Naval mines

[Dalwin]

The mines laid by Britain in the English Channel mentioned in the article are of particular interest as it describes them as "anti-submarine" mines. How does a mine know if it's contacted a submarine rather than a ship?

The English Channel was, most definitely, open to navigation by surface ships (even German ships) but definitely closed to submarines. So... did every man & his dog have a map showing where not to go? I'm pretty sure such a map wasn't captured by Germany. All they'd need to do is watch for a few days to see where ships went. Or was it simply that these mines were tethered in such a way that they remained submerged and, therefore, were only a threat to submerged units? This implies that a surfaced submarine would be able to pass over them without incident. Other than running the gauntlet of the RN, RAF and whatever coastal batteries were awake of course.

It is a matter of depth. The mines were placed low enough that surface ships would not trigger a detonation when passing over them.

Indeed subs could have travelled along the surface and been safe from the mines, but they'd have been very vulnerable to other things.

 

[ExeTick]

I think this would be great if they were placed by mine laying ships it should be like a counter how many sea mines you produced and you need those mine layers to actually place them. or by any shipclass that could lay mines.

that would means the enemy need to patrol the sea so you cannot place any mines and tbh would for me give navy a bigger reason to be used.

 

[safe-keeper]

Indeed subs could have travelled along the surface and been safe from the mines, but they'd have been very vulnerable to other things.

They did travel on the surface anyway most of the time, remember. I seem to recall that travel in high-risk areas was done by diving on sunrise, for then to resume travel when darkness fell again. While submerged, subs couldn't use their diesel-powered engines and had to resort to running on batteries, which propelled the sub forward at slow speed and also quickly ran out of power, forcing the sub to either sit idle or surface to fire up the diesels to recharge batteries.

 

[jamesd]

Mines were an important part of naval warfare and should be in the game. For example Germany laid mines between Denmark and Norway so as to keep British ships from interdicting shipping between Oslo and the Baltic. They also had quite an extensive barrage off their own North Sea coast which would have made Allied landings directly into Germany quite risky.

On the subject of coastal defences, I think the existing land and coastal forts needs some overhaul. Land forts should protect units from amphibious assaults as well as overland attacks. Coastal forts should actually represent static artillery that has a naval attack capability. Maybe rather than buildings they should become units that can only move strategically.

 

[MaxxCombat]

They could make minefields a province building for sea provinces; you can build AA guns and radar sites for land provinces, so you should be able to build minefields in your adjacent sea provinces. They could work like AA guns and give a negative penalty to enemy ships in naval battles. Then there could be a 'logistic strike' mission but for ships called 'Minesweeping' which would take down the minefields to a level 0. Maybe this mission could be done by destroyers or by a separate minesweeper unit. Or they could be abstracted into a Destroyer flotilla or something.

 

[Dalwin]

They could make minefields a province building for sea provinces; you can build AA guns and radar sites for land provinces, so you should be able to build minefields in your adjacent sea provinces. They could work like AA guns and give a negative penalty to enemy ships in naval battles. Then there could be a 'logistic strike' mission but for ships called 'Minesweeping' which would take down the minefields to a level 0. Maybe this mission could be done by destroyers or by a separate minesweeper unit. Or they could be abstracted into a Destroyer flotilla or something.

I don't think it is realistic or practical to mine anything other than narrows or coastal areas. Something should be done, however. Even simply taking the most significant historical minefields and including them as special rules withing the affected areas would be fine. There is no need for players to get involved in manufacturing ot laying these minefields, IMO.

 

[fillap]

Dalwin. Even in WW1 the US had developed and started to carry out a plan to mine the entire northern exit to the North Sea. From Scotland to Norway. Extensive mining was feasable in shallow waters like these, it was just a question of commitment of resources. It wasn't possible in WW2 as the Nazi's took over Norway. Again something that had been provoked as the British started to mine Norwegian waters.

 

[Dalwin]

Even that ambitious project, which never happened, is a far cry short of mining some zone in the middle of the Atlantic which is what some folks in this thread are talking about and apparently hoping for. Planning by itself does not really justify inclusion of a major game feature. Lots of things were planned during this period which never got beyond early testing stages. One of my favorites is Pikecrete, building hulls for large ships like CVs from ice and sawdust.

 

[unmerged(46341)]

Honestly mines are represented by the negative modifiers to amphibious invasion, and the special modifiers to places like the bosphorus. Mines make less sense on the strategic map than run-of-the-mill air superiority fighters.

 

[Mabs]

you could abstract it to attrition

if you are at sea, you have a 0.01% chance to lose a ship, or take 5% damage or whatever at all times. longer at sea, more likely to take damage, bit like EU4 ocean attrition

on top of that, have a "mine tech" and a "minesweep tech" the variance between them sets your % chance. so if you have lvl 10 mines vs 0 sweeping, you get a 0.1%. or something, you get the idea