Naval battles : positioning and hull/morale damage formula ?

[Magean]

Hello all,

I was planning to run simulations on naval warfare but the Wiki is very vague on this subject.
Does anyone know what the formulas for positioning and damage calculations are ?

I recall that it took practically a year for the Land Warfare article of the Wiki to include Art of War's casualties calculation changes, although someone had successfully elicited them very shortly after AoW's release.

So it is possible that some people here have a precise idea of how naval combat works, while this knowledge is still a secret hidden in the depths of the forum. I could also try to empirically infer how damages are computed, but positioning would remain a mystery.

The best thing would be some developer's comments on the subject, though.

Thanks in advance !

 

[jcranmer]

I'd love to know this too, but I've held off trying to divine this since Mare Nostrum could very well be changing how it works.

 

[Ameron]

Since naval combat is all about throwing more ships at the enemy and stackwiping their fleet, I don't think anyone really cares enough to understand how it works. I mean, it surely would be interesting and moderately useful (being able to maximize your fleet efficiency would allow you to use smaller fleets and win anyway), but why bother? Ships are cheap, do not (yet) cost manpower and losing a few it's not a big deal.

 

[Viperswhip]

Groogy tried to make a point to, I think it was Johan about how the naval combat worked and how the Mughals or Mamluks could kill the English fleet, but was shot down because he's in 8th place. it doesn't mean he doesn't know about naval combat lol

It was funny, but I wanted to hear what he had to say. From what I gather is that you can beat a more dangerous fleet by throwing a ton of cheap ass ships at it, with fewer heavies, because while the English heavy fires its cannons, it might one shot that galley, but the damage doesn't carry over to another ship, meanwhile your fewer heavies are pummeling their fleet. Basically, protect your Queen by throwing pawns to their doom, but in this case your Queen can fire across the board and you win by sacrificing a bunch of 10 gold ships, despite being out cannoned due to more heavy ships.

Or I could be wrong since Johan (? maybe him) didn't let Groogy f'ing explain it.

 

[Magean]

Groogy tried to make a point to, I think it was Johan about how the naval combat worked and how the Mughals or Mamluks could kill the English fleet, but was shot down because he's in 8th place. it doesn't mean he doesn't know about naval combat lol

It was funny, but I wanted to hear what he had to say. From what I gather is that you can beat a more dangerous fleet by throwing a ton of cheap ass ships at it, with fewer heavies, because while the English heavy fires its cannons, it might one shot that galley, but the damage doesn't carry over to another ship, meanwhile your fewer heavies are pummeling their fleet. Basically, protect your Queen by throwing pawns to their doom, but in this case your Queen can fire across the board and you win by sacrificing a bunch of 10 gold ships, despite being out cannoned due to more heavy ships.

Or I could be wrong since Johan (? maybe him) didn't let Groogy f'ing explain it.

Where did you hear this comment ?

Besides, yes, at the moment naval warfare is mostly about building more heavies and sending them smashing the enemy fleet. Not very interesting. This is why the Netherlands are better than England as a naval power because they get quantitative bonuses, not qualitative ones. Yet, I was curious... to what exactly do England's (and other nations) qualitative bonuses amount ? How outnumbered can you safely be when you have +x% morale or durability ?

 

[BarrosRodrigues]

Where did you hear this comment ?

Besides, yes, at the moment naval warfare is mostly about building more heavies and sending them smashing the enemy fleet. Not very interesting. This is why the Netherlands are better than England as a naval power because they get quantitative bonuses, not qualitative ones. Yet, I was curious... to what exactly do England's (and other nations) qualitative bonuses amount ? How outnumbered can you safely be when you have +x% morale or durability ?

The principle should be that any ship can only fire at a single ship per day so if instead of firing at expensive heavies they may be firing at galleys while the few heavies you have always do maximum damage. This is one of the reasons screens/low cost capitals do so well in HOI III against expensive capital ships like BBs.

 

[Viperswhip]

Where did you hear this comment ?

