Tankaxe

I played a short game before I head to work and I don't know why but screening destroyers keep suiciding themselves into the enemy fleet instead of sticking with the battleships and you know protecting them. I found other issues but I want to play more before I talk about em.

Agreed and most of the super structure we have are big and unwieldy that it makes it hard for me to make different unique designs because SS shape and hardpoints is a massive restriction.

Well at least the Germans have a chance to give a strong argument against Fischer's"speed is armor" concept lol.

Hello everyone I would like to open up thread to talk about battleship development in the 1920s and the pause of battleship construction from the Washington Naval Treaty and how it would affect this game. I don't want this game to fall into the same trap RtWs fell into in this era with AI ships templates going by treaty limits when the player has no reservations to be bound by a treaty that was never signed. The 1920s would've given birth to warships that are the apex of battleship construction and it would only grow from there because naval aviation was still in its infancy. While most techs are available from what I've seen in custom battle designers in 1920-26 the 18" gun seems to be a 1930s tech which might upset people who would like to build an G3 design. Battleship designs would also be serious unknowns after the initial batch of designs and trends drops of by the WNT. This would require creativity in regards to superstructure design and hulls by navies who weren't a naval power and plans on what the next generation of battleships would look like if construction wasn't stopped. While I'm ambivalent to Iowa, Bismarck and Yamato hulls and superstructure (a topic for another time) I believe that it is crucial to factor in what is a non-WNT naval world. Thus I would like open this thread about this and open to discussion in regards to non-WNT gameplay.

I'm not a fan of the fact that captain can magically boost a ships capabilities (rate of fire, flooding). Besides most of these aren't necessary because we will have crew training in the campaign. Which already does most of those things if you invest in them.

Major issue with the Hood hull and towers. It doesn't allow you to fit any secondary below the towers and the max you can place is only 4x3 5" guns. Also I am seconding on the survivability issues pointed in this thread. I am seeing BBs in the 1930s tanking multiple 18" broadsides at close range with negligible damage.

Perhaps feel was not the proper word to use but Roach was correct that I reevaluated my opinions once its been pointed out. What I was trying to say with the damage model as it is now the lower hit rate would make sinking ships a more tedious action unless both were changed together. akd did point out that it can be inconsistent like the 9" one shot example but then require ludicrous amount of ordinance to sink the next game. However the Pre-dread era is much more easy to sink ships because all the background dam con techs hadn't kicked in yet and can be quite fun. Enjoyed these discussions and wish everyone a good day

Perhaps, I do know that IRL hit rates were in %5 and that's including advanced radar and fire control. However since the bulkhead damage model in-game requires alot more ordinance to damage the lower hit rates makes it feel unwelcome. We already have ships that can 32 large caliber penetrations and still chug along once the proper dam con tech is aquired. Maybe the hit rate is fine but in that case penetrating hits should be of more consequence.

Light forces (heavy cruiser and below) are still a major contention this update. They are unable to have accuracy above %20 regardless the range and their hulls are tanky enough to withstand a hail of medium gunfire that is 11" the only semi-useful cruiser gun. Accuracy for lower caliber guns need a major overhaul rather than a light step we had this patch. Torpedoes also make cruiser action unfun since everyone is throwing torpedo spam at each other with reload times. All sense of tactics and positioning is useless besides the ungodly micro of dodging torps because formations makes evasive manuvers a mess. This also includes of boths sides has DD as it's just stabbing DDs at each other and dropping torps suicidally.

Recently back from a custom battle between a 1v1 battleship fight with 1918 tech and the results were concerning. AP damage and ship survivability is constantly beaten horse during the Alpha but its still something to take a look at. during my little test the enemy ship took over 32 penetrating hits from 14" guns in 1918. this is quite ridiculous as some can see and I wasn't able to sink the ship because it turned around leaving nothing to shoot at but the stern. As anyone knows when a battle turns into a stern chase it will be impossible to catch them because all of your penetrating hits will register no damage leaving the structural health bar alone. Even an ammo detonation did little to speed things along flooding after serious pounding dropped to %21 and rapidly clawed its way to %51 once it turned astern. This is currently the more frustrating issue in the Alpha and in my opinion should be the most pressing matter. Regardless I enjoy the game and wish the devs best of luck.

