Battleship Showdown, the Final Match


  • @Imperious:

    I know the yamato looks really cool and most would like to have Japan have a better ship, but really the Missouri is a better ship on average.

    Having grown up around Chinese people (older siblings family) and having lived in China, I can assure that is not the case and I have a very deep dis-like, bordering on hatred, of WW2 Japan.

    The scenario, which is literally a battleship version of “celebrity death match”, would seem to favor the Yamato to me. The Missouri is going to have to close, and the Yamato can afford to fire blind (much like a game of actual battleship come to think of it) with a general idea of where the Missouri is, which would become less of an issue the closer the missouri gets. I would think that since the Missouri has to close both sides would just break even on this issue, the Yamato may not be able to accuretly hit at its maximum range but the Missouri would need to get well with in this range to be able to hit.

    The armour is a sticking point though, and I know nothing of the comparative effectiveness of armour used. From what i’ve seen the Yamato’s armour was thicker in all instances (for instance, the Yamato’s main deck had 8.92in of armour where the Missouris was only 7.5in) but if you’re going to get into talk of metallurgy and different alloys and what not I dont know what any of that means, it being well beyond my area of expertise


  • @Clyde85:

    Ok, look, i’ve tried to be nice about this but i’ll just come out and say it, I dont believe any thing you’ve said about the Yamato’s faulty fuses, you have either grossly mis-understood something you read or have completely fabricated it because I have found absolutely nothing about it in my research, so im counting it as a non-issue.

    You can’t even read the comments made and understand them or bother to actually search for their basis.  I haven’t posted links as that has not worked in the past with the Byzantine posting privilege system the site employs.  But if you want to make your stand on this it might be fun to embarrass you…

    It’s not a faulty fuze so much as a design choice that made for a long delay/decreased the likelihood of it detonating.  Follow the links in some of the other threads and the information is there.  There are also some examples out there for this type of fuse where the hits against U.S. ships were counted and the number that failed to detonate were also counted.

    Second, You keeping going on about the Missouri’s fire control system but seem to unaware that this wasnt a new concept. Most WW2 battleships and all of the ones listed here had fire control systems. The only difference for the Missouri was that it’s fire control system was also linked up to its Radar, but thats it.

    The only one “unaware” is you.  This is just another strawman (like radar) where you attack an argument that isn’t being made.  I’m aware that each nation had its own fire control systems.  It doesn’t change the argument in the least.

    No, radar is not the “only difference.”  The Missouri’s system was more advanced in several ways, radar just being one of them.  It was using what amounted to gyro stabilization for an artificial horizon and such.  Again, do some actual searching.  I believe it also had more direct control from the fire control system without as many intermediate steps.  This isn’t my area of expertise, but I was surprised by how many different things were coming together at once for this system.

    Thats another thing, the Yamato had radar. While it wasnt linked up to its fire control system they would be able to detect the approach of the Missouri and have a rough idea of where it was. Further more they could then use this information, relay it to their fire control system and plot out a firing solution based on the coordinates.

    Everybody already knows they had radar, it has already been discussed and explained several times.  The Japanese radar had less than 1/3 the resolution based on wavelength, and with 1/25th as much power output.  I’m not well versed in radar, but as for efficacy this would appear the rough equivalent of a 5" gun to a 16" gun.  Good luck with that.

    And what are the chances of them hitting a maneuvering target at 40,000+ meters with such an inferior system?

    While this would be a guess at best it would become increasingly easier for the Japanese to plot out fire solutions on the Missouri as it would have to close range of its guns to be able to hit. In any scenario the Yamato can wait and force the Missouri to charge in at it and cross the very little, “T”, which would give the Yamato the ability to fire with all of its guns.

    You haven’t even considered the angles or flight time on this have you?  Best I can tell there will be over a minute of flight time, then the time for the radio transmission of the splashes to the Yamato, passing this to the fire control/director, correcting the solution manually, then retraining the guns.  (If you do a search there are some descriptions out there of some systematic weaknesses in relaying information in WWII Japanese fire control that relate to this.)  If you can get off an aimed salvo once every two minutes this way you are probably doing well.  And if you stay turned at an angle where all of your turrets can fire and are still heading away at full speed, the Missouri will probably be closing at something like 15 knots.  That works out to about 28,000 m/hr.  The difference in range of the two gun types is about 3,300 meters.    So the Missouri will not be in range for 3,300 meters/28,000 meters/hr = 0.12 hours…7 whole minutes!

    So the good news for you is that you can get off maybe 3 or 4 very poorly aimed salvos before Missouri has you in range of her guns.  You only get 2 salvos if you cross the T and as a result yield a 30+ knot closing speed.  The first shot is only a wild assed guess at your max elevation so I’ll give you that one as time zero…adding one to each of your counts.  If you manage to hit anything, chances are it won’t be vital.

    From then on out Missouri has your range, can maintain it at will, and will be firing well aimed salvos at perhaps twice the frequency you can muster for poorly aimed ones.  Neither boat will be particularly accurate at this range, but the Yamato will be at least a full order of magnitude less accurate, perhaps far less accurate even than that.  I’ll fight you all day, all week, all month from this range.