Besides, yes, at the moment naval warfare is mostly about building more heavies and sending them smashing the enemy fleet. Not very interesting. This is why the Netherlands are better than England as a naval power because they get quantitative bonuses, not qualitative ones. Yet, I was curious... to what exactly do England's (and other nations) qualitative bonuses amount ? How outnumbered can you safely be when you have +x% morale or durability ?

It was during one of the discussion they had after the multiplayer streams, I don't know, a few weeks ago I think.

 

[Magean]

The principle should be that any ship can only fire at a single ship per day so if instead of firing at expensive heavies they may be firing at galleys while the few heavies you have always do maximum damage. This is one of the reasons screens/low cost capitals do so well in HOI III against expensive capital ships like BBs.

There is the same thing in Vicky 2. However, in EU4, communication on the matter is so poor that it's really difficult to back this point with strong evidence. The consensus so far is "lots of heavies -> win."

In order to infer the formula, on would have to play a "1 heavy vs 1 heavy" battle, everything else being equal (tech, bonuses...) and look at the morale and ship resistance bar. Yet, we don't even have the precise information we have for land units. Just decreasing numbers.

 

[wingren013]

From what I've gathered positioning determines how many of your ships can engage a target. So a fleet with low positioning is spreading out its damage rather than focus firing.

 

[Viperswhip]

How do you flag a dev @Groogy ?

There we go I think, Groogy, can you finish the explanation that I think Johan cut off about naval combat please?

 

[jcranmer]

There is the same thing in Vicky 2. However, in EU4, communication on the matter is so poor that it's really difficult to back this point with strong evidence. The consensus so far is "lots of heavies -> win."

In order to infer the formula, on would have to play a "1 heavy vs 1 heavy" battle, everything else being equal (tech, bonuses...) and look at the morale and ship resistance bar. Yet, we don't even have the precise information we have for land units. Just decreasing numbers.

Get a large naval battle going (uncompressed non-Ironman works best), slow the game down, and save it once a day. Any factor that influences combat will have to be saved in the savegame somewhere, e.g.:

Spoiler

    naval_combat={
        id={
            id=22583
            type=4713
        }
        location=1332
        phase=0
        day=1
        duration=25
        attacker={
            dice=5
            is_attacker=yes
            unit={
                id=8176
                type=4713
            }
            unit={
                id=22375
                type=4713
            }
            losses=0.000
            losses_type={
                0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000
            }
            light_ship=6.000
            transport=4.000
            participating_country="OMA"
            positioning=0.509
        }
        defender={
            dice=0
            is_attacker=no
            unit={
                id=14799
                type=4713
            }
            losses=1.000
            losses_type={
                0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 1.000 0.000 0.000
            }
            galley=3.000
            light_ship=1.000
            transport=3.000
            participating_country="ORM"
            positioning=0.414
        }
    }

From prior investigations into land combat, I'm betting that things like the conversion of dice rolls to damage or choice of leaders follows the same rules as land combat. Indeed, there even appears to be a last_target in effect for naval units like there is for land units. Unfortunately, the save games do a horrible job of telling you some information that the game computes, like which leader is in charge.

 

[Groogy]

How do you flag a dev @Groogy ?

There we go I think, Groogy, can you finish the explanation that I think Johan cut off about naval combat please?

Don't work on EU4 or the new Expansion, so I can only explain how the old naval combat system worked really since that's what I've played with.

 

[Zelius]

You summoned the wrong demon!

Apparently Johan will talk about that in March 10th DD, or so he said in today's DD
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/eu4-development-diary-3rd-march-2016.911697/

 

[Viperswhip]

Don't work on EU4 or the new Expansion, so I can only explain how the old naval combat system worked really since that's what I've played with.

Okay sorry, maybe I am misrembering because I thought it was you trying to explain it to Johan. Cool, I hope Johan can clear it all up.

 

[hwoosh]

Don't work on EU4 or the new Expansion, so I can only explain how the old naval combat system worked really since that's what I've played with.

I really, really would like to hear about the old naval combat system, @Groogy. Both in the interests of posterity, and because I personally prefer pre-Common Sense EU4 and will probably be pouring hundreds more hours into 1.11...