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Post by tbr on Sept 10, 2024 5:34:22 GMT -6
To quote myself: I had an epiphany today. We are witnessing the end of the Mahanian Age of Naval Warfare. UMS (Unmanned Systems) effectively create operational, strategic and procurement circumstances that are closer to the Age of Oars than they are to the Mahanian Ages of Naval Warfare (Sail, Steam, Iron, Dreadnought, Carrier, Missile), at least if procurers and industry do not f*** it up (and then the enemy takes that as an oppurtunity). Now, that is good news for RTW-X game design. We have an effective endpoint for the game: the AESA radar sub-age (ca. 2000-2020) which ends in the "rise of the UMS". Since the future is non-Mahanian (unless we go into SciFi interplanetary/interstellar warfare) it makes no sense to extend the RTW concept beyond it. The effective earliest startpoint is 1660 if we follow Mahan himself (begin of effectively professional Navy organization signified by Samuel Pepys starting his diary). Alternatively one could go with 1590 (second decade after Lepanto, the biggest and last major "oar battle" and first decade after the Armada where the purpose built "gunfighter" sailing man-o-war proved itself). Podcast on the non-Mahanian nature of galley warfare:
UMS get us there again. While their endurance and geographical control loop range will eventually also enable operational "near-Mahanian" Blue Water operations the change in procurement is more profound. A galley cost as much to build as it cost to operate it a month, making the galley itself very expendable. A mission ready modern warship (new ship class) costs as much as its operation for 10-15 years to build and bring into service, which in itself takes 4-6 years (deduct 2 years for follow-on builds of an established class without modification and build pause / build yard change or a bit less if there is some of either/both). Warships are major investment items with "national value". UMS however are being built and expended (or recoup the opportunity cost of their procurement if reusable) within a quarter (3 months) to 3 years (depends on size and mission), unless the idiots business-as usual guys mandate treating it effectively like a standard manned plane/boat/ship with a 20-40 year lifecycle.
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Post by tbr on May 2, 2024 13:04:12 GMT -6
Could you please elaborate on what to edit and how? I've tried using dates both before 1890 and after 1990 and neither seem to work. Is going back to a year between 1890 and 1990 the only option? Can I not use the year of 1000 or 1200 or something like that? I just wanna keep playing that's all Yes you can only pick dates between 1890-1990. Though do note that the AI will use the design templates of the current year set. So if you reset from 1990 back to 1890 then the AI will be making some wacky Pre-dreadnoughts. So if you plan on making your game longer than the 100 years or extend the time period of a certain era. It's best to reset in the middle of your campaign going back a decade or so. Also note, you may run into some weirdness with ship and Officer histories and the obsolescence of ships by turning back the clock. I haven't tried it in RTW3 yet but in 2 the (O) status would appear and dissappear in not super predictable manners What I susually do when I want to play extra-long games is to generate an additional text file for logging and repeat every year (by resetting the year in the savegame each January to the previous year) 3-5 times while noting the current repeat count in the text file. This actually works best of all options since this ensures technology and AI design templates do not mess thing up.
Alternatively you can deduct a few all years from the date when after 1970 before you hit 1980 to extend the "end game".
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Post by tbr on Jan 23, 2024 14:56:56 GMT -6
I did some interesting "station" B's in some lategames with 6 or even 7 main guns. Superior to anything below contemporary BC/BB and far more economical than using "full size" but older BC/BB on "station" duty. Does not work at all in seas where a potential enemy has a home area though...
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Post by tbr on Dec 1, 2023 17:10:30 GMT -6
You also need to differentiate a bit. The early Soviet "VLS" is an upright revolver, conceptually very much like a slim Tartar/Terrier launcher with a vertical only rail that is recessed into the deck. Nevertheless that meant for some designs that several (IIRC up to six) launchers could be positioned in/on/under a deck space only 1.5 times larger than the space for a Mark 26 twin arm system. But I doubt that effective rate of fire was anywhere close to three times that of a Mk 26 and would not be surprised if overall number of missiles was not significantly higher. Those revolvers waste a lot of below deck space compared to a modern Mk41, let alone a Mk54 VLS.
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Post by tbr on Sept 6, 2023 15:09:57 GMT -6
Disabling aircraft altogether is easy, just delete the aircraft manufacturer names in the respective data files. Airships will be unaffected. Problem is the AI will still build aircraft carriers, airbases and ships with floatplane installations.
You could try deleting all aircraft carrier templates from the data folder as well and modify all CL/CA/BC/BB templates to remove floatplanes, helicopters, hangars and catapults. Limit max airbase size to the minimum in the game settings as well.
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TSL?
Aug 11, 2023 2:01:40 GMT -6
Post by tbr on Aug 11, 2023 2:01:40 GMT -6
"Turns Since Last" (Invention)
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Post by tbr on Jun 28, 2023 11:51:58 GMT -6
To be absolutely fair you don't actually have to hit with underwater torpedoes for them to have an effect in battle, their presence forces the enemy to perhaps take less than totally favorable positions that would expose them to torpedo attack And this is one reason why historically hits by/with underwater torpedo tubes were so rare. The other is the gunfire threat. Historical naval combat ranges were influenced by the commander's knowledge (and respect for) contemporary weapon system capabilities. A lot of the desired effect was "tactical deterrrence", i.e. hedge in the enemy's alternatives of action. In RTW the player often acts extremely risky without being conscious of it. This results in at least an order of magnitude more "torpedo risk" and therefore hit expectancy.
