>>>Alpha-5 Feedback<<<

[disc]

@Steeltrap Is this the damage model you are referring to?

What did you find valuable about it? Any glaring deficiencies?

 

I agree with the spirit of @baltic1284 's post. Should be able to give light cruisers additional armor, if so desired. US 6in-gun light cruisers from Brooklyn to Worcester had 6.5in turret faces -- not possible in the game.

I would go the "opposite" way for battleships. Several pre-Dreadnought classes had only 6in belts, as their thin Harveyized and Krupp-style armors were so much better than thicker compound belts. We should be allowed to use minimal armor ourselves.

[Steeltrap]

3 hours ago, disc said:

@Steeltrap Is this the damage model you are referring to?

What did you find valuable about it? Any glaring deficiencies?

Certainly looks like it from memory.

I liked the "track shell" option, so you could see where your hit went, if it exploded, and what mischief it caused. Having important components in specific locations was useful, too.

Best of all for me was the damage control/damage interplay. Clear number of resources for firefighting, shoring up flooding, plus pumping capacity. Fires ultimately damaged compartments and anything in them, ultimately to the point of both counting as destroyed. They could spread, too, of course. With finite resources, you'd sometimes have to sacrifice fighting one fire if another were threatening to damage something more important; that was especially true if fires were nearing magazines as you could flood them but with obvious consequences.Stability model meant you would often need to counter-flood, which was available. It highlighted really effectively why, as I believe the USN concluded, the first 10 minutes after a torpedo hit were the most vital as loss of stability usually was by far the greater danger than the flooding itself on a capital ship.

To sum it up, shells had to defeat armour (if AP) or explode largely on contact (HE). They could travel into the various decks of the ship, explode, and thus do damage and start fires. They could also cause flooding if below waterline of course. You can see where the ship's vital systems are. If you ship was the one hit, you then had finite means at your disposal with which to attempt to deal with the damage, fires and flooding. Flooding, counter-flooding, repairs and pumping all interacted, along with stability. Some systems were repairable, others would require returning to an appropriate base. In some peculiar ways it was like a game within a game. Trying to save a damaged ship could be challenging and fun.

The most obvious problem was the AI's inability to use the system effectively. It would lose ships it ought not because its damage control logic seemed really poor. Then again, the AI was the point of abject failure across the game in general. It had NO concept of refusing battles if outclassed, and that had pretty dire consequences (just as did Atlantic Fleet). It was released in 1990, and CA went for decades with shite AI, so I suppose we ought not be surprised.

Other problems?

I'm not sure there was much scaling in terms of damage; you could KO any ship's important component IF you could get to it regardless of what you used. On the other hand, that didn't matter so much on the major warships because small calibre guns were like ping pong balls when it came to really hurting the important stuff (within citadel, or armoured such as turrets and conning tower) just as ought to be the case.

"Damage sponging" might have been a problem, but I can't remember how it treated destroyed 'compartments' so it's possible it wasn't. Thinking about it, I suspect it wasn't and that it 'ignored' destroyed compartments when it came to more shell hits. Not exactly realistic, either, although if I had to choose I'd take that over destroyed compartments seemingly being endless in their capacity to absorb further damage.

Bear in mind it's probably 25 years since I played it, LOL, so my details of memories of it are sketchy. I do remember the bits I mentioned, obviously, so they're probably the most significant plus and minus points.

Have you played it? If so, what were your conclusions?

Cheers

[disc]

No, I never have.

I think many of the issues people post about trace back to the primitive damage model in place. I've been wondering how to rework it into something more realistic and accessible.

[Hangar18]

On 3/21/2020 at 6:12 AM, Mhtsos said:

 

Speed is also still not really affected by hull shape. Stubby/chonky BBs can easily make 30kns+.

It is. Even by your example, Yamato is a stubby BB, but only makes 28 knots. because its stubby, it also has a very tight turning circle.

hull geometry is important, its a large factor in turning radius, as well as speed. even the shape of the bow and aft have an affect.

