Let's Sperg Rule the Waves II: Kiwis at Sea - From Pre Dreadnoughts to the Missile Age, Something is Always Bloody Wrong With Your Ships Today

[GnomeofDoc]

Man that Falco class was way outta position. Shit got pushed in hard by your BC. I mean what is the AI thinking! From what you have shown me and from what YT vids I have watched the AI seems to be decent at best. So what happened there? Was it simulating the utter incompetence of the Italian Admiralty?

Or are you just a strategic genius...

 

[Techpriest]

Man that Falco class was way outta position. Shit got pushed in hard by your BC. I mean what is the AI thinking! From what you have shown me and from what YT vids I have watched the AI seems to be decent at best. So what happened there? Was it simulating the utter incompetence of the Italian Admiralty?

Or are you just a strategic genius...

The big thing that screwed with the AI was the close distances of the Adriatic. Combine that with the decision of the AI to turn tail and run, rather than try and press me back and away from the carrier - which spawned in a bad location because again, the Adriatic is tiny. I was able to split the battle cruisers away from the carrier, and when I did that there wasn’t much the Italians could do to save the Falco.

 

[Adamska]

Man that Falco class was way outta position. Shit got pushed in hard by your BC. I mean what is the AI thinking! From what you have shown me and from what YT vids I have watched the AI seems to be decent at best. So what happened there? Was it simulating the utter incompetence of the Italian Admiralty?

Or are you just a strategic genius...

The AI seems to have some trouble understanding priority when it comes to fleet protection. I've noticed this since they tend to underguard or protect certain vessels that need guarding. It's most notable with transports, but it seems CVLs aren't entirely safe either. @Techpriest is probably more right though, and that this was just an unfavorable spawn on the Italian's part due to the sea's narrowness. Some of the Bullshit from the Bullshit turn makes some sense if that gets factored in.

Though you can argue that since Carriers are brand new no one really knows if they should or could stand in a fight. I mean, this was the period where quite a few models still had medium sized guns on them after all.

 

[Techpriest]

The AI seems to have some trouble understanding priority when it comes to fleet protection. I've noticed this since they tend to underguard or protect certain vessels that need guarding. It's most notable with transports, but it seems CVLs aren't entirely safe either. @Techpriest is probably more right though, and that this was just an unfavorable spawn on the Italian's part due to the sea's narrowness. Some of the Bullshit from the Bullshit turn makes some sense if that gets factored in.

Though you can argue that since Carriers are brand new no one really knows if they should or could stand in a fight. I mean, this was the period where quite a few models still had medium sized guns on them after all.

The whole thing about aircraft carriers is that they were originally designated as cruisers - Cruiser Voler. AV was taken by Seaplane tenders and carriers, and carriers, true carriers, were bigger by far. Cruiser Voler (Cruiser Flying or Cruiser Aviation) was given to aircraft carriers, as CA was taken.

 

[Techpriest]

After that battle, I'm blockading Italy. Every capital ship but the Budapest is in the docks for the next two months. I won a big victory, but it cost me. I'm planning an invasion of Sicily.

OLD MAN I WARNED YOU, I FUCKING WARNED YOU BRO.

New torpedo bomber designs come in too. I'll take the Lloyd - 193 mile range, with good maneuverability and toughness.

All the merchants. Aw yee.

I'll risk a cruiser battle, at medium. I trust my CL's and heavy cruisers can do some real damage.

Meet Karl VI. She's probably about to get fucked up by a battle cruiser.

Let's get over with this shall we?

Luckily, it's a light cruiser apparently. ENGAGE RAPEMODE.

I note her armament, and her awful awful armor and meh guns. I can take her on, if I'm careful.

I'm nailing her with 8 inch guns, and she's not having a fun time.

I've blown one of her turrets off.

And then she's dead in the water. She's fucked, not surprisingly. Dusk is falling, so I fuck off. I'll take the kill.

She didn't sink. Oh well. It's still an engagement that I'll take. The Kaiser's have proven themselves to be light cruiser killers pro-excellence.

And it's enough to make the Italians capitulate. Damn good. What isn't good is my budget after it. I have to kill most of my ship building.

With good quad turrets, I'll be able to make some interesting designs now.

I'd like to, I'd really like to. But it's expensive.

It's June 1936, and I really, don't need this.

Sure, I could use funding.

Sorry, I can't afford it. Unless I make really really shit ones.

Now, this is a nice surprise. I'll need to check the range of my 16 inch guns.

