British vs. French Shipbuilding

[JaM]

a good article about difference between French and British Shipbuilding:

---------------

This is very important because the alleged superiority of French ships in this era is a myth that evaporates on close examination. I know its repeated over and over again in virtually every popular history one can read but the reality is that it is a myth that has grown up on the basis of anecdote without any solid evidence to support it. In fact, solid evidence on this matter does exist; a lot of it. Let’s have a look at some.

Admiralty records bless them. The Admiralty keeps records like they were going out of fashion. One aspect of this is that we have details of the maintenance and repair of every ship that has ever served in the Royal Navy. In those days there was a thing called a "Great Repair" - the modern equivalent of a mid-life upgrade. We have records for every such repair. They can be tabulated. They show a very clear pattern; French prizes in Royal Navy service had Great Repairs more often than British built ships and those repairs tended to be more expensive and require work that was more fundamental in nature. The expenses resulting from keeping French prizes in Royal Navy service are much greater than the equivalent cost for maintaining and supporting a similar British-built ship.

Its also interesting to read the surveys of work needed during a Great Repair because they tell us much about how those ships were built. Surveys of French ships make continual reference to the ship's frame hogging, sagging and racking. They refer to decks sagging. Frames were cracked and broken. It’s very rare to read this sort of structural damage on a British ship unless she's being repaired after a severe action. Also interesting are the comments on structural practices. British ships had their joints grooved and rebated, secured by a peg and reinforced with a futtock. The French equivalent was to butt the two members together and nail them in place. The use of nails was extensive in French building and was a major cause of failure. There was a thing called nail sickness - a nail would rust in place with the rust seeping into the wood greatly weakening it. Stamp on a joint with nail sickness and the components would separate - not a good idea. Another very common reference is to the French using green timber rather than seasoned wood in the construction of their ships.

These reports also give us a new look at how the ships were armed. In every case, French ships were downgunned after capture. 24 pounders were replaced by 18s and 18s by 12 pounders (the French pound was larger than the British). Why? Because the structural components of the decks were incapable of taking the strain caused by the heavy armaments the French put on them. Once again, we have a direct reference to extensive structural weakness in French ships of the era and one that suggests inexperience (to put it politely) on behalf of their designers.

This is all pretty devastating. Lets see if we can cross-check it. We can from another source - the people who served on the ships. Not the officers, the sailors. They were a pretty voluble, outspoken and literate lot. They wrote to the Admiralty all the time with complaints, suggestions, comments and advice - much of which was acted on. The idea that the crew of a British ship were a bunch of illiterate yokels who were driven into action by brutal and stupid officers in the equivalent of a floating concentration camp is about as wrong as its possible to get. The degree of literacy aboard British warships of the era was about comparable or slightly greater than that in the population as a whole. As a result, we know quite a lot about what the inhabitants of the gun decks actually thought and believed.

Those letters to the Admiralty make fascinating reading. A lot are personnel matters - complaining about specific issues or officers (and just as often praising their Captain and asking to serve with him again). What's relevant here are the comments on the ships. Complaints about French prizes are extensive and far outweigh those about British ships. Main complaints are lack of headroom on the lower decks (the crew complaining in many cases that they can't stand upright and/or have no room in which to hang their hammocks), pervasive leakage through decks and overheads (meaning that the crew's possessions were never dry). They complain about poor ventilation (British ships had systems installed to ventilate the lower decks; French ships did not). They complain about the frightful smell of French ships (not helped by the French habit of burying their dead in the sand ballast). Most interesting of all they complain about the noise of French ships; the constant creaking and groaning of the structure. All this supports the evidence of severe structural weakness in French warships (leakage and noise are both evidence of the structure working). However, it doesn't affect how the ships sailed. Lets look at some solid evidence there.

More Admiralty reports, this time on the sailing and handling characteristics of French ships. Astonishingly, these are very unfavorable. They usually describe the ships as being pleasant and good sailers in ideal conditions with the wind and seas in ideal aspects. However, their performance drops off very badly once conditions deviate from ideal and they are described as being "unweatherly" - in other worlds incapable of coping with bad conditions. These reports make mention of shipping large amounts of water, of flooding, of the pumps having to be run constantly even in mild conditions. In other words, sailing trials under controlled conditions do not support suggestions that French ships were good sailers.

