Has Anyone Destroyed the Raiders?

[Hardlec]

Has anyone managed to win the Scenario "Destroy the raiders?"  if so, how?

[Shaftoe]

I didn't give this mission much attention, but after several unsuccessful tries, I have almost won it by building a very heavily armored battleship with 4 twin 13' gun turrets (one at the bow, one at the stern and one at each side amidships) and underwater torpedoes. Casemate guns would be useless (not worth the weight and money). 

I was able to destroy 2 enemy cruisers and almost destroyed the last heavily damaged cruiser, but by that time my battleship succumbed to non-stop enemy fire from that last cruiser (which is what I dislike about this game: heavily damaged ships are often just as effective and dangerous as those in perfect condition, as if they are not completely ruined and their crews weren't turned into a bloody mess).

It's going to be an extreme close quarters battle. From tactical standpoint, it's very important that you do not allow enemy cruisers to surround or outflank you. Do your best to keep your BB angled, but avoid maneuvering too much, as it will decrease your chances of actually hitting the enemy. I would also suggest using "safe" gun and torpedo behavior in order to avoid wasting time on bad shots and reloads between them. 

Theoretically, you could try building a very heavily armored, slow battleship with a lot of smaller caliber guns (like double 6' and/or 8' turrets - but preferably single caliber, as it would give you accuracy bonus) and getting into extremely close range battle, counting on the sheer amount of shells you'll be sending their way. But all three enemy CAs have excellent damage control, they are VERY reseliet to floodings and fires, so smaller caliber may end up not working as desired.

I think it would be fair to say that it mostly comes down to luck. You are going to be badly outmatched, and your only chance is "rolling the hard six" by entering extreme CQB and focusing your attention on a single (closest) enemy, quickly dispatching them one by one, until there is no one left. All while not allowing them to surround or outflank you. But, as I am sure you have already learned from experience, things don't always go your way. So, you better hope.  

Tbh that mission is retarded (just as the one where you're supposed to sink a Semi-dreadnought), because you have to fight against overwhelming odds while having only outdated tech (no matter what bonus you take) and too few resources to afford building enough ships that could actually reliably get the job done (and additional money bonus for this mission is pathetic - no extra tech for just 2.000.000 bucks). 

 

[WelshZeCorgi]

I managed to do it in two ways. One is focusing on long distance dueling, trying to find guns that balances range, accuracy, penetration and damage, get thick deck armor for plunging fire protection, angle your ship to try and deflect the incoming shots as you take the inside circle to keep them at range. And it's a waiting game, trying to keep out of their big gun's effective range. 

 

The other was a heavily armored brawler with smaller, faster firing guns. I tried with torpedoes but the cruisers are agile enough to dodge them, so don't put those on, as you're also increasing ammo detonation while their low rpm limits their usefulness past the first shot. but definitely prepare to put a torpedo belt for the cruisers torps. Put plenty of belt armor and try to have Max bulkheads and citadel for ammo detonation prevention. And don't make your tonnage too high, your ship too big, cause you'll need to be a hard to hit target. Plus heavier ships are also harder to maneuver so try to keep tonnage to a minimum, this means trying to get away with 80% engine efficiency, little armor on secondaries, deck, towers and turret top. Try to balance hitting power with reload speed as you'll be outgunned and need both to negate it. Angle your armor on the approach and try to go for the last in line and work your way up. 

 

The long range version takes a lot of time and gets boring and even then it's not a sure thing that you'll win. One lucky shot can cripple you. 

Shorter range is a bit more difficult but takes much less time and allows you to fine tune the ship in less time. 

 

If one of the cruisers looses engine power (both engines, not just one) and falls out of line, it's a tough decision to either try and sink it or move on to a more dangerous target. If it has knocked out main guns as well, it's better to switch targets to try and knock out more guns attacking you. 

Edited January 19, 2020 by WelshZeCorgi

[RAMJB]

I had no problems with this scenario at all. Used both the firepower route, and the maneouverability route. Haven't tried the survival one though (might give it a try at some point)

Firepower route is self explanatory. Pick the predreadnought hull and pack a sensibly strong main battery alongside a strong secondary one and let the class III rangefinders do their job. Given the rather limited range of the engagement, both coincidence and stereoscopic do a good job out of it. I went for stereoscopic out of personal practice (anything capital ship gets the long range version of the rangefinder in my designs).