2nd tower is superior really because you have alot more space to place secondaries of your choosing.

I hope everyone enjoys the new update but I feel it only tip toed to the larger issues. I recently experimented in the custom battles of a task force cruiser battle (1926) and unfortunately it was a mess. ships that were set to screen abandoned their charges and sailed bow first into the enemy. Since their were a lot of light forces present they all proceed to get hit by torpedoes and due to how clunky the formation system is their is nothing I could do about it. My personally designed heavy cruisers armed with 11" guns were pitiful when it came to engage the enemy. Starting at 12000m apart I've yet to see any of their accuracy percentages grow beyond %12. Destroyers were worse as my 5" armed secondary's struggled to hit and struggled to do damage. Even the main guns of 11" still do pitiful damage when they hit, I've rolled damaging hits that only gave 4.2dmg! Light forces still have major issues that need to be resolved because without torpedo spamming they don't do much I returned back to capital ship fights and the issues were still the same. Armor piercing, luckily, is much more capable of landing hits but almost never cause serious damage. I might knock out a chunk of health here and there but the process of just repeatedly banging an old ship with 18" gun fire is frustrating. I believe the issue is that since citadels dramatically reduce the chance for an engine or ammo hit its quite difficult to land a ship that can do a lasting blow The placement system leaves me unimpressed as the only major change I see is that Yamato has hardpoints for folks to try a Nelson style ship but not much else. The ability to move our structures without snaps would be nice. Also the towers we get is restricting on what secondary armament I can mount on a ship. Despite the doom and gloom I like the new hulls and the more modern turret designs for secondary's look great. I'll gladly follow along and see things improve and wish the devs best of luck

I think it's important to remember that UA:D is already running a bit of alternate history. For an example "what if China was a competent naval power?" That's even stated in the main website Obviously this wasn't the case IRL the government was too corrupt and incompetent to wield a navy. But in this game is different enough that Spain and China wielding competent Navies isn't such a hard thing to believe. It seems in UA:D timeline the Spanish and the Chinese were able to be relatively put together with enough competence to wield a navy.

USA would be unique as well Industry leader: the nations economic capacity grows at a faster rate than other countries. +%5 shipbuilding, constant economic growth. +%5 research bonus And for the negatives Money pinching government: The government is very reluctant in giving the Navy funding and prefer to keep it low for other programs. -%15 less funding than normal at low tension (will go away or be reduced when tensions become higher). Perhaps the negatives can be overcome by going to war multiple times and have an event where Congress recognizes the importance of a navy and removes the money pinching malus.

Neat but I was thinking more of a hit going through the hull

Neat, does anyone has any example of what an over penetration from capital ship armnements does to a lightly armored target be it a protected cruiser or destroyer. Having a visual effect of it would be worthwhile

The ability to choose which nations flag you can fly on your ships would be a nice option to add

Yes the RNG in RtW is a pain (don't you just love when the battle generator feeds your CLs to enemy CAs and having to convoy raid with a grand total of 3 destroyers that's escorted by CLs) One of my major beef with it is how it handles cruiser battles. You don't get a proper cruiser task force and instead get these incredibly odd 1v1 or 2v2 cruiser battles with a destroyer escort here and there. It doesn't make sense and since the AI can have up to 20 CAs and more CLs all these single cruiser actions can be very exhausting. Things like convoy raiding and bombartment missions should require an entire taskforce of cruisers if they expect a similar number of enemy cruisers in the area. So IMO if the game can make cruiser actions bigger with missions that are important would be useful

Another advice is to slow your ships to full speed for the aiming bonus and you should start landing hits. I don't know about the above advice but I've had the enemy fleet completely focus on my CLs making them good to bait leaving my B unmolested. (Also check their speeds of it's 18kts restart as they can't do anything) If your using a BB only use 12" and above. You can fit these guns on the battleship hull by rotating it with the R key. But just as above you must knock out those CL because right when you start landing hits on the B the entire enemy fleet will run. Worse case scenario you cripple the semi-dread but due to damage model shenanigans you aren't able to land a killing blow because your shells keep hitting the destroyed sections. This will give the CLs time to escape and the enemy B has a rather significant chance to land a hit that will slow your ship and that's when you restart.