We have evidence to back that up to. This time combat evidence. During the Napoleonic Wars, British ships habitually attacked and destroyed ships much their superior in force. They harried and hunted down ships that on paper were by far their superiors. This reached a peak with the two-day hunt and destruction of the Droite Du Homme by Sir Edward Pellew - the only case on record of a 74 being attacked and sunk by a frigate. The conventional explanation tends to talk of crew training experience etc., etc., but the pattern is so pervasive (and affects events where the portside nature of French sailors was not exhibited) that there must be more to it than that. If French ships were such better sailers and fighters than the British, why were they hunted down and destroyed with such ruthless efficiency? Seen in the light of the evidence above the picture becomes a lot clearer. An unweatherly ship can be hunted down more easily than one that performs reasonably in all condition. A ship that is structurally weak and poorly built will take terrible damage when hit by a broadside; one that is solidly built will give her crew some element of protection. A ship that is already overgunned and whose decks are already sagging under the weight will have difficulty in handling those guns in the heat of an action. Add in the benefits of a trained, experienced and hardened crew and the reason why the British habitually won actions fought against the odds becomes explicable.

So what do we make of French ships? The reality seems to be that they were lighter than British ships of the same nominal type and size and their hull lines (and sail plans) were optimized for running under ideal conditions. On the other hand they were structurally weak, unhealthy, expensive to maintain, over-armed, badly built and poorly arranged. So where does the legend (and it is a legend) of their superiority come from? It’s anecdotal. There is NO solid evidence of it. What we have are sea stories and assertions with nothing to support them. The only solid material we have is action reports from British Captains that usually end with the French ship being defeated and taken for prize. And therein lies our first clue. Two words. Prize Money.

When a British captain took a French ship, his first priority was to sell his prize to the Admiralty so she could be taken into service. This was by far the most remunerative option. So the Captain had a direct financial interest in presenting the capabilities of his prize in the best possible light. Another word, Honor. Defeating a French ship was a sure path to honors, promotion and, eventually, an Admiral's flag. It did no harm to an officer's career to present his defeated opponent in the best possible light.

By now, the message should be clear; the myth of French naval superiority is based on the action reports of officers who had a vested interest in emphasizing the capabilities of their opponents reinforced by sea stories and tales that have grown with each repetition. In contrast, hard data and expert witness all point to exactly the opposite conclusion. French ship design in the Napoleonic era was not superior to British; in reality it was far inferior.

What relevance has all this to Marder's comment? In fact, it shows exactly the same mental processes and approach as the story of "French superiority". He disregards the hard evidence prepared after great effort and detailed analysis by ship design experts in favor of a single unsubstantiated memorandum by a junior officer who is totally unqualified to make the comments that he does. Phipps-Hornby's opinion is essentially worthless and Marder's acceptance of it (with the implicit statement that he does not recognize how valueless the content of the memorandum is) does immense damage to his credibility as a historian.

What it does show is an interesting trend which is reflected right across the military spectrum and that's the presumption that the enemy's kit is better than ours. US soldiers damned the M16 and praised the AK47; North Vietnamese prisoners did the reverse. US soldiers worshipped the Soviet 130mm and damned their 155mm while their opponents did the reverse. And so it goes. The reason is quite simple - they see the effects of the enemy's weapons on a daily basis but not their own. There is also the novelty factor. Living on board somebody else's warship (something I've done more often than I care to remember) highlights the differences and novelties of the layout; its easy to translate that novelty into a "Theirs is better" mindset.

I've read the DNC report on Baden (many years ago) and its a lot less favorable than merely saying that British designers had little to learn from their German rivals; its actually damning of design inefficiencies and poor layout. It comments specifically, for example, on the large engine room compartments, the difficulty of accessing key systems for maintenance and much else. There is no doubt in some areas German designers came up with some pretty good ideas - they also came up with some real stinkers. However, in the specific quoted case of Baden vs. Revenge, Marder's opinion is not supportable.

Stuart Slade
.

