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Post by barrybull on Feb 7, 2019 23:46:36 GMT -6
Greetings to all RTW players. New to the discussion board and looking forward to RTW2.
While there is a well-known tendency for the AI to keep building BCs in mid to late game in RTW to the point that BC:BB ration may reach 2:1, is the same bug/ feature also responsible for AI scraping all earlier CAs and not building 1920s-1930s tech level CAs?
Putting role-playing and historical authenticity aside, is it common for players to just avoid building CAs in mid to late game to save budget for building capital ships?
Grateful if anyone can clarify this matter, as that affect how I develop my fleet.
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Post by rimbecano on Feb 8, 2019 0:59:54 GMT -6
Well, CAs towards the beginning of the game fill basically the role of pre-dreadnought battlecruisers. When BCs become available, the early game CA style is obsolete. Towards the late game ships that resemble RL inter-war heavy cruisers become viable, and I'll often build out a fleet of those, but their mission is closer to an early game CL than an early game CA.
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Post by noshurviverse on Feb 8, 2019 2:42:56 GMT -6
In my opinion, CAs become rather obsolete right around the mid-1910's. Before then, gun penetration is low enough and the caliber gap between capitals and them is small enough that they can reinforce a battle line. Afterwards, when 14, 15 and 16" guns become the norm on capitals, they're basically made of paper and their guns are too weak to meaningfully contribute.
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Post by akosjaccik on Feb 8, 2019 4:58:38 GMT -6
This is why argued regarding RtW2 (well... RtW3 now) for decent organization/logistics (at least some player-designed/designated missions instead of pure random), as by game logic I think anywhere a CA can go so can a BC and do things simply better; and as the game picks from the pool whatever is available, if it won't find much else, like CAs, it will pick the battlecruiser. Again: building for the game's internal rules. On the flip side, when a lone enemy capital ship gets into a region, of course it will always be selected for battle, not so much on the player's side if the player has a diverse fleet there, where you get to roll the dice until you finally get something that can actually fight the thing apart from occassionally throwing destroyers at it at night and praying. Here shows the near-constant avability of ships in a given zone it's shortcomings, they are esentially omni-present for anything. In such an environment, a heavy cruiser can't fight bigger ships, and what it can defeat so does the battlecruiser and sometimes nor for much more money.
Maybe even "banning" capital ships from cruiser engagements, though a drastic decision, would force the players to upkeep a competitive cruiser force?
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Post by rimbecano on Feb 8, 2019 5:27:23 GMT -6
In my opinion, CAs become rather obsolete right around the mid-1910's. Before then, gun penetration is low enough and the caliber gap between capitals and them is small enough that they can reinforce a battle line. Afterwards, when 14, 15 and 16" guns become the norm on capitals, they're basically made of paper and their guns are too weak to meaningfully contribute. Yeah, the early-game CAs are played out by then. But at that point you can build them to be armored against CLs, and marginally against their own weapons, without any intent of having them stand in the line, and pack them full of machinery, and they'll do quite well in the scout/screen and anti-raider roles.
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Post by desdinova on Feb 8, 2019 5:49:10 GMT -6
Historically heavy cruisers came into existence because of naval treaties. It can happen in-game, too. I personally find 8" gunned heavy cruisers pretty pointless. Give them a broadside of 15 6" guns, and 30+ knot speed, though, and they'll chase down and murder anything through sheer volume of fire.
