Impressions from early-access streams

[Deinhardt]

Except that using floatplanes from cruisers and battleships to provide scouting was the established historical doctrine that for example Japan used at the time.

This is how they could launch so powerful and devastating Carrier strikes early in the war, because they didn't send out up to 25% of their Carriers planes on scouting missions like the US Carriers did.

The Japanese even developed a special type of cruisers to carry 6 float-planes each that could be responsible for scouting for their Carrier Strikeforce. This was the Tone Class.

You can actually build that type of cruiser in MtG it seems. Man I cant wait for us plebs to get the DLC.

 

[macegee]

This probably more a choice for the sake of gameplay. If carriers can spot better then cruisers and destroyers, they take a role away from them. Maybe this is done to stop players from simply producing carriers.

Also isnt the point of the new Naval Gameplay, that you have your strike forces with carriers and battleships sit in port, until one of your spotting fleets finds the enemy? I dont know how sensible it is to put a carrier group out there to play hide and seek with the enemy.

Carrier vs Carrier combat is pretty much a hide and seek affair. That's why I was hoping for more detail / for it to be more.. prominent, I guess?

You can always park the carrier in the naval zone, and use it as floating airfield, therefore increasing/providing air superiority in said naval zone, and thus helping with the spotting.

IMO this makes more sense, than just providing flat spotting bonus for having carrier hangars, while having those unmanned by any planes.

You could. I dunno how viable it is in Man the Guns, but doing so in current version of the game is rather tricky, especially in Pacific, due to huge distances. Also, I seriously doubt that the AI is capable of doing the same. So if he can't, using it would be unfair, IMO.

Except that using floatplanes from cruisers and battleships to provide scouting was the established historical doctrine that for example Japan used at the time.

This is how they could launch so powerful and devastating Carrier strikes early in the war, because they didn't send out up to 25% of their Carriers planes on scouting missions like the US Carriers did.

The Japanese even developed a special type of cruisers to carry up to 6 float-planes each that could be responsible for scouting for their Carrier Strikeforce. This was the Tone Class.

Oh, yes, of course, I know about those. I just meant that I feel like the carriers are unfairly dismissed as spotters.

 

[krios41]

What I did notice is that some ship modules have unrealistic stats. First, carrier hangars have no spotting bonuses. Making catapults planes on cruisers and battleships better at spotting. Crazy unrealistic. Second, later Fire Control modules decrease ship's reliability. Eeewwwww. And don't even get me started on non-historical stats of starting US ships.... That, I'll just silently accept because it's fixable.

@podcat, would you comment on carrier spotting stats and Fire Control reliability debuffs, please?

Carrier hangars shouldn't have spotting bonuses, if they had you could put an empty carrier at sea for "spotting"
it only should get spotting bonuses when said carrier has planes on them

I do agree with the advanced fire control modules decreasing reliability, like... WHY? What is the logic behind this seemingly arbitrary penalty.... why would anyone ever be compelled to use them if you get such debuff?

 

[RAID186]

Just reading this gives me hope and anticipation for release. Thanks OP!!

 

[Alex_brunius]

Oh, yes, of course, I know about those. I just meant that I feel like the carriers are unfairly dismissed as spotters.

Someone did claim that Carrier planes now operate like normal planes.

Have anyone on the streams tested if the airplanes on the Carriers provide spotting even when not flying missions from stationary Carriers?

I think this would make more sense to have Carriers detection come from the planes instead of any stat on the hangars. That way Carriers without planes don't provide detection and the range of planes might also impact it.

 

[Lord of Beer]

Excessive micro on land (24 division limits) made land combat worse.

Seems like the same is going to happen for naval combat.

Air power will soar to even greater heights since its the easiest to micro.

Maybe a future DLC will make your allocate individual bullets to a plane's guns, and make you write a heartfelt note to each pilot after a successful mission, then it will all be equalised.

Alternatively maybe navy controllers will become a thing (in multiplayer), like they did for air controllers. I guess it depends on how good naval invasions are now.

 

[Alex_brunius]

Excessive micro on land (24 division limits) made land combat worse.

Seems like the same is going to happen for naval combat.

Only for people who want to play the game on speed 4 or 5 like if it was a Starcraft RTS game.

For those of us that enjoy playing the game at slower speeds and take our time all the extra details is wonderful!

Alternatively maybe navy controllers will become a thing (in multiplayer), like they did for air controllers. I guess it depends on how good naval invasions are now.

Good luck lend leasing your fleet. Let me know how it works out for you

 

[CheesySnake]

People are having an extremely hard time adapting the new naval combat.

Awesome. I can be even worse than I already am at balancing things.

 

[pete_ts]

It will be very interesting to see the discussions regarding fleet compositions after Friday. For instance do I need all sorts of different destroyers (anti-submarine, mine sweepers, AA, torpedo screens) to protect my carrier task force now? Or should the different destroyer types be grouped into task forces and (auto?) deployed where needed?