In battle position yourself between the transports and the enemy, try to keep a mostly safe range waiting for hits to happen. 12'' hits will truly disgrace whatever they touch, and the 7'' are more than enough to grind down an enemy cruiser at the ranges involved. Once you deal enough damage for an enemy to be seriously impaired, switch targets and move on to the next. Once all three are seriously wounded, and if you've sunk none due to an ammo detonation (which do happen) move in for the kill. The key is keeping your ship at the correct covering position between you and the transports. Don't be afraid of doing full reversals if needed. Act as the shield to prevent them from engaging the transports, while forcing them to shoot at a target they can deal very limited damage to. And to not go gung ho at the beginning - the enemy has more guns but most of them of limited caliber meaning they'll overpower you at close enough ranges where they begin being able to go through your armor.  You have the FCS advantage (compared with the other options) and the armor to bounce most of what they lob at you - so use both. 



Maneouvering route was more challenging and convoluted but I had a heck of a time with it. You can get an exceedingly fast, yet very well armored and armed, AC out of the options that choice gives you. This one relied a lot more in correct tactical choices, positioning and grinding. Your FCS is notably worse but your main guns fire a lot kicker and still do pretty big damage per hit while guaranteeing pens at pretty much safe ranges for your main armor (nowhere close to a 12'' though). Accuracy can be helped by keeping the speed at 26-ish knots, more than enough to outmaneouver the enemy and making yourself a harder target to hit, while getting the accuracy bonuses for going at speeds close to cruise. Your secondary guns become firestorm spitters but their lower accuracy hurts - still at the ranges involved 5'' can, and will, hurt the enemy. 

Again, the key is to disable and move on while acting as a shield. Don't go looking for straight up kills, rather soften an enemy enough so it maneouvers out of the line, and target the next one in line. Once all three are injured enough, move in for the kill. It's a lot more touchy as 3'' extremities means you're far more vulnerable to hits on the extremities, but you still have a thick as heck main belt - keep outside of the range they can pen it and you'll be mostly good to go.

In both cases you'll end up with a very very beaten up ship - but both routes allow you to win as long as you make the right tactical calls.

 

Edited January 21, 2020 by RAMJB

[Shaftoe]

So, I tried the option with smaller guns (+firepower bonus). 11-12' for bow and stern turrets, and largest possible guns (7-8') for side turrets. No torpedoes (weight/cost saving choice). All on a slow (15 kt) and heavily armored platform. This time I decided to avoid close quarters combat and kept distance. Still got severely damaged, but was able to sink all three raiders, thanks to better rate of fire of smaller guns and proper angling. I tried to keep my own maneuvering to a minimum in order not to suffer penalties for it, and attacked only ships that sailed straight and weren't turning. Eventually, I was able to wear them down.

The problem is that no matter what you do, your accuracy is terrible, so you must always try to orchestrate the best conditions for your guns to work in. Which means - not turning and not shooting at enemies that are turning. Also, make sure to give secondary turrets decent armor - they will be very important, and will easily get knocked out. Needless to say, main turrets will need to be armored pretty well, too. 

Good luck.

P.S. Ironically, all "raiders" seem to always ignore the transports that they're supposed to destroy. Lol.

[RAMJB]

6 hours ago, Shaftoe said:

So, I tried the option with smaller guns (+firepower bonus).

With firepower option going for bigger guns makes more sense. You get the bigger dudes up to the 13'' turret on their Mk3 versions, while with the other options only the 9, 10 and 11'' turrets have Mk3 status, the 12'' and 13'' ones being Mk2s (and suffer accordingly from lower accuracy and reload).

Not saying that smaller guns won't work, but it makes sense, if you go with firepower bonus, to at least load 12'' guns, to "milk" the bonus you receive :).

[cj95]

 

 

Me:   Spending hours and hours replaying this scenario over and over.  Trying various configurations without success....either transports or my battleship, or BOTH going to the bottom in flames....

 

Also Me: (looking at clock) ugh...I have to leave for work in ten minutes....Ill run one more game on full time compression 5X and just sail in a straight line while I get dressed.

 

Computer ME:  (Ding) Success...you have won the battle!

 

 

 

Yeah...well a win is a win I guess....even if I didn't even hit the keyboard.

2x13" turrets and 4x 7" turrets for the record......17 knot top speed with armor maxed out.

