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Not entirely sure what your point is with that example, but when playing as the UK you don't really need to worry about the German navy. Nor the Italian one for that matter; your starting ships are more than enough to deal with both. Japan is the country you need to be afraid of, as its carriers will tear the Royal Navy apart.

However, as you can see from the UK entry, the Royal Navy didn't change their battleship-centric approach until Japan's carriers gave them a bloody nose. One thing to remember is that during this time period battleships were a sign of prestige, but carriers were not. This thinking heavily influenced naval construction for all of the war's participants without exception until Pearl Harbor and the Japanese East Indies Campaign threw such thinking out the window.
 
If you have radar, and the latest A-A guns in a S-H Battleship, along with the cruisers and destroyers, the aircraft are not a problem, perhaps. The question is, how many naval bombers will Germany have. The radar will measure the trajectory approach and speed of the aircraft. It appears, the later radar would do that. The early radar gives you information in enough measure, about approaching ships and aircraft, for action to be determined.
 
And even Japan felt carriers were important enough to do the HOI3 equivalent of putting a SHBB back in the damn production queue to turn it into a carrier. Too bad Shinano was bagged by Archer-fish 10 days after commissioning. :p

That's what not having any screens will do to you :) There's a "lack of screens" penalty in the game for a reason.
 
The Brits are notorious for always wanting to fight the last war, until reality smacks them in the face. Most of the issue was always the old fossils inside Horseguards or Admiralty House resistant to change and wanting to fight the way they knew, instead of keeping up with developments. Not just a British issue by any means, but it really bit them in the tookus concerning their naval and armor development in WWII.
 
That's what not having any screens will do to you :) There's a "lack of screens" penalty in the game for a reason.

I agree. Or, more specifically, I wish subs in the game were deadlier to inadequately screened ships. In the real world, Archer-Fish sees Shinano, gets in range, and fires torpedoes. In HOI3, Archer-Fish spots Shinano, begins combat at 30,000 yards, never catches up, and gets bombed by CAGs. :p

The Brits are notorious for always wanting to fight the last war, until reality smacks them in the face. Most of the issue was always the old fossils inside Horseguards or Admiralty House resistant to change and wanting to fight the way they knew, instead of keeping up with developments. Not just a British issue by any means, but it really bit them in the tookus concerning their naval and armor development in WWII.

That's true, I suppose. But I would have thought that even hidebound old school naval thinkers would have put more land based aircraft at Malaya and Singapore. But I also suppose that the RAF was stretched thin covering the Home Islands, North Africa, and other commitments.
 
That's true, I suppose. But I would have thought that even hidebound old school naval thinkers would have put more land based aircraft at Malaya and Singapore. But I also suppose that the RAF was stretched thin covering the Home Islands, North Africa, and other commitments.

Actually the defense plans were to have Malaya with a strong RAF defense force of top line fighters and bombers. Problem was Churchill kept raiding forces scheduled for Malaya to defend Egypt, then Greece/Crete, then Egypt again. Malaya had 3rd priority after the home isles and Egypt. By the time Japan struck, there were finally crated Hurricanes being landed with little or no time to assemble or fly them. And as the Brits found out very fast, Hurricanes were 2nd rate planes only usable against Jap Army fighters, Zeros blew them out of the sky.
 
The funny thing is that in 1936 Singapore wasn't the awesome naval base we know from 1941. The British actually invested a lot in Singapore before the war, hoping that a big nice fortress and the RN's presence in Asia would deter the Japanese aggression. This strategy is quite old, you can easily Google it.

I imagine that 1940-1942 period was quite stressful for the British leadership... So many commitments, so many problems.
 
So, you're telling me that the British can cover some of the empire some of the time, but they can't cover all of the empire all of the time?
Exactly. Hence Appeasement. In the words of the Chiefs of Staff committee in December 1937:

"We cannot foresee the time when our defence forces will be strong enough to safeguard our trade, territory and vital interests against Germany, Italy and Japan at the same time … We cannot exaggerate the importance from the point of view of Imperial Defence of any political or international action which could be taken to reduce the number of our potential enemies and to gain the support of potential allies."
 
