Should the game add frigates and corvettes?

[Metz]

Frigates were cheaper than destroyers and were used primarily to escort convoys on their trade routes. This could be an option for weaker countries with smaller economies. The frigates would report threats and the strike force nearby (if any) can come and assist. Destroyers would then be more for anti-air warfare or a wealthier country's choice of escort ship if they can afford it. In time, you can evolve your frigates into anti-submarine warfare ships. Corvettes on the other hand could be the cheapest ship and they grant you defense against submarines on coastal water zones. This would be the option for trade between neighboring countries that don't need convoys to enter the high seas (Saudi Arabia with Iran, Greece with Turkey, or Denmark with Sweden for instance). In turn, your stronger ships would be freed up for other duties.

If its too many ships then frigates and corvettes can be an invisible statistic like convoys. You could have X/Y/Z listed where you have convoys. X being convoys, Y being frigates, and Z being corvettes. The higher your proportion of X to Y, the "safer" your convoys are when moving. The Z proportion would only apply to safety on coastal waters.

 

[Ksyr]

We kinda have frigates already as we can design a cheap destroyer and use it for escort. What I would like to have is a choice of lower speed/longer range engines.

 

[Bki]

Among the ship types I would like to see in the game, smaller escort are quite close to the bottom of the list, especially since DE/Frigates can be modeled quite simply as an early destroyer hull (about the same displacement) with slow (but cheaper) engines.

If you really want, you could do like HOI3 type and simply have an "escort" pool that you would assign to convoys (though I feel the balance of things should be such that you still have to assign some fleet to convoy protection).

More interesting I feel would be escort carriers, especially since the US build something like a million of them during the war. They should be good at escorting, ASW, as well as invasion support, but less good at carrier battles.

And personally what I really want is support ships to be represented in some way. Repair ships, fleet oiler, ammunition ships, submarine tenders, seaplane tenders (though it would require seaplane to be actually relevant, which won't happen as long as you can build any random atoll in the Pacific into a level 10 airbase) as they were often just as crucial to the war effort as combat ships could be, especially in the Pacific. Of course making them relevant and not too micro heavy is probably not that easy.

 

[mursolini]

More interesting I feel would be escort carriers, especially since the US build something like a million of them during the war. They should be good at escorting, ASW, as well as invasion support, but less good at carrier battles.

You can build very cheap carriers, same way you build frigates out of DDs.

 

[SophieX]

Destroyers would then be more for anti-air warfare...

DD are small ships, and therefore they are not a very "stable" platform, especially in blue ocean water they "swing" too much, even at "normal" sea state.
To perform AAW not only for self defense, but for "fleet"-defense, you need bigger platforms like CL.
Please keep also in mind, that AAW-guns didn't have a stabilization, so a very "stable" platform is needed; a DD cannot act as a usefull AAW-ship.

 

[Bki]

You can build very cheap carriers, same way you build frigates out of DDs.

It's still on a capital ship hull with capital ship engines though. Escort carriers were often merchant ships with a flight deck. This make it nowhere near as cheap as an escort carrier would be.

 

[Androbey]

From Wikipedia:
The United States Navy had a sizable fleet of escort aircraft carriers during World War II and the era that followed. These ships were both quicker and cheaper to build than larger fleet carriers and were built in great numbers to serve as a stop-gap measure when fleet carriers were too few. However, they were usually too slow to keep up with naval task forces and would typically be assigned to amphibious operations, often seen in the Pacific war's island hopping campaign, or to convoy protection in the war in the Atlantic.

To that end, many of these ships were transferred to the Royal Navy as part of the US-UK lend-lease program. Note that many of the lower-numbered carriers were transferred to the Royal Navy, where they received new names. The new names are mentioned in each article individually. While some of these ships were kept for a time in reserve after the war, none survive today, as they have all since been sunk or retired and scrapped.

The US Navy commissioned 122 escort carriers during the war.

Bogue-class escort carrier:
The Bogue-class escort carriers were based on the Maritime Commission's Type C3 cargo ship hull.
20 were converted and commissioned into the US Navy.
24 were converted and lend-leased to Great Britain.

Usually 19-24 planes embarked:
(typical complement: 12 × fighters (Grumman F4F Wildcats)

• 9 × torpedo bombers (Grumman TBF Avengers))

Casablanca-class escort carrier was designed and built from the keel up as an escort carrier. 55 commissioned.
27 planes embarked. Smaller & lighter planes like the F4F Wildcat.

 

[GSP Jr]

It's still on a capital ship hull with capital ship engines though. Escort carriers were often merchant ships with a flight deck. This make it nowhere near as cheap as an escort carrier would be.

Shameless plug:
Try GSP's Baby Flat Tops mod on Steam. They still count as capitals, but have light hull, light engines, smaller aircraft capacity.

 

[Androbey]

Shameless plug:
Try GSP's Baby Flat Tops mod on Steam. They still count as capitals, but have light hull, light engines, smaller aircraft capacity.

Since the Bogue class CVEs were flight decks added on top off merchant ship or oiler hulls they had a merchant ships speed.
When grouped with DEs, this was what broke the German U-boats. If you can build them, I see them as group like convoys and accounted for like convoys. The number of groups the you have will determine how many sea zones that you can protect., these will usually be the zones that are outside of land-based air coverage.

