by Sr. Gopher » Fri Aug 20, 2010 1:51 pm
Abram, it would be great if you could draw them out! The designs do play into my what-if story, which now seems like a short book (66,102 words, and I still have 2 more theaters to finish up). The designs well, the idea for first 2 cruisers just came when in my story, huge numbers of Allied cruisers are very lightly armed (6" main batteries for 2/3 of them), and well, the Axis ships are large numbers of destroyers and heavy cruisers, which are showing a great number of successes. Building a cruiser that could sink a cruiser with a single volley, and possibly a battleship, seemed reasonable for a large cruser such as that. To make things better, I made the 8" turrets automatics from the Des Moines class. The actual design is really supposed to be an enlarged Des Moines class, but with 6" and 5" secondaries. The "medium cruiser" USS Beast was created as a lighter combatant than a heavy cruiser, but larger than a light cruiser in terms of armament. It's armament arrangement also was supposed to try and trick the eye of an enemy pilot, (something I'm trying to apply to everything now), making the ship look like a battleship. If everything is in the same camo scheme, and with a smilar layout, cruisers could look like battleships. the Beast was meant mainly as a convoy escort, and a submarine or surface raider could possibly mistake it for a battlesruiser design I'm working on, the USS Mustang, which looks very similar to your design above, armed with 2 twin 18" guns, 2 triple 8" guns, and 8 5" twin guns. It is supposed to try an masquerade as a Cleveland class cruiser.
Abram, it would be great if you could draw them out! The designs do play into my what-if story, which now seems like a short book (66,102 words, and I still have 2 more theaters to finish up). The designs well, the idea for first 2 cruisers just came when in my story, huge numbers of Allied cruisers are very lightly armed (6" main batteries for 2/3 of them), and well, the Axis ships are large numbers of destroyers and heavy cruisers, which are showing a great number of successes. Building a cruiser that could sink a cruiser with a single volley, and possibly a battleship, seemed reasonable for a large cruser such as that. To make things better, I made the 8" turrets automatics from the Des Moines class. The actual design is really supposed to be an enlarged Des Moines class, but with 6" and 5" secondaries. The "medium cruiser" USS Beast was created as a lighter combatant than a heavy cruiser, but larger than a light cruiser in terms of armament. It's armament arrangement also was supposed to try and trick the eye of an enemy pilot, (something I'm trying to apply to everything now), making the ship look like a battleship. If everything is in the same camo scheme, and with a smilar layout, cruisers could look like battleships. the Beast was meant mainly as a convoy escort, and a submarine or surface raider could possibly mistake it for a battlesruiser design I'm working on, the USS Mustang, which looks very similar to your design above, armed with 2 twin 18" guns, 2 triple 8" guns, and 8 5" twin guns. It is supposed to try an masquerade as a Cleveland class cruiser.