So, you're telling me that the British can cover some of the empire some of the time, but they can't cover all of the empire all of the time? ;)

Only when I become Churchill, then it is Rule Britannia! :eek:
 
Just wanted to post that I've updated the Soviet entry based on new information TZoli provided me. The link to the updated post is here: http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?529044-Naval-Plans-for-the-World-s-Naval-Powers&p=12239590#post12239590. TZoli found an article written for the Northern Mariner that goes over in detail Stalin's plans for the Red Navy, including ship count by class as well as the doctrinal evolution of the navy. I picked 3 expansion plans and posted them in the USSR's entry, but I linked to the article as well so those who are interested can read about the other plans I didn't mention as well as the planned usage of the navy.
 
Yeah, the article talks about how the Red Navy was supposed to be only for coastal defense, but after the UK and Germany signed their 1935 naval agreement Stalin wanted to be able to project power too. Basically, the 2nd naval arms race started in 1935 (the first being before WW1) and Stalin didn't want to be left out. The USSR had a lot of area to protect and no easy way to move fleets around, so each fleet had to be large enough to sustain itself for an extended period of time. The Baltic and Black Sea fleets could easily be trapped in their seas and wouldn't be able to reinforce each other if any of the various straits were blocked. The northern fleet could reinforce the Far East fleet and vice versa, but the distances involved would make such a move impractical. I think the high number of ships wasn't just about prestige, but about strategic realities as well.

It's interesting to look at the pre-war plans and what they would've consisted of and the post-war plans. You can see in the pre-war plans the slow realization that Germany will attack at some point, and the post-war plans better reflect the role of carriers. From a gameplay-perspective the 1944 plan would be closer to what a player would build than any of the pre-war plans. The pre-war fleets were supposed to be done by around 1947, and I don't remember if the article said anything about the revised post-war plans and when they were supposed to be finished.

Overall, despite the size of the plans it's still certainly do-able in the game to make the fleets in terms of numbers, beat Germany, and finish everything in time to use against the Allies if you want to start WW3. The real challenge I think would be to make sure the ships are modern (level IV or better), which is what the real plans called for.
 
I have a stupid question about heavy cruisers and older battleships.

I've been scouring Pacific naval battles for decisive fleet engagements (or even not so decisive ones) where newer (after 1934) CAs beat out older (pre-1936) BBs or BCs in surface combat.

I'm trying to get a sense of the effectiveness of the old WWI and 1920s treaty ships in combat against newer, but smaller, cruisers designed and built in the wake of the failure of the 1936 naval treaty. But so far, no dice.

The goal I have in mind is to measure in-game ship effectiveness against historical effectiveness when it comes to OOBs. In TFH, I get the impression that at some point, CAs got slightly more powerful than they should be, because I'm wiping the floor with the IJN with 1940 tech CA/CL fleets without using land-based aircover.
 
AFAIK, battleships, battlecruisers, and heavy cruisers were non-actors in the Pacific theater. They either did nothing or were sunk by aircraft without seeing an opposing surface ship. Destroyers and submarines were the only ships that saw extensive surface combat, due to the air-heavy nature of the war there.

Now, surface ships of all types saw heavy combat in the Mediterranean and Atlantic. You're best off looking at the Mediterranean theater naval battles if you want to see how surface ships fared in combat with non-carriers. Most Italian cruisers were modern and very fast, as they sacrificed armor for speed. Italy's main problem was its inability to field its navy due to political reasons (Mussolini wasn't willing to use his navy for what it was designed for: to fight), even though its navy wasn't bad on paper; Italy never used it, so we don't know how well it really would've performed. Germany squandered its navy on fruitless convoy raids, so nothing there that applies to your question.
 
I have a stupid question about heavy cruisers and older battleships.

I've been scouring Pacific naval battles for decisive fleet engagements (or even not so decisive ones) where newer (after 1934) CAs beat out older (pre-1936) BBs or BCs in surface combat.

I'm trying to get a sense of the effectiveness of the old WWI and 1920s treaty ships in combat against newer, but smaller, cruisers designed and built in the wake of the failure of the 1936 naval treaty. But so far, no dice.

The goal I have in mind is to measure in-game ship effectiveness against historical effectiveness when it comes to OOBs. In TFH, I get the impression that at some point, CAs got slightly more powerful than they should be, because I'm wiping the floor with the IJN with 1940 tech CA/CL fleets without using land-based aircover.

SM. In order to determine the effectiveness of old battleships against modern heavy cruisers, just read the account of the battle of the River Plait.

