Not to sound like a smartass or something, but you were aiming below the waterline right? You could shoot a hundred shells at point blank range, and have the whole ship ablaze, but if there is no damage below the waterline, that baby aint going down.
As for the deckgun rate of fire, this has been covered a million times. I happen to use RFB as well, and I must say that Beery has gone to great lengths to ensure that the ROF is as accurate as could be expected in a COMBAT situation. Alot of research was done on this, and from what I could tell, nobody has shown it to be otherwise.
