• 🇰 🌀 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 🇮 @pawb.social
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    16 hours ago

    I only have experience in video games, and in the vast majority of them the chainshot is the most OP shot type you can use. Enemies can’t escape or evade you if their masts have all been cut in half. 😌

    • Quetzalcutlass@lemmy.world
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      6 hours ago

      In Sid Meier’s Pirates! it was the objectively correct choice 99% of the time. Even a tiny ship could take out a ship of the line with a few well-placed chain shot barrages, and ships would pretty much always surrender the instant they lost their mast.

      I think the story battles were an exception to the instant surrender rule, but without their sails you could switch to grape shot and pepper their helpless vessel until they had no crew left, then board for an instant victory.

      I miss that game. I should redownload it and see how it holds up.

      • mech@feddit.org
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        6 hours ago

        In that game the OP tactic was ramming ships of the line with a war canoe (it sails faster than cannonballs fly so you can evade them), then beating up the captain so his 2000 trained Marines will surrender to your 50 brigands.

    • Kraiden@piefed.social
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      16 hours ago

      I was gonna pick bar shot for similar reasons. I feel like the flexible chain would allow for too much loss of energy. Pure guess though, IANA 18th century naval warfare expert

        • YellowParenti@lemmy.wtf
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          6 hours ago

          First thought was shooting parallel to floor, then ppl where talking about masts. I was like oh, ok that makes sense too.

          there’s also that a lot died of infection.

          The vast majority of wounds documented during the Civil War were caused by the Minié ball, while the rest were from grapeshot, canister or other exploding shells. Few men were treated for saber or bayonet wounds and even fewer for cannon ball wounds.

          Unfortunately for the soldiers and the surgeons, the Civil War was fought just years before the widespread acceptance of the Germ Theory and the understanding of antisepsis and the sterilization of instruments and equipment. The Civil War surgeons performed their work as best they could, but did not have the knowledge of the role germs played in causing infection. While some antiseptic substances like iodine and bromine were used, the reason for their effectiveness was unknown. The discovery of antibiotics was still decades in the future.