Large British Fleet in Baltic?

[baloo7777]

In a recent PBEM Lightening War scenario, with me as Axis, turn 26 of 70 (I think), and as Barbarossa begins, a Brit fleet complete with aircraft carrier opens up on me in the Baltic Sea?!I have Denmark and Finland, but Norway and Sweden are both neutral, and USSR is AI. How did they get to the Baltic? I cannot sail past Gibralter with my Uboats, so how could an aircraft carrier and other large capital ships sail past the straits of Denmark?

[Numdydar]

Stealth technology [:D]

Sorry could not resist. The naval system in the game definately needs some help. This is just one of the unrealistic actions that naval units can preform. So I really hope at some point, there is some work done to address this. I would even been willing to pay for an expansion (or a new version even) as i love eveything about he game execpt the naval system [:(]

[baloo7777]

Yes! I forgot how advanced the Brits Ultra deceptions were! But, as my PBEM opponent just showed me, I can do it too (in our other PBEM Lightening War Scenario, as Allies)! Unfortunately, I don't have the stuff it takes to commit a large carrier fleet into a bathtub (i.e. The Baltic)...still, its these surprises that keep me loving this game!

[Numdydar]

The issue is no Allied shipping when anywhere near land based air range until '43 and later after air sepority could be gained. Yet I have Allied ships running all over the place ignoring this. When I indaded Poland, British ships sailed in to help. Of course they did not sail back out [:D]. The game should make the Baltic a 'no sail' zone [:)] for Allied ships for the entire war in order to prevent this sillyness.

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: Numdydar
The issue is no Allied shipping when anywhere near land based air range until '43 and later after air sepority could be gained. Yet I have Allied ships running all over the place ignoring this. When I indaded Poland, British ships sailed in to help. Of course they did not sail back out [:D]. The game should make the Baltic a 'no sail' zone [:)] for Allied ships for the entire war in order to prevent this sillyness.

If you make the Baltic an Allied 'no sail area', then the Axis player knows that the Baltic is safe from naval attack and doesn't need to defend it and can use air assets elsewhere. The Allies didn't sail into the Baltic, because it was expected to be well defended, so be it, defend it or lose it, that's the players' decision.

Making a sensible AI is another matter, there should be some sort of air superiority assessment over sea areas, as there already is over land. Naval units currently can pass safely through sea zones, during a turn, past substantial enemy air units and can only be attacked in the sea zone where they end their turn. There should be losses possible for passing through sea zones en-route, where there is an enemy bomber air superiority. The AI should be programmed to react to that superiority and the player will have to place the air units to get air superiority.

For the AI there could be a losses threshold, depending on whether you set fleets to 'Evade', or 'Engage' (fleets on 'Engage' will accept higher losses to reach their destination sea zone). If the losses threshold is reached, the move would be aborted and the fleet moved to a sea zone out of enemy air superiority range. For a human player, if the threshold is reached during the move phase, the player would be offered a choice to continue with the selected move, or designate another destination sea zone.

In other words let the strategy resolve the issue, rather than make rules for it. [:)]

PS, if the Baltic, or any other sea zones, were to be made 'no sail' then you should have to earn that by placing a required number of bomber air unit strength points adjacent to the sea zones, but personally not fond of deciding strategy with rules.

[baloo7777]

[/quote]

If you make the Baltic an Allied 'no sail area', then the Axis player knows that the Baltic is safe from naval attack and doesn't need to defend it and can use air assets elsewhere. The Allies didn't sail into the Baltic, because it was expected to be well defended, so be it, defend it or lose it, that's the players' decision.

I can agree with you mostly, but I do have some points I would like to make:

1. If/when Denmark and/or Norway fall to the Axis, would this not effectively close the straits of Denmark to Allied fleets?
2. Did Allied subs see service in the Baltic?
3. Why should the Brits be able to sail through the straits to the Baltic, and the Germans not past Gibralter with no air unit placed there, or the Italian subs out of the Med?

These are likely too detailed for this game and play balance may also be a consideration as to what is allowable and what is realistic. And I enjoy the debate, and am not sure what the correct answer should be. Still enjoy this game immensely too!

