Naval Battles

[Mr. Will]

Hey y'all,

I'm curious as to how many people here have ever had any good naval battles with the game's AI. It seems to me like the AI ignores the Navy as a way to make war on ppl. I have rarely seen them ever build many ships, and have only have them attack me with them once or twice. It seems like the person with 2 or more ships has naval superiority, which is pathetic. Is there a way to convince them to have major naval engagements in the open sea? And also, this is totally unrelated, but can you make the Warriors that join yur side from goody huts a different unit?
Thx

 

[sabo]

Well they seem to like to make war with me, I just had a battle ship sunk by the japanese who came in and bombarded me down to red with about 8 galleys, then one came in to attack to finish me off, pretty smart if you ask me becuase he didn't lose one Galley, but I lost my battleship.

 

[akhenaten]

What level are you playing on? I've seen more and larger navies as I've moved a little bit up the levels (only to regent so far, I'm not l33t or anything.)
One recent game I had a privateer and several of the AIs sent dozens of ships after it.

 

[silver 2039]

In a PTW game I played I fought a massive naval war against America. It was great. But lately I've only fought big naval battles in scenario's.

 

[Esckey]

The problem is that most civs that like building ships(Netherlands, England and etc) don't like building ground units so they tend to die out quick.

In one game I got Netherlands has lived into the modern age and I do not want to face their navy, everywhere I go they have a ship of some kind(I'm still running into Caravels and it's 2067

 

[Speedo]

It seems to depend. I've had a few games where a war declaration would result in (literally) dozens of ships off my coast bombarding within a few turns. In the average game though they don't seem to have more than a handful of ships.

 

[DreadCthulhu]

Set nuclear submarines to hidden nationality. Watch the AI build hundreds of them.

 

[killerbunny]

I've seen huge AI-naval forces. Often i try to avoid naval warfare because it is so costly, but when they start bombarding and wrecking your coasts, you have to react somehow. And they do that on emperor-level. Usually then i use artillery, bombers and a few ships

In a few games i've also battled the AI for naval superiority. It is sometimes necessary to ensure safe transport. This usually takes a lot of units and effort, but the feeling of ruling the seas is so good, it's worth it.

 

[CaptainCommando]

I've never seen the AI build more than a few ships, which sort of sucks because you can annhilate any AI invasion with no problem if it's coming over by see, the AI really needs to be revamped, i'm thinking maybe the military advisor should count land, air and sea as different things.

"We greatly outnumber them in land troops."
"Their Navy is far superior to ours, we must build ships!"
"Our air force is about even with theirs"

Something like that, so the AI can regard each differently to help keep up with humans.

 

[Longasc]

I think the problem is not the size of the AI navy.

It is simply not smart enough to deploy them at hot spots or make use of them.

Often, the whole navy is scattered all over the world and a core force is heading towards your continent or so.

There are also problems with naval battles:

Want to kick AI ass?

Simply fortify your ships! (Ancient Age)

With equal stats, the attacker on sea tends to lose.
If you add "fortify" you gain +25% more, so +10% for defending and +25% for being fortified.

The Manowar makes things perhaps a little harder now: It will probably enslave ships that fail an attack on it...


But honestly, I was able to invade England and transport in replacement troops in Napoleonic Europe with having little more than 3 Frigates in the beginning, against a dozen on Manowars...

You can also trick the AI cheaply in Age of Discovery. Have a Privateer sail before your fleet, the AI will throw everything after the poor Privateer and largely ignore your transports and Capital Ships.

 

[KaNick]

I recently played a game against the Dutch and they had a very large navy. This did not seem to decrease their production of land units as they took over their home continet. Unfortunately for them they finally declared war on me after I had finished a large stockpil of nukes. Needless to day their navy did not last very long.

 

[IglooDame]

In a regent game I'm playing right now the Ottomans (who own Australia) have at least two dozen frigates and galleons. I think the AI figures out somehow that if they own the complete island/continent, than it should build a stronger navy to prevent invasion.

Don't tell the Ottomans, but I'm going to declare war, immediately land some tank armies, capture a city and build an airport, and his navy can watch while I roll over his continent. I might even have a few ICBMs by then that will help de-industrialize his core cities.

 

[cableguy]

OOPS! think i just let the cat out the bag and the sultan aint happy

 

[IglooDame]

Originally posted by cableguy
OOPS! think i just let the cat out the bag and the sultan aint happy

Well, at this point he can either take it like a man, or he can sneak-attack me which will make it tougher for me to win but will ensure that I will commit civocide on him - raze every city he has, and disband every captured Ottoman worker that I get. :devil2:

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

The best naval battles I have ever seen are in the Rise of Rome scenario in C3C. The AIs build huge navies and fight each other all the time with galleys. Its really quite fun.

 

[sealman]

I have witnessed large AI navies since Vanilla.

 

[cableguy]

And to answer the thread originators second question build a barracks and upgrade em when the option is open for it

but will ensure that I will commit civocide on him - raze every city he has, and disband every captured Ottoman worker that I get

Thats just plain harsh, FYI the sultan is approaching NATO, so BE WARNED u r being watched

 

[Punkymonkey]

One time the AI civ built 14 battleships and i had a a real nice battle. Too bad i had like 10 battleships, 16 AEGIS and 20 destroyers

 

[hoplite505]

in the napoleonic europe conquest the british have a good navy and use

 

[Raijer]

As I usually like having a navy, I've seen both sides of the coin out of the AI. I've had games where the AI built and used a very large and effective navy, and other games where the AI navy was basically non-existent. I remember one game in particular where China built one of the most massive ironclad navies EVER... well over a hundred units! When war went down between us on the open seas, my modern navy was often overwhelmed by numbers (although the unbalanced navy stats also contributed).