Does recoil effect on accuracy make sense?

[TK3600]

As you may know, a full broad side salvo cause about 80% accuracy debuff on a moderately large ship like BB. But does it make sense?

On a per gun basis, none of the gun fire fast enough for recoil to matter. By the time it is loaded, it should have recovered. Recoil should not affect gun's accuracy.

On the basis of moving entire ship, it still makes no sense. Lets say my ship weights 15000tons. A broadside of 8x 12 inch guns are not nearly enough to move the ship meaningfully, especially pushing against the ocean. So it cannot be ship's movement affecting accuracy.

The only possible reason I can think of is the shaking. Perhaps it shakes the deck violently, kinda like engine vibration. See the example below:

While it may affect the accuracy, certainly not to the degree of 80% malus. The deck looks rather stable firing 16 inch broadside. Should not shake the ship more than a calm sea wave (17%). The shake on the video is relatively minor despite 16 inch, lasting 1-2 seconds. Meanwhile it takes about 10 seconds in game to fully recover the recoil. This don't seem right. Further more, the shake may have been the camera shooting it. The ship looks very calm.

From what I can find, the in-game recoil system could use some reduction. Of course, there might be something I was missing. I am open to any criticism.

[PhoenixLP44]

you are not missing anything. My 98k tons battleship shouldn't move an inch in any direction when firing a 12x16 inch gun broadside.

[flaviohc16]

The problem is not " moving" after firing, it's the vibration/shaking. 

A difference of only 1 degree at 20 kms is missing the targhet by 350 meters.

[PhoenixLP44]

pretty much the same result. 100k ton battleship aint moving/shaking/vibrating violently after that broadside. Cruisers and smaller ships can experience that effect but 1. you have smaller guns on that ship and 2. you are probably not firing a 16 inch gun from a cruiser anyways so... yeah but over the top on that effect.

Perhaps if the ship has already suffered severe damage to its hull but at that point everyone is trying to get of that ship and not reloading and firing the main guns.

Also please nerf HE i'ts way too powerful.

[TK3600]

3 minutes ago, flaviohc16 said:

The problem is not " moving" after firing, it's the vibration/shaking. 

A difference of only 1 degree at 20 kms is missing the targhet by 350 meters.

True, I do think there is a possibility of that happening. But vibration recovers really quickly. Like 2 seconds at best. Game takes like 10 seconds.

 

[Panzergraf]

Didn't some fire control systems compensate for recoil somewhat?

I think it would be a good idea to have some kind of Recoil Mitigation tech baked into some of the existing techs.
Similar to how we can reduce the effect of Own Guns' Splashes and Other Guns' Splashes, which cause problems early on, but by late game the malus doesn't even show up in the Shoot Info table.

[marine0351w]

I have the issue of my 9 inch and higher guns keep turning off to getting too high of a recoil malus that won't drop off until I've clicked on them and then it starts to drop, and after it drops below 10% it seems to fix and then they will fire normally, so once engagement starts I'm sitting there on every big gun ship waiting for the recoil to drop sufficiently.

[TK3600]

I hope they just turn off recoil mechanics. It makes no sense and is unfixably bugged.

[Suribachi]

There is an answer on this page from Cameron Strasse that addresses something called "broadside drift".  This would be the equivalent of a person feeling recoil after firing a gun.  An interesting read I think.

https://www.quora.com/When-the-USS-New-Jersey-fired-a-broadside-of-all-of-her-16-guns-how-far-did-that-move-the-ship-sidewise

TL;DR  Recoil penalty for accuracy is not a thing on warships that I can see based on the math equations presented


EDIT:  Just realized that broadside drift technically isn't about accuracy, but I think my point still stands because the ship does not move in the water to throw off the calculations or anything like that

Edited June 13, 2024 by Suribachi

[TK3600]

1 hour ago, Suribachi said:

