Carrier thoughts

[daringly]

In the real war, carriers were devestating against capital ships as long as they had initiative. In SC2, carriers are ineffective in fleet combat (except against submarines). While fighters are much cheaper to replace than battleships, the cost of repairing each does not reflect this.

Why not decrease the defense of battleships/carriers to air, and decrease carrier defense to battleships/carriers? This would make them much more interesting.

[Retributar]

Sound's like your on the right-track daringly !, so i will defer to our 'Naval' member's or Naval History Buff's to fine-tune your proposition!.

[daringly]

I mis-typed.

Battleships and CRUISERS should be vulnerable to carrier attacks. Carriers should be more vulnerable to Battleships and CRUISERS.

If this can be implemented, I think naval battles will take on a much more interesting dynamic - right now, there is only a small advantage for being "first to engage".

One other thought: Why not let carriers attack from a distance (and not show where they attack came from, if under FoW).

[John DiFool the 2nd]

CVs should also be faster than BBs. They generally

were, until the Iowa-class BBs showed up. Before

that only BBs which were as fast as a CV were the

Japanese Kongos (glorified battlecruisers).

[Edwin P.]

Excellent points all around. I really the the idea of their being an advantage to the side first to engage with carriers.

One item to keep in mind is that reducing the defense of a battleship/cruiser to air units also affects their defense vs ground based air units.

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

Keep the old discussion in mind that basically Carriers should be treated as two different units.. the ship and the aeroplanes.. unless this problem isn`t solved, the Sea Combat model doesn`t fit anyway...

[Edwin P.]

Basically the carrier was supreme as long as surface warships or aircraft from other carriers or land bases did not locate it and get within range. Without its air component carrier task forces were extremely weak.

[Bromley]

I have to admit that I don't understand the combat equations. That said, can't the CA/CD values be adjusted to allow carriers to win if they're attacking and lose if attacked?

That's the biggest failing of carriers to me. Bugger the high reinforcement costs, I'm too busy losing too much of my UK carriers to the Italian navy in a first strike scenario.

I suspect that there's another point about there being too many UK carriers, but that's something else.

[Liam]

Carriers are difficult to cover accurately, I do not use them against many Naval Ships, only usually to "finish the job," when my Surface fleet is bottled up. You see in a seazone with 100 miles or more of space such the Straights between Norway and Denmark you still are crunched for space in a major naval engagement. That extra strike capacity of Carriers comes in useful for specialized jobs!

However it's pretty much staple to use Carriers for the Primary Job, that is Land combat.. It is a excellent unit to add the last few blows in with LR it does the trick perfectly, though without experience, the cost on you, is beyond the value. Though if you need a breakthrough, imagine what 3 Carriers with LR2 or LR3 can do for you? They also are good against soft unentrenched targets that aren't on a city or resource. Carriers cannot get proper practice that is the worst part, as Experienced units do not take damage as easily opposite of SC1... Meanwhile Land Fighters pretty much soak up Damage and gain experience so long as the target is a corps or an army... Experience is way too high for Land Based Fighters

Regardless, Carriers were very deadly weapons against Supply, and were good for special jobs, like subhunting. I believe carriers resupplied Malta before it was crushed, not much of an effort but a tiny one that did the trick. Carrier aircraft were more deadly in the Pacific where there was no landbased aircraft to the do the job.

In SC2 fighters aren't such great tools vs Battleships I notice, which I do not mind. Honestly, Battleship fleets would have Destroyers and strong AntiAir Abilities.. Which I believe should be an upgrade quality to all Vessels to a certian "level," make for at least more use of AntiAir Radar...

All the UK Carriers might benefit if they could find some softer targets to practice on, like 3-4 corps, or Mod them with 1 or 2 experience Bars.. You'd get the effect you all are thinking of with that at 'least'

[Minty]

Carriers in the European theatre were of limited use. They were not as devastating against capital ships as Mr daringly suggests. Yes they were in the pacific where both the US and Japanese had them in larger numbers and with more modern planes that the RN. The first real Carrier vs Capitol ship encounter resulted in the sinking of the carrier HMS Glorious by the ugly sisters of Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. In game terms the carrier would have had no experience (new captain in real life) and be low on supply ( it was ferrying RAF planes in and out of Norway and did not have it's full compliment). Compared with a Pacific fleet Carrier ( US or Japanese ) she barely is worth the name carrier. The US carriers have would have had advanced aircraft at LV1 or LV2 by comparision.

