Partial penetrations need a revamp.

[Schirüno]

First off, here are my armor values.

And these are the penetration values of their 16" guns.

My armor should easily be able to block these shells but...how are they doing partial pens that should be blocks?

Range for this engagement was around 18km.

Also HE shells are basically AP shells that don't ricochet.

[akd]

Quite the opposite issue, actually.  The damage from large-caliber AP shots that don’t penetrate main deck armor and main belt armor is extremely minor in game.   A main deck partial penetration would have already passed through several decks and would do significant damage.  The armor protected the ships vitals; it did not protect the ship from all damage.

Battleships were not tanks and didn’t carry their primary armor on their exterior skin in most areas*.  The whole idea that battleships can take a large caliber AP hit and receive zero damage is mostly bogus.

*Early belt armor was mostly exterior, but almost never extended all the way to the upper deck from bow to stern.  Note however that later inclined belts were interior or partially interior to the hull and any hit would do exterior hull integrity damage.  Turrets and above deck barbettes were the elements of the ship that had uniform armor “skin,” but even here a large AP shell hitting and failing to penetrate would likely shower unarmored areas of deck and superstructure with large, penetrating splinters.

The zero effect, 100% block “ricochet” concept as implemented in game is World of Warships, not history.  It should be very rare in reality, more confined to smaller caliber shells deflecting off turret armor, etc.

Note in particular the damage from 8-inch AP partial penetration of main belt forward of rear turret.  Also note the 14-inch non-penetrating hit on the rear turret barbette.

https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/w/war-damage-reports/uss-south-dakota-bb57-war-damage-report-no57.html

Edited January 7, 2022 by akd

[SPANISH_AVENGER]

I agree...

I once made a test: a Battleship with 700mm thick belt and extended belt, and 400mm thick deck and extended decks.

It didn't have any firepower, mobility or components, it wasn't an usable ship; I just wanted to make a testbed for armor.

And guess what? It was destroyed in a few minutes in x3 speed... through "partial pens". By 356mm guns...

So no matter how thick you make your armor, it doesn't really matter. 300mm thick belt? 356mm thick? 410mm thick...? They will all take the same damage from "partial pens"...

Edited January 10, 2022 by SPANISH_AVENGER

[Somhairle]

7 hours ago, akd said:

Quite the opposite issue, actually.  The damage from large-caliber AP shots that don’t penetrate main deck armor and main belt armor is extremely minor in game.   A main deck partial penetration would have already passed through several decks and would do significant damage.  The armor protected the ships vitals; it did not protect the ship from all damage.

Battleships were not tanks and didn’t carry their primary armor on their exterior skin in most areas*.  The whole idea that battleships can take a large caliber AP hit and receive zero damage is mostly bogus.

*Early belt armor was mostly exterior, but almost never extended all the way to the upper deck from bow to stern.  Note however that later inclined belts were interior or partially interior to the hull and any hit would do exterior hull integrity damage.  Turrets and above deck barbettes were the elements of the ship that had uniform armor “skin,” but even here a large AP shell hitting and failing to penetrate would likely shower unarmored areas of deck and superstructure with large, penetrating splinters.

Historically, factually, realistically, and accurately, you are correct. The in-game adaptation, on the other hand, is basically a box. The deck armor is the top of the ship, the belt armor is the side from the deck to the keel.

[Schirüno]

15 hours ago, akd said:

Quite the opposite issue, actually.  The damage from large-caliber AP shots that don’t penetrate main deck armor and main belt armor is extremely minor in game.   A main deck partial penetration would have already passed through several decks and would do significant damage.  The armor protected the ships vitals; it did not protect the ship from all damage.

Battleships were not tanks and didn’t carry their primary armor on their exterior skin in most areas*.  The whole idea that battleships can take a large caliber AP hit and receive zero damage is mostly bogus.