Edited March 22, 2020 by Hangar18

[puxflacet]

Not exactly related directly to this update, but I have small nitpick:

I think you should remove german ship names starting with "Ersatz". afaik, these names were just placeholder names for projects and these ships were about to receive proper names when launched. In fact the term "ersatz" means "replacement" and were given for projects which were supposed to replace certain units in the fleet, ex.: "Ersatz Yorck" = "Replacement for Yorck".

Edited March 22, 2020 by puxflacet

[desphex]

Is it me or does the AI go mental on it's armor thinkness on modern battleships when in custom battles? I've come across multiple engagements where i'm sailing my tiny 44 to 67k displacement battleship at 28 to 30 knots armed with 8/9 14/15 inch guns and decently armored 35/38cm belt and 20/22cm thick deck armor only to stumble upon the AI's 90.000+ displacement battleship steaming at 27 to 31 knots with a simular main armement as me and a 70cm to 90cm armored belt....

so when i keep at long range for plunging fire i miss more then i hit untill my ammo runs out and we both sail away slightly damaged or when i close into the AI all i get to see is my shells simple bounce off the side while i get pummeled at that close a range and see my ships sleep with the fishes. 

I mean even with 18 inch guns you need to get pretty much into less then 10km range to try and penetrate that much armor 16 inch guns need to get within 5km range to try it and thats just to much, feels like the AI needs more restriction in how thick it is allowed to make. Cuz realy almost 1m of krupps IV armor, why not just give it a force shield to go with it just to make sure no gun can harm it...

[HusariuS]

Rear Tower VII is reversed for some reason.

Hull: Modernized Dreadnought II

Custom Battles + Unlock All + 1940

Graphic: Beautiful

[samrotman]

my game always crashes when I have a lot of ships brawling it out. I wonder if its to much shells in play or something?

[Steeltrap]

On 3/21/2020 at 7:27 PM, Hangar18 said:

oof thats a nasty exploit.

This is from firing on a CL that's doing 0.4 knots at the time:

That's REALLY obnoxious. Not only has it erased the penalty for all but being stationary, it's STILL managed to apply a penalty beyond that.

Plus it was a *^$%*%_^#** Zombie "MAX bulkhead" CL, the sort of thing you can't kill unless you train ALL your BC's guns on it and KEEP them on it until it sinks. Had one of them get down to 0.6% floatation, switched targets. Few minutes later, it's sailing along at something like 46% floatation.

[DerekChasing]

Did someone reported this?  https://imgur.com/SxIbCE6

[nigelnire]

Loving the Alpha its really good, awesome and addictive and shaping up to be something very special. 

What id love to see Is a few sailor sprites here and there mostly in the towers like shown on the ships in Atlantic fleet. I know they are tiny but give the feeling of a crew on board. Also survivor’s in the little lifeboats that appear when a ship sinks. There was a mod for silent hunter that did this including survivors and wreckage and it looked great
Also enemy appearing from different positions in custom battles with ability to choose weather and time and perhaps the odd Island ice ,tropical etc to  manoeuvre.   
 
Lifeboats like this perhaps shown here at 6 mins sprites would not need to be animated just even sitting in the boat.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ck1M3JCCXjo
 

[Harrytheboat]

N3/G3 Hull is basically pointless. Still only the Austrians who can get a Nelson style ship. 

Seems odd that considering the Royal Navy were at the forefront of naval development throughout this period they are basically forgotten (apart from Hood, I know) and just get the same hull across all classes, just scaled up or down. Disappointing. Will come back to this game after Alpha 6 I think. 

Custom Battles you seem not to be able to build decent cruisers anymore? It's all about scaled down battleship hulls (boring) and the new italian super structure. 