Holy shit. Nearly 6.5 inches of penetration at 29,000 yards.

God damn, I want this. It's time for new destroyer designs soon anyway.

Firstly, an anti-aircraft and escort destroyer. 5 inch DP guns in 4 mounts. An AA director, a couple K guns, and a load of smaller AA. Likely 20mm's and 37mm's, all attached to an AA director. All at a reasonable 35 knots and 2000 tons. They'll fucking murder smaller aircraft.

Meet the new Wien. She's armored out to 30,000 yards against 16 inch guns, and can penetrate 6 inches of deck armor. She's also got medium range, and can go 28 knots. She carries a pair of float planes too, for scouting. At 50,000 tons, she's the biggest ship I can build, and a true fast battleship. All her armament is forward, and she carries 12 15 inch guns. Six inch secondaries means she'll wreck smaller ships, and her AA armament?

17 smaller AA armaments, 40 medium AA mounts and 4 AA directors. Plus, 14 dual mounted 4 inch guns that are DP. Welcome to the pain train, and I'm intending to share that pain train with everyone on the planet. She's got almost 300 tons spare for radar or refits. It's truly a successor to the dreadnought that started it all.

Speaking of radar...

Holy shit, fund 'em!

Our Slavonian aircraft designers really outdid themselves.

My torpedo bombers got better, way better. Thanks to the Lloyd company, because that's a MASSIVE improvement. My guess is that the designers upped the horsepower of the engine. I'm insanely happy with that. I might just ditch my dive bombers too, because god damn, I could use just the 59B for my carriers. Speaking of carriers, after a couple of Wiens, I'll design a purpose built CVL at least.

It's about time really. After three humiliating defeats, I expected this.

Oh my god, it keeps getting better!

261 nautical miles carrying a torpedo. 9 maneuverability, 8 toughness. This fucker can take a pounding, avoid AA fire, and is fast as hell approaching the target.

HOW MANY TIMES ITALY. HOW MANY TIMES MUST I KICK THE SHIT OUT OF YOU BEFORE YOU LEARN YOUR LESSON!

My torpedoes are even better now.

Skoda also gives me a hell of a new gun.

Damn. 8 firepower?

Oh damn, that's nice for 1939.

Shit. I could have used this a few months ago. I'll buy it, and I'll refit my ships with it.

Downside, the Italians have Albania. Upside, I can take Albania from the Italians. We're going to war with the Italians soon too - I just need to drag it out long enough to finish the Wien.

 

[GnomeofDoc]

Meet the new Wien

This new Wien will trash the fuck out of these uppity fascist pasta nerds. God that thing has some serious AA defense! Does AA really make a difference from my knowledge from history it seems that other aircraft are best at deterring pesky torpedo bombers from ramming one up your ass.

 

[Techpriest]

This new Wien will trash the fuck out of these uppity fascist pasta nerds. God that thing has some serious AA defense! Does AA really make a difference from my knowledge from history it seems that other aircraft are best at deterring pesky torpedo bombers from ramming one up your ass.

AA does make a difference, a big difference. US studies done after the war show a compilation of confirmed and assumed aircraft kills. AA wasn’t as effective at killing enemy aircraft, but it has another major impact. While I’d decrease the reported air to air kills by quite a bit (dogfights are confusing and planes thought to have crashed on their way back to base or too damaged to survive are often assumed as kills) the AA numbers are a little deceiving. See, a lot of air to air kills in the pacific were CAP’s intercepting enemy attack formations and escorts. That’s the longer range defense, and a good CAP will disrupt and disorganize a raid without as much issue. The main thing that AA does is also break up formations, discourage attacks, and damage incoming or outgoing aircraft - who then have to brave the CAP once again if they’ve dealt with the escort fighters.

Like it was historically, AA can be broken into 3 categories, and each was part of a sort of protective layer. Heavy AA is things like 3 inch, 4 inch, and 5 inch dual purpose or purpose built anti aircraft guns. This is the flak wall, and is mostly effective at disrupting formations before VT proximity fuses were developed. After that, it became far more lethal. Rather than timers for the burst, they’d instead explode close to incoming aircraft at even medium range. This is very deadly - a direct or close hit is enough to either destroy or severely damage an aircraft, enough to force the pilot to either go on a one way bombing run he won’t be able to return to base from, or break off to try and save the aircraft. The main problem was before proximity shells, it would rarely hit or explode close enough to the plane to do damage.

