Discussion on CEAW-GS v2.10

[JimR]

Slitherine mentioned it can take a little while until they can host the GS 2 patch. That means we have time to add a few more fixes before we make it available.

At the moment we're currently working on the following.

1. Retreats for air units being attacked by ground units.

Retreat is now set to 100 and will happen even if the air unit occupies a city or fortress. So you can't anymore hold any defense lines with air units unless the defense line is double so retreat is not possible.

2. Naval unit retreats

We have coded so naval units can also be forced to retreat after battle. The retreat chance is dependent upon the naval unit type, defense strength and attack strength after battle. Subs and BB's are the most difficult ones to retreat and transports the most easy ones.

This means that if you use transports to screen your surface naval units then the enemy can attack them to dislodge them and sail through the hole in the line to attack your rear naval units.

3. Sub evasion

Subs who are defending (not attacking) can now evade attacks by air and naval units. The evade chance is dependent upon the attacking unit type, sub tech in submarines, attacking unit tech in ASW and radar.

The reason to do this is to give the subs a bigger reason to go after e. g. convoys even when the Allies have got naval superiority. Retaliation won't be guaranteed.

We are experimenting with the values to find a reasonable evade chance. Evading subs is used e. g. in Lordz'es Panzer Corps.

4. Surface naval unit sweeps

We are also looking into adding an opportunity for surface naval units who don't attack after movement to sweep adjacent sea hexes (not ports) for enemy subs. The percent chance for finding a sub is dependent upon tech and unit type. Once a sub is found the sweep is ended and the sub becomes visible. A battle can occur, which the sub can evade as usual.

The main reason for these possible updates is to make the naval warfare a little more interesting. At the same time we hope we can reduce the exploits people are doing to use garrisons as transport cannonfodder.

The Allies will usually use surface naval ships as a perimeter around their transports when sailing units across the Atlantic. Before the transports were completely impossible to reach for the subs. Now the subs can attack to force a retreat in the perimeter and then sail into the rear units to attack the transport. The retreat chance is not that high, but it's there and with several subs you should get a good chance because retreat chance increases if the defender is damaged.

The proposed new sea combat rules should make the naval aspects of the game even more interesting and unpredictable! Sounds like fun.

[Morris]

It sounds good ! Especially for the Europe Fortress style who has a big Axis fleet like Supermax did .

[Cybvep]

Very interesting. In fact, I would consider those things as new features, not bug-fixes, especially sub evasion and naval sweeps.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

What these changes will hopefully do is to ensure that investing in naval units is good. The Germans get more value of their subs because they can operate for a longer period of the war. The Allies need naval units to sweep for subs and protect their transports. If your opponent invests in naval units and tech and you don't then you will be losing the naval battle.

The trick is to find the right balance so we don't create new ways to exploit the game rules.

The wolfpacks can now become more potent so the Allied player should really begin to fear then when sailing across the Atlantic. They need CV's and DD's with good sweep chances to locate the subs and strategic bombers based in different locations to follow up with attacks. Since subs will evade attacks about 50% of the time it means the Allied player needs more effort to control the situation. Sweeps will counter the evade chance so you can detect hidden subs you don't bump into.

The changes means that CV's will become even more important since they have air range to hit subs you find with sweeps.

It's important to know that subs attacking can NOT evade so going after destroyers with subs will still be a bloody affair for the subs if the Allied player invests in ASW tech. Sometimes you have to do it if you want to get to the precious transports the DD's are protecting.

Maybe even the Allied player will have to send some "fake" transports using garrisons to lure the subs to attack while the important transports can sail unhindered.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

Very interesting. In fact, I would consider those things as new features, not bug-fixes, especially sub evasion and naval sweeps.

They are not considered bug-fixes, but rather exploit fixes. That those changes enhance on the game play is just a bonus.

The air unit retreat rule won't affect game play much because most often the air units are in the rear. Those who use air units as front line cannon fodder will get a nasty surprise, though. It's not fun if you put an air unit in the Siegfried line only to see the Allies attack with a ground unit and dislodge the air unit, thus opening up your entire defense line.

The naval changes will affect game play so we just need to make sure the benefit to the Axis will have a similar benefit to the Allied player. Naval retreats should be rather neutral and should benefit both players. Germany can use it with subs to get at transports while the Allies can use it against Axis transport blob situations in e. g. Sealion.