[Hangar18]

On 3/23/2020 at 4:11 AM, Steeltrap said:

This is from firing on a CL that's doing 0.4 knots at the time:

That's REALLY obnoxious. Not only has it erased the penalty for all but being stationary, it's STILL managed to apply a penalty beyond that.

Plus it was a *^$%*%_^#** Zombie "MAX bulkhead" CL, the sort of thing you can't kill unless you train ALL your BC's guns on it and KEEP them on it until it sinks. Had one of them get down to 0.6% floatation, switched targets. Few minutes later, it's sailing along at something like 46% floatation.

Also to add to my list, range is bound to accuracy. So adding range = better accuracy at all ranges. Shouldn't it be just a further degradation from current max range?

having lighter shells wouldnt matter at 10km vs 8km as far as accuracy, max range has nothing to do with that.

[The Fundamentalist]

I've only played a few missions so far, but I've found that the only glaring issue seems to be the issues with torpedos disappearing or impacting the launching vessel immediately after firing at higher speeds. 

[Steeltrap]

21 hours ago, Hangar18 said:

Also to add to my list, range is bound to accuracy. So adding range = better accuracy at all ranges. Shouldn't it be just a further degradation from current max range?

having lighter shells wouldnt matter at 10km vs 8km as far as accuracy, max range has nothing to do with that.

I remember we've all had quite a few discussions about all of this over several threads.

Were I to guess, I'd say the thinking is that a flatter shell trajectory means a lower shell travel time, and thus something firing at 10km that can reach 30km is going to have a shorter flight time than something with a max range of 10km.

Of course that is a pretty gross simplification. Sometimes the range is limited due to the gun mount.

If we look at the very dependable, excellent Royal Navy 15" gun that replaced the 13.5" as the RN's main gun, appearing on no fewer than 11 BBs (5 x Queen Elizabeth class, 5 x Revenge class, and Vanguard) and 3 BCs (Hood and the 2 x Renown class) were on mounts restricted to 20 degrees of elevation with a range of 23.7kyd/21.7km. Modernisation before WW2 saw that increased to 30 degrees, and that increased the range to 29.0kyd/26.5km (Hood was built with her own, unique mount giving 30 degrees, based on lessons of Jutland, and of course Vanguard had the same elevation).

Worth noting, however, from 1938 a further 3,000yd/2,743m range increase was achieved on that 30 degree elevation by an improved streamlined ballistic cap on the shell (it gets messy as changes had to be made to the shell handling equipment to use the newer shells, and so not all the ships had them despite their improved performance, including Hood in her final battle).

What hadn't changed, however, was the muzzle velocity. The fact the gun could fire to a greater range through increased elevation didn't change the characteristics of the shell arc firing at the previous maximum range. In other words, firing at a target 15kyd away was no different whether the gun had the initial 20 degree elevation OR the increased 30 degree one. The improved shell of 1938 on would have changed the flight characteristics somewhat (mainly through lower drag, as I understand it), but I'm leaving that out as it would be making the same point, that firing at 20 degrees elevation was the same whether that was the maximum elevation or not.

"Accuracy" is a HUGELY complicated subject, so much so I'm not going to pretend I know all the factors. Even that concept, "accuracy", is a little misleading when it comes to naval gunnery. What we're REALLY talking about are two things combined:

1. Ability to estimate where a target WILL be such that if we shoot NOW our shells will HIT it once travelling the relevant distance, and

2. Ability to place shells reliably AT the position calculated in point 1.

The best Fire Control System is worthless if you've no means of landing the shells where the FCS says they'll need to be to hit the target. Meanwhile, the most stable ship and brilliantly reliable guns, able to land shells within a tight pattern around the intended aim point, will prove just as useless if the FCS providing that aim point is always in fact generating terribly poor 'solutions'.

The game quite reasonably makes some compromises, while including quite a lot of "hidden" things such as ship stability (base value per hull type, affected by various design choices including those that alter the pitch, roll, and general lat/long balance). In fact I think it does a pretty good job of showing quite a number of relevant things.