Medium AA was the real killer. Once the 40 mm Bofors was slapped onto more and more ships, you started seeing more outright AA kills. Why? Tracking. A 40mm gun can be traversed fast enough to keep an aircraft in sight, and often times would use a mix of timed and contact fused shells - and proximity fuses once they got small enough. 40mm hits were devastating to small single engined planes, and the rate of fire they had allowed them to effectively lead and hit targets before they could make their attack runs, or hit them as they were making them. While this didn’t break up formations as much, it could do heavy damage to the attack before they launched their own weapons.

Light AA is stuff ranging from .30 caliber machine guns slapped on a mount or carried by a sailor, dedicated .50 caliber AA mounts, and includes the 20mm AA cannons that were pretty standard for almost everyone before the war on every ship. Put simply, it wasn’t very effective. Sure, it killed planes sometimes. The tracer fire they could put out was very impressive. But they didn’t have the range or power to really hurt aircraft before they were already in the process of making the attack run. 20mm cannons would seriously damage aircraft with only a couple hits, same with a successful concentrated burst of .50 caliber rounds, but that was rarely enough at this point to kill an aircraft. .30 caliber rifle bullets were really only going to tickle most aircraft when fired essentially unguided, and were mostly just used as anti aircraft weapons for the morale, if included at all. With the speeds of aircraft at this point, tracking became a big problem, because the range you could hit at only left a few seconds for firing, let alone adjusting your aim. The main thing that lighter AA guns did was make pilots twitchy and less accurate - seeing tracers all around you really makes it hard to truly concentrate on keeping your aim steady. Much like early heavy AA, light AA was only good at reducing the effectiveness of the attacks, not killing the attackers.

Luckily for ships though, people hit on the idea for fire directors for anti-aircraft guns relatively early on, and this increased the effectiveness of heavy and medium anti aircraft guns significantly. Concentrating fire on an area with multiple guns (even if they’re not all aiming at the same target) made hits far more likely.

This is all modeled in the game itself.

Despite the relatively low effect of AA when it came to kills, there were some notable fly swatters. American battleships were often attached to carriers to provide a layer of defense for the carriers, as their main AA armament was their planes. Several cruisers were designed to specifically put as much flak and light AA fire into the sky as possible. Scout float planes meant to be launched from battleships and some heavy cruisers also would sometimes help defend ships from enemy recon planes or assist with the CAP. They’d also harass submarines sometimes - HMS Warspite is notable as the first battleship to sink a submarine using an airplane, among other grander achievements she had in her long and distinguished career.

 

[Techpriest]

We're going to war soon anyway, so whatever happens, happens.

A corvette? They blew up a CORVETTE!?!?

It's on now though.

I'll take it. We're equal in capital ships, without question.

The gang's all here too.

It's a fun little trip back to the same place we've bombed the fuck out of so often. Ah, good memories.

It's the battle cruisers the Italians have. Karnten is opening fire at them at long range. If she hits belt, she's penetrating even the newest Italian battlecruiser, even at this range. She's slugging it out, and has taken some nasty hits.

But, I've got a strike on the way from aircraft, and their battle cruisers are getting into my screens (who are spamming torpedoes like no tomorrow) and into range of my battle line. Oh, this isn't ending well for them.

Two torpedo hits on the lead battle cruiser.

She's a strong one, but that belt armor and her turrets are trash. 31 knots is pretty damn good for 40,000 tons though.

Python gets shotgunned with 2 15 inch shells at close range, and starts to sink. My aircraft though, have found the enemy battle line.

Shit's going down. Sadly my torpedo bombers don't hit, but they are able to send the whole battle line into disarray.

As I chase down the enemy, the Italian's seaplane carrier gets targeted by medium bombers out of my airfields. And oh yeah, they fucking murder it. Three direct bomb hits.

Anyway, my basic strategy in most naval battles with Italy has been to exploit their divisions, and push in aggressively. It's served me well so far, and I don't think that's going to change. To the north east are pretty much all of the Italian lighter combatants. The battleships followed their battle cruisers into harbor. The Carlo Alberto is currently sinking into the ocean, while my battle line pounds one of their battleships into the dirt.

Speaking of the Carlo Alberto, I've blown off ALL OF HER TURRETS. She's on fire, barely moving, and getting shot at by a light cruiser

The other Italian battleship I've gotten to pound isn't looking too good either. She's a design from the 20's, before the Italians got turreted secondaries on BB's. Still mounts 14 inch guns though, and had 10 of them. Had being the key word here, as I shot off 8 of them and disabled the last turret. She's also on fire, and pretty dead in the water.

