Destroy a Full Fleet Scenario

[VarangianGarde]

Why does this scenario start with the enemy having superior sight and range finding? It's a major disadvantage that seems to make the scenario unwinnable (aside from cheating by restarting until you get lucky enough to avoid major damage until you can bring your own guns to bear). The enemy fleet usually starts out somehow having sight of my fleet at ranges of greater than 15 km, and I'm never able to sight them until around 10 km. Most major fleet battles of the dreadnought era featured kills at greater than 10 km range.

 

I love the concept here, but it just seems like the scenario parameters need improvement. I would suggest making a "Improved Fire Control" perk in the mission. If RADAR and Computer Assisted Fire Control were introduced as an option, that would be a significant improvement to allow BBs and BCs to make full use of their long range heavy guns. Further, you'd really see the difference between ships equipped with it and those not.

 

Historically, WWII BBs would open fire at about 13 mi/20 km. Here's a non-exhaustive list:

       Battle of Surigao Strait: BB USS West Virginia RADAR picks up Japanese BB contacts at 38 km, opens fire with 16" guns at 20.8 km. (Confirmed hits)

       Battle off Samar Island: BB IJN Yamato makes visual contact with DDs and CVE, opens fire with 18" guns at 31 km (Intially ineffective, with later hits at closer range)

       Battle of Denmark Straits: BB HMS Prince of Wales and BC Hood  sights BB Bismarck and CA Prinz Eugen at 27 km. BC Hood opens fire at 24 km  (BB Prince of Wales scoring several hits as range closed)

                                                   BB KMS Bismarck opens fire at 14 km, inflicting a catastrophic hit detonating BC Hood's magazine.

Finally, if the scenario were more of Jutland style encounter:

       Battle of Dogger Bank: BC HMS Lion opens fire with 13.5" at 18 km (initially ineffective, though salvos calibrated to effective fire within 20 minutes)

       Battle of Jutland: BC SMS Lutzow opens fire with 12" at 14 km (very effective, with two British BCs destroyed within an hour)

 

As you can see, long range gunnery was very much a thing by at least 1914. Considering the tech levels of this mission, I'd love to be able to bring my BB or BC guns to bear at a more realistic range.

 

 

@Nick Thomadis @admin

 

Edited October 13, 2019 by VarangianGarde
Tagged admins for reference

[VarangianGarde]

 

As you can see, the formation has to endure about 18 minutes of fairly accurate bombardment, and doesn't even have the chance to fire until the lead contact is 7.3 km out. Hopefully you guys can work on this.

All that aside, thanks for your work! I've enjoyed the game in 1 on 1 and small fleet encounters. I'd love to see major fleet actions improved.

[TBRSIM]

This (and some other things like range/accuracy nerfs for more rapid loading systems discussed in another thread) is a sign that UA:D currently strays too far into arcade territory. Instead of making the game more approachable and fun such things are "gamey" and detract from the potential of a "sim-like" approach which strives to respect realism. That visual sight range for any dreadnought can be less than 12km when the more modern enemy has a sight range of 26km is ludicrous, but that is how the variables for hull, component "signatures" and vision boni of the towers currently work.

I sincerely hope Darth will allow/enable modding of the game as he himself is a modder of note. Some variables might still be a matter of historic interpretation (like flash fire rate and cause) but the current "arcade" approach to some variables massively detracts from the game's potential. At the very least we need a "historical" or "realism" mode in addition to the current "arcade" mode.

[Christian]

yeah this seems unrealistic at ranges up to around 18 km both ships should be able to see each other when they open fire 

one ship could gain the range advantage if it opened fire at lets say 30km with radar and so on

 

but i think capital ships should be instantly spotted if they open fire below 18 km or 15 km range would make the most sense

 

 

Edited October 12, 2019 by Christian

[Niomedes]

This scenario can be won pretty easily if you know what you're doing and build your battleships accordingly with lots of armor and gunnery that is optimised for long range precision. In fact, I've never lost it even once. 

Aside of that, Fire rate and engagement Range for most ship types really seem a little short, and could be increased significantly without retracting from realism, but rather while increasing it.

Edited October 13, 2019 by Niomedes

[VarangianGarde]

Quote

This scenario can be won pretty easily if you know what you're doing and build your battleships accordingly with lots of armor and gunnery that is optimised for long range precision. In fact, I've never lost it even once. 

Aside of that, Fire rate and engagement Range for most ship types really seem a little short, and could be increased significantly without retracting from realism, but rather while increasing it.

