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Post by fredsanford on Dec 11, 2018 6:29:48 GMT -6
That is true...but I mostly eat torpedoes while attempting to disengage from an unexpected night engagement. That comes down to crew training, I think.
I've gotten most of my torpedo hits on enemy capital ships during those same engagements. Live by the sword...
I think that I saw in one of your posts that one of your emphasis areas was night battles. I don't have any proof, but I feel like I get more night battles when I have that selected, so I have stopped selecting that to lessen the change of night battles where my capital ships are so vulnerable. I've come to accept that I just want to disengage from night battles and avoid contact until the clock runs out. I'll accept a draw and then I'll crush the AI during the next battle where I can keep its destroyers and cruisers at arms length.
Agreed. Best thing to do with a night battle is immediate turn together away with your big ships, and put DDs on Flotilla Attack. I also switch any scout cruisers to 'Support' so they don't linger around trying to sight the enemy.
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Post by theexecuter on Dec 11, 2018 8:29:03 GMT -6
It's all situational though.
When playing Austria Hungary...building strong DDs and giving night battles is a great way to whittle down the Italian navy...that usually outnumbers you but has poor crews. Especially since your battleline is smaller and more easily removed from harm's way...
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Post by director on Dec 11, 2018 15:40:42 GMT -6
theexecuter - I feel your pain; truly, I do. There were years - maybe decades - of my Byzantium game where the sun never came out, the rain never quit and the fog never lifted. My poor battlecruisers 'Kraken' and 'Typhon' took so many torpedo hits they were called 'monsters that eat their crews'. Other than scouting hard and disengaging the big ships when something is spotted, I just don't have a lot to offer. I think you get more low visibility battles if the enemy has selected night battles for crew training. Not sure if it applies to the human player but it would make sense.
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Post by jwsmith26 on Dec 11, 2018 17:31:44 GMT -6
It's kind of a catch 22. You train for night battles because you hate them and want to reduce your losses in them, but by doing so you get more night battles.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 12, 2018 1:19:01 GMT -6
If the issue was evenly balanced, I wouldn't be so irritated by it. As it is, the AI ALWAYS gets the advantage in force composition. If I outnumber the enemy, my admiral doesn't bring more ships to bear. If the enemy fleet outnumbers mine, it ALWAYS brings more ships to bear. It is breaking my desire to play the game. Just had yet another Russia v Germany war where I never receive a favorable force composition... Quality over quantity is the name of the game... There is no need to worry about blockades. War outcome in this game is decided by unrest level. Blockade = +unrest Battle victory = -unrest So just gotta win 'em battles in every chance possible. This is by building big ships (because AI usually has numerical advantage) and captain's mode (because AI is stupid). Turn by turn micro mngmt is important especially night battles. When faced with a superior enemy running away can be an option but there's always a cost, from possibly getting a less favorable peace term to losing the war (say when unrest is 9...). It is important to judge the line between aggressiveness and stupidity... Eh never mind, it is just a game, so if it's only one word to live by, it is not being "smart", but always "attack"!!! Yes it pays off:D Anyway by constantly winning battles with big ships the AI would gradually lose the bulk of his fleet and player can reverse the blockade. At this stage the AI usually would decline battles due to player numbers advantage. The exception being coastal raids probably CRs have a wider acceptable numbers gap set for the AI. Problem with this is ofc CRs are harder to win as the enemy has the sanctury/protection of his ports and often hard to find. And gradually player unrest due to long war/subs/raiders would start to creep. The solution is only Active Fleet equal number of capital ships against the enemy fleet, i.e. he has only 1 BB and 2 BCs left, so I reserve all capitals sans 3BCs. By doing this the AI would still accept non-coastal battles. I think this is the best/safest way to ace the wars and gives least frustration, the other alternative being spamming subs. Downside is it takes a lot of effort because you have to fight a lot of battles. But I consider the tactical battles exciting enough to be worthy of time.
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Post by theexecuter on Dec 12, 2018 8:41:21 GMT -6
Always fighting is foolish though. If you follow that strategy when facing the UK as France or Italy...you will always be blockaded and your fleets quality will be only comparable to the UK.
I like to play admiral mode...as captains mode is way too unrealistic. This makes my play of low education countries problematic as the ships not under my control are more likely to do dumb things.
You say build better ships...but even an 8000 ton light cruiser will be sunk by 3-4 enemy smaller light cruisers. The same for armored cruisers.
IMO, you need to select battle types that favor your fleet composition and or ship advantages over your current opponent. Sometimes, you just have to stay in Port and spam submarines.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 12, 2018 12:08:33 GMT -6
If you refuse even Real Adm mode the early/mid dreadnought wars against UK are tough, poor education is a pretty heavy penalty and it is hard to out duel UK's big caliber capitals without some micro. It's then the historically familiar path of the diplomacy game and a plethora of subs yes.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 21, 2018 2:58:51 GMT -6
Well,, typical example. 1 v 2 BC fight, plus the enemy gets a 3 BB support force. Yes I have 4 BCs in fleet, 2 of each class. And I'm blockading France. My lone BC was built in USA, 41.5k ton, 12x13" Q0. 2 enemy BC 38.9k ton, 6x14" Q1. A standup gunnery duel is a total kaput. The 2 enemy BCs are each done in by 5 torpedoes. Gunfire damage is negligible. Point is it is impossible without captain mode (+ patience + some luck), only in captain mode can the player order the DDs to.. kamikaze. If the enemy is Britain it would only be harder. e.g. current game britain already has 6x15" and 9x14" BCs. Even if it's a 2v2 fair fight, still dicey with 13" guns especially against the 15" ships. PS a bit off topic, I find this stage of game the most difficult... from 14" and up, penetrating hits on hulls often generate flooding. The magical *coal bunker* no longer works and damage control tech is not yet up to par. A few damage control tech levels higher there can be 16" pens and still 0 flood; a few years before it was still world of 10" guns and floodings are less common.