So the enemy light forces are split up into two groups right now. A pair of destroyers hanging out near the AV that got absolutely wrecked by the bombers isn't too big of a threat. A heavy cruiser and a flotilla of destroyers could be an issue. My battle cruiser is going to chase down that heavy cruiser and make it her bitch.

She's taken some nasty hits, and one of her turrets is currently disabled and can't traverse, but otherwise she's looking good. That AA factor is something I giggle about.

Despite the new heavy cruiser the Italians fielded being actually pretty good for a treaty design, the San Giorgio's getting wrecked. She's dead in the water, and the Karnten is finishing her off, with a load of 15 inch shells.

While I'm sending my carrier forces after the light ships of the Italians still out there, I have my battle line start to do a drive by of the enemy bombardment target. It only takes a single pass.

Meanwhile, the damaged destroyer Cobra is reporting that the Carlo Alberto is sinking, and that he saw another large ship go down.

For a refit (and admittedly a design I never wanted to see battle) I'm pretty happy that the Cobra survived a pair of dive bomber strikes.

As I mop up, I take a quick look at the Italian DD design. It's pretty good. They managed to get the dual turrets for DD's tech. I start turning for home now, as night falls. There's submarines about, and the enemy has been broken. The 15th of January, 1940, will be put down as a decisive Austrian victory, no question about that.

It's devastating. We lost a single destroyer, an older model I never intended to see combat any more. The Italians lost far, far more. The Marcantonio Colonna, Carlo Alberto, San Giorgio, Anna Scotto, the destroyers Granatiere, Insidioso, and the submarine Medusa all went to the bottom. Over 90,000 tons of Italian warships are now at the bottom of the ocean. We also shot down 13 italian aircraft in the air..

Holy. Shit.

15k warscore, from a single battle. This wasn't just a major victory, this was an absolute dunking. The Radetzky will be in the docks for a month, as a lucky shot from an Italian destroyer managed to destroy one of her fire control directors, and the Karnten will need to be pumped out, and have the dents hammered out of her.

Holy. Shit. This is everything the Italians have. All of it. 22 ships. Tops. The building battlecruisers aren't going to filter in for a while. The Italians gambled, and forgot the game was rigged from the start.

The first two months of the Submarine war are quiet. We sink a trio of enemy merchant vessels, while losing one of our own. We also lose a submarine, but sink two of theirs, and a corvette.

An unexpected cruiser battle erupts. In the fray, my leopard class DD's, and a pair of Taurus class cruisers. So basically, I have 7 destroyers.

This poor enemy destroyer stumbled into a world of hurt. Five inch shells smash into the poor dumbass ship without any kind of warning. in 26 turns, she's already on fire and barely moving.

To the north though, there's another group of light ships. I'm just going to yeet out of here. Why?

Because 40 torpedo bombers, a bunch of medium bombers, and other aircraft are about to unleash hell on these suckers.

I lose a destroyer to a submarine as the battle ends, but I'll take killing 4 Italian ships.

Italy is now under blockade. It's been two months.

We kill a few ships, they kill a few ships, we both lose a submarine each.

I decline another coastal raid, but I'll take a cruiser fight. It's a night battle, but Radar lights up my contact immediately.

We start chasing and shooting. Dawn approaches, and as it comes...

A new sun appears for a brief instant.

The second ship dies, as 6 inch shells pound into her. I love my light cruisers sometimes.

The Italian cruiser fleet has been cut in half in just two months.

Once again, we both lose submarines, but I kill more of their merchants. After this though, my game breaks. No battles can be accepted. I've got Italy blockaded to hell and back though, so it isn't that bad.

The Duce gets the boot. I take Albania in the peace deal.

In 1943, the Austro-Hungarian empire is now the uncontested king of the eastern Mediterranean. The Italians were fucked over so hard, that the game can't process it anymore. I want to call that a win, so I will. I've essentially accomplished all I can this game, so with that, the Career of Admiral Null comes to an end. 43 years of rapid, massive changes.

Wow. Look at the Italian Navy every time it fights me.

I lost a grand total of ONE capital ship, an armored cruiser. In exchange, I killed 12 capital ships, 6 light cruisers, 36 corvettes, 12 DD's, and 83 italian submarines. Get. Fucking. Dunked on.