[JaM]

Nothing from the age of sail generates more of a sense of power and majesty then the term "Ship of the Line". The line of battle has been discussed in another article, so the discussion now turns to the ships specifically designed to serve as line-of-battle ships. The modern term, Battleship, is directly derived from these ships and their purpose. What was that purpose? Simply put, it was to deliver, on command, a devastating broadside of destruction and mayhem to the enemy. We know from the previous discussion that there were three classes, or Rates, of ship in the line of battle. This article will discuss the Third Rate ships.

All of the ships in the three classes of line-of-battle ships derive their heritage from the so-called �Great Ships� which, in turn, were direct descendants of the galleon. In 1511, King James of Scotland launched the Great Michael. She was 240 feet long, 35 feet in width, and carried 27 guns. In 1514, King Henry VII, not to be outdone, built the Henry Grace a Dieu. Afterwards called the Great Harry, she carried over 150 guns. From these beginnings, the idea of the great ship began to develop until 1608, when Phineas Pett began the first of the classic great ships, the Prince Royal for James I. This ship was the basic model for all the later warships to sail in the line of battle. Gone were the elaborate fore and stern castles that made the carrack and early galleons so top-heavy. Her quarterdeck and forecastle carried no heavy guns, only light guns for sweeping the enemy�s decks. Her upper deck carried lighter guns than the two decks below and eventually she carried 100 guns across her three decks. Later designers maintained the same general design for ships carrying from 64 to 120 guns.

In the 1650s the third-rate ships were all of the frigate class. By the 1720s the lowest third rate was a 50-gunner. By the 1750s the standard had been raised again to 64 guns as the minimum. The Third Rate ship of the line, for our purposes, carried between 64 and 80 guns. These were the fleet equivalent of the heavy horse from the days of chivalry. They were able to stand in the line of battle or serve in distant waters, either singly or in small squadrons, as a sign of sovereignty of the nations they served. The most successful design of the class is universally considered to be the 74-gun ship.

In the beginning of the 18th century, Britain was the major naval power simply because the other countries had withdrawn from the race. But the British ships were ill-designed and older than most other navy�s ships. The 70-gun two-deckers were probably the best in the fleet but were lightly armed with only 24-pounders. The 60- and 50-gun ships were considered too small and weak to serve in the line of battle.

Meanwhile, the French naval establishment had reached its low point in 1720 having only forty ships on its lists. By 1730, with the recognition France would never be able to match the British navy in sheer size, the administrator of the Royal Navy for Louis XV, Jean-Frederic Phelypeaux Maurepas, the comte de Maurepas, commonly called simply Maurepas, decided to avoid the enormous three-decked ships almost totally and concentrated on the three main types of two-decker vessel, the 64-, 74-, and 80-gun ships. In 1733 the French launched the Eole at Toulon. A 64-gun ship, she was wider and deeper than her predecessors and was the model for many more ships with similar design. The British were also building more 64s.

After the War of Succession ended in 1713, the Spanish Navy was also moribund. In 1719, there were only 26 ships of the line left to defend the largest colonial empire in the known world. But around 1720 there was a revival in Spanish shipbuilding. In that year a Spanish naval officer named Gazta�eta drew up plans for a new 60-gun navio or ship of the line. The emphasis was on blending speed, maneuverability, and gunnery. He lengthened and slimmed down the traditional design, particularly at the first gun deck. They were not built for traditional fleet battles but rather for those ongoing needs peculiar to Spain: convoy protection, information relay, and patrol or scouting work. They were lightly armed compared to French or British ships. They carried 24 18-pounders on the lower gundeck, 26 12-pounders on the upper deck and 10 6-pounders on the forecastle and quarterdeck.

Between 1720 and 1790 Spain built an entirely new navy and this reconstruction started with the shipyards themselves. The Spanish ship of the line, or navio, came from one of only four or five locations:

Havana, Cuba
The astillero real built 197 ships in ninety-seven years, from the 120-gun Santissima Trinidad to the 12-gun Nuestra Senora de Loreto. Cuba's rich natural resources and defensive strengths made her an ideal site for the building and launching of new ships. Launched in 1739, the Princesa (70 guns) fought alone against three British ships in 1740 and first alerted them to the high quality of Spanish design and build. Like thirty-four other Spanish ships of the line, the Princesa eventually spent a long time in the British navy -- twenty years in her case.

