1.2 (Now 1.3) Naval Combat Complete Guide

[Alex_brunius]

There is a clear difference you're not seeing.

Lets say side A (100) and Side B (50) are fighting. Both have 100% efficiency at 50. Also lets say each plane does 1dmg and kill a plane when they reach 10 dmg.
In the game the penalty will decrease with numbers but i will even make it worse for side A and say they have a 50% penalty untuil they reach the airfield limit.

Only a full number will get the kill. (If plane receive 9dmg it will heal that 9 dmg). Just to make the calculation simple.

That's alot of assumptions on how the aircombat calculation works there that we actually have no idea if they are true or not.

How do you know that the 9/10dmg will heal and not roll a 90% chance to kill a plane for example? Or how do you know that damage is not stored and it uses 0.9 planes to replace it from reserves in the code internally (but only displaying even numbers of planes in the reserves/bases to the GUI)?

Without a dev to confirm the exact formulas we can't know the exact workings of this because there are too many variables for an accurate analysis based on ingame tests alone.

In the game the penalty will decrease with numbers

I don't think your calculation for over capacity and losses uses the correct numbers to begin with.

According to the numbers in elitesix tests above a Carrier with 100 planes but 50 capacity would be running at a -80% efficiency penalty, not a -50% one...

I can't test in the game at the moment, but I would be quite surprised if the airwings on a Carrier with 100/50 planes would only get a -50% efficiency penalty in combat.

Interesting, so I reran the overcrowding numbers (some from memory :/), based on the assumption that the overcrowding penalty is based on percentage overcapacity, rather than per plane overcapacity.

The wiki seems to agree that % over capacity is what is used. If we make the assumption that overcrowding for Carriers uses the same mechanic and formula that overcrowding for airbases use.
http://www.hoi4wiki.com/Air_warfare#Capacity
(confirmed easilly when you make tests with bigger wings)
Edit: It seems Carriers use a different formula when further testing/data is done below so this is actually wrong. But I still do believe % over capacity is used in some way since it makes logical sense to use it.

 

[Miaow]

That's alot of assumptions on how the aircombat calculation works there that we actually have no idea if they are true or not.

How do you know that the 9/10dmg will heal and not roll a 90% chance to kill a plane for example? Or how do you know that damage is not stored and it uses 0.9 planes to replace it from reserves in the code internally (but only displaying even numbers of planes in the reserves/bases to the GUI)?

Without a dev to confirm the exact formulas we can't know the exact workings of this because there are too many variables for an accurate analysis based on ingame tests.

According to the defines, 9/10 dmg is a 45% chance to die (in vanilla) but only if there isn't enough damage to outright kill a single plane.

Of course, comments in the game files may be out of date and it would be nightmarish to test.

 

[Alex_brunius]

According to the defines, 9/10 dmg is a 45% chance to die (in vanilla) but only if there isn't enough damage to outright kill a single plane.

Of course, comments in the game files may be out of date and it would be nightmarish to test.

I agree. I have made a small number of tests on a few of the defines myself, and already found some of the comments in the defines to be wrong / not updated sadly.

I agree that some of it might be possible to figure out by heavy modding to isolate and test one defines / stat at a time, but I haven't seen anyone on the forums do anything like that yet.

 

[elitesix]

So I just finished an MP game as Japan where I put my starting carriers with 50/45 and 63/58. My overcrowding penalties were -20% and -14% respectively.

I'm too tired to figure out the possible forumlas, but I think no overcrowding formula discussed in this thread, including my own, properly covers what I observed. My guess would be that there is a hidden carrier tech level overcrowding modifier that is not shown, since the 45 carriers were tech 1, the 58 deck carriers were tech 2.

 

[Alex_brunius]

So I just finished an MP game as Japan where I put my starting carriers with 50/45 and 63/58. My overcrowding penalties were -20% and -14% respectively.

I'm too tired to figure out the possible forumlas, but I think no overcrowding formula discussed in this thread, including my own, properly covers what I observed. My guess would be that there is a hidden level of carrier overcrowding modifier that is not shown, since the 45 carriers were tech 1, the 58 deck carriers were tech 2.

50/45 = 1.111 => 11.1% planes over capacity (20% penalty)
63/58 = 1.086 => 8.6% planes over capacity (14% penalty)

So we can exclude a linear penalty for Carriers at least, and I think also conclude that there is some hidden stuff modifiers going on for Carriers that make them work differently then land bases ( since land bases use linear stacking penalties ).