 

Fair enough, @Niomedes. That hasn't been my experience, though. Is there a way to build it so that you don't have to slog through miles of unanswered salvos? What build do you use?

 

Here are the stats from my last playthrough:

Unfortunately I don't recall the long range bonuses, but I had high base accuracy, excellent stability, no triple turret malus. I bought the highest grade rangefinder and radio available, and still had to slog through miles of gunfire.

Here's a snap of the build I used.

Four 15"s, Two 9"s, and a host of casemate 8"s and 6"s. Perfect fore/aft stability and all that.

 

What did you do different?

 

Edited October 13, 2019 by VarangianGarde
Refinement

[Niomedes]

20 minutes ago, VarangianGarde said:

 

Fair enough, @Niomedes. That hasn't been my experience, though. Is there a way to build it so that you don't have to slog through miles of unanswered salvos? What build do you use?

 

Here are the stats from my last playthrough:

Unfortunately I don't recall the long range bonuses, but I had high base accuracy, excellent stability, no triple turret malus. I bought the highest grade rangefinder and radio available, and still had to slog through miles of gunfire.

Here's a snap of the build I used.

Four 15"s, Two 9"s, and a host of casemate 8"s and 6"s. Perfect fore/aft stability and all that.

 

What did you do different?

 

145 mm of effective deck armor. You won't take a lot of damage that way.

[VarangianGarde]

Good suggestion @Niomedes

 

Replayed with 6.2" deck armor, and it made a big difference. I'd had deck armor at 3" in previous builds, similar to Pennsylvania class and of WWI spec. Bumping deck spec up to Iowa class levels made for a lot fewer major hits.

 

That being said, I feel like the range criticism I had remains true. It's still unbalanced to slog through miles of salvos before you can open up in answer. Hopefully range finding, radio, and RADAR tech is boosted in further updates to give the big guns the advantage they're supposed to have.

 

[JohnVicres]

1 hour ago, Niomedes said:

145 mm of effective deck armor. You won't take a lot of damage that way.

I'm not the most creative ship designer, and I tend to prefer the Battlecruiser approach of decent armor and lots of guns, but this mission has consistently kicked my ass because of that... I focus on firepower while trying to armor up the BCs at a decent cost/value (to have more than one BC): someting around 350-200mm belt, 100-80mm deck, ~200mm/50mm turrets, 100mm secs, and a stupidly armored conning. However, the BBs just plough through all that like butter, even if I bow-tank; my ship's guns can barely dent the CAs, and I've used 356 to 406 cannons; my ships can't hit shit, even at some suicidal ranges like 7km; while theirs can pinpoint and obliterate mine from the usual 20km.

Seriously, what the hell do I do? I get that making impenetrable armor helps a lot, but that goes at the expense of better guns, speed, or number of ships! Did you just HE everything with low calibers, or what? I kinda don't know what else to do

 

[Shaun]

I personally find this scenario a little annoying because the enemy is firing at you for miles before you see them. This doesn't seem to carry in any other scenario.

[VarangianGarde]

27 minutes ago, Shaun said:

I personally find this scenario a little annoying because the enemy is firing at you for miles before you see them. This doesn't seem to carry in any other scenario.

Exactly.

[VarangianGarde]

20 hours ago, JohnVicres said:

I'm not the most creative ship designer, and I tend to prefer the Battlecruiser approach of decent armor and lots of guns, but this mission has consistently kicked my ass because of that... I focus on firepower while trying to armor up the BCs at a decent cost/value (to have more than one BC): someting around 350-200mm belt, 100-80mm deck, ~200mm/50mm turrets, 100mm secs, and a stupidly armored conning. However, the BBs just plough through all that like butter, even if I bow-tank; my ship's guns can barely dent the CAs, and I've used 356 to 406 cannons; my ships can't hit shit, even at some suicidal ranges like 7km; while theirs can pinpoint and obliterate mine from the usual 20km.

Seriously, what the hell do I do? I get that making impenetrable armor helps a lot, but that goes at the expense of better guns, speed, or number of ships! Did you just HE everything with low calibers, or what? I kinda don't know what else to do

 

After following @Niomedes  armor uber alles approach, I did finally "win" the scenario. Everything I wrote in my initial post was the same, and I still had to grind through endless salvos before bringing my guns to bear at about 10 km. Effective fire really only started working at 7.5 km, and I actually closed to 5 km or less to engage with the heavily armored BBs. That isn't how I want to play the scenario, and I don't think its a good simulation of the way an engagement with a later stage Iowa/Bismarck type ship should go.

