Buying and selling ships

[Mappo]

Hi, thinking about for aircraft where we can buy the licence to produce a foreign aircraft, why not introduce the possibility to buy or to sell an existing foreign vessel or his project? Now we can use foreign yard and this assicurate us to have the ship we wish, but it would be more simple and fast also buying a ship without expecting a lot of months. We should must expect only a few months waiting for the signing of the contract, for example six months. The player could use either the system of building at a foreign shipyard or the system of buying the ship directly or buying the blueprint, depending on the circumstances and convenience. Furthermore, by selling his own ship, the player could get money in times of economic crisis.
Sorry for my bad english.

[EwaldvonKleist]

Decent idea, would be nice to have feature imho

In real life, buying/selling ships usually took place between major powers who had obsolescent or surplus ships and minor powers who didn't have enough money to order state of the art ships from yards. Since ingame, you only play at least major powers (e.g. Spain) and great powers, this would not happen often. Only typical candidate for buying used ships would be China and perhaps Spain.

[Stelteck]

The option to sold it to minor power sometimes instead of scrapping the ship (for better money, but maybe with diplomatic consequences) could be introduced as a feature or an event.

[imp44791]

The option to sold it to minor power sometimes instead of scrapping the ship (for better money, but maybe with diplomatic consequences) could be introduced as a feature or an event.

I agree. Was there even a historical case for selling completed or semi-completed ships between great powers? I can't think of one case. Plenty of cases to minor/not-represented in the game (Ottoman Empire) powers, but major-to-major sales? The Lend-Lease sale of those old US destroyers to Britain is perhaps one exception, but this was more of a not-quite-allied-but-really-we-ARE-allied situation for a US administration keen to reinforce Britain in the face of isolationist resistance.

An event of disposing a ship to a minor rather than just scrapping could easily be added. The question is how to make it a proper game choice, i.e. upside vs downside. Selling it should give you more cash than scrapping, but raises tensions (to reflect the proliferation of armaments)? Another possibility is if the ship is non-obsolete - just raise the amounts both side (sell a better product for more money - cause more tensions for proliferating good equipment), and of course for type/tonnage: selling an obsolete pre-dreadnought is not as impactful as selling a new armoured cruiser: think the ex-German Ottoman ships vs Averoff in 1912.

Another nice event would be that of keeping a ship built in one's own shipyards for a minor power at the expense of tensions and prestige (the Agincourt/Erin event basically). Not seizing the ship gives you prestige ("We don't need to stoop to such underhanded practices!") and lowers tensions with neutrals. Seizing it gives you a nice ship (perhaps with a slight delay of 3-6 months to reflect training a crew/modifying things for your own navy standards) but raises tensions with neutrals and costs you prestige.

[EwaldvonKleist]

Selling old warships generally was more a problem of finding a good buyer imho. Old warships often need a major refit and are of an older generation, so the list of buyers isn't that long.

[NimrodSam]

... Was there even a historical case for selling completed or semi-completed ships between great powers? I can't think of one case. Plenty of cases to minor/not-represented in the game (Ottoman Empire) powers, but major-to-major sales? The Lend-Lease sale of those old US destroyers to Britain is perhaps one exception, but this was more of a not-quite-allied-but-really-we-ARE-allied situation for a US administration keen to reinforce Britain in the face of isolationist resistance.

Even the Ottoman case does not qualify. Those were Turkish ships built in Britain, like others of that period that smaller powers had built in UK or US yards.

An event of disposing a ship to a minor rather than just scrapping could easily be added. The question is how to make it a proper game choice, i.e. upside vs downside. Selling it should give you more cash than scrapping, but raises tensions (to reflect the proliferation of armaments)? Another possibility is if the ship is non-obsolete - just raise the amounts both side (sell a better product for more money - cause more tensions for proliferating good equipment), and of course for type/tonnage: selling an obsolete pre-dreadnought is not as impactful as selling a new armoured cruiser: think the ex-German Ottoman ships vs Averoff in 1912. ...

Agree with the next poster. Practically all ships sold from a major power fleet were considered to have zero military usefulness (to that power, at least), and were transferred in pursuit of foreign policy goals, not for the money.

[imp44791]

Even the Ottoman case does not qualify. Those were Turkish ships built in Britain, like others of that period that smaller powers had built in UK or US yards.

I meant the Balkan Wars fleet, with the ex-German PDs (renamed as Barbarossa/Reis etc). The Ottomans then went on a Dreadnought ordering program, mirrored by Greece. Neither got their ships (well, the Ottomans technically got Goeben, but that was an odd case in itself, and perhaps could be made to be a wartime event in game): We know about Agincourt/Erin and the Greeks had their dreadnought hulls stuck in the German shipyards after 1914.

I agree with you otherwise, just wanted to make the clarification of which Ottoman ships I meant.

[ReneeLegg]

I agreed with you, I like this idea.

[Glenn Beasley]

This would be a Good additional feature.

[CharlesSwett77]

Any update?

[rs2excelsior]

It hasn’t made it to the regular release version yet, but in the current steam beta you can get the chance to sell one of your old ships (or have an AI nation offer to sell you one of theirs)