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Post by bcoopactual on Dec 21, 2018 9:33:41 GMT -6
AI capital ships pretty typically have large numbers of light guns. Something I don't think you can see in the almanac but can during a battle's post-scenario review of the enemy ships (double-click a ship in the details screen that you bring up from the post battle summary).
They (AI ships) certainly tend to carry more light guns than my personal designs. I'm reasonably certain that the AI for cruisers and destroyers is programmed to veer off in the face of withering fire so yeah, it's totally logical that you would have to micromanage the destroyers in Captains mode to have them make a suicide run. If you treated your destroyers like every battle was the death ride at Jutland or the Battle off Samar then you would pretty quickly run out of destroyers and probably run out of men willing to crew them even if you had the ships.
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Post by aeson on Dec 21, 2018 10:59:13 GMT -6
AI capital ships pretty typically have large numbers of light guns. Something I don't think you can see in the almanac but can during a battle's post-scenario review of the enemy ships (double-click a ship in the details screen that you bring up from the post battle summary). They (AI ships) certainly tend to carry more light guns than my personal designs. I'm reasonably certain that the AI for cruisers and destroyers is programmed to veer off in the face of withering fire so yeah, it's totally logical that you would have to micromanage the destroyers in Captains mode to have them make a suicide run. If you treated your destroyers like every battle was the death ride at Jutland or the Battle off Samar then you would pretty quickly run out of destroyers and probably run out of men willing to crew them even if you had the ships. The Almanac ships lists for each nation indicate the number and size of the guns in each ship's main and secondary batteries, but if you double-click on a ship it'll bring up the design overview, which as far as I am aware will always list the tertiary battery if present. For example, here we can see HMS Royal Sovereign, whose Almanac list entry (just above the top of the design overview) indicates that it's an 8x16", 14x6", 2 TT design and whose design overview tells us that it has an additional 12 3" guns in a tertiary battery.
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Post by dorn on Dec 21, 2018 12:13:12 GMT -6
Well,, typical example. 1 v 2 BC fight, plus the enemy gets a 3 BB support force. Yes I have 4 BCs in fleet, 2 of each class. And I'm blockading France. My lone BC was built in USA, 41.5k ton, 12x13" Q0. 2 enemy BC 38.9k ton, 6x14" Q1. A standup gunnery duel is a total kaput. The 2 enemy BCs are each done in by 5 torpedoes. Gunfire damage is negligible. Point is it is impossible without captain mode (+ patience + some luck), only in captain mode can the player order the DDs to.. kamikaze. If the enemy is Britain it would only be harder. e.g. current game britain already has 6x15" and 9x14" BCs. Even if it's a 2v2 fair fight, still dicey with 13" guns especially against the 15" ships. PS a bit off topic, I find this stage of game the most difficult... from 14" and up, penetrating hits on hulls often generate flooding. The magical *coal bunker* no longer works and damage control tech is not yet up to par. A few damage control tech levels higher there can be 16" pens and still 0 flood; a few years before it was still world of 10" guns and floodings are less common. Did you try stay on coal? For BBs and anything slow this is quite interesting option as coal bunkers sometimes do wonders in RTW. And for speed up to 23 knots the oil advantage is not so high as oil propulsion weight less however is much more expensive, more than you save by lower tonnage.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 21, 2018 15:03:52 GMT -6
Did you try stay on coal? For BBs and anything slow this is quite interesting option as coal bunkers sometimes do wonders in RTW. And for speed up to 23 knots the oil advantage is not so high as oil propulsion weight less however is much more expensive, more than you save by lower tonnage. Well yes they're all on coal - don't have oil firing yet. Doesn't help. I think game just works this way, sloped deck armor scheme + lackluster damage control. Scenarios like Lutzow/Seydliz vs 15" guns. In my usual games when oil firing's researched, damage control's already caught up and AON's about ready as well.
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Post by dorn on Dec 21, 2018 16:13:24 GMT -6
Did you try stay on coal? For BBs and anything slow this is quite interesting option as coal bunkers sometimes do wonders in RTW. And for speed up to 23 knots the oil advantage is not so high as oil propulsion weight less however is much more expensive, more than you save by lower tonnage. Well yes they're all on coal - don't have oil firing yet. Doesn't help. I think game just works this way, sloped deck armor scheme + lackluster damage control. Scenarios like Lutzow/Seydliz vs 15" guns. In my usual games when oil firing's researched, damage control's already caught up and AON's about ready as well. More issue is to have oil, sometimes it does not happen to get access to oil. But if slow speed of battlecruisers is accepted it is not as such issue for capital ships. For light ships it is more the issue.
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Post by bcoopactual on Dec 21, 2018 16:35:41 GMT -6
aeson , thanks, yes that was my mistake. I happened to click on an AI ship with no tertiary guns, saw what I thought was normal and didn't check any others. Sorry for the bad information.
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