    The ship that will get stuck trying to cross the T while in effective range of the enemy guns is the Yamato.

    According to who? While I wont say that Japanese gunnery is exceptional, I would have to say for this scenario its at least as good as everyone elses. If anything, review the battle of savo island in 1942 where the japanese wrecked an allied fleet, in pitch dark. Sounds like good gunnery to me

    This isn’t at night at close range, it isn’t a surprise attack, it doesn’t employ the superb Japanese torpedoes, and it isn’t a 1942 confrontation against a green enemy unprepared for night fighting.  Other than being nothing like Savo, it is just like Savo.  :roll: :wink:

    In this scenario the gunnery is no better than the men and fire control systems at the disposal of each crew.  The Japanese don’t appear to have a fire control system capable of handling the situation.  The Missouri does.  The U.S. BB’s demonstrated their long range accuracy (and that of radar fire control), the Japanese did not.  That Japanese built a system for visual based engagement.  The USN built one that could blindfire over the horizon.


  • @Clyde85:

    The scenario, which is literally a battleship version of “celebrity death match”, would seem to favor the Yamato to me. The Missouri is going to have to close, and the Yamato can afford to fire blind (much like a game of actual battleship come to think of it) with a general idea of where the Missouri is, which would become less of an issue the closer the missouri gets. I would think that since the Missouri has to close both sides would just break even on this issue, the Yamato may not be able to accuretly hit at its maximum range but the Missouri would need to get well with in this range to be able to hit.

    The opposite is true.  The Yamato won’t have any precision at these ranges, the Missouri will.  That is fundamental to the differences in the fire control systems and radar–the difference between early war tech, and late war tech.  The Yamato will have to close to be able to connect, but won’t be able to because of the speed disadvantage.

    The armour is a sticking point though, and I know nothing of the comparative effectiveness of armour used. From what i’ve seen the Yamato’s armour was thicker in all instances (for instance, the Yamato’s main deck had 8.92in of armour where the Missouris was only 7.5in) but if you’re going to get into talk of metallurgy and different alloys and what not I dont know what any of that means, it being well beyond my area of expertise

    One of the links I hunted down was to a paper that talked about testing performed by the USN against some of this plate in 1946.  They fired a 16" round with a newer AP type against the 26" turret face of the Shinano (which was finished as a carrier…hence the turret availability.)  There are images available of this.  It was completely penetrated at 1990 ft/sec with a dead on shot of the 16" AP round.  The USN testers rated the plate quality as “0.839” compared to US plate.  In a second test at lower velocity “the projectile nose tip only penetrated 21” (53.34cm) into the plate, though punching a hole entirely through."  And this sort of damage would seem likely to kill the turret–large chunks of steel spalling off at high velocity inside will do that…  Interestingly, Okun assumes a 0.97 plate quality for the Japanese armour and states that the frontal turret armour can’t be penetrated in real world conditions because of the 45 degree slope and falling proj. velocity at range.  (Of course that’s not going to help the deck, etc…from his tables they look very vulnerable at the ranges one would want to fight the Missouri from without the Yamato being able to hit.)


  • Another potential ace for the Missouri:  The USN also worked up tables for reduced powder charges for the AP round (two bags vs. three or something like that.)  I do not know if that capability was put into the fire control computer (esp. with it being mechanical in nature, plus the radar range finding component.)  If it was then the Missouri would have the ability of extending its plunging fire against the vulnerable deck to something less than the current extreme ranges.  This would be an option if extreme over-the-horizon gunnery was not producing hits or if the Yamato scored a lucky hit to Mighty Mo’s propulsion and began closing.


  • Should we crown the winner? Any voters still undecided?

  • Moderator

    the Missouri would have crushed the Yamoto.  It had Fire Control Radar. Doesn’t matter if the Yammy can shoot farther, does no good if you can’t hit your target.

    The Yamato was equiped with three different types of radar. None of these radars were firecontrol specific designs. A 10cm fire control design known as the Mk3Model2, developed from the Mk2Model2, never made it into operation before the end.


  • Yep thats pretty much the sinker.

    Id like to see a poll on the best Great War Battleship


  • @Red:

    First, let’s review the scenario:

    From ABWorsham’s original listing of the contenders:

    Let’s say for contest infomation, the showdown will take play in Caribbean. Ships will start 35 miles apart and can use all technologly at hand, for example Radar.

    I’ll expand on this somewhat.  Whether the battle is fought at night or in the day could make a big difference.  My opinion is that the vastly superior radar of the Missouri makes a daylight contest the most equal.  At night the Yamato might as well be a boxer blindfolded in the ring against an opponent of similar (if not equal) physical strength.  The Imperial Japanese Navy had excellent night fighting skills, but this was due to employing the best torpedoes in the world (a weapon of destroyers and cruiser, not BB’s.)  Their nightfighting prowess did not lie in long range gun duels where they performed surprisingly poorly.  Without radar, nightfighting would likely favor the IJN substantially, with radar it favors the USN heavily.

