Navies, priority?

[Atreides]

Navy.

What’s your opion about it? I absolute dislike the whole navy.

Why I dislike the navy:
- The Al over focus on the navy. This was especially true with version 1.1.
- You will fight with any campagain multiple foes, which makes your navy (relative)even weaker.
- You do not influence the outcome of the battles.
- Gaining command stars is way to hard for an navy commander.
- A human player, playing as a barbarian faction should stay away from naval issues. Nevertheless because of the multiple foes issue barbarians managed to kick the crap out of me on the water.

So at the end of the day I focus on transport duties and protecting my harbors. I recommended non-use of the navy in my campaign with Carthage. Another user Bhruic recommended strongly the use of navy. He said:

With the proper use of navy, you can defend Sicily without ever fighting a land battle. The only way the Scipii can get to Sicily, once you take their city, is by boat. They will continually load up their armies on a single ship. Sink that ship, and their army goes down with it. This is a much better approach than constantly fighting land battles. < END QUOTE >

So, should we avoid the water and minimize battles of should we dominate the sea?

[The Stranger]

but in 1.2, tha AI doesn't focus that much on navies. and gaining stars has been fixed in 1.2.

[Es Arkajae]

The AI doesn't build hardly any fleets in 1.2 mate, its another one of those unexpected consequences of the 1.2 patch.

I'm pinning my hopes on whatever expansion pack CA has going on now~;)

I'd go back to MTW except I must admit I'm a bit of a graphics whore and the bad unit graphics throw me off~D

[Atreides]

but in 1.2, tha AI doesn't focus that much on navies. and gaining stars has been fixed in 1.2.

Stars has been fixed. You can GAIN stars.

But i found it VERY hard to exactly achieve those stars.

I am fighting an campagain, I beat the crap out of my foes and there i trouble to stay alive still they assualt me with some stupid boats

[cunctator]

I always try to dominate the seas and bolckade all enemy ports to crush their economy. In 1.2 that`s much to easy. 1.1 was a nice challenge especially fighting the romans.

[Tricky Lady]

Hmm, I guess I am the only one, but in my current Seleucid campaign (1.2 patch) the AI (especially the Romans) is spamming the Mediterranean with zillions of small fleet (max. 3 boats per stack).
Very very boring.
Unexpected side-effect: those fleets DO blockade my ports. They're like the flies buzzing around a dung-hill. You kill one and 3 others appear.

:duel:

[Bhruic]

Yes, the AI will have lots of little groups (overall). My point was that the Scipii, once they are down to one city, can't effectively produce ships anymore. Keeping them off Sicily is extremely easy because they'll make one ship and load their army on to it. Defeating (and even sinking) that one ship is pretty easy.

The rest of the factions you are at war with (we were talking about Carthage) will likely have more ships, but as long as you have a large stack, none of them will beat you. As you say TL, they don't make large stacks anymore.

Bh

[Kekvit Irae]

Navy.

Why I dislike the navy:
- The Al over focus on the navy. This was especially true with version 1.1.


People complained that the AI underfocused it's navy in MTW, leading to broken trade lanes.
I, for one, enjoy large scale sea campaigns. It makes planning treks across the sea, with an army in transport, a calculated risk unless you have adequete support.

[runes]

i'll admit, i havent yet played a campaign in 1.2 (mostly mp) but at leat in 1/1.1 i used navies ALL the time. if you built up a strong navy early on, it becomes almost too easy to take just about anywhere.

[Fisherking]

~:eek: The way the AI handles navies is different in 1.2 but there is still an enemy navy out there… The Romans, Egyptians, & Greeks mostly but occasionally someone else will start building one. The original game was over the top in enemy fleets with everyone having massive navies. V 1.2 is a bit truer to what was real in some regards but hey, nothing is perfect & none of us will all be pleased with each change. The AI will give you a naval challenge if you don’t protect your ports. The Romans will always have some navies to bug you. When one naval power is defeated usually some other faction starts to build up a navy.

The only large naval battles the Romans fought were against Carthage after which they drastically reduced their navies. Caesar had to build his navy from scratch to fight the Venittii and to invade Britton, other than that most Roman naval vessels were biremes, liburniams, or smaller for courier duties. :book:

The game is not perfect, especially in the naval realm but it seems a fair compromise.

It is not that I wouldn’t enjoy fighting a strong naval campaign with Sexdakares, Octares, Quinquremes and so on deploying dolphins, arrow engines, and Greek fire but have you seen any game yet where you can? Greek & Roman Naval Warfare is a deep subject all on its own spanning times long before & after the present RTW. The ship types alone would boggle the mind and each having different speeds & handling characteristics not to mention the troop types, whether fighting with the sails stepped or unstepped & so on. It is enough for its own game! I can deal with the current compromise.
~:handball:

[Mikeus Caesar]

The only problem with navies that i have is the way they spam the sea's with mini fleets. Currently, on one campaign, all of the sea below the coast of southern france is flooded with roman ships. It's awful.