Submarine Warfare musings

[FinnMcCool]

You know, I haven't been playing Civ3 for as long as a lot of people in this forum, and I've been modding even less. But I've been playing wargames of one kind or another for a verrrry long time, and several parts of Civ3 kinda... well, suck. Like no stealth bombardment, precision bombing, and the ZOC? What is that for? One potshot? Not much control in that zone, if you ask me!

But a really nifty thing about Civ3 is you can change it if you don't like it. Great! I've been musing over ways to work around some shortcomings, and I wonder what the experienced modders might have to say.

Like air superiority, you can make it actually sort of useful if you tweak the unit's operational range, for instance. Can't improve ZOC unfortunately, that's hardcoded. Bombardment is what I'm thinking about right now though. It can be useless or too powerful, and that depends almost entirely on the ROF. And Submarines (hence the title) shouldn't have to surface and commit open combat when their real use is to make a secret attack. Invisibility isn't enough. By using the attack-defense values, a sub gets sunk too easily by ships with no det invis. For my own mods, I'm thinking to set a sub with bombardment range 1, rate of fire THREE and lethal sea bombardment.

"That'll make'm too powerful" you'll say. Yeah, sure. They were too powerful, the Wolfpacks in WWII almost defeated the Allied navy! So to counter that, the Destroyer should be more powerful too. Unfortunately, there isn't a graphic of a Destroyer dropping depth charges (that I've seen) but I wonder if the unit can be tweaked to simulate such combat.

Such as, Sub with att 2 def 6, lethSB of 10, ROF 3, Invis
Destroyer with lethSB and ZOC.

It only gives the Destroyer one free shot, so theoretically it would take a pack of 3 destroyers to sink a sub before it makes its torpedo run. Correct?

Opinions?

 

[jatibi]

i guess it works playing against humans, but the AI uses naval bombardment mostly on my well defended cities. submarines damaging fortified infantry - that's what the AI would most probably do. bombarding enemy ships isn't AI's strength, that's sure.

 

[El Justo]

You know, I haven't been playing Civ3 for as long as a lot of people in this forum, and I've been modding even less. But I've been playing wargames of one kind or another for a verrrry long time, and several parts of Civ3 kinda... well, suck. Like no stealth bombardment, precision bombing, and the ZOC? What is that for? One potshot? Not much control in that zone, if you ask me!

But a really nifty thing about Civ3 is you can change it if you don't like it. Great! I've been musing over ways to work around some shortcomings, and I wonder what the experienced modders might have to say.

Like air superiority, you can make it actually sort of useful if you tweak the unit's operational range, for instance. Can't improve ZOC unfortunately, that's hardcoded. Bombardment is what I'm thinking about right now though. It can be useless or too powerful, and that depends almost entirely on the ROF. And Submarines (hence the title) shouldn't have to surface and commit open combat when their real use is to make a secret attack. Invisibility isn't enough. By using the attack-defense values, a sub gets sunk too easily by ships with no det invis. For my own mods, I'm thinking to set a sub with bombardment range 1, rate of fire THREE and lethal sea bombardment.

"That'll make'm too powerful" you'll say. Yeah, sure. They were too powerful, the Wolfpacks in WWII almost defeated the Allied navy! So to counter that, the Destroyer should be more powerful too. Unfortunately, there isn't a graphic of a Destroyer dropping depth charges (that I've seen) but I wonder if the unit can be tweaked to simulate such combat.

Such as, Sub with att 2 def 6, lethSB of 10, ROF 3, Invis
Destroyer with lethSB and ZOC.

It only gives the Destroyer one free shot, so theoretically it would take a pack of 3 destroyers to sink a sub before it makes its torpedo run. Correct?

Opinions?

hi FinnMcCool.

for my TCW scenario, i flagged all subs as stealth attack, invisible and see invisible.

now, there are a few different variations. the early era ones are diesel and have short ranges w/ high A and low D. next come the first generation of nuclear powered subs (longer range/better A/D) and then comes the SSBNs which carry missiles (both conventional and nuclear).

the key is, we recently removed the 'sees invisible' flag for just about all of the surface vessels save some ASW frigates and late-game DDGs. as a result, one needs to have some subs tag along in convoys or else the enemy will pounce on your transports (stealth attack). this switch has made naval warfare a lot more interesting to say the least. subs are deadly b/c you can pick transports out of the stack.

