A Small Christmas Teaser DD

[Johan]

So, me and @Groogy have been posting a few teasers recently, and I wanted to clarify a little bit about them.

Marines

One of the new categories of units we are adding in 1.30 is Marines. If you own the Golden Century OR the Rule Britannia Immersion Pack, you'll get this new unit.

• Marines are infantry only.
• Marines use sailors instead of manpower when built and reinforce.
• The amount of Marines you can build is a fraction of your force limit, and the default is 0%.
• Naval Ideas gives you 5% of your force limit as Marines.
• The Recruiting Act Policy gives 5% of your force limit as Marines.
• The Portuguese Naval Doctrine gives 10% of your force limit as Marines.
• English Red Coats National Idea gives 5% of your force limit as Marines.
• British Britannia Rules the Waves gives 10% of your force limit as Marines.
• Marines land at +200% disembarking speed.
• They ignore crossing penalties, so if your army is 50% marines, and you cross a straight, its -1 penalty instead of -2, and if you land with 100% marines, you have no penalty.
• Marines however take 25% extra damage in the shock phase, as their drawback.

numbers subject to tweaking..

Coastal Defence Buildings
Two of the new buildings in 1.30 that I can talk about today are the Coastal Defence and the Naval Battery. They can be built in any coastal province.

Coastal Defence
Required Dip Tech 5
+50% Blockade Force Required
+100% Hostile Disembark Time

Naval Battery
Required Dip Tech 12
+100% Blockade Force Required
+200% Hostile Disembark Time
+5% Hostile Fleet Attrition


These are three new statements you have not heard before, so let me explain them.

Blockade Force Required - Previously the amount of ships required to blockade a port was entirely dependent of the development of the province. Now this is increased by 50% and 100% by these buildings, making it more expensive to blockade an hostile coast.
Hostile Disembark Time - This slows down how quickly hostile forces can land on this coast. The Naval Battery can totally negate the bonus of the Marines.
Hostile Fleet Attrition - A fleet sitting in a sea-zone will take the highest hostile fleet attrition, from adjacent enemy controlled ports, each month. (Yes, the AI will as well.)

Yes, there will be more fun stuff later on, but most likely not more this year... dunno...

 

[Demonkill227]

ooooooh, very intresting addition to the navy side of the game very intrigued to see how this plays in a regular game!

 

[Lunar Spark]

Always nice to see the naval side of the game being updated.
I do have a question though, won't these new buildings be practically useless?
I mean, consider the fact that you are likely going to have to build them in at least nearly every single one of your provinces for them to actually have some effect(otherwise your enemy will just land on a province that doesn't have any defence), and, as far as I understand, these new buildings still take that precious slot, meaning that very rarely will it be effective to spend money on them.

Also another question, does that :"+5% hostile fleet attrition" stack depending on how many coastal provinces are adjacent to a given sea tile?

 

[orochi2k]

Now we just need to add a heavy tank to make it a space marine division template.
oops...wrong game.

 

[Johan]

Also another question, does that :"+5% hostile fleet attrition" stack depending on how many coastal provinces are adjacent to a given sea tile?

Highest one.

 

[Johan]

I mean, consider the fact that you are likely going to have to build them in at least nearly every single one of your provinces for them to actually have some effect(otherwise your enemy will just land on a province that doesn't have any defence), and, as far as I understand, these new buildings still take that precious slot, meaning that very rarely will it be effective to spend money on them.?

I'd put a fort + naval battery as a low develop mountain province adjacent to my richer one.

 

[Ursul]

I'll be curious to see those things in action, it feel like this could shake up a bit how you play. That "hostile sea zone attrition" in particular.
Although I fear the consequence will be a further relegation of navy as a secondary concern.

 

[Doctor Bones]

Coastal Defence
Required Dip Tech 5
+50% Blockade Force Required
+100% Hostile Disembark Speed

Naval Battery
Required Dip Tech 12
+100% Blockade Force Required
+200% Hostile Disembark Speed
+5% Hostile Fleet Attrition

This doesn't seem right. Are you sure it isn't "hostile disembark time"?

 

[st360]

Arent these buildings going to be useless? Sounds to me like you will need to spend 100 gold times 30 provinces to defend them in a highly situational war, and they still wont be realy defended. Or you can just have a big fleet and dominate the sea both in defence and offence for any province you fancy.

 

[Hallon]

As their drawback? Looks like only English and Portuguese will even use them, so I don't see why they need a drawback at all.