El Ferrol, Spain
Fifty ships built between 1720 and 1790. In 1735 they launched the Guerrero (74 guns), which became the longest-serving warship in the age of sail with a record of 89 years of continuous service: a testament to design and build quality.

Guarnizo, Spain
Near Santander, they launched the first Spanish three-decker in 1732: Real Felipe (114 guns). They produced another thirty-seven in total including the San Jose (112 guns). Captured by Nelson at Cape St. Vincent and renamed the San Josef, she was to be his first flagship command. That a prominent commander would choose a foreign-built vessel is yet more evidence of the quality of Spanish ships.

Cartagena, Colombia
Produced nineteen ships, mainly to supplement and support the galleons, named the Galeones a Tierra Firme y Per�, which sailed between C�diz and Cartagena.

La Carraca, Spain
The shipyards of C�diz produced only seven ships of the line in this period, most of them earlier 60-gun designs for convoy escort duty.

The Spanish, like the French, concentrated on larger vessels for a given gun count. The Spanish 70-gun ship was nearly as large as a French 74. The Spanish also built some 74s in the first half of the 18th century. As described earlier, their Princesa astonished the British navy in combat. She carried 28 24-pounders, 30 18-pounders, and 16 8-pounders. She was 165 feet long, 50 feet wide, had a 22 foot draught, and weighed 1709 tons. By and large, however, the Spanish settled on the 60-gun ship with some 50s as well. The Spanish did not rate their ships and any ship over 50 guns was generally considered big enough to fight in the line of battle.

In 1743, the British 64-gun ship Northumberland was launched at Woolwich. She was 159 feet long, 44 feet wide, had a 19 foot draught, and weighed 1300 tons. She carried 32-pounders on the lower deck and 18-pounders on the upper deck. By 1758 the 64s carried 24-pounders on the lower deck and 12-pounders on the upper deck with 9-pounders on the quarterdeck and forecastle.

The French were also working on a new design for the 74-gun ship during this period. The success of the Eole with her expanded dimensions was carried forward to the new 74. It was a much handier ship and a much more lethal one as well, due to its larger size and the replacement of guns from the upperworks with heavier caliber ones on the gundecks. The old ships carried 26 24-pounders on the lower deck, 28 18-pounders on the upper deck, and 20 light guns on the forecastle, quarterdeck, and poop. The new design carried 28 36-pounders on the lower deck, 30 18-pounders on the upper deck, four stern chase guns, two forward chase guns, and none on the poop or quarterdeck.

As part of this development process, the French built The 74 gun ship Terrible in 1737 at Toulon. They expanded her length from 152 to 156 feet but she was still something of a poor sailer. But then, at Rochefort in 1744, the French built the Invincible. She was 171 feet long, 49 feet wide, had a draught of 21 feet, and weighed 1793 tons, nearly 400 more tons than a contemporary British 70-gun ship, the Establishment.

The Invincible was an incredible success. She could do 13 knots compared with 11 for a typical British equivalent and was described as �the best ship of her class� and �answering all the purposes than can be desired of a ship of war.� She had the ill fortune (for France, anyway) to be captured by the British in 1747. Her capture and examination by British shipwrights pointed out the truly antiquated designs of current British 74s. In 1760, the British built the first new English design for a 74 gun ship, the Bellona. At 168 feet long, 46 feet wide, with a 20 foot draught, and weighing 1810 tons, the Bellona would be the standard for British 74s for the next 20 years.
The Spanish, by this period, had also become enamored of the 74. A new design by Jose Romero y Landa called the San Ildefonsinos class was probably their most successful. One of the first of this class, the Monta�es, was launched in 1794. She was 190 feet long, 51 feet wide, had a draught of 26 feet, and weighed 1500 tons. Vice-Admiral Jose de Mazarredo said of her, �She sailed to windward like the frigates; she managed and tacked like a boat; she has a spacious battery . . . stable in all positions, instances and circumstances."