 

[Axe99]

I agree that some of it might be possible to figure out by heavy modding to isolate and test one defines / stat at a time, but I haven't seen anyone on the forums do anything like that yet.

I've done some tests on how naval armour works . Not much use to this discussion though. @tom_jones has done some tests on a broader range of things though, and I'm sure some of the other modders have done some testing as well. You kind of have to for things that are important to how you want your mod to work (I haven't looked much at air though, but if anyone wants a run-down of the naval armour formula pre 1.2 (haven't tested it since, but I'd expect it to have remained the same, although I will check if my naval combat results start looking a bit funny) am happy to post/link from the naval defines discussion thread .

 

[Alex_brunius]

I've done some tests on how naval armour works . Not much use to this discussion though. @tom_jones has done some tests on a broader range of things though, and I'm sure some of the other modders have done some testing as well. You kind of have to for things that are important to how you want your mod to work (I haven't looked much at air though, but if anyone wants a run-down of the naval armour formula pre 1.2 (haven't tested it since, but I'd expect it to have remained the same, although I will check if my naval combat results start looking a bit funny) am happy to post/link from the naval defines discussion thread .

Nice. I must have missed that.

Naval Armor was in fact what I was referring to, since the defines testing I did revealed that the flat "Armor = Reduces damage by 90%" claimed by both the defines comments and Sterrius guide here can't be what is used in practical HoI4 navalcombat.

 

[Axe99]

Nice. I must have missed that.

Naval Armor was in fact what I was referring to, since even the quick and dirty defines testing I did revealed that the flat "Armor = Reduces damage by 90%" claimed by both the defines comments and Sterrius guide here can't be what is used in practical HoI4 navalcombat.

Well, I can help with that . Easy enough (if a tad tedious) to test with BBs with attacks and HPs that are all multiples of 10 too. What the data seemed to turn up is that reduction in damage is (as far as I could tell):

attack multiplied by (1 - ((armour-piercing)*(defines armour reduction))/armour)

Where armour-piercing cannot be less than 0 (ie, once piercing is higher than armour, that's as much piercing as you need)

(as long as I haven't put a bracket wrong somewhere - the data are in a spoiler in the linked posts below (both in the same page/thread, but linked for convenience), and I'll have them in a word file or spreadsheet somewhere as well.There are other discussion of naval defines in that thread (and the earlier part of the armour discussion) that may or may not be of interest, and when I finally finish my class events and get back to defines tweaking, I'll do more tests and post the results in there.

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...l-related-defines.959595/page-2#post-21640341

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...l-related-defines.959595/page-2#post-21643161

Edit: Writing this up for the wiki I noticed an error, and have corrected the formula appropriately, apologies for any confusion.

 

[sterrius]

@Alex_brunius

1-> I was using a example for you to understand the logic. By no means i was using game numbers as that would make me waste 3-4 hours doing calculations.

Air x air combat during naval battles happens exactly like it would happen in land. There is little assumptions here and it would work the same way. The mechanics of air war is well know and was discussed exhaustively during 4-5 topics during 1.0-1.1. (Unfortunaly outside of my outdated guide all of them went to the graveyard).

for example: Plane wings don´t heal until they reach the airfield. That is confirmed. But i "healed" them to make the example simple. (For carriers they would heal each day, as they land in the carrier and wait for the next day).

I don't think your calculation for over capacity and losses uses the correct numbers to begin with.

According to the numbers in elitesix tests above a Carrier with 100 planes but 50 capacity would be running at a -80% efficiency penalty, not a -50% one...

I can't test in the game at the moment, but I would be quite surprised if the airwings on a Carrier with 100/50 planes would only get a -50% efficiency penalty in combat.

2-> Again. Its was a Example for logic, i was not using game numbers. (Im of course thinking you're talking about the example i put for you).

To test this in game right now you wil have to build the exactly amount of planes you need and stop the production to take the replenish factor out of the equation.
Its a very boring and tedious process, reason im waiting that to be fixed to give you all the numbers.

But its also pretty simple to confirm that the side with more planes will win in a fight using equal planes. Even if those said planes have a little penalty on the first rounds, because after they get into the size the airfield can support the penalty will be over and the side with less plane will be damaged.

Also i responded to elitex and confirmed to him that overcrownd is a % based. (By how much above 100% you're going). Not a Fixed value.
If you get a carrier with 100 decksize the penalty for each extra plane will be less.

