DeRuyter

I know this is a necro but I have just returned to the new forum. How far yards could be braced on a square-rigged ship was limited by the shrouds. John Harland's "Seamanship in the Age of Sail" has a great illustration of this problem. I don't have my copy at hand, but 60 degrees is usually quoted as the limit.

I could tell you how they work in Naval Action. 🙂 Double Charge give you greater penetration. Double shot gives you 50% greater damage but is inaccurate at anything but short range and loses penetration. The range should be reflected on the map in UAAOS. Historically double ball (or Triple shot as loaded on the Victory at Trafalgar) was loaded as an initial broadside if a ship was closing to pistol range, 50m or less. It was highly inaccurate. Often a ship would load ball + grape on the Quarter deck guns as an antipersonnel load. Double shot is trickier because it risked blowing up your own gun!

What is misleading? What lake better are you talking about? Are you talking about the Burlington Races? The schooner/gunboats with pivots didn't factor very much in any of the lake battles for a variety of reasons. Maybe I am misunderstanding here. Are you saying that long guns outranging carronades is a fiction? Again we are talking about effective range in combat, not the theoretical distance a shot would carry. Lake Erie is a prime example. Perry had to close the range for his carronades to be effective whilst being hit by three vessels with long guns.

Did I write effective range? If not that is what I believe he meant or anyone writing about carronades vs. long guns for that matter. All they had to do is stand off sufficiently for a low hit probability from the carronades whilst still being able to maintain sufficient hits from the long guns on Essex. It is true that Porter was not happy with the mandated rearming of Essex with a main battery of carronades, so I'll give you there was an element of excuse in his letter. However his initial maneuvering (after the loss of the main top mast) was under the assumption that he could anchor in the bay and continue to use the neutrality ploy rather than poor seamanship. He mentioned that the British ships stood off at a range where he could not effectively reply with the carronades several times and noted that he tried to close the range but by then he had sustained too much rigging damage to maneuver.

I'll have to look at those. @Lieste here is a contemporary history with extracts from Captain Porters correspondence. He mentions several times the British ships maneuvered to stay outside of the range of his carronades. He does also talk about the springs being shot away as well. Porters letter to the Secretary of the Navy begins on page 132. He mentions the carronades several times starting on page 136. https://archive.org/details/biographyofprinc02wils_0/page/136/mode/2up

I know about the springs but the common view is that at least Phoebe stayed out of range of the carronades. Do you have a source?

Well I think the range range was the major factor at Valparaiso - after Essex lost her main topmast trying to make it to open sea. So your statement above could be; if Essex could have closed the distance her 32lb carronades may have won the day. The British stayed out of effective range of the carronades, still Essex did do some damage with her 12lb battery.

Exactly a 17th century ship: Kalmar Nyckel. One of the few replicas with a sprit top'sl. I also went to Gannon U. but that was before Niagara was rebuilt. I had hoped to sail on her a few years ago but we had to cancel our trip to Erie. I did see her sail and got on board at an OpSail event in NYC a while back. Still planning on visiting her and the museum in Erie someday.

Excellent post. +1 one on the luffing sails idea. Do you sail on Niagara? I think what @admin pointed out about those battle maps is the most important point. You would almost never sail directly downwind rather one would sail a reaching course. I think the issue with furling is more semantic because the game depicts the sails being furled rather than doused in their gear. Another point about battle sails that people miss with the speed test is that you didn't have to send men aloft and needed less men for sail handling. When I was sailing we only went aloft for a harbour furl or if there was fouled gear. For Sea Legends I am hoping for more individual sail handling and damage to standing and running rigging.

What one tends to see in game is the shot bringing down an entire mast rather than spars or a topmast. I know standing rigging and damage to spars is not separately modelling in game so hits to masts and sails include that damage. So what one would see with chase guns normally 6, 9 or 12 lb as you said would be damage to spars, t'gallant masts and running rigging mostly. (Constitution used 24 longs but I think that is an exception in frigates). Adding penalties to sail control with rigging damage would be a good addition IMO. @admin

Makes sense because they could use the land combat part of UA for faster development of a larger scale AWI campaign game. Frankly UA was a development of UG essentially using the same basic game engine. I am still holding out hope for a UG Napoleonic Wars though!

Sounds like the next game - "Sea Legends" I hope those features will be in it!

It has been awhile since I sailed on tall ships but here are a couple of points: I hope you can take into account the size of the ships. So that a Snow would not have any effect on a 3rd rate for example. In racing when to try to blanket another boats wind the size disparity is not that great. I would agree that when you hit a lull, whether that is caused by another ship, the land or just the wind being lighter, you will feel a noticeable slowing of the ship. That brings up the wind shadow coming off the land which given the tall land masses on some of the islands would have a big effect if you sail to close to the lee of that land mass. If it is coming in for sails you should have it for the land mass effects as well.

The double forestay gave it away. 🙂

The type of wood didn't effect speed nearly as much as it does in game. Also keep in mind that Endymion was armed with an 18 lb main battery when she logged this speed.