Sorry (!) but the surface combat routine needs tweaking ASAP

[Rex Bellator]

Before I ask for another thing to be done, let me just confirm that I love this game and have recommended it unreservedly to others who have ordered it here in the UK. I'm no whiner but...

The more surface battles I see the more I worry. It seems that ships always concentrate their fire on 3 or 4 of the opposition to the point of overkill, and then break off even when comfortably winning.

Prime example: In my PBEM game I managed to pull off a perfect night attack on 12 Cargo Ships and 4 Minesweepers who were unloading at Gili-Gili. Tanaka himself led 4 cruisers and 3 destroyers stragiht at them. The action opened at 6,000 yds, closed to 2,000 yds, then back out to 7,000yds before concluding.

Now this should be an utter massacre, expertly led heavy ships against almost no opposition, immobilised unloading at a tiny port. In real life one cruiser by itself would have reduced the convoy to shambles.

In UV, some of the cruisers ganged up on 2 of the MSWs in the first phase, scoring multiple shell and torp hits. At close range they badly hit 2 of the Cargo Ships, then piulled back back out to long range and slightly hit 2 more. Then they disengaged

In effect I sank 2 MSWs and two Cargo ships, possibly a third. Please see the AAR below. This is silly. There's no way any commander (let alone Tanaka) would have disengaged when his fleet was right in amongst such easy targets. I would expect to have sunk every Cargo ship and also all the MSWs provided they had a lower speed than my CA/DDs. Sinking 3 and leaving 9 sitting ducks afloat is ludicrous.

To conclude, I would recommend that either A) Ships disperse their fire more evenly amongst enemy ships, not victimise one or two, or/and B) Decent commanders should not disengage until they have run out of targets or ammuniton when they are obviously winning.

Thoughts please?

Night Time Surface Combat, near Gili Gili at 17,42

Japanese Ships
CA Chokai
CA Aoba
CA Furutaka
CL Tenryu
DD Mutsuki
DD Yuzuki
DD Oite

Allied Ships
MSW Cessnock
MSW Ipswich
MSW Launceton, Shell hits 2, Torpedo hits 1, on fire, heavy damage
MSW Lismore, Shell hits 11, Torpedo hits 2, and is sunk
AK Barwon, Shell hits 6, on fire, heavy damage
AK Adelong
AK Rhesus, Shell hits 1, on fire
AK Mildura
AK Mungana
AK Murada
AK Demodocus
AK Diomed, Shell hits 13, Torpedo hits 1, and is sunk
AK Asphalion
AK Idomeneus
AK Lycaon, Shell hits 3, on fire
AK Neleus

[Mike Wood]

Hello...

In an earlier version, the program distributed fire more evenly, as you requested. We had to work to make it behave the way it does, now, which we feel is more realistic and historical.

The two cruisers concentrated fire on the MSW, because they could not see the rest of the enemy fleet. The ships don't have the same view of combat that the player has.

When the taks force breaks off depends on the task force commander's aggressiveness and task force type. In the case you provided, I am sure the cargo task force scattered and evaded, immediately upon spotting the combat task force. The patch has a brief description of the tactics the commander has chosen, when the battle begins, that will help clear some it up.

Hope this Helps...

Michael Wood

[Rex Bellator]

Thanks for the quick reply Michael. I understand that not all ships engage at once, but I do think that sinking just 2 or 3 of those cargo ships is unlikely.

We had 12 fat cargo ships unloading at a small port. Suddenly the hyper-aggressive Tanaka and 4 Cruisers show up at 6,000 yds. Now I just cannot see that they could get away, probably not even get to a decent speed, before the cruisers should be amongst them.

If the Cargo ships somehow did have enough advanced warning and had put to sea (I can't see how though) I would still think that the much higher speed of the cruisers would easily prevent the majority from escaping. I would hate to fight the action as the Allies in Fighting Steel for example! Slow cargo ships hemmed in by land and 4 cruisers barreling in at 6,000yds.

Anyway, I look forward to the patch and the text with it.

FWIW I had a system in my head where at the end of each surface combat phase the VP total of ships still present (excluding Cargo ships/Carriers) is totalled for each side. Then if one side has say a 3 to 1 advantage it tries to maintain contact, which is determined by the surface commanders competence and the speed of the ships.