Overcrownd is not a light penalty, it is particulary heavy on small carriers but not so much for big ones. Specially if you get the Base Strike -50% penalty.

 

[Alex_brunius]

for example: Plane wings don´t heal until they reach the airfield. That is confirmed. But i "healed" them to make the example simple. (For carriers they would heal each day, as they land in the carrier and wait for the next day).

This is what the defines.lua file says about your example with planes magically healing and not having a chance to die when damaged:

"LAST_PLANE_DIE_FACTOR = 0.5, -- chance to kill last plane if our damage was too low to kill even one plane (1 = 50% chance if it had 50% dmg)"

Can you point to where you have tested and confirmed that this defines is broken/doesn't work the way it say?


If your going to make a "example for you to understand the logic", you can't use totally different mechanics and logic then the game use without backing it up by testing. If no such testing exists we need to assume that it works the way the lua file claims, don't we?

The same with stacking really. If you use a totally different % number then the game use your simplified test will show the wrong conclusion/result. When I'm testing a 100% overcrowded Carrier (2x planes) without the doctrine I end up with -100% penalty from overcrowding... That took me 3-4 minutes to test and confirm ( saving you "3-4 hours of calculations" ).

 

[sterrius]

Ok. Let me paint what im trying to say to you with screenshots.

German with 0 overcrown penalty vs english with 24,5% overcrown penalty. Both using carrier IV that allowed britain to have 20 extra planes. All at 75% str.

Both sides have 0 planes on the stockpile. So replenish is out of the equation.
Both using same doctrine. (Carrier doctrine to the max).

PS: The first screen was the start of the second engagement because it ended so fast i needed to make a second engagement to take the picture. So it shows pretty well the casualities of both sides on the first fight. (just look at max planes).

If after that you still can´t believe that overcrownd carriers > carriers going only with what the airfield allows it i can´t help you. I can´t get simpler than that to explain the logic.

We don´t have to test 100% of the things we say. I don´t need to test to know that a DD can´t beat a Battleship. The numbers and everything says this is not going to happen. (I do need to test do tell you how bad will be the beating, but thats another history and not what i was trying to prove in my previous post).


The reason im not yet making this kind of test about how much overcrown you can place in a carrier before it actually starts to hurt you its because the replenish bug make this a boring task where i have to star/stop the production of the planes every time to always have the exact amount of planes needed, if i have 1 in the stockpile i have to create a group in a random airfield and place it there to not mess with the test. Making this test one time is one thing. Doing this test for all 4 carriers plus their manufacturers is a lot of work. Doubled as you must also take in account screen bonus and doctrines into account. So i need to do this for all 3 doctrines plus with and without the screen high command.

When you finish you will have done this test 20+ times. Taking 5-10m each plus 1-2 m taking notes, you will easily spend a afternoon doing it.

Also with replenishment bug working in 1.2 all the test above have no use. You wil get fresh planes from the stockpile during combat so no point going above your limit, you will only be nerfing yourself.

Wait they fix the bug before going for this. Until they fix this it serve no purpose to spend time testing a mechanic that is not working and even mods can´t fix it.


About planes "heal".
Your line says nothing about what i tried to say.

Im telling that once a plane goes to the airfield/carrier (Mission of the day are over) they will heal before going to the air again. The line you got in the quote only works during combat not after combat.

 

[Alex_brunius]

Edit: removed comment about first screenshot.

About planes "heal".
Your line says nothing about what i tried to say.

We must have different versions of reality then because this is what I did read in you post and objected to:

Also lets say each plane does 1dmg and kill a plane when they reach 10 dmg.
...
Only a full number will get the kill. (If plane receive 9dmg it will heal that 9 dmg).

 

[jju_57]

I don't see how your first screenshot is relevant at all. It shows a German Carrier with a total of 12 planes, fighting a British carrier with 72 planes.

Not to get involved but I think this was the start of the second battle. That means Germany only has 12 planes left out of the original 85 while UK has 72 out of the starting 105. Germany therefore lost many more planes in the first fight.

 

[Alex_brunius]

Not to get involved but I think this was the start of the second battle. That means Germany only has 12 planes left out of the original 85 while UK has 72 out of the starting 105. Germany therefore lost many more planes in the first fight.

I realized that now, and removed the comment from my post. Sorry for not reading the ps.

But if the difference is that big I suspect there must be other factors at play. Normal aircombat does not have that big difference of losses between that similar numbers of planes in identical number of wings. Even if there were zero "overcrowding" penalty 105 vs 85 planes in landbased aircombat with 2vs2 wings would see the end tally remaining be closer to 20-0, rather then 60-0.

