophy.
I battled regularly for 4 years with my daughter before she lost interest in playing with toy bots with Dad. Her other interests in soccer and horses kept me too busy for several years. I have again become active this last year. My son wants to battle, so I am building a new boat. I started with the DKM Adm Scheer. Never really liked it. Pesky at best. I build a Suffern next. It belonged to another battler, so I built it as a loaner only. Much better cruiser, but still only Pesky. I next built a Nassau. Again it was not owned by me. I was only able to use it for a year. That was fun. Should have paid more attention to the fact that I LIKE sluggers. I next did a rebuild on an I-boat. It did not impress me much. Too much freeboard, and not maneuverable, compared to Nassau. I then became overly impressed with the idea of triple aft. I built a N. Carolina class. Did very well with it for a couple of years. It has been a reliable boat that rarely if ever sinks. Keith
I got into the hobby in 2001, went to mwc nats 2002-2005, a good size regional (fray at Brays) each of those years, and a smaller battle or so each year as well. Met the wife in o5, life got in the way for a bit. Getting back into it now. Battled the Dkm Scharnhorst every year except 04 when I gave it a go with a Nagato.
Ah , but if you start on the top of the mountain, you can only roll downhill. If you start in a hole and sink, well, you had an inferior ship - it was to be expected. If you have the best ship and you sink, you must not be very good at this. And at 3ft long do rather well in the game of spinning.
I have played this game for a bit (31 years) and in general good boats are the ones that have a driver that knows his boat and works with it, also it has to be dependable when called. All of the boats I listed have issues and strengths and all are good fighting platforms, but it depends on the captain more than any other thing. Rudder size isn't the only goal, small single rudder boats can still be worthy, I tangle with a Mississippi that can give my Nassau a challenge.
Mississippi BB-23 at 32" or BB-41 If you are referring to BB-23 you are pushing your credibility trying to sell it as equal to a Nassau. If you are referring to BB-41, Are you trying to sell that the same captain that can challenge you in the Mississippi would not be more dangerous in a dual rudder boat like the Q.E.? I will state again. I will not take captain skill into consideration when evaluating a battling platform. Again a great captain in a mediocre boat will give you a challenge. A great captain in a "class boat" will be most feared. What in your opinion with all of your years of experience is the best all around Allied boat out there? Keith
There is no best, boats that would be considered dogs can be battled in a very effective manner. Vangard is a good example not so good most of the time but in the right hands a "world beater"
You can, of course set your own criteria for judging a boat, but I think the point is when you throw out captains skill, you are tossing out the lions share of what makes a ship good. It most feared captain, not ship. I know at least once a scharnhorst (ww2 ) got most feared. Not exactly what I think you'd call a "class" ship. It's the guy driving it, for the most part, not the ship itself.
I don't know about that. I think Tim and Brian were more feared in their Vanguards than their Bismarcks. Some ships are better than others, that's not a secret. Trying to make all ships equal would be impossible. But the fact remains that ship stats are a relatively minor driver in who wins, you may discount skill level but in the real world it has a huge impact especially since a lot of people don't limit themselves to picking based on CEF. If you choose to limit your selections to what the CEF tells you to use then yes you'll greatly limit your choices, but that's your decision.
I think that as soon as you start talking about who fears what, you are now talking about captain skill because this is the psychological part of the game.
I was mulling this thread over, and as the gears ground away, and the smoke poured forth, I came to a few conclusions that should add little to nothing to this thread. 1) We've wandered quite a bit from the initial premise of the thread, that the 50% bonus is an advantage, that 50% bonus on side-by-side rudders is probably a greater advantage than on an inline or single large rudder. I think everyone can agree that the bonus IS an advantage, the disagreement seems to stem at the questions of 'How much of an advantage' and 'is it an advantage that should be granted' - instead of discussing that, it seems we have gone back to the topic of attempting to prove or disprove the level of suckage of a single rudder ship. 2) It seems most of the responders on these various rudder related threads are Axis captains. In fact, I have yet to see a single Allied captain come forward and say 'We lost at Nats for the past decade because: our ships arent reliable / we cant score belows / our captains are mostly noobs / we dont work together / our ships cant turn competitively' - the silence is so stunning one might think that they are in fact filled with shame about their constant defeat, and their morale is pitiful. I have however arrived at a different conclusion. The majority of the captains on this board appear to be Axis captains, and thus being a member of this board says something about your ability as a captain. Or perhaps that participating in this social club of ours improves a captains knowledge in ship construction, maintenance and tactics or provides some other intangible benefit. Clearly if the Allies want to have a prayer at the next Nats they will need to start posting here en masse.
