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Post by director on Aug 25, 2021 23:45:29 GMT -6
gurudennis - I build a lot of DDs - I often have more DDs than two or three powers - and I have really good CLs, so I am willing to risk a night or low-visibility action. I do NOT find that capital ships are of much use in low visibility - they can't use their range and they are very prone to take torpedoes. Whoever said, 'a battleship has as little place in a night action as a little old lady in a bar-room brawl,' summed it up for me. If that tactic works for you then I applaud. I would not agree that I find a battle line marginally useful - I just realize the mission generator will often arrange to give me parity or nearly so, and I want superior ships for that.
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Post by gurudennis on Aug 26, 2021 0:41:46 GMT -6
Can't say that I'm excited about night engagements with my BBs either. It sure beats night engagements with my CVs against a battle line. Neither is much of an issue if you manage to disengage, but that is not assured.
The need for a large number of destroyers is undeniable. As for CLs, for operational reasons I tend to have few or none outside of colonial areas. Once the expansion drops, hopefully the task force editor will make pure fleet escort CLs more viable (including 5" DP platforms a-la USS Atlanta).
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Post by arminpfano on Aug 26, 2021 11:10:56 GMT -6
arminpfano, whats a useful speed? I don't recall seeing your thoughts at: nws-online.proboards.com/thread/5955/speed-cvl and I don't see them noted in the OP. I can't argue on the BB line as I generally use BC for my CV conversion, B and CA for CVL. Other than night time and weather limiting flight ops but not ship speed, I haven't seen carrier speeds being impactful. Might just be how I fight... But my carrier force never keeps up with the main battle line nor do I want it to. The patrol role seems to work to keep them in in a general non-surface-combat area, so I've been experimenting with that role to good affect. My issue is that carriers turn into the wind to launch and retrieve planes, which makes them virtually un-controllable with larger wings / high operational tempo. As such, with new build CVs I'm usually 26-29 knots (my low end is right above gurudennis "25 kts or so"); rebuilds of my early BCs with bulges end up in the 24-26 knot range (with gurudennis 25 knots right in the middle of my range). I think I've built a handful of early BCs at 27 knots with most ending up at 28-29 knots with bulging (cheap TPS and extra aircraft or AAA capability) then bringing it down to that 24-26 knot speed.
Put another way, my new CVs I try to keep within a few knots of most enemy CA speeds - night time / bad weather evasion needs and the screening DDs can force an opening of the range for the CVs to slip away into the night / rain squall. If the enemy CAs have more than say 3 or 4 knots on my CVs than I usually need to divert some CL or capital ships to screen or at least be in the general area as the CVs. I tend to treat converted CVs as being semi-expendable in that they get less escorts, are sent to secondary theaters and or go to RF or TP once the enemy has been sufficiently mauled; so for me there really isn't any reason to spend the monies chasing speed.
Concerning CV speed: I experience it like two distinct ranges:
1) My first generation 1900ish CAs with 22 knots and 16.000 ts would be ideal vor CVL rebuilds. But they are just too slow to go with a 27-28 knot task force, especially during the 1920s, when the TB are rather short legged. I use one or two of them for CVL rebuilds, but only to get the "high" research rate for shipboard aircrafts asap, and to train the first carrier flight units for later.
2) From 26 knots on and faster everything is ok for CV, methinks. I do not feel any big difference. So any real BC can be converted, but the old ones tend to be too small for a good a/c capacity, and the TP 0 is a liability which has cost me some ships. Because of this my strategy now is the special-built CA for conversion, as described above.
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Post by nimrod on Aug 26, 2021 12:24:54 GMT -6
arminpfano, whats a useful speed? I don't recall seeing your thoughts at: nws-online.proboards.com/thread/5955/speed-cvl and I don't see them noted in the OP. I can't argue on the BB line as I generally use BC for my CV conversion, B and CA for CVL. Other than night time and weather limiting flight ops but not ship speed, I haven't seen carrier speeds being impactful. Might just be how I fight... But my carrier force never keeps up with the main battle line nor do I want it to. The patrol role seems to work to keep them in in a general non-surface-combat area, so I've been experimenting with that role to good affect. My issue is that carriers turn into the wind to launch and retrieve planes, which makes them virtually un-controllable with larger wings / high operational tempo. As such, with new build CVs I'm usually 26-29 knots (my low end is right above gurudennis "25 kts or so"); rebuilds of my early BCs with bulges end up in the 24-26 knot range (with gurudennis 25 knots right in the middle of my range). I think I've built a handful of early BCs at 27 knots with most ending up at 28-29 knots with bulging (cheap TPS and extra aircraft or AAA capability) then bringing it down to that 24-26 knot speed.
