SHBB in FTM

[jaava]

I just started my first FTM game as Japan. I've never really understood paradox decision to make SHBB completely unupgradeable (not even radar wtf?) but now this seems ridiculous. Sea Attack 18!? A 1936 battleship has 21. Actually almost every value is worse than in 1936 battleship. Yamato had biggest guns ever put to a battleship but obviously those can only be used in convoy hunting (22).

Also not being able to upgrade shbb is just stupid. Argument that you couldn't really put bigger guns to a ship is not valid (japanese had desings of 20.1 inch ship guns and a ship to use them) and you should be able to put on better AA and radar anyway.

 

[Hptm. Jaadoo]

I agree with you, it's the same in Semper Fi.

But Paradox wants it to be and dead end, and unfortunatly forces their decision on us...

 

[lastmantodie]

here is a link to SHBB mod dont know if it is FTM compatible though

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?420330-SHBB-Mod&p=9971254&viewfull=1#post9971254

 

[Ulsterman]

Yamato had biggest guns ever put to a battleship...

The biggest, but not the best. That's exactly the point of SHBB in HoI3. As it was in reality.

 

[jaava]

The biggest, but not the best. That's exactly the point of SHBB in HoI3. As it was in reality.

Yes but 18 is way too low. Japan can produce BBs with higher sea attack values without researching any tech, from the game start. So what's the point of having super heavy if the normal 1936 BB has higher values on almost everything? Nagato-class ships have 17.

And still, what prevents us to put good guns to a SHBB? If those 18 inch guns were bad as you say. How do you know it btw? They were never really tested in combat and even their caliber were not known in the west that long before sinking of yamato and musashi. Why weren't they good?

Edit: Besides SHBBs were not dead end. The whole battleship concept was a dead end. If the CVs didin't rise to dominate the seas we would have seen a lot more SHBB designs (like Montana).

 

[unmerged(159022)]

Yes but 18 is way too low. Japan can produce BBs with higher sea attack values without researching any tech, from the game start. So what's the point of having super heavy if the normal 1936 BB has higher values on almost everything? Nagato-class ships have 17.

And still, what prevents us to put good guns to a SHBB? If those 18 inch guns were bad as you say. How do you know it btw? They were never really tested in combat and even their caliber were not known in the west that long before sinking of yamato and musashi. Why weren't they good?

Edit: Besides SHBBs were not dead end. The whole battleship concept was a dead end. If the CVs didin't rise to dominate the seas we would have seen a lot more SHBB designs (like Montana).

The Yamatos were completely overrated ships, and probably would have lost to a South Dakota in a 1v1 fight all things being even, let a lone the Iowas which were far more advanced ships.

But in the game is a completely different story, SHBB should be able to be upgraded as BBs are, and in game terms I wouldn't mind them being rated as better than BBs even, there is nothing keeping a country from exploring that option and keeping them modern, as long as their cost is always more than a standard BB.

 

[wright1331]

The Yamatos were completely overrated ships, and probably would have lost to a South Dakota in a 1v1 fight all things being even, let a lone the Iowas which were far more advanced ships.

But in the game is a completely different story, SHBB should be able to be upgraded as BBs are, and in game terms I wouldn't mind them being rated as better than BBs even, there is nothing keeping a country from exploring that option and keeping them modern, as long as their cost is always more than a standard BB.

This I feel is 100% correct. Its completelly stupid for them to be none upgradable and another flop by the "brains" who thought of this @ PI. I'm not a BB user but this being a "game" and all, there should be viable options and not just one route to success. I mean honestly you can complain from a historical point of view till your blue in the face, but games need some things to be balanced and for their to be at least some possible counter to every unit.

When I think about this about this from a gaming point of view, and then hear people ask the question "how do you counter CV's" and for the answer to always and only be "with more CV's" is a bit rediculous and results in One possible route for being successful. I believe this takes away from the game and basically makes it more linear instead of a game where the player can experiance more than one way to build his forces and be victorious.

 

[mrwrong]

The Yamatos were completely overrated ships, and probably would have lost to a South Dakota in a 1v1 fight all things being even, let a lone the Iowas which were far more advanced ships.

But in the game is a completely different story, SHBB should be able to be upgraded as BBs are, and in game terms I wouldn't mind them being rated as better than BBs even, there is nothing keeping a country from exploring that option and keeping them modern, as long as their cost is always more than a standard BB.

1 v 1 against a yamato ?:wacko: yeah right ,HA!

 

[SAS]

1 v 1 against a yamato ?:wacko: yeah right ,HA!

I'll second that. The Musashi sank after being hit with 17 torpedoes and 19 bombs.

Yamato was hit by at least eleven torpedoes and eight bombs. Two more torpedo hits are possible, but unconfirmed.

 

[Rancher]

mrwrong and SAS agree completely with you, however as HOI is a "game" and is not supposed to be linear There seems to be a growing compulsion to keep things "real". I beleive that if SHBB were possible they should be allowed and effective. This forum shows how many differing views there are on how to fight the war, and PI should not exclude any of them. It should perhaps create a situation where, using SHBB as an example, supply or cost make them perhaps less popular but possible, if the country wishes to make the sacrifices necessary.
This would also apply to other weapons. Perhaps in someway to make the He177 Greif a viable aircraft. After all it was a lost opportunity partly due to Adolf's interferance that it was messed up. This I only use as an example, I am sure you all have many better examples to hand and I wouldnt want this thread turned into a discussion about this particular aircraft.
I just wish that HOI could be a little more open ended sometimes. Still a great game though!!

