World War One PBEM Playtest

[Patient English]

Frustrating, maybe. But with a few exceptions, coastal bombardment of cities never happened.

Troops in the open, maybe, so you should give every coastal city a coastal battery. However, that only works for MP, because if the AI can bombard, it will, even if it is dumb to do so, and will soon burn up all its ships.

[academia]

I agree with Palaiologos
Please, don´t give them the submarine flag.
I played TSFE scenario, and all the vessels have that quality... believe me, it´s extremely frustrating that you can´t bombard coastal enemy cities

[Patient English]

Well, I suggest this:

Naval Bombardment in WW1 had a role (Gallipolli, Belgium) but it was usually purpose-built Monitors, or obsolete Battleships.

The super-expensive Dreadnoughts were absolutely weapons of naval superiority, and their owners would not risk them in bombardment roles where mines or coastal submarines could sink them cheaply.

Naval superiority WAS worthwhile, particularly for the Brits. If they lost it, ultimately the High Seas Fleet could escort a huge invasion armada of Britain. More immediately, it would be almost impossible for British trade to survive.

I am going to try to simulate all this in my WW1 scenario (currently in development), but you're welcome to use the ideas/come up with solutions if you can...

In the meantime, why not have a Monitor unit, or let the old pre-Dreadnoughts bombard? The Dreadnoughts then protect these.

[Nilat]

And I would say NO!!

I agree with palaiologos!

[Palaiologos]

I would say NO.

Otherwise what would be the point of attaining naval superiority? If the ships can only be used against other ships, then they are not realy worth building.

And naval bombardment did play a role.

I can't think of a ww1 example but in operation Weserubung(sp?), the conquest of Norway(WW2), German battleships blasted Norwegian defences.

Perhaps if you decreased their stats a bit.

[jim panse]

Along with German aid Skopje was liberated and is now once again part of the Ottoman Empire. Also the Russian Black Sea Fleet was annihilated.


@ Gameplay: What would you all say giving the Submarine Flag to all the naval vessels as shore bombardments were not really the key to victory. I´ve seen Pericles´ astonishing victory over the Allies and I´m thinking of different ways how to make this not possible in the future ......

[Nilat]

Im not!

[Palaiologos]

Originally posted by FiGu
Well.. Look at your units in the Western Front... You got.. about 5 times more units than i do. And France + Britain had as large armies as Germany did during this time..

Mmmm..... i admit i haven't looked at the allies' units.

But i think that jim was fairly accurate in this. He had a detailed Order of battle so he should have made things right.

P.S I hope you dudes are not downloading my turn to check my movements

[jim panse]

I´m back and I´ll post my turn tomorrow.

[academia]

mmm.... where´s Jim???

[Nilat]

Very true!!

[FiGu]

Well.. Look at your units in the Western Front... You got.. about 5 times more units than i do. And France + Britain had as large armies as Germany did during this time..

[Palaiologos]

Small?

One world war division was about 17.000-20.000 men.

Therefore the three divisions destroyed in london would amount to 60.000 casualties.

Unfortunately due to the limits of the civ2 combat engine(all battles are to the death) a single powerfull naval vessel can bombard three units out of existence pretty easily.

Now if the ship of the line(or pre-dreadnaught) had something like an attack of 15(instead of 25) attacking a fortified unit supported by coastal defences would be something to think twice about.

[FiGu]

Oh, and something to add..
How Can the Allied Armies be sooooo small... The British Isles was more heavily defend than those units..

[Nilat]

And I have to say the russian navy was a little more bigger (It may look like im thinking only about myself, but i agree with palaiolog with those things, exept the ship battle rules)