User:Wikimage recently edited USS Missoula and USS Idaho to add OTL information on those US warships and the Southern Victory info as a sub-article. Normally we do this especially for historical persons and places but I am wondering whether its appropriate for these ships. Since they date from the Great War, they might close enough to the POD to be similar enough to the historical vessels for such treatment. However, we do have e.g Yorktown a disambiguation for a historical fleet carrier mentioned in several stories and treated as such and the escort carrier from Southern Victory which is treated as entirely fictional the way the USS Punishment was.
So do we treat all Southern Victory ships as fictional or do we use the historical information along with the SV particulars for those that are similar e.g. battleships such as the Missoula and Idaho? ML4E (talk) 21:10, January 2, 2014 (UTC)
- I'm more inclined to treat them as fictional, given the distance from POD, and because of ships like the Yorktown which just could not be the OTL version. There's also the matter class: the OTL Missoula was a Tennessee-class battleship, and the OTL Idaho was a Mississippi-class ship, both of which are impossible in 191.
- That's a timeline in which there was far less standing in the way of the US conducting the same defense policy as OTL, though. Turtle Fan (talk) 02:24, January 3, 2014 (UTC)
- Given his grasp of weapons and such, Nelg should probably weigh in, even if it's a simple "I don't care". TR (talk) 22:23, January 2, 2014 (UTC)
- I'm inclined to treat them as fictional to be safe. Some are definitely fictional, others may or may not be; but the US Navy of GWI would have had to take a substantially different path from the one that led to the OTL US Navy of WWI, so even with those that might be historical, the question marks loom too large.
- What we could safely do is add literary notes outlining the careers of historical ships of the same name. Turtle Fan (talk) 02:24, January 3, 2014 (UTC)
- I have the same inclination but raised it for purposes of discussion. I, too, would like to wait a bit for Nelg's comments. We do have the example of USS New York (Southern Victory) for TF's idea of literary notes. If we go that way, we may also want to rename the articles to included (Southern Victory) in the name the way we do for the USS New York. ML4E (talk) 21:38, January 3, 2014 (UTC)
Ahh, the ships of Timeline 191. What a paradox. You know, I originally thought that all US ships in Southern Victory were based off German design. After all, all infantry weapons, air planes, and even tanks were. So why not ships? Turns out that's not true. I've come to understand that HT has a limited understanding when it comes to technology and weapons. It seems on this particular matter, HT got lazy. My opion is that the GW ships are identical to that of OTL WW 1 US ships. The USS Dakota bears a striking resembles to the OTL US New York class, IE primary armament of 14inch guns and secondary armament of 5ich guns.
Even after the great war, when Sam Carsten joins the destroyer USS O'Brien. It bears a striking resembles to OTL USS O'Brien. Only one problem. OTL O'Brien was decommissioned in 1922, while in TCCH, it's still active in 1924. By the 2nd GW, we start to see something different. The USS Josephus Daniels on the other hand, dose resemble somewhat the DE of OTL US Navy during World War 2, but there was never a class with 4inch main guns. There were at least 5 different classes that were 306 ft long, however, all were equipt with ether two 3inch or 5inch main guns. I've got two theories. He wanted to show this really was AH, or he goofed.Mr Nelg (talk) 02:31, January 18, 2014 (UTC)
So should we treat them as historical ships in a fictional setting, or as fictional ships with historical counterparts? Turtle Fan (talk) 04:34, January 18, 2014 (UTC)
I say go with fictional ships with historical counterparts. As TR pointed out with the M3 Grant in M&Sm it's identical save for the name. In TL-191, I believe that's not the case. As I pointed out with the ships, they are identical in the GW, but start to change during GW2. Another reason I say this is because of the Ark Royal in SV. Technically, that should be a different ship, because OTL Ark Royal was built to the specifications of the Washington Naval Treaty. Mr Nelg (talk) 08:31, January 18, 2014 (UTC)
Interesting. I have a vague recollection of a brief discussion on the similarities between US and German warships early the GW trilogy. I think it was between Enos Sr. and the fishing boat captain but could be mistaken. Also, there is the case of the USS Townsend which had triple 5" gun turrets that no destroyer of the time had. See the Talk:USS Townsend page for more details. ML4E (talk) 17:04, January 18, 2014 (UTC)