Questions and a suggestion for naval battles

[HeilLoki]

Hey!

I just watched todays WWW a second time and there are a few things on my mind.

Question 1: Will german submarines be able to raid convoys on the east coast of the USA (with later techs)? Naval range seems to be pretty low early on.

Question 2: Do I have any posibility to tell my naval bombers that they should support my fleets during battles or is naval strike based on luck whether naval bombers actually help my fleet in battle!? In short: Can we target specific sea provinces? If not, why? Or is there any mechanic behind it that the likelihood of naval bombers helping your fleet in battle is massively increased and it's just a matter of time until they join and help out?!

Question 3: How fast will I be able to retreat from battles (an hour, a day, a week?) and is there a chance that a retreat fails, because my enemy has some tactic that prevents me leaving?

Suggestion: We see what class of ship is firing, but we don't see what class they are shooting at. If ships shoot at multiple classes of ships, you only see the name of the ship they are targeting without knowing, what class it is. Same goes with kill stats. Please add the same "(Destroyer I)" text beind the ships name that is fired at. This should be easy to add anyways.

I had actually a few other questions about naval battles, but I forgot them. I hope that other people on the forums have a lot of questions too and they'll post it here. Looking forward to some interesting answers. Thanks!

 

[LordOfWar16]

1: Yes, ships have different ranges of course and a fleet adjusts to the smallest one of course. You could also extend the range of your submarines with the variant system aswell.

2: Planes will rush to aid your ships in battle, just as any naval vessel assigned to that area, granted they have the range of course.

3: Daniel actually explained and showcased that in the WWW Yapan streams. Units take a while to retreat and can actually be overrun, which means they will instantly surrender. That actually happend to one of daniels divisions in todays stream as hungary aswell.

 

[Mannstien]

Has anyone seen a setting on the CV's that let you put them to Auto-resupply? I was watching the old MP streams the other day and noticed that one of Johan's CV's didn't have any planes left on it, so I was wondering if you could set their supply priority and from what airfield (assuming they first appear at one after completing production) they will be supplied from or perhaps it's more simple than that?

 

[HeilLoki]

1: Yes, ships have different ranges of course and a fleet adjusts to the smallest one of course. You could also extend the range of your submarines with the variant system aswell.

2: Planes will rush to aid your ships in battle, just as any naval vessel assigned to that area, granted they have the range of course.

3: Daniel actually explained and showcased that in the WWW Yapan streams. Units take a while to retreat and can actually be overrun, which means they will instantly surrender. That actually happend to one of daniels divisions in todays stream as hungary aswell.

1. I know, but will Subs be able to reach eastern coast of USA? If so, when? Sub Tech I, Sub tech IV?, somewhere in between?

2. Sure, but what's the mechanic behind it? I hope it's not random chance. Will there be any possibility to tell your planes to engage in a certain battle/provine or is it just based on these huge areas and if so how does it actually work.

3. Yeah, but I doubt the overrun mechanic does apply to naval battles. So how does it work?

 

[Axe99]

If it helps, the range of the Type VIIs was only 8500 miles, and before Germany had bases in France, they had to travel a decent portion of that just to get into the Western Atlantic, let alone the Eastern. I'm pretty sure they weren't able to hit the Eastern US from Germany, and just eyeballing my atlas, would barely have been able to get there and back again from France. The Type IXC (in service from 1941) had a range of 13450 miles, and was far more feasible for those kind of operations.

Sorry I haven't seen the WWW yet, will once it's on YT (prefer the reliable high-res of YT), so don't know the specific context.

 

[Sun_Killer]

Has anyone seen a setting on the CV's that let you put them to Auto-resupply? I was watching the old MP streams the other day and noticed that one of Johan's CV's didn't have any planes left on it, so I was wondering if you could set their supply priority and from what airfield (assuming they first appear at one after completing production) they will be supplied from or perhaps it's more simple than that?

I think the orginal air wing of this carrier was with old planes. and since air wings are variant specific in creation and he didn´t produce them anymore there weren´t anymore planes to bring up the numbers of the wing.