Eighty gun ships were never numerous in any navy. The French created a purpose-built 80-gun ship, the Tonnant, built by Coulomb in Toulon in 1740. She was 197 feet long, 50 feet wide, had a draught of 24 feet, and weighed 2281 tons. She was captured by the British in the Battle of the Nile in Abukir Bay in 1798. She carried 32 32-pounders, 34 18-pounders, and 18 32-pound carronades. By 1780 the British had fairly well abandoned building any new 64s and concentrated on 74s, but still built a few 80s. In 1783 the British launched the Caesar. She was 181 feet long, 51 feet wide, 22 feet in draught, and weighed 1992 tons. She carried 30 32-pounders, 32 24-pounders, and had 14 9-pounders on the quarterdeck and 4 9-pounders on the forecastle. Only four years later, the Foudroyant was launched. She was 184 feet long, 50 feet wide, 22 feet in draught, and weighed 2062 tons. She carried the same 30 32-pounders on her lower gun deck, and 32 24-pounders on the upper gundeck, but now carried 14 12-pounders on the quarterdeck and 4 12-pounders on the forecastle.

In 1782, the United States built their first ship of the line, the USS America. She was 182 feet long, 50 feet wide, 23 feet in draught, and weighed 1982 tons. The America was given to the French immediately after launching. In 1814, the U.S. built and placed in service the USS Independence. At 190 feet long, she was fourteen feet more than a typical British 74. She was 50 feet wide but only had a draught of 20 feet, and weighed 1914 tons. Classed as a 74, she actually carried 82 guns, all 32-pounders. She carried long guns on the lower gun deck, medium-length guns on the upper gundeck, and carronades on the quarterdeck and forecastle. Her broadside weight -- the total poundage of all cannonballs fired in a single broadside -- was 2624 pounds as compared to 1964 pounds for a typical British 74.

Third-rate ships such as the 74 were used as flagships, placed in the line of battle, deployed to show the power of the crown in foreign waters, and to demonstrate governmental might when necessary. Although the third rates were the lowest of the three classes considered suitable for serving in the line of battle, they were ships to be reckoned with no matter their location or duties.

This article written by Lawerence D. Davis (Curmudgeon)

[littleleo]

Hi i don't understand this ! ... why do you pretend that people thinking that the french royal navy "La Royale" is better than the British ? I always heard people say "British are the best on field and on the sea" (Better material, better commander, better soldier, better weapon, better tactics, better moral, ect) . I think nobody reply because you said to us an evidence. Don't trying to found many arguments ... everybody know that.

[JaM]

i'm not saying they were better, i'm just saying they had some interesting designs,which were later copied by others..

[Serenissima]

Well, historically, it's often been claimed that French shipbuilding was better than British shipbuilding (though Britain had the better commanders, crews, tactics, etc). JaM is just debunking that, and giving us some other interesting essays about the period.

[sage2]

Excellent read.

[JaM]

Live fire tests against a model of the ships hull

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfsuIaTU92Y



check especially large amount of splinters... btw, i was suprised that roundy shots made roundy holes in the ship hull in this video... probably hull didnt played ETW to know that it shoud break nicelly into square holes.... "NICE JOB CA!!!..."

[Didz]

Yes! I must admit that I've heard it said repeatedly that French ships were better built that British Ships and that French Guns were better than British. The reason why the Royal Navy regularly trounced the French is usually put down to superior seamanship and more experienced crews, at Trafalgar for example it was reasoned that most French and Spanish seamn would have been seasick.

The articles you've posted are interesting as they suggest a different view from the norm.

[Didz]

Live fire tests against a model of the ships hull

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfsuIaTU92Y



check especially large amount of splinters... btw, i was suprised that roundy shots made roundy holes in the ship hull in this video... probably hull didnt played ETW to know that it shoud break nicelly into square holes.... "NICE JOB CA!!!..."

Its a shame that they didn't think to simulate the hammock stowage behind the bulkheads. I would have liked to see how much of the splinters were absorbed by the hammocks.

[Earl Uhtred]

Obligatory, and very enjoyable reading - NAM Rodger's 'The Command of the Ocean'.

http://www.amazon.com/Command-Ocean-.../dp/0393060500

[Serenissima]

Indeed it is. Having bought it a month or two ago, I began reading it a couple of weeks ago - excellent read, and very detailed.

[Beastro]

Stuart Slade

Haha, Stuart.

I'm a regular on his site, tboverse.us, it mainly goes into modern warfare and politics.

If ya take a look and disagree with our political views, you can atleast bookmark the board for the essay forum, it's a gold mine of knowledge from Nuclear Warfare to Thai wars during the Middle Ages.