There is an answer on this page from Cameron Strasse that addresses something called "broadside drift".  This would be the equivalent of a person feeling recoil after firing a gun.  An interesting read I think.

https://www.quora.com/When-the-USS-New-Jersey-fired-a-broadside-of-all-of-her-16-guns-how-far-did-that-move-the-ship-sidewise

TL;DR  Recoil penalty for accuracy is not a thing on warships that I can see based on the math equations presented


EDIT:  Just realized that broadside drift technically isn't about accuracy, but I think my point still stands because the ship does not move in the water to throw off the calculations or anything like that

Consider the recoil mechanics is unrealistic, disruptive to gameplay, and costly in performance (constantly updated), it ought to be removed. No sunk cost fallacy of spending time coding it. Sorry but it has to go.

[DougToss]

Recoil is a non-factor on naval mounts, for the reasons listed above as well as skimming the literature (Brown and Friedman). It ought to be removed. 

[TK3600]

On 6/18/2024 at 9:57 AM, DougToss said:

Recoil is a non-factor on naval mounts, for the reasons listed above as well as skimming the literature (Brown and Friedman). It ought to be removed. 

I guess the developer fell in love with their codes because it took so long to perfect it. I get that, I also feel it when I code. But sometimes less is better. It takes a big man to look past one's sunken cost, and make the right choice. In this case, removing the recoil mechanic because it is harming the game.

[DougToss]

On 6/19/2024 at 9:15 PM, TK3600 said:

I guess the developer fell in love with their codes because it took so long to perfect it. I get that, I also feel it when I code. But sometimes less is better. It takes a big man to look past one's sunken cost, and make the right choice. In this case, removing the recoil mechanic because it is harming the game.

I feel like there's a lot of that. There are so many modifiers on everything. I mean, on the one hand, some of it is pretty incredible, but on the other hand, yeah it leads to thinks like this. 

Earlier on, ship speed reduced chance to hit. Now, at first glance to a lay person, this seems to make sense. However, it's not how fire control works. Once you have a solution you have a solution, and only a rapidly changing rate of speed throws off accuracy. If you think about it, heading doesn't reduce accuracy, angle on bow doesn't, why should speed? 

Well it took a lot of arguing and showing how things like Dreyer fire control tables and the Dumaresq worked to change opinions on that, and as you said, the calculations were all built in, calculations based on those calculations were built in, light ships couldn't rely on speed alone to  rush past the battle line etc etc.

Still, I've appreciated that the devs listen, and the community sticks to its guns. 

 

e: Found an article,Do Battleships move sideways when they fire?
 

Quote

Summary: This section is meant to give some practical examples of what it would really mean should a battleship suddenly move 30 feet when her guns fire. Inertia does not go away just because the ship is in water nor does displaced water suddenly become as thin as air when something as large as a battleship moves through it. The math in the previous sections explain why this movement does not happen, this section was meant to show why the math is correct.

 

Edited June 23, 2024 by DougToss

[justMike247]

On 5/11/2024 at 7:32 PM, PhoenixLP44 said:

pretty much the same result. 100k ton battleship aint moving/shaking/vibrating violently after that broadside.

not trying to be argumentative, but... have you ever fired a gun? I'm not talking small stuff like pistols or shotguns, but a proper crew-served weapon significantly bigger than 20mm calibre. I have, and believe me, immediately after firing, and for a significant period afterwards, the earth definitely feels like its moving, and that's from a perspective of the gun being very firmly grounded. A naval rifle doesn't have that grounding benefit, and they're a hellova lot larger in calibre than anything a ground-pounder like me would experience... But the effect you're trying to argue doesn't affect the gun, nor the gun crew, but the dozens of guys tasked with accurately laying the guns for their next salvo. Look at where they're stationed... then apply basic leverage physics. Stuck wayyyyyyyyy up in the DCT, it doesn't take very much of a change in pitch and roll at deck level to have a huge effect on where they are, hundreds of feet above the guns.