 

[FinnMcCool]

Justo, I do love your avatar. "Shining City On A Hill" and all that... but:

setting subs for Stealth only works when they surface and commit cannon fire. The graphics notwithstanding. Consider:

A sub goes to periscope depth (invisibility is active) and sees a convoy. Numerous ships are viable targets. No destroyers are around, and AEGIS hasn't been invented. The sub has a free shot (stealth). What does the game give you? Sub's attack vs. chosen-target's defense. The sub sneaks up on a cruiser and gets sunk. Presumably by um... I think, cannon fire...

Destroyers are another matter. The sub can be on the defensive, and the DD attacks and combat odds are pretty normal. What I'm trying to create is a unit that can act like a respectable sub on offense.


However. I do seriously respect jitibi's experience and it kinda annoys me that he knows how badly the AI will play. I'd like to create a mod that gives the friggin AI a gawdam chance. Skews my French.

 

[SoulSkorpion]

I've been thinking about this problem as part of a re-balancing mod I've had in the works for a while. I also thought of this idea, but I rejected it because it would mean submarines could bombard land targets with torpedoes (whoops!).

The best solution I can think of (although I haven't implemented it yet - too busy testing other gameplay changes) would simply be to increase the offense strength of the submarine to be several points higher than any ship it's expected to be able to torpedo. That way a submarine that can close on a big ship undetected can blow it out of the water, but any ship that happens to catch a sub will blast it to pieces.

It still doesn't solve the problem of ships that aren't supposed to have any anti-submarine equipment being able to attack subs (either on purpose or accidentally), but then neither does the bombardment method.

 

[WildWeazel]

Finn, somebody came up with the idea of using the 0 defense + HN bug on subs. That way, they can't be accidentally attacked becuase the other ship will just go over it. It could still attack using Stealth Attack, and you could give it good 0-range bombard for attacking ships in the same tile (also it couldn't bombard land tiles). I don't know if the AI would know how to use the bombard tho.

 

[vingrjoe]

Weasel Op, that sounds like an interesting idea.

El Justo, any chance of testing this out for possible implementation in future versions of TCW ?

 

[El Justo]

Weasel Op, that sounds like an interesting idea.

El Justo, any chance of testing this out for possible implementation in future versions of TCW ?

i like the idea of 'letting ships pass' over a tile that is occupied by the 'invisible' sub unit. however, i'm not too hip on the 0 D. iirc, any unit w/ a 0 D is either killed or captured (ie workers). no?

 

[WildWeazel]

i like the idea of 'letting ships pass' over a tile that is occupied by the 'invisible' sub unit. however, i'm not too hip on the 0 D. iirc, any unit w/ a 0 D is either killed or captured (ie workers). no?

No, that's the bug. It stays there underneath the other unit just like it's in a stack. (as a sub would) The only way to kill it is with lethal bombardment or defeating it when it attacks. I don't know how the bombardment works since it has no defense, but it came up in thread about that bug and someone had tried it in a game and IIRC it worked out ok.

 

[vingrjoe]

I did some quick tests, here's a couple of findings. Zero bombard range will not work very well. You cannot move your sub under an enemy ship, but they can move over you. So you would have to wait for an enemy ship to move into your tile to be able to bombard them. With zero defense, a unit is killed, unless it cost some population points to build it, in which the unit captured would turn into a worker or workers. Flagging a sub with invisible, zero defense and hidden nationality will confuse the AI. I had the AI destroyers swarming over my subs, but doing nothing.

 

[FinnMcCool]

I've been thinking about this problem as part of a re-balancing mod I've had in the works for a while. I also thought of this idea, but I rejected it because it would mean submarines could bombard land targets with torpedoes (whoops!).

Wow. Good thinking guys. This is just a quick note before I'm off to work, but I have a hunch there's a solution here.

Part of the difficulty is visualizing the battle. I also hope a unit maker out there drops in and links us to a DD that actually drops depth charges...

But I have some rusty memories of stories out of WWII where some sub attacks were actually made against harbors. At least, they were planned. I for one don't think a sub bombarding land would be too high a price for the added benefit it gets in making submarine warfare better at sea...