The article on the design and construction history of the French carrier Charles de Gaulle is a riot for anyone who needs to be convinced of the utter stupidity of the human insititution that is bureaucracy.

There's also Warships1 or Nawweps as it also goes by. It's a good place, they have a dedicated sailing ship board but it's pretty quiet. It too focuses on recent history and politics.

They complain about poor ventilation (British ships had systems installed to ventilate the lower decks; French ships did not). They complain about the frightful smell of French ships (not helped by the French habit of burying their dead in the sand ballast).

This was a big thing for the Brits.

Though they though they thought disease came from bad smells, they were correct in the end about being obsessive about keeping the ship clean which prevented my outbreaks of sickness.

As soon as a battle had ended and the ship brought back to readiness, the Brit sailors immidiately went to work scrubbing every portion of the ship with a mixture of water, vinager and I think a bit of wine (or it might have been a chemical, I forget) which was soon followed by a good painting of white paint to cover up the blood stained wood.

The only fault the British had with this was, if done too often, allowed more moisture into the wood which rooted the ship out earier than it would have.

The body thing is a matter of religionin which the Brits Protestantism helped them. Catholics believed one must be given last rites and buried in consecrated ground to go to heaven while the Protestants held such a view as superstitious and dumped the dead overboard as soon as they dropped onto the deck.

Indeed, the RN actually took triage to a whole new level by having sailors dump the terminally wounded overboard to drown - they couldn't be saved and they were in the way while there was a battle still to be won.

This was the big fear of Nelson at Trafalgar. Being a typical egotist, he feared having his corpse dumped overboard and lost into the void of the ocean to be forgotten and several times as he lay dieing in the bowels of Victory he pleaded with those around him not to let this happen and to have his body taken back to England to be buried in the soil of his homeland.

Of course we all know his men honoured his request.

The biggest area where disease got on ships was from new impressed men during a Hot Press.

They were often placed on barges and hulks in the harbour and lacked a good scource of heat, had poor food and given messy clothes to put on before they got to their ship and were given the ones they'd buy from the purser.

Cold and poorly clothed, they were easy targets for illnesses and it was common for a newly comissioned ship to suffer from typhoid for the first few weeks at sea.

Another thing is that France lacked many rivers with easy access to oak which ment the French often built their ships out of elm, a wood that is usually reserved purely for the masts since it takes the wearing effects of constant bending better than oak.

The problem with elm was not only that it was weaker but it also allowed infections to occur from splinter wounds than oak. I don't have anyhting to back me up, but it seems oak has something in its resin that acts as an antibacterial.

The English take on things like ship design is something I've always loved about that part of my heritage, a conservative people that forcus progress on the practical and a slow evolution of things, not sudden right angles and 180s that only end up making things worse and leaving many dead.

[sage2]

"I don't have anyhting to back me up, but it seems oak has something in its resin that acts as an antibacterial."

I think there's something to your statement. I have a good friend who is a world-class pathologist, and a lot smarter than me. She has made exactly this statement to me on several occasions -- that a number of types of wood, especially oak, tend to restrict bacterial growth.

[RazAlgul]

Great article......loved all the data....toooooooooo bad that CA did not do a proper research and adaptation of all the info available into the game.......providing proper differentiation for different factions......I just simply hate that everything has to be balanced and standardized.....

[littleleo]

Yes! I must admit that I've heard it said repeatedly that French ships were better built that British Ships and that French Guns were better than British. The reason why the Royal Navy regularly trounced the French is usually put down to superior seamanship and more experienced crews, at Trafalgar for example it was reasoned that most French and Spanish seamn would have been seasick.

The articles you've posted are interesting as they suggest a different view from the norm.

Hi ... i right with you ... but that we do on one side we must do at the other side. I really want see more diversity on ship who include the exellence of British seaman. But as we are agree above that, i know that the french guns and the french standadization system (at the end of the period), make them powerfull and better artillery than many other european country (and than brit too). But nobody discuss about that or add it in mod (exept the artillery mod but that comparative advantage is not evident). Why ?
When we discuss about the exellence of some british thinks (it's logical because we are on anglosaxonforum), why didn't discuss about the exellence of other country (an exeption : the prussian army that we know they are very disciplined ... ect) ?

