Might sound like a weird question, but i dont understand how the new naval combat system enables you to use battlecruisers or heavy cruisers for convoy raiding. If enemy fleets or ships find your cruisers, they will get easily sunk. Or not?
How do you use german battlecruisers for convoy raiding?
- Thread starter Pashahlis
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Ships on convoy raiding missions will try to evade conflicts with the enemy navy. If they are cought they try to disengage as soon as possible. If they are currently attacking enemy convoys and enemy warships reach the battle they will disengage aswell. It is never guaranteed to find the enemy tho, so an enemy fleet might aswell slip through the english channel.
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Also, when an enemy navy moves onto the same tile as you, it also doesn't necessarily begin combat. The fleet has to find you first.
There are different orders you can give to fleets so they will either stick close together, and thus have a lower chance to find an enemy, but are quicker to concentrate all their ships into the battle, or an order that spread ships out, with a higher chance to find enemy fleets, but ships arrive piecemeal, to battle.
There are different orders you can give to fleets so they will either stick close together, and thus have a lower chance to find an enemy, but are quicker to concentrate all their ships into the battle, or an order that spread ships out, with a higher chance to find enemy fleets, but ships arrive piecemeal, to battle.
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There are different stances for fleets. Finding a single enemy ship (the raider) has a pretty low chance of success unless your patrolling fleet has a stance which enables them to spread out (to cover a larger area). Spreading out however means that the chance of initiating a battle with the raider with superior numbers/odds are low.
If you're out hunting for the Tirpitz you can set your fleet to cover as large an area as possible with a better chance of intercepting the raider but IF battle is joined it's likely that your lone destroyer or cruiser making contact will be at a severe disadvantage initially (giving the raider a good chance to sink/damage the pursuer and escape).
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so imagine it more like this, you have a big square of 100km x 100km, andi n this ocean area that is huge, you know theres an enemy cruiser sinking your convoys.
you have two stances to respond to this
1) Search and Destroy - your fleet groups up fairly tight and is prepared for a battle, but the downside is, they are packed tight in an area thats absolutely huge! unless the convoy raider gets unlucky and stumbles into your death fleet, they are going to continue sinking convoys, and other convoy raiders could well be doing the same in other areas.
2) Patrol - your fleet of 10 destroyers, 3 heavy cruisers and 3 battleships and a fleet carrier splits up. they start putting distances between them and travelling around maximising their surface coverage. so instead of being a tight compact fist, they are an open hand reaching out across the sea zone. they are going to find the convoy raider a lot easier in this formation
however - who finds the convoy raider first? what if 2 destroyers happen upon a german heavy cruiser that is both faster than them and has better guns and armor? the destroyers are the ones at a disadvantage even though the allied fleet in the area is much larger, because the destroyers are alone until reinforcements can arrive.
this is basically the theory behind convoy raiding with heavier ships. as someone pointed out to me in another thread, part of the reason why the bismarck was sunk was actually a fatal design flaw in its rudder that allowed it to be easily disabled, and had it not had that it would have sailed back home just fine. Whether or not that is accurate, i'll assume it is and make this statement - consider if the bismarck's mission had been succesful, a single battleship (yes, the prinz eugen was also there but lets just talk about bismarck) sailed around, sunk the pride of the UK fleet and got back to germany/france ports without being sunk even though the UK had naval supremacy
this is a very real possibility in HOI4, as your bismarck does not neccesarily have to be taken out by a naval bomber crippling it's rudder
you have two stances to respond to this
1) Search and Destroy - your fleet groups up fairly tight and is prepared for a battle, but the downside is, they are packed tight in an area thats absolutely huge! unless the convoy raider gets unlucky and stumbles into your death fleet, they are going to continue sinking convoys, and other convoy raiders could well be doing the same in other areas.
2) Patrol - your fleet of 10 destroyers, 3 heavy cruisers and 3 battleships and a fleet carrier splits up. they start putting distances between them and travelling around maximising their surface coverage. so instead of being a tight compact fist, they are an open hand reaching out across the sea zone. they are going to find the convoy raider a lot easier in this formation
however - who finds the convoy raider first? what if 2 destroyers happen upon a german heavy cruiser that is both faster than them and has better guns and armor? the destroyers are the ones at a disadvantage even though the allied fleet in the area is much larger, because the destroyers are alone until reinforcements can arrive.
this is basically the theory behind convoy raiding with heavier ships. as someone pointed out to me in another thread, part of the reason why the bismarck was sunk was actually a fatal design flaw in its rudder that allowed it to be easily disabled, and had it not had that it would have sailed back home just fine. Whether or not that is accurate, i'll assume it is and make this statement - consider if the bismarck's mission had been succesful, a single battleship (yes, the prinz eugen was also there but lets just talk about bismarck) sailed around, sunk the pride of the UK fleet and got back to germany/france ports without being sunk even though the UK had naval supremacy
this is a very real possibility in HOI4, as your bismarck does not neccesarily have to be taken out by a naval bomber crippling it's rudder
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Speed comes into play as well, otherwise they will run you down like the filthy raiders you are so even if you research a BB1 you'll want to use your experience perhaps to improve engines on them for this specific task.
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No, those are heavy cruisers, he also asked about battlecruisers.
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Can we have a fleet in Search and Destroy and use aircraft to locate the enemy?