OK now this is turning into a smear the Allied cause they are Noobs or worse, and that isn't the case. A couple of years ago I built a NC, yes even a old crusty Axis can have sympathies the poor and everwet Allied. Put some new ideas in it and tuned it up to play that year (no the new ideas weren't that great). It was a total blast being on the "other" side, I got to shoot at my old team-mates. The turning point of my Allied experience was Thursday at Nationals (2011?) during the Allied captains meeting that afternoon: 1. We had just sank TWO Biz's that morning, WOW good deal 2. We were catching up on points, but still behind a good amount but closing . 3. Morale was very high (the morphine had not been administered yet). And the meeting moves to the topic of should we "do it to them again", And universally all the attending Allied voiced concern for the moral of the Axis we had just SPLASHED (Like Hillary they have empathy for the enemy, and try to understand them?) My reaction to that attitude may have been a little extreme but it was something like "WTH", yes they play and have sympathy for the ones getting wet that day (I guess after hundreds of sinks sympathy comes easy). And this is the fact that the Allied in IRCWCC are truly GOOD GUYS, and to their credit it was eyeopening.
Summon Bill and Ted, "whoa". Battler since 1999, and yes I partied like it. Been on both sides and even Italian ( Vittorio Veneto - favorite hence the (VV) Aholic- like alcoholic). But never French, not even once What I see in this thread is talking about NATS more than local battles. For the Atlanta guys, we have a great local experience because it's mostly 1:1 battles or battles with no real tactics. At NATS we are expected to fight like a team. Like taking a test and no studying, and we all know how that goes. Now, get a few NATS under your belt and you start to get the idea of tactics, how and when to pick your targets. There are so many differences between NATS and local battles that we could have multiple threads. Build what you want and stick with it for a few years to become effective. Practice shooting dixie cups if needed. Stress test the boat, never be afraid of sinking it (if you are, you know you are not building your ship reliably). HELP the other battlers, regardless of which team they are on. If more boats equals more fun for all, we need to be more welcoming to both sides. Have we noticed the same people at NATS (whatever format) each year? Are we growing the hobby? Rambling now....
Not my intent, I was merely recapping the reasons people had conjectured and implied previously in the thread and having a little fun with it in light of the list of individuals who have responded to the topic. I suspect this is due to someone seizing a hold of the readily available points totals from Nats as being solid evidence of the shortcomings of ships available to the Allied cause and the thread rapidly devolving in to a discussion on that point alone.
Double haymakers on the Vanguards made a lot of difference in MWC, combine that with time tested systems design, life batteries, high flow guns and the new pump outlets... I've no difficulty saying that the two Brits were much more effective than our Bismarcks. However, that double haymaker advantage is nullified in IRC since Bis also gets them. A refit of my old Bismarck using the tech from Vanguard would be scary indeed. Would the same tech and captain skills in a Richelieu (same length/width/rudder as Vanguard) be nearly as effective? Or would the Nagato and Bismarck captains go 'Yum, free lunch'? Cannon placement makes a world of difference when you can't out run or out turn your opponent.
I think, for my part is that while the data from the initial post makes it look bad, the reality is that captain/reliability are so much more of a factor than cef that there is not as much of a disadvantage to the allied side as it may seem when you concentrate on this one thing. The problem is that if one begins to truly believe there built in biases to the rule sets, then there starts to be some resentment. That's not what this hobby should be about. It's about building and battling your boat in order to defeat those "allied scum"/"vile axis menace"/"no flag freedom haters"/"perilous flag flying monsters" etc. or maybe just building the boat you want to build and doing the best with it you can with some friends, both new and old. Mein zwei pfennig.
I have had the following view on this for quite some time. First .. ships are built the way they were made in the past. A NC has triple sterns, my Baden does not. The WeeVee has a single rudder, my Baden does not. That is based on the way the real ships were made. And.. as Mr Palmer has demonstrated in 2011.. the WeeVee can be IMPOSSIBLE to sink.. first it sank almost every sortie.. then it didn't sink again. The WeeVee can be a very solid ship in the right hands and with the right amount of work. So on Rudders... were real ships made with 2 half size rudders or two full size rudders? Did ship designers say.. well we have two rudders lets make them 50% smaller since we have two, I don't believe they did. They added a second full size rudder, which is the same exact thing we are doing now. I realize that while we may not utilize the original shape of the rudders we are still following the basic formula of either 1 or 2 rudders which were/are full sized when compared. Based on the Vanguards and the current interpretation of the rules, single rudder ships now have an advantage in being able to make super thick rudders that dual rudders ships cant properly take advantage of, at least not in the same way it was done on the Vanguard. So to boil it down.. features like number of guns, barbette placement, number of rudders are historical features of the ships.
