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Because it needed slowing down. You can still build unrealistic amounts of capital ships. You just have to be prepared to devote your entire economy to building enough shipyards so you can build them in parallel. I'd say you also need to plan ahead but since you can also upgrade ships a fair bit, that's not strictly true once you've got the hull and guns types you want.
Building a capital ship is a serious undertaking. That's why naval powers can be counted on the fingers of one hand, most other countries can only afford to build a few at best, and the rest of the unwashed masses make do with buying one (an old one) from someone else.
Look on the bright side - if you can't spam people with capital ship stacks any more - neither will they be doing it to you. Well except for the US player but then, what did you expect?
One day, I hope you (Paradox) will do something about your interfacing with mods. You produce updates and DLC at a very healthy rate, and the open files available to make some amazing mods are great. I have no issue with your profit model since your updates/DLC are usually quite full (sometimes TOO full *Cough*fuel*Cough*). But it seems that even when you put out smaller updates, all mods break. This can be frustrating to your customers, as I'm sure you can imagine. OK, I've made the point.
One day, I hope you (Paradox) will do something about your interfacing with mods. You produce updates and DLC at a very healthy rate, and the open files available to make some amazing mods are great. I have no issue with your profit model since your updates/DLC are usually quite full (sometimes TOO full *Cough*fuel*Cough*). But it seems that even when you put out smaller updates, all mods break. This can be frustrating to your customers, as I'm sure you can imagine. OK, I've made the point.
I don't think there's any real way around this. As a modder, I'd far, far prefer that we get regular updates to the game and new content, and I'm saying that as someone who basically has to put their mod together from the ground up for Man the Guns (The War at Sea's main feature was balancing the variant system to provide historically-statted ships, as well as tuning naval combat mechanics - both things which have changed so much it's back to the start again with them modding-wise). Sure, it's a lot of work, but being able to mod historical ships with the ship designer is very, very exciting .
As someone who plays mods, it's probably best to be aware that Paradox tends to try and get a patch out very quickly (within a couple of weeks usually), and then often there's 1-2 more over a longer timeframe, before they put their head down and start working on whatever they've got planned next. If you take a while to get through your games (I take 1-2 weeks for a long, 20-hour game) then it might be safest to play vanilla until your mod's been updated for the *.*.1 patch (ie, 1.6.1 in this case).
That said, the smaller patches tend to be much quicker and easier to make things compatible with than the big readjustments, so all being well your mod's creator will be able to have a version that's ready to go nice and quick .
Agreed, Axe99, thanks. I know modding's a rough road. I wasn't thinking quite as much for me as a player, but for the modders. A person does the work and gets us out a 1.6.x version, only to see a 1.6.x+1 version a week or two later and there's the dreaded red exclamation point. But, yes, with these early tweak patches, we all need to wait for the inevitable stability. Until the next DLC of course. ;-)
I can't speak for the devs, but it's worth keeping in mind that pre-MtG capital ship build speeds were ludicrously fast, relative to historical build speeds. Beyond the reduction in the level of strategy required (faster builds = less planning = less strategy) and the reduced immersion for anyone familiar with ship build times historically, this also had a huge impact on Japan's viability relative to the US. Long ship build times historically meant that the Essex class carriers took until late 1943 to start making a difference in the Pacific, but with the pre-MtG build times, it was possible* to have the equivalent of the Essex class carriers form the bulk of the carrier force by the time of the Battle of Midway (June 1942) which fundamentally alters the balance in the Pacific theatre, and makes Japan's position (which is hardly good historically) much tougher.
Keep in mind that over the course of two or so years, the same amount of NIC will still build the same amount of ships - it's just necessary to plan things in advance a bit more, as those ships will all be completed at the end of the two year (or so) period, rather than in dribs and drabs throughout.
* Assuming the start times of the ships were as they were historically.
I agree in part with what you have said especially outside of the US, but you refer to the Essex class, did you know from 31st December 1942 up to the end of WW2 that there were 18 Essex Class Carriers built (3 of which were built in 1945), but lets not forget the other carrier class in production at the same time the Independence Class, which of course was a light carrier design, there were 9 built for the US. Then there is the Escort Carrier class of which there were 5 classes, in total 97 were built for both US and lend lease purposes. The average build time for an Essex Class ship was 15 months before Pre Jan 43, After February 43 the average build time was 12 months. All light and escort class carriers were built within 12 months with the exception of converted ships of which there were only 6 before the end of 1942. So at the same time the US had the North Carolina, South Dakota, and Iowa Class Battleships being built, not to mention the new Baltimore class cruiser, and the favoured Cleveland class cruiser and Fletcher class destroyers all while building over 100 main line and subline carriers.