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As you can see in that post if you have air superiority you will have a bonus in detection chance, but the chance to find someone will be greater if you use the patrol order.Ships on convoy raiding missions will try to evade conflicts with the enemy navy. If they are cought they try to disengage as soon as possible. If they are currently attacking enemy convoys and enemy warships reach the battle they will disengage aswell. It is never guaranteed to find the enemy tho, so an enemy fleet might aswell slip through the english channel.
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The Graf Spee could have been anything from a very heavily armed and armoured cruiser to a lightly armoured and armed battlecruiser, depending on your preference.
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True, it was bigger than your average heavy cruiser but so were the American heavy cruisers.
If the Deutschland-class armoured cruisers could reach at the very least 31 knots we can speak about a skinny battlecruiser.
It was the best I could do on short notice.
I didn't realize at first that there were actual photographs of the scuttling itself. I was originally going to make the snarky post with a normal picture, but then I saw this and I was like "Icing on the sarcasm cake."
And everyone got it, too.
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The sarcasm was too obvious.It was the best I could do on short notice.
I didn't realize at first that there were actual photographs of the scuttling itself. I was originally going to make the snarky post with a normal picture, but then I saw this and I was like "Icing on the sarcasm cake."
And everyone got it, too.
Jokes aside, I would be neat to know if capital ships as raiders is workable.
Since Germany starts with a few heavy cruisers I can make some battleships and pair one BB with one HC, I don`t like to send lonely capital ships.
I hope they add 1936 BCs down the road. Scharnhorst kind of fits that class.
The sarcasm was too obvious.
Jokes aside, I would be neat to know if capital ships as raiders is workable.
Since Germany starts with a few heavy cruisers I can make some battleships and pair one BB with one HC, I don`t like to send lonely capital ships.
I hope they add 1936 BCs down the road. Scharnhorst kind of fits that class.
There is a doctrine for it (as an alternative to wolfpacks), though they haven't shown exactly what it does.
Since the concentration of force would likely be sufficient to make it very difficult to sink with surface fleets, it should do reasonably well against a surface fleet. The enemy would need to either concentrate their forces, making it unlikely that you will be spotted before you can retreat to a safe harbor, or spread out their forces, allowing the battle cruisers to defeat the enemy navy that finds them through local numerical superiority because the rest of the fleet is too far away. However, the range of aircraft would mean that naval bombers based on either airbases and carriers would counter them really effectively. Since so much effort is required to find and sink a capital ship that is raiding, it is very similar to the fleet in being doctrine, but adapted for raiding, and shares the critical weakness to carriers. If your enemy doesn't have air coverage superiority where you are raiding and sufficient naval bombers to sink your battlecruisers, it will work well. At higher tech levels, carriers could make them obsolete.
So can I have two fleets in the same zone ?
One fleet on patrol and the other on search and destroy ?
While waiting with my fingers crossed than the raider should be encountered by the patrolling fleet
One fleet on patrol and the other on search and destroy ?
While waiting with my fingers crossed than the raider should be encountered by the patrolling fleet
Yes, as many as you like. Particularly effective to use subs to spot the enemy and a surface fleet to engage them.
Also, very useful to have a sub or DD fleet patrolling for naval superiority when you are planning an invasion, then bring another fleet to anchor off the coast to protect the invasion transports. Capital ships also bombard any defenders on land.
Lastly, bring a CTF into a naval region to use as an extra air base, if your ground forces are far from air cover. Replace any NAV on board the CVs with CAS. But still keep another fleet patrolling so your immobile CTF won't be caught out. And ensure you have air superiority, otherwise you are vulnerable to NAV. Since you are automatically spotted by ground forces if you are anchored in a coastal zone, then remain out to sea.
A combination of three fleets would be most effective for a US Pacific Island campaign : Subs or DDs patrolling a wide area including the whole route of the transport convoy; a capital ship heavy force to bombard the defenders off the coast; and a CTF further away to provide air support to the marines.
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If the game reflects the actual war experience, then speed becomes paramount. The German Scharnhorst class was capable of almost 33 knots and Bismarck about 30. Britain had exactly three ships that could keep up with them - Renown and Repulse and Hood (the King George V class could make about 28 knots). No British battleship could force the Germans to fight. Putting an old BB on escort duty with a convoy would deter the Germans from tackling it (even slight damage is dangerous for raiders - see Bismarck) but British BBs weren't made for that and were vulnerable to subs (see Barham).
Graf Spee was brought to battle by ships with superior speed - 32 knots to her 26 - and beaten by her own bad tactics and by British numbers and superior tactics. If Harwood had only 2 cruisers, the German wins. If Harwood had Cumberland instead of Exeter, the British win outright. Unless some 'lucky' hit happens - the kind that crops up in almost every naval battle LOL.
Raiding with surface ships depends on using fast ships with high endurance that are powerful enough to beat or drive off the escort, and on having wide areas in which they can hide from pursuers. This was possible only for a brief period at the start of the war; the short, unhappy cruise of Bismarck shows the window of opportunity had closed.
Graf Spee was brought to battle by ships with superior speed - 32 knots to her 26 - and beaten by her own bad tactics and by British numbers and superior tactics. If Harwood had only 2 cruisers, the German wins. If Harwood had Cumberland instead of Exeter, the British win outright. Unless some 'lucky' hit happens - the kind that crops up in almost every naval battle LOL.
Raiding with surface ships depends on using fast ships with high endurance that are powerful enough to beat or drive off the escort, and on having wide areas in which they can hide from pursuers. This was possible only for a brief period at the start of the war; the short, unhappy cruise of Bismarck shows the window of opportunity had closed.
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