Ship Repair 101 Guide

[dr.hal]

Thanks Alfred, very much.... I certainly understand that a gun tube is a gun tube... but damage to a gun system that destroys it is a LOT more than just the tube, it is a system.... and it is repaired in stages... and progress can be made in stages... I was just wondering if the abstraction used in the game reflected that aspect, and thus the "carry over" of work done while in a legitimate port or facility can be interrupted and later resumed at the stage it was stopped at, as a way of reflecting that concept. What I hear load and clear is that it is all or nothing... repaired or not. That's good to know. Hal

And yes, I do understand that you are outside that magic circle, but you DO have a very well earned reputation in this forum.

[Alfred]

ORIGINAL: MartinB

... I am thrilled by your passion to pass on your knowledge - or is it just that you grew tired of ever the same questions on the forum? Maybe both...

Mainly the latter. Reading the nature of the ship repair questions asked on the forum, and the quality of the answers provided by others, it was very clear to me that this was an area very poorly understood. My own answers to specific elements of the repair process were regularly being overlooked as the same questions were being asked over and over again.

Although the game manual is a wealth of information on the subject, it was obvious people were not reading it or were failing to comprehend it. With all due modesty, I felt I could improve upon the manual's presentation of the subject. Bullwinkle was used as a sounding board to see if the "average Joe" would find my guide more comprehensible than the official manual. Being the perfet writer I was quite prepared to post version 1 of the guide. Bullwinkle's feedback demonstrated that as it stood, version 1 was not completely removing his own misconceptions, and taking into account his own editorial comments, the need for version 2 (almost a complete rewrite) became obvious. Now with the additional feedback provided by a developer, some additional tweaking will be forthcoming but this additional information is basically about how the repair manager operates under the hood, an area which the player has no impact over.

The final motivating factor is that i am very much of the view that people who merely ask questions of others and fail to do their own study into a subject area, never really learn nor improve their game play. Therefore one of the overriding objectives was to get players interested enough in the subject to do their own study. Whilst it remains an abstraction in AE, a point I make early in the guide, the level of detail involved in the repair process is not something readily found in other wargames. Just an additional layer of "realism".

Alfred

[Justus2]

Table G: Major integrity damage of combat vessels repairable by repair ships

AD – PB/PC/SC/AM/ML/HDML/MGB/YP/YMS/AMc
AG – PB/PC/SC/AM/ML/HDML/MGB/YP/YMS/AMc
AGP – PB/PC/SC/AM/ML/HDML/MGB/YP/YMS/AMc
AR – PB/PC/SC/AM/ML/HDML/MGB/YP/YMS/AMc
AR – all ship types sized DE and above provided the aggregated major IR damage does not exceed 5 POD
ARD – flotation damage only to all ship types but only 1 ship at a time is repaired

Exemplar G: A heavy cruiser with 3 “major” engine POD will be repaired by an AR. If it had 6 “major” engine POD, it could not be repaired by the AR.

*******************
11. Expertise required to repair major damage
Ports sized 7 can repair up to 5 “major” flotation or engine POD on ships which are in “pierside mode”.

Alfred,
Thanks for the wonderful guide! However, I have one question for clarification: From the above, it appears the AR is restricted to 'aggregated major' IR damage, but ports say up to 5 'major' damage on flotation or engine - is this also aggregated? I understand if a ship has over 5 major in a category, it is not eligible for the repairs, but what if for example it has 4 engine, and 3 flotation? Can it get repaired in pierside at a Port 7? Thanks!

[stuman]

Good work guys.

[Keifer]

"there is a hidden IRP cost which varies between ship classes" - by Alfred

I assumed there must be, since BB take much longer to repair than CA which take longer than DD

Do you know if tonnage or durability impacts the cost/time of repair?

[Don Bowen]

ORIGINAL: Keifer

"there is a hidden IRP cost which varies between ship classes" - by Alfred

I assumed there must be, since BB take much longer to repair than CA which take longer than DD

Do you know if tonnage or durability impacts the cost/time of repair?

While it is not specifically hidden, I do not know if I have the authority to detail the calculation.

Basically, it is obvious. 20 damage point (i.e. 20% damage) of a battleship is harder to repair then 20 points for a sub chaser. The calculation considers tonnage, durability and armor. The higher the numbers are for these, the more repair effort is required to repair one point of damage.

[Don Bowen]

ORIGINAL: Justus2

... I have one question for clarification: From the above, it appears the AR is restricted to 'aggregated major' IR damage, but ports say up to 5 'major' damage on flotation or engine - is this also aggregated? I understand if a ship has over 5 major in a category, it is not eligible for the repairs, but what if for example it has 4 engine, and 3 flotation? Can it get repaired in pierside at a Port 7? Thanks!

Repairability of major damage is distinct per damage type. An AR can repair up to 5 points of major float damage AND up to 5 points of major engine damage. The intent of the calulation is to estimate the structural damage and limit the ability of repair ships to handle it. A relatively small of major damage can be repaired by a smaller facility (like AR). Larger amounts infer structural damage where major ship's components are "out of whack" and these must be repaired before the "minor" major damage can be fixed.

Possible example: A hole in the side of the ship that does not misalign frames or compress decks could be repaired by an AR. But significant damage to the ship's frames and keel would require a more capable facility.