I am not saying I want to build ships on that scale, but you mentioned accuracy, I think a bit of research would tell you that HoI4 ship building is not accurate by a long shot.
Because it needed slowing down. You can still build unrealistic amounts of capital ships. You just have to be prepared to devote your entire economy to building enough shipyards so you can build them in parallel. I'd say you also need to plan ahead but since you can also upgrade ships a fair bit, that's not strictly true once you've got the hull and guns types you want.
Building a capital ship is a serious undertaking. That's why naval powers can be counted on the fingers of one hand, most other countries can only afford to build a few at best, and the rest of the unwashed masses make do with buying one (an old one) from someone else.
Look on the bright side - if you can't spam people with capital ship stacks any more - neither will they be doing it to you. Well except for the US player but then, what did you expect?
I agree in part with what you have said especially with spamming, but did you know from 31st December 1942 up to the end of WW2 that there were 18 Essex Class Carriers built (3 of which were built in 1945), but lets not forget the other carrier class in production at the same time the Independence Class, which of course was a light carrier design, there were 9 built for the US. Then there is the Escort Carrier class of which there were 5 classes, in total 97 were built for both US and lend lease purposes. The average build time for an Essex Class ship was 15 months before Pre Jan 43, After February 43 the average build time was 12 months. All light and escort class carriers were built within 12 months with the exception of converted ships of which there were only 6 before the end of 1942. So at the same time the US had the North Carolina, South Dakota, and Iowa Class Battleships being built, not to mention the new Baltimore class cruiser, and the favoured Cleveland class cruiser and Fletcher class destroyers all while building over 100 main line and subline carriers.
I am not saying I want to build ships on that scale, but you mentioned accuracy, I think a bit of research would tell you that HoI4 ship building is not accurate by a long shot.
I was playing IronClad without Man the Guns but with three other expansions. Here are my observations regarding balance of the game played on Regular with Historical. I played as Czechoslovakia and prevented Germany from taking over Austria and all other Balkan countries by rebuilding Austro_Hungary, thus quite weaking them (or I thought). Japan was not able to take China so that seemed like a pleasant suprise (well eventually they did after Germany took over Soviets). Previously Japan was always taking over China quite quickly. Thats one plus! However, I noticed that US by the year 1945 still had less than 100 divisions and was on Civilian Economy with Limited Conscription. How are the Allies to even try D-Day? They failed multiple times by doing minor operations. My other observation is that German AI has very easy time against Russia AI. Perhaps attrition during the Russian winter or some events could balance that out? For example China has scorched earth focus, perhaps the same could be done for Russia? I noticed that attrition for Japanese troops is quite high in China, I think similarly it should be increasingly difficult to push east for Germans against Soviets. While as now Germany just drives through basically. I even tried to slow them down by justifying war goals against them (as Austro-Hungary) and keep repeating but still they were able to push eventually.
I think in previous versions US was much more resourceful. Perhaps the AI can't control Congress?
I'm an enthusiast rather than an expert, but I have read a little bit about ships and naval warfare of the period:
Here's a quick snapshot of the relevant section of my bookcase - note the left-hand side of the bottom shelf aren't books, they're dust jackets for books that are in circulation, or have been referred to a lot lately* (and other bits and bobs) - you'll see the actual Naval Weapons of WWI on the for bottom-right, while Warships of the IJN 1869-1945 is currently off the bookshelf and in use, along with Conways All the World's Fighting Ships 1860-1905):
Now, this doesn't mean anything I write on the forums or elsewhere is necessarily correct, but I do recommend making sure you've done your research well before you start telling other people to do their research .
* If I find I'm pulling a book out a lot I'll take the dustjacket off to protect it.
A good source online for high-level ship stats is Navypedia. Here's a link to their page on the Essex class carriers, which are by far the fastest constructed fleet aircraft carriers in history. As far as I'm aware, their numbers are accurate, and consistent with other sources I've seen (or, where inconsistent, the issue has been with the other source, not with Navypedia - Navypedia do make some mistakes, but as best I know their Essex class construction numbers are on point).
One of the neat things about Navypedia is that as it's a HTML table, it's possible to take those 'laid down to completion' dates and pop them in a table, and quickly and easily calculate how long the ships actually took to complete. So, for example, if you look at that table, the time between laying down and completion for the only Essex class carrier completed before January 1943 was 612 days, or 20.1 months. While it's not really a fair comparison (if we look at all Essex class carriers completed post-1943, then we include the carriers completed on a go-slow after it was clear the war was over, the standout of which was the USS Oriskany, but I've used your time periods to be consistent), for Essex class carriers completed after the start of 1943 it's an average completion time of 689 days, or 22.7 months.
