Naval HQ Attachment

[abukede]

Naval combat, critical to the war in the pacific, is missing those key commanders who changed history, such as Nimitz and Nagumo (sp?) Would there be a way to assign an HQ to a ship that would give a slight boost to the surrounding ships? Meaning you would have to build the HQ to get it... then assign it to a ship. You lose the ship... you lose the HQ.

[LampCord]

I wondered about that myself. It would be nice addition. Not sure how easily that would fit in with the game mechanics though.

Are you talking about a separate naval unit that travels around on the ocean and provides some combat bonus to the surrounding ships or adding the ability to assign a leader through a right click option like upgrading or reinforcing?

[abukede]

I am talking about assigning a leader to an existing ship, kinda like an upgrade.

[panzerkiller]

Something like Commander Europe at War , attaching a leader will give combat bonus to the unit and units within range

When the unit is destroy , the Leader is consider injured and return to the force pool , unable to be use again for a set numbers of turns

Nice feature ....

Cheers

PK

[abukede]

I feel it would add a real fun and historic feature to the battles of the pacific.

[scottsmm]

I just had a fairly similar though about that, but I took it one step further in thinking of allowing an HQ to command specific units. Some command infantry, others command naval units, and some command air units.

[Blashy]

One word... micromanaging. The idea is cool, but for a more elaborate game.

I would actually prefer if Hubert came up with a way to ELIMINATE HQs totally.

[panzerkiller]

One word... micromanaging. The idea is cool, but for a more elaborate game.

I would actually prefer if Hubert came up with a way to ELIMINATE HQs totally.

As in Commander Europe at War , there are no HQ , only leaders , you start the scenario with none

Each leader have different rating , you pay more for capable leaders and as with Commander Napoleon at War , different leader command different type of units

It is fun when you attach an infantry to let say , Napoleon Bonaparte , it become a super charge infantry ..

[abukede]

In a strategic sense leaders truly affected the outcome of the war and many times they were the difference between success and failure. Look at Chenault (sp). His presence in China was the determining factor in how good the flying tigers were and they had a significant impact upon the war in china.

[scottsmm]

This is a good idea guys it's just that it will most likely never happen unfortunately. I'm not complaining by saying this, because the game is addictive enough as it is already if this went through though I might never get any sleep for the remainder of my life.

[Stitch]

What about for those people that don't want to sleep for the rest of their lives?

[scottsmm]

Stitch, you can definitely be funny sometimes, but unfortunately you need a little more then that to get this to go through.

Blashy,

If Hubert gets rid of HQ's all together all that will happen is he would have gotten rid of the most important unit in the game. I hope that will NEVER happen. Off subject your strategy against Colin was flawless, and I have to admit you changed my thinking on how the Allies should work to defeat Japan.

[Blashy]

My strategy was exploiting his lack of experience. Putting all that air power north of Japan really took away his MPPs.

I am sure he will always put one unit on that village from now on .

[scottsmm]

Your right. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the screenshot of Japan, and where all his units where compared to your own.

[LampCord]

If Hubert gets rid of HQ's all together all that will happen is he would have gotten rid of the most important unit in the game. I hope that will NEVER happen. Off subject your strategy against Colin was flawless, and I have to admit you changed my thinking on how the Allies should work to defeat Japan.

I'm with you on this. The HQ's add a real strategic element to the game especially for the US forces because you really have to plan ahead as to where to put them since its such a long trip from build queue to Hawaii to the front.

Without the need for HQ's to fight and supply effectively, the US can just use a sort of 'infantry push' strategy and invade everywhere at once. With HQ's, you have to pick and choose your battles more carefully. Or at least that's my take after only 4 games vs. AI.

I guess I just don't see them as being much of a micro management issue because the represent such a small pct. of the units.

If you really wanted to get rid of micro management, you could add the ability to assign 'missions' to naval and air units so they would automatically bomb or patrol or whatever until they reach a minimum strength threshold or until you change their orders. Or add the ability to give movement orders that exceed the span of a single turn so that a unit will continue on the path you give it, turn after turn, till it reaches its destination. That would get rid of the need to have the teleportation arrows since you could just tell your unit to go to Pearl from LA (or Iwo Jima for that matter) and they would get there in as many moves as it takes while still being vulnerable to enemy units on the way.

But both of those things would be massive changes. An entirely new game, really. But it would eliminate 90% of the micro management.

[Stitch]

If you really wanted to get rid of micro management, you could add the ability to assign 'missions' to naval and air units so they would automatically bomb or patrol or whatever until they reach a minimum strength threshold or until you change their orders.

From a tactical standpoint, I don't know if I would agree with this. As it is, I find the CAP assignment entirely useless, nay detrimental for 2 key reasons.

First off, it will defend just the first enemy strike within range. What if you didn't want to give away your position? Or what if you wanted to wait to defend against that nearby bomber instead of those weak first strike fighters?

Secondly, the CAP assignment for carriers work *only* one time per defensive turn. An enemy carrier attacking your CV? Better hope you get them in the first shot, cause you won't have a second chance even with available air power remaining. And anyway, CAP defense is so paltry (you take air losses and your ground unit gets hit) that it's almost pointless.