Assuming all else is equal ofcourse (doctrines/techs/leaders and so on).

 

[sterrius]

i give up. I can´t make you understand the example i used on my quote was made up just to explain to you that numbers matter even if you get a penalty and will win against a inferior number of planes without penalty. (As long the penalty is not that big).

I was not using the GAME RULES. I made a SIMPLIFICATION to make the explanation SIMPLE.

Not going to try to explain that a fifth time.

 

[Alex_brunius]

Not going to try to explain that a fifth time.

And I'm not going to try to explain to you a fifth time that if I arbitrarily am allowed to change the game rules just to make an example, I can prove anything ( both things that are false and true ) in the game. But it's not going to be a very good example...

The screenshots and explanation of what happens is a more appropriate explanation ( since I would have understood what you meant right away ).


But I still think that you misunderstood what I was trying to say. I never tried to claim that Carriers without stacking penalty always beat those with it...

What I claimed was that it doesn't matter if the games internal mechanics/calculations use efficiency or plane numbers to calculate combat results, because 100 planes making an attack at 50% efficiency (each of them doing half damage) will deal exactly the same damage as if that same 50% penalty is used to "remove" 50 planes from the calculation to only allow half of them to deal full normal damage. In both cases you have the same 100 planes operating at 50% penalty.

 

[elitesix]

I agree that overcrowded carriers should be > normal carriers, but I was trying to run the numbers to figure out the overcrowding penalty to get a good idea on how many planes to overcrowd. I'm not sure we're there. sterrius's raises the salient point that overcrowding can add significant amounts of plane reserves, such that the increased number of planes (and therefore increased number of hp or agility or whatever defensive stats planes have) for the opposing side to chew through. So in a certain sense, overcrowding a carrier makes it overall a more "tanky" airgroup - capable of taking heavy damage, in exchange for less offensive output until its planes have been killed. So the question becomes how much overcrowding is good? And how "simultaneous" are air carrier battles even in just one round of battle?


Simultaneity is a key point in overcrowding analysis. If in my earlier example 50/45 loaded carrier gives a -20% overcrowding penalty, assuming, that -20% is a straight malus to offense, there are still numerous unanswered questions. It is simultaneous, thus 50/45 carrier would have 50 planes fight at 80% all at once, versus 45/45 carrier which would have 45 planes all fight at 100% at once - if so, the 45/45 would slaughter the 50/45 in a simultaneous combat round. However, if combat is done iteratively, that means the 50/45 airgroup would fight at 80% efficiency until it's lost exactly 5 planes, and then the remaining 45 would fight at 100%. It would easily trounce the 45/45 airgroup if the first round of battle itself was calculated iteratively.


So perhaps we're going about this the wrong way, and perhaps sterrius's approach is best. Just test 1v1s out, screw the overcrowding penalty analysis because there are other factors, such as simultaneity, at play, that can best be discovered by battle outcome testing rather than looking at tooltips.


p.s. And as Japan, I definitely had naval battles where my carriers planes didn't replenish for at least weeks despite stockpiles while the carriers where at sea -but they were in faraway sea zones, so that probably was a contributing factor.

 

[hoi3newbie]

@sterrius: any chance that radar coverage had an impact on the results?

 

[Miaow]

Rad coverage gives no combat bonus though.

 

[sterrius]

@sterrius: any chance that radar coverage had an impact on the results?

Like miaow said, radar coverage only give detection bonus. Also i dont used missions for that fight, just placed both navys on the same province. (That makes you start with full fleet removing reinforcement from the factor).

I did forget to make both countrys get the same air doctrine, but the first level of all 3 doctrines again, only affects detection so no combat bonus involved.

Carrier battles are always kind of brutal. Its pretty rare in a carrier vs carrier battle to both sides leave with a good number of planes. Usually the fighters will go all out and die in the first 2-3 days. Replenish make sure they will get reinforced.

p.s. And as Japan, I definitely had naval battles where my carriers planes didn't replenish for at least weeks despite stockpiles while the carriers where at sea -but they were in faraway sea zones, so that probably was a contributing factor.

I tried to get how much hours you have to wait for reinforcement while i was making the guide, it have a random factor. Sometimes i got the reinforcement on 10-15 hours, other time i had to wait 24hours or more to get the replenish.

Its kind random and i don´t see how you can calculate this from observation and the data is hidden in the .exe so defines is not gonna help here.