Indeed we could argue it probably doesn't matter HOW it does it IF it produces "acceptable" results, although I would always prefer something that is built on known factors. It's not as though this problem of accurate firing hasn't been studied, LOL.

Nonetheless, the real question in some respects becomes "how reasonable/acceptable are these results?".

Which is why this issue of tying accuracy to MAX range strikes me as being rather backwards.

I think it's another case of "Alpha". The system is in place and works to produce results.

There are plenty of kinks left in it. Look at my earlier one about the modifier able to be applied against my accuracy by a ship doing 0.4 knots, for example. Equally, consider the enemy DDs in the "Hurry Up" scenario that apply a MINIMUM penalty of -130% when sailing in a straight line simply through "target ship size" of -40% and "target high speed" of -90%. If they turn tightly and bleed off speed, it hardly matters as they can apply -75% through "target manoeuvre" modifier. At 1.5km my ludicrously bad CLs (top speed of 22 knots, min bulkheads, single underwater torpedo tube bow and stern) had a calculated hit rate of 0.1%. Really? WTF is that?? (As an aside, has anyone succeeded with that mission? I got sick of how stupidly outclassed my CLs were compared with DDs that could blanket my Transport Fleet with torpedoes while proving impossible to hit; meanwhile my BC starts >25km away and I've almost lost the mission requirements before it can get to a range where it matters as the weather seems fixed as "terrible" for accuracy, something that DOESN'T really affect torpedoes. Really would like to hear from people)

My own view is basing accuracy on max range, if indeed that's what it's doing, is NOT the way to go. The counter argument is they've not especially done that, which is why the higher marks of lower calibre guns can be more accurate than lower marks of longer range, higher calibre guns. It's not helped by the fact the "theoretical" accuracy of the guns don't change in the shipyard as you alter the design, something I think would be REALLY helpful (especially based on the FCS choices, tower choices and then the pitch, roll and any built in fore/aft weight imbalances).

Add it to the list of things to watch? I'm sitting here at home, following our specific Covid-19 health instructions, so thought I'd use some time writing something for fun.

Cheers

Edited March 27, 2020 by Steeltrap

[Hangar18]

6 hours ago, Steeltrap said:

I remember we've all had quite a few discussions about all of this over several threads.

Were I to guess, I'd say the thinking is that a flatter shell trajectory means a lower shell travel time, and thus something firing at 10km that can reach 30km is going to have a shorter flight time than something with a max range of 10km.

Of course that is a pretty gross simplification. Sometimes the range is limited due to the gun mount.

If we look at the very dependable, excellent Royal Navy 15" gun that replaced the 13.5" as the RN's main gun, appearing on no fewer than 11 BBs (5 x Queen Elizabeth class, 5 x Revenge class, and Vanguard) and 3 BCs (Hood and the 2 x Renown class) were on mounts restricted to 20 degrees of elevation with a range of 23.7kyd/21.7km. Modernisation before WW2 saw that increased to 30 degrees, and that increased the range to 29.0kyd/26.5km (Hood was built with her own, unique mount giving 30 degrees, based on lessons of Jutland, and of course Vanguard had the same elevation).

Worth noting, however, from 1938 a further 3,000yd/2,743m range increase was achieved on that 30 degree elevation by an improved streamlined ballistic cap on the shell (it gets messy as changes had to be made to the shell handling equipment to use the newer shells, and so not all the ships had them despite their improved performance, including Hood in her final battle).

What hadn't changed, however, was the muzzle velocity. The fact the gun could fire to a greater range through increased elevation didn't change the characteristics of the shell arc firing at the previous maximum range. In other words, firing at a target 15kyd away was no different whether the gun had the initial 20 degree elevation OR the increased 30 degree one. The improved shell of 1938 on would have changed the flight characteristics somewhat (mainly through lower drag, as I understand it), but I'm leaving that out as it would be making the same point, that firing at 20 degrees elevation was the same whether that was the maximum elevation or not.