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: baloo7777

If you make the Baltic an Allied 'no sail area', then the Axis player knows that the Baltic is safe from naval attack and doesn't need to defend it and can use air assets elsewhere. The Allies didn't sail into the Baltic, because it was expected to be well defended, so be it, defend it or lose it, that's the players' decision.

I can agree with you mostly, but I do have some points I would like to make:

1. If/when Denmark and/or Norway fall to the Axis, would this not effectively close the straits of Denmark to Allied fleets?
2. Did Allied subs see service in the Baltic?
3. Why should the Brits be able to sail through the straits to the Baltic, and the Germans not past Gibralter with no air unit placed there, or the Italian subs out of the Med?

These are likely too detailed for this game and play balance may also be a consideration as to what is allowable and what is realistic. And I enjoy the debate, and am not sure what the correct answer should be. Still enjoy this game immensely too!
[/quote]

1. What closes the straits, as with the Channel and Gibraltar, is the force you put there to enforce the closure. If you don't put enough defensive forces there, the straits are not closed.

2. Don't know, will have to look it up.

3. See 1., except that the sea currents past Gibraltar made it difficult to pass submerged, whilst only able to make 6 Kts under water, but some U-boats did manage it. As with the previous post, there should not be any 'no-sail' areas, make each side fight for the passage of these straits.

Six German small, coastal type, U-boats got into the Black Sea by being transported down the Danube, in sections, and re-built in Romania, at Galati. I my current game I have the historic 30th U-boat flotilla operating in the Black sea, built in Romania (has to be flagged as Romanian), with German PPs (using F12 for the PP exchange). Perverse, but fun, there is so much you can do with this game.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/30th_U-boat_Flotilla

As the game is now configured fleets don't have to fight through restricted sea zones, you only have combat in the sea zones you stop the move in, but not in the sea zones you pass through to get there. Hence the suggestion for some kind of superiority check for the sea zones that fleets pass through, during a move. [:)]

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: baloo777

2. Did Allied subs see service in the Baltic?

Can't find any reference to Allied subs operating in the Baltic, except the Polish navy in 1939. The straits are narrow and shallow so you would guess that, as with Gibraltar, submerged passage is difficult, but perhaps not impossible.

The Soviet Baltic fleet had something like 65 subs, so submarine operations were possible, but perhaps not necessary, as the Soviets had it covered after 1941. The Western Allies would not see the need to intervene in the Baltic, but it doesn't answer whether they could have done, if they had wanted to.

Side issue :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_submarine_flotilla_in_the_Baltic‎

I know the circumstances were very different in WW1, Denmark not occupied by Germany, air power not so effective, etc., but should the game exclude strategic options just because they were not used historically ?

There probably is little likelihood of any game changes, but perhaps certain designated straits (Channel, Gibraltar, Kattegat, etc.) need to be handled separately, detection possibility is much higher than in the open sea, so chance for combat increases above a normal sea zone. Perhaps it needs something like a naval 'zone of control', something like the ZOC effects in the ground game.[&:]

[Rasputitsa]

Proposed British operations in the Baltic

Plan Catherine

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Catherine

Sounds very much like the game situation described by the OP and might have happened, if Churchill had got his way.

However, note the proposal to reduce the draft of the BBs involved to allow operation in shallow waters, I don't think that was necessarily for the passage of the Kattegate, but more for operations in shallow Baltic waters for coastal bombardment, but I have no evidence to support that.

With the shelving of 'Catherine', an alternative was to send 6 of the new 'T' class boats into the Baltic in early 1940, to operate from a base in Finland, cancelled when Finland made peace with the Soviet Union and the Winter War ended.

RN submarine operations around Denmark and Norway were limited, because much of the Swedish iron ore shipments were being carried in neutral shipping which could not be attacked (without the sub surfacing to search, and/or give warning) and although British boats patrolled the Skagerrak and Kattegat, they did not attack. However, on the 9th April 1940, with the German invasion of Denmark and Norway, a 'sink on sight' order was issued to boats already on station and the shooting war in the Kattegat started.

