Hearts of Iron IV - DD 15 - On the High Seas

[MatteFnatte]

That's how it worked in HOI3, and IIRC HOI2. The ships would automatically engage in shore bombardment in any coastal province where there was combat. It could be an amphibious landing, but also applied if you had ground forces attacking along the coast.

The mission then is to Hold in the coastal sea zone if they are not part of an invasion mission.

Except for carriers, which can Hold further out to sea, and you use the air map mode to give more specific missions to the different plane types in the CAG. Including port strike, bombing of ground forces or logistics strike.

The only obvious omission is the ability of a surface fleet without carrier support to attack ships in a port. It didn't happen very often IRL, and you can see why it might not be included, as it could be a complicated mechanic to get right.

I hope the arrival of any fleet just off the coast (either amphibious landing or shore bombardment) has an immediate response by the AI, naval and air. And the player gets informed.

Just checked my Steam-account, 475 hours of HOI3 since 2014-07-16 (holy crap that is a lot considering I haven't played it since 2015-03-15, but I blame Black Ice Mod ), haven't realised the naval invasion bombardment support worked like that in HOI3, however if I recall correctly in HOI2 there was a specific mission called "shore bombardment" right?

Note that I'm not being sarcastic or anything I'm just not a big fan of amphibious landings in HOI3 for several reasons so I never took the time to figure out the mechanics much, and also I have mostly just played mods where landings occur by events.

 

[Gamer_1745]

Did a coastal artillery ever managed to sink a ship ? I'm quite curious about their actual effectiveness, though i'm sure they acted as a deterrent.

As pointed out it did and the presents of large shore guns changed the behavior of ships. They kept the Japanese fleet away from Singapore.

 

[Kinghillard]

But HOI IV is going to be a dumbed down arcade game amirite boiz?

 

[varsovie]

Why is there no "resupply" mission to simulate the multiple PT, DD and SS several nations used to resupply isolated areas or areas too dangerous for civilian ships?

But I'm glad to see that interdicted convoys can loose their supplies, should make the deep strike doctrine in the pacific riskier than in previous HOI.

 

[safe-keeper]

But HOI IV is going to be a dumbed down arcade game amirite boiz?

Not that I've seen, then again you may just have been sarcastic.

 

[Denkt]

Why is there no "resupply" mission to simulate the multiple PT, DD and SS several nations used to resupply isolated areas or areas too dangerous for civilian ships?

But I'm glad to see that interdicted convoys can loose their supplies, should make the deep strike doctrine in the pacific riskier than in previous HOI.

Because they wan't you to use convoys and only convoys for supply transport.

 

[Hatting]

Are we already on weekly DDs? can it be confirmed?

 

[Denkt]

Are we already on weekly DDs? can it be confirmed?

Well in a week you will have the answer. I myself doubt that we have weekly DDs yet as we have still to here about the beta

 

[Axe99]

I think organisation represent how much operational capability the ship/division have. I think a slow trickle represent better how the ship slowly lose opertaional capability to loss of fuel, crew wearnes and other things that would eventually force the ship to return to port. If it drops from all to nothing then you will have a hard time know how much it is left before you need to return to port. Maybe several bars could be added for fuel, crew and ammunation and the ship if forced to return to port then any of them reach zero.

I'm just thinking of the examples of the German raiders or subs that spent long periods of time at sea and were still very effective up until they came back to port. If the model has the organisation trickling down, it could create a situation where instead of hunting the ships out at sea, it makes more sense for the UK to form a 'wall' between the Atlantic and the French ports/North Sea, take a one-off hit to convoys (which won't last as long as it did historically as the subs/surface raiders will lose org from day one) and hammer the low org ships as they come back home and aren't up to coping with a closer-to-full-org RN.

I do like the idea of separate bars for fuel, crew and ammunition, where fuel would drop slowly over time, ammunition quickly during engagements, and crew would stay high for a set period before dropping at a certain rate and then levelling off again at a low-ish level. If it was a multi-bar approach, it's probably worth having another for supplies as well - if they run out of food and water, then the voyage will end plenty quickly .

Did a coastal artillery ever managed to sink a ship ? I'm quite curious about their actual effectiveness, though i'm sure they acted as a deterrent.

