Extremely Hypothetical: Off Dakar 1904

[MengJiao]

  Some not-so hypothetical ingredients went into this mix: 1) Kaisar Wilhelm pretended to be worried about the "Yellow Peril" (that would be both the Chinese Empire and the Japanese Empire) when trying to get his cousin Nicky who was the Tzar to deal harshly with Japan and China...so the Kaisar was busy stirring up as much trouble as possible and 2) the 1902 agreement between Japanese Empire and the British Empire specified that each would aid the other if either was attacked by more than one enemy. 3) the US did sell 2-3 pre-dreadnoughts (depending on how much of the Retivizan you want to count since she had French guns and German armor)...so mixing that all up, you could have the US selling 2 pre-dreadnoughts to China funded by German money and a German colony like the MArshal islands.  This would trigger the intervention of the Royal Navy to block the Chinese-American vessels from reaching China while the US would send the Chinese-crewed ships under the protection of the French and their allied Russian navies.  From the British point of view, their ally, Japan is being attacked by Germany, Russia, China, the US and France.  For the Royal NAvy step one would be sinking the ex-Kentucky and the ex-Kearsarge before they can reach China despite the French and Russian escorts for those ships.  Anyway, here is a Russian image of the Kearsarge:

[Gusington]

So complex and byzantine but fascinating at the same time. Love this stuff.

[MengJiao]

So complex and byzantine but fascinating at the same time. Love this stuff.

  Thanks!  The problem is to get an interesting battle that's not too big.  The line-up for this one (and preliminary runs show it can be pretty dramatic) is RN: 2 armored cruisers, 4 Canopus-Class Pre-dreadnoughts (Ocean, Vengeance, Glory, Goliath) vs 6 allied pre-dreadnoughts -- two French with guns that can hit at 20,000 yards just like the RN battleships, 2 Russian and 2 Chinese-American Ex-Kearsarge and Ex-Kentucky Plus one cruiser so that's 6 total RN versus 7 total allied.  The RN is ahead in terms of technology, but needs to sink the two Chinese American Dreadnoughts (or force their surrender, which does work in SMR)

[Gusington]

Totally agree. Even in just reading about the action, my eyes and brain glaze over after a certain amount of ships are referenced. Not from lack of interest...I can only follow so much.

[MengJiao]

Totally agree. Even in just reading about the action, my eyes and brain glaze over after a certain amount of ships are referenced. Not from lack of interest...I can only follow so much.

  With any luck, things will reach an eye-glazing stage in this nautical action -- but for the moment, around 10 minutes into the battle, the RN armored cruiser Bacchante hits Oleg with a 9.2-inch shot and Oleg hits Bacchante
with a few 6-inch shots.  Both ships suffer pretty minor "structural damage" (an SMR term for damage that accumulates progressively without immediately having critical or floation effects).

[Gusington]

 ;D

[MengJiao]

;D

  About 15 minutes into the battle, Borodino almost blows up (and does lose all forward guns):

[MengJiao]

;D

  About 15 minutes into the battle, Borodino almost blows up (and does lose all forward guns):

   about 45 minutes later, the Royal Navy manages a bizarre double set of critical hits.  First Euryalus hits Kentucky with a 9.2 inch shell at 13,000 yards
(a deck hit that penetrates and blows up a boiler) cutting Kentucky's speed to 11 knots.  We can assume she would surrender at that point.
  Next, Vengeance hits Orel with a 12-inch shell that penetrates the belt (at 8,000 yards) blowing up something important that reduces
speed to 12 knots. Orel has already almost surrendered twice so we can assume she would surrender at that point.
 
   
   

[MengJiao]

;D

  About 15 minutes into the battle, Borodino almost blows up (and does lose all forward guns):

   about 45 minutes later, the Royal Navy manages a bizarre double set of critical hits.  First Euryalus hits Kentucky with a 9.2 inch shell at 13,000 yards
(a deck hit that penetrates and blows up a boiler) cutting Kentucky's speed to 11 knots.  We can assume she would surrender at that point.
  Next, Vengeance hits Orel with a 12-inch shell that penetrates the belt (at 8,000 yards) blowing up something important that reduces
speed to 12 knots. Orel has already almost surrendered twice so we can assume she would surrender at that point.