An Admiral's Guide to Naval Warfare
Flying Pig
Being a keen dealer of seaborne death in every other strategy game I have and having learned the art of conclusively beating the AI in anywhere remotely wet, I was expecting to be able to do the same in RTW. However, for some bizzare reason CA did not develop naval combat (the ship models exist, try fighting a battle on a beach when there is a fleet present just off shore) but I still have gleaned some knowledge of how to use ships. This, then, is the compilation of it.
Ships
I divide ships into classes which define their use: transports, lineships and flagships
Transports is a class of small ships which consists of the barbarian boats and everyone else's biremes. These are so called because the best use I have so far found for them is moving small armies or raiding parties across the sea, because they are not too expensive yet apart from during the very early game they are too weak for heavy duty on the frontline. This makes them expendable things that are ideally suited to bear 400 saxon pirates to Britannia but not tough enough to take on the powerful pirate fleets (themselves composed of transport-class vessels) and their skilled admirals without large numbers, which is the other good use for them, although it is expensive to buy and maintain a stack of 20 biremes. It can be useful to buy up large stacks of these, but beware of compound trireme fleets! One other useful trick with transports is to make them into a bridge and just march across it (although in doing so you resign yourself to needing three ships where maybe one would suffice)
Lineships are the ships one most commonly sees in battle. They are the triremes or large boats that can be built at a level 2 port. As these are affordable but not cheap and can expect to be confronted by an equal adversary in battle, they should never travel alone (that goes for transports as well). Stacks of four can be used as 'pirate fleets' attacking small fleets or unguarded transports/lineships and blockading docks. A main battlefleet is essential and should be at least half composed of these workhorses, particularly if sailing around south Greece where Roman, Greek, Macedonian, Pontic, Seleucid and Egyptian navies will often be at the same time.
Flagships are Quinqueremes, Corvus Quinqueremes and Deceres. only Roman factions can build the Quinquereme and only the Scipii can make anything better by constructing the Temples of Neptune. These are really expensive ships that can operate alone if urgently neccessary, although they are a prize target for a collection of fleets being employed by an enemy coalition and their loss is devastating to your battlefleet. Pirate patrols of these can operate very far from base due to their immense resilience which makes them unlikely to need reparing after a few engagements. They are probably best kept to your main fleet to give it armour and a superior edge against all comes, including massive combined fleets. Use them also for high-priority transport missions: prehaps the 10-star assassin that was trained in Italy but needed in Armenia, the diplomatic embassy to Alexandria or the legion under the command of the Consul that makes for Jerusalem.
Admirals
A good admiral for your navy is essential. Admirals can get up to very high levels but because you cannot command naval battles they find gaining stars very difficult. This is my method of training admirals:
1. Get a stack of two biremes (you should have one at the start anyway) and a rookie admiral
2. Send it to fight the enemy. Seeing as they have only got stacks of two at the start, you can blockade ports and chase down their version of patrols easily. You may find that using a stronger navy makes the computer decide that the battles are 'easy' and so he will never go anywhere. There is one notable advantage to this: that if you lose crushingly you may get an ancillary which actually improves your commander's abilities.
3. Send it for refits regularly! It is possible to have an awful turn at sea and be thrown around and destroyed utterly by enemies and pirates (I lost a delegation of 5 diplomats, all above 7 stars, and two deceres that way) and so you need to be prepared. It is very rare to be wiped out in one battle and so you can scurry off to safety and get back to full strength while your ships wil probably have sailors made veteran by the ordeal. Obviously, stronger fleets need fewer refits.
Basic Tactics
It is difficult to actually define how to use ships on the stratmap but here goes: Navies can fulfil one of three roles: Transport, Piracy and Direct Warfare. Each level requires progressively better navies to be successful.
Transport ships are straightforward; sail your ship loaded with men up to a shore and kill any landlubber in your path. Needless to say this also involves picking good sea routes and sometimes, for example to get through conquered Greece from Italy, sailing to one shore, disembarking, and marching to a nearby port where another fleet is waiting just to get around the perilous southern Greek sea.
Piracy is just blockading docks and ambushing convoys. When attacking fleets, look at all of the visible groups for armies or agents on board as a diplomatic embassy or a mighty army is more of a prize than a sunken bireme. Be aware also that you can attack ships to re-direct them so if you know an army is headed for your territory by means of the sea then get between the two and make it change course! Blocading docks is also a good way to pressure a state into surrender, as it starves their trade, though not as good as a seige which starves ALL trade.
Direct Warfare is unsubtle and the only things to think about are your targets (armies or good fleets) and attacking gulfs. If you can force your enemy into a gulf and block the entrance, he will be destroyed if he loses a fight. The best gulfs are the Korinthian Gulf (incidentaly, the only way out of Corinth to the Macedonians...) and the Gulf of Actium if you are preventing invasions of Italy.
Control of Seas
This is a matter of controlling points and of keeping a network. For example, to keep sicilia free from enemies just keep a good navy in each port. That way, you can hit anywhere within a turn's sail of the island while refitting easily. Other points are the Bosphorous, as holding it completely destroys Armenian seapower, Cyprus, Crete and Mallorca as the last two islands are small enough to defennd with one stack while Cyprus is close enough to Antioch to allow a land-based army to hold it and keep a fleet in dock as backup to the Cyprus main battlefleet. Pirates are impossible to really supress but KILL THEM QUICK! They can get very experienced very qouckly due to the fact that the kill anyone and even two pirate ships look scary with a 5-star admiral and 9 exp apiece
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