Hmm, the destroyer is 30 strength, 8 moves, 200 cost. It isn't invisible to most units, it doesn't have a 50% retreat chance, it doesn't have a 50% bonus when fighting submarines. It does have a 30% interception chance of airplanes, but that's not a lot. There might be undocumented changes to balance the attack submarine versus the destroyer, but at present the destroyer is not the counter to the attack submarine anymore. The battleship, missile cruiser and stealth destroyer also don't have the statistics to be a really good cost effective counter to attack submarines.
Maybe the destroyer now has a 50% bonus versus submarines, but it isn't documented.
I'll join the group who would like to see (some form of) the glance screen in the Foreign Advisor. It's the only quick way to get a feeling for the relations of various civilisation towards one another.
I hear what your saying, i think it's an improvement as at least 1 sub is now worth getting, but it still shows up some very odd, unit matchups/counter unit matchups
I mean you start with destroyers that are fast, counter subs, and have good all round abilty.
Battleships are the toughest sea going unit in terms of brute str they counter destroyers.
The first sub has no real role (unlike in real life were they played a critical role in WW2) since it cant sink anything.
Destroyers are then replaced with Stealth Destroyers that loose the anti sub role and so can no longer counter sub's (can't see them), and get stealth instead so they can't be counterd by missile cruisers or battlships.
A new Attack sub appears after the first basic sub that now has the str to attack destoyers so it's counter no longer counters it since equal str, and it cant attack the later SD since it cant be seen.....
What a mess of units frankly that either half counter, or don't counter the units there supposed to......
And that mess is shown up in all it's glory because of the simple yet great way the naval ships of the sailing era, have been organised with a nice (an similar to the land unit combat ) system of combat an counter combat units.
Privateers, can attack anything that moves, even in peace time, fast good site radious
Countered by frigates, fast, good combat power
Countered by ships of the line, Medium speed, strong combat power vs all sail ships
Countered by Ironclad, strongest ship of the time, counters all sail ships but slow, an cannot travel across ocean
The beauty of the age of sail is that it promotes a balanced naval force, since the weaker combat ships, frigates/privateers have either speed or highly useful abilties that make them very worth while, while the stronger combat ships that counter them although far superior str wise have slower speeds or hinderances that mean a balanced fleet is by far the best way to go.
The modern era should be organised along similar lines of unit & counter unit since at the moment the best counter to far to many of the modern era ships is themselves.
Something alongs the following lines, with units having specific jobs an counters.
Destroyers counters subs + 25% bonus vs subs (destroyer no longer obsoletes either)
Battleships counter destroyers + 25% bonus vs standard destroyer
Standard Sub has a 100% bonus vs battleships,MC & a 50% chance to evade combat ships in a stack, and attack a transport or carrier directly, standard sub moves reduced too 3 (Idea is to make it important to send a couple of fast moving destroyers ahead of the stack to root out any standard subs lying in ambush, a la WW2 when subs lay in wait for passing convoys were they then attacked the merhant ships only)
Stealth Destroyers, Ambush style unit, 25% bonus on the attack only, vs all surface ships (except sub's and other SD), can be detected by Attack subs & other SD
Attack sub, str 30, 2 first strike's, counters sub's, SD, capital ships, 50% bonus vs MC/Battleship, can see other sub's, SD
Missile Cruiser, same as now, but carry's 8 missiles, 25% bonus vs standard destroyer
You get the idea something along those lines, with units having specific roles an counters, just like they did in the naval era before an just like all the land units have, so that it's important to have a balanced fleet with a bit of everything in it to counter what your enemy might throw up at you