Sub evasion will main benefit the Axis, but to some degree the Allies, particularly in the Med. Sweep will benefit the Allies, but the Italians can now gain from building new DD units trying to deal with the Allied sub units harassing the Italian fleet.

We will have to test this a bit until we get the balance right.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

Players who want to help out with testing can send me a PM to get the files needed.

So far the changes won't invalidate save games, but the map changes means the map you will see will not be the one you use if you continue old games. It's probably not a good idea to run with the updates if your opponent doesn't. You will get sub evasion etc., but he won't.

[Cybvep]

Except the transport thing, I like naval combat in CEAW even now. It's abstract, of course, but I consider naval superiority to be quite important, at least for the Allies. Nevertheless, there is always room for improvement and those changes sound interesting. However, while I think that they will make subs, DDs and CVs more important, BBs may become relatively weaker. Considering that one BB unit is a whole SAG and not just a single battleship, I don't think that it should be the case. There is no day and night cycle in-game, so you cannot represent the problems that CVs faced during night-time, and I don't think that weather affects CVs more severely than other naval units (realistically, it should, because CVs attack with aircraft). Balance is important, too, because every unit needs to be useful. Lowering the cost isn't the way to go, I think, because there should be a clear difference between building BBs and DDs, but maybe BBs should be a bit deadlier against transports and DDs?

[pk867]

Hint start new games to get the benefit of the patch

[Peter Stauffenberg]

Except the transport thing, I like naval combat in CEAW even now. It's abstract, of course, but I consider naval superiority to be quite important, at least for the Allies. Nevertheless, there is always room for improvement and those changes sound interesting. However, while I think that they will make subs, DDs and CVs more important, BBs may become relatively weaker. Considering that one BB unit is a whole SAG and not just a single battleship, I don't think that it should be the case. There is no day and night cycle in-game, so you cannot represent the problems that CVs faced during night-time, and I don't think that weather affects CVs more severely than other naval units (realistically, it should, because CVs attack with aircraft). Balance is important, too, because every unit needs to be useful. Lowering the cost isn't the way to go, I think, because there should be a clear difference between building BBs and DDs, but maybe BBs should be a bit deadlier against transports and DDs?

BB's can also do naval sweeps, but with less success chance than DD's. BB's are already quite deadly against DD's and transports due to higher firepower and survivability. BB's are much better in shore bombardment as well. You need BB's to get naval superiority against surface ships. You need DD's and CV's to get naval superiority against subs.

It's certainly possible to add BB firepower by e. g. 1 against transports. I'm not sure we really need that, through, since transport lose 5+ steps per hit already. So 2 BB units should be able to completely sink a full strength transport.

[Cybvep]

I remember reading sth about using the entire RM against one transport ship and FAILING to sink it. There were also some suggestions to make transports more vulnerable to naval units when they are unescorted.

[jimwinsor]

With the naval retreat rule dealing with the transport blocking exploit, maybe consider reducing (or even eliminating) the transport surcharge? 8PP is a lot. As things stand, I've come around to the cost-benefit conclusion that sending the BEF to France is in general a terrible idea.

Also, I'm worried about this sub dodging rule. My general impression thus far on subs is that they are overpowered against capital ships (this is partly due to their hidden nature; they are guaranteed to get in a calculated first blow every time), in which 3 or more subs can tear apart and sink a lightly wounded BB or CV like a pack of piranhas.

With subs getting to act dodgy now, now an escort screen around your capital ships may not even be an adequate deterrent.

If subs get to dodge now ... maybe limit sub attacks on capital ships to one a turn? This would allow them to sink heavily damaged ships, which feels a bit more in line with history.

[GogTheMild]

With the naval retreat rule dealing with the transport blocking exploit, maybe consider reducing (or even eliminating) the transport surcharge? 8PP is a lot. As things stand, I've come around to the cost-benefit conclusion that sending the BEF to France is in general a terrible idea.

So long as you land at one of your own (full strength) ports you get the 8PP back. Watch your PP total the next time you click to unload. Or load, say, the Belfast GAR and unload it the next turn; all you will lose is some effectiveness.

[GogTheMild]

Also, I'm worried about this sub dodging rule. My general impression thus far on subs is that they are overpowered against capital ships (this is partly due to their hidden nature; they are guaranteed to get in a calculated first blow every time), in which 3 or more subs can tear apart and sink a lightly wounded BB or CV like a pack of piranhas.