*Early belt armor was mostly exterior, but almost never extended all the way to the upper deck from bow to stern.  Note however that later inclined belts were interior or partially interior to the hull and any hit would do exterior hull integrity damage.  Turrets and above deck barbettes were the elements of the ship that had uniform armor “skin,” but even here a large AP shell hitting and failing to penetrate would likely shower unarmored areas of deck and superstructure with large, penetrating splinters.

The zero effect, 100% block “ricochet” concept as implemented in game is World of Warships, not history.  It should be very rare in reality, more confined to smaller caliber shells deflecting off turret armor, etc.

Note in particular the damage from 8-inch AP partial penetration of main belt forward of rear turret.  Also note the 14-inch non-penetrating hit on the rear turret barbette.

https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/w/war-damage-reports/uss-south-dakota-bb57-war-damage-report-no57.html

I agree that partial pens should do some amount of damage, but they shouldn't be able to do full pen damage. 

[ColonelHenry]

9 hours ago, Somhairle said:

Historically, factually, realistically, and accurately, you are correct. The in-game adaptation, on the other hand, is basically a box. The deck armor is the top of the ship, the belt armor is the side from the deck to the keel.

Which means if anything, the current partial pen is sorely needed because nothing in this game is built to stop you from having 20 inch of belt armor and just be an invincible floating box. It will have to do until we get detailed armor layout.

 

1 hour ago, Schirüno said:

I agree that partial pens should do some amount of damage, but they shouldn't be able to do full pen damage. 

They don't? But again, repeated hits into the same spot should be equivalent of a penetrating hit anyway.

[Grayknight]

Well in my opinion if certain place gets hit enaugh times then it should downgreade in amount of effective armor but this solution while proper isent fiting in with a "gamy" side of things. Partial pen should do damage as they do in my opinion, the same way that anti tank rifle bullet could not penetrate tank but kill the crew with sheer force of impact causing shrapnel to form from inside armor and cut evrything to pices.

In fact one could argue that in certain cases partial pen should be far more dengerous to over pen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spall

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wz._35_anti-tank_rifle

[Bishop120]

On 1/7/2022 at 9:04 AM, akd said:

Quite the opposite issue, actually.  The damage from large-caliber AP shots that don’t penetrate main deck armor and main belt armor is extremely minor in game.   A main deck partial penetration would have already passed through several decks and would do significant damage.  The armor protected the ships vitals; it did not protect the ship from all damage.

Battleships were not tanks and didn’t carry their primary armor on their exterior skin in most areas*.  The whole idea that battleships can take a large caliber AP hit and receive zero damage is mostly bogus.

*Early belt armor was mostly exterior, but almost never extended all the way to the upper deck from bow to stern.  Note however that later inclined belts were interior or partially interior to the hull and any hit would do exterior hull integrity damage.  Turrets and above deck barbettes were the elements of the ship that had uniform armor “skin,” but even here a large AP shell hitting and failing to penetrate would likely shower unarmored areas of deck and superstructure with large, penetrating splinters.

The zero effect, 100% block “ricochet” concept as implemented in game is World of Warships, not history.  It should be very rare in reality, more confined to smaller caliber shells deflecting off turret armor, etc.

Note in particular the damage from 8-inch AP partial penetration of main belt forward of rear turret.  Also note the 14-inch non-penetrating hit on the rear turret barbette.

https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/w/war-damage-reports/uss-south-dakota-bb57-war-damage-report-no57.html

Dude check down near the bottom.. Hit no 20... 6in hitting and penetrating main belt and caused a fire in a supply office.

[akd]

11 hours ago, Bishop120 said:

Dude check down near the bottom.. Hit no 20... 6in hitting and penetrating main belt and caused a fire in a supply office.

That hit did not penetrate main belt, but is another example of hits to area that game considers main belt that don’t simply ricochet and do no damage, but do significant (but not critical) damage without even touching the citadel armor.

Edited January 9, 2022 by akd