Above water torpedo tubes were historically used as "salvo" weapons, i.e. individual torpedoes were not aimed at individual ships but entire flotillas coordinated their torpedo launch to "sweep" an enemy formation's course so that individual ship evasion was not as much a factor. In this case the effect on enemy alternatives of action (keep course and steady firing solutions on enemy BB disivions and accept probability of torpedo hits or evade) was often more important than hitting (and sinking) an enemy vessel. Torpedo hit rates in the low single digit percentages were acepted. This is one aspect of torpedo engagement I miss in RTW3 since such salvoes can only be approximated by using the captains setting and choosng targets and firing positions carefully. I would really like to see a "salvo planner" with a graphical UI. The underwater torpedo tube however, especially on capital ships, was a weapon for aiming at and hiting individual targets, so the probability to get to a situation in combat to actually use it was significantly lower than for above water tubes on non-capitals. Small unit engagement was also far more prevalent historically so there were lots (relatively speaking, see below) of opportunities to use above water torpedo tubes.
Another factor is the the effect of scale on statistics. Historically true maximum effort naval combat was very rare, even counting relatively risk averse engagements like Jutland/Skagerrak. Within the RTW3 timeframe we are barely into the triple digits. The typical RTW3 game will see more than an order of magnitude more engagements and probably two orders of magnitude more ships engaged in combat.
All in all an RTW3 game should see between 100 to 1000 times (or even more with superextralarge fleet settings) the incidences of various historically rare events, e.g. torpedo hits from underwater torpedo tubes, but also ships sunk in combat, magazine explosions etc.
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Post by tbr on May 24, 2023 9:50:07 GMT -6
You can also edit the date of your savegame to extend play
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Post by tbr on May 21, 2023 10:15:14 GMT -6
Congrats for the first nation mod in RTW3! Wouldn't it have been better to replace Austria-Hungary instead of China? The Netherlands have possessions in sea areas where Spain and China also are present, A-H is stuck in the Adria...
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Post by tbr on May 19, 2023 14:15:58 GMT -6
I get a design error about being unable to fit triple turrets on a 30kton BB with TPS 2 and 25 knots in 1916. This seems somewhat unreasonable considering Nevada, etc. historically.
Note that the AI does not seem to have this issue, having built the following, both of which have TPS 2 according to the files.
This is a mechanism to reflect the constraints which IRL led to the turret layout of the US Pensacola class cruisers (and others) until you get a certain tech. Your second AI design is too slow (IIRC there is a speed/displacement relationship behind this and anything below 23kn is unaffected anyways). Your first design only has two mid-line turrets which is why (I think) the rule does not apply. IIRC the tooltip does not state this but you are only restricted from tripple turrets in "A" and "Y" positions if there are more than two midline turrets. So this is WAD but the tooltip/design remark should be better worded.
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Post by tbr on Apr 22, 2023 15:55:40 GMT -6
I’m not entirely sure why you’d want to build an 8000 ton pure ASW ship that’ll instantly get relegated to TP only. IMO the Kidd is a much better template to build fleet workhorses against. Those would need to be classed CL in RTW3 game terms however
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Post by tbr on Mar 23, 2023 16:55:30 GMT -6
UAD's designers do not understand abstraction. Thie leads them to "simulate" things on the one hand and try to generate "balance" on the other. The biggest issue is sighting ranges, but also ballistics (a weird mix of "simulated balisstics" and abstracted "to hit" probability calculations), economies, technology effects etc.
UAD's designer understood RTW on a surface level only. The biggest and best thing Fredrik did was to realize he needed to abstract in order to approximate reality, never forgetting he is abstracting. The gun quality system is a case in point, when I first played a SAI demo I was put off by the rendition of SMS von der Tann, coming off Distant Guns Jutland where von der Tann's increased elevation was very impactful. I also missed the difference between high MV and "mid" MV guns etc. But when RTW came out I understood. Detailed "simulation" of all the different gun aspects would have been a rabbit hole leading to complexity and imbalance. UAD went down about a dozen of such rabbit holes and is deeply flawed by it.
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Post by tbr on Jan 14, 2023 9:05:28 GMT -6
Keep in mind though that Italy was not all that united then as well. There were anti-monarchists who were very sore with Cavour for trading Nice to France, Southern Italy was a wholly different kettle than the North, the Pope was still trying to regain temporal power (and was supported by the Roman nobility who chafed under Piedmontese-Savoyard domination). In RTW2/3 terms (and perhaps it was even historically) a collapse of Italy and A-H regaining Venetia-Lombardy, France gobbling up Piedmont-Savoy and Sardinia with Southern Italy and Sicily descending into "minor" status is as likely as Italy gaining the full Adriatic coastline. Or an emergence of "Poland-Lithuania" or Sweden/Scandinavia to equate Spain's RTW2/3 role in the Baltic after disastrous defeats of Germany and/or Russia.
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Post by tbr on Dec 24, 2022 16:02:23 GMT -6
If you examine the tonnage and SHP of the USS Kitty Hawk, full load is about 80,000 ton with a Shaft Horsepower of 280,000. The game must take this into account. I always considererd RTW tonnage to be standard displacement. But Kitty Hawk is a good argument for allowing 64kton carriers in the 1960's.
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Post by tbr on Nov 16, 2022 3:23:45 GMT -6
Keep in mind RTW3 starts in 1890, so secondaries are arguably the main weapon for the first decade or so. As a general rule armoring secondaries makes sense early game, later on anything beyond splinter protection is superfluous.
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