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Post by bcoopactual on Feb 8, 2019 8:32:33 GMT -6
Greetings to all RTW players. New to the discussion board and looking forward to RTW2. While there is a well-known tendency for the AI to keep building BCs in mid to late game in RTW to the point that BC:BB ration may reach 2:1, is the same bug/ feature also responsible for AI scraping all earlier CAs and not building 1920s-1930s tech level CAs? Putting role-playing and historical authenticity aside, is it common for players to just avoid building CAs in mid to late game to save budget for building capital ships? Grateful if anyone can clarify this matter, as that affect how I develop my fleet. Welcome to the forum barrybull . As was pointed out above the armored cruiser was made obsolete by the "dreadnought" armored cruiser (HMS Invincible) that later became known as battlecruisers. So after battlecruisers make their appearance it wouldn't make sense for the AI to lay down new armored cruisers. The later generation of treaty cruisers that the USN gifted with a confusing ancestry by deciding to reuse the CA designation are totally unrelated to the armored cruiser. They were a response to the building holiday of capital ships. They were the largest class of ship that could be built without regard to numbers of ships built or total tonnage, only individual limits on tonnage and gun caliber. Excluding the British "Elizabethans" of the Hawkins-class which formed part of the basis of the 10,000 ton, 8in caliber limit, most of the first generation of treaty cruisers weren't laid down until right before the end of the game's original time frame (Jan 1926) or after. County-class (UK) first unit laid down Sep 1924 Duquesne-class (France) first unit laid down Oct 1924 Trento-class (Ita) first unit laid down Feb 1925 Myōkō-class (Jpn) first unit laid down Oct 1924 Pensacola-class (USA) first unit laid down Oct 1926 So the treaty cruisers probably weren't considered heavily when the developers were programming the AI because most weren't commissioned until after the game's original time frame. It's interesting to consider where cruisers would have gone without the Washington treaty. The US was looking at 10,000 tons to be the minimum for an acceptable scout cruiser that had the range to patrol the pacific. (One of the other main driving forces for the 10,000 ton limit in the treaty.) The Hawkins-class was sitting there outclassing every other light armored cruiser in the water at the time. However, there was still a lot of pushback against the 8 inch gun on cruisers because their rate of fire was considered too slow until later developments in shell and powder hoists for 8 inch guns. Plus obviously, 10,000 ton cruisers are significantly more expensive than 6-8,000 ton cruisers. I don't know for sure because it's hypothetical. I'm willing to believe that the developers have spent some time discussing what 1920-30 cruiser development would look like without the treaties there.
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Post by barrybull on Feb 8, 2019 8:35:57 GMT -6
In my opinion, CAs become rather obsolete right around the mid-1910's. Before then, gun penetration is low enough and the caliber gap between capitals and them is small enough that they can reinforce a battle line. Afterwards, when 14, 15 and 16" guns become the norm on capitals, they're basically made of paper and their guns are too weak to meaningfully contribute. Yeah, the early-game CAs are played out by then. But at that point you can build them to be armored against CLs, and marginally against their own weapons, without any intent of having them stand in the line, and pack them full of machinery, and they'll do quite well in the scout/screen and anti-raider roles. That is my view playing Chin China. The longer construction period and cheaper price allow a larger CA fleet that can effectively eliminate the escorts (CL and DD) of the opposing BC heavy fleet while resisting enemy BCs with 10 inch guns, which then give rise to opporunity for my destroyers to do torpedo runs.
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Post by barrybull on Feb 8, 2019 9:20:33 GMT -6
Greetings to all RTW players. New to the discussion board and looking forward to RTW2. While there is a well-known tendency for the AI to keep building BCs in mid to late game in RTW to the point that BC:BB ration may reach 2:1, is the same bug/ feature also responsible for AI scraping all earlier CAs and not building 1920s-1930s tech level CAs? Putting role-playing and historical authenticity aside, is it common for players to just avoid building CAs in mid to late game to save budget for building capital ships? Grateful if anyone can clarify this matter, as that affect how I develop my fleet. Welcome to the forum barrybull . As was pointed out above the armored cruiser was made obsolete by the "dreadnought" armored cruiser (HMS Invincible) that later became known as battlecruisers. So after battlecruisers make their appearance it wouldn't make sense for the AI to lay down new armored cruisers. The later generation of treaty cruisers that the USN gifted with a confusing ancestry by deciding to reuse the CA designation are totally unrelated to the armored cruiser. They were a response to the building holiday of capital