I Hate You, Naval Battles.

[Sir Winston Churchill]

Oh how I hate you Naval battles. For more reasons than I can think of. That is why I groan every time I find myself having to play your sick game. Moreover why I hate you, is that I'm forced to physically play you, because every time I auto-resolve somehow all my ships were sunk and the enemy is 98% intact.

I would have thought with the AI's uncanny ability to be masters of the sea at ease, knowing just where to go, just how to turn, just when to fire, and just when to board, that my fleet would be somewhere on par with the enemy's strategically. For I know too well that I personally must suck at being an Admiral, because all the time I find my sailors getting mauled, my ships being mutilated, and my admirals wearing a big target for hats. All the while the enemy have elite crack core men at their disposal, who almost never miss and never die.

Not to mention when I tell my men to get dirty on board an enemy ship, they sail around leisurely for hours trying to find the perfect position to throw a couple of ropes over and drag in their prey. When the whole thing is over, if my ship is still intact from the bombarding it gets, I watch my men bunch up and one by one jump over to the next ship, either dying because of the great fall if their ship happens to be bigger, or into the welcoming points of the enemy's swords that are waiting in a big mob. So one by one I watch my men get massacred on this slaughter line.

Then, when I finally say enough is enough and I give the order to retreat, oh where do my men retreat to? Oh yes, you guessed, against the wind and straight for the blob of enemy ships. Oh no, no such thing as going to long but safe way.

Yet of all these things I've listed there is one problem that I hate the most about you Naval Battles, it's that there is no such thing as strategy in you. You do not have to be strategic to win you, in fact even if you are you'll lose. The only thing that matters is how big and what grade your ships are, there is no such thing as strategy, just big guns. If I have one 4th rate and the enemy 10 brigs, I will surely win. 15 brigs? I'll still win. 3 6th rates? I'll still win. It makes everything boring and predictable, there is no need to be strategic, just make sure you have more ships and bigger ships than the enemy and victory is assured...

Your hater,
Isaristh.

[pattonrommel]

Well, you can't expect them to be perfect on the first try can you? I agree with you on those issues, but least naval battles aren't too important for most factions (depending on play style)

Unfortunantly, we just have the choice of bearing through the battles or sticking to land oriented nations

[Alco]

I miss it when I could crash my trade ship into a 3rd rate and sink them both. I must agree with you, naval battles are boring and terrible over all. It was a nice idea, and pretty cool that you can control the out come to a certain degree. Not to mention it seems the AI enemies love to make a million ships, while I can't seem to make enough without going bankrupt or suffering with land units.

- Spain is hard, I love the fact you get the large trade ships - but I finally was able to afford 4 of them to battle off the Brits. - Yet I make next to no money every turn, while British ships are evvvverrryyy whererererere and appear to be making them constantly.

So does Austria, never knew Austria loved making vast fleets.

[setep]

Honestly, I don't mind naval battles so long as I stick to the basics (Line astern formation, sail into the wind and bring them down via firepower rather than boarding actions).

[Sneaking Viper]

I must admit i rather enjoy naval battles, yes the AI always seems to get the weather gage and yes the group order ai is a bit buggy to say the least, but at least you dont have the Ninja natives to deal with, damnation i hate those, autoresolve every battle against those, why they can shoot and be invisible at the same time is unknown logic to me

Also in sea battles its fun to be mean to the hated foes by broadsiding their ships while they have surrendered

[Timefool]

I have to say the most annoying part is never, ever, EVER, having the wind on your side. I always sail into it, and have never once gotten it on my side in campaign. It doesn't matter if I attack them or defend form them, it makes me so mad. Despite that, naval battles are my favorite part of ETW.

[Alco]

I recently started using the chain shot (not sure if that's what its called) - the cannon shot in order to take down the sails. I found if I have the upper hand I really like doing this in order to capture the enemy ships and get some money out of the fight. Or if I don't want to wait to recruit a trade ship. I wish they had captured soldiers like in M2TW. ;0

[Sneaking Viper]

I recently started using the chain shot (not sure if that's what its called) - the cannon shot in order to take down the sails. I found if I have the upper hand I really like doing this in order to capture the enemy ships and get some money out of the fight. Or if I don't want to wait to recruit a trade ship. I wish they had captured soldiers like in M2TW. ;0

You dont get any money for scuttling captured ships as far as i know, so i normally kill of surrended smaller ships and keep the larger prizes for my self.

I would prefer that you could get money from scuttling old ships, that could become quite a nice side prize you then could get by hunting the pirates and selling all their small ships

[Alco]

You dont get any money for scuttling captured ships as far as i know, so i normally kill of surrended smaller ships and keep the larger prizes for my self.

I would prefer that you could get money from scuttling old ships, that could become quite a nice side prize you then could get by hunting the pirates and selling all their small ships

I meant when you capture them and use them as price money - not adding them to the force, expect for the rare high end ship or a trade ship.

[Vanillamarine]

IMO, if you slap on darthmod naval battles are quite nice.

