Serviceable Capacity and Dependent Tech Tree Lines.

[Skeksis]

There must be a better way.

A: Controlling fleet capacity could be done with tech trees, namely by 'Serviceable Capacity'. Currently, the new update is trying to control it with maintenance cost, it's not working verywell.
B: Also, a singular tech line can advance so far ahead that the overall tech becomes imbalanced and creates huge one-sided battles. While putting A together I realized that these two are connected.

We can still control nation's ship numbers with maintenance costs but to a lesser extent, so long as we add in other tech tree elements to support overall fleet serviceable capacity. 

I'm going to showcase this with a conventional tech tree, lets see:

Serviceable Capacity Tech Tree:

1885                                       1887                        1892                                                                        1909
  |                                                |                                |                                                                               |
  |                                                |                 On-Dock Rail ------|                                                    Marshaling Yard I ------|
  |                                                |                                                  |                                                                                            |
Wharf I ----- Bollards I ---- Tugboats I -------------------Wharf II ----------- Tugboats II ------------------------- Wharf III --------- etc.
     |                         |                                                                        |---------|                        
     |                         |                                                                                        |                        
     |                         |---------- Dunnage & Tethering I ------------- Dunnage & Tethering II --------------------------------------------etc.
     |                        
     |                                                                           1903
     |                                                                                |
     |---- Marine Surveyor I                         Pressure-Resisting Diving Suits ------| 
     |                   |                                                                                                         |
     |                   |------------ Gravity Anchors I--------------------- Embedded Anchors I --------------------- Suction Anchors I ----- etc.
     |                   |                           |                                                                   |--------|
     |                   |                           |----- Buoys I -------|-------------------------- Day Beacons I ---------|-------- Fog Signals --------- etc.
     |                   |                                                              |                                                                                   |
     |                   |-------------------------------- Harbour Master I ----------------------------------- Harbour Master II --------------- etc.                            
     |                                                                        
     |---- Feeder Service I -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Launch Services I ---------------- etc.

• 1890                                    Enables Researching Of (Enables) Wharf I.
• Wharf I                                -10% maintenance costs (mc) to all ships. Enables Bollards I, Marine Surveyor I, Feeder Service I.  
• 1887                                    Enables Tugboats I.
• Bollards I                             Enables Tugboats I & Dunnage Tethering I.
• Marine Surveyor I               Enables Gravity Anchors I, Harbour Master I.
• Feeder Service I                  -1 to Repairs Times, Enables Launch Services.  
• Tugboats I                            Adds 6 Battleships to dockside processing (dockside), 6 Heavy Cruisers dockside. 
• Dunnage & Tethered I         Adds 12 Light Cruisers, 18 Destroyers/Torpedo Boats dockside.
• Gravity Anchors I                 Adds 6 BB to harbor anchoring (anchoring), 6 CA anchoring. Enables Embedded Anchors, Embedded Buoys.
• Buoys I                                 Enables  Harbour Master I, Enables Day Beacons I. 
• Harbour Master I                 12 CL, 18 DD/TB anchoring. Enables Harbour Master II.
• 1896                                      Enables On-Dock Rail.
• On-Dock Rail                        Enables Wharf II
• 1903                                      Enables Pressure-Resisting Diving Suits.
• Pressure-Resisting Diving Suits    -    Enables Embedded Anchors.
• 1901                                      Enables Day Beacons.
• Embedded Anchors             +2 Battleships, +3 Heavy Cruisers to anchoring. Enables Suction Anchors I, Enables Day Beacons.
• Day Beacons I                      Enables Harbour Master II, Enables Fog Signals.   
• Harbour Master II                +6 Light Cruisers, +9 Destroyers to anchoring. 
• 1909                                     Enables Marshaling Yard I.
• Wharf II                                -5%mc, Enables Dunnage Tethering II.
• Dunnage & Tethered II        +3 Light Cruisers, +6 Destroyers dockside.
• Marshaling yard I                +5% to repair time, Enables Wharf II.
• Tugboats II                          +4 Battleships, +4 Heavy Cruisers dockside. 
• Launch Services I               -5 to Repairs Times, +5 to Training.
• Suction Anchors I               +2 Battleships, +3 Heavy Cruisers  to anchoring.
• Fog Signals                         +6 Light Cruisers, +9 Destroyers to anchoring.
• Wharf III                               -5%mc.
• Etc.

Actual researches, research times and all figures by Dev's.

Note: If a player/nation builds more than serviceable capacity, builds extra ships, an 'Over Service', then hefty penalties should apply, similar to port capacity penalties. This should too allow for some wriggle room, allow for short time periods for players/nations to rollover replacement ships and scrap old ones.

Points:    
If players wants more battleships than escorts they can research Tugboats II ahead of Dunnage & Tethering II. Should be typical of research branches.
No research can get too far ahead of it's time but could be researched before another if its associated researches are completed, i.e. the governor.
If all research were setup this way then there could be a fair amount of limitations to complete certain research lines, thus stabilizing research lines in general and throughout the time frame. 

Anyway I think every one knows how conventional tech tree's works but the main point with this is, a particular research would be dependent on another, not just linear but branched dependent.

If all techs are setup this way then the total amount of researches should govern each tech line so none could be overly researched.    

Summary.
Sure, if you rebuild the entire tech tree and convert it all to conventional, it would take months and months of work and a huge graphical display panel (see EVEs) but as you can see, there are sufficient advantages to conventional tech tree's. It would solve alot of issues including B. For a long time I thought conventional tech trees would be better, in hindsight it's probably alittle bit more apparent and maybe alittle bit too late but it would solve many issues.