*******

With Austria Hungary coming to a close, I'll look back on this, and say, Holy shit.

I at this point, cannot begin to stress on how amazing this is compared to where I was at the start. The US navy exploded in power about mid way through the game, as the industrial buildup they had just wouldn't stop. They've got more tonnage in service in battleships than in my entire navy. I surpassed Russia and Italy budget wise, if not tonnage wise (in the case of russia). My ship designs are better than most of the worlds, mostly because of the obsession with speed many navies got. I like speed but as you can see you can get by with slower capital ships without many problems if you design them properly. I'll likely start a new campaign as either the Americans, or as the Japanese. Both will end up focusing more on carrier warfare than this playthrough did, just by necessity of what I had to work with and a far more limited budget - I'll do japan on game budget instead of historical, if I do it. The extra challenge isn't really needed.

 

[GnomeofDoc]

Congratulations!

 

[Techpriest]

Tri

Congratulations!

me IRL right now. I'm fucking done for a bit. This was an awkward, nail bitingly tricky game at some points. If you're wondering about my naval strategies, it basically boiled down to this against the italians -

Step 0. Determine if it's a battle that I can think I can actually win. Otherwise, deny it.

Step 1. Find them.

Step 2. Seperate my target from the herd (the rest of the fleet).

Step 3. BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF IT UNTIL IT DIES.

Of course, this also meant maneuvering properly. I spent quite a bit of time determining exactly how and when the enemy was going to be crossing my T, or when I was crossing his, and exploited that. The close ranges of the Adriatic mean that combat is very much limited. You can't maneuver all over the place, especially after aircraft start coming into play.

 

[NerdShamer]

The reason why Italy keeps losing to Tech Priest

But seriously, being spawned away from your escorts is as fucked up as it sounds.

 

[Techpriest]

The reason why Italy keeps losing to Tech Priest

But seriously, being spawned away from your escorts is as fucked up as it sounds.

The Falco had escorts, it's just that they were destroyers. They couldn't do anything before the Lissa got within range with her 12 inchers and started landing hits.

 

[Adamska]

Jesus H Christ you just proceeded to dunk on Italy so hard the only thing they could even do to you were some spasms caused by the blunt force trauma you inflicted on them from the last few times you made them see nothing but darkness and tears. They had three different governments, four to five rearmament plans and four wars and they could do nothing to you but collapse into shit.

Like the Vieste region should just be seen as cursed waters for Italy, because they just kept losing their prides of the fleets to torps as you yeeted them in the process. Seriously, it's almost like the game made crazy ass Huber and Lazars the prophets of Torpedo and Air warfare respectively given how as we wrote that shit you got the things needed to do what we asked. Hell, besides the one time that the game chose to megadick you, you mostly had this under control.

I mean shit, the only reason Pasta was even matching you in raiders was you literally didn't try until you hit the Italians so hard they forgot how to fight. That one battle was just disgusting.

Anyways, if you do a round two I vote Hakko Ichiu because I want to see you yeet the best fleets in the world with planes.

 

[GnomeofDoc]

Well I will be waiting for the next run through the gauntlet with the nips should be fun!

 

[Techpriest]

I’m not sure if I should make a second thread or not. I kind of want to, just so I can make a title joke. Also, I’ll need to make a couple in universe style things, alt history bullshit, and probably a guide to your first game of RTW II, in case this has somehow made you want to drop 35 bucks on a spreadsheet simulator.

Jesus H Christ you just proceeded to dunk on Italy so hard the only thing they could even do to you were some spasms caused by the blunt force trauma you inflicted on them from the last few times you made them see nothing but darkness and tears. They had three different governments, four to five rearmament plans and four wars and they could do nothing to you but collapse into shit.

Like the Vieste region should just be seen as cursed waters for Italy, because they just kept losing their prides of the fleets to torps as you yeeted them in the process. Seriously, it's almost like the game made crazy ass Huber and Lazars the prophets of Torpedo and Air warfare respectively given how as we wrote that shit you got the things needed to do what we asked. Hell, besides the one time that the game chose to megadick you, you mostly had this under control.

I mean shit, the only reason Pasta was even matching you in raiders was you literally didn't try until you hit the Italians so hard they forgot how to fight. That one battle was just disgusting.

Anyways, if you do a round two I vote Hakko Ichiu because I want to see you yeet the best fleets in the world with planes.