Of course its stupid that the only thing that matters is the size of the ship, but if you go and try bomb-ketches and carronades you will see that there is also alittle strategic layer into it. There is also a strategic layer on how you engage your enemy, for example - single line formation or double column, this can mean alot and I have beaten down the AI with double column formations even when I had less guns than the AI.
However, I wouln't recommend using double column formations because once you have realised how to cut their line right after their admiral you simply win every naval battle :/

[Underarmour]

Yea, the naval battles piss me off. Usually autoresolve the majority of them -- just can't get the hang of it for some reason.

[Blofeld2k]

Isaristh, I feel your pain man. I just don't bother with naval battles. Sure it pretty much makes GB unplayable, but I'd rather have that than the frustration of having to play the unplayable.

But hey, if you ignore the fact that you wasted €50 and hours of frustration they promise that all that is broken with ETW will be fixed in NTW...

[antaeus]

i quite enjoy them.

i feel a far greater sense of accomplishment when i hit and run 3 or 4 pirate galleons with an ambushed 4th rate than i do from winning any land battle...

[Squatdog]

Oddly enough, having the wind against you is actually beneficial, as you can initiate a running battle and alternate broadsides, while the opponent can't bring his to bear as he chases.

[Darkpriest667]

Maybe someone can explain to me this..


I have a full fleet of 2nd rates and 1 fourth rate... a pirate galleon A LONE PIRATE GALLEON.. attacks. I figure its an easy win... so I autocalc.. ... the results of the battle are i win... with 4 ships remaining...

[Vanillamarine]

Nice money sink?!

[foszae]

Well i've watched these naval battles, and the Autocalc is pretty harshly addicted to basic rules:
1. Every small ship will get destroyed
2. At 10:1 odds, you should lose four ships anyhow
3. Even when you outclass an enemy, you're going to pay for being too lazy to fight out a battle (arbitrarily).

Plus, i've watched the tactics used, even in a battle i ran myself. If you rely on simple ideas like grouping ships in formation or telling ships to attack, they'll basically clump and jump as if they were land units, seemingly unaware of basic naval tactics. I tried, diligently, to actually use things like line formation telling them to focus on a single enemy, but whenever that was the case, they'd still seem obsessed with just getting in much too close, and turning circles to bear their loaded guns on the other side regardless of which way the wind was blowing.

I love naval tactics by the way. And i am using the DarthMod UC but i suspect the people at Creative Assembly just hadn't played East India Company (which does this era of ship combat far more accurately, with tactics even). Either that, or they were trying to make a simple user interface and figured their Battle AI was already close enough.

In practice, i've just learned to make giant fleets, accept that there's always a tail-end of those tiny ships being lost to get a win on Auto-resolve. For real fights (such as when it's close or important), i pause a lot, direct ships by hand, and rely on the fact that i actually know how ship battles work, because blessedly, the computer opponents can't do anything better than the built-in AI which for some reason has never heard of tacking.

[ottomanfan]

Maybe someone can explain to me this..


I have a full fleet of 2nd rates and 1 fourth rate... a pirate galleon A LONE PIRATE GALLEON.. attacks. I figure its an easy win... so I autocalc.. ... the results of the battle are i win... with 4 ships remaining...

I know your pain well - the autoresolve facility is ridiculous! not sure how it could be made worse from M2TW but there you go!

[SCA Tordenskjold]

First rule of ETW navy battles: Never auto-resolve.

With that ouf the way, I too struggled early on. In 1.5, however, I find that a slow pace of game will allow for the necessary micromanagement to become victorious.

A LOT of the time I find that my own, supposedly cunning maneuvering, is outdone by a mix of AI fluke and skill; I simply did not participate well enough that he... would pay COMPLETE disregard to the wind, for instance. The greatest battles are no doubt those that involve great numbers of big ships; even with all the patience in the world, you can never look out for each and every one of your ships. This is accentuated further if you are as renegade as to play at normal pace! Verily your ships will become almost as lost to your control as they did historically.

For me, the naval battles can demand a better AI, and that the AI places more weight on supporting fleets with an admiral. Other than that, while the system for wind use is rather primitive, overall this aspect of the game is the most exciting to me. =D

[Humble Warrior]

Actually, I never really thought ship battles were that bad, apart from the unrealistic elements popped in by Lusted and crew. Darthmod fixed that somewhat. I quite like it.

I don`t have a problem manouevering my ships versus the AI`s and always tend to give the AI as good as I get. I hardly ever try boarding and I never auto-resolve unless I have overwhelming superiority. This I learned from STW days- you`ll always tend to suffer more if you don`t fight it yourself. In fact, I always took this as a TW trademark, `If you really need to win, don`t autoreslove`.

I would`ve liked more realism again darthmod fixed that a lot and to see the landshores sometimes. Also varying bad weather with waves would`ve been nice.

I think the trick is to look ahead and `anticipate` your enemy and your ship`s next move, paying attention to the wind. Simple.

All in all though, the ship AI plays a better game than the crap BAI does with troops IMHO.