I would rather be afforded the option to "micro-manage" to tell my units to stand down with a tac strike assignment than have the computer determine when it's going to waste my resources.

[SeaMonkey]

Good points Stitch on the CAP feature. I would like CAP/intercept to be an auto allocation to bomber sorties only(TAC & SAC) so as not to allow a response to the fighter only soak-off mission.

This would almost surely dictate the use of escorts/mixed mode or else.:eek:

[LampCord]

From a tactical standpoint, I don't know if I would agree with this. As it is, I find the CAP assignment entirely useless, nay detrimental for 2 key reasons.

First off, it will defend just the first enemy strike within range. What if you didn't want to give away your position? Or what if you wanted to wait to defend against that nearby bomber instead of those weak first strike fighters?

Secondly, the CAP assignment for carriers work *only* one time per defensive turn. An enemy carrier attacking your CV? Better hope you get them in the first shot, cause you won't have a second chance even with available air power remaining. And anyway, CAP defense is so paltry (you take air losses and your ground unit gets hit) that it's almost pointless.

I would rather be afforded the option to "micro-manage" to tell my units to stand down with a tac strike assignment than have the computer determine when it's going to waste my resources.

OK, but what I was talking about was being able to tell a bomber group for example, "Keep bombing that port every turn till I tell you otherwise." Or telling a sub, "Patrol this route till I tell you otherwise." Or telling a HQ transport unit in San Francisco harbor "Follow this multi-turn route around Australia to Rangoon Port until I tell you otherwise."

That's the sort of thing I'm talking about. I'm not saying it SHOULD be done. I'm saying it would minimize micro-management. Personally, I like the way things work. I was just trying to make the point that if minimizing micro was the goal, getting rid of HQ's was not necessarily the best path. That's all.

[scottsmm]

"I'm with you on this" Glad to see it Lampcord. I just wish you were "with me" on more then just this one.

[Bill101]

From a tactical standpoint, I don't know if I would agree with this. As it is, I find the CAP assignment entirely useless, nay detrimental for 2 key reasons.

First off, it will defend just the first enemy strike within range. What if you didn't want to give away your position? Or what if you wanted to wait to defend against that nearby bomber instead of those weak first strike fighters?

Secondly, the CAP assignment for carriers work *only* one time per defensive turn. An enemy carrier attacking your CV? Better hope you get them in the first shot, cause you won't have a second chance even with available air power remaining. And anyway, CAP defense is so paltry (you take air losses and your ground unit gets hit) that it's almost pointless.

Hi Stitch

I'm not sure I fully understand what you're saying here, as in my experience carriers in CAP mode will intercept twice, and they dish out a fair amount of damage too.

To directly clarify the difference this makes, I've just tested out having 3 US carriers operating CAP just off Hawaii when the Japanese carriers strike in turn 1, and the difference in result to normal was astounding:

Here the carriers haven't been intercepted during their attacks:

And here they have:

To make things fair I gave the US carriers experience and upgrades equal to their Japanese counterparts.

Given the difference, and the fact that all the carriers intercepted twice, I am a little confused by your comments. Am I missing something?

Thanks

Bill

[Stitch]

Greetings Bill,

I have seen that AI carriers will intercept twice on CAP if your same carrier attacks it twice, just as enemy AA guns will fire twice in 1 defensive round if your carrier attacks a same unit adjacent.

However, I have never seen, in my handful of game experience, my carrier CAP'ing twice on an enemy carrier attacking it twice. I would think that if carriers normally have 2 attacks, shouldn't they also have 2 defensive CAPs when so ordered?

In your example, did you notice which carrier group was intercepting each of your sorties? Was there an overlap of coverage? ie. On your first attack, carrier B CAP'ped carrier A, then on your immediate follow-up, carrier C interdicted the attack on A? Or did carrier A interdict both attacks as well as do the normal combat damages two times?

Thanks for looking into this, Bill. I will be much happier to know that I am wrong, and a CAPing carrier will defend twice against the same attacking carrier on the same half turn, as I can count on that during future manuevors.

If it works for the AI, I can't imagine why it wouldn't work vice versa.

[Bill101]

Hi Stitch

There was what you've called "overlap of coverage", but I think that will happen because carrier A will have taken some losses intercepting, so when another strike comes in carriers B and C are more likely to intercept it as their air components were still at full strength. As a result the carriers launching the intercepts will tend to alternate so that the strongest ones should be the ones intercepting (I think that morale and/or readiness will also play their part in determining who intercepts).

I did also try it with just one US carrier there, and this lone carrier did intercept both of the strikes by the first Japanese carrier.

It might be a good idea if you play around in the editor and set up a little scenario to test it all out, as in my experience it all seems to work ok. You can always PM me if you find anything interesting that you'd like me to take a look at.

[scottsmm]

Bill101,

Whenever there are two capable air units to intercept an enemy unit it always depends on there readiness/morale. So it doesn't play much of a part in it, because it's the single deciding factor, just as long as there are two capable units ready to intercept the enemy unit. I think though that it goes by readiness first, and then morale decides it if readiness is tied.

[abukede]

Back on track... a naval HQ attachment could really make things interesting, especially for Japan.