The collapse of Italy from unified country to divided one in less than 80 years will be a topic historians in this universe will struggle to explain for years. Post this war, I’d imagine you’d see a semi-independent Republic of Venice re-emerge, and join or ally with the Austrians. You might also see a collapse once again in between southern and northern Italy, and at the very least an Austrian puppet government installed in Rome. Hell, an Austro-Hungarian dominated Balkans would likely be one hell of a land power, even with all the ethnic tensions. Serbia and Romania would likely have sided with Italy in several of those wars, and been absorbed into the Hapbsburg empire, probably as semi- autonomous regions. Then there’s the saga of the Wien, which is just golden. You’d get a good amount of BBC docs on it.

“Wien: The Battleship That Changed The World.”

Well I will be waiting for the next run through the gauntlet with the nips should be fun!

I’ll need to put it to a vote for who I play next. Honestly, I expect Japan or the US. Both of them are very different from Mediterranean powers. Italy would be interesting too - I’d be focusing on growing enough to focus on France and maybe chipping away at the U.K. once land based air gets good.

 

[GnomeofDoc]

I’ll need to put it to a vote for who I play next. Honestly, I expect Japan or the US. Both of them are very different from Mediterranean powers. Italy would be interesting too - I’d be focusing on growing enough to focus on France and maybe chipping away at the U.K. once land based air gets good.

No matter what the poll chooses, you do a really good job with describing your thought process for ship design and tactics. Plus the one liners are always nice to have! You have serious made me consider slapping down $35 for spread sheet sim.

 

[Techpriest]

No matter what the poll chooses, you do a really good job with describing your thought process for ship design and tactics. Plus the one liners are always nice to have! You have serious made me consider slapping down $35 for spread sheet sim.

Well, I'm glad to hear that.

Well. Shit. Looks like I'm going with the weebs.

Admiral Kensama shall lead the land of GLORIOUS NIPPON to glory. But before that, some tips for people who want to play for the first time. Here's my list of tips.

1. Play a nation like Germany, France, or the United States first. Great Britain has a lot going on, and a large empire to manage. The US also has a lot of zones to manage, same with France, but the budget for the US makes up for it. You're also starting with good docks, good tech bonuses, a safe zone, and a lot of potential. Germany is good if you want a harder first game, but within reason. You are going to be primarily focused on Europe, and on contesting France or Russia.

2. Take the auto build of the legacy fleet at first. It helps with making sure all your various outer colonies start with appropriate ships. You'll get to design ships soon enough, and there's not much you can do with your initial builds anyway. You're very limited in tonnage.

3. Don't jump into a war right away. Early fleet engagements are some of the most frustrating in the game. Battleships won't penetrate one another, everything moves very slowly, and destroyers will miss about 99% of the torpedoes they fire, if they shoot them off at all. If you're playing a smaller nation, you need to build up.

4. Don't go crazy on budget events. Budget is important, but too high of a budget raises unrest. High unrest is no bueno, and starting a war at high unrest is even worse.

5. Losing is fun. You'll learn a lot getting the shit kicked out of you. I played a lot of Rule the Waves I, which is why I was confident enough to pick A-H for my first lets play here. I'd still completed a game as the USA first, to get an idea of how aircraft worked.

6. Ships take time to build, and become obsolete very quickly. Don't hesitate to continue building a design you know is outmatched or obsolete - a bad ship is still better than no ship, and it might have a use later on in refits.

7. Design by role. Battleships are meant to kill battleships. Battlecruisers are meant to kill cruisers. Armored and Heavy cruisers are meant to engage other cruisers and harass battleships. Light Cruisers are to kill other light cruisers, destroyers, screen, raid, and otherwise act as a flexible element. Destroyers are for engaging enemy destroyers attempting to do torpedo runs, and to do torpedo runs on enemy ships.

8. Colonial service ships are worth it if you have a spread out empire - they count more for tonnage at the cost of a bit more upkeep; I think they also work better as raiders due to that, but I could be wrong.

9. Cost matters. The biggest battleship you can build is appealing, I know, but the monthly build costs can cripple you. Don't design something you can't afford to keep around in active service for at least 5 years, or construct uninterrupted. I broke this rule sometimes, but I had to - otherwise I wouldn't have had any large combatants.