If the AI could somehow be made to use it at sea, at least. (what flag anyone?...)

 

[FinnMcCool]

I like ElJusto's method, except it does tie down a player quite a bit. The movement of subs is, and should, be a lot less than destroyers. If a convoy wants to move fast they need the DDs. Also, I just like the aesthetics of the Destroyer (though I miss depth ch's...)

As far as using bombardment at sea, I'm wondering if anyone has tested out tweaking flags to get the units to commit at sea instead of focusing on land. It seems, the designers feel "land is what the civs are fighting over" since you never see VPLs at sea locations.

Is it possible to put a VPL in a sea square? This would definitely encourage the AI to commit sea combat. I'm even thinking to change the icon for VPL to anchor and putting HUGE numbers of VPLs all over the sea, to spread out the AI squatters...

 

[El Justo]

FinnMcCool,

there is a unit out there that may fit your needs (by Wyrmshadow)

http://cdgroup.org/forums/tbs/civ3/viewtopic.php?t=5935

you need to register/sign in to see the image though

i've seen vp's at sea in other scenarios but i haven't seen or heard AI results. it is interesting to think of though.

i guess i'd equate a sub's range to whether or not it's an SS or SSN and, to a lesser extent, how quiet their engines are.

 

[WildWeazel]

If you give them lethal sea bombard but not lethal land it would help a little. Give them ZOC too.

vingrjoe, I did some tests with that bug once and I think the AI will leave the unit alone if it stays still. Not much help here tho.

 

[FinnMcCool]

Sorry, players, my CD is on loan right now, so all I'm doing is Editor. But I love reading your test experience.

Lemme see... My own experience is somewhat limited. I've used units with HN and 0 attack, also >0 attack. Perhaps a sub with >0 attack, LethSB, NON-lethal LB, Ivisibility and Stealth Attack. Enemy subs escape its detection untill an advanced model is discovered, but DDs will detect it. It can perform a St-Att (with high numbers--it's defense should be very low for combat with DDs)

So we have a Submarine with att-10 def-2, Lethal SB, NON-lethal land Bombard, Invisibility and Stealth Attack. Hidden Nationality will only make it do the same thing without declaring war. Grrrr. As long as it has Att>0, it's a normal unit, no?

It can bombard 1 square away to make a torpedo attack at the strongest unit. Or it can waltz on in to the midst of a convoy and make a stealth attack on the transports, who have a small chance of killing the sub.

For game purposes, a transport's guns can be considered augmented by neighboring DDs etc.

Fair. Possibly.

 

[El Justo]

i was trying to C&P the stat set-up we have for the TCW subs but the spreadsheet info dosn't paste well so i'll post the whole dang file. it has all of the sea units on it, their stats, techs, and special flags.

for the most part, the early gen subs have a high A and low D but these numbers even out some as the time line progresses. have a look and you may be able to get some ideas Mr. McCool.

we've been very, very pleased w/ the revisons we did on them (subs). they're relevant now as opposed to the past versions where it made no sense to build subs...

 

[FinnMcCool]

Thanks Justo. I've saved the file, I'll look it over in more detail when I get more time. Seems I'm rushing in and out of this site lately, my previous post seems a little like blather. I was just tossing out numbers to see if they float.

Just generally, I favor 1-square bombardment range. Torpedoing land squares doesn't seem too far-fetched. Pronounce that "torpeh-DOING!"

 

[WildWeazel]

Modern subs carry cruise missiles too. I don't know when that started, but it's a good excuse.

 

[BadKharma]

I was wondering why nobody has set a modern sub to carry troops you know navy seals and other elite units launch from nuclear subs and with the subs invisibility factor couples with making a covert seal team hidden nationality I think it made make an interesting twist to the game.

 

[WildWeazel]

That's an interesting idea. You could give SEALs the tactical missile and foot unit flags too, and then subs could carry cruise missiles or SEALs.
You could also differentiate between nuclear and... other subs. Make tactical nukes air units, set boomers to transport tacticals and air units. Make SEALs and cruise missiles tacticals and foot's (not feet ) and set non-nuke subs to transport those. I don't think this would have any side effects, except that helicopters could carry cruise missiles, which is no biggie.