Personally, I'd recommend looking at the times taken for all Essex class carriers completed prior to the end of January 1945, as I'd expect the US to have expected to need carriers completed up to this date for the expected invasion of Japan. Looking at this, we get an average time of 558 days, or 18.3 months per carrier.
Now, if I fire up HoI4, and with a little console-fu give me the 1941 industry techs, and the US 'Bureau of Ships' national focus (which is very much historically plausible), get myself out of the naval treaties, give me a 1940 carrier hull and dual-purpose secondaries and some decent radar, and put 5 NIC on the line, we get:
The number of days between 14 Jan 1936 and 2 July 1936 is 534. In other words, the average speed the US can build Essex class carriers in MtG is still faster than they were built historically (and you also don't need to do trials, or a working up/shakedown cruise - USS Essex completed in December 1942, but she wasn't sent to Operational Duty until May 1943). It's worth noting that once you've got the 1943 industry tech that speeds up NIC output, the time drops again, to 504 days. Now, this still isn't as quick as the fastest completed fleet carrier ever (USS Franklin, which went from launch to completed in 420 days, or 13.8 months), but I'd argue that short of special mechanics to reflect variable building times at different yards and in different economic circumstances, shooting for the 'average wartime construction speed' is a good benchmark to work to.
Either way, clearly, the six months or so they could be built in under the 1.5.4 and earlier was, from a historical plausibility perspective, very much historically implausible, even for USS Franklin, let alone the average Essex build time.
Escort carriers were a whole 'nother thing altogether, and aren't represented in HoI4 (beyond one doctrine tech in the Fleet in Being tree) - they were built on mercantile hulls to mercantile standards. It's absolutely true that these were completed in six months (and often faster - Henry Kaiser's yards were knocking them out in 4 months iirc), and if they were in the game they should be quick to build here as well, but the reliability and hit point figures for the carrier hulls are inconsistent with them representing CVEs.
All light and escort class carriers were built within 12 months with the exception of converted ships of which there were only 6 before the end of 1942.
The average completion speed of the Independence class CVLs was 529 days, or 17.4 months. However, even the fastest took 415 days, or 13.7 months. In-game (granted, using 1943 industry tech as I'm doing this as I go), I can build similar (with a slightly higher aircraft capacity) in 10.6 months.
This argument is entirely based on historical plausibility (there's nothing wrong with wanting an OP US to roflstomp Japan as long as you're not concerned about historical plausibility or balance, and for fast build times to achieve this, or for wanting fast ship build times for other reasons) - but I'm responding to your historical arguments. It's worth noting that while the US can achieve better-than-historical average build speeds for its carriers, given how fast the US built them, this also means other nations (none of which came close to the US on carrier build times) can build carriers a good deal faster than they did historically.
As always, if I've messed anything up, or overlooked anything, please let me know - I'm a good way from infallible - but I'm fairly confident about my argument on this one.
I'm an enthusiast rather than an expert, but I have read a little bit about ships and naval warfare of the period:
Here's a quick snapshot of the relevant section of my bookcase - note the left-hand side of the bottom shelf aren't books, they're dust jackets for books that are in circulation, or have been referred to a lot lately* (and other bits and bobs) - you'll see the actual Naval Weapons of WWI on the for bottom-right, while Warships of the IJN 1869-1945 is currently off the bookshelf and in use, along with Conways All the World's Fighting Ships 1860-1905):
Now, this doesn't mean anything I write on the forums or elsewhere is necessarily correct, but I do recommend making sure you've done your research well before you start telling other people to do their research .
* If I find I'm pulling a book out a lot I'll take the dustjacket off to protect it.
A good source online for high-level ship stats is Navypedia. Here's a link to their page on the Essex class carriers, which are by far the fastest constructed fleet aircraft carriers in history. As far as I'm aware, their numbers are accurate, and consistent with other sources I've seen (or, where inconsistent, the issue has been with the other source, not with Navypedia - Navypedia do make some mistakes, but as best I know their Essex class construction numbers are on point).