 

[LordOfWar16]

If it helps, the range of the Type VIIs was only 8500 miles, and before Germany had bases in France, they had to travel a decent portion of that just to get into the Western Atlantic, let alone the Eastern. I'm pretty sure they weren't able to hit the Eastern US from Germany, and just eyeballing my atlas, would barely have been able to get there and back again from France. The Type IXC (in service from 1941) had a range of 13450 miles, and was far more feasible for those kind of operations.

Germany actually used refueling submarines in order to extend their range to the united states. It was the Typ XIV "Milchkuh" ("Milk Cow"). It could resupply other submarines with 613 tons of fuel, 13 tons of oil, 4 torpedoes and fresh food presevered in refrigerator units. They even had a bakery on board to provide the luxury of fresh bread to the crews being supplied. Shouldnt suprise you that the only armament they had were anti-aircraft guns, since those arent combat vessels.

Exactly the Typ VII you mentioned was resupplied by those, allowing them to raid the east coast of the USA. Shouldnt suprise anybody that those were priority targets for the allied forces and that duty onboard of them extremely hazardous since you are basicly sitting ontop of a fuelbomb. 25 of them were planned and 10 were completed and in active service, but all were sunk by 1944.

 

[Axe99]

Germany actually used refueling submarines in order to extend their range to the united states. It was the Typ XIV "Milchkuh" ("Milk Cow"). It could resupply other submarines with 613 tons of fuel, 13 tons of oil, 4 torpedoes and fresh food presevered in refrigerator units. They even had a bakery on board to provide the luxury of fresh bread to the crews being supplied. Shouldnt suprise you that the only armament they had were anti-aircraft guns, since those arent combat vessels.

Exactly the Typ VII you mentioned was resupplied by those, allowing them to raid the east coast of the USA. Shouldnt suprise anybody that those were priority targets for the allied forces and that duty onboard of them extremely hazardous since you are basicly sitting ontop of a fuelbomb. 25 of them were planned and 10 were completed and in active service, but all were sunk by 1944.

Aye, but the Type XIV didn't enter service until late 1941, after the Type IX. The first raids on the US were by type IXs, although you're quite right that later raids also involved Type XIV-supported Type VIIs. The US East Coast should be out of range of U-boats in 1939 though, unless Germany's been building long-range fleet subs ahistorically (subs of the Type IX's range were produced by a number of nations in the 1930s, just not by Germany). I was more trying to explain the low range that seems to have been noticed early on, and that this is historically appropriate for what the Germans had at the time.

 

[HeilLoki]

I hoped some Pdx dude may answer and at least read my suggestion, because there is currently no chance to see, what class of ship is shot at.

 

[Mannstien]

How about for Naval Experience outside of War you can set them to fleet maneuvers costing oil or something to that effect?

 

[Denkt]

Screenshot of a 1944 tech submarine stats (this may have been changed), note the 26000 km range.

Question 2: Do I have any posibility to tell my naval bombers that they should support my fleets during battles or is naval strike based on luck whether naval bombers actually help my fleet in battle!? In short: Can we target specific sea provinces? If not, why? Or is there any mechanic behind it that the likelihood of naval bombers helping your fleet in battle is massively increased and it's just a matter of time until they join and help out?!

Your aircrafts priorties helping your ships over searching for enemy ships.

Question 3: How fast will I be able to retreat from battles (an hour, a day, a week?) and is there a chance that a retreat fails, because my enemy has some tactic that prevents me leaving?

Speed of the ships are important here as fast ships have much easier time at both retreating and pursuing.

 

[HeilLoki]

Screenshot of a 1944 tech submarine stats (this may have been changed), note the 26000 km range.

.

That's even without range-upgrades. I assume Class III and maybe even Class II subs (upgraded, probably not vanilla) can raid near US coast. Very nice.