Put another way, my new CVs I try to keep within a few knots of most enemy CA speeds - night time / bad weather evasion needs and the screening DDs can force an opening of the range for the CVs to slip away into the night / rain squall. If the enemy CAs have more than say 3 or 4 knots on my CVs than I usually need to divert some CL or capital ships to screen or at least be in the general area as the CVs. I tend to treat converted CVs as being semi-expendable in that they get less escorts, are sent to secondary theaters and or go to RF or TP once the enemy has been sufficiently mauled; so for me there really isn't any reason to spend the monies chasing speed.
Concerning CV speed: I experience it like two distinct ranges:
1) My first generation 1900ish CAs with 22 knots and 16.000 ts would be ideal vor CVL rebuilds. But they are just too slow to go with a 27-28 knot task force, especially during the 1920s, when the TB are rather short legged. I use one or two of them for CVL rebuilds, but only to get the "high" research rate for shipboard aircrafts asap, and to train the first carrier flight units for later.
2) From 26 knots on and faster everything is ok for CV, methinks. I do not feel any big difference. So any real BC can be converted, but the old ones tend to be too small for a good a/c capacity, and the TP 0 is a liability which has cost me some ships. Because of this my strategy now is the special-built CA for conversion, as described above. Thank you for the response; it helps.
gurudennis, those three ships were absolutely a weird build for me in 1909-1914 and SAMs were researched in 1946. They were way too small to convert to a carrier, too under armed to justify an engine refit and too lightly armored to legitimately keep in service. Near constant wars (longest time of peace was something like 16-20 months in that game) warranted keeping them for blockade tonnage calculations along with torpedo / mine soaking and they were effective against enemy CLs (raider or otherwise) and shore installations. I would say they were not effective against CAs starting in the late 20s, their armor was just too light to stand against upgraded 8-10" (+1, AP advances, autoloaders) guns; they had to be rescued a number of times. I've built a few similar creatures as Italy and France, but I've pretty much learned my lesson and once I get a few consecutive years of peace in the 20's and 30's they tend to get scrapped or sent to SEA.
The SAM DD route works very well and it can be very frustrating to play against (GB had DDs with SAMs in the mid 40's in one of my games). Generally by the time I acquire SAMs I have a rather large number of 2000-2500 ton DDs in the fleet that are optimized for ASW with the secondary surface & AAA role being filled by 6, 5" DP guns. As such, immediate programs are launched (budget and possible war time needs allowing) to retrofit SAMs to capital ships and late CLs if I can free up enough weight. Usually I can't free up enough space on the existing DDs for a SAM and keep what I consider adequate ASW / speed / surface fighting capabilities. Usually a new line of cruisers will be started as well with SAMs being the driving force for the design; if its a CA it will often have a vague similarity to those coal powered monstrosities (5-7" belt, 30ish knots, 2-3 SAMs, somewhat limited main battery with a lowish amount of shells and generally 6-9 7-8" guns with a handful of 5" DP). Usually I end up with 5-10 SAM DDs by the end of the game (try to get them escorting the carriers) with nearly all my non-carrier capital ships being retrofitted with them; its pleasant not having to keep a lot of escorts around the BCs / BBs...
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Post by gurudennis on Aug 26, 2021 18:08:59 GMT -6
Generally by the time I acquire SAMs I have a rather large number of 2000-2500 ton DDs in the fleet that are optimized for ASW with the secondary surface & AAA role being filled by 6, 5" DP guns. I'm curious about this choice ( emphasis mine). I was under the impression that only ships on TP contribute to the national ASW score at war, but the ASW rating of a given vessel in AF status does not contribute to its effectiveness at soaking up sub torpedoes for the purpose protecting the capital ships. Have you observed any different, or is the purpose of these DDs to be on standby for TP if and when you need to bolster the national ASW score? |
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Post by nimrod on Aug 27, 2021 6:07:33 GMT -6
Generally by the time I acquire SAMs I have a rather large number of 2000-2500 ton DDs in the fleet that are optimized for ASW with the secondary surface & AAA role being filled by 6, 5" DP guns. I'm curious about this choice ( emphasis mine). I was under the impression that only ships on TP contribute to the national ASW score at war, but the ASW rating of a given vessel in AF status does not contribute to its effectiveness at soaking up sub torpedoes for the purpose protecting the capital ships. Have you observed any different, or is the purpose of these DDs to be on standby for TP if and when you need to bolster the national ASW score? Good questions, I'm not sure how exactly respond; so please forgive the rambling response. I'm mostly going on the word of others, and even then their is no firm conclusion... All my testing comes up with way too much gray area to have a firmly held belief on the subject - National and AF ASW values change a lot due to deployment needs and DD sinking, enemy sub effectiveness, fleet support - unrestricted trade warfare, etc...