So there were plans to send major Allied fleets, including capital ships, into the Baltic before Denmark was occupied and during 'Weserubung' there were already several British submarines in the Kattegat, which immediately began operations when released to fire without warning. The Germans rapidly began to build up an anti-submarine fleet in the straits and although the submarine force wanted to keep operations going, the surface fleet would not commit destroyers into the narrows to deal with German anti-submarine vessels. The lengthening daylight into the summer of 1940 curtailed British submarine operations (they needed sufficient night hours to surface and recharge batteries), presumably anti-submarine measures closed the straits and other priorities seem to take over in the following years.

Source : Sea Wolves - Britain's WW2 Submarines - Tim Clayton.

As regards Allied surface fleets passing into the Baltic, if the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau forced a passage of the Channel, could not a fleet force a passage of the Kattegat (maybe use Soviet bases after June '41), unless the Axis has provided enough power to stop them. Human v Human could be left to fight it out, but to be sensible, the AI needs to know where naval and air superiority exist in sea zones, to stop it doing really stupid suicidal moves, but not exclude any reasonable combat risk.

[baloo7777]

Hmmmm! Guess what I thought was reasonable thinking on my part turns out to be a limited view of the reality of the situation. I withdraw my complaint!

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: baloo7777
Hmmmm! Guess what I thought was reasonable thinking on my part turns out to be a limited view of the reality of the situation. I withdraw my complaint!

Not sure how much 'Operation Catherine' also demonstrated a 'limited view of reality' and what would have happen if it had been launched, but it is not true to say that 'The issue is no Allied shipping when anywhere near land based air range until '43 and later after air sepority could be gained'- Numdydar, as the Dunkirk evacuation was carried out under intense air attack, including many slow and unarmed vessels. British naval operations in the Med continued in the face of increasing air power, evacuation of Crete, Malta convoys etc., with an acceptance that heavy losses would result.

So I am just saying that I would prefer not to have 'no sail areas', including Gibraltar, but to let the strategy decide (maybe have some limits set, but not total prohibition). If an enemy wants to make a mistake by sending in fleets to face air power, so be it, but you will have to have the air power available to enforce superiority.

It's the AI that has to be dissuaded from doing really stupid moves, or at least not repeating the same mistake again and again, but I am not sure about that. Mainly playing Axis early war scenarios (haven't edited a good 'Gotterdammerung' yet to try Allied amphibious and naval operations), the Allied AI sends fleets into the Med, Western Approaches, North Sea, etc., gets hit by air power and seems to retreat, then come back for more, but it does stop (or delay) me doing what I want to do.

Are the ships losses worth it, [&:] but it does keep me thinking what might happen next. [8D]

[Numdydar]

The issue is that the AI's ship losses because of this behavior allows the human's ship power to be more pronounced than historical. Which of course allows the player additional actions that were not very fesiable (or even impossible). This combined with the idiotic behavior of the AI having only a few ships in a TF totally ruins a really great game. At least for me anyway [:(]

[Rasputitsa]

ORIGINAL: Numdydar
The issue is that the AI's ship losses because of this behavior allows the human's ship power to be more pronounced than historical. Which of course allows the player additional actions that were not very fesiable (or even impossible). This combined with the idiotic behavior of the AI having only a few ships in a TF totally ruins a really great game. At least for me anyway [:(]

Agreed, hence the proposal for some sort of naval supremacy assessment so that the AI hopefully will not use suicidal strategies. The game already assesses and displays fighter supremacy over land areas, it would be good to have a similar supremacy feature for TAC bombers in sea zones and that the AI will react to it, either by avoiding areas with enemy superiority, or concentrating forces to overcome any superiority.

However, the original issue was whether fleets should be sailing into certain areas at all and the creation of 'no sail zones', I would hope for better ways to modify AI behaviour.

In reality, you may only know that the enemy has superiority when you start losing ships, it's not so much making the mistake, as repeating it again and again. The AI need more variation, right now it's hammering the same ground unit on the Channel coast with air attacks, turn, after turn, after turn, the same attack. It needs some variation, to avoid becoming too predictable.