Where carriers were used succesfully in Europe was in spotting and recon. For sub hunting and for Bismarck hunting. HMS Ark Royals swordfish spotted and damaged the bismarck but it took the weight of several capital ships to finish her off. Again this is realistic in the game, a carrier can find an enemy , soften them up a bit but then you need to get some heavy metal in to finish up.

Lastly they were used at Taranto in surely the most cost effective military encounter in history. 3 outdated biplanes in return for the sinking of 3 battleships/ heavy cruisers. The inspiration for Pearl Harbour isn't reflected well in the game and I would like to see the Carriers more effective against ships in Port to reflect this.

Carriers in europe (and it was only really the Royal Navy who had them) were much smaller than their Pacific equivalents. Many were converted Cruisers or used hulls that had been laid down for Battlecruisers. This was to circumnavigate the Washington Treaty restrictions on tonnage as Carriers did not count and Britain did not want to scrap perfectly good ship hulls. As the US and Japanese were younger navies with lower weight caps ,they had no choice but to build new ones. One benefit was felt though and that is that British carriers were much more heavily armoured and had armoured metal flight decks ( US ones mostly being wooden). This meant that in 44 / 45 when operating in the Pacific they took little damage from Kamikazes.

[daringly]

I admit, the British had some of the worst naval air in WWII.

If we want to keep carriers at their current effectiveness, perhaps decrease their cost?

[Retributar]

I wasn't aware that the British had so many Carrier's as the game depict's.

I was thinking that at-best they had 1 or 2 Carrier's.

The game has at least 3 or 4 Carrier's!,... or so that's the impression im getting!.

[Minty]

Actually the Royal Navy had 7 fleet carriers at the start of the war, 5 of which were just coming out of the docks. So in game terms would probably be in production queue for late 39/40. The RN also had 15 battleships (including the tragically miscategorised battlecruisers such as the HMS Hood) Problem was most of these were built in WWI. The game does well not to list all of them as Battleships as they would never had stood up to the Bismarck or Tirpitz.However 5 modern battleships were under construction and these feature in the game. Except HMS repulse which was sunk off singapore by land based japanese bombers.

Back to the carriers though.

The Royal navy had planes like this (see the link and try not to laugh - yes this is WWII - the same era as the Me262). The Fairey swordfish. Not just at the start of the war but well into it. Top speed 130mph. My car can do that.They were effective early on and especially against the Italians who did not have a Naval air wing and air cover was badly coordinated with the airforce. But they were slaughtered when the Luftwaffe could provide aircover.

Swordfish data

Meahwhile the US had divebombers ( more efficent than torpedo bombers) like the devastator and later seriously powerful Grumman avenger torpedo bombers. In Games terms these would be LV4 or LV5 compared to the Royal navies aircraft.

[Guest Mike]

The British Skua divebomber was completely comparable to US bombers of the period - it was "good enough" to get the first British kill of the war, and sink a German light cruiser. FAA Skua page

However the Brits had plenty of other priorities before developing a small nubmer of a/c for a limited naval carrier capacity, and were only too happy to adopt US designs!

As for the ol' Swordfish - sure the Italians didn't have a fleet air ar, but then Taranto Harbour was well within range of local airfields for land based planes!!

[Liam]

I think it was the surprise at Taranto

Those Swordfish were outdated biplanes, but without aircover and with a good pilot they could inflict damage. Though really they are capable of inflicting significant damage upon land units as well? You think this really possibe? I suppose they're meant to reflect abstractly other ships within the RAF armada of naval going vessels, I don't know, LOL just seems a little funny, 40 Swordfish Divebombing and destroying the 6th Army?