One of the neat things about Navypedia is that as it's a HTML table, it's possible to take those 'laid down to completion' dates and pop them in a table, and quickly and easily calculate how long the ships actually took to complete. So, for example, if you look at that table, the time between laying down and completion for the only Essex class carrier completed before January 1943 was 612 days, or 20.1 months. While it's not really a fair comparison (if we look at all Essex class carriers completed post-1943, then we include the carriers completed on a go-slow after it was clear the war was over, the standout of which was the USS Oriskany, but I've used your time periods to be consistent), for Essex class carriers completed after the start of 1943 it's an average completion time of 689 days, or 22.7 months.
Personally, I'd recommend looking at the times taken for all Essex class carriers completed prior to the end of January 1945, as I'd expect the US to have expected to need carriers completed up to this date for the expected invasion of Japan. Looking at this, we get an average time of 558 days, or 18.3 months per carrier.
Now, if I fire up how, and with a little console-fu give me the 1941 industry techs, and the US 'Bureau of Ships' national focus (which is very much historically plausible), get myself out of the naval treaties, give me a 1940 carrier hull and dual-purpose secondaries and some decent radar, and put 5 NIC on the line, we get:
The number of days between 14 Jan 1936 and 2 July 1936 is 534. In other words, the average speed the US can build Essex class carriers in MtG is still faster than they were built historically (and you also don't need to do trials, or a working up/shakedown cruise - USS Essex completed in December 1942, but she wasn't sent to Operational Duty until May 1943). It's worth noting that once you've got the 1943 industry tech that speeds up NIC output, the time drops again, to 504 days. Now, this still isn't as quick as the fastest completed fleet carrier ever (USS Franklin, which went from launch to completed in 420 days, or 13.8 months), but I'd argue that short of special mechanics to reflect variable building times at different yards and in different economic circumstances, shooting for the 'average wartime construction speed' is a good benchmark to work to.
Either way, clearly, the six months or so they could be built in under the 1.5.4 and earlier was, from a historical plausibility perspective, very much historically implausible, even for USS Franklin, let alone the average Essex build time.
Escort carriers were a whole 'nother thing altogether, and aren't represented in HoI4 (beyond one doctrine tech in the Fleet in Being tree) - they were built on mercantile hulls to mercantile standards. It's absolutely true that these were completed in six months (and often faster - Henry Kaiser's yards was knocking them out in 4 months iirc), and if they were in the game they should be quick to build here as well, but the reliability and hit point figures for the carrier hulls are inconsistent with them representing CVEs.
The average completion speed of the Independence class CVLs was 529 days, or 17.4 months. However, even the fastest took 415 days, or 13.7 months. In-game (granted, using 1943 industry tech as I'm doing this as I go), I can build similar (with a slightly higher aircraft capacity) in 10.6 months.
This argument is entirely based on historical plausibility (there's nothing wrong with wanting an OP US to roflstomp Japan as long as you're not concerned about historical plausibility or balance, and for fast build times to achieve this, or for wanting fast ship build times for other reasons) - but I'm responding to your historical arguments. It's worth noting that while the US can achieve better-than-historical average build speeds for its carriers, given how fast the US built them, this also means other nations (none of which came close to the US on carrier build times) can build carriers a good deal faster than they did historically.
As always, if I've messed anything up, or overlooked anything, please let me know - I'm a good way from infallible - but I'm fairly confident about my argument on this one.
the thing is about the usa, is that you either have realistic naval, or air, or ground production. you can t have them all, even despite the buffs, the usa is a shadow of itself (thank godness, i don t want to play a broken game..) with the plenty of research buffs and good research you still really-really struggle to approach the realistic technological advancements of the usa, so while i don t think naval production would be unrealistic.. the nearly 1000 smaller vessel alone would require an insane amount of dockyards. (don t mind me, i have at least 60 with usa every game) so not that you cant have a historical output, but that means you have a weaker army or airforce etc
the thing is about the usa, is that you either have realistic naval, or air, or ground production. you can t have them all, even despite the buffs, the usa is a shadow of itself (thank godness, i don t want to play a broken game..) with the plenty of research buffs and good research you still really-really struggle to approach the realistic technological advancements of the usa, so while i don t think naval production would be unrealistic.. the nearly 1000 smaller vessel alone would require an insane amount of dockyards. (don t mind me, i have at least 60 with usa every game) so not that you cant have a historical output, but that means you have a weaker army or airforce etc
Ehh, I am not like completely sure. Maybe if you keep the a-bomb in play but a war, 1 on 1, with the SU would have been a pretty hard fight. Yes the SU was in dire straits then, had a lot of hurt thrown at it, but it was also geared fully towards war production so could easily produce a lot of equipment.
Good chance that the US would win, but it would be a pyrrhic victory most likely.
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