As well as the examples listed, here's a quick snippet from Wikipedia (sorry for the low-class link, but I've definitely read about the Texas and Toulon elsewhere). Looks like the coastal artillery at least took significant resources to settle down, even in situations where the attackers had pretty much air supremacy. I could imagine they'd be a good deal more useful when things weren't as one-sided.

The old battleships HMS Ramillies and Warspite and the monitor HMS Roberts were used to suppress shore batteries east of the Orne; cruisers targeted shore batteries at Ver-sur-Mer and Moulineaux; eleven destroyers for local fire support. In addition, there were modified landing-craft: eight "Landing Craft Gun", each with two 4.7-inch guns; four "Landing Craft Support" with automatic cannon; eight Landing Craft Tank (Rocket), each with a single salvo of 1,100 5-inch rockets; eight Landing Craft Assault (Hedgerow), each with twenty-four bombs intended to detonate beach mines prematurely. Twenty-four Landing Craft Tank carried Priest self-propelled howitzers which also fired while they were on the run-in to the beach. Similar arrangements existed at other beaches.

On June 25, 1944 the U.S. battleship Texas engaged German shore batteries on the Cotentin Peninsula. Battery Hamburg straddled the ship with a salvo 240mm shells, eventually hitting the Texas twice; one shell damaging the conning tower and navigation bridge and the other penetrating below decks but failing to explode. Return fire from the Texas knocked out the German battery.

Allied efforts to take the port of Toulon in August 1944 ran into "Big Willie", a battery consisting of two turrets taken from the French battleship Provence, each mounting a pair of 340 mm naval guns. The range and power of these guns was such that the Allies dedicated a battleship or heavy cruiser to shelling the fort every day, with the battleshipUSS Nevada eventually silencing the guns on August 23, 1944.[3][4]

 

[Fryslan0109]

This sounds fantastic! I hope these changes will influence the way naval warfare works in any future Victoria titles - blockading Germany or the CSA would actually have a more strategic impact.

 

[safe-keeper]

Why is there no "resupply" mission to simulate the multiple PT, DD and SS several nations used to resupply isolated areas or areas too dangerous for civilian ships?

Agreed. I suggested in another thread that they add one or more researchable naval doctrines (if they haven't already) that allows using warships to carry realistic amounts of troops and cargo.

 

[Alias72]

Coastal artillery did its job in that it forced the enemy to either 1) land elsewhere or 2) spend large resources suppressing those defenses. The defenses at Calais forced the landings at Normandy. and the defenses at Normandy took away thousands of men and tons of ammunition. That is why coastal defenses exist. NOT to sink ships, but to scare them.

 

[ozmono2005]

Don't have much to say but awesome. Seems like convoys are getting some much needed love. Keep up the good work.

 

[potski]

Well in a week you will have the answer. I myself doubt that we have weekly DDs yet as we have still to here about the beta

It wasn't dependent on starting Beta:

The game is coming along nicely, and alpha submission is today [Fri 20 Mar].. So fingers crossed, in a few weeks time we’ll be on the stretch run, with dev diaries every week during the final months until release.

 

[BobbyDylan]

Man. Every DD makes me want this game more.

 

[Communitnerd92]

awesome

 

[Razor]

Very nice! Thanks Podcat.

 

[zonkie]

I'm glad you guys pushed back the release date, hopefully this game will be great to someone who was put off by HoI 3. I had no problem getting into CK2 but I was a bit confused when I played the EU IV demo, thankfully the tutorial was really great in EU:IV and after I played it I could enjoy the game. HoI 3 was really confusing and complicated so I never liked it even though I had enjoyed playing HoI 2. I hope tutorial for this game will be as great or even better as the one for Europa Universalis IV.

 

[Beagá]

Very nice but how will the german AI actually behave in the game? Will it build the standard naval BO or will it react to what player UK is doing?

Above all how will it interpret enemy numbers and positions so that Germnay doesn´t lose all its fleet to the french in 1939 already?

 

[Jeankazuhiza]

The more of i see of it.... the more i want it! I feel the urge of doing for the Commintern a sort of a Normandy-like invasion!