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Dec 2, 2011
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A BC is quite fast while having strong air defence & attack. The DD even more so. Would a BC+DD fleet for Germany be a more efficient build than a BB+DD fleet if it's often (not always) going to engage carriers? I mean, the UK has allot of carriers...
 
A BC is quite fast while having strong air defence & attack. The DD even more so. Would a BC+DD fleet for Germany be a more efficient build than a BB+DD fleet if it's often (not always) going to engage carriers? I mean, the UK has allot of carriers...

AFAIK the fleets with lots of carriers are japan and USA. UK's carriers have biplanes mostly, bait them to the coast and rip them apart with your air power from land.
 
It is doubtfull that the average speed will be faster then the CV force average. And unless you exceed it you can't close for combat. And the CAG's start hitting you while you are closing and many times your force is decimated even before getting into gun range. Finally, if the CV force has surface ships like BB's or CA's your BC force engages them and not the CV's, but the CAG's still attack you.

Best is to forget BB's/BC's/CA's and go for a CV/CL fleet.
 
A BC is quite fast while having strong air defence & attack. The DD even more so. Would a BC+DD fleet for Germany be a more efficient build than a BB+DD fleet if it's often (not always) going to engage carriers? I mean, the UK has allot of carriers...

could work, but youl will be less efective vs BBs, and UK has a lot of BBs in 1936 (12) vs only 3 CVs (aprox) , dont know in 1940.

UK will be at war with italy and Japan probably. SO, as Germany, you dont need to be the main naval force vs UK, just to help out, thats why BBs are so good for germany. You can sink lot of fleets with BBs, make UK to move fleets to fight you, and let Italy and Japan win the naval war to UK thx to you.

jju_57, i dont see CVs an option for germany. Maybe in normal dificulty. But playing in hard or very hard, you dont have any practicals, and this will result in maaany IC waste. So you will probably lose to URRS.
 
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jju_57, i dont see CVs an option for germany. Maybe in normal dificulty. But playing in hard or very hard, you dont have any practicals, and this will result in maaany IC waste. So you will probably lose to URRS.

It can be done. It requires serious IC whoring while simultaneously doing a couple runs of CVLs for the practicals. Germany should already be looking at good practicals for light aircraft, so the CAGs won't be a big problem. Also, Germany's generally advanced air force will naturally involve teching up the CAGs along with the INTs and CAS. That just leaves the doctrines, so one abandons sub warfare entirely and perhaps trims a bit on the ground, perhaps by going MEC/TD instead of ARM for the mobile forces. Those are complimentary strategies in other ways as well, since the fuel savings from using MECs in place of ARM will help to offset the higher fuel requirements of a CV-based navy over an exclusively submarine force.
 
You don't need IC whoring. On very hard I research the CV techs till I get the 1934 ones completed. I then build 3 CV's in the first run. Yes it takes 27 months and costs alot. But they finish in early 1940 and the next run with those practicals take 18 months and I have plenty of IC due to the 1939 victories. I now have a 3CV+6CL fleet to harasse the Brits. My normal strategy is to do Barbarosa in May '41 and then Sealion in '42 after I defeat the SU. By then I have 9-12 CV's and have severely crippled the Royal Navy. And my ground forces for Russia don't lack due with this strategy. If you manage the air force you can easily get by with 24 INT and 20 TAC. Those are always completed by late '39 early '40 so you do have the IC for a few CL's and CV's.

Do not build any other ships or subs if you go this route. 3 transports are all you need till Sealion. I use those three to move troops to Prussia, take out Sweden quickly in '40 and for some landings going to Lenningrad. In late '41 you can build 9 more which gives you 12 and more than enough for Sealion.
 
You don't need IC whoring. On very hard I research the CV techs till I get the 1934 ones completed. I then build 3 CV's in the first run. Yes it takes 27 months and costs alot. But they finish in early 1940 and the next run with those practicals take 18 months and I have plenty of IC due to the 1939 victories. I now have a 3CV+6CL fleet to harasse the Brits. My normal strategy is to do Barbarosa in May '41 and then Sealion in '42 after I defeat the SU. By then I have 9-12 CV's and have severely crippled the Royal Navy. And my ground forces for Russia don't lack due with this strategy. If you manage the air force you can easily get by with 24 INT and 20 TAC. Those are always completed by late '39 early '40 so you do have the IC for a few CL's and CV's.

Do not build any other ships or subs if you go this route. 3 transports are all you need till Sealion. I use those three to move troops to Prussia, take out Sweden quickly in '40 and for some landings going to Lenningrad. In late '41 you can build 9 more which gives you 12 and more than enough for Sealion.

Sounds good, but i still cannot understand how you can get 3CVs + 6 LCs + 6 CAGS + 24 INTS + 20 TACs in 1940-41, and still have enough land forces to overrun URRS in 1 year in very hard. Do you do this in FTM and without any gammie strategy?.
 