Regards, Leo

[RazAlgul]

Well.....I guess it would be possible to adapt a diversity among ships...for example the British ships would have 1 or 2 Chevrons to show the better experience and training of the crew....but would be more expensive...yet again...French ships would have better firepower......Spanish ships would have stronger hull...etc.....that would make for a nice game change...also this could be implemented with land units....like Russia having bigger unit size (less powerful), while Prussia had standard..but more experienced etc.....also French Arty would be more accurate and longer reaching.....while the other wouldn't.....this way...each faction would have its Pluses and Minuses.....which would opt for the need of different tactics and strategies to be used......

thus my question on the TROM team....would this be possible from your side??

[Didz]

When we discuss about the exellence of some british thinks (it's logical because we are on anglosaxonforum), why didn't discuss about the exellence of other country (an exeption : the prussian army that we know they are very disciplined ... ect) ?

We do up to a point, I've been involved in several discussions about the quality of units right across the spectrum. On a more general note I think the problem lies with the fact that the gaming industry is largely conducted in English, and unfortunately historians are largely driven by nationalist propaganda to write what is acceptable for their country in their language. So, whilst I'm sure for example that their are a number of French Historians who have written books on the qualities of the French Army and Navy, those books are probably written in French and only read by Frenchmen. Hence they don't come to the notice of the gaming industry and don't influence any games.

There are exceptions of course as anyone who has read the excellent books on the Waterloo Campaign by Peter Hofschroer will know. But boy what a storm they caused amongst British historians. An account of the Waterloo Campaign told using german sources from a German perspective which contradicted the British accounts and undermined the Wellington mythos did not go down very well amongst his peers and he ended up having to sue people for slander and libel to put a stop to the hate campaign.

[littleleo]

Yes you maybe right ... but i knowning some French historian student and more French scientist and they doing effort to speaking and understanding 2 or 3 foreign languages (most of them speaking English, German and Spanish). I thinks it's an ethics step to try to consult foreign sources of information about some historical fact. I my poor situation of historian amateur i ever try to consult french and anglosaxon sources (or from other country who are writing in english or french). I understanding english but I'm not speaking well and badly writing ... but i try ...
Maybe there is an great difference between english historian's researchs or Thesis and some publications (from the same historians but for a different public)...
Here we can do this job because some of our are not english or US ... I'm curious to know from where the forum members come (stat) ... ? is there some statistiques somewhere ?
thanks Leo

[RazAlgul]

For example I am from Slovakia......and I support Didz...that most Gaming industry related stuff is pulled only from the English speaking environment......I don't think that CA has done big research outside of the US or GB regarding historical accuracy etc.....had they contacted all the historians that could provide info related to the game...they would have been working on ETW for another decade....IMHO simply put...they rushed the jobs

[Didz]

I did watch an interesting documentary a few days ago which claimed to be the French account of the the Battle of Trafalgar. That was quite interesting though it didn't really reveal much that was new from my perspective, just a slight adjustment to emphasis. About the only thing that was revealed was that the French knew exactly what Nelson's battle tactic's would be and had actually discussed what to do to counter them. Unfortunately, it didn't really work and to be honest they seemed to more or less accept that it was hopeless before they even put to sea, in fact the Spanish didn't want to sail at all and had to be persuaded by Villeneuve to participate.

I also have the French account of Waterloo by Henry Lachouque which has some interesting angles to it. Such as the fact, that Napoleon knew exactly what the Prussians were doing, before the British in fact. The British accounts always like to claim that Napoleon was incompetant and got 'humbugged' by the sudden appearance of the Prussians. 'Mon deiu, its the Prussians run away. ' Didn't happen.

Not that we needed the Prussians anyway, according to our accounts.

I don't think that CA has done big research outside of the US or GB regarding historical accuracy etc.....had they contacted all the historians that could provide info related to the game...they would have been working on ETW for another decade....IMHO simply put...they rushed the jobs

True though there is not much excuse for the uniform anomalies, from what I can tell they relied almost exclusively on the water-colour print collection in the New York Museum which is why so many uniforms and regiments are wrong. Its not like there aren't some really reliable books available with properly researched uniforms, even the Osprey series would have been a better basis.