A near miss followed by a single hit from 11" guns wreaked terrible damage on Exeter, followed by another two hits effectively putting the CA out of action.

Scale this up to a 15" or 16" shell and that first hit on "B" turret would probably have blown the front of the ship off.

It wouldn't matter if it was an old gun. The same model was used to arm both Queen Elizabeth and Vanguard. Fire-control, including RADAR and computers, is what allowed effective ranges to be increased. Armour penetration for these monster shells is more dependent upon weight than velocity and has a fairly high lower limit. A few inches of heavy cruiser armour is always within this lower limit.

I've posted many times that in big-gun engagements a CAs armour actually works against it, as it acts to confine the explosion (comparable to a V2) within the ship. Heavy cruiser captains of the period were very well aware of their vulnerability to large caliber guns and would stay out of range. Which may explain why there are so few accounts of CAs involved in big-gun battles. Prinz Eugen being one lucky, notable exception as Hood was focusing on the greater perceived threat.

Quite simply, if a BB shoots at a CA, one hit kills.


EDIT: Thanks TheBromgrev, there was a night battle in the Med (Matapan) where British ships fired on an Italian squadron including some cruisers. OK, it was a night-battle, but the effect of hits from old battleship guns on cruisers is demonstrated.

It was all over in a few minutes.
 
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AFAIK, battleships, battlecruisers, and heavy cruisers were non-actors in the Pacific theater. They either did nothing or were sunk by aircraft without seeing an opposing surface ship.
that's if you exclude the five battles off Guadalcanal, and Leyte Gulf

Italy's main problem was its inability to field its navy due to political reasons (Mussolini wasn't willing to use his navy for what it was designed for: to fight), even though its navy wasn't bad on paper; Italy never used it, so we don't know how well it really would've performed.
well the Italians pursued the "fleet in being" doctrine and it seems to me that it wasn't Mussolini preventing any actions but in many cases bad luck, poor leadership/officers, lack of an agressive naval tradition, and lack of italian radar that stopped them from risking major fleet actions. Wikipedia has a very nice series of articles that describe all the Italian fleet actions, they didn't have such a bad record when you look at them all. Oh, and fuel shortages didn't help!!
 
I have a stupid question about heavy cruisers and older battleships.

I've been scouring Pacific naval battles for decisive fleet engagements (or even not so decisive ones) where newer (after 1934) CAs beat out older (pre-1936) BBs or BCs in surface combat.

I'm trying to get a sense of the effectiveness of the old WWI and 1920s treaty ships in combat against newer, but smaller, cruisers designed and built in the wake of the failure of the 1936 naval treaty. But so far, no dice.

The goal I have in mind is to measure in-game ship effectiveness against historical effectiveness when it comes to OOBs. In TFH, I get the impression that at some point, CAs got slightly more powerful than they should be, because I'm wiping the floor with the IJN with 1940 tech CA/CL fleets without using land-based aircover.
Yes, thats true, theer have been some AAR's where CA/CL fleets wipe the RN out of the Sea and even managed to kill the CV's(positioning and speed is key).
If you "Zerg" them, the dmg they hand out is big enough to kill eveything. And they stay long enough in battle to close range due to the numbers.
Against faster CV's it will be of course hard, but you can also use land based Aircover to nail them down.

In game terms some units need need maybe lower hull. So a hit will be more devastating.
As for now even A DD has 1.0 while a BB has 1.5.
And the SeaDefence raised for the big ships to simulate the armour to some extend.
As smaller vessels can eavade shots through their speed, and bigger ones due to their armor..
And as bigger have also more hull, they stay longer in battle..
 
An important thing to remember here is that “modern” heavy cruisers are actually bigger (longer) than old battleships (Queen Elizabeth 645’, Baltimore 673’) and they are by no means nimble enough to evade once within about 15,000m where flight time is below 30 seconds.

The typical 8” CA armament couldn’t penetrate even an old battleship (9.4” @ 10,000m Vs 13” belt of Queen Elizabeth) therefore, is incapable of inflicting significant damage.

Seriously. In a stand-up between a Queen Elizabeth & a Baltimore, my money would be on the Queen Elizabeth every time. Even a group of them would only be able to evade.

I’d actually be surprised if a Baltimore survived long enough to get in range of her guns.



Edit: Even the Scharnhorst wouldn't stand-up to the old rust-bucket Ramillies.
 
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