Getting Battlecruiser Trolled by the AI

[euchrejack]

So, as Austria-Hungary I have been having a jolly good time beating up on Italy for dominion over the Mediterranean.  But Italy has built some Battlecruisers, and keeps trouncing me on Cruiser actions, Coastal Bombardments, even a couple Convoy actions I think, by bringing their Battlecruiser that my Cruisers can't sink with their puny guns.  The max caliber on a Cruiser is 10", and their battlecruisers have armor too thick.  Plus, they move at 25 knots, so many of my cruisers can't even dictate the range.

Granted, I can see solutions to this (torpedoes, aircraft, coastal batteries), I just thought it was interesting to see Battlecruisers actually excelling at what they were suppose to excel.

...Of course, Italy has only build one Dreadnought Battleship for the entire game, so they don't win Fleet Battles.  Since I have build Battleships, I blockade them.  So I win the wars, and don't generally do those above missions, and Italy declines on most Fleet Battles, so I gain more VP then they do.  I didn't say their Battlecruiser strategy was one that won wars, but their battle record is impressive.

[ramjb]

Well, to be honest, you're seeing battlecruisers excelling at what they were supposed to excel: Trouncing enemy smaller cruisers .


In general you want to avoid cruiser actions when there are enemy BCs involved if you don't have any of your own, or yours are woefully outmatched. The type just rules in that role, exactly as historical BCs did. Build your own BCs to cover for the role and fight the enemy ones.

Around the mid 30s you'll probably be able to begin building battleships fast enough to come into cruiser battles aswell (27 knot BBs get into cruiser battles in my games a lot), and concentrate of them instead of building more BCs. But until then, yes, if the enemy has battlecruisers and you don't, just flee from cruiser battles as if they were the plague .

[Blothorn]

Yeah. My preferred underdog strategy is to build only BCs--even on a smaller budget I can usually inflict enough attrition in cruiser actions to avoid being blockaded, and you can accept fleet battles, harass scout forces, and avoid the battleships). Fleet-sized enemy coastal/convoy raids are the problem, but they don't come up very often.

Overall, RTW meta is rather non-Mahanian--there isn't much incentive to accept a decisive battle that you don't expect to win, as long as you can win the little engagements consistently. I wish invasions weren't so dependent on total superiority--invading an enemy island/oversea territory is an excellent incentive for the enemy to more actively contest the sea.

[ramjb]

Building only BCs works relatively well if you're on a limited budget. But BBs will always be more resilient on a fleet battle thanks to the thicker protection they can carry for the same tonnage accepting lower speeds. Personally unless I'm in an extremely tight budget, I build both BBs and BCs, I think both have their place. But I've been in the seat of building BCs only several times, and it can work. You just have to be quite careful when enemy BBs are around .

[mycophobia]

May 29, 2019 16:23:17 GMT -6 Blothorn said:

Yeah. My preferred underdog strategy is to build only BCs--even on a smaller budget I can usually inflict enough attrition in cruiser actions to avoid being blockaded, and you can accept fleet battles, harass scout forces, and avoid the battleships). Fleet-sized enemy coastal/convoy raids are the problem, but they don't come up very often.

Overall, RTW meta is rather non-Mahanian--there isn't much incentive to accept a decisive battle that you don't expect to win, as long as you can win the little engagements consistently. I wish invasions weren't so dependent on total superiority--invading an enemy island/oversea territory is an excellent incentive for the enemy to more actively contest the sea.

From a gameplay perspective it is rather rule, just avoid decisive battle and let BC farm the points.

That said, winning a decisive fleet engagement against the enemy battle line basically means u can sit and turn down every battle that comes up regardless of how strong his BC force is and wait for a peace settlement. a 20k to 5k VP ratio will last you a good while.

Also, while not often but a stronger enemy sometime like to make the mistake of throwing their BC against ur BB line in a convoy mission if he feel he has the number or gun advantage, and can sometime end up getting themselves rather bloodied. (My current Russia game has both of my BCs lost in various engagement to the 3BCs French had. All 3 French BC was sunk by my BB line(though sometime finished by torpedos) over various larger surface actions.

[rimbecano]

May 29, 2019 16:14:47 GMT -6 ramjb said:

Around the mid 30s you'll probably be able to begin building battleships fast enough to come into cruiser battles aswell (27 knot BBs get into cruiser battles in my games a lot), and concentrate of them instead of building more BCs. But until then, yes, if the enemy has battlecruisers and you don't, just flee from cruiser battles as if they were the plague .

Mid-30s? In my current game, my BCs grew heavy enough armor that the game wouldn't classify them as BCs anymore in 1915. Of course, I'm the 2x3 AB guy...

I'm rarely outclassed in cruiser battles. In my current game I didn't even build any non-capital cruisers until 1920 (my legacy CAs were built to be my entire battle-line). The one problem is that every once in a while, if the game's giving you a cruiser battle and you don't have any CLs, you'll get a force composed entirely of destroyers.

[ramjb]

Well, depends a bit on exactly what you expect out of the BB in question, and how much you want to keep the ship's size at a reasonable level . A 9x15'' 27 knot 35000 tonner would have to wait for the 30s to be able to carry enough armor as to be classed as a BB .

But yeah, if you only put a couple triple turrets in the design, given a proper displacement, it's not hard to put more than enough armor for the game to class it as a BB already in the mid to late 10s .

[euchrejack]

May 29, 2019 17:08:45 GMT -6 ramjb said:

Well, depends a bit on exactly what you expect out of the BB in question, and how much you want to keep the ship's size at a reasonable level . A 9x15'' 27 knot 35000 tonner would have to wait for the 30s to be able to carry enough armor as to be classed as a BB .

But yeah, if you only put a couple triple turrets in the design, given a proper displacement, it's not hard to put more than enough armor for the game to class it as a BB already in the mid to late 10s .

Speaking of which, my treaty Armored Cruisers are currently being refitted as Battleships by upgrading the guns and decreasing the number of turrets.  That will teach 'em to put treaties on my navy!

[snwh]

personally I've been using the opposite philosphy in my games. I won't deny battlecruisers being useful, but for me its been battleships that really put the work in, the past few games. I've basically been eschewing BC's to try and get something resembling battleship parity, and making sure that they're relatively modern so they don't eat up the budget.

works like a charm, I can actually fight out fleet battles and generally do very well. It's also an opportunity to take out large amounts of the enemy battlecruiser fleet.

I won't say battlecruisers are the wrong path though.

and of course, fast battleships are the ultimate fusion of the two.