Has anyone done any comparisons of fleet makeups? Would you rather have a few big monster ships or a bunch of smaller buggers.

Quantity or Quality? What do you guys think is the best?

I believe fleets are usefull for one thing: Tranport. This means my fleets (if any) will be built mostly around merchant ships. Maybe a few escort ships.

The second use I see will be coastal bombardment. But since fleets are not as flexible as the airforce I doubt we will so much use of these fleets. I think it's a good idea to use the biggest guns available for CB fleets, that means Battleships and battlecruisers. Have you noticed how many supplies these monsters use?...

For historical reasons (I know, I know...) I allways try to build a somewhat balanced fleet. This means destroyers, tenders are built as well.


And don't forget the FIGHTER COVER!!!

For building a balanced fleet, you will have to look at the numbers.
The screen ratings of ASW, HAA and LAA are important. Look up the rules for the calculation of these ratings.

Further, the building of your fleet is limited to your amount of supplies. When sailing, ships use a lot of FUEL. For A CB, a fleet uses 10 times the MUN consumption. Remember to supply a fleet after a CB. They will be a floating duck when attacked, if they are left without supplies.

Norbert

Norbert is right. A BB holds 100 mun and uses 10x4 per CB. That's two turns of CB and you need to resupply. Tenders anyone?? If you survive for two turns that is. CB's tend to make people upset. Your ships will enjoy the sight of a lot of bombers.

By the way, the Missouri class BB's holds 1000 fuel... That's one nice supertanker...

If you build tenders in your fleets, they have extra MUN supplies.

With big fleets, I use build-in tenders. And I have seperate fleets of tenders to bring supplies to my fleets at sea. These fleets are sometime nessesary if you forget to load a fleet with enoug supplies.

So far, I have been lucky. My fleets have not been bombed by airplanes. I do have encountered a lot of PTs harassing my fleets. DD work best against these toy ships...

Norbert

Be prepared for a lot of attrition, unless you can hide them in the open Atlantic. An air fleet can make mincemeat of your expensively garnered ships. DDs can be handy for their AA capacity. Vospers/Pts can never find anthing to attack. Subs are largely a waste of time for the same reason. Minelayers are useful, as are Minesweepers (and they are so cheap as to be utterly expendible). I agree with the above - CBing and transport are largely all that ships are worth using for, though you will need sweepers to clear the way - minefields not only cause irritating damage, they stop your ships in their tracks for that turn - upsetting your plans greatly...

I see one reason for building subs. Or should I say ONE sub. Getting those rangers to their target.

I once heard this guy complaining his 50(!) subs couldn't stop a Queen Mary. Now there's a surprise. This QM is doing 30+ knots while the subs do 5 knots. :lol:

I will build a small surface fleet. Just for historical reasons. Maybe a BB, some cruisers and a bunch of destroyers. I doubt I'll ever use 'm though.

ChicO,

Have you considered PTs for delivering rangers? These ships are a lot cheaper to build and the are a lot faster.

Special operations aircraft are more flexible for delivering rangers, as they are not bound to coastal provinces.

Norbert

PT's... Nice idea and also realistic.

Rangers are fun. The good part is you can build a few in the turns before war starts. And then you can have a massed ranger assault... Dead commanders, destroyed aircraft, sunken ships.

Fun!

purrrrrrrrrrrrrr Queen Mary's nice ships.
they also have more hull points than any other ship, you even need a lot of good torpedo hits to sink one.

downside though.. they are friggin expensive and ya can never build more than 1 each turn.

I guess only the USA, Canada and Iceland ever build QM's. Who else needs 'm?

I do,

The QMs are great. You use less FUEL and GEN than with 8 AKs. If you need to transport large amounts of cargo, QMs are a must (if you can afford them).

Norbert

Yep, used them as portugal as well to get divisions to Italie.
The are actually more cost effective than cargo ships, they use less supplies, they only are a bit more expensive at the time of building.

and like mentioned before they are bloody fast and almost impossible to destroy.

Interesting,

I just did the math and they indeed use less supplies. Freighters are less expensive but the QM has 24 SMR range, high speed and a nice damage rating.

Hmmmmm...

Still not enough to make it on time to Saudi Arabia and back.

But is't a nice floating supply depot!

sure, i mean ya can load 4000 supplies into it.

now in one of my old vic games where I played Tunis and invaded Italie...

I used those Queen M...

but I will tell you they will sink... and fast... the only thing your enemy has to do is some standard attack on the sea with some long range recons...

and bingo your QM will be gone before you can say... defecit...


just remeber that those QM will travel every turn towards the occupied port to deliver troops or supplies and backto get them.....

I can asure that within 5 turns .. your fleet is gone.... and if you build a new one... well the enemy can go for force peace....

One nice tactic I used with a fleet of QM's. I landed a couple marine divisions with my Bayfields, then (and this is order intensive) I landed 16 more divisions on the same turn using multiple, RG, RN, DAF orders.