"Accuracy" is a HUGELY complicated subject, so much so I'm not going to pretend I know all the factors. Even that concept, "accuracy", is a little misleading when it comes to naval gunnery. What we're REALLY talking about are two things combined:

1. Ability to estimate where a target WILL be such that if we shoot NOW our shells will HIT it once travelling the relevant distance, and

2. Ability to place shells reliably AT the position calculated in point 1.

The best Fire Control System is worthless if you've no means of landing the shells where the FCS says they'll need to be to hit the target. Meanwhile, the most stable ship and brilliantly reliable guns, able to land shells within a tight pattern around the intended aim point, will prove just as useless if the FCS providing that aim point is always in fact generating terribly poor 'solutions'.

The game quite reasonably makes some compromises, while including quite a lot of "hidden" things such as ship stability (base value per hull type, affected by various design choices including those that alter the pitch, roll, and general lat/long balance). In fact I think it does a pretty good job of showing quite a number of relevant things.

Indeed we could argue it probably doesn't matter HOW it does it IF it produces "acceptable" results, although I would always prefer something that is built on known factors. It's not as though this problem of accurate firing hasn't been studied, LOL.

Nonetheless, the real question in some respects becomes "how reasonable/acceptable are these results?".

Which is why this issue of tying accuracy to MAX range strikes me as being rather backwards.

I think it's another case of "Alpha". The system is in place and works to produce results.

There are plenty of kinks left in it. Look at my earlier one about the modifier able to be applied against my accuracy by a ship doing 0.4 knots, for example. Equally, consider the enemy DDs in the "Hurry Up" scenario that apply a MINIMUM penalty of -130% when sailing in a straight line simply through "target ship size" of -40% and "target high speed" of -90%. If they turn tightly and bleed off speed, it hardly matters as they can apply -75% through "target manoeuvre" modifier. At 1.5km my ludicrously bad CLs (top speed of 22 knots, min bulkheads, single underwater torpedo tube bow and stern) had a calculated hit rate of 0.1%. Really? WTF is that?? (As an aside, has anyone succeeded with that mission? I got sick of how stupidly outclassed my CLs were compared with DDs that could blanket my Transport Fleet with torpedoes while proving impossible to hit; meanwhile my BC starts >25km away and I've almost lost the mission requirements before it can get to a range where it matters as the weather seems fixed as "terrible" for accuracy, something that DOESN'T really affect torpedoes. Really would like to hear from people)

My own view is basing accuracy on max range, if indeed that's what it's doing, is NOT the way to go. The counter argument is they've not especially done that, which is why the higher marks of lower calibre guns can be more accurate than lower marks of longer range, higher calibre guns. It's not helped by the fact the "theoretical" accuracy of the guns don't change in the shipyard as you alter the design, something I think would be REALLY helpful (especially based on the FCS choices, tower choices and then the pitch, roll and any built in fore/aft weight imbalances).

Add it to the list of things to watch? I'm sitting here at home, following our specific Covid-19 health instructions, so thought I'd use some time writing something for fun.

Cheers

A flatter flying shell i think would have a better chance to hit, just because its less time before impact. But for instance, super heavy shells increasing range, and accuracy. These shells are meant to not be flat, theyre made to dive and penetrate decks.

technically i think 45* gives you max range. But the guns wouldnt suddenly fire different because of that change, just as you stated.

[Jatzi]

Just gonna say about the light cruisers having more armor. Going through the list of light cruisers in WWII on wikipedia and looking at the different classes I can only find one class that had armor over 5in, the Cleveland class. That was exclusively on her turrets and honestly the Cleveland was just a beastly light cruiser all around. From what I can see most light cruisers had belts of 3 inches or less and the Cleveland was unusual in having a 5in belt. And the fact that we can put 5in on light cruisers now is better than in RTW where you're limited to 3in so I'd say it's good as it is

[disc]

You're right, only a few others with >127mm -- Brooklyn / St. Louis, Worcester, Duca degli Abruzzi, and Mogami (prior to rebuild).