10. Corvettes aren't sexy, but they help a lot. I built a lot of destroyers and ignored corvettes as A-H for a long time, mostly because my starting fleet had a bunch of destroyers I knew would be obsolete very fast, and only good for trade protection and ASW work. For larger nations, having a dedicated fleet of corvettes to do minesweeping and ASW work is worth it. It frees up your more expensive destroyers for being in battles. I probably fucked up a little bit by not scrapping some destroyers and just building corvettes instead.

 

[Adamska]

Well, I'm glad to hear that.

View attachment 790284

Well. Shit. Looks like I'm going with the weebs.

View attachment 790297

Admiral Kensama shall lead the land of GLORIOUS NIPPON to glory.

Oh hey, reality itself is telling you to take glorious Japan and Banzai it into the US and UK. To celebrate, let's get some proper music!

Why an army and navy song? Because HAHAHAHA, IRL Japan's military was constantly in a mega bitchfight with each other and actively fucked over the Japanese government and each others' war aims. The Army and the Navy saw each other as rivals to defeat and crush, not just one up over each other like most other nations. This has a lot to do with how two different clans with a long history of hating each other were installed as head of each way back in the time of the Tokugawa Shogunate, and not really papered over during the Meiji Restoration.

So @GnomeofDoc , which service do you want to take? I'm cool with being the IJA myself, since slapping the Bear for useless tundra and wasting time on my own carriers sounds fucking awesome. I can force my grunts to buy my shitty haiku and art to promote them and then beat them too, just like your average Japanese officer in this time!

 

[Techpriest]

I'll need at least some kind of actual ship of the line. The Yashima class isn't a terrible ship. She's not the best, but she'll do for the next five or so years.

Locally, I decide to go with a smaller, less armored design. She's cheaper, and I'll take two just for tonnage. Her guns aren't the best, and she's more of a glorified armored cruiser but you take what you can get.

As for my armored cruisers, they're adequate. They aren't cheap either. Still, they have good quality 8 inch guns, a good amount of ammo, and an alright secondary battery. They'll certainly kick the teeth in of light cruisers. The turret ROF isn't the highest due to them being 8 inch guns (and dual turrets with 9 inch guns are the minimum to avoid the ROF debuff at the start), but I'm not concerned. She'll do fine.

The Izumi is cheap, functional, and has an impressive amount of 4 inch guns. She's meant to be an expendable early game destroyer leader. She's not very fast, but she'll do some real damage to lightly armored ships, or deter raiders.

The Takachiho on the other hand, is more expensive, and designed expressly to raid, and fly the flag in colonial regions.

The Akikaze is the baseline early game destroyer. Cheap as chips, 27 knots, 3 inch guns. I put the range on medium instead of short as I do want to be able to move them around Asia freely.

My starting navy is small, but that's alright. I've got three more capital ships to be built, and my funding is still within tolerable limits.

Compared to A-H, I'd say I'm starting in a rather nice position.

Delays hit my battleships early. Not a surprise, although I'd rather it not happen. But that's underdeveloped ship building industry for you.

I'm not at war with anyone, I have a healthy budget surplus, and prestige is never unwelcome this early.

While it would be funny to get a treaty this early, prestige is good. The chance to get the Anglo-Japanese security agreement this early though...

Rats. Well, it didn't cost me anything to try.

They do compensate me though, I suppose. I'll take it.

Now, when I get docks large enough, I can actually build a functional battleship.

The first event of the new year is rather nice.

So is this really nice tech. I order another Yashima class ship from the british too - having three of them would be ideal.

Tensions with the brits could be better however.

Hrrrrg. I need to try.

FUCK!

I'm not ready for a big war this early, really.

Tensions with Germany doesn't stop me from improving my armor though.

I really want it but it might push tensions too high with the UK for me to get that battleship I ordered.

The UK has 14 inch guns in service already. That's a bit worrying.

Hopefully, we don't get slapped with a treaty.

Kill. Me. Now. 11 years? 11 FUCKING YEARS!? There goes the fleet build up of about every nation. The butcher's bill is pretty nasty for the Germans and the UK.

I get to build a better destroyer design though, so not all is lost. No, all is lost. Holy shit this is painful. I need to go to war with someone, ASAP.

The best candidate for fucking up happens to be the Russians. We're similar in battleship tonnage, my CA's might be better than theirs, and I can catch up when it comes to small ships without a huge amount of trouble. It's a real pity my tensions with them aren't the highest. Hmm.

The Sawakaze class destroyer is a direct improvement over my Akikaze's.