 

[Faeelin]

Do we know if Congress is locked behind MTG?

 

[Alex_brunius]

Do we know if Congress is locked behind MTG?

99% sure it's not, because the Democratic NF path using it, and that is part of the free patch.

 

[Jabby]

It will be very interesting to see the discussions regarding fleet compositions after Friday. For instance do I need all sorts of different destroyers (anti-submarine, mine sweepers, AA, torpedo screens) to protect my carrier task force now? Or should the different destroyer types be grouped into task forces and (auto?) deployed where needed?

I would say all of those different destroyer types should be seperate except torp screens and maybe minelayers.

 

[BeauNiddle]

I do agree with the advanced fire control modules decreasing reliability, like... WHY? What is the logic behind this seemingly arbitrary penalty.... why would anyone ever be compelled to use them if you get such debuff?

It looked like engines and a lot of other components also dropped reliability. I assume it's to signify how many critical components you have on board. A hit to your fire control module should reduce the stats of your ship and possibly require repair work at a dock yard. I'm not too sure how they use reliability for ships (I hope it's not the same as planes where they have a chance to be destroyed every time they go on a mission!) A max level carrier with all mods had a 48% reliability IIRC from one of the streams - I assume they want it to be powerful but fragile.

 

[macegee]

Carrier hangars shouldn't have spotting bonuses, if they had you could put an empty carrier at sea for "spotting"
it only should get spotting bonuses when said carrier has planes on them

I suggested to do it on module basis for easier computations (less CPU drain). Could be even done with the carrier hull itself, for balancing purposes. But that's just my suggestions.

Someone did claim that Carrier planes now operate like normal planes.

I think this would make more sense to have Carriers detection come from the planes instead of any stat on the hangars. That way Carriers without planes don't provide detection and the range of planes might also impact it.

Hmm.. I don't remember reading about it. Or seeing it in the videos. But if the carrier planes did operate like normal planes while in combat, then yeah, I totally agree. That would've been more logical.

I do agree with the advanced fire control modules decreasing reliability, like... WHY? What is the logic behind this seemingly arbitrary penalty.... why would anyone ever be compelled to use them if you get such debuff?

Actually, this needs some reality check. Hence my question to @podcat . I haven't played HOI4 for a while, so I went to read it up on HOI4 wiki:

Reliability. Reliability is the ability of a ship to continue functioning during combat. The lower the value the more likely the ship is of suffering a critical hit. Ships may receive critical hits that are much stronger than usual hits primarily because of exploding ammo or fuel tanks. Increasing a ship's reliability will reduce the chance that a received hit becomes critical. Note that the highest critical chance is done by torpedoes and not by a ship's main guns.

I agree that having an advanced Fire Control means it can be more prone to failure (new tech vs old tech). Meaning a ship might suddenly lose its operational effectiveness (= get org hit). But increasing the chance of suffering a critical hit, meaning big bada boom (HP hit), that I cannot understand.

They did implement a new system for critical hits/failures on ships. Maybe there's some other connection within that system as well? I dunno...

 

[fellaz007]

I do agree with the advanced fire control modules decreasing reliability, like... WHY? What is the logic behind this seemingly arbitrary penalty.... why would anyone ever be compelled to use them if you get such debuff?

IIRC, reliability for ships is a 'armor' against critical hits. Since fire control modules (both the older optical/mechanical and the more modern elecronic/radar ones) have to expose (the built them on masts) to incoming fire and are quite delicate mechanically, their existence will increase the chance for a critical hit.

Just my 2 cents...

 

[Deinhardt]

So I just finished watching Bokoens Stream of last night, MP.

They struggled for 2 hours at Speed 3 against the Submarine menace of the Axis in the Atlantik. The god damn Submarine Blockadde is a thing now!

 

[Fulmen]

Btw has anyone seen if they fixed air wings gaining mission efficiency while not flying?

Update on this: This has still not been fixed. I guess masses of strat bombers will continue to be banned.

EDIT:

@podcat would it be possible this would be fixed in 1.6.1?

 

[Gort11]

So I just finished watching Bokoens Stream of last night, MP.

They struggled for 2 hours at Speed 3 against the Submarine menace of the Axis in the Atlantik. The god damn Submarine Blockadde is a thing now!

From what I've seen, submarines look like a real threat now. They're approximately 9,000 times more survivable in the next patch than in this one.

 

[Teo41]

Excessive micro on land (24 division limits) made land combat worse.

micro? Mate, you´ve never played HOI3 if you talk about micro...

 

[Indyclone77]

So I just finished watching Bokoens Stream of last night, MP.

They struggled for 2 hours at Speed 3 against the Submarine menace of the Axis in the Atlantik. The god damn Submarine Blockadde is a thing now!

Any other takeaways you had from that stream?, I've not got time to watch it