Yep thats a pretty nifty trick but for you to move 16 divisions ya had indeed quite a fleet of them. I'm impressed.


Grimor.
As to being intercepted well ya should always try to prevent your enemy from being able to predict what you're gonna do. And trust me QM's are worth it to be protected well. Besides they are still less vulnerable to attacks than regular AK's.

And if ya have chosen for an attack over sea well then ya can do little else, you'll need superior cargo ships and Vic! only has one answer to that, Queen Mary!

I played Canada in 55 and had one of the biggest fleets ever constructed . When I hit Iceland with 12 marines on two beaches and directly into the port city followed on the same turn with units on Queen Marys , the Iceland player gave up in two turns. Yet Queen Marys can be sunk. Playing Central Russia two thirds the way thorough the game I mined the Faeroe Islands and imbedded a group of subs. The American player was surprised when his six Queen Marys were either sunk or so badly damaged they would never make it back to the US. He quit a few turns later ----- no fun in that. Put at least one carrier in each fleet and escort your fleets . Make sure your aa is as high as possible and don't go near shore until you must------some naval thoughts. I wanted to try a naval country again in 72 but I got Germany and I think I will have other things to worry about , don't you? Rommel

Try 20 Queen marys! that's a transport capacity of 8000.
and yes, they were escorted!!

Hmmm ... is there any passive minesweeping in Victory!?

So far (in my reading of the rules) you can only clear a naval mine field two ways - the Minesweeping [OMN] Order and taking excessive damage to your ships by trying to 'plow' your way through.

What I was wondering is whether or not ships that are mine sweeping capable sweep for mines when the Fleet they are in encounter a minefield even if the fleet is executing a different operational order, such as Naval Movement.

Thanks
-SK

It's in the rules addendum:

'Automated Minesweeping

The Naval Maritime Patrol order has been modified so that it will
also conduct routine minesweeping at the end of turn if the force on
patrol has such capability.
The rationale for changing this order to include minesweeping was
to increase the value of the Naval Maritime Patrol order and give
players a method for ordering routine minesweeping operations. Naval
operations of any kind can be a precious drain on available orders.
This change should result in a net savings of one or more orders per
turn for players involved in such operations. Orders that may be put to
other uses.'

Cheers!

Hey Shadow,

At the end of each turn,every minefield degrades.

So even if you do nothing, all mine fields will eventually disappear.

Norbert

Thanks guys ...

Unfortunately what you're telling me is that I can't send a Minesweeping Fleet in front of my Transport Fleet to 'clear' the way, unless there is only one mine field along my route and I guess where it is correctly. Drat!

On a side note, does Cargo take proportional losses based on original capacity or final capacity? For example, if I have a fleet cargo capacity of 2000 but only load 1000 units of assorted Cargo. If said fleet travelling from Port A to Port B encounters minefields, naval interception or whatever which cause 40% damage to the overall Cargo capacity of the fleet, do I --

{a} still have my 1000 units of assorted cargo since I still have a Cargo capacity of 1200?

-or-

{b} have only 600 units of assorted cargo since I lost 40% of my original capacity?

Thanks,
-SK

Shadow,

Cargo is assumed to be devided evenly along the ships. So, if your ships with cargocapacity take 40% damage, your cargo also takes 40%damage.
Also, if you cargo ships take GEN-hits, cargo is also lost. An AK, with a transport rating of 50, on 80% effectiveness only has 40 cargorating left.

The same applies for airtransport.

If you suspect a mine field on your shipping route, you can send a navalfleet the inspect each seazone to pass. With the OMN MS order you can sweep 1 seazone.
When the minesweepers are in a seazone, you want constantly checked for mines, you can give the TF a patrol order.

Hope this helps.

Norbert

Embedded subs in a mine field are hard to overcome. Of course eventually the subs will need to refuel ( include a tender or two) or they will degrade and get slower and slower. Subs will sink the minesweepers but I'm not sure if the mines are disabled first. Rommel

When a task force enteres a seazone, the following things happing in secuence:
- Air Maritime Patrol
- Naval Maritime Patrol
- Minefield
- Naval Maritime Interdict
- Air Maritime Interdict

If a taskforces with mine sweepers survives the different intercepts, it will sweep for mines.

Norbert

Therefore the mines damage the ships , slow them down so the the subs can get in position and all the minesweepers will be sunk before the fleet can enter the infested area QED subs can sunk fleets ( unless they are escorted) How can subs get past the escorts?Rommel:alien:

Shadow,
One tactic is to put minesweepers with the transport fleet, and then the MS will hopefully help or take the damag instead of the transports.
Another, is to attach minesweepers to escort (or with an escorting force) thus lessening the chance the transports themselves will hit the mines.

mines... subs.. who cares.. they are fun to play with...

just some standard long recon.. will destroy your fleet... even if you got a cap.. who will notice those few buggers....


ships means one quick way into an empty pocket...

ok if you got a lot of oil you can change your route a bit but you still have one point of origen and 1 point of arrival....

oh well just wait and see.....