So are they slightly more realistic in SC2, yeah sure

and they did ferry spitfires and other neccessary airfact in and out of theatres, so if nothing else they were good for transport of Fighters. Perhaps, the game would better suite them to "No Land Attack," and cheapen the cost of RAF operational movement? Heh

And let them hunt subs and target ships as they were meant, that and recon work

The USA was an isolated nation it needed good Carriers and good Planes, the UK really could use Malta, Gibraltar, Egypt, it's Island, etc... It had good coverage for land bases to hit a lot of targets. I assume the USA doctrine was assuming if she went on the offensive she'd need Good Range and that she had with Good Fighters

The RAF also likely didn't have the resources solely to devote to Carriers nor the same doctrines of the Japanese and US navy's

[Minty]

I don't care how big your Panzer is, if someone manages to drop a two tonne torpedo on top it then you're not going home in piece. Odds of hitting it though......

How about making aircraft carriers just that? Carriers of your aircraft. Actual transports for airfleets. You load them up, fly them to sea and attack from where you want. The ship itself is useless without it's aircraft which it can load and unload where it sees fit at low cost. Give the UK two fleet airarms but at low initial strength ( say 3). UK can then spend money on bringing the air arm up to full strength or use the RAF units on the carriers. It won't effect the battle of britain as the UK won't be able to afford to bring the units to strength against LW fleets unless the player has sacrified something else very critical. If the carrier is sunk then it loses the aircraft on board but if they fly off first you can use them elsewhere. This is what happened in malta where it's only aircover for a while were some outdated Fleet airarm fighters that were supposed to be onboard HMS Glorious.

[Liam]

Minty, will be impossible to implement that in the game engine

you're right a 2ton torpedoe might actually hit 1 Panzer if you dropped 400 of them?

those were specialized craft I doubt the Brits used them against Land units... HC is merely giving the Carrier a Flexible quality by letting it hit multiple targets

You know what else is not reflected Sturmoviks, how many German Tanks did they kill thousands? The Pathetic Red Airforce can't kill 5 tanks

I think that we should have a Medium-Divebomber Unit

I suppose fighter aircraft are suppose to be responsible for this aspect but still, the Red Airforce sucks in SC2

[shawnt63]

Interesting thread! It is important to remember that the British Fleet Air Arm was not equipped with the same aircraft as the RAF and seemed to have fallen far behind their land based brother. They did try and catch up using both the Hurricane and Spitfire in a carrier based role, however the Spitfire or Seafire was just too weak in the undercarriage and the Sea Hurricane was...well, obsolete. The Fairey Barracuda, FIrefly, Seafury etc all showed the lessons learned and were in their own right very good aircraft. The other answer was to use US built carrier aircraft and a good number of Avengers, Corsairs and Wildcats ended up with the Roundel on the wing for the Royal Navy, Royal Canadian Navy and Royal Australian Navy. (amongst others) As for carriers, the armoured flight decks and hangars of the British did cause big problems with numbers as did lack of folding wings in earlier versions of carrier based aircraft. Carriers like the Hermes and Argus could only handle about 17 to 19 aircraft reasonably, while the "Fleet Carriers" like Glorious, Furious, Indomitable, Formidable and Illustrious topped out at between 40 and 52 aircraft or just over half the aircraft used on the standard USN or IJN carriers. The Ark Royal was the big boy for the RN with 60 and stayed that way until she was sunk and eventually the Indeftigable and Implacable which operated about 72 aircraft bringing them on par with the Japanese fleet carriers but were now about 18 to 28 aircraft behind the Essex class USN Carriers. The tail end of all this was the escort and light carriers. The RN operated a total of about 68 escort carriers with some manned by other navies, Canada for instance manned up the Nabob, Puncher and Warrior. The small carriers only carreied between 18 and 24 aircraft and had a top speed of about 18 knots and were designed to escort convoys and to look after aircover and airpatrol against wolfpacks. The Light carrier carried about 40 aircraft was as far as I know was used almost exclusively by the USN in the pacific.

What I would like to see is an ASW type counter in the mix which would take into account the CVE and Destroyer aspect of navies. Very limited ability against major surface units but make the life of a submarine a living hell. Would be vulnerable to shore based air and battleships but would be a close match for a cruiser.

[Capt Andrew]

Minty and Liam are correct, that the European theatre carriers were floating transport and support ships. They were there to protect the "big boys" (battleships), find subs, and haul land based fighters.