Short practical answer is that, as you suspected, once the enemy fleet is defeated the DDs will go to TP, AF or RF depending on budgetary, trade and fleet needs... So having a reserve ASW value for TP is very helpful. Practically as France, Germany or even Japan, I'll often have older or special built 900-1500 ton DDs and older CLs in the non-home sea zones as they can go AF or TP in a turn and pretty well satisfy FS requirements. They aren't as economical as dedicated KEs but the battle value is much higher given the torps... So against, say a surprise Japanese attack, I can absorb their losses; and if engage in the first couple of battles while the main fleet arrives than they have an opportunity to do some damage - particullarly if land based air-power cripples something or they get night / bad weather or convoy attack missions.
Additionally, Dorn has written that ASW ships need to be in active fleet to protect capitals - nws-online.proboards.com/post/72655/thread and at: nws-online.proboards.com/post/75582. I and others have noted that a strong ASW presence on AF seems to drop the frequency of strategic and post battle torpedoing of ships. Exact mechanism is a mystery to me - so I can't comment on if it is a number of ships in the escort classes or if their is a magical ASW value making the perceived difference.
Pretty good discussion on ASW values at: nws-online.proboards.com/post/66801/thread and I tend to follow wlbjork's take (due to my inability to confirm with hard numbers), while aeson gives a position similar to what you noted.
Getting back to the OP: Just a reminder, CVLs, aren't hard capped at 16000 tons, I often get 16400 ton CVLs by rebuilding a 15900 ton CA and adding bulges during the conversion... Just click though and it generally works. However, there can be issues trying to convert a ship that is initially over 16000 tons - most consistent route for me has been the 15900 tons + bulging. With bulging the speed drops, but that may or may not be an issue depending on the play style.
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Post by wlbjork on Aug 27, 2021 11:10:30 GMT -6
Generally by the time I acquire SAMs I have a rather large number of 2000-2500 ton DDs in the fleet that are optimized for ASW with the secondary surface & AAA role being filled by 6, 5" DP guns. I'm curious about this choice ( emphasis mine). I was under the impression that only ships on TP contribute to the national ASW score at war, but the ASW rating of a given vessel in AF status does not contribute to its effectiveness at soaking up sub torpedoes for the purpose protecting the capital ships. Have you observed any different, or is the purpose of these DDs to be on standby for TP if and when you need to bolster the national ASW score? It's complex. *Ships with an ASW rating on TP will form hunter-killer groups to eliminate subs as well as protecting convoys from subs - i.e. inadequate ASW assets will result in more transports being sunk by subs in total war or prize rules de. *Ships with an ASW rating in AF mode will protect the fleet - in this case inadequate ASW assets will result in you being at more risk of a capital ship being torpedoed. Additionally, in a scenario with subs present friendly ships with ASW equipment can force these to submerge and maybe even attack them |
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Post by gurudennis on Aug 27, 2021 12:26:25 GMT -6
It kind of doesn't answer the core question of whether it's both the quantity and the quality of ASW ships on AF that protects the capital ships, or just the quantity alone (i.e. ship ASW rating is irrelevant for this purpose).
I've been going off of the assumption that it's the latter. This has strategic implications in that I do not equip fleet DDs with any dedicated ASW capability beyond their natural baseline score. Of course, if this assumption is false, I may want to reconsider.
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Post by arminpfano on Aug 27, 2021 13:00:41 GMT -6
It kind of doesn't answer the core question of whether it's both the quantity and the quality of ASW ships on AF that protects the capital ships, or just the quantity alone (i.e. ship ASW rating is irrelevant for this purpose). I've been going off of the assumption that it's the latter. This has strategic implications in that I do not equip fleet DDs with any dedicated ASW capability beyond their natural baseline score. Of course, if this assumption is false, I may want to reconsider. There is this hidden technology "Creative use of depth charges". With this you can drive your DD next to an enemy BB, until the distance is shown as 0. If you now zoom in to the max, you can watch your crew throwing the charges on the deck of the BB, blasting away all the superstructure. Then boarding is easy, so you get a BB as a prize, you just have to repair it. Happens all the time. Apart from this I also find ASW stuff unneccessary for fleet DDs. |
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Post by gurudennis on Aug 27, 2021 13:29:29 GMT -6
There is this hidden technology "Creative use of depth charges". With this you can drive your DD next to an enemy BB, until the distance is shown as 0. If you now zoom in to the max, you can watch your crew throwing the charges on the deck of the BB, blasting away all the superstructure. Then boarding is easy, so you get a BB as a prize, you just have to repair it. Happens all the time. Just like in the movie, Das BBoot. |
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