Note that once Battlecruisers hit the scene they made armored cruisers virtually obselete and most nations had stopped production of such ships to focus on building battlecruisers. so the only thing that would remain relevant is Mass produced light cruisers and destroyers to cover regions and screen the battlefleet Light and heavy cruisers were only a thing because of the Washington naval treaty and without it cruisers would just be further enlarged Battlecruisers. While the player can also make enlarged armored cruisers as some sort of 'anti-cruiser cruiser' the time and money they'll take would give other nations an advantage in the Battlecruiser race. So either way it's quite realistic that BC and BBs are stronger against weaker opponents and their main duty's is protecting and projecting force with numbers

Ah I certainly don't want to take too much time and resources. A road-map would be nice and thanks for the feed back. Now I feel bad because now I feel I was demanding.

Honestly the priority dev blog should be campaign features since we have players jumping on board either without reading the website with only their own fantasy in their heads. Or they do read it but are just miss understood on how it works. This is my preference but if the devs prefer to do a dev blog on campaign once they have it close to working order I have no qualms about it. My next preferred dev blog is just their statement on how they plan to handle the topic of aircraft carriers and other advancements in the 1940s+. Since most players are mostly fascinated with the era or it's the only part of naval history they know.

We really need more communication of the developers as discussions in the forums are going in all directions. We also dont really hear much from them besides acknowledging bugs and from what iv'e seen has recently stopped giving feedback to suggestions. I propose a dev diary so that we can see what the devs are focusing their efforts on so forum posts and tester can stay and keep relevant one topic at time. It should be moderated just enough to keep everything ontracks and not derail into a historical debate as we've seen multiple times. for an example say the developers release a diary on torpedoes on how they work and how they planned to go forward with it. Testers can give feedback to how they are and leave comments and suggestions for any proposed future development on one topic. This will help keep the community focused and focus feedback in areas that can be proven useful.

The jump of damage from 8" to 9" is so significant that it isn't worth going lower. 8" and below should also be the focus on bringing their damage in working but perhaps once the accuracy issue is resolved we can see if they can produce actual results the way they are.

Greeting and today I would like start the topic of citadels The way they are represented is disappointing and the only thing they do is reduce chances for magazine and engine room hits with an eye boggling amount of weight costs. Really I think they should be simplified and similar to what Rule the Waves did and limit it to three armor schemes: protected cruiser, sloped deck and flat deck(can be researched to be All or Nothing). Now this isn't just what is needed but what is required is citadel placements. Currently the players can space gun turrets nearly to the ends of the bow and stern which makes ships quite comical. So my suggestion is that funnels and gun turrets are all connected to each other as a citadel. The farther apart the funnels (which represent machinery space) and gun turrets the longer the citadel and the heavier they'll be. The players can control the citadels placement by just having its funnels and armnements together or farther apart. To prevent shenanigans, turreted secondaries must be placed in the citadel. This will the force the players, just as IRL ship designers, to make the ship more compact so the smaller the area the less weight is spent armoring the ships vitals and more armor can be placed over it. Everything outside the citadel is essentially Belt and Deck extended which are still important to protect from flooding and other damage with pre-AoN armor schemes. All or Nothing essentially focuses the protection of ship to one spot of the ship leaving BE and DE to 0". What makes it more unique is the that the ship will not ever take flotation damage unless the citadel is penetrated. Now to get this working Players need much more freedom on placement of guns, superstructure and funnels so they aren't forced to have everything apart. Now hulls are interesting, most of what we have didnt have either sloped deck or AoN designs. For an example some of some of the early hulls we have could be quite restrictive to placements that would make AoN unappealing because of how far your forced to spread out everything. So an easy fix is to have equipping different citadels allows you to choose between different hull types. These are my thoughts and I will be happy to extend this idea for discussion