 

 

[Shaftoe]

8 hours ago, RAMJB said:

With firepower option going for bigger guns makes more sense. You get the bigger dudes up to the 13'' turret on their Mk3 versions, while with the other options only the 9, 10 and 11'' turrets have Mk3 status, the 12'' and 13'' ones being Mk2s (and suffer accordingly from lower accuracy and reload).

Not saying that smaller guns won't work, but it makes sense, if you go with firepower bonus, to at least load 12'' guns, to "milk" the bonus you receive :).

I took firepower for some technologies and took smaller turrets to save weight (and increase RoF) - to use it for better armor and secondaries. all "extremely big guns" options did not work well for me - accuracy was extremely low, while the enemy was consistently dealing damage.   

[RAMJB]

No, not all extremely big. You'll note in the screenshot I linked avobe, my firepower ship had 12'' guns. Firepower allows you to get 13'' Mk3s too, but those ended up eating too much into my armor to be used. I was using 7'' secondaries too, when the hull allows to up to 9'' in turrets on twin turrets onthe sides (four per side, but still), or the same number of 8'' secondaries (in both cases the lower rate of fire loss was too big to be interesting enough for their extra weight cost, specially so when 7'' guns are enough against the ships you end up fighting).

So it's not a case of going "all big gun". Rather that one of the bonuses the firepower option gives is two extra Mk3 main battery turrets that with other options are Mk2 at best.  Given the pretty large effect the extra damage those big guns bring to the table, it's kind of counterproductive to go for the firepower option that allows for them, to then not use them at all.

Edited January 21, 2020 by RAMJB

[Shaftoe]

It is not counterproductive, because firepower also opens access to other technologies which other options will not provide. I don't know about you, but personally I am not waiting for winter holidays to come just so I can put the christmas tree on in my living room. There are many other nice things that come with it, and it's them that I am most interested in. 

It's the same here. 

[Latur Husky]

A bit cheeky victory, but win is a win xD

Edited January 22, 2020 by Latur Husky

[RAMJB]

Ok, gave a try to the survivability option too.

Plainly stated, it's by far the best option. And by a very VERY large margin over the other two (I don't consider "funds" an option at all xDDDDD)


First try I failed - I was not doing all that bad but I still was taking far too damage on the ship's extremities. By the time I was able to finish one of the enemies I was down to 50% structure, suffering from large hit penalties, and slowed down by both structural damage and some flooding in my extremity compartments. The remaining two came far too close with me not being able to do anything to prevent it, and they began being able to pen my main belt too - game over.

I recorded myself today on a 2nd try, this time with a different design with almost as much armor on the extremities as in the middle of the ship to prevent that kind of thing happening again.

The result: On a ship with maxed out bulkheads, most options to the max, 18 knot speed, twin 11'' main mounts and 4x2 9'' main wing mounts, you can pack up 14'' of belt armor, 13'' of turrets and secondaries, 12.5'' of extended belt armor, and 3.5'' deck everywhere, which is rather ridiculous, specially because that's Krupp IV.

With the way the armor system currently works (armoring your whole hull instead of the belt) your hull becomes an impregnable fortress to whatever the enemy ships bring, as long as you keep your distance at 4-5km or so. Your funnel and towers are still vulnerable  but you can shrug off whatever they shoot at you. It'll either bounce or at the best get minimal damage semi-pen hits.

Yes, the enemy will have vastly superior FCS than yours. It's going to be A LOT of hits, but in the test I gave I ended up the battle at circa 75% structure and no flooding - given that with both firepower and maneouver options I ended up with terribly mauled ships (on the 30-40% structure range), that says enough. It was quite literally a walk in the park. So meanwhile the enemy is bouncing off your ship like mad or doing absurdly laughable damage at best, you'll be scoring far less hits, but each individual hit being a 9'' or a 11'' it's going to be REALLY telling for them (specially because I went with heavy shells). They don't have the armor to take the hits at all while they can spend the whole day shooting at you for no real result.

Keeping a chase profile is massively important. Torpedoes are key in this setup too - keeping the enemy at range is vital. Anything that comes close to 4.5km or so, you throw a torpedo at him to force him to turn away. If you're VERY lucky, you'll score a hit. Don't count on it tho - those torpedoes are crappy slow and they can see them from Saturn, so they will avoid them. But the point of those torpedoes is not to hit with them - it's to force the enemy to move away when they come too close for comfort.

