I don't know what to name "problems". 6" in DG1.5 behave not like in 1.0 - maybe because of fires changed of whatever - it doesn't matter. The point is - armored ships are only vulnerable to 10" or more shells - which (maybe) more realistic (doubt) but leads to less interesting and challenging game. That's my point...

I apologize. I haven't been clear on at least two points:
1. 6" guns *do* penetrate armor in my DG installation. The VARIAG didn't because it never really engaged the one armored cruiser in the formation that I sank it with. But other Russian ships with 6" (152 mm) guns *have* been damaging my Japanese armored cruisers at 3000-4000 yards. My copy of Janes 1905-1906 predicts that the Russian 6"/45 gun would penetrate 6-7" Krupp steel at 3000 yards and that's roughly consistent with what I'm seeing in my Distant Guns 1.5 installation. Of course, I've read someplace that Jane's old armor penetration formulae were wrong. But I can tell you that, when I let 6"/45 shooters get inside 3000 yards in DG 1.5, they start to punch holes in my ships...

2. 6" guns being "useless" would not be realistic based on what I've read. The only historical source that I can see that even hints at that is from CAPT Pakenham who was the senior Royal Navy observer in theater. He apparently said:

"The 10in guns of the Peresviet and Pobeida were of 45 calibres, and may also be of greater range, but the effect of every gun is so much less than that of the next larger size, that when 12in guns are firing, shots from 10in pass unoticed, while, for all the respect they instill, 8in or 6 in guns might just as well be pea shooters, and the 12 pdr simply does not count. This must be understood to refer entirely to the moral effect."

D.K. Brown, Warrior to Dreadnought, Chatham Publishing, London, England, p.175.

But all this guy is saying is that guys aren't afraid of 6" and 8" rounds when they're under fire from 12" guns. Nothing I've read says that 6" were useless historically.

v/r
feld

6" may cause some fire at AC - that's the only effect I could notice. I've made an experiment - about 12 Russian PC (all I could find) with 6" guns only controlled by computer against two Japanese AC.

When I played that in mode "computer vs computer" - none of AC was seriosly damaged untill all of the Russian ships were sunk. When I played that by myself managing AC - the damage was much more sensible but still quite not enough to state that 6" guns do REALLY damage to armored ships...

That's my the only point...

That's odd. The 6" guns do the damage that I'm expecting to the Japanese AC's in my games (with me as the human player). My secondary guns get all shot up by them, the AC's flood some, but no conning tower or main turret hits get through. Damn. I wish I could read Russian...there's apparently some historical data on losses and damage sources here but I am unable to read it.

I'll try computer vs. computer and see what I can see.

v/r
feld

I'll probably try to translate for you - although WHOLE book is too much ;) What exactly data are you interested in?

Yes, quite interesting data... I think some time requires for me to make a reasonable compilation of it.

For example, there are interesting numbers of cause of death among Russian sailors during the whole war:
1. KIA - 519
2. Burned or boiled - 28
3. Drowned - 61
4. Uknown reason - 5691
5. After reciving medical assistance - 212

Other damages (stayed alive):
1. Wounded (I think direct wounds meaned) - 2192
2. Shell-shocked - 406
3. Burn - 122
4. Poisoned by gas - 108
5. After shock - 22
6. After heat-stroke - 4

From this numbers we already may see that damages of crew from fire MAY be unrealistic too high in DG. Although most of Russian sailors were dead by unknown reasons, the remaining numbers allow us to conclude that fire didn't really cause much deaths as in the game... I'l keep studing

There is also very important conclusion: most of the losses were caused by ships sinking. During the battle despite the heavy fire crew losses were moderate while most of the crew of sinking ships could not survive.

During the research there is also a strong conclusion that damage level of crew of ships stayed alive not exceed 30% - no matter how intensive fire was. It means - if ship is not damaged enough to drown - most of it crew is alive and functional. Only when enemy's fire so intensive it leads to ship sinking - it also damages crew much.