Lets talk about Carriers

[Emden1]

Is it worth having them in HOI IV? They hardly carry any airplanes and very expensive to build. Worse when you have to make Aircraft variants to boot.

Sorry for the stupid thread, never tried Japan before till last night, and yes, got my butt handed to me by China LOL.

 

[Archie]

Carriers + CLs + DDs make a great killing flotilla; add BBs, BCs, and CAs to make it even more powerful. Strive for more than 2 carriers per battle group. Load initial carriers with 2/3s fighters and 1/3 torpedo bombers. Latter on, up the level of bombers once you've got 2-4 carriers per battle group.

Yes, China can thwart Japan's invasion. Gather your best units there, have adequate infrastructure to reduce attrition, have overwhelming air support, and send at least two armies to fight against the northern front. Add a third one to protect your ally's front, as well. And, don't forget to establish naval superiority in the China seas!!!!

 

[Emden1]

thank you... will try that... for carriers, do I have to actually assign the aircraft to the sea zones or will they launch as needed on their own? I'm thinking the ship captain is not really all that bright and I have to assign them to the sea-zone on air missions.... (looking for confirmation)

 

[Archie]

Each "force" (ships under the same Captain) has five buttons--Patrol, search & destroy, convoy raiding, convoy escort, or home. Choose one of the first four to assign the function of the carrier group, then left click (iirc) up to three zones for that task to be executed in. OTOH, you can send a task force to one specific sub-zone in and all the ships will participate to some degree to support the land battles within range. Be sure to load CAS on the carriers for this, since torpedos don't work in land battles.

 

[Emden1]

So, when I assign a mission, it is for the carrier strike force and aircraft... thanks. 50 CAS, I can't really see that doing much on land.... lol

 

[Diados]

I see the CAS as more of a US thing. It can make the difference when attacking islands in the Pacific that you can't reach with ground based air.

US because they can afford to have a couple CAGs and still park a 10 CAS carrier 2 BB fleet next to the province they are going to naval invade.

 

[C-Breeze]

Is it worth having them in HOI IV?

They actually do serve a purpose that can't be replicated with land-based naval bombers. With the current game mechanics, carrier based aircraft don't suffer the same time penalty as their land-based counterparts, so they're able to engage enemy fleets before they have the opportunity to flee. This becomes particularly important when the opposing fleet is down to their last ship or two, and are constantly running at the first sign of smoke on the horizon.

 

[Zyllen]

Carriers are borderline OP when it comes to naval warfare. I managed to sink the entire Japanese navy without a zero loss using a fleet made out of dd. lc and cv's as America. research the base strike right tree . For land battle they are less useful.

 

[Tacticus101]

Carriers are exceptionally powerful in naval combat, possibly the most powerful ship. Load them up with naval bombers, protect them with screens, and they will tear through enemy ships.

For land they can be useful, depending on the scale of the combat. For an invasion of Normandy, they are pretty useless; 100 CAS will barely make any difference to a large front like that. For landing on islands, small naval invasions or places like Norway where you might not have access to airbases in range they can be exceptionally useful. The number of CAS in a battle is limited by enemy combat width, a battle with a 20 width garrison division can only involve 60 CAS anyway, a carrier can provide that and win an otherwise challenging battle.

 

[seattle]

Totally hate the micro of carriers (the planes...).
That said, it depends on the region. Italy doesn't need CVs to dominate the Med, Germany and Britain don't need them to rule the sea in Europe. If you can't provide air supremacy from land, then you need CVs. My German Kriegsmarine without CVs still beats the Americans in the Channel, Bay of Biscay and Easter North Sea. That's all I care about and that's all I can provide land-based air cover for.

 

[browd]

Micro of carrier planes? Unless you are parking your carriers next to an invasion zone and designating your fighters for Air Superiority and your CAS for Ground Support, what's to micro?

 

[Alex_brunius]

Micro of carrier planes? Unless you are parking your carriers next to an invasion zone and designating your fighters for Air Superiority and your CAS for Ground Support, what's to micro?

I wonder this as well. Once set up the ratio of planes the way you want (which can be done during production) there is literally nothing you need to manage with them, they will fight in all naval combats using all assigned planes automatically.

 

[Emden1]

Thank you for the feedback. I was able to see how they work on China, now that China fell (1940), I have about 18mo or so to build more carriers and screens muhahahaha!

