How to build a succesful Navy?

[Leadfingers]

I seem to recall someone saying a long time ago that a successful navy only requires tons of Destroyers...Is that true?

I've been building "pretty" navies of mixed ships and combined arms. Am I wasting my time?

What are your thoughts?

 

[qwertyuiop2]

The most gamey you can do is to create stacks of 30 submarines (preferably 1938 tech) each an sink em all.

 

[unmerged(141551)]

I usually have 2-5 carriers with 2-4 battleships, along with some destroyers and submarines

 

[Lord of Time]

I use the fleet composition on the HOI2 wiki, here.

My navies usually consists of:

-6 BBs (Battleships)
-2 CVLs (Light Carriers)
-10 DDs (Destroyers)

including as many attachments as I can stick on. I've sunk hundreds of ships while losing only one (a Destroyer).

Whatever you do, don't mix battleships with aircraft carriers. Light carriers are fine (they'll provide air cover for the battleships), however. It's all to do with attack range; the attack range of carriers are about 2-3x higher than battleships, so they're basically useless.

A discussion on Carrier fleets can be found here, but it boils down to:

-6 CVs (Aircraft Carriers)
-2 CVLs
-10 DDs

I only discovered this about a month ago, and since then I've seen a massive improvement in the quality of my navies. You should too.

 

[Dadaan]

Don't go for the "Best" or gamey tactics, just stick with your mixed "flavor" fleets and have fun.

 

[unmerged(141364)]

Navies are useless unless you wish to conquer far away places that require a sea route like the British because otherwise your Transports would get pwnt.

But I do have 1 game going on where I'm just building the German's Super Heavy Battleship navy for the giggles. It's moar fun if you have imagination because anyone would think that 460+mm Naval Guns v.s. 1 Aircraft carrier = carnage, so it's moar of a mental thing. So far I have 12 Super Heavy battleships under construction :O

 

[Leadfingers]

I use the fleet composition on the HOI2 wiki, here.

My navies usually consists of:

-6 BBs (Battleships)
-2 CVLs (Light Carriers)
-10 DDs (Destroyers)

including as many attachments as I can stick on. I've sunk hundreds of ships while losing only one (a Destroyer).

Whatever you do, don't mix battleships with aircraft carriers. Light carriers are fine (they'll provide air cover for the battleships), however. It's all to do with attack range; the attack range of carriers are about 2-3x higher than battleships, so they're basically useless.

A discussion on Carrier fleets can be found here, but it boils down to:

-6 CVs (Aircraft Carriers)
-2 CVLs
-10 DDs

I only discovered this about a month ago, and since then I've seen a massive improvement in the quality of my navies. You should too.

ok, then I'm in dire need of some schooling, then. I've never seen any reason at all to have CVLs of any type.

And...how do Carriers and Battleships counteract one another?

/boggle

 

[Pal]

ok, then I'm in dire need of some schooling, then. I've never seen any reason at all to have CVLs of any type.

Before Armageddon 1.3beta the CVL is the supership. It instantly teleports your navy into optimum range (of course this is also affected by the leaders involved) and thus saves your battleships from the higher range of the carriers. When the battle begins, normally your gunships would be pounded upon without being able to fight back until the range gap is closed, but with CVLs you can *start* the battle at gunpoint range.
Justification: The carriers would have total recon superiority over a gunship fleet and thus would be able to dictate the time and place of battle. If the gunships are accompanied by CVLs, those would have recon planes too and those would also have fighter planes to shoot down enemy recon. Thus the whole thing is evened out. Of course, in game, it is more than evened out - the gunships get a huge advantage over the carriers. This is unrealistic and thus it was purged in Arma 1.3beta.

If your CVLs are accompanying fleet carriers, they act as damage soaks. With a short build time and minimal cost they are cheap to repair/replace if hit, while the real carriers are not. Since the enemy carriers will target your capital ships randomly, having CVLs can act as a target dummy drawing hits while your real carriers are tearing the enemy to shreds.

And...how do Carriers and Battleships counteract one another?

As LordOfTime said, if you're mixing capital gunships with carriers, one of two situations can occur in battle:
a) You have the advantage of chosing range: Your whole fleet will be kept at carrier range, meaning all ships which aren't carriers do not fire at all. If the enemy has carriers, your defenceless capital gunships can be sunk without having used their weapons even once.
b) The engagement distance is very close: Your whole fleet will fight at gunship range, meaning your carriers are used for close combat which will require you to set the game to lowest speed to even see the carriers being sunk.

 

[qwertyuiop2]

Βest fleet if you annex USA:


30 SHBBs and sink em all.