I'm sure it pales into insignificance next to the code in the game, and there is probably some obvious fault, but I like to try

[Paul Vebber]

Remeber when a large group of ships breaks off, it generally splits up and goes in several directions so a smaller attack group must choose only one small grou, or risk splitting up and getting caught themselves piecemeal..

[Ron Saueracker]

Mikawa basically wiped out both the Southern and Northern Covering Forces at Savo Island, but chose to leave the transports alone, virtually sitting ducks at this point, and retire. His decision was based on many factors. His ships were split up and somewhat disorganized after the action and would have taken much time to rectify and engage the transports, an action which would have consumed more time and made his victorious ships extremely vulnerable to air attack in the morning (something he was very concerned about). As well, his ability to navigate accurately was hampered by the destruction wrought by a hit on the Chokai's bridge. This stuff happens, off Samar, Yamato and other BBs chose to retreat while smashing through USN escort carriers, the only line of defense left between the IJN and the Leyte Gulf invasion fleet. Go figure.

A strategic upset was his, but he chose to preserve his ships to fight another day. He was not to know that the USN CVs had left the scene a day previously, and under Fletcher, the USN CVs would not have exposed themselves to Jap LBA anyway. My one gripe with this is that all of you have experienced USN CVs constantly charging into Jap LBA range when this was not historically a command option very often during this period. US CVs were too valuable to be risked in such a fashion. Leigh Noyes, in command of the Wasp TF, offered to counterattack the retreating IJN CAs (his AGs were adept at night launches) but was refused by Fletcher.

This raises another question...in UV, would it be possible for Wasp to go galavanting north while the other CVs are heading home? More accurately, if each carrier is in a separate TF, would they abandon their mutual protection and act independently?

[JohnK]

Ah, but Savo Island isn't particularly relevant because in the example here, there's no PRIOR combat with a cruiser force. Tanaka just shows up right in the middle of the transports.

I agree that at night, it probably would be harder to sink ALL or MOST of the transports than you might think, but the inability to do SIGNIFICANT damage to ANY transport force (or even a powerful surface force against a weak surface force) with any surface force in UV, because of the "ganging up" problem (this doesn't seem to be an isolated example) is troubling.

[Ron Saueracker]

I think a big redo is being done to naval combat routines for first update.

[Erik Rutins]

What you'll see in the patch is more messages during naval combat. In this case you would have seen that the transport group was dispersing and fleeing. Any combat ships would try to screen them while they disappeared into the darkness. If the TF commander is good, he might get his transports away.

In situations where the transport TF commander doesn't do so well or doesn't have any significant escorts, you'll maul the transport fleet. An aggressive attacking commander is also always helpful in achieving this. Coming upon a transport group in daylight also makes things more difficult for them since you can spot and hit them at longer ranges as they're trying to disperse.

Regards,

- Erik

[Rex Bellator]

JohnK - I agree, and looking back I think that's what troubled me most about the action. It seemed that even if I had put 20 Cruisers into the battle, they would have sunk no more transports due to the "ganging up" routine in the game. It just seems impossible to sink a worthwhile number of ships even under ideal conditions.

Erik - Thanks for your explanations. I did have Tanaka in charge and don't feel that I could have done more. This was an optimal attack for my force, and I don't expect I'll be in that position again (my PBEM opponent is a little wiser now ). So to see 75% of a virtually unarmed TF escape while only sailing at half my speed is frustrating.

Looking forward to those additional messages in the patch.

[Paul Vebber]

There is some tweaking beeing done to the "decisiveness" of comabt (the latest testing seems to indicate "winning' TF's less likely to give in when the enemy is at his mercy. But these things can be very complicated...especially regarding what information the "winning" side has about what else might be out there, and the ramifications of staying and expending ammo in a situation that may leave it vulnerable...

The best read on how seemingly "dead meat" victems to superior raiding forces can manage to survive is Dudley Pope's "73 North" about the 'Battle of the Barents Sea'. In this action which earned Capt R. StV. Sherbroke the Victoria Cross, 14 merchants comprising convoy JW 51B set out for Mermansk on 22 Dec 1942, carrying 2040 lorries 202 tanks, 87 fighters 33 bombers, 20,120 tons of oil feul, 12,650 tons of Aviation fuel and 54321 tons of 'mixed cargo' ranging from ammunition to zinc. She was the smallest convoy yet and escorted by the MSW Bramble, Three Hunt Calss Destroyers, Blankney, Chiddingfold and LEdbury, 3 corvettes Hyderabad, Rhododendron and Circe and two trawlers Northern Gem and Vizalma.

