How to deal with navy doomstacks stuck in port

[midget_roxx]

I had a scenario where I had taken the UK mainland as Germany but still had most of UKs fleet intact in the shetland islands. My navy wasn't good enough to face them head on so I tried using bombers to soften them up a bit. However every time I attacked, whether it be naval bombers or CAS, within 3 hours my planes would be smashed by 30% and lose all their ORG. I tried rotating plane groups attacking the fleet, but after 4-5 attempts I gave up as it was too micromanagy/inefficient. Is the only strategy to setup convoy raiders and let them sit there?

 

[Wraith11B]

That's part of it. Making sure that you're getting the necessary training doctrines with regards to Port Strikes is key, as well as using NAVs or CAGs to execute the strike packages. Rotating them through is also necessary, and using them in waves should also be considered. For instance:

TAC: concentrating on Log-bombing the province (if the infra is down, their ability to refit/rearm/replenish decreases).
NAV/CAG/CAS: port strikes.

Note, keep your wings in groups of three (most efficient). Make sure that you're upgrading the bombs/air torps and the organization penalty reducing techs. Giving them all different times (ie, one group handles days, the other nights) should generate more sorties and keep your aircraft fresh.

 

[Kovax]

Groups of 3 may be the most efficient, but 4s will spread the damage out 4 ways instead of 3, meaning less attacks against each plane, more hits negated by Defensiveness, and less STR damage. The problem is that every ship in the stack will fire at the small group of planes, making it pretty close to a suicide run. As long as the fleet in port is in supply, it will be difficult to damage them faster than they repair. It MIGHT be possible to attack the infrastructure of the province with Strategic Bombers, rather than the port and ships, in which case the fleet might not get to shoot back, but I'm not positive about that. That way, any damage you do to the ships will take a longer time to repair. Usually, by the time I'm invading the British Isles, there's not much of a fleet left to worry about anyway.

 

[DABegley]

I, as Italy, have been bombing 45 UK ships out of supply in Malta for 6 months and haven't sunk a ship. I have barely damaged them. I am using 3 NAV, 4 TAC, 5 CAG and 4 INT in alternating waves and have failed utterly. I nick them up a bit but they damage my planes so badly that by the time they recover the ships are near 100%. They have 4 CVLs an 2 INT in Malta. I stopped the whole affair a couple months ago and decided to puppet the UK so the ships would be useful when those $#@$#!*&^% Japanese attacked the US and declared on the UK. Japan chose the war goal of conguer on the UK so now my puppet will be overridden forcing a conquest on Italy's part and now I have to kill those boats in the Med, there are 33 more in Cyprus (including a CV) to kill as well. I have tried bombing infrastructure and got no better results. Good luck as I am stumped. I will likely take Malta when Russia falls, within the month, and try and kill some boats in a sea battle when they run to Cyprus. The Japanes are losing the land war to the Nationalist Chinese so that hard coded declare war is really gonmna hose them. They did not sink a single US ship after declaring war either so it will get ugly quick. Interstingly the US is not at war with Germany or Italy and I intend to keep it that way as long as possible.

 

[midget_roxx]

Groups of 3 may be the most efficient, but 4s will spread the damage out 4 ways instead of 3, meaning less attacks against each plane, more hits negated by Defensiveness, and less STR damage. The problem is that every ship in the stack will fire at the small group of planes, making it pretty close to a suicide run. As long as the fleet in port is in supply, it will be difficult to damage them faster than they repair. It MIGHT be possible to attack the infrastructure of the province with Strategic Bombers, rather than the port and ships, in which case the fleet might not get to shoot back, but I'm not positive about that. That way, any damage you do to the ships will take a longer time to repair. Usually, by the time I'm invading the British Isles, there's not much of a fleet left to worry about anyway.

I didn't have such a luxury as I started at the 1939 scenario. Fortunately they were completely out of supply/org as my subs had wiped out their convoys. Unfortunately all those ships still wreck my planes

 

[themousemaster]

Groups of 3 may be the most efficient, but 4s will spread the damage out 4 ways instead of 3, meaning less attacks against each plane, more hits negated by Defensiveness, and less STR damage. The problem is that every ship in the stack will fire at the small group of planes, making it pretty close to a suicide run. As long as the fleet in port is in supply, it will be difficult to damage them faster than they repair. It MIGHT be possible to attack the infrastructure of the province with Strategic Bombers, rather than the port and ships, in which case the fleet might not get to shoot back, but I'm not positive about that. That way, any damage you do to the ships will take a longer time to repair. Usually, by the time I'm invading the British Isles, there's not much of a fleet left to worry about anyway.

