Precision fire from a single familiar turret

A monitor's crew could learn the individual characteristics of one pair of guns instead of managing several turrets in a fleet action. Fire-control equipment that a battleship distributed across several mountings could be concentrated on one turret and one firing problem. Shore bombardment also made measurement unusually firm because the firing ship's position and the shell's point of impact on land could both be established. Those advantages help explain why monitors repeatedly appear among verified long-range naval gunfire records. Precision remained relative by modern standards. The entire ship was optimized to make its two heavy guns as consistent as contemporary technology allowed.