 

[Johan]

This doesn't seem right. Are you sure it isn't "hostile disembark time"?

yes

 

[Hallon]

Arent these buildings going to be useless? Sounds to me like you will need to spend 100 gold times 30 provinces to defend them in a highly situational war, and they still wont be realy defended. Or you can just have a big fleet and dominate the sea both in defence and offence for any province you fancy.

Lots of changes are completely geared towards multiplayer instead of general gameplay.

 

[lolada]

Looks to me that disembark time doesn't really mater in coastal forts, players will just land on another tile. One can try to force players in multiplayer to land somewhere... but its likely waste of money and building slots. Its ok as side benefit - blockading bonus + attrition is quite great.

edit: Do coastal forts have ZoC so enemy must disembark there?

Actually isn't attrition too strong? There's no way you are blockading London for example. GB or Venice will wait 3-4 months and sink all your damaged fleet with no losses.

Btw @Johan aren't blockades already too hard and naval game less important. It should be easier to blockade countries not harder. Base blockades should require way less ships/guns to make naval matter. And then you can buff these buildings to 100% and 200% to make it really hard to blockade if need be. It makes the both naval supremacy and these buildings more important.

Marines look awesome, gg idea putting sailors to use.
edit 2: aa -_- so no Naval == no marines? unless you ar Por, Spain, GB (What is The Recruiting Act Policy)

Btw did you reduce prices of buildings? Looks like 10% discount.

 

[Canute VII]

I'd put a fort + naval battery as a low develop mountain province adjacent to my richer one.

So the new building uses fort zone of control?

 

[Ixalmaris]

Okay I guess....

I doubt that those things will be useful though unless you change blockades completely.

Even when you for some reason max it you wont have enough marines to form a complete army. So you have to micro your marine stack to arrive 1-2 days before the real army to start the battle without crossing penalty and then get reinforced.
And imo this level of micro doesn't really add to the fun nor are there many situations in EU4 where this is required.

Because of the ZoC mechanic naval landings are hardly used anyway as you are always just one lost battle away from a stackwipe. So either you land with an overwhelming force or so far away frim the enemy that speed doesn't matter. And you only need 2k marines anyway to capture a province without fort to instantly disembark the rest of the army.

So imo marines are at best a gimmick and units of last resort to make use if your sailors if you get them as british once manpower becomes relevant again. At worst they are just more micro.

How do they interact with the portugese flagship abilities anyway?

As for costal defenses, the only real use is to prevent the enemy from trapping your fleet in port with the attrition despite that being a historic tactic.
And the rest? Who blockades provinces anyway? You get warscore elsewhere and the little bit of devastation is neglible. And by the time naval batteries come in play you simply use naval barrage on forts to negate their siege defense. No need to leave a fleet there.

Still a gifted horse etc. and its not as if RB and GC wouldn't need a bit more meat, even if its a bit late.

 

[Zephyrum]

I'd put a fort + naval battery as a low develop mountain province adjacent to my richer one.

I still don't think they'll ever be used. For real, if your enemy is disembarking near your mountain fort coastal defense province, either they are an awful player about to get utterly destroyed, or they have no opposition cause your armies are somewhere else. More interestingly is how the AI rationalizes building it. Does the AI build it? Where? When?

-

Unrelated, but how moddable will Marines be? Are we ever going to get actually moddable special units at any point? Crappy tweaks aside, Banners, Cossacks and company are all still mostly hardcoded.

 

[Cancerofthehead]

I'll be curious to see those things in action, it feel like this could shake up a bit how you play. That "hostile sea zone attrition" in particular.
Although I fear the consequence will be a further relegation of navy as a secondary concern.

If you control one adjacent province it will be irrelevant as you just need a few extra ships to cycle through port on the month end. Annoyance is the main impact. The other effects of teh coastal forts seem to be very niche as well in single player. However, they may be able to be abused against the AI. Then some might be good.

The Marines would be a nice addition, if they weren't so limited. Basically England and Portugal have a new means to tank some attrition from sieges without bleeding manpower but even then the limit will be very low. Unless you are doing RP Naval and Maritime ideas still suck.

 

[Marinho]

So how about a new year teaser in form of a 1.30 DevClash.... Please

 

[Moridin997]

I really like this addition


Small nitpick: since the UK's forcelimit is far larger than the Portuguese one, is there really a need to give them a higher percentage of their forcelimit as Marines?

 

[Cancerofthehead]

I really like this addition


Small nitpick: since the UK's forcelimit is far larger than the Portuguese one, is there really a need to give them a higher percentage of their forcelimit as Marines?

They are the same. England goes from 5% to 10% when they form Great Britain and Portugal has 10%. Of course Portugal's means giving up 33% ship trade power.