ships. They were the largest class of ship that could be built without regard to numbers of ships built or total tonnage, only individual limits on tonnage and gun caliber. Excluding the British "Elizabethans" of the Hawkins-class which formed part of the basis of the 10,000 ton, 8in caliber limit, most of the first generation of treaty cruisers weren't laid down until right before the end of the game's original time frame (Jan 1926) or after. County-class (UK) first unit laid down Sep 1924 Duquesne-class (France) first unit laid down Oct 1924 Trento-class (Ita) first unit laid down Feb 1925 Myōkō-class (Jpn) first unit laid down Oct 1924 Pensacola-class (USA) first unit laid down Oct 1926 So the treaty cruisers probably weren't considered heavily when the developers were programming the AI because most weren't commissioned until after the game's original time frame. It's interesting to consider where cruisers would have gone without the Washington treaty. The US was looking at 10,000 tons to be the minimum for an acceptable scout cruiser that had the range to patrol the pacific. (One of the other main driving forces for the 10,000 ton limit in the treaty.) The Hawkins-class was sitting there outclassing every other light armored cruiser in the water at the time. However, there was still a lot of pushback against the 8 inch gun on cruisers because their rate of fire was considered too slow until later developments in shell and powder hoists for 8 inch guns. Plus obviously, 10,000 ton cruisers are significantly more expensive than 6-8,000 ton cruisers. I don't know for sure because it's hypothetical. I'm willing to believe that the developers have spent some time discussing what 1920-30 cruiser development would look like without the treaties there. The difference in time needed to build a BC and a CA is, in my view, too small. 30 months to 24 months for the USA in my current late Chin China game, but the difference in displacement is more than a 100%.
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Post by bcoopactual on Feb 8, 2019 11:14:08 GMT -6
If the same number of people were used to build both then that would probably be true but I doubt that was the case. Size isn't a reliable indicator of time to complete. In fact all of the Tennessee-class armored cruisers (14,500 tons) took just over three years from keel laying to commissioning (except Washington which was just under three years. The almost twice displacement Nevada (27,500 tons) took 3 years and 4 months. Economics, the available budget of the navy and the maturity of the shipbuilding industry have more effect than just size.
The US is probably catching a break in-game when it comes to shipbuilding times. They were hamstrung in naval shipbuilding for most of the time period of the game by a very frugal and isolationist Congress. One of the reasons the Standards all have the same tactical performance (speed, turning radius, etc) is because Congress wouldn't generally authorize more than two a year so the US had to put different classes in the same squadron to operate unlike the British who would lay down four or five a year and so could build an entire squadron's worth of ships every year. The US had the shipbuilding capacity to match that but not the political will. At least not until 1916.
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Post by aeson on Feb 8, 2019 13:38:05 GMT -6
Historically heavy cruisers came into existence because of naval treaties. Heavy cruisers probably owe their prevalence to the naval treaties, but they did not come into existence because of them. The first examples of the type - the British Hawkins-class cruisers laid down during the First World War - came about in part due to intelligence reports indicating that similar vessels were being built for the German Navy and in part due to a recognition of the fact that battlecruisers were becoming too valuable and too expensive for any considerable number to be built or made available for service as heavy trade protection cruisers in distant waters. The next clear-cut examples of the type* - the Japanese Furutaka-class cruisers - were laid down towards the end of 1922 and were thus in the Treaty period, but were most likely already being designed before the Washington Naval Conference began and were partly a response to the British Hawkins-class cruisers.
*I think a reasonable argument could be made that the Omaha-class cruisers are also an early example of the type despite being armed with 6" guns. You'd have to drop gun caliber as the primary characteristic distinguishing "light" and "heavy" cruisers, but to be honest I feel that that's a bit of an arbitrary distinction anyways; the 10,000t 6" ("light") cruisers that emerged after the 1930 Treaty of London are much closer in capability and armor protection to near-contemporary 10,000t 8" ("heavy") cruisers than to near-contemporary ~6,000t 6" ("light") cruisers anyways. That said, the Omahas' somewhat obsolescent main battery configuration hampers that to some extent; despite carrying a dozen 6" guns, only eight could be used in a single broadside, which is closer to the six or seven 6" guns in the broadside of the then-typical ~5,000t light cruisers than to the eight 7.5" guns in the broadside of the Hawkinses or the six 20cm guns of the Furutakas.
