Suggestion: Shared Targeting Solution for all Weapons, and amongst formations.

[Accipiter]

-The Suggestion:

when one weapon on the ship is "LOCKED" on the target, ALL weapons of that ship should be instantly "LOCKED" as well, regardless of what state of ranging salvo, ladder aiming, ect they were in beforehand. possibly, all ships in a formation (as long as they are, and remain, in the same formation) could get all of their weapons locked even.

-Reasonning/explaination:

when one weapon is "LOCKED" in game and can fire at maximum accuracy, that means pretty much that they have found the target' range, speed and bearing precisely. since the fire control system system, rooms and team is centralized, as long as the crew knows this, all weapons can then be fired at maximum accuracy at that target. it doesn't matter that the ranging process was done with quick firng secondary guns that have much different ballistics from main guns. all you need to know is target range, speed and bearing, as soon as you know those, there is no need to individually fire ranging slavos then ladder aim for each size of guns, the ballistics of each weapons are obviously known to the crew and they can calculate a firing solution for each right away.

as for formations, when one ship in a formation has gotten "LOCKED" on the target, it can communicate the range, speed and bearing of target to other ships of the formation. as each ships in the formation know precisely their own range speed and bearing relative to each other ships in the formation, from there they can also calculate right away a firing solution for their own weapons. and so they should be able to get "LOCKED" immediately as well, or at the very least, get a massive boost to their aiming process and get a full "LOCKED" in just 1 or 2 salvos from there, instead of doing the whole aiming process again on their own. obviously, this should apply only for the ships that are shooting at the same target as the one another ship in their formation has gotten "LOCKED".

 

-a concrete exemple whould be:

2 enemy ships: 1 and 2.

1 formation of 4 friendly ships: A, B , C and D.

i get ships A, B, and C to fire at target 1. and ship D to fire at target 2.

a short while later, ship B is the first one to get a "LOCKED" on its target, with her 5 inch secondaries. ALL her weapons become instantly "LOCKED" as a result, and ALL weapons of ship A and C as well. ship D is continuing to aim on her own since she has a different target.

a short while later, ship 4 get target "LOCKED" on her own.

a short while later, target 1 is sunk. ships A, B and C now shift fire to target 2. because ship D already has a "LOCKED" on target 2, ship A, B and C instantly have a "LOCKED" on it as well, and start firing with maximum accuracy.

target 2 sunk.

Edited December 22, 2019 by Accipiter

[akd]

This is not simply how it worked in reality and was highly situational and dependent on ship-specific technologies, most of which would only be available at the very end of the era, and even then arguable in fully achieving what you describe.

Edited December 22, 2019 by akd

[akd]

Caveat: once central firing of main battery is developed, centerline and side turrets with same guns should be treated as a single battery, as should turrets with the same gun but in different numbers.

Edited December 22, 2019 by akd

[RedParadize]

One thing I would take is if torpedo hold order would be applied to all the formation instead of having to do it one by one. 

[arkhangelsk]

15 hours ago, Accipiter said:

when one weapon is "LOCKED" in game and can fire at maximum accuracy, that means pretty much that they have found the target' range, speed and bearing precisely

OK, time to be a wet blanket again. The most basic problem is that this presumption is not really true. Suppose I have a battery of guns at point A, firing at point B (to simplify things, we are all stationary). First, I get a rangefinder to focus in on point B. I think the distance to target is 30,200m, but really, I'm not sure. I could easily be several hundred meters off, but anyway I'll assume it is 30,200m. Today, the weather is a bit hot and the air pressure is a bit low ... my shell will fly a little farther than the test condition, but my barrel's a bit worn. I factor in these things and finally set the guns to shoot range 29,800m. The shells fall long ... by about 400m, I think.

Is it an error in estimating the wind (I did not have an air balloon and thus could not obtain a good set of meteorological conditions). Maybe I misread the rangefinder. Maybe the gun is less worn than expected. I don't really care and even if I did I have no means to find out. What I have to do is to put some shells on target ASAP. I set range to 29,400 and fire. Still long. Darn it, was Salvo 1 actually long by 800 instead of 400m?

Ah, whatever, 29,000 ... short. At least we bracketed it. That is, if it doesn't turn out it was short only because this salvo had just a bit less powder than all the others or some other reason.

Up 200, ahh, finally... now, where is the target? Is the distance really 29,200m? Unlikely, it's just that my guns happened to straddle the targets firing at range setting 29200 and I accepted that. I have no real idea why it is six hundred meters (and 1000m closer than my estimated distance) lower than my first estimate. Do you really think I can just tell the other guns this number and have them shoot with any expectation of success? Especially since they have not torqued out their own error in their gun conditions ... etc. Most likely, they'll end up ladder firing, just like me.