Only if you are daft enough to send them out unescorted. Which seems historically accurate. As it is subs can seriously damage or sink a BB or ACC, but so long as it is escorted by 2 or 3 DDs they are going to get a hammering in return. (Subs which have attacked won't be able to evade.)

[unikey]

Should the 8th Army stay inactive once mainland UK is invaded in 39/40?

[Vokt]

2. Naval unit retreats

We have coded so naval units can also be forced to retreat after battle. The retreat chance is dependent upon the naval unit type, defense strength and attack strength after battle. Subs and BB's are the most difficult ones to retreat and transports the most easy ones.

This means that if you use transports to screen your surface naval units then the enemy can attack them to dislodge them and sail through the hole in the line to attack your rear naval units.

As a comment, this will also add importance to air units performing naval attack missions so now the attacker can carefully plan aeronaval operations keeping in mind that air units will be very likely to finish the badly damaged retreated naval units.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

2. Naval unit retreats

We have coded so naval units can also be forced to retreat after battle. The retreat chance is dependent upon the naval unit type, defense strength and attack strength after battle. Subs and BB's are the most difficult ones to retreat and transports the most easy ones.

This means that if you use transports to screen your surface naval units then the enemy can attack them to dislodge them and sail through the hole in the line to attack your rear naval units.

As a comment, this will also add importance to air units performing naval attack missions so now the attacker can carefully plan aeronaval operations keeping in mind that air units will be very likely to finish the badly damaged retreated naval units.

I think that is right. You shouldn't send your navy into areas where the enemy has air superiority. With this change you probably need to have a few more CV's to engage the enemy air units.

Remember that it's not enough for the enemy to have air superiority. He needs to have some kind of naval parity so he can make naval retreats. The surface ships don't have a high retreat probability, especially not the BB and CV units. So it's mostly the transports that can be vulnerable to retreats. If you screen the transports with surface ships and subs then they shouldn't be more likely to retreat.

The main effect of the change is that it will be harder to use garrison units as transports to screen surface ships. These cannonfodder units can more easily be destroyed.

Sub evasion means that you will probably see subs go after convoys even if they are partly protected. If you have 50% chance or so to evade then you might take the risk. If you knew that the DD's and strategic bombers could retaliate all the time then you just didn't dare to go after escorted convoys.

[Vokt]

I want to bring here some question. I have observed that in the last updates french OOB has been modified so north african units (XIX RM, CSTT, etc) are directly deployed in mainland France from the start of the game. Seems like it was introduced here direct availability of these forces in case of a german 1939 blitz over Belgium, Holland and France. So just in case that no 1939 german blitz happens then it is up to the allied player to send these units to North Africa to defend against a possible italian invasion or landing. The fact is that I have checked that France receives extra garrison units in North Africa once Italy is activated so allied player will have available garrison units in that territory anyway. Then no there is no real need at all to make any transportation of units from France. If this is so, should we change the name of the referred units in France and include the corresponding name of the historical french units facing a possible italian invasion? Or should not let the extra garrisons appear in North Africa for free so it will have to be the allied player who decides to redeploy some of the units in France and transport them to North Africa?

[Kragdob]

I propose one more change for naval. Remove limits of units for naval purchases, especially SUBs and DDs.

I like the changes. Thank you for responding to the concerns about the navy and air units!

[Peter Stauffenberg]

DD's don't have build limits even now. I don't think we should remove build limits for subs. They become more powerful initially since they can evade attacks about 50% of the time. This will be offset later when the Allied player gets enough DD's to perform sweeps. Later (like 1942+) the build limits are so high so players aren't affected much by them.

I'm a bit afraid of seeing the sub blob appear again. With sub evasion it will become even more lucrative. That will force the UK navy to run for port and stay there until they have enough DD's and ASW tech to deal with the subs. That's not historical at all.

We need to TEST the implications of sub evasion and sweeps. These values have to be set right so we don't introduce a game imbalance.

[Kragdob]

That will force the UK navy to run for port and stay there until they have enough DD's and ASW tech to deal with the subs. That's not historical at all.

I have the opposite feeling. Wasn't it that Allies didn't have enough vessels or inferior ASW techs to escort their ships properly till 1943?

Right now Germany can build 5 SUBS by 1940 and if UK isn't overwhelmed on ground by 1941 you can have 10+ DDs so Germans don't have any chances to get any superiority, even with sub evasion on place.