[Niomedes]

12 minutes ago, VarangianGarde said:

After following @Niomedes  armor uber alles approach, I did finally "win" the scenario. Everything I wrote in my initial post was the same, and I still had to grind through endless salvos before bringing my guns to bear at about 10 km. Effective fire really only started working at 7.5 km, and I actually closed to 5 km or less to engage with the heavily armored BBs. That isn't how I want to play the scenario, and I don't think its a good simulation of the way an engagement with a later stage Iowa/Bismarck type ship should go.

I mean, you can also equip your ships with 406's and the advanced fire control and shoot them from 10km with about 25% accuracy. But engagement ranges of over 15km aren't really feasable at the moment outside of radar ships.

[Shaun]

5 minutes ago, Niomedes said:

I mean, you can also equip your ships with 406's and the advanced fire control and shoot them from 10km with about 25% accuracy. But engagement ranges of over 15km aren't really feasable at the moment outside of radar ships.

HMS Warspite is turning in her scrapped, watery grave.

[VarangianGarde]

28 minutes ago, Niomedes said:

I mean, you can also equip your ships with 406's and the advanced fire control and shoot them from 10km with about 25% accuracy. But engagement ranges of over 15km aren't really feasable at the moment outside of radar ships.

I did indeed go with highest possible rangefinder and radio, towers, etc. I equipped mostly 15"s and a single battery of 16", as that was all weight would allow.

[Niomedes]

7 minutes ago, VarangianGarde said:

I did indeed go with highest possible rangefinder and radio, towers, etc. I equipped mostly 15"s and a single battery of 16", as that was all weight would allow.

That decreases your accuracy due to non-uniform calibres

[Pedroig]

22km is standard max spotting range BB to BB. 
 

WWI typical battle range was 10-14km, rare cases of ranges closing to under 7500 m. 
 

Except for very specific training scenarios or very early torpedoes, ships should NEVER be within one nautical mile of the enemy. It should be rare to ever be within 400 m of any friendly ship under way. 

[Schwieger]

12 hours ago, Niomedes said:

That decreases your accuracy due to non-uniform calibres

Niomedes, do you have a setup that is able to match the AI's range? From what I've been able to gather here you have decent range but still mainly rely on tanking + speed to get the job done.

[Niomedes]

2 hours ago, Schwieger said:

Niomedes, do you have a setup that is able to match the AI's range? From what I've been able to gather here you have decent range but still mainly rely on tanking + speed to get the job done.

No. Because you don't get the sufficient spotting quipment in the scenario.

[Nick Thomadis]

This mission will receive the necessary rebalance and will go up higher in the mission list, to reflect its difficulty.

[Squatter]

Going back to the OP - I would like to know the answer to the question why the enemy vessels in this scenario are able to see the player's ships so far in advance? What is the mechanic here? Is it simply because the DDs are spotting ahead and signalling back to the large ships? 

Also, once ships begin firing shouldn't they be much more spottable? What is the historic reality to this - wouldn't large vessels firing their big guns be easier to spot than if they were not firing?

[Squatter]

On 10/13/2019 at 4:24 AM, Niomedes said:

This scenario can be won pretty easily if you know what you're doing and build your battleships accordingly with lots of armor and gunnery that is optimised for long range precision. In fact, I've never lost it even once. 

Aside of that, Fire rate and engagement Range for most ship types really seem a little short, and could be increased significantly without retracting from realism, but rather while increasing it.

 

I'm sad to say I've played this scenario with various builds about ten times and lost every time. 

Do you care to elaborate on your 'never lose' setup for this mission? 

[Entropy Avatar]

I tried my first crack at this scenario last night. I think I came close to the 70% threshold, but the remaining enemies fled beyond the visibility range and both my ships took enough damage that I couldn't catch up to them. Even the almost-completely sunk BC managed to slip away somehow.

I didn't take much damage from the approach fire, but having ships just vanish into the fog was rather annoying. 

[Shaun]

51 minutes ago, Entropy Avatar said:

I tried my first crack at this scenario last night. I think I came close to the 70% threshold, but the remaining enemies fled beyond the visibility range and both my ships took enough damage that I couldn't catch up to them. Even the almost-completely sunk BC managed to slip away somehow.

I didn't take much damage from the approach fire, but having ships just vanish into the fog was rather annoying. 

An enemy sailor shouts through his fog horn "so long suckers!" as their ship disappears into the fog...

[Niomedes]

3 hours ago, Squatter said:

 

I'm sad to say I've played this scenario with various builds about ten times and lost every time. 

Do you care to elaborate on your 'never lose' setup for this mission?