 

[Axe99]

That sub range is comfortably large enough to hit the East Coast of the US (and a tad higher than I'd expect for the base range of a fleet sub in 1944 - but have to see how it works in-game before judging one way or another). Cheers for sharing Denkt .

 

[Denkt]

Cheers for sharing Denkt .

The picture was from the submarine DD

Maybe you can upgrade range by the variant system although this is not mentioned as a choice in the submarine DD. Maybe the milk cow submarines could be represented as a doctrine in the sealane interdiction choice like escort carriers.

 

[potski]

That sub range is comfortably large enough to hit the East Coast of the US (and a tad higher than I'd expect for the base range of a fleet sub in 1944

Isn't 26,000 km more than the distance from London to the land of barbecues and kangaroos? Must have been a placeholder.

Nevertheless I'm sure Daniel sent subs from Japan to patrol in the Indian Ocean.

 

[Axe99]

Isn't 26,000 km more than the distance from London to the land of barbecues and kangaroos? Must have been a placeholder.

Nevertheless I'm sure Daniel sent subs from Japan to patrol in the Indian Ocean.

It's definitely a fair way . The Japanese aircraft carrying subs actually had longer ranges (I'm pretty sure the range was "in good conditions" and in a straight line, neither of which often held true, so actual ranges in terms of map distance travelled were a good deal less than the ranges in best possible conditions, even when ships weren't zig-zagging to avoid subs (which, granted, I wouldn't expect subs to be doing )).

The late war subs did have some impressively long ranges - the US Tench class at a little over 19,000 km, the German Type XXI at 25,000 km (they obviously were keen for a BBQ ) and the Japanese Otsu-Gata B3 at nearly 34,000 (! maybe they wanted a BBQ, and to be able to get back home without filling up again?) km - so 26,000 isn't a 'bad' number per se, I just think that the German and Japanese ranges are probably better handled by variants, so it allows for the relatively shorter range later-war US and British submarines. All those figs are from Navypedia, converted into km - there may be a typo in amongst it (I'm doing this quick'n'dirty) but should be close enough to be indicative .

Edit: On the Pacific Ocean patrolling, I haven't crunched the numbers, and don't know the stats in-game, but Japan built long-range subs pretty early, so I'd expect they'd have had the capability historically.

 

[potski]

Yes, but the range IRL includes them doing patrolling around the Indian Ocean, before going back to base to refuel. In the game the range should just be the maximum distance to a region they can patrol. Otherwise, you have German subs sinking convoys in Sydney harbour.

 

[Sun_Killer]

the problem is we don´t know how range is defined in game. Is it the range to go 20000km in one direction. Is it the range to go to a target that is 20000km away on sea and make the return trip. Then we would need to know if the take half of the range for operations and only the other half for callculation how far away a region it can reach. But this is a question for Batm.... äh @podcat .

 

[Axe99]

Yes, but the range IRL includes them doing patrolling around the Indian Ocean, before going back to base to refuel. In the game the range should just be the maximum distance to a region they can patrol. Otherwise, you have German subs sinking convoys in Sydney harbour.

Totally agree. I'm not worried, as I'm pretty confident that the devs will be sensible with ranges, and totally confident if there's anything I'm not happy with I'll be able to mod it by editing one or two lines in the unit files. 25,000km does feel a bit long for a base range for that year of sub (particularly as that model is for all 1944 subs, and not just long-range fleet subs), but we don't know how that'll translate into the game model yet either.

 

[Hanitora]

While boats like the Type IXC and XXI had an impressively long range of 25000 km, that's literally what it is - range. The boat was capable of traveling 25000 km before running out of fuel. The boat was NOT capable of operating at a range of 25000 km from the port. At best a boat with range like that could go on a patrol in a sea zone around 10000km away and type IXC boats raided in the Caribbean sea which is less than 10000 km from their ports in France.

If the 1944 boat can actually operate in a sea zone 25000 km away, it's quite impressive. Because that boat must have a range in excess of 50000km. Rebasing 25000 km away is no problem, but operational distance should be half or less of the max range.