(Re)supply for ships should be reduced in accordance to the port's base supply level

[Elessar2]

OK, you have a unit on a island in the middle of the ocean, sitting on a town or settlement with an attached port. It has a maximum supply of 5. So far, so good...

A ship comes along and docks at the port.

It now has a supply of 10. How? If the ground/air unit on the island can't get above 5, how is the ship able to get to 10? Shouldn't it have to go back to a major base which is a primary or at least a secondary supply source to get back to 10? Maybe primary = 10, secondary = 8, none = 5?

This feature is creating issues in the Pacific (both vanilla and in mods), where ships dive into such ports near the action and come quickly charging back into battle at supply 10. You could, note, have the Logistics skill increase the resupply level from the base of 5 just like it does on low-supply land installations (which would model the USN's ability to keep their ships going via the extensive fleet train they ended up creating).

Yes, I know where you all are in the dev cycle. I'd be satisfied if the max supply in this case is changed to 8. I am also aware of issues with the AI which likely won't bother to go back to a supply source like a human might.

[ThunderLizard11]

Agree - should be fixed.

[firsteds]

Is this correct? What is an example of a port with supply 5 where you can reinforce a ship to 10? Usually it is only 8.

There are a few ports that are 5 early in the game but reach 6 or higher later (e.g. after Japan invades) - I am thinking of the ports in Malaya and Indochina. Also the ports in Canada start at 5 but increase later in the game for the Allies. But even in my current game in 1943 most ports are 5 and ships will only reinforce to 8 (e.g. Japan holds Hawaii and it is only 5).

Happy to be corrected if you can provide examples.

[CaesarAug]

Interesting. Since there are different observations in gameplay, I gather we must first ascertain if a port 5 can re-supply naval units to 10 or 8…

[ThunderLizard11]

Is this correct? What is an example of a port with supply 5 where you can reinforce a ship to 10? Usually it is only 8.

There are a few ports that are 5 early in the game but reach 6 or higher later (e.g. after Japan invades) - I am thinking of the ports in Malaya and Indochina. Also the ports in Canada start at 5 but increase later in the game for the Allies. But even in my current game in 1943 most ports are 5 and ships will only reinforce to 8 (e.g. Japan holds Hawaii and it is only 5).

Happy to be corrected if you can provide examples.

I think OP was talking about supplies not reinforcement. A 5 port can only reinforce to level 8.

[CaesarAug]

Yes, there is a difference between strength and supply values.

There was a change in naval supply rules back with patch 1.11.00,
16 April 2021:

“ • Naval units can now have a maximum supply that matches the max port strength providing supply, previously naval units were capped at 10 supply even if a port provided 12 supply. All other naval supply rules remain the same, e.g. a 5 strength port can still provide maximum 10 supply to naval units.”

So if indeed a 5-strength port is supplying 10 to naval units, the game engine is working as designed. The issue, of course, is exploring the possibility of reducing the maximum supply a 5-strength port should give, seemingly between 5-8 max supply. Logistics research can increase these values. Sounds interesting.

[firsteds]

OK. Sorry if my post caused some confusion there.

[Nginear]

It's a bit ironic that 2 hexes away the ship only gets the amount as marked on the supply map (4 in many cases), but it goes one hex near or inside the port and it jumps to 10. Personally I would be fine with 5 supply just like it gives the island.
I would even like to see a non-supply port added ("wharf" - major/minor/wharf port options) that only allows units to transport on/off the island but does not supply ships.

[BillRunacre]

This feature is creating issues in the Pacific (both vanilla and in mods), where ships dive into such ports near the action and come quickly charging back into battle at supply 10.

Yes, I know where you all are in the dev cycle. I'd be satisfied if the max supply in this case is changed to 8. I am also aware of issues with the AI which likely won't bother to go back to a supply source like a human might.

It is true that if the ship is undamaged then it can refuel and re-enter the fray in a pretty good way, though if it has been damaged then its inability to fully repair at this port will impede its combat potential. So I presume that those doing this have not been receiving any significant damage when they have been in action?

