The meaning of range

[magnin]

Does anyone have any good understanding of what "short range" really means and implies ?

what is the radius of action in game terms of a short-range destroyer, for instance ? Does the game punish you for having short range ships in the med, for instance ? If so, in what way ?

For instance, I have short range DDs in the Med as the French player. Is there a penalty and if so, where ? At what distance from my bases ? Would I be penalized in battles off Sicily ? Or further away, near Crete ?

This is all vaguely alluded to in the manual. I'd love to have more precise info in order to make educated building decisions.


Same for long range :
Do long range AF ships have any advantage at all in the Med (as France/Italy) ? In what seas are they more useful (as AF) ?

[kastratore]

Short range means that during wars you can't move those ships between areas. Also short range destroyers are more likely to miss a battle due to distance to nearest base. Don't know exactly how far away they can go, but from my experience, not that far. During my short Italian game, my short range destroyers frequently missed battles, despite Italy being pretty much in the middle of Mediterranean.

Long and Extreme range are used pretty much only for raiding. They're less likely to be scuttled or interned due to lack of fuel, also seem to be able to go on raiding for longer without penalties (* near status on ship list, indicating lack of supplies). They probably can stay in areas without sufficient base capacity for longer, but of that i'm not sure.

[Antediluvian Monster]

You can't go raiding with short ranged ships. They are also supposed to be less effective at intercepting raiders, but raider interception is bit ineffective anyway. They are also less effective for filling colonial tonnage. As above destroyers will miss battles more with short range, I actually try to avoid short ranged destroyers as everyone, even AH.

But there isn't a major problem for making brunt of your battlefleet short ranged as France. As both Mediterranean and Northern Europe are home area to France you can move short ranged ships between them in wartime. Consider it a perk for playing France. Though you might still want to have few medium ranged capital ships for fighting Japan/USA in SE Asia.

[skoggatt]

I don't think there is a specific range from base where short range ships can't join battle anymore, I think it's more of a random generated thing. At the beginning of a battle you might notice that some ships start out with less than 50% fuel. This is much more likely with short range ships than longer range ships. You might also notice that you can get a message stating that X number of destroyers could not participate due to range from nearest base. I don't think it's range per say, I think the battle generator randomly assigns some amount of fuel at the beginning of the action and short range and coal fired destroyers are randomly chosen to not be able to make it into battle.

I don't use short range on any ships except my first class of 500 ton destroyers because it limits their usefulness so much even for a country like A-H or Italy. Early on the combination of coal firing and short range can cut half or more of your available destroyers out of fleet actions, while later with oil it doesn't make sense to save so little displacement with short range. On the other hand I only ever use long or extreme range on AMCs since those options cost so much and offer so little benefit since the long and extreme range options don't make it more likely to make it into battle, they only extend the time a ship can raid in enemy territory without being interred.

[asdfzxc922]

Jun 25, 2020 15:30:43 GMT -6 skoggatt said:

I don't think there is a specific range from base where short range ships can't join battle anymore, I think it's more of a random generated thing. At the beginning of a battle you might notice that some ships start out with less than 50% fuel. This is much more likely with short range ships than longer range ships. You might also notice that you can get a message stating that X number of destroyers could not participate due to range from nearest base. I don't think it's range per say, I think the battle generator randomly assigns some amount of fuel at the beginning of the action and short range and coal fired destroyers are randomly chosen to not be able to make it into battle.

I don't use short range on any ships except my first class of 500 ton destroyers because it limits their usefulness so much even for a country like A-H or Italy. Early on the combination of coal firing and short range can cut half or more of your available destroyers out of fleet actions, while later with oil it doesn't make sense to save so little displacement with short range. On the other hand I only ever use long or extreme range on AMCs since those options cost so much and offer so little benefit since the long and extreme range options don't make it more likely to make it into battle, they only extend the time a ship can raid in enemy territory without being interred.

The battle generator seems to roll a random number for each division, then subtracts that many miles from each ship's cruising range to calculate the starting fuel levels. If any ship would start the fight below a certain percentage threshold (looks like 30-40%?), they're sent home. For destroyers the biggest factors are displacement (an 1100t destroyer has a ~20% longer range than a 900t destroyer for a given tech level), short/long range, and whether you've unlocked reduction gears. A 900t, reduction-geared destroyer has a much better chance of making it to the fight than a 500t legacy destroyer, even if both ships are coal-fired with medium range.

[magnin]

Jun 26, 2020 1:17:40 GMT -6 asdfzxc922 said:

It looks like this is what is happening to me as France in the Med. Though I have 35 DD to Italy's 15, I find myself in constant inferiority. Most of my DDs are legacy, many are short ranged, and all are coal-fired. This is quite annoying, as I am nearly always heavily outnumbered when fighting near Sicily.

And yet, my bases are not far away in Tunisia. I expected these ports to support short-range DDs.

I wish the game manual gave more insight into this. I have to discover this the hard way, when a real-life admiral would know why things happen. Though the manual is big and the developers put lots of effort into it.

Never saw a message telling me this or that DD was out of action for lack of range.

[magnin]

> The battle generator seems to roll a random number for each division, then subtracts that many miles from each ship's cruising range to calculate the starting fuel levels.


Do you think that distance between the place of action and nearest port is taken into account ? What would my ports in Tunisia be for, if they did not allow my short range ships to see more action ?

[Antediluvian Monster]

Jun 26, 2020 7:01:43 GMT -6 magnin said:

Jun 26, 2020 1:17:40 GMT -6 asdfzxc922 said:

Never saw a message telling me this or that DD was out of action for lack of range.

[/div][/quote]


If you aren't getting the message (it's a pop-up window that appears before battle telling that x number of destroyers could not participate) then lack of range is probably not the reason for the force compositions you are seeing. It also only applies to destroyers, cruisers and above with short range seem to always be counted as being fit to operate anywhere in the seazone.

[fleet5]

BTW, when you start to get really fast capitals with really reliable engines, you may want to give the long range since the capital can actually run out of fuel if it's running at 30kts for over a day.