 

[seattle]

I wonder this as well. Once set up the ratio of planes the way you want (which can be done during production) there is literally nothing you need to manage with them, they will fight in all naval combats using all assigned planes automatically.

First you need to manage the construction of 2-3 additional plane types and I never quite understood the option in the air field orders for carrier planes whether they should stay or move with the carriers. A carrier fleet also is optimal with exactly 4 CVs, not more not less. Then you need to keep an eye on the desired composition of each ship type in the CV fleet.

That's why I usually just go with subs plus land-based air cover as Germany because you already got enough on your plate.

 

[Alex_brunius]

First you need to manage the construction of 2-3 additional plane types and I never quite understood the option in the air field orders for carrier planes whether they should stay or move with the carriers. A carrier fleet also is optimal with exactly 4 CVs, not more not less. Then you need to keep an eye on the desired composition of each ship type in the CV fleet.

That's why I usually just go with subs plus land-based air cover as Germany because you already got enough on your plate.

None of that has anything at all to do with micro management though, just setup once and don't touch ( for production tweaks might be needed once a year or so but no more then your other 20 production lines do ).

Move with Carrier is only needed if you want to use the CV planes outside the Navalbattles ( then the planes orders will follow the fleet into next naval region ). Even with no orders the CV planes always fight in Navalcombat automatically.

I do agree with you that the extra research cost needed for planes+carriers+doctrines is tricky to fit into the German tech budget.

 

[Anaraxes]

I never quite understood the option in the air field orders for carrier planes whether they should stay or move with the carriers.

Carrier planes operate in two ways.

First, they will automatically join naval battles in which their carrier takes part. You don't have to do anything to get them to attack.

Second, you can treat a carrier exactly as you do an airbase on land. Open up the icon, select air wings, assign them missions, and so on.

As with a land airbase, coverage of an air zone matters to the efficiency of your carrier planes used this way. This matters more in the Pacific and Asia than in does in Europe. The air zones are larger, and so longer range is more important. So, you're likely to care where your carriers are, and where they're allowed to move. If your goal is to use divebombers (CAS) to support island invasions or ground forces, or get some use out of the fighters for air superiority over land, you're likely to want to just park the carrier in a sea province near the land zone you're operating in. But you also might have your carriers patrolling the seas, looking for enemy convoys or fleets. You might want carrier planes doing air superiority over sea zones (as opposed to just cap over the carrier itself, part of that automatic combat). So, just like a land base, you might open up the carrier and assign fighters to that mission.

But then, you might have assigned the carrier to patrol multiple sea zones. The carrier will move away from the zone to which you assigned the fighters. So you have a choice: do the fighters keep patrolling where you told them to ("defend this spot here") even though the carrier is sailing further away (and thus lowering their efficiency)? Or did you really mean "fighters just patrol whatever sea zone the carrier happens to be in while it patrols around these three zones", even if that means leaving their original sea zone empty? You'll have better efficiency because the planes are closer to their base, but you won't be patrolling in that sea zone all of the time, either. If you want the first behavior, tell the planes to stay put. If you want the second, tell the planes to move with their carrier.

 

[CharlieFox]

One thing to consider is that carriers can be completely neutralized by land based air superiority. If you focus on carriers you also have to make sure they never fight on any sea region where the enemy has air superiority

 

[Tacticus101]

One thing to consider is that carriers can be completely neutralized by land based air superiority. If you focus on carriers you also have to make sure they never fight on any sea region where the enemy has air superiority

That isn't really true. Land based planes only strike once, carrier based planes will keep attacking and wrecking the enemy fleet. It is really difficult to stop carrier based naval bombers as well, you just cant kill enough of them with land based fighters.

 

[CharlieFox]

That isn't really true. Land based planes only strike once, carrier based planes will keep attacking and wrecking the enemy fleet. It is really difficult to stop carrier based naval bombers as well, you just cant kill enough of them with land based fighters.

The issue are not land based naval bombers but rather fighters running air superiority. As far as I know, enemy air superiority reduces the efficiency of carrier based planes naval battles, if the enemy has enough fighters on air superiority you get a 100% penalty meaning that your carriers are completely useless.

 

[Tacticus101]

The issue are not land based naval bombers but rather fighters running air superiority. As far as I know, enemy air superiority reduces the efficiency of carrier based planes naval battles, 100% enemy air superiority gives a 100% penalty meaning that your carriers are completely useless.

Are you sure? I am fairly certain I have seen carriers work effectively even with 2000 fighters in the region.