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Post by mycophobia on Jun 20, 2019 12:38:57 GMT -6
So the discussion about most optimal ship raider got me thinking. Currently most optimal raider design in game generally completely forgoes firepower in favor of range/reliability/cheapness. However I feel it arguably gets a little ridiculous when some of these raider cant even beat some historical AMC in terms of armament.
It is not uncommon for some merchantmen to start carrying armament for self-defense, the British even have merchant ships that can carry a single catapult launched fighter.
So I am wondering would it spice up the current raiding game/convoy raiding battle to allow some merchant ship to show up armed? The exact armament/ratio of their armament etc can depend on a mix of year and tech. This will mean player's light ship actually take a bit of risk when running into a massive convoy if a third of them carry a couple 4 or 5inchers on deck.
The player either don't need to pay for these armed ships, or just check a doctrinal box that result in a flat fee based on perhaps the size of the player's empire. These armed merchant ships are only generated for convoy scenarios and cannot be used for raiding, so AMC remains relevant.(They can/should also be weaker than actual AMCs) Their presence will also make raider less effective strategically (especially if the raider is undergunned, but does next nothing against a heavily armed raider)
Just a thought since most merchant in game are utterly defenceless, and extremely under armed raider should operate quite as well as a more armed one that have similar speed/range/reliability. (This doesn't mean heavy raider needs to be cost effective, but they should have a bit of an advantage) If nothing else, having more guns makes it easier to sink more ships in a convoy before they disperse.
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Post by aeson on Jun 20, 2019 13:20:28 GMT -6
Given the way the game handles raiding, I very much doubt if defensively-equipped merchant ships (DEMS) would make any difference. DEMS might punish running warships into the middle of an enemy convoy, though by how much I don't know, and it'd need to be done carefully lest attacking convoys with light forces becomes a sucker's game.
Also, you can already use AMCs for trade protection and they'll sometimes show up as escorts in the convoy force.
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Post by mycophobia on Jun 20, 2019 14:51:24 GMT -6
Given the way the game handles raiding, I very much doubt if defensively-equipped merchant ships (DEMS) would make any difference. DEMS might punish running warships into the middle of an enemy convoy, though by how much I don't know, and it'd need to be done carefully lest attacking convoys with light forces becomes a sucker's game.
Also, you can already use AMCs for trade protection and they'll sometimes show up as escorts in the convoy force.
AMC for TP is incredibly cost-ineffective and you build them almost exclusively for raiding. Right now, while they can be used for that purpose it ends up being such as waste of resource most of time that I feel its not an effective way to implement DEMS. (I do note that this is a larger issue with abstraction of raiding as a whole) Attacking large convoy with light force like DDs should be something that require care. Right now if you aren't worried about losing a DD or 2 you can almost run your entire DD fleet into the middle of the convoy and obliterate it(since enemy escort are unlikely to exceed you in size). This is almost never done historically AFAIK, and I feel trying this in practice will result in the DDs at least getting quite bloodied(looking at how close range gun fights of DDs in the pacific night actions turned out, and Sydney being sunk by pointblank gun fire from an AMC). My main reason for suggesting this is, admittedly caused by the "meta" of minimally armed raiders. I feel even if larger heavy cruiser raiders does not need to be effective, they should standout from the standard raiding duty sea-plane tenders in their ability to potentially take on a convoy by themselves and inflict heavy losses (Admiral Scheer, Scharnhorst sisters, Admiral Hipper had all done this, and I doubt a 3000 tonner with 2 5in guns can accomplish this by itself). In fact, I feel heavy raiding ship should be able to trigger or be present for convoy attack missions, the potential VP from sinking 15+ TP at once can make them a bit more useful than they are now. Since it still depends on RNG letting your heavy raider catch one such convoy to initiate the mission, traditional "economical" raider remains valuable.
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Post by rob06waves2018 on Jun 20, 2019 15:08:32 GMT -6
I helped originally on a tiny mod on RTW 1 to add a functional 4" gun to merchants. It didn't really make much of a difference but I seem to recall losing a couple of old DDs to them. I'll have to see if I can access the generic merchant file first though.
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Post by JagdFlanker on Jun 20, 2019 15:12:17 GMT -6
AMCs on TP are useful in 1 instance - when you can blockade the enemy that means raiders no longer work, so if you have raiders built you might as well throw them on TP to keep them useful
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Post by aeson on Jun 20, 2019 15:26:15 GMT -6
In fact, I feel heavy raiding ship should be able to trigger or be present for convoy attack missions, the potential VP from sinking 15+ TP at once can make them a bit more useful than they are now. Since it still depends on RNG letting your heavy raider catch one such convoy to initiate the mission, traditional "economical" raider remains valuable. I haven't seen it yet in Rule the Waves 2 so I don't know if it's still the case, but in Rule the Waves 1 raiders would on rare occasions show up to engagements without the enemy being blockaded. It didn't happen often, but it could happen. MTBs might disagree, though historically they mostly attacked under the cover of darkness whereas many of the convoy attacks in the game happen during the day.
Also, I feel that being able to run destroyers into a convoy and obliterate it is more a problem with how the game places and the computer uses the escorting forces than with the lack of a defensive armament on the merchant ships, and HMS Sydney being sunk by Kormoran is a bit of an exceptional case and involved a much more heavily armed ship than would be typical for a DEMS - a typical DEMS might have a single 3" to 6" gun on the stern and perhaps a lower-caliber bow gun plus a couple light or medium AA guns whereas Kormoran had six 15cm guns of which four could fire on the broadside ( page 4), and on top of that Sydney appears to have been taken by surprise with its guns trained fore-and-aft rather than towards Kormoran, which is exceptionally unlikely to be the case for a warship charging into a convoy with the intent to sink ships without regard for the prize rules.