 

Look at the equipment they're trying to operate; as flaviohc16 said, a seemingly insignificantly small error multiplied by the ranges we're dealing with leads to a miss measured in hundreds of meters. The poor buggers up in the tops are doing their level best to lay the guns accurate to hundredths of a degree. How easy do you think that is when their whole universe rattles like a coke tin in a tumble dryer every 90secs? It doesn't matter how much gyro stabilisation you apply, nor how much shock-damping their gear's fitted with, there's a significant period where they just can't accurately range the target because things are just shaking too damned much... Physics gotta do what physics does...

 

That accuracy error should only reach that max value immediately after the guns have fired, and immediately after firing, the guns are nowhere near ready to fire again, even using medium calibre rounds on a fully automated reloading turret. So there's time for the vibrations to dampen out... that time being how long it takes to open and flush the breech, load the next projectile and ram it home, load the propellent bags and ram them home, close the breech, reload the primer, close the firing circuits yadda yadda... During that time, the lads up in the DCT are busier than one armed paper hangers ranging and re-ranging, doing as best they can to maintain a tracking lock so that the fire control predictors have the best information those lads can generate for the next salvo.

[PhoenixLP44]

7 hours ago, justMike247 said:

not trying to be argumentative, but... have you ever fired a gun? I'm not talking small stuff like pistols or shotguns, but a proper crew-served weapon significantly bigger than 20mm calibre. I have, and believe me, immediately after firing, and for a significant period afterwards, the earth definitely feels like its moving, and that's from a perspective of the gun being very firmly grounded. A naval rifle doesn't have that grounding benefit, and they're a hellova lot larger in calibre than anything a ground-pounder like me would experience... But the effect you're trying to argue doesn't affect the gun, nor the gun crew, but the dozens of guys tasked with accurately laying the guns for their next salvo. Look at where they're stationed... then apply basic leverage physics. Stuck wayyyyyyyyy up in the DCT, it doesn't take very much of a change in pitch and roll at deck level to have a huge effect on where they are, hundreds of feet above the guns.

 

Look at the equipment they're trying to operate; as flaviohc16 said, a seemingly insignificantly small error multiplied by the ranges we're dealing with leads to a miss measured in hundreds of meters. The poor buggers up in the tops are doing their level best to lay the guns accurate to hundredths of a degree. How easy do you think that is when their whole universe rattles like a coke tin in a tumble dryer every 90secs? It doesn't matter how much gyro stabilisation you apply, nor how much shock-damping their gear's fitted with, there's a significant period where they just can't accurately range the target because things are just shaking too damned much... Physics gotta do what physics does...

 

That accuracy error should only reach that max value immediately after the guns have fired, and immediately after firing, the guns are nowhere near ready to fire again, even using medium calibre rounds on a fully automated reloading turret. So there's time for the vibrations to dampen out... that time being how long it takes to open and flush the breech, load the next projectile and ram it home, load the propellent bags and ram them home, close the breech, reload the primer, close the firing circuits yadda yadda... During that time, the lads up in the DCT are busier than one armed paper hangers ranging and re-ranging, doing as best they can to maintain a tracking lock so that the fire control predictors have the best information those lads can generate for the next salvo.

No I have never fired anything with a higher recoil than an airsoft gun :). So yeah if you put it like that. I probably missread the part with vibration. But I still don't think a 100.000 ton battleship should be this badly impacted by a salvo of 12 16inch guns firing at least not to such a degree (Although it seems to be at a level that is more reasonable Imo now). So valid point and I learned something new now. 

[justMike247]

10 hours ago, PhoenixLP44 said:

So valid point and I learned something new now. 

Sadly... it's not all roses and unicorn pharts... Main guns might not be significantly impacted by recoil effects from their firing, but... it's a whole different ballgame for the secondary and tertiary guns. Their faster firing rate increases the probability of them firing when main-gun recoil effects are at their most problematic, inducing the corresponding nerf on their potential accuracy.