Naval Tech

[Jollyguy]

IMO, something should be done regarding repair of naval units. The games I’ve played so far have been great compared to SC 1 in the size and breadth of naval engagements, some battles have involved up to a dozen naval units on each side and ranged over hundreds of miles of ocean, many times with bombers and fighters joining the fray and often deciding the victor. But after the naval units are spent there’s a good chance that they become a non-factor, as capital ships are just too expensive to repair. On the flip side, IMO subs and advanced subs are a relative bargain, which biases game play to the Germans in this regard.

Has there been consideration to a naval infrastructure tech? Perhaps such a tech would make upgraded ports more efficient in repairing naval units. I’m not sure how much play such a tech would get in the European Theatre, but when someone creates a global campaign that includes Japan and the US such a tech could be very important, as navies will assume paramount importance.

And another pet peeve. I would either make cruisers even less expensive, to balance somewhat the disparity to cheap U boats, or add destroyer squadron units with soft build limits. There were scads of destroyers in WW II, some squadrons easily large enough to show up in a strategic level game. And it just isn’t aesthetically pleasing to scout with a 100 mpp corp. A 150 or 200 mpp destroyer squadron could do the same thing, without having to Kamikaze the equivalent of 50k men.

[Moonslayer]

Have you tried to script these things yourself?

I have started to modify the 'partizans' unit to become destroyers. So far so good but I have put that mod on hold until I have finished scripting my expanded '39 campaign. I would like to include destroyers, however, so if you get done with a mod I would love to see it

[Edwin P.]

If you make destroyers too plentiful you eliminate the ability of German subs to hide in the Atlantic.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

Soft limits would presumably come into play there

Edwin.

Moonslayer see my post in the other thread.

[Edwin P.]

"Has there been consideration to a naval infrastructure tech? Perhaps such a tech would make upgraded ports more efficient in repairing naval units."

Interesting idea - you could use the current infrastructure tech - and allow it to improve ports (aka anti-air). Ports thus upgraded would reduce the cost of repair for naval units. Of course, such upgrades would be more expensive than anti-air guns.

Perhaps 100MPP per Naval Port Improvement Level. Each level of which reduces the cost of naval repairs at that port by 10% per tech level.

Maximum 5 levels of Naval Infrastructure per port, if you have level 5 infrastructure tech.

[MasterChief]

Perhaps this is stating the obvious but the orignal Naval architecture in the game seems fairly accurate. I was under the impression that the naval units represented entire battle groups or fleets, not single ships. Based on the scale of this game a single CV unit would probably represent around 4 or more carriers, 2 to 6 battleships, at least 6 to 8 heavy cruisers, probably 2 to 4 light cruisers, and about 8 to 10 destroyers. Add to this the supporting vessels such as tankers, tenders and such and throw in the aircraft and you are talking about a massive expenditure for one unit. Maintaining a strong naval presence could and almost did literaly bankrupt Nations. On the other hand submarines offered huge results in anti-merchant and anti-military shipping for a fraction of the cost.

[Guest Mike]

The major ships (Carriers, BB's) pretty much represent just one ship with perhaps some attendant small vessels AFAIK - you've got Bismark AND Tirpitz, Gneisenau & Scharnhorst - all individual ships.

Same with the Brits - their BB's and carriers are individual as far as I can see.

[Cheese Panzer]

The Germans are roughly one capital ship per unit (plus, one assumes, a light cruiser and some (6-10) destroyers). Everyone else is 2 (carriers 3) capital ships and proportional numbers of escorts. Cruiser units are one battlecruiser or two cruisers for the Germans and 3-4 for eveyone else.

So a fleet unit, in game terms, is a pretty major collection of resources. Ships should be expensive to replace - it's take 20 years to create a navy that can be lost in an afternoon!

[MasterChief]

Cheese Panzer, not sure where you got your info from but the numbers do seem to fit. Bottom line is - Heck yeah building and maintaining a Navy is almost to expensive to consider - The key note is "almost to expensive" when compared to the potential gains and losses associated with not having a Navy strong enough to protect your interests and project power. A very accurate simulation.