150 miles east of Iceland, the 3 Hunts and Circe turned back and 7 fleet destroyers took over the escort duties, Captain Sherbroke in Onslow, together with Oribi, Obedient, Obdurate, Orwell, Achates, and Bulldog. Bulldog was damaged in heavy seas heading for the rendezvous point ad turned back. S0 6 DDS , 2 Corvettes and misc others headed off across the "zone of Destiny" as Hitler called it protecting 14 merchants.

Before long the Germans learned of JW51B from submarine scouts and radio intercepts set up a welcoming commitee to greet her upon entering the Barants. The pocket BB Lutzow, CA Hipper Each armored with in excess of 4 in of hardened belt armor, the Battleof the River Platte had shown was all but impervious to 8 in shells. The 4 and 4.7 inch guns of the destroyer escorts may as wel have been pop-guns. Torpedoes where the only real threat and 6 destroyers were to escort them just on that contingency. Adm Kluber sent the force terse orders:

"Procedure on meeting the enemy: avoid a superior force, otherwise destroy according to tactical situation"

Hitler himself monitored personally the impending slaughter.

Realizing this Adm Kluber sent his task force this fateful amendment to his orignal order:

"Contrary to the operational order regarding contact against the enemy, use caution even against enemy of equal strength because it is undeisrable for the cruisers to take any great risks"

In the mean time, Oribi was sent back to port after her Captain very nearly caused a collision, though the particulars were in dispute, the senior by definition was right. Short 2 escorts The British "Force R" the light cruisers Sheffield and Jamaica were put to sea from the Kola inlet to be ready to come to the assistance of the convoy should the need arise. Heavy gales prevented them from making much progress...but word of there sailing soon reached Adm Kluber, though not overly concerned about the heavily outmatched British light cruisers. It was notice of another British force at Sea , the King George V class Battleship Anson and 8in gun cruiser Cumbarland, together with three destroyers was at sea as well, though not seen in the vicinity of the convoy for several days. With both forces at sea, he felt it had bbe wise of himself wise to ammend his order...especially in light of who was "wacthing the game"...

New years eve Action Stations sounded on Onslow as two German destroyers were sighted . Perhaps Russian? Sherbrooke could nt tell and dispatche Obdurate to investigate. Weather was very poor and the ships failed to respond to flashing light. Onslow was the only DD with 4.7 in guns (4) the others had WWI vintage 4in (4). German Destroyers each had 5 5in guns in individual mounts. Each more than match for a counterpart.

All ships were covered with inches of ice.

Sherbroke gave the simple order to the destroyers "Join me"

As the destroyers calmly moved to deal withthe threat,, little did they know a behemoth loomed just out of sight, circling like a wolf 'round a flock...

As the British readied to take the fight to the German DD's a dark shape loomed out of a snow squall. At 16000 yards eyes craned at binoculars to ID it, Was it Sheffiled or Jamaica? Were they about to make a ghastly mistake and open fire on Force R? Were those friendly D's after all? JUst in case Sherbrokke orderes Achates, still back near the convoy, having come from the other side of the formation, to lay screening smoke to blind the enemy to its manuevering.

As it drew to starboard, a manuever toward teh convoy, it soon came into focus. A few cries of "Tirpitz" from overzealous lookouts frantically came to the bridge, but she has not big enough. Not Tirpitz, but it may have well have been for all the little DD's could do to Adm Hipper.

The two forces were accelerating toward each other now and teh closing rate was approaching 60 mph.

Sherbrooke, unlike many of his contemporaries, didn;t think about the effect the impening action would have on his carrer. He tried to place himself in teh frame of mind of his adversary.

The light was poor, still dawn-like because of the high lattitude at 0930 with intermittant snow squalss. Standoff and shelling at long range was not an option. He would have to close.

Sherbroke had cgone over this scenario many times, realizing he might well find himself in such a situation, out classed considerably. His thoughts always returned to the one thing he had that could threaten a larger ship. Torpedoes. OR more precisely the THREAT of his torpedoes.


