Re: Full Thrust Campeigns: Big vs Small ships

On Mon, 31 Mar 1997, Phillip E. Pournelle wrote:

>   One player commented that if a destoyer squadron attacked a
battleship,
> the battleship would only have to be repaired while the destoyers had
to be
> replaced.  

I do have a name. It may be long and hard to spell, but it is my real
name.

> At the hieght of WWII the United States was pumping out a victory
> ship a week and a destroyer every two.  However, Battleships and
carriers
> took much longer and cost a lot more. 

FT points system does not reflect this reality. Looking at Jane's, the
Queen Ellies cost roughly 3 million pounds a piece (displacement about
32000 tons) and KGVs were around similar figures, while a Tribal class
DD
cost about 467,000 pounds (displacing 1870 tons). 1400-tonnish DDs of
Isis, Gallant, Admiralty and Escapade classes cost around 300,000 pounds
a
piece. 

Thus one pound bought 0.01 tons of a BB but only about 0.004 tons of DD.
Sure, timewise the DDs come out first for a number of reasons, but what
are 
the points supposed to represent? Then we have shipyard sizes and blah 
blah blah... this is not a simple issue.

And even the US had most shipyards big enough committed to building 
more carriers, nevermind the cost.

> The infrastructure costs for a BB and
> CV (i.e. Thrust efficiency cost) is proper and allows a DD squadron of
equal
> value to destroy a capital ship. 

Can you show a single historical incident where DDs (any number of 'em) 
operating alone sunk a contemporary capital ship at open sea?

Usually the saving grace of DDs was that capital ships had bigger fish
to 
fry.

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