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Kantai Collection - Fanfic Idea and Recs

For those following The Seventh Shipgirl, there's a little Valentine's omake you'll like here.
 
Anyone know the "brevity codes" (USS, HMAS) of civilian vessels by any chance? Merchant convoys are proving hard to write about without extensive maritime knowledge.

Also, what do you suppose are the major countries' stances on Natural-Borns and conscription? Not for the very newsworthy capital ships, but the odd destroyer/frigategirl that no one cares about?
 
Librarian said:
Anyone know the "brevity codes" (USS, HMAS) of civilian vessels by any chance? Merchant convoys are proving hard to write about without extensive maritime knowledge.

Also, what do you suppose are the major countries' stances on Natural-Borns and conscription? Not for the very newsworthy capital ships, but the odd destroyer/frigategirl that no one cares about?
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Generally such ships would be known as "S.S.".
 
Librarian said:
Also, what do you suppose are the major countries' stances on Natural-Borns and conscription? Not for the very newsworthy capital ships, but the odd destroyer/frigategirl that no one cares about?
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It would probably depend on the rate of self-summons to conscripts. One of the issues with random frigates and destroyers is that their human selfs will probably be very young, and there might be a pretty big uproar if the USN or JMSDF starts conscripting 10-year olds.

Maybe stick them in a school near the naval base, but very explicitly separate from such? "Well, shipgirls need specialist doctors and taking them away from the naval bases is bad" as your reasoning. Keep them out of the battlefield until the legal age thing is no longer a problem. And if you're controlling their education, hopefully you've got a bunch of eager recruits once they're of age.

If the rate of natural-borns is very high, then throw PR people at the problem and start conscripting. Also, hire psychologists.
 
ltmauve said:
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Many thanks!

Alright, context. I've currently got a story plan revolving around the "merchant marine" convoys oft heard in the background of KC fics, consisting of loose collections of semi-large civilian boats (converted trawlers, bluewater yachts, etc) a la the convoy system implemented by the UK in WW2. Run mostly by said boats' owners/volunteers with a small amount of military escort, these serve as the regular "bread-&-butter" supply shipments along (reasonably) secured sea lanes, in contrast to the world's dwindling reserve of superfreighters that are held back for the rare "strategic" convoys.

Shipgirls smaller than cruiser-weight will likely feature heavily in said plot, hence the question. Thoughts?
 
Librarian said:
Many thanks!

Alright, context. I've currently got a story plan revolving around the "merchant marine" convoys oft heard in the background of KC fics, consisting of loose collections of semi-large civilian boats (converted trawlers, bluewater yachts, etc) a la the convoy system implemented by the UK in WW2. Run mostly by said boats' owners/volunteers with a small amount of military escort, these serve as the regular "bread-&-butter" supply shipments along (reasonably) secured sea lanes, in contrast to the world's dwindling reserve of superfreighters that are held back for the rare "strategic" convoys.

Shipgirls smaller than cruiser-weight will likely feature heavily in said plot, hence the question. Thoughts?
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Quite frankly, trawlers and bluewater yachts aren't going to be very useful for shipping materials, because of the limited amount of cargo space they have. Honestly IMO it's a better use of the trawlers to keep them going out and fishing, since countries need food.

Also this link on container ships may be helpful.

The other problem is that your idea of convoys made up of smaller boats runs into the same problem everyone proposing smaller carriers for the USN runs into: your boats may be smaller, but that doesn't mean that your escort flotilla is actually smaller. Running more convoys of smaller ships will actually use up more resources and escort shipgirls as composed to fewer convoys of bigger ships.

It really depends on what those convoys are running. Weapons? The USAF Military Airlift Command can work that out for you - airlift of PGMs is a lot more viable today vs days past; airlifting battleship shells could never happen in WW2, but a C-5 can carry 122 metric tons of cargo, which works out to the weight of 297 Joint Strike Missiles, give or take (dimensions, volume, and stacking those missiles is a different matter tho :V)​. Raw materials? You're definitely going to need bulk transport for that - there's no way a bunch of fishing trawlers are going to replace container ships or tankers. Sure, the biggest fishing ships can store 7,000 tons of fish, but that's processed fish, not cargo in standard shipping containers.
 
Whiskey Golf said:
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True, true. But aren't the container ships/tankers going to be priority targets for any hunting subs? Worldbuilding is currently tending towards most of the Big boats being 'nommed by the Abyss during the start of the Abyssal War, with subs fighting over who gets to whack-a-Panamax during the dark early days. I'd suppose nations would want a ready supply of cargo transports going on as soon as the frontlines stabilise, and civilian convoys end up being used until new bulk freighters roll out of the slipways years later.

Can probably shift it from international to inter-regional/inter-island if that's too egregious though. Thanks for the input!
 
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Librarian said:
True, true. But aren't the container ships/tankers going to be priority targets for any hunting subs? Worldbuilding is currently tending towards most of the Big boats being 'nommed by the Abyss during the start of the Abyssal War, with subs fighting over who gets to whack-a-Panamax during the dark early days. I'd suppose nations would want a ready supply of cargo transports going on as soon as the frontlines stabilise, and civilian convoys end up being used until new bulk freighters roll out of the slipways years later.