To be continued...

[Rex Bellator]

Interesting story Paul, but I'm not sure of it's relevance to the current surfact combat routine of UV. While just playing another turn I had another big TF consisting of Cruisers and DDs hit 5 US DDs at night.

I sat back ready for the usual overkill routine as 3 CAs and 2 DDs blasted a lone US DD in the first phase. Then something blindingly obvious hit me (so obvious that I still can't believe it)....the enemy DD was returning fire at every incoming broadside! It was actually a massive disadvantage to outnumber the opponent as his DD suddenly magically pours out the same amount of broadsides as it is taking.

An Example: a battle where 5 IJN DD's attack 1 US DD. Every time an IJN DD fires at the US DD, the US DD returns fire. Thereby the lone US DD will always fire back the same weight of shell that all 5 IJN DDs together are capable of firing at it. It is suddenly 5 times as powerful in terms of gunnery as it should be!

This is a consequence of the "ganging up" routine together with the fact that the target is allowed to fire back at all incoming rounds. The 1 US DD can inflict at least as many hits spread around the 5 IJN DDs firing at it, as it takes (barring turret hits). It is suddenly an uber-rapid-firing death machine, single handedly equal to 5 IJN DDs in terms of gunnery, but not of course floatation

So the Surface Combat system needs changing ASAP, so that A) it is possible to hit and damage large numbers of enemy ships in a battle, not just overkill one or two.

Most importantly B) that the victim of the massed "ganging up" fire is not able to fire back at every incoming broadside.

I'd like everyone's thoughts, please tell me how wrong I am, or support me if you understand what I am trying to say.

[Paul Vebber]

The point of the story was that no surface combat takes place in a vacuum, so the fact the flotilla of transports was not sunk to the last, may have been because of concerns of the attacking commander over what might come his way if he hangs around blowing up transports for too long.

To give away the end of the story, because of proper use of the threat of torpedoes against Adm Hipper, and a sighting of the Force R CLs that IIRC get mis-reported as the Anson group. So, despite having JW51B at its mercy the German force of Hipper, Lutzow and 6 DDs ultimately allow it to escape because of lack of aggressiveness and concern over what might happen if they attack and get drawn into the BB/CA vs Pocket BB/CA fight that Kluber warned against.

Hitler, shall we say "is not pleased..."

I have not done "1 on many" scenarios n teh patch, but will do so, but what was the result? Did the 5 DDs get sunk by the single DD? I have not seen anything like that. There is a lot going on under the hood here, so I don't think its safe to assume that a "full broadside" is going at each enemy. It could be each mount taking an enemy from local control. Could be the enemy ships failing a roll and attacking in an uncoordinated sequence, could be smoke or fog or rain squalls forcing the engaement to be split into packets fo limited firing opportunity, any number of things the level of abstraction of the surface combat doesn't show.

IF you look at the RESULTS of engaements, most folks seem to find they feel pretty right. With light guns limited to SAP or HE Common rounds were historical limitations existed and adjusting the penetation more appropriately for range, one sees far less "details" that strike one odd.

By the time we get it wrung out, I think most folks will find it believable. There will always be "snakeyes" that will occur that will cause folks to complain "that couldn't happen".

But ultimately its a tactical abstraction to an operational level game, it is not meant to be 'Fighting Steel in a bottle' so long as the RESULTS are believable it is doing its job. It does that pretty weel now, and in the patch will do it a lot better. But one can fiddle with these things FOR EVER and jsut vary which 5% of teh hard corp you offend.

Those who hit "done" and largely blow by the detailed "play by play" not looking carefully for too many deck hits, or following the sequence carefully of what order who shoots at who and has mostly "balanced" actions with a couple BB/CAs, a couple CLs and a hnadful or two of destroyers may not notice much difference, except DDs will be much less capable and haveing a CA/BB when the other side doesn't will be much more decisive. BUt I could give you line ups of ships on each side and series of results and you might be hard pressed to sort them into "current game" patched game" piles.

Its ultimatley just a statistical construct to apply damage. If the results match hisorical results pretty well, it can't be considered "broke". Things can always be improved, but it works pretty well right now and will work a lot better when patched.

