Query on RTW3 special subs minelaying and long

[brygun]

How useful are the special subs minelaying and long range types?

Ive played a lot of RTW 1 & 2 and completed a 3 campaign. Finding it hard to understand how useful they are.


For minelayers there isnt a direct feedback. Something that happened in real life. TMU you have to overload their mine sweeping through AMC, DD and others with mines with the mining subs adding to that.


For long range subs in my first game I used them for +2 sea zones. That is if a sea zone had a colony I would have ~3 coastal subs there. The medium subs could be used one sea zone past that. Like if I had a colony in west africa the medium subs could raid the Caribbean. The long range subs in my doctrine then would be use farther out.

This time Im playing UK and have pretty much every sea zone with a colony, thus barely a need for mediums other than being able to shift them during wartime.

What have people found in using the long range subs? 

[imperatoraugust]

Minelaying subs under perform heavily imo.

Long range is very situational. IE you dont have ports in NE or home zones.

[bthom37]

Minelayer subs seem to get sunk really quickly, and I've never seen long range subs be worth the production. Missile subs seem even worse - I don't know that I've seen one do damage. Honestly the standard sub is satisfactory for all use cases, although I do try to keep 4-6 minelayer subs in the fleet since they, anecdotally, do seem to provide a strong element of minelaying. I feel like I see more significant "X ship has struck a mine and is reported sunk" when I have minelayers around. Coastal subs - if I'm playing with Mediterranean or Baltic home ports, I build a decent # simply because they're so cheap.

[brygun]

I have on the battle map seen missile subs salvo in IIRC 2 missiles into a battle. Which was kinda neat. Though their cost compared to coastals is pretty high for that.

One does imagine the trade routes in the mid ocean really sucking if SSM are sent to missile them.

[bthom37]

I like the minelayer subs - I feel (purely feeling, no data) that they generate more significant mine casualties at the end of turn, but they do seem more vulnerable. Again, there is no data to back this up. The long range subs seem completely useless.