Generel Rules – clarification and questions

[d.giessmann]

Hello everybody,

so what is your oppinion about the modification of attack-dice. There is no specification in the rules, what to do, when it is getting worse than 6+. Our normal chance to hit is a 4+ on D6.  For example, you shoot at a cruiser (+1), which moves faster than 6 (+1) on extrem range (+2). So the total modification is +4, that meens 8+ on a D6. So what is the solution or how do you handel this?
There are some possible ideas, first of all it could be impossible to hit, which makes certainly no sense to me, because the target is in Range and so there must be a chance to hit, even when it is moving at higher speed. Perhaps we should handel it like in bolt action, that meens we need 6 on a D6 followed by another 6? Or is a 6 a hit all the time regardless of further modifications?

Please give me your statements

 

Daniel

[Nat]

Games are permissive rule sets… it tells you what you can do.. if it doesnt tell you then you cant do it.  Using other games systems as a why cant we is genrally not a good place to start espically when they are written by different people…. that out of the way :p

Now should there be a chance to hit with every shot – No! why….well according to the author of the game we are looking at 1″ of board distance to 1k yards in real life.. Then we get that even with a 5″ shell its very hard to actually HIT a ship moving at 10 knots of speed…espically when you are moving as well..its very hard to hit a moving target with a single shot when you are moving as well.. (also the size of the ships models are larger than if they where in scale with the ranges, which is why all messurements are to/from the bridge)

However, as we dont have the full rulebook yet (I think the twitch video a couple of weeks ago said November) there may be extra modifiers that we dont have yet……

EDIT – ps you example is the other way round to how the rulebook words it so could be confusing … plus you dont get a modifier for shooting a cruiser (only destroyers)

EDIT 2 – how we handle it is targeting and tactics… ie if I have longer range guns i’ll be trying to keep the distance between me and you so you cant hit me but I can hit you.. if I’m the otherside I’m putting out smoke so you can see me whilst I close in to my range.

 

• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by Nat.
• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by Nat.

[Enioch]

Nat: Based on the beta rules (which might not necessarily be applied in the final published version), there are no further modifiers. 7+ on a dice means impossible to hit, period.

d.giessmann: This is naval warfare. Time-to-target is absurd, and fast, nimble ships can and will actively maneuver at longer ranges to evade shells. Yes, there is always an infinitesimal chance that IRL a hit would be scored, but when a small agile ship can consistently and constantly evade shells by chasing the splashes, that chance might as well not exist.

This is not Bolt-Action. IRL ships could actually dodge shells. No soldier can dodge bullets.

[Greg S]

We always played it as couldn’t be hit in 1st ed and beta.  Ships’ big guns can’t traverse fast enough to catch a speeding destroyer.

[Eumerin]

On this general topic, I was reading about the USS Edsall earlier today. The Edsall was a USN destroyer that was part of the ill-fated ADBA Fleet, during the Japanese rampage through the Pacific. Edsall attempted to come to the rescue of a friendly transport that had been attacked by two IJN battlecruisers (Kirishima and Hiei) and two IJN cruisers (Chikuma and Tone). She arrived after the distressed vessel had already been sunk, and spent HOURS evading gunfire from the four IJN ships. IIRC, the Japanese only managed to hit Edsall twice during the battle, and apparently the hits didn’t do that much damage to her. Finally, the Japanese admiral commanding the task force decided that his gunnery crews had been humiliated enough, and called in dive bombers from Kaga, Hiryu, and Soryu, to deal with the destroyer. The dive bombers immobilized Edsall, which allowed the warships to finally start hitting her with their guns.

So, yeah, I’m fine with shots that have a “to-hit” number higher than 6 being automatic misses.

For the curious, Edsall presumably didn’t break contact with the Japanese ships because the two Tone-class cruisers were capable of matching Edsall’s 35-knot speed. Also, Edsall was a Clemson-class destroyer, which means that you can represent her with one of the destroyers in the USN fleet box.

A couple of thoughts –

The IJN would once again be reminded of the lesson of this battle – that USN destroyers were not easy targets for IJN cruisers and battleships – during the Battle of Samar, when Taffy-3 – a group of destroyers, destroyer-escorts, and escort carriers – miraculously held off an entire Japanese fleet. This also wasn’t the last time that a USN destroyer would bedevil Hiei. The destroyer USS Laffey gutted her bridge with gunfire during a *very* close pass (estimated to have been within 20 feet; even destroyer pop-guns will hurt a battleship when they’re that close) of Hiei during the First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, wounding the Japanese admiral during that action, and killing his staff.

[d.giessmann]

Thanks for your statements guys,

so the rule 7+ could not be hit, makes sense for me. Your story about USS Edsall is a great example for nimble and small destroyers. Thanks for that. So in the game, it will be the best tactic to use light cruisers with fast-tracking guns against that destroyers.

Daniel

[Eumerin]

Battleships also have batteries of light guns that can be used against fast, agile targets such as destroyers. However, a battleship that gets close enough to a destroyer to use its light guns is also very close to being in range of the destroyer’s torpedoes.

[Author]

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