and the Italians didnt go mad with theirs?! British ships are sleek, elegant and try to look graceful. emphasis on "try". Italians are a cross between the mad scientist route and the British style route. I agree with yours on the Germans and Americans though.
I think that's why I like the Italians. They combine the lovely lines of the RN, and the insanity of the MN.
What's the jury on the Japanese? Both in relation to and before Pagoda Masts?
imo, before the pagoda masts they tended to be very British in their style (and also with a bunch of ex-Russian prizes in their pre-dreadnought fleet), and their carriers generally looked nice even if their funnels to the side rather than regular is weird. Thought early 3 deck Akagi and Kaga were pretty bad, but I would say the trough deck versions had handled that problem.
Ryujou and Ryuhou are also pretty weird looking.
imo, before the pagoda masts they tended to be very British in their style (and also with a bunch of ex-Russian prizes in their pre-dreadnought fleet), and their carriers generally looked nice even if their funnels to the side rather than regular is weird. Thought early 3 deck Akagi and Kaga were pretty bad, but I would say the trough deck versions had handled that problem.
Ryujou and Ryuhou are also pretty weird looking.
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Pre-Pagoda? They look like RN ships. Post-Pagoda... they look very interesting. I can never decide on their ships.
The Soviets are mad btw, and before that the Russian empire had some very nice looking ships.
The heavy cruisers look good, and so do their post-Akagi and Kaga carriers; Akagi and Kaga themselves look butt-ass ugly.
Preaching to the Choir my man. the Regia Marina had some good shit.
Japanese for me, I kind of have a love-hate relationship with them. I love ships like the IJN Kongo, and the some of their carriers like the Hiryu, but their pogodas. they look kind of like the French but instead, decided to play Jenga with them.
Russian Empire Cruisers looked good. the Soviets on the other hand, DEFINITELY had too much Vodka when designing their ships.
McPherson
Banned
Ugh.Counterpoint:
In general as to shipwrighting, the best balanced of the WWII warships are the Italians, cursed by a lack of torpedo defense, a good DP gun and radar. British ships tend to be good looking and extremely well armored, but their compartmentation was poor and their artillery was only "fair". Their AAA was "unacceptable". This puts them behind the Italians.
American warships tended to be wet, were top-heavy and until their torpedoes and guns were fixed, relatively toothless. They were very hard to sink, which is a tribute to their compartmentation and damage control qualities, but they still look like components piled on a hull. Also their armor was only good up to 12 inch /50 bore size and velocity. Once past that limit, the plate shattered like glass. So, don't get hit. EXPENSIVE to fix that mistake. It was fixed.
French ships were like Italian. But the French guns worked.
Less written about the Japanese and Germans, the BETTER. Bismarck and Yamato looked beautiful but were outrageously bad designs.
Then I stand corrected, the French ships were poorly designed after all. I apologize for the error.
Which is ironic since almost all sailing ships of the line had tumblehome, and the French built one of the only ones that didn't and that ship was unstable because of its lack of tumblehome.
It could be said the Yamatos were the best looking battleships ever built, though to me efficient and sound design looks good in itself.
Interestingly when I learned how welding curved plates was much harder than welding multiple flat ones back in WWII and earlier, I started to notice that welded ships seemed to have less curved plates in their superstructure than riveted ones did (especially the older WWI-era and earlier ships). But I think that was just confirmation bias now, there were plenty of riveted ships in WWII that had mostly flat plates. It seems curved plates were used less over time in all types of ships after the 1800s.
Japan though seems to be an exception- their gun turrets in particular had many curves in them, even on welded designs, right up through WWII, and I don't know why it was unique to them. (Fittingly, they were the ones to figure out how to easily make and weld curved plates after the war- at least for plates less than 30 mm thick.)
I'm sure they are windows but it is hilarious to imagine that in addition to pre-dreadnought style turrets this ship has ship of the line style gun decks.
Coulsdon Eagle
Monthly Donor
I assume you mean portholes, but the idea of La Marine Nationale sending out a battleship with a series of dormer & bay windows in the main armour belt rather tickles me!
Coulsdon Eagle
Monthly Donor
Yes - but they don't have that wonderful view. Told the expensive cabins on cruise ships are those on the outside with balcony views. The MN could open a whole new line of credit for further construction by loaning out their battlefleet as cruise liners. The similarity to hotels has already been noticed - this is just the next logical step.
British WW1 and Italian WW2 tied, then Japanese with pagoda's, then Americans with tripods then everything else then Americans with lattice masts. I hate those things.