Can probably shift it from international to inter-regional/inter-island if that's too egregious though. Thanks for the input!
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Sure, container ships and tankers are going to be targets for abyssal wolfpacks, but from an operational perspective, if for example you need 4x ASW LCS and 12x DD shipgirls to cover a srsface convoy, and if you need 4x ASW LCS and 12x DD girls to cover the scratch convoy, because both are carrying stuff of equal importance, then you had better run the srsface convoy. There's also the issue that while a convoy of larger ships is a bigger target, it's much easier to defend a convoy of 12 large ships than it is to defend a convoy of 48 small ships.

Final aspect is where is your story taking place? Because oceangoing yachts and the average fishing trawler don't have the range to do cross-atlantic and cross-pacific trips (and yachts are absolutely shit at carrying anything more than a miniscule amount of cargo). Yes, the miracle at Dunkirk was a thing, but it was also a short-range cross Channel hop carrying people, not cargo.
 
Librarian said:
I see, I see. Some reworking might be in order then.

Thank you very much for the advice!
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It might be more helpful if you lay out in its entirety what you're planning and thinking of, so everyone reading can see the full picture and we all can fill gaps in each other's knowledge.
 
Librarian said:
True, true. But aren't the container ships/tankers going to be priority targets for any hunting subs? Worldbuilding is currently tending towards most of the Big boats being 'nommed by the Abyss during the start of the Abyssal War, with subs fighting over who gets to whack-a-Panamax during the dark early days. I'd suppose nations would want a ready supply of cargo transports going on as soon as the frontlines stabilise, and civilian convoys end up being used until new bulk freighters roll out of the slipways years later.

Can probably shift it from international to inter-regional/inter-island if that's too egregious though. Thanks for the input!
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To add onto what Whiskey Golf says, you're dramatically underestimating the capacity of the modern shipbuilding industry. China and Korea each separately cranked out more cargo tonnage in 2015 than what was lost in the entire Battle of the Atlantic, and Japan is no slouch in that department, either. Hell, just China and Japan together cranked out as much tonnage that year as the entire production run of Liberty ships. Further, there's currently overcapacity in the cargo ship market, to the point that Korean shipbuilders are suffering from financial trouble due to fewer orders. And that's not counting potential expansion of capacity in Europe and the United States, though that would take quite a bit of time.

So despite a run of whack-a-Panamax early in the Abyssal War, I don't see a lack of new cargo construction being a good reason to start conscripting yachts and fishing trawlers into cargo duties.
 
Librarian said:
Anyone know the "brevity codes" (USS, HMAS) of civilian vessels by any chance? Merchant convoys are proving hard to write about without extensive maritime knowledge.

Also, what do you suppose are the major countries' stances on Natural-Borns and conscription? Not for the very newsworthy capital ships, but the odd destroyer/frigategirl that no one cares about?
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Missed this earlier, but the prefix SS has largely fallen out of use. The only ships that use it these days are single screw feeders and inter coastal tramps. Mostly these days merchantmen either don't use a prefix, or they use MV.

There is a list of possible prefixes, but their use is conditional thing. Largely it's up to the owner's preferences as there are no established law for merchantmen to use a prefix.
 
Whiskey Golf said:
but a C-5 can carry 122 metric tons of cargo, which works out to the weight of 297 Joint Strike Missiles, give or take (dimensions, volume, and stacking those missiles is a different matter tho :V).
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Annoying enough thru that equals only about 50 16 inch shells, and maybe a hundred HE 14 inchers.

Not even half ammo load of a gun for a battleship. Most ships carry about 100 to 130 main gun shells per gun.

That just in weight, in dimesion you can fit oh... Two Iowas worth of shells in it.
 
Every single new ship right now.

Musashi Kai 2.


Gambier Bay.




Jervis



Provisional, CVE Princess.




The DEs, Hiburi-class.



 
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Great, more potatoes. O'Bannon is going to have a blast... CURSE YOU SHIBAFUU!!

And I think you posted Jervis' undamaged art twice, so I suppose the spoilered one is her damaged art.
 
*Looking at White Plains*

*Looking at Gambier Bay*

"...I'm not sure I should asking this, but does bigger carrying capacity means bigger-"

CLONK
 
Shipgirls and relationships; any instances in fanworks where you see them dating or being intimate with anybody other than admirals and fellow kanmusu?
 
GnosisEater said:
Shipgirls and relationships; any instances in fanworks where you see them dating or being intimate with anybody other than admirals and fellow kanmusu?
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The most popular one on that front is from the Shiba Dog Admiral strips, which has Ashigara in a relationship with ship captain Yonehara Sousuke (it was initially one-sided on his part LOL).

There's also stuff like that one strip featuring Shoukaku and a fighter pilot.
 
Speaking of new kanmusu, the Kancolle Wiki has Intrepid and Tashkent listed as coming soon, people.
 
LGear said:
The most popular one on that front is from the Shiba Dog Admiral strips, which has Ashigara in a relationship with ship captain Yonehara Sousuke (it was initially one-sided on his part LOL).

There's also stuff like that one strip featuring Shoukaku and a fighter pilot.
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Isn't Shibe admiral discontinued? And was that like a fairy pilot?
 
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