Edited August 18, 2022 by Skeksis

[HistoricalAccuracyMan]

While I like this idea as a supplement/alternative to controlling fleet size with (seemingly) ever-increasing maintenance costs, I would have to ask the question about port capacity. With the British for example, you have the giant ports of Scapa Flow, Rosyth and Portsmouth that are capable of holding a small fleet in each of them. But then look at the smaller ports of Gibraltar, Valetta and Belfast: they can't hold near as much.

So if this serviceable capacity "tech tree"/research branch (or something similar) is implemented...would certain ports be restricted to a certain maximum size (i.e. would Gibraltar only be able to advance to something like Dunnage/Tethering I), or would it be more of a "if I have enough money, play my cards right and research new tech like a mad lad...I can have 12 ports the size of Scapa Flow" approach?

I might just be misunderstanding something or not making a connection, but I feel like port capacity and serviceable capacity would have to be connected some how.

[Skeksis]

On 8/12/2022 at 8:46 AM, HistoricalAccuracyMan said:

While I like this idea as a supplement/alternative to controlling fleet size with (seemingly) ever-increasing maintenance costs, I would have to ask the question about port capacity. With the British for example, you have the giant ports of Scapa Flow, Rosyth and Portsmouth that are capable of holding a small fleet in each of them. But then look at the smaller ports of Gibraltar, Valetta and Belfast: they can't hold near as much.

So if this serviceable capacity "tech tree"/research branch (or something similar) is implemented...would certain ports be restricted to a certain maximum size (i.e. would Gibraltar only be able to advance to something like Dunnage/Tethering I), or would it be more of a "if I have enough money, play my cards right and research new tech like a mad lad...I can have 12 ports the size of Scapa Flow" approach?

I might just be misunderstanding something or not making a connection, but I feel like port capacity and serviceable capacity would have to be connected some how.

Serviceable capacity is the global governor, your entire fleet, port capacity is the local governor, how many ships per port. Ship tonnage still has to be under port tonnage else penalties apply. You could look at it this way, once researched, serviceable capacity technology is passed to all ports.

I guess this doesn't explain enough on its own: "-10% maintenance costs". It also means that if a nation builds more than serviceable capacity, full maintenance costs applies to all extra ships (we'll call this Over Service). Maybe 10% should be much higher so over service has a real effect but again actual implementation by Dev's (if they go for it!). 

I'll add Over Service to op. The game could add penalties to Over Service too. With penalties the player/nation could have extra ships but it will cost them. Also this would allow for some wriggle room, allow for short time periods to rollover replacement ships and scrap old ones, etc.

Edited August 13, 2022 by Skeksis

[Hibbidyhai]

I like the idea of a tech branch that affects maintenance costs and your ports (adding things like speeding up repairs, improving construction time, or increasing the range of ships, etc.) But I think implementing this as you suggested might complicate things too much, even if it did add some realism. Having separate inputs on your fleet capacity as a whole and your port capacity on a local level, or knowing which ports they may apply to, may not be obvious. It would simpler to have techs similar to what you suggested, but have them just apply easy to understand buffs (-10% maintenance costs, +10% port capacity, -10% repair times, etc.) that all apply globally.

Since this is kind of a 'logistics' tech branch, it would be a good opportunity to throw in techs that affect your transport fleet: the ability to control if they are armed, and with what; equipping transports with radios so that they can receive basic orders; adding frigates to the game to guard convoys and/or defend ports; adding in replenishment ship techs that extends operations ranges. 

And a way to punish a player for building too many ships such that escalating maintenance costs aren't enough to prevent them from building more ships than they can fit in port, would be forcing them to scrap or mothball some ships (with an additional tech that affects how many ships you can keep in mothballs at once). It would also be interesting introduce gunnery exercise missions, where you get a mission to attack one of your own mothballed ships in exchange for a boost to accuracy or fire rate. Or add an option to offer up ships for sell to other nations as an alternative to scrapping or mothballing them. Could also add a small unrest penalty for scrapping or selling off old ships that have seen a lot of combat and therefore have a public following. So the option to turn old ships into museum ships could be another possibility (and if you turn a captured enemy ship into a museum ship you get a relations penalty with the nation it used to belong to). 

[Candle_86]

honestly it should really be closer to how it really happened, once someone discovers the tech, other countries usually either bought it, or spied on each other enough to steal it within a year or two. So honestly once a tech is learned by one country everyone else should realistically just get it automatically within a year for an ally, or 2 years for non-aliened, thought if at war only the ally gets it due to higher security until after the war is over. This would more closely replicate how it really happened, no one was building with Harvey after Krupp, well except the American's, but that was more a congress wont give them the money to buy it kind of problem. 

[Grayknight]

5 hours ago, Candle_86 said:

honestly it should really be closer to how it really happened, once someone discovers the tech, other countries usually either bought it, or spied on each other enough to steal it within a year or two. So honestly once a tech is learned by one country everyone else should realistically just get it automatically within a year for an ally, or 2 years for non-aliened, thought if at war only the ally gets it due to higher security until after the war is over. This would more closely replicate how it really happened, no one was building with Harvey after Krupp, well except the American's, but that was more a congress wont give them the money to buy it kind of problem. 

I think it should act more as a - slider for Naval espionage.

 

Whenever one country gets a tech that is not hull you should get special project that is automaticly being reserched by the naval espionage slider with more bonuses when other countries reserch it.

[Skeksis]

More options:

• Dockhands I                -1 Month All Ships to Mothball Speed (mothball).
• Longshoreman I         -1 mothball to BB, CA.
• Dockworker I              -1 mothball to CL, DD.

You know such a conventional tech tree would 'help' the player not to construct “20 super battleships”!

And conventional tech trees could be introduced progressively, once the framework is done have both the current and new side by side, then with every patch move one or two over to the new. Easy!