[Paul Dyer]

Nice post about the Barents Sea Paul. Always sends a tingle down the spine thinking about that battle. BTW Sherbrooke was still running the fight with one eyeball knocked right out of its socket - dangling down against his cheek. If ever anyone deserved a VC...

Anybody interested, you might like to check out the action at Balikpapan on 20 Jan 1942 which was similar to the original post. A group of four US DDs surprised a Japanese TF of 12 transports at the perfect moment. They had everything going for them: The Japs were at anchor in the process of disembarking troops, the escort had obligingly deserted the scene in a madcap chase against a phantom threat out to sea, and the Japanese vessels were nicely silhoutted by buring oilfields. Yet somehow, in an hour long action, the Americans managed to sink only four transports. Ok there were mitigating circumstances - the DDs were old four stackers, it was the crews' first combat experience (in fact the first surface action of the USN in the war) and many of the torpedeos proved dud. Even so, what should have been a sure thing somehow slipped from the grasp.

That said, IMHO the game would probably benefit from surface TFs caught at anchor or unloading suffering a combat penalty and being more vulnerable.

[John Lansford]

Last night I had a large force of USN cruisers and destroyers intercept an equally large IJN force of cruisers and destroyers coming to sweep Guadalcanal. The ensuing battle took about 20 minutes, but the gunfire damage appeared to be fairly well spread out. All of the five USN CA's were damaged to one level or another, as were the IJN CA's. Some DD's on both sides avoided damage, and some even didn't fire at all!

Once this battle concluded, I read the after action report, thinking myself lucky I lost only one destroyer sunk by the superior IJN fleet (they had one more CA and two more DD's). Then the bombardment task force showed up, with Kongo and Kirishima escorted by two more CA's and more DD's. USS New Orleans got in a couple of hits on Kongo in the free turn while the IJN changed from bombardment to surface combat, but it wasn't nearly enough and the USN got mauled very, very badly.

I've also seen battles where a greatly superior USN fleet shot up three destroyers, and sank all three of them.

[Paul Vebber]

After testing lots of Many on few battles. the "excessive return fire" is imited to cases where there is only 1 ship on one side. If there are 2 or more ships, the "impules" will alternate in a more random sequence. With only 1 ship he "options" for the impulse on that side is limited, so the same ship tends to keep returning fire.

[Paul Vebber]

Rex, are you still having trouble posting? if so email me and we will figure out wht that problem is. You most certainly have not been 'turned off for criticizing the game'.

One thing that seems to make a big difference in those Many on one" situations is the crew and captain rating of the ship.

also remember that if you replay a save game over and over you will keep getting the same result. Once orders are in the random seed is saved and you get the same result (so you can't reload for better results in pbem)

[Paul Vebber]

Another thing to remeber in surface combat is that the game assumes that TFs are often split into more than one "line of battle" so ships will tend to engage in "clusters" that are sort of independant. The poorer the leader the worse the coordination between these "lines of battle" and the higher the probablity they will get engaged peicemeal by a better enemy.

A single ship is never 'uncoordinated" so that appears to be where it gets some of its advantage, though the luck of "first draw" tends to be very important - if the single ship gets hit hard first, it can go quickly down hill. Particularly if teh enemy "straddles" it and pumps hitting salvo after hitting salvo and the lone ship can't find the range.

The new routines add a lot of better feedback as to what is happening, with more damage locations revelaed and estimates of scope of damage (which are not always accurate for opposing ships)

[Wilhammer]

Around 10:30 AM, EST, on Tuesday June 4, when I tried to access this board, I got the same error message that Rex is reporting.

My first thought was not good, "Did they ban me for being overly critical?".

My second thought was, "Nah, why would they do that?"

I eventually got back on, as you can see.

Around 2:00 or 3:00, the board would not work at all.

Hope this helps in debugging board problems...

[Paul Vebber]

It was probably down for a maintainence cycle and for some reason was giving the wrong "can't connect message".

Thanks for the feedback that it seemed to occur to others attenpting to access helps track it down.

We have never and will never 'ban" people for criticism.

And even in the case of profanity or personal attacks, warning will be given and private discussion before we resort to a "banning". Only two accouts have been banned and they were both for spam...

So if you get that message out of the blue, send up an email, because its not intentional...

[ROSLEY]

Rex,
Where do you live in Kent , I am in kent as well .
I mainly play Panzer Campaigns by HPS but just getting into this .

CC