Torpedoes are getting better. Hopefully they'll get better even quicker. I also order the start of dedicated night fighting and torpedo training - but it won't be finished until the next year. I want to beat the shit out of the Russians with a sneak attack if I have to.

Or I could yoink some colonies off of Germany. It's worth looking at.

I get my wish a couple of turns later.

Oh boy, it's going to be a night battle! My AI destroyers sink a merchant, which wakes the enemy fleet up and wastes two of their torpedoes. Guess what happens when they run into a german CL that's sortieing out of port?

Fucking idiots.

It's complete pandamonium.

FUCK!

The torpedo hit the magazine.

Meanwhile my destroyers are spread all over the place.

You're fucking kidding me. The light cruisers are able to launch their sub torp tubes at close range, while my ships can't. For fucks sake. This is a disaster. The Fuso was one of my GOOD ships.

One of my good light cruisers is fucking around with theirs. For fucks sake you dumb ass we're LEAVING. I blame this disaster entirely on those dumb ass destroyer captains who couldn't keep it in their pants.

The captain of the Naniwa though, has at least sunk one of their light cruisers.

What an absolute cock up.

The fuck do you mean, 'minor victory?' This was a complete and total waste of an engagement.

But we seized that fucking shithole at least.

As long as it's in the daytime, I know I can win it.

Thank god. Wait, shit, we're starting in the afternoon.

The Izumi swings around at full speed and makes a beeline for the enemy.

It's a Hela class cruiser. It's light as the dickens, and all her 4 inch guns are in casemates. Interesting design choice to save weight, I suppose.

She's got a cute little friend too.

The Izumi starts landing hits with her six inch guns, as I close the distance carefully. Before long though, I have to slow to cruising speed, and I lose both her and the Hela in the dark.

It's barely a victory.

But the public will take anything after that fiasco outside the bay.

A few german ships have been interned due to damage they took against me. That's sort of good at least. I also develop a design out of the ships I ordered from the british. She'll carry more 12 inch shells.

Prestige is worth it.

Oh FUCK.

Upside, it's almost night. I might get lucky and not even find them.

Or not.

Good news though, the enemy CA had to fuck off because he couldn't find the target at night.

A couple months later, more good news. The bad news is that the Germans are just pounding the fuck out of my merchant shipping and I can't really do the same to them.

I'll have the Izumi do her best. Months drag on though, and shit isn't happening at all. They're racking up warscore because I'm declining to fight them directly.

This is good news but I'm not very optimistic.

I've gotten what I wanted out of this war, which was an end to that awful fucking treaty.

FUCK.

It continues, month after month. No real tech breakthroughs, and a lot of Germans sinking my merchants.

This however gets me to sit up and pay attention.

Germany is also starting to get unrest issues. I accept the next offered battle, a cruiser duel off of Hokkaido.

I have a bunch of destroyers and both of my heavy cruisers. It is later in the day though, which is annoying.

It ends without fleet contact.

Central firing pops in december 1904, which is nice. We've been at war with Germany for almost two years and haven't engaged their fleet at all.

My designers do give me good 10 inch guns though, which is kind of nice.

I'm sending some destroyers on a convoy raid in the south pacific.

Uh, holy fuck. I end up ramming a merchant ship, everyone's heavily damaged, and my torpedoes of course hit nothing.

The germans won this easily. LOOK AT ALL THOSE DESTROYERS!!!

In september I get the kind of breakthrough I'd been waiting for. I can build dreadnoughts now, not very good ones though. I can't afford it though, so I'll wait for the war to end and my other battleships to finish before breaking out the designer.

40 months into the war, and now I know I need to design something new. 12 inch quality 0 guns? Yes please.

The Iki will be expensive, and take 33 months to finish up, but she'll be an all Japanese built design.

4 years into the war, and we finally crack the mystery of 700 ton destroyers.

I get into a nasty unexpected coastal raid where they brought along a pair of battleships.

Luckily, I've been mining the shit out of the seas along Taiwan.

It's low, but I'll take it.

56 months in, and I get something that completely obsoletes my two battleships currently under construction. Such is Rule the Waves.

IT'S OVER. FUCKING FINALLY, IT'S OVER. It's been almost nine fucking years.

I have to say goodbye to my budget, but Jesus Christ, I don't care anymore. I need to remodel a bunch of my ships, get new light and heavy cruiser designs into service, and otherwise take a breather. Fuck me, that was disgustingly long.

 

[Adamska]

>BS treaty in first two years of gameplay

Yeah no, I'd just restart.