I'd still like the choice. It would be nice to try heavily armored small ships. Instead of a hard stop, I think there should be escalating costs for heavier armor, though.

[arkhangelsk]

I've just noticed that starting this patch, ships lose structure even when they are not being hit. Was there an increase in the continual structural damage caused by fires that cannot be extinguished?

[Hangar18]

On 3/27/2020 at 11:47 PM, Jatzi said:

Just gonna say about the light cruisers having more armor. Going through the list of light cruisers in WWII on wikipedia and looking at the different classes I can only find one class that had armor over 5in, the Cleveland class. That was exclusively on her turrets and honestly the Cleveland was just a beastly light cruiser all around. From what I can see most light cruisers had belts of 3 inches or less and the Cleveland was unusual in having a 5in belt. And the fact that we can put 5in on light cruisers now is better than in RTW where you're limited to 3in so I'd say it's good as it is

edinburgh, pre refit mogami, brooklyn, town, all have around 5" of belt

[baltic1284]

9 hours ago, Hangar18 said:

Edinburgh, pre refit Mogami, Brooklyn, Town, all have around 5" of belt

Some had more than that the Fargo's after CL-109 New haven to CL-118 Chattanooga where to have 6 inches of belt and turret face armor. Some the design plans that would come later in some nations but never built also came that way even some early Light Cruisers had 6 inches. Although 3 inches was the more common practice for nations due to cost and weight savings and ranges.

Before anyone brings up the Fargos where advanced Clevelands only the first 3 where built on Cleveland Class hulls due to avalbility at the time after that the order was given for the Fargo hulls to built. Shortly after the class was cancelled due to the War ending and so no need for theme and all money was given back for other projects in the government at the time.

Some of the More heavily armored Cruisers like Mogami's by US standards where Light Heavy Cruisers CL/CA's much like was done to the North Hampton Class all the way up to the Portland, After that CL/CA's died as a ship role with the New Orleans Class in the US Navy. Much the same with Large Cruisers in the US Navy they where Large Cruisers in name only but firmly fitted into Battle Cruisers hence why they had CB lettering in some other lettering. In the US Navy they called Large Cruisers for political reasons nothing to do with the Role of the ships itself.

[BELEW848]

will there be aircraft carriers coming to the game at any point in the futcher?

[Ink]

4 hours ago, BELEW848 said:

will there be aircraft carriers coming to the game at any point in the futcher?

Greetings Admiral,

CVs and Planes are a complex feature and will only be considered after base campaign is delivered to users and plays well

[Dan Dare]

maybe its is just me but, in cunstom battles, i think AI is doing something wrong with the funnels when creating vessels...one tall, then one short, then another even taller and so on...never seen that (even i go and check all Conway's great books to verify that it never happens that way) ... i don´t know why but its giving me a bad mood when i saw this almost always...i could live with the last one being smaller as a kind of compromise but...

[Fuems]

@Nick Thomadis I hate to be overly nitpicky, but some of the scaled-up / scaled-down towers and turrets are really bothering me - obviously, many of them are temporary placeholders while more models are created, but I hope that we won't see the giant-sized cruiser tower on 30's-40's Italian battleships in the release. Someone else already covered some of the secondary gun glitches on the American modern towers, but another one I've been fighting with is the falsely-detected overlaps on the British 'Hood' style towers. Somewhat minor, but you know the "devil's in the details" etc, etc.

Amidst these complaints, I'd like to say how much I am loving this game, and how impressed I am with what you guys have presented so far. Alpha-5 has absolutely delivered what I hoped, and I am already looking forward to the next patch!