Will we see all full first-rate fleets?

**Boohugh** · 03-01-2009, 23:50

Originally Posted by Greyblades

Just out of interest, how many people who joined over 2 years ago have come out of hiding for this game?

Me. Probably even longer than 2 years in fact! Got high hopes for this one though, after the partial disappointment of RTW and the more complete disappointment with M2TW.

**Beskar** · 03-02-2009, 01:22

He who defends everything defends nothing.

**Greyblades** · 03-02-2009, 01:29

I dont realy understand that, shouldnt it be: he who can defend everything is doing it right?

**Beskar** · 03-02-2009, 01:35

I used it in reply to the wrong thread.

I will explain it this way. While you are defending everything, your armies are all spread out, along the border, obviously, you will only have a certain size due to upkeep, and as such.

This makes it very easy for some one to do precision strikes, for example, I could charge at your supply line and take that, out, leaving your army without the supplies and reasources dealing a critical blow, because your forces are all spread out defending every city/piece of land.

In opposite, the tactic of leaving a small garrison which weighs up the opposing army and providing information on numbers, composition and tactics, relaying it back provides resistance in order for a very large counter opposing army to assault with the element of surprise and due to obtaining vaulable information, knows all about the other army.

The downside of this tactic, is obviously, there are some temporary causalities and losses, which some people might complain about, but it is far more effective and efficient and doesn't open yourself up due to being spread out so thinly.

**A Very Super Market** · 03-02-2009, 01:40

My biggest concern, is not of the all first-raters, but if the AI will blitz. Some factions have only one territory in Europa, and it would be a cinch to take them, if measures aren't enacted.

**PBI** · 03-02-2009, 02:00

I believe some reviews have indicated that holding on to conquered territory in Europe is likely to be hard, since taking a country's homelands like France is likely to result in large loyalist revolts to return the province to its rightful owners. Hopefully this should make blitzing Europe very hard, since each province will need to have a large enough garrison to deal with the loyalist revolt (not to mention the AI will hopefully do a better job of defending its capital in the first place this time).

Regarding fleets, I'm rather hoping that large fleets of any kind will be a rarity, simply because I fear a 20 vs 20 ship battle will be a nightmare to control and will probably just descend into a big free-for-all (which I suppose is probably realistic, but not much fun). I'm hoping that more manageable engagements of around 6-odd ships will be the norm, I struggle to see how bunching all your ships together in a huge 20 ship fleet is such a good idea for defending thousands of miles of trade route.

**Malkut** · 03-02-2009, 02:24

I would rather not use an all 1sts fleet. It's a waste of resources, for one. You're going to have this one heavily-armed fleet, but it can only be in one place, at one time.

Secondly, I'm convinced that a 1sts fleet would lose to a well managed, well balanced fleet.

**quadalpha** · 03-02-2009, 02:15

Originally Posted by Boohugh

Me. Probably even longer than 2 years in fact! Got high hopes for this one though, after the partial disappointment of RTW and the more complete disappointment with M2TW.

Ah, fellow 2003-er!

I think one the guys who went to a CA open day said naval engagements were usually around 5 a side.

**Miracle** · 03-02-2009, 02:37

Historically 74-gun Third-rate ships represented the best combination between sailing ability, firepower and cost. Nelson's fleet at the Battle of the Nile (1798) for example consisted almost entirely of 74-gun ships. But this is not entirely reflected in-game. According to my calculations, Third Rates have lower overall effectiveness/cost than First Rates. And if you end up having loads of disposable income and therefore do not really care about cost, then First-rate ships are indeed the best (on paper at least) especially if the experience factor is considered. That means you would see full fleets of First Rates.

But, you cannot have your entire navy consist of only First Rates. You will need faster ships to catch pirates and merchant vessels on the campaign map. Furthermore, getting to the point where you have multiple full First Rate fleets takes a considerable amount of time. In the mean time, you are much better off building Second and Third Rates.

Of course, the situation changes dramatically for MP. According to my calculations, Second Rates appear on paper to be the best in terms of overall effectiveness/cost.

**Polemists** · 03-02-2009, 06:41

I think the key will be time. Remeber this game only lasts 200 turns, so if it takes 10 turns to build a single first rate ship, it would take you the whole game to have a full fleet of fire rates.

We know what price is but no one knows how long it takes to build a ship, and last I heard the devs stated many ships could not be built in a single turn or two. So I think there is hope.

**Mad Mac** · 03-03-2009, 07:40

You guys have played Total War games enough that you should know that price and upkeep are far from the most important unit stats.

It's like asking me why I don't conquer the world with full armies of Gothic Knights every time I play HRE. This never happens, not because of cost or upkeep but because:

A: By the time I can build Gothic Knights at all, the game is mostly over.

B: Even after I do unlock the unit, I probably have 1-2 whole castles who can produce a single knight every couple turns or so. Building an entire army of Gothic Knights would take decades.

c: Once I have spent umpteen billion years putting together my full stack of G Knights, I have to spend another couple of years sailing them to the other side of the world where they will still probably arrive too late to accomplish anything useful.

Unit availability is (nearly) everything. The Danes are monsters in MTW2 not because Dismounted Huscarls and viking Raiders are literally the most cost effective units in the game, but because they can both be produced en masse from any decent sized castle and easily bury half in Europe in heavy infantry early game.

**A Very Super Market** · 03-03-2009, 07:48

Right, so we assume that naval facilities in this time are all for frigates and corvettes? While you sail around with full fleets?

**Polemists** · 03-03-2009, 09:01

Actually it's been stated else where that when you build a port you must decide to make it a fishing port (food) trading port (money) or military port (Ships)

Much like MTW2 and making every place a castle, I doubt people will make every port into a military port. Not to mention most nations are starting off with only one or two ports (unless your england).

Then factor in that to get first rate you would have to forsake other technology to get it quickly. As there is a new technology tree.

So if you figure you may have 2 or 3 military ports, I don't see you building full stacks of anything soon.