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Post by rimbecano on Feb 8, 2019 14:55:28 GMT -6
The design scheme of the heavy cruiser does not owe its existence to the treaties, but the name "heavy cruiser", and the existence of the type as something distinct from the heavier end of the CL spectrum is a result of the treaties. In particular with regards to RTW the dividing line between CA and CL is pretty much exactly the London Treaty limit on CL size and armament.
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Post by cv10 on Feb 8, 2019 15:02:43 GMT -6
Maybe even "banning" capital ships from cruiser engagements, though a drastic decision, would force the players to upkeep a competitive cruiser force? This is (theoretically) possible for a player to do by editing the war missions file for each nation. You'd simply go through each nation's war missions and for "cruiser engagement" or "cruiser battle", you change MaxShipType from BC to CA. You can use the "custom nations editor"make this change. It's not particularly difficult to do in of itself. The reason I say "theoretically" possible is that I've never tested it myself, so I can't strictly vouch that it works.
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Post by aeson on Feb 8, 2019 16:39:40 GMT -6
Maybe even "banning" capital ships from cruiser engagements, though a drastic decision, would force the players to upkeep a competitive cruiser force? This is (theoretically) possible for a player to do by editing the war missions file for each nation. You'd simply go through each nation's war missions and for "cruiser engagement" or "cruiser battle", you change MaxShipType from BC to CA. You can use the "custom nations editor"make this change. It's not particularly difficult to do in of itself. The reason I say "theoretically" possible is that I've never tested it myself, so I can't strictly vouch that it works. You'd also have to go through the map file; I believe all of the standard possessions have predefined battles associated with them, and my recollection is that cruiser engagements/battles are perhaps the most common type of engagement defined in the map file.
Personally, I don't think that banning battlecruisers from cruiser engagements is a good idea. Take away the battlecruiser's ability to show up in cruiser engagements and what you're left with is essentially just a battleship subclass - arguably a worse battleship, especially later in the game when some configurations of battlecruiser get a 12" belt armor limitation and battleships are allowed to be designed for up to 30 knots. Additionally, hunting down and destroying hostile cruisers was one of the primary missions intended for the original battlecruisers (and also for the last battlecruisers, if you consider the Alaskas to be battlecruisers), and making battlecruisers unable to show up for engagements other than fleet battles, battleship engagements, and a few of the more significant coastal raids and convoy missions would more or less eliminate the battlecruiser's ability to perform that kind of mission.
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Post by barrybull on Feb 8, 2019 20:40:39 GMT -6
If the same number of people were used to build both then that would probably be true but I doubt that was the case. Size isn't a reliable indicator of time to complete. In fact all of the Tennessee-class armored cruisers (14,500 tons) took just over three years from keel laying to commissioning (except Washington which was just under three years. The almost twice displacement Nevada (27,500 tons) took 3 years and 4 months. Economics, the available budget of the navy and the maturity of the shipbuilding industry have more effect than just size. The US is probably catching a break in-game when it comes to shipbuilding times. They were hamstrung in naval shipbuilding for most of the time period of the game by a very frugal and isolationist Congress. One of the reasons the Standards all have the same tactical performance (speed, turning radius, etc) is because Congress wouldn't generally authorize more than two a year so the US had to put different classes in the same squadron to operate unlike the British who would lay down four or five a year and so could build an entire squadron's worth of ships every year. The US had the shipbuilding capacity to match that but not the political will. At least not until 1916. There is also the power of manpower restrictions. While the two classes you referred initially had similar complement sizes, the Nevada class would took a crew almost 3 times larger than Tennessee-class. Size is indeed not the sole indicator, but the complexity of syztems, crew size and other factors taken into account should meant that BCs are much more time, budget and labour demanding to build than CAs and the late game US fleet that fields more than dozen BCs, less than 10 BBs and none CAs still does not feel realisitic even in a world without Washington and London Treaties.
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