The AI is crap. I meant in a general strategic sense. Assume it's a MP game, then UK would surely spam CVs for its Navy.

Let's say Germany wants to help out Italy against the RN. Germany can in no way afford to build CVs (Come on.. be realistic...), so should it use BC+DD or BB+DD fleets against the RN? Naturally, the luftwaffe will be providing interceptor-cover.
 
Sounds good, but i still cannot understand how you can get 3CVs + 6 LCs + 6 CAGS + 24 INTS + 20 TACs in 1940-41, and still have enough land forces to overrun URRS in 1 year in very hard. Do you do this in FTM and without any gammie strategy?.

My land forces consist of 25 (3xINF+1ART) defending all the westen areas. My invasion force consists of 30 Panzer (2xMArm+1xMot+1xSPArt, sometimes Mot have 2 brigades), 5 Mtn (3xMtn plus maybe a support) and 70 to 75 (3xInf+1xArt). In the queue are another 10 INF and 3-5 Panzer. Many feel that this is way short for SU and if you left it to the AI you would be correct. This is a manual based force and my plan is to fight as close to the orginal border as possible. I use three posckets to destroy all SU forces. One is to go to Riga then swing right along river till you hook up with forces driving to Minsk. The Minsk thrust swings right and left. The right swing hooks up with forces going to Kiev that swung left fromt here. And also at Kiev swing right along river till you get to Black Sea.

Keep Romania out of war and use the border to trap SU forces along it. Then the infantry destroys the pockets. the armor is moving to prevent excapes and once things are under control they rush eastward with nothing to stop them. Over 95% of all forces in western SU are destroyed on the starting borders and the trip to Moscow, Rostov and Lenningrad is basically unopposed. If you start May 1st this is done by mid-August and you should have captured those three cities by end of August. Now call in Finland if possible and push to Archangelsk, Murmansk in the north, To the river and very bad infra provinces near Gorky in the center and Stalingrad and Baki int he south. Getting these nets you the bitter peace.

The other benefit is that for most of the big fight you are well supplied and your air force is in Prussia/Poland. Base bombers in Lenningrad as this can be sea supplied. Now just be careful about supplies and don't move the northen forces or central forces too much. And make sure those 5 MTN divisions are in the Caucuses.
 
Germany can in no way afford to build CVs (Come on.. be realistic...), so should it use BC+DD or BB+DD fleets against the RN? Naturally, the luftwaffe will be providing interceptor-cover.

After the first run the cost of a CV drops dramatically. It is now only about 1.5-2 IC more than a BC. The CAG's can be viewed cost wise as replacing NAV's or INT. Don't buy any NAV's and only buy INT till 21 to 24 max.
 
i did this in a randomHOI game - it was really good, you can have large fleets with low penalties that can strike anywhere on the map quickly.

not sure how well it would work in a regular game, however, where the naval powers are pre-defined =/
 
BTW for Semper Fi I conducted a number of tests on CV+CL vs BC+DD fleets. I am not sure if FTM changed anything but in over 30 tests the BC fleets got decimated and teh CV's were barely scratched if attacked at all. If the BC's closed they usually ended up targeting the CL's anyway. Bottom line is multiple tests through SF showed that no SAG combination could ever hurt a CV+CL only fleet.
 
I guess British fleet do not build CVs so it is possible to harrass it with 3 CV with -40% malus but how does it work against the USA?

What other combinations you have tried to fight CVs? Have you tried only DDs or SSs. I saw one MP game where DDs sunk 15 US CVs in separate engagements.
 
Keep Romania out of war and use the border to trap SU forces along it.

While your forces prove it's possible to do and still crush the USSR, this is using a gamey exploit. Crushing armies against an imaginary uncrossable line on a map is using a game mechanic that shouldn't be neccessary.
 
I guess British fleet do not build CVs so it is possible to harrass it with 3 CV with -40% malus but how does it work against the USA?

What other combinations you have tried to fight CVs? Have you tried only DDs or SSs. I saw one MP game where DDs sunk 15 US CVs in separate engagements.

Those 3 CV's are only your first fleet. And I never have fleets with more than 3 CV's + 6 CL's in them. You may not be sinking much at the start but you damaged them. So pull that fleet to port for reparis and send inthe next fleet. You have a decent chance of fighting that same damaged fleet and now you start sinking some of their ships. Rotate out the damaged 2nd fleet and replace with 3rd, etc.

While your forces prove it's possible to do and still crush the USSR, this is using a gamey exploit. Crushing armies against an imaginary uncrossable line on a map is using a game mechanic that shouldn't be neccessary.