Some of the biggest roles that the carriers had were in ferrying planes to Malta - through the straits of Gibraltar at night! (Allies had a terrible time crossing at Gibraltar since the Vichy had land based guns that were shredding ships, Spain had Axis spies watching, and the Germans had U-Boats flinging torpedos everywhere.) If memory serves me, the Ark Royal made several re-supply runs to Egypt and Malta. In fact, it was the USA that saved Malta from capitulating. The CV Wasp made not one, but TWO night runs to Malta delivering RAF planes, pilots, and supplies to the rock fortress. This led Churchill to utter the famous quote, "Who said a Wasp couldn't sting twice?!"

If (and when) anyone every makes a Pacific theatre, the idea of keeping the location of a striking carrier hidden is a fantastic one! I'm sure it would require some of Huberts coding to prevent the carrier from popping up during FOW attacks, but the idea is golden! I'd put that on the wish-list for future releases!!

[Retributar]

Capt Andrew !,...you are so right!...

If (and when) anyone every makes a Pacific theatre, the idea of keeping the location of a striking carrier hidden is a fantastic one! I'm sure it would require some of Huberts coding to prevent the carrier from popping up during FOW attacks, but the idea is golden! I'd put that on the wish-list for future releases!!

I especially agree with the 'Carrier' not having it's position given away when it make's an Air-Strike!,...this is a 'Definite-Must'!.

Also, maybey im off-track, but a partial solution might be to extend the Carrier's 'Spotting-Range' so that it can see the Adversary before it-itself is seen!.

This modification would help to make the Carrier's harder to spot and make them much more effective, as in reality, they were!.

[SeaMonkey]

I'll bring up the fact that many larger warships carried catapult launched recon aircraft.

And when an enemy carrier was in the mix and radar became a little more sophisticated, not to mention radio triangulation, that many of the attacking CVs had their positions deduced.

It was a relatively simple item to shadow the returning CV aircraft and monitor their radio transmitions for vectors, not always foolproof but effective.

[Retributar]

Good Point SeaMonkey !,...however the change i would make to your idea,...is that for every attack, that there would be something like a 25% to maybey 50% chance of figuring the 'APPROXIMATE-AREA' location of the Carrier,...as in that it is located within for example,...a 9-Segment Tile area!.

Finally!,...also, perhaps have a 10% to 25% chance of getting a 'Hard-Fix' on the Carrier's Exact location!.

[Edwin P.]

Capt Andrew, Seamonkey and Retributor, excellent and most realistic refinements for the fragile carrier unit.

I would suggest; to make it simple, that carriers reveal their location 25% of the time when making an attack from a non-adjacent tile and the attack is not intercepted by carrier based aircraft.

When intercepted (perhaps by only carrier based aircraft) their (the attacking carrier's) location is revealed 75% of the time.

[ September 24, 2006, 10:05 PM: Message edited by: Edwin P. ]

[Capt Andrew]

I love it. I think we're on to something. Now if only HC could make it happen!

Carrier attacks (land and/or sea)

- 25% chance true carrier location is shown on screen

- 75% chance a false location is shown on screen. Random tile within attack range of target unit is used to show the carrier location.

- 100% chance true carrier location is shown on screen when attacking from adjacent tile, adjacent to any enemy unit, or if within spotting range of enemy aircraft unit.

- 85% chance true carrier location is shown on screen when enemy air interdicts/intercepts the carrier attack. (15% chance false random tile within range will be shown).

I think that tweak could really spice up some of the naval battles and intrigue of the carrier. Only question... is it doable?

[Guest Mike]

Originally posted by Capt Andrew:

Some of the biggest roles that the carriers had were in ferrying planes to Malta - through the straits of Gibraltar at night! (Allies had a terrible time crossing at Gibraltar since the Vichy had land based guns that were shredding ships, Spain had Axis spies watching, and the Germans had U-Boats flinging torpedos everywhere.)

Uh....no

Vichy didn't have land based guns shooting at anyone - firstly they were neutral, an secondly they didn't have guns with anything like the range required!!

Gibralter is a bad place for subs too - the currents through the traights are a nightmare and the RN tried damned hard to close the straights to U-boats.

The Med isn't much better because it's very shallow.

Spies was teh reason for any night time passage - pure and simple. Spies in both neutrals (Spain and Vichy Nth Africa) had a perfect view of passing ships, making the targeting of them by the LW and Regia Aeronautica much simpler once htey progressed into het med a bit.