Task Forces

[Wowzery]

Pretty sure its just me, but I'm just having a hard time grasping the concept of what to actually do with them.  And they seem pretty pointless in peacetime.

Is there any in depth guide/video focusing on the ins and outs of this mechanic.

[Norbert Sattler]

If you play a nation with few ports (i.e. Austria-Hungary) task forces are ironically a way to save money, since the extra cost of sending the ships out is lower than the cost of going over the port-capacity... which you are VERY likely going to do as Austria.
You can also use task forces during peace to intentionally increase tension with other nations... though that doesn't seem to work consistenly right now.

In war they are quite important since it allows you to extend your reach beyond your home ports. So sending out taskforces does make a very noticable difference in my experience.

What unfortunately isn't so noticable is the stance you put them in. Supposedly protection is best to keep transport losses low, invade for raiding enemy convoys ect... but I can't say I noticed much of a difference between them.

[Bodi]

I wonder if they work at all, so far none of mine intercepted anything, the enemy is more worried to go 20x1 against a a 2500t light cruiser I just built instead. Also, I have no idea what is the difference between sea control, protect and limited in the context of a TF, invade seems to never do anything as well.

[Norbert Sattler]

Sea Control provokes fights with enemy task forces.
Protection makes your ships prioritize protecting your own convoys and thus reduce the number of transports you lose.
Invade is the opposite of Protection and makes your ships prioritize hunting enemy convoys.

... at least that's how they should work, whether they currently do anything I can't say.

With Limited I havn't read anywhere what it's supposed to do, so I could only speculate.

[kjg000]

I can’t say I’m happy with the current task force concept. A task force cannot blockade a choke point, such as the Gibraltar Strait as any force too weak just sails past, unless they are significantly faster (say their slowest ship is 5kts faster than your fastest) then they should have to engage or withdraw, not just sail past.

The “Fleet” screen does not have the ability to display ships by task force or to manage them with respect to replacements etc. I’d love to see task forces given names with the ability to instruct ships to join ( BB Intrepid to join TF Jellico) and to replenish or at least maintain minimum manning lists (TF Jellico = 2BB, 4CA and 6 LC) which the AI can seek to maintain from existing unallocated ships. I’d also like ships, and task forces, given home ports where they would return either for repair or once repaired, currently keeping track of ships is poor as the AI just moves them around.