How is this gamey? Is it gamey to trap French units against Switzerland? Yougoslav forces against a neutral Bulgaria? A border is a border. I seldom have Romania in the Axis in May '41 and if I do I declare a limited war which is not gamey at all. After all I have to penetrate to the Dneiper and then cut them off at the Black Sea. The SU forces do try to break out and I have to seal the pocket with my panzers. Finally, all those minor countries do is suck up precious supplies in Russia. On VH your biggest obstacle is the hugh 50% supply throughput malus. Keep those worthless allied forces out of SU. Use them to help defend against those pesky invasion in France and elsewhere.
 
BTW for Semper Fi I conducted a number of tests on CV+CL vs BC+DD fleets. I am not sure if FTM changed anything but in over 30 tests the BC fleets got decimated and teh CV's were barely scratched if attacked at all. If the BC's closed they usually ended up targeting the CL's anyway. Bottom line is multiple tests through SF showed that no SAG combination could ever hurt a CV+CL only fleet.

I'll echo his sentiments. I, too, was seduced in my younger days by the speed of BCs. I ran some tests and the results were craptacular. Under land based air cover, the BC/DD fleet would hurt some CLs while INTs would hurt the CAGs. But I could never inflict any significant damage on a CV. (Sometimes I'd scratch their paint.) If I had no land based air cover, the CAGs would chew up the BCs and DDs while my ships would inflict very little damage on the opposing fleet. My love for BCs died that game.

You can basically be assured of same/worse results if you try to use fast CA/CL groups to hunt CTFs, except that the CAs have weaker hull, resulting in more dead ships.

The only real way SAGs in can hope to threaten CTFs is by fighting them in range of land based air cover. Surface ships and subs just aren't ever going to bag a CV.
 
A BC is quite fast while having strong air defence & attack. The DD even more so. Would a BC+DD fleet for Germany be a more efficient build than a BB+DD fleet if it's often (not always) going to engage carriers? I mean, the UK has allot of carriers...

First off, to reply to another post... in SF, surface forces could barely do jack to a fleet containing a single carrier. FtM, this is no longer the case.




Now, as to the original post...

I have done a LOT of naval fighting. My report is: Yes, BC-DD fleets (as GER) are more effective at anti-CV warfare than combinations with BB or CL.

That being said, I am ---most definitely not--- saying that "BC beats CV".

If you are going to honestly counter the RN (and later USA) CV fleets with BC, you need to make sure of a few things:

A) Keep your BC and DD engine tech as far ahead in research as you reasonably can. Other techs too of course, but this one is crucial.
A2) If you have "old ships", use them for *other purposes* than refilling lost ships. Anything more than 1 tech-level behind the fleet you are trying to "replenish" is going to likely hurt you more than help. If you have an entire fleet that's "getting up in years", switch it's active role to convoy raiding, shore-bombarment providing, or standing in the next seazone over from the actual fight to intercept any other enemy navies trying to get to the "juicy carrier" combat.

B) ALWAYS engage within rage of land-based air. Even if you out-speed the target CV fleet, their CAGs are going to do a lot to you while you are trying to shoot at the ships. By engaged the CAGs, at worst, the CAGs will end up with the "multiple combat penalty" for being engaged by INT at the same time, and at best, you can chase them off/destroy them, which (by definition) prevents them from harming your BC/DD fleets.
B2) If the air is clear of CAG, then send in some NAV of your own. Shooting the target from both air AND sea will speed up the "sinking process", and as well, if the enemy fleet is already engaged by 1 of your forces, the other one will have a 100% detection chance to enter combat with it

C) Even in ideal conditions, it will take a while to sink the ships; CVs (both ingame and historically, save for maybe a couple JAP models) are one of the more resillient ship types. You'll chase off to port/damage a lot more CV than you sink from full health. While sinking is always better, a CV is only a dangerous sea opponent if it's actually out in the sea. If you keep them locked in ports forever, that's 80% of a win right there. (for added fun, then launch an amphibious invasion against the port province while you have it blockaded... the fleet will try to move out to intercept the invasion, right into your waiting battlefleet, and usually then right back into port after taking a few hits ;p )
 
I'll echo his sentiments. I, too, was seduced in my younger days by the speed of BCs. I ran some tests and the results were craptacular. Under land based air cover, the BC/DD fleet would hurt some CLs while INTs would hurt the CAGs. But I could never inflict any significant damage on a CV. (Sometimes I'd scratch their paint.) If I had no land based air cover, the CAGs would chew up the BCs and DDs while my ships would inflict very little damage on the opposing fleet. My love for BCs died that game.

You can basically be assured of same/worse results if you try to use fast CA/CL groups to hunt CTFs, except that the CAs have weaker hull, resulting in more dead ships.

The only real way SAGs in can hope to threaten CTFs is by fighting them in range of land based air cover. Surface ships and subs just aren't ever going to bag a CV.

Agreed. Although they are very helpful in a combo with air power, but at that point its best to use BB due to increased strength. The heavy surface ships ARE good at taking out escorts and thus reducing their air defense. Gradually, if you kill enough screens, BB/BC can be IC effective and aid air power in killing CV's and aid subs by reducing screens.