 

[unmerged(159022)]

I'll second that. The Musashi sank after being hit with 17 torpedoes and 19 bombs.

Yamato was hit by at least eleven torpedoes and eight bombs. Two more torpedo hits are possible, but unconfirmed.

There is a HUGE difference between taking 17 torpedoes and 19 bombs before sinking and taking 17 torpedoes and 19 bombs to sink.

They were both absolutely smothered with aircraft and hits came fast and frequently. It was very much over kill. One of the big reasons why Musashi took a few more torps than Yamato is because they hit her using standard torpedo attack tactics which resulted in a pretty even spread of hits on both sides which caused equal flooding with no list. They learned their lesson with Yamato and hit it with torpedoes from only one side, but Yamato was doomed from a single 500lb bomb that penetrated near her aft secondaries into magazine which caused a fire there.

The South Dakotas with their Radar and better fire control should land hits first and more frequently than a Yamato will, it would likely be a very one sided match. But war is known for its randomness, Yamato only needs one lucky hit on South Dakota's radar or fire control systems to level the playing field, and could very well do it on the first salvo, but such is war. You can go by stats and get likely outcomes but when it actually comes down to it anything goes.

 

[Kaiser Bill]

There is a HUGE difference between taking 17 torpedoes and 19 bombs before sinking and taking 17 torpedoes and 19 bombs to sink.

THIS...

These ships were glass-jawed fighters. The huge guns had lousy fire control and the substantial armour thickness was flawed due to poor materials and metalurgy techniques. When it comes to sinking battleships we actually have very little to go on in the dradnought era, but compare the munitions expended to sink these SHBB and, for example the Bismark.

I agree that the guns were still huge and if they hit then they are really going to hurt. That is a problem you are going to face in a strategic game because accuracy and damage are combined into a single factor.

Now then, turning at a slight tangent history is cruel here. There is no reason that SHBBs cannot be upgraded beyond the fact that in our history they became obsolete. Our game wants to model that and so frankly has to impose some artificial restrictions. Ironically, they do not need to with the new naval warfare balancing. They can just zap up the hull of the ship to make them very impractical to form sqaudrons with. The fact that everyone else felt they needed a lot more ships a whole lot more than they needed some realy big ones was probably the main reason no other nation tried this method during the war. The long term plans of the Nazi building programme included ships we would consider SHBB, and I doubt they would have been made so badly if that ever came near to reality.

 

[Slan]

My question to you is this: what makes SHBBs so different from BBs that you need a different unit type? Aren't they simply battleships with bigger guns and thicker armour compared to what their engines can move properly? It made sense in HoI2 where a given model had specific statistics, but in HoI3 you can design your own ships.

 

[Baltasar]

Point being that it doesn't seem to fill into the design "philosophy" if it is the one and only ship type which is unupgradable. This makes them quite useless as even earlier BBs and BCs will outclass them eventually thanks to much better secondary equipment. I'd love to have such a beast as a pride of my fleet, but they're not worth building, sadly.

 

[Kadur]

Actually.. you cant even make em as a Pride of the fleet.
at least not in FtM

 

[Sakkura]

Equally advanced SHBBs should be stronger than BBs. Both in firepower and defense. And whatever you can upgrade on a BB should be upgradeable on a SHBB.

Obviously very advanced BBs will be better than obsolete SHBBs, but that's no different than comparing BCs and BBs.

 

[Lamahorse]

The South Dakotas with their Radar and better fire control should land hits first and more frequently than a Yamato will, it would likely be a very one sided match. But war is known for its randomness, Yamato only needs one lucky hit on South Dakota's radar or fire control systems to level the playing field, and could very well do it on the first salvo, but such is war. You can go by stats and get likely outcomes but when it actually comes down to it anything goes.

I completely agree. The Hood sank after an extremely lucky initial salvo from the Bismark.

 

[Sakkura]

I completely agree. The Hood sank after an extremely lucky initial salvo from the Bismark.

Well... The Hood was obsolete while the Bismarck was quite modern, so had they been matched one-to-one the Bismarck would have been the likely winner in any case.

 

[xtfoster]

If you want the components of these to have different level, all you have to do is:
1) Open the file "Naval Technologies.txt" in the technologies folder.
2) Everywhere you see a section like:

	battleship = {
		sea_attack = 2
		convoy_attack = 1
	}

3) Copy that section, mod the values to what you feel would be appropriate for a SHBB and change battleship to super_heavy_battleship. (I would suggest comparing the values for a 1936 BB against a base SHBB and keeping the same ratios).
4) You might want to do the same thing with naval doctrines (or did they finally fix that?) and any other technology groups that you think should benefit from this.

If you want SHBBs to be able to be a "Pride of the Fleet" just:
1) Open super_heavy_battleship.txt in the units folder.
2) Add can_be_pride = yes below the capital = yes line

(You can do the same for Carriers by the way).

Note that any of these changes will affect your checksum...so you won't be able to play MP unless all of your friends have made these changes.

 

[jaava]

Yes i know how to mod ship values and how to make shbb upgradeable. I just thought it's stupid i have to mod things like this. Actually my original point wasn't upgrading shbbs. I can live with unupgradeable yamatos but the initial values of a shbb are way too low. Like i said 1936 battleship is already better than hugely more expensive super heavy battleship. So why to build if you get better ships cheaper and without any extra research? And if not playing japan this is even more confusing since you have to first research BB to be better than SHBB just that you could build SHBBs...