That said, I would be interested to know more about the issues in the Pacific, including examples of which ports you think this would apply to. Questions I am thinking of are how might this affect gameplay and strategies: will one side end up spending more time shuttling back to and fro to a "proper" port in order to refuel, and what impact might this have on the game's tempo?

[Tanaka]

This feature is creating issues in the Pacific (both vanilla and in mods), where ships dive into such ports near the action and come quickly charging back into battle at supply 10.

Yes, I know where you all are in the dev cycle. I'd be satisfied if the max supply in this case is changed to 8. I am also aware of issues with the AI which likely won't bother to go back to a supply source like a human might.

It is true that if the ship is undamaged then it can refuel and re-enter the fray in a pretty good way, though if it has been damaged then its inability to fully repair at this port will impede its combat potential. So I presume that those doing this have not been receiving any significant damage when they have been in action?

That said, I would be interested to know more about the issues in the Pacific, including examples of which ports you think this would apply to. Questions I am thinking of are how might this affect gameplay and strategies: will one side end up spending more time shuttling back to and fro to a "proper" port in order to refuel, and what impact might this have on the game's tempo?

This is actually a neat idea and pretty historical. In the south pacific Japanese ships had to sortie out of Truk or Singapore and the allies Noumea or Australia. While major repairs had to be done in Japan or Singapore, and Australia, Hawaii or American west coast. You could not repair or resupply ships at small islands and atolls. I think anything that helps slows down the naval tempo and the in and out would be a good idea. I always thought that once a ship makes an attack its turn should end and it should not be able to scoot back out away again same as land units...

[Elessar2]

It is true that if the ship is undamaged then it can refuel and re-enter the fray in a pretty good way, though if it has been damaged then its inability to fully repair at this port will impede its combat potential. So I presume that those doing this have not been receiving any significant damage when they have been in action?

That said, I would be interested to know more about the issues in the Pacific, including examples of which ports you think this would apply to. Questions I am thinking of are how might this affect gameplay and strategies: will one side end up spending more time shuttling back to and fro to a "proper" port in order to refuel, and what impact might this have on the game's tempo?

[sorry gang was battling a minor case of SC burnout combined with some personal stuff]

Those are all valid positions. Yeah the ships in question may or may not have had minor damage, but they still can get fully resupplied. I was just thinking of your garden variety island, one or a few hexes, no primary or secondary supply, just a minor port attached. What I've been finding in the AARs I've been seeing is that the tempo becomes very quick for the shuttling power, giving an edge to the defender (who thus has a much shorter distance to go than the attacker). See the WitP AAR between Ngineer(Japan) vs. Feinder(Allies):

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 0&t=396378

Again I would be happy to get an editor toggle or such so that the vanilla/modded scenarios aren't affected-my dream is that certain hard-coded stuff would become amenable to screens in the editor before the next engine comes into being (weather effects would be my #1 priority there).

[redrum68]

While I agree getting supply 10 from some of these ports off tiny islands is probably not realistic. From a gameplay standpoint, island hopping in the Pacific is already underpowered so making those ports even less useful would probably make that even worse.

[ThunderLizard11]

While I agree getting supply 10 from some of these ports off tiny islands is probably not realistic. From a gameplay standpoint, island hopping in the Pacific is already underpowered so making those ports even less useful would probably make that even worse.

I don't agree it's underpowered. You can do a direct attack on Japan with no forward bases now - that to me is overpowered.

[redrum68]

While I agree getting supply 10 from some of these ports off tiny islands is probably not realistic. From a gameplay standpoint, island hopping in the Pacific is already underpowered so making those ports even less useful would probably make that even worse.

I don't agree it's underpowered. You can do a direct attack on Japan with no forward bases now - that to me is overpowered.

Uh maybe I wasn't clear as I think we agree here. I'm saying you can skip most of the tiny islands right now and just invade Japan/DEI/China directly rather than capturing them. If you make the supply from the ports in these tiny islands lower then they are even less useful than they already are.