Battle question

[gord96]

Hey all. 

I had a question about the battles in this fantastic game. I have just been playing on Admirals mode as it seemed the easiest for a noob like myself. But I am finding I am losing most battles that are close, perhaps because all I do is set the course. Is captains mode the best way to play the game so you can really control the fighting? Thanks for any tips or info!

[elouda]

I play on Rear Admiral's, and find that it offers more flexibility without allowing full direct control (which I do not want). It does let you take control of maneuvers for squadrons within line of sight, and also lets you assign priority (division-level) targets to everything. This latter bit is really useful, for example, you can give DD group a certain target (like a crippled ship while you chase its buddies), and then set them to independent to let them loose on it. In general the different AI roles are rather powerful once you get a feel for how to assign them and what to expect in different situations.

[ccip]

That depends on what you think is "best", whether best = most realistic, and how you define realism in the first place

As far as I can gather, the SAI games have been basically designed with the Admiral mode in mind. For the SAI Campaigns games, I've never played them on anything except admiral.

However, just like elouda, I found myself switching to Rear Admiral mode in RTW - mostly to make up for the randomness of battle and inability to plan things like formations in advance. It provides a nice balance and limitations, and as long as you set "initial AI control of divisions => all", it basically plays like Admiral's mode with a switch that allows you limited control when you need to do something.

I actually think that the way the game is designed, the Captain's mode where you're controlling everything is the least enjoyable way, because then it's almost like any other strategy game with a lot of micromanagement. However the AI in the game is good enough that I usually trust it to do its job, and I actually get a lot of satisfaction out of only having to really think about the flagship and fleet as a whole, to focus on the "big picture" and let my captains make their own tactical calls. The game flows far better when you take out the micromanagement.

[gord96]

Thanks guys. I agree, I enjoy not having to micromanage everything. Maybe I will try rear admiral mode and see what happens! Thanks again.

[gord96]

Played around with captains mode tonight and I like it. It may be gamey but I love taking DD's and running them at B's and BB's and being able to launch torps when I want to. Playing as Spain I had a big battle with GB. They had 4 B's 3 CA's and a bunch of CL's and DD's versus my 1 B, 2 CA, 2 CL and 7 DD's. We were outgunned but I put my destroyers in independent and took off the AI one by one and did torpedo runs at the enemy B's and managed to sink 2 of them and only lost 2 destroyers (and 1 CA from a lucky shot that blew it up). Probably wouldn't have got that victory in Admiral's mode.

Anyways I may actually beat Britain in a war I have been losing as I got like 3800 VP's that battle (of course would have been more in Admirals mode as you lose 20% I think in Captains).