[Justus2]

Thanks for the clarification!

[BigDuke66]

Great guide!

A question:
If the manual is correct all AR classes from smallest to largest generate 1000 Op points, is that correct?
Sounds a bit strange that a 670t Castor has the same impact as an 10100t Medusa on repairs.

[jmalter]

hi Alfred, many thanks for writing up this guide.

i've a question wrt ARD - how best to take advantage of them?

i gather that they are best used to repair flotation damage, but in order to use its capabilities, should a damaged ship be in 'repair ship' mode? or will the ARD automatically apply its repair capacity to any disbanded ship in the same harbor?

i've got an ARD at Mare Island, she'll take more than a month to get to Pearl or Midway. If i send her to Midway, once disbanded, will she automatically add her repair capability to the base, or will i need to assign damaged ships to 'repair ship' mode? I've got an AS & AR disbanded there - if a damaged SS arrives, do i need to assign it a specific repair mode to take advantage of the ARD's repair abilities?

If i send the ARD to Pearl, does her repair capacity get added in with the port's shipyard abilities, or will they only be used if a ship is assigned to 'repair ship' mode?

best regards!

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: BigDuke66

Great guide!

A question:
If the manual is correct all AR classes from smallest to largest generate 1000 Op points, is that correct?
Sounds a bit strange that a 670t Castor has the same impact as an 10100t Medusa on repairs.

A couple of things. First off, the developers freely acknowledge that they have not - and are not allowed to - give us all the forumlae used by the game code. So it is quite possible, even likely, that they haven't told us all the details of how ship repair works.

Second, Op points are not repair points. All ships get 1,000 Ops Points to use every day (or every phase, which is 2 x phases per day, I forget which it is). Since an AR is a ship its 'activity' for the turn gets tracked by Ops Points. If it uses up 1,000 Ops Points getting refueled then it has no 'time' left to help repair other ships because it spent all day taking on fuel. Ops Points are just a way of helping the code to keep track of ships to make sure they are not all like 'Superman', able to do an unrealistic number of things in one day.

When you consider both of those points together you can see that it is quite possible that there is code in there that accounts for how big is an AR ship when the code takes into account how many 'repair points' it can contribute to fixing other ships. The developers might not tell us this, or they might jump in here and comment but not tell us the formulae involved.

[BigDuke66]

Gee who speaks of a formula, I just would like to know the capability of those ships, just like I know that the cargo capacity for AS limits the torpedo types that can be reloaded I would like to know if the cargo capacity(I guess that would be the best indicator, what else could you use?) has an impact on repair.
The way the manual suggests it it seems that there is no difference which I can hardly believe with anything else around ship repair so detailed.

Anyone here that has seen differences in repair rate by ARs?

[1EyedJacks]

Thanks Alfred & Bullwinkle - I enjoyed this.

TTFN,

Mike

[crsutton]

Thanks to the two of you for the clarifications. It really helps me see what I am doing right and wrong. I sort of knew all of this by intuition but did not really fully understand it. My question is would you expand the formula for figuring out the cost of WRP for guns? This is where I was caught off guard. I have just been under the assumption that a repair yard the size of Cape Town could repair any ship. However, the formula shows that a broken 16 inch or 15 inch gun will not repair in Cape Town, but I am not sure about a 14 inch gun. This really indicates the limitations of operating large ships in the Indian Ocean theater. Perhaps the larger BBs should be kept out of there altogether-or severly limited.

[inqistor]

I am pretty sure this section is still in-game:

14.2.1.1 DAMAGE REPAIR SELECTION

Floatation damage and major engine damage
are given higher priority by offsetting damage levels for band calculations. Major floatation
damage is tripled, regular floatation damage and major engine damage are doubled. This
means that floatation damage will be considered to be in approximately the same band as
systems damage of up to twice that much, three times that much if the damage was Major
floatation damage.

So the example is not entirely correct. Floatation would need to fall below 24, to begin repair of engine.
And I am not sure, such large engine damage is even possible.

[oldman45]

ORIGINAL: BigDuke66

edit

Anyone here that has seen differences in repair rate by ARs?

Nope.

[jmalter]

some questions on repairing:

1) for a ship w/ a 'full suite' of damage, disbanded in a port w/ a shipyard, is there a 'total time for repair' advantage if the ship is assigned to readiness/pierside mode until all its non-major damage is repaired before it's transferred to shipyard repair? or will damaged ships repair more quickly when placed in a shipyard (assuming the shipyard capacity isn't exceeded)?

2) when a ship w/ floatation damage is repairing in a port, must it be assigned to repair-ship mode for a disbanded ARD to have any effect? if the damaged ship's size is greater than the tonnage-capacity of the ARD, do i assume correctly that the ARD will have no effect on that ship's flotation repair?

[BigDuke66]

Durability was mentioned here and I would like to know if the durability has any other function besides being used as measurement of the "ship’s seaworthiness"(an din case of subs their diving depth).
Are ships with high durability harder to sink or damage in combat?

[bretg80]

Please put this into a PDF so we can read it on our IPADs and search it for the information we are looking for. [:)]

[BigDuke66]

Better this all flows into a revised manual.