    Now if I were in the Missouri, and detected the Yamato within a few hours of sunset (assume they both find the other at the same time), I would maintain the separation until night fall–and the relative speed of the Missouri would make that a trivial effort.  Radar gunnery will own the night.

    So let’s also say that the battle begins at dawn of sometime before late afternoon so that the battle occurs primarily during daylight hours.

    If I were the captain of the Missouri and spotted the Yamato even at dawn, why not simply shadow her for 12+ hours until nightfall?  With the superior speed of the Missouri on the open ocean with clear skies this is a trivial matter.   Then rip her apart when she is at her weakest.  There would have to be some kind of need (to protect transport ships?) before I would knowingly engage a battle on perhaps 60/40 (or would it be 80/20?) odds when by simply waiting a while I can engage on terms of 95/5 or better odds.


  • I’ve been playing around with some text editing to create new scenarios in “Fighting Steel” with the existing ship models (since I can’t use the game’s editor.)  Today, I did Yamato vs. Missouri starting about 30,000 yards apart, calm seas, perfect weather, daylight.  I read the project guidelines for radar and used “average” for the Yamato (no radar fire control, but decent detection) and “superb” for the Iowa class–a fair representation of both in 1945.  Crew quality was average for both.

    I’ve tried it once from both sides and the Yamato is at a serious disadvantage.  I don’t know how much of it is in the models, particularly the project team’s model for the Missouri.  Or is it a function of assumptions about gunnery/fire control, or ballistics hard coded in for given guns, ships, or navies?  It isn’t the last word on this, but it was a not-unsurprising result.

    Keep in mind that this is best case for Yamato, since it is already within the dangerous “blindfire” zone that Missouri’s radar makes possible.  From the bridge of the Missouri it was a straightforward fight, I pushed the thottle forward and turned to present my broadside while working to maintain separation for the first half of the fight.  I could score hits now and again with a few salvoes at long range and would get bursts of 5% probabilities whenever I straddled.  The Yamato was tough, losing secondary 6" guns readily, but not suffering loss of propulsion, magazines, or main gun turrets.  Unfortunately for the IJN, the Yamato could not get a firing solution.  I suffered exactly one hit from the 18" guns and that was when both of us were trying to find the range–it was a very low probability shot according to the gunnery log, but it wasn’t a dud and did some substantial damage.  In the 2nd half of the fight I closed the range with the Yamato’s burning hulk to about 12,000 yards pouring my remaining HE rounds into her.  She was taking on water and burning furiously, but would not sink and could still make 18 knots.  I was credited with sinking the Yamato at battle’s end.

    I then tried the Yamato’s helm.  I pushed the throttle forward, closed to about 25,000 yards and began working on a solution with my broadsides as I attempted to close even more, timing moves after firing and to foil the Missouri’s solution.  I began exchanging hits with the Missouri with the Missouri still scoring 2.5 for every one of mine.  My unscathed secondary battery then started connecting at ~22,000 yards and I hoped it might tip the scales.  I penetrated the hull with 18" AP rounds and the Missouri was taking on water, but at this range the Missouri was scoring rapidly with the main battery and I soon was taking on water too, and had a lot of structural damage, so much that my gunnery became ineffectual.  The good news was that hits against my main turrets couldn’t penetrate.  The bad news was that my hits on the Missouri’s main turrets didn’t penetrate either–though I took out some secondary 5" guns.  Although I scored far more hits than the AI had as the Yamato (about 6x), I was still left with a beaten burning hulk, that was taking on water and could not score with the main guns anymore, while the Missouri still had nearly full speed and function.

    p.s.  A glaring weakness in the Yamato class revealed itself, something I had noticed in the Japanese Mogami class heavy cruisers as well and in other Yamato scenarios (the Yamato/Musashi’s 6" turrets came off of Mogami’s which were converted to 8" turrets.)  The 1" turret face armor of the 6" turrets (8" on the Mogami) was useless in combat.  I’ve been hunting around trying to learn if it was really this thin, because it might as well have been tissue paper.  I’ve noticed that the Japanese cruisers of various classes lose turrets if you look at them funny, and the thin armor seems to be the cause.  By comparision USN “light” cruisers such as the Brooklyn class have heavy armor on their 6" turrets, and a much higher rate of fire.  The combination of low firing rate and thin turret armor in the IJN cruiser turrets means that they have no endurance in combat even against destoyers.  If they don’t score decisively at mid/long range, they get knocked out in rapid succession by more rapidly firing 5" guns.


  • @Imperious:

    Yep thats pretty much the sinker.

    Id like to see a poll on the best Great War Battleship

    The Great War is awesome to study. Wish I knew more about the ships of that era.

Suggested Topics

  • 3
  • 1
  • 12
  • 1
  • 26
  • 9
  • 13
  • 7
Axis & Allies Boardgaming Custom Painted Miniatures

38

Online

17.0k

Users

39.3k

Topics

1.7m

Posts