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Post by mycophobia on Jun 20, 2019 16:11:11 GMT -6
In fact, I feel heavy raiding ship should be able to trigger or be present for convoy attack missions, the potential VP from sinking 15+ TP at once can make them a bit more useful than they are now. Since it still depends on RNG letting your heavy raider catch one such convoy to initiate the mission, traditional "economical" raider remains valuable. I haven't seen it yet in Rule the Waves 2 so I don't know if it's still the case, but in Rule the Waves 1 raiders would on rare occasions show up to engagements without the enemy being blockaded. It didn't happen often, but it could happen. MTBs might disagree, though historically they mostly attacked under the cover of darkness whereas many of the convoy attacks in the game happen during the day.
Also, I feel that being able to run destroyers into a convoy and obliterate it is more a problem with how the game places and the computer uses the escorting forces than with the lack of a defensive armament on the merchant ships, and HMS Sydney being sunk by Kormoran is a bit of an exceptional case and involved a much more heavily armed ship than would be typical for a DEMS - a typical DEMS might have a single 3" to 6" gun on the stern and perhaps a lower-caliber bow gun plus a couple light or medium AA guns whereas Kormoran had six 15cm guns of which four could fire on the broadside ( page 4), and on top of that Sydney appears to have been taken by surprise with its guns trained fore-and-aft rather than towards Kormoran, which is exceptionally unlikely to be the case for a warship charging into a convoy with the intent to sink ships without regard for the prize rules. MTBs like S-Boote are abstracted in game as MTB squadrons, and their use in rtw 1 had always felt Iffy. I can see several of the Guadalcanal night action eventually turning into "DD diving into the middle of convoy" situation if the forces in question were not intercepted by their opponent. Bottom line is that in RTW this became standard practice for players at no risk. Fixing an AI offers a solution, but even with Scheer and Hipper catching a convoy(SLS 64/HX 84) almost undefended you don't see them going amongst the cruisers and sinking everyone of them as you would in RTW. Both Scheer and Hipper closed in, but did not engage at the melee range you'd expect to see in RTW, despite being much more powerful than the Sydney. SLS 64 was to my knowledge totally undefended, and Scheer was delayed first by the merchant cruiser Jervis Bay and then the Beaverford (which with only two guns seems to qualify pretty fairly as DEMS). This bought time for the rest of the convoy to scatter and limited losses. The Kormoran is indeed a bit of a step up from normal DEMS, and there is a lot of context around that fight that makes it somewhat unique. But the fact is that diving into a convoy of 15-20 ships armed with even just a 5in deck gun is a risky affair for a moderately armored cruiser. They might not be sunk, but that kind of behaviour is certainly extremely risky if enemy escort are also present/known to be in the area. I for one would no longer risk diving into a convoy escorted by enemy destroyers if I risk being slowed by deck guns and subsequently torpedoed. In the end, right now small/mid sized convoy battle tend to feel like free 2000~ VP because you can almost always sink the entire convoy unless you are given something like 1-2 DDs to do the job with. I understand this is in part due to the AI's inability to react appropriately and protect them. Based on what I read of the German surface raiders, even heavy raiders avoid getting unnecessarily close with armed TPs even if no other escort/only armed DEMS are present. TPs don't need to be a major threat and they don't need to stop raiding all together. But there is both realism and gameplay value to make "diving into the convoy" less of a default option. DDs/CLs can still sink convoy by going around the convoy, dumping torpedos and using their superior firepower to pick off TPs one by one, while suffering only minor damage. But diving into the middle of a bunch of TP is not going to be Open Season as it is now. Having to be a little more cautious with jumping into a convoy also makes for more realistic scenario where the Convoy's escort will likely have to be dealt with first before the attacking ships can have (almost) free-reign over the now helpless convoy. As is, without involving BC/BBs, smaller convoy attacks inevitably ends up with me ignoring the escorts, blast the TPs and tail out. (If a CA amongst enemy convoy can give me pause from going into the middle of it, 15 TP with 2 5incher each should as well)
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Post by JagdFlanker on Jun 20, 2019 17:02:13 GMT -6
In fact, I feel heavy raiding ship should be able to trigger or be present for convoy attack missions, the potential VP from sinking 15+ TP at once can make them a bit more useful than they are now. Since it still depends on RNG letting your heavy raider catch one such convoy to initiate the mission, traditional "economical" raider remains valuable. I haven't seen it yet in Rule the Waves 2 so I don't know if it's still the case, but in Rule the Waves 1 raiders would on rare occasions show up to engagements without the enemy being blockaded. It didn't happen often, but it could happen.
i'v used AMCs very very extensively and the only time i'v ever seen them in battles in RtW1/2 outside of intercepts is when they are on AF - which is when i forget to switch them to R before they finish working up
i let them reach fair before i set them to raider
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Post by aeson on Jun 20, 2019 18:11:49 GMT -6
I haven't seen it yet in Rule the Waves 2 so I don't know if it's still the case, but in Rule the Waves 1 raiders would on rare occasions show up to engagements without the enemy being blockaded. It didn't happen often, but it could happen.
i'v used AMCs very very extensively and the only time i'v ever seen them in battles in RtW1/2 outside of intercepts is when they are on AF - which is when i forget to switch them to R before they finish working up I was talking about raiding cruisers - CLs or CAs, not AMCs - and I am reasonably confident that I have on rare occasions seen them show up to regular engagements despite being assigned to raider status and despite the enemy not being blockaded.
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