Attacking the attached province with Strategic Bombers will still get them shot at by the ships in port.

You should still do it though (deplete both the INFRA and the Port levels), since A) STR bombers are way more survivable, and B) Reducing INFRA and port levels is the only real effective way to prevent them from healing faster than your follow-up strikes damage them.

Your absolute best choice, if you have a navy of your own, is to blow up the INFRA and supplies in the province, then land a marine landing on it. immediately after capture, the ships will be ejected into the nearby seazone, and if you've blown up the INFRA/supplies, they will be out of supply and fuel, making them meat for any reasonably-size fleet. chase them around with ships and planes, and they will be out at least some of their fleet by the time they find, like, anywhere else.

 

[Kovax]

The root cause of the problem was that you invited the Japanese to the party, and they inevitably got into a scuffle with the Americans. Now the UK is a Government in Exile, hiding out in the US, and their fleet didn't conveniently go away when you occupied London. You need to take the US out of the war to finish the task, all because you decided that Japan would make a good distraction to keep the UK busy while you conquered mainland Europe.

Letting Italy into the Axis before France falls is a bad idea, because Italy then has to face both the British Royal Navy and the French fleet in the Med, and the AI is too stupid to have Italy wait until the French are safely out of the war before venturing out to engage the Royal Navy. Inviting Japan into the Axis before the UK falls is another bad idea, because it brings the US into the Allies before they're isolated and able to be taken down with the undivided attention of the entire Axis. Unfortunately, AI Germany will cheerfully bring Japan into the Axis years before it historically allied with Germany, increasing the impact of Japan's perceived threat to the Soviet Union, thereby boosting Soviet production and making Barbarossa harder.

The suggestions in the previous post have a few details I disagree with. If you're going to land a Marine and take the province anyway, why blow up the Infrastructure first? Your Marines are going to want that in reasonably intact condition, and it won't affect supply for the fleet once it's occupied. The other issue is that once the fleet's supply base is taken, its source of supply will switch to the next closest port. Even if the fleet's route to that port is blocked by a closed strait, the fleet will still successfully draw supply from it, as long as it has supplies to draw. That's why you NEVER take the last port in the Med until the last RN ship has been sunk.

 

[DABegley]

Kovax is right on never taking the last port in the Med. It also applies to the Black Sea. I had isolated the Russian Black Sea fleet in Odessa and took Odessa without thinking. The fleet was now back in supply and ran around the Black sea for months before I finally finished them off. For some reason the Russians built a ton of Subs in the Black Sea and it was a real pain to hunt them down. They were a large problem with my supply lines running by sea to Sevastopol and other Black sea ports.

 

[themousemaster]

The suggestions in the previous post have a few details I disagree with. If you're going to land a Marine and take the province anyway, why blow up the Infrastructure first? Your Marines are going to want that in reasonably intact condition, and it won't affect supply for the fleet once it's occupied. The other issue is that once the fleet's supply base is taken, its source of supply will switch to the next closest port. Even if the fleet's route to that port is blocked by a closed strait, the fleet will still successfully draw supply from it, as long as it has supplies to draw. That's why you NEVER take the last port in the Med until the last RN ship has been sunk.

I have a different experience. When I capture a province and eject the fleet, mine dont find a "new home" of supply until 1 hour AFTER they arrive in the seazone adjacent. So if I hit them in the immediate hour they get to said seazone (after blowing up the INFRA/supplies first), they end up in a full-length combat at 0 supplies and no fuel (1km speed).

If your game has them find "new supply" before you can engage them, then yes, my advice is hyper-pointless.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Using 4 wings in an air group is indeed the best choice for the reasons Kovax stated. While 3 are indeed optimal mathematically, the addition of a fourth wing makes quite a difference in staying power and effectiveness over time. Do not include INT or FTR as they won't make enough of a difference. So as others said, start with either 4 STR or 4 TAC doing Logistic strike to get the ships out of supply and to destroy Port level to zero.

No infra, no supply.
No port, no repair.

No supply means a big malus when the ships get bombed. and no repair means the ships can be ground down.

Now you can switch to 4 NAV hitting the ships themselves. Yeah, the first group will get mauled which is why you need to have a second group ready to take over. As GER, I always build 8 NAV to deal with the Royal Navy. If the first group isn't ready to resume by the time the second group gets mauled, use TAC as a temporary replacement. Remember that your planes don't need to be at 100% strength and organization to attack.

Yeah, it's micromanagement and it takes a while but it's worth the effort since once you're done, the Royal Navy will be wiped out.