You'll need to be aware of which enemy ships have torpedoes too, and do regular changes of course to throw any incoming's aim off. Just by following those steps the scenario wins itself. 

I'm rendering a video right now which shows both the design and the try I gave to it. It's a design I'd change a bit (needs a 2nd funnel as backup in case one gets destroyed), but otherwise passed the test with flying colors. Will link it when it's uploaded.

Edited January 22, 2020 by RAMJB

[arkhangelsk]

Ended up winning with this:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/icGDw8vPj5NXrWtX7

I also won another time with a faster design (post-hotfix) ... but did the devs tweak it? It seems harder this time. I ended up with the firepower build but took some tips from RamJB's idea. Forget speed - the speed accuracy reduction isn't worth a damn at this zone. Put it on armor and I'm not sure if the torpedoes worked, but at least they didn't hurt.

[RAMJB]

As promised:

 

[RAMJB]

2 hours ago, arkhangelsk said:

Ended up winning with this:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/icGDw8vPj5NXrWtX7

Some thoughts on your design:
0'' of armor for secondaries is asking to lose them to almost anything they get hit by. Even with firepower option your chances to hit are worse than theirs, if anythign because how many guns are firing at you and how fast they do so. In this scenario you're going to get hit. A lot. Anything you don't armor well enough isn't going to last in an operational status...and your firepower is something you want to protect at all costs - even secondary guns.
Lack of antitorpedo protection is .... bothersome in a scenario where all three enemies can bring them to battle. Same with the basic bulkhead option - armor can keep damage out but fires are going to happen no matter what. With the basic bulkheads that fire can, and will, spread, and quite fast at that.
Only one funnel is dangerous - you can't armor it, it's not a rare thing to see getting hit, and if it goes down your ability to accelerate goes down the drain. Any speed  you lose in maneouvers, is speed gone almost for good. While you'll never be a speed demon you need that speed up if anything to avoid incoming torpedoes - lose too much and you won't be able to comb them. That compounds your lack of antitorpedo protection and can mean the end of a scenario if unluckly.

Meanwhile you're going with 13''. Which really hurt when they hit but have a slightly lower ROF than the 12'', and 12'' is far more than enough to deal with any armored cruiser. 13'' is a bit overkill and you're using up a lot of weight that would help you solving the other issues.

So I'd downscale the main battery to 12'' guns, use the saved weight to up the armor on secondaries, put at least antitorpedo and bulkeads II, and drop a small funnel as a backup for the main one. Downgrade other armor as necessary to accomplish that. In general 12'' should be enough to give you a large range of safety against the guns the AI usually brings to battle.

Not saying that the design doesn't work - but it has some flaws that can make it fail with an unlucky hit or two. Part of the design process is to try and cover all your bases as good as you can, and this design leaves some open for the enemy to exploit ;).
 

Edited January 22, 2020 by RAMJB

[Hardlec]

I'm very very very disappointed in this scenario.    The build bonus says I may have 5 mounts for main guns.  I get 2.  Thye largest guns I can put on wing turret mounts are 10 inchers.  So the most big guns I can get are 10x10 inch, a right poor main battery.  

My accuracy is always "--poor,"  no matter how much of a priority I give it.

I am out-ranged by a lot, and I am out gunned by more than double and I am out displaced by double.

My biggest possible ship is 18.5 K tons.  I am facing 3 ships of 12K tons.

With the best possible armor I can by, my opponent is penetrating my 6 inch deck plates with 6 inch guns at a range where my 10 inch guns won't hit except on a fluke , and then do dink damage.

The disparities are worse with the other choices.

The several other commentators all seem to say:  they win on a fluke.   Well, I've won on a fluke, but I don't consider that really winning.   

 

This scenario is seriously broken.  please fix it.

 

[arkhangelsk]

First, these scenarios are called Naval Academy, and by the time you work up to Destroy the Raiders, you should have gotten the basics down. The scenario is designed to be hard and yes they have better, more modern guns and FC - this is to force you to really learn the system and maximize what advantages you have.

And just a hint. Don't bother with 10" guns. They are the disfavored guns of this round for one reason or another. Go with a mix of eleven and nine inch. The latter is clearly a "hero gun" - check the stat cards if you want to confirm yourself. But the hotfix is coming soon, so we'll have to go and check out all the guns and other relationships ... again when it is done.