Casablanca-class could possibly be used with the fleet, but their roles would be either replacement planes for the fleet carriers or as dedicated invasion CAS.

Until PDX fixes naval combat, especially carriers, I do not see that the adding of CVEs as useful.
I think my main issue is that you can base an unlimited number planes on a carrier and with the proper doctrine still operate up to 20% of them.
Carrier capacity should be hard coded to hull type. There is only a limited amount of usable space on a ship to be able to operate aircraft.

 

[sekelsenmat]

You can build very cheap carriers, same way you build frigates out of DDs.

Besides being uneconomically expensive, such pseudo-escort carriers also use the same amount of fuel as a fleet carrier.

The cruiser conversion hull should cost 1k less, take only 1 deck to prevent being OP and use 1/3 as much fuel.

 

[mursolini]

Besides being uneconomically expensive, such pseudo-escort carriers also use the same amount of fuel as a fleet carrier.

The cruiser conversion hull should cost 1k less, take only 1 deck to prevent being OP and use 1/3 as much fuel.

Yeah, apparently cruiser conversions I remember we're from a mod ((

 

[Fulmen]

Shameless plug:
Try GSP's Baby Flat Tops mod on Steam. They still count as capitals, but have light hull, light engines, smaller aircraft capacity.

Judging by the screenshots, they're still a bit too expensive in the mod to be real CVEs. At least from what I remember, a CVE should cost somewhere in the ballpark of 3000-4000 NIC.

 

[GSP Jr]

Judging by the screenshots, they're still a bit too expensive in the mod to be real CVEs. At least from what I remember, a CVE should cost somewhere in the ballpark of 3000-4000 NIC.

I should update those screen shots.
Here are new ones of the 1936 initial CVE - cost 3085,

and a fully buffed CVE, light hulls, max 30 planes, start with 20, upgrade from light hulls.

 

[fallgelb22061940]

I think that they are presented as convoys. Since convoy should be transport ship with some escorts

 

[Ketchup & friends]

There were discussions on ship types in our thread.

The conclusion is:

I. These ships cannot be recreated with the existing ship builder hulls and modules.

• They would be too fast and consume too much Fuel
• Too expensive to be built in historical numbers.
• They would have many empty slots. This would allow abusing the system when upgrading them.

In order to make escorts possible, a new type of Engine would be necessary that would be much cheaper and less fuel-consuming but also limit the speed of the ship. (Not faster than 20 knots even with minimal modules)

II. Corvettes (and medium-sized TB) require a Tier 0 light ship hull. It needs to be cheaper than a T1 DD and have limited range and only 1 custom slot.

With a fast engine, such a hull could be armed as a TB and with a slow engine (see above) it would be a PG, MS or MM, deepening on the module in the custom slot.

I think that they are presented as convoys. Since convoy should be transport ship with some escorts

apparently yes, but this is very abstracted. But it leaves out

• escorts were used for sub-hunting patrols
• mine warfare ships (MM and MS)
• medium TB (this weakens the navies of Denmark, Romania and Siam notably)

 

[J1ffst3r]

I think navy is fiddly enough as is without adding more ship types. As others have said you can use the ship designer to custom make extra light fast ships or whatever you like, it's pretty flexible.

 

[Ketchup & friends]

you can use the ship designer to custom make extra light fast ships or whatever you like, it's pretty flexible.

But the Problem is you can't make extra light SLOW ships.

 

[Riekopo]

Before they add anymore boats they need to improve the flaws of the Ship Designer. It's too simple. Can't make historical submarines for example. Cruiser submarines simply become obsolete and pointless. Missing Light Carriers and Escort Carriers. Carrier combat needs a lot of work with regards to their aircraft. And the naval OOB also needs a ton of changes and improvements.

 

[Le Jones]

Before they add anymore boats they need to improve the flaws of the Ship Designer. It's too simple. Can't make historical submarines for example. Cruiser submarines simply become obsolete and pointless. Missing Light Carriers and Escort Carriers. Carrier combat needs a lot of work with regards to their aircraft. And the naval OOB also needs a ton of changes and improvements.

This - in the game that is the basis for (shameless plug) my AAR I did produce an ASW 'light destroyer' in 1940 using 1940s ASW tech (and skimping on virtually all AA and other expensive items) on an early hull to save a bit of cost per unit, but I think that frigates / corvettes shouldn't be the priority. I could kinda get behind an abstract 'convoy escort' line in a similar fashion to how convoys currently work, but I'm not passionate about it.

Making CVEs a worthwhile option, IMO should be more of a priority.

 

[Ketchup & friends]

Before they add anymore boats they need to improve the flaws of the Ship Designer. It's too simple. Can't make historical submarines for example. Cruiser submarines simply become obsolete and pointless. Missing Light Carriers and Escort Carriers. Carrier combat needs a lot of work with regards to their aircraft. And the naval OOB also needs a ton of changes and improvements.

Fixing Carriers will also enable small escorts. Most of the problems with CVE are the same as with small escorts: They’re too fast and too expensive (both construction and fuel).