Let's talk about RA's Navy

AKA Blackened's Naval Balance testing

Discussion about the game and its default mods.
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Blackened
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Post by Blackened »

Doomsday wrote:
SirCake wrote: You might also want to change the default stance of the attack sub to "attack anything" (currently "hold fire").
To me it allways appeared weird that the pro setting is the default, and the noob setting isn't.
Oh my god yes this.
I'm going to change it to return fire in my next update. A sort of compromise between hold fire and attack anything. This way they still naturally can scout without revealing themselves.

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SoScared
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Post by SoScared »

Btw with your next update, I'd love to throw on some map.png colors on it (e.g. whitish borders) to help distinguish them in the lobby a bit. If interested throw me a .zip with your next collection before you upload them to the resource site.

I'm also playing around with visible civilian caps (oil, hosp...) on the map previews.

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avalach21
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Post by avalach21 »

I know everyone is complaining about how disadvantaged the Soviets are at sea, and sure they dont have anything that can strike land until tech center level tech. Also one on one, maybe 2 on 2 or 3 on 3 sub vs destroyer, yes I can out micro the sub(s) and probably come out on top as Allies.

But when it becomes a larger pack of destroyers vs larger pack of subs, I honestly find the subs to be grossly overpowered! honestly, unless someone can give me some pointers or tips or send me a replay/youtube showing the proper way to handle this situation, I find the allies have no chance vs a large pack of subs. The torpedoes may be intended for a certain target but once it dies, the torpedoes keep going and hit the next target. This does not happen with destroyer missiles or depth charges, so IMO this grossly swings large naval engagements towards the Soviets.

Sure you can say bring in air support, but in my experience its really not that easy or intuitive trying to target subs that are constantly submerging and become untargetable over and over again..

I have played a lot of RTS over the years and my micro is decent. As I said, I can def dodge torpedoes in 1 destroyer vs 1 sub, 2 dest vs 2 sub, but even 3 v 3 starts to get dicey. I'm wondering how other players feel about the balance of naval battles between larger packs of units

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IronScion
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Post by IronScion »

Not sure if you're doing this already, but you can change hind's stance to 'attack everything' and park them above the subs, then they'll fire at the sub as soon as it pops up.
"Each denomination in the new series of banknotes will feature a different species of Australian wattle" - Mint Spokesman

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Blackened
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Post by Blackened »

SoScared wrote: Btw with your next update, I'd love to throw on some map.png colors on it (e.g. whitish borders) to help distinguish them in the lobby a bit. If interested throw me a .zip with your next collection before you upload them to the resource site.

I'm also playing around with visible civilian caps (oil, hosp...) on the map previews.
Will do!

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Blackened
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Post by Blackened »

Made a few changes. New map pack available here courtesy of Soscared. :)

I increased torpedo damage by ~14%. Destroyers now die in 4 hits rather than 5. Horizontal rate of turn has been decreased to 2.

Transports speed is now 105. For every 3 passengers it loses 5% of its speed. Fully loaded a transport goes 80% as fast as an empty one. This also means a transport loaded with 1 or 2 will still run at 105. Meaning Nuke truck drops/engis/tanya/mcvs etc can still maneuver better.

Gunboats damage reduced by 10%.

Lastly, subs initial stance is set to return fire.

SirCake
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Post by SirCake »

Blackened, i think you reduced the speed of the transports BY 80% not 20% if full. could that be? :D

EDIT: My calculations indicate its actually 45% reduction in speed. (same distance - full: 47 seconds, empty 26 seconds)

SirCake
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Post by SirCake »

Looking at all those test games in Soscared stream, I find

7 ) Cruisers (and soviet counterpart) need a SERIOUS buff. It should be a BIG issue if you let a Battleship in your harbor. They cost more than 2k, require highest tech, are super slow and dont do anything right now. make them a real threat the palyer has to respond to, or he looses all shore buildings quite fast. Beyond shoreline, they can't do anything anyway...
8 ) Move the missile sub to radar dome tech.
9 ) Maybe add the nuclear sub from overhauls "uzbekistan" faction as Tier 3 unit for soviets. They then could choose between building nuclear silo on land OR building a sub, which can launch the nuke from the seas after regular countdown (also a huge threat that requires you to take the seas immediately)

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Blackened
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Post by Blackened »

SirCake wrote: Blackened, i think you reduced the speed of the transports BY 80% not 20% if full. could that be? :D

EDIT: My calculations indicate its actually 45% reduction in speed. (same distance - full: 47 seconds, empty 26 seconds)

It seems the code isn't working correctly and aggregating the total Speed debuffs rather than tiered debuffs, I'll have to look into it tomorrow. :(

SirCake
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Post by SirCake »

Btw. Praise for your mission description, so short and informative! :D I saw it briefly during the stream.

SirCake
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Post by SirCake »

Hey Blackened, where's the next revision of your naval playtest? ;)

I liked your careful approach to naval reballance way better than omnoms ridiculous range and power submarines playtest (i think it was omnoms). Please keep it up!

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Blackened
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Post by Blackened »

It is coming soon actually! I'm hoping this is the one that can run for awhile and get some quantity/quality testing!

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Blackened
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Post by Blackened »

Tis the season for playtests it seems!

For the full list of changes.

Things that have changed with this version and why:

Updated Gap Generators to properly limit ship vision. Updated ships code to current release.
I had started this venture before the current release which added these. Nothing major here.

Subs Cloak Delay increased by 20%.
This is to allow missile subs to actually hit a sub. Before they had 0 chance for their missile to close in.

Torpedoes now do 1000% of their damage to concrete.
Subs are tragically bad and killing a bridge. On a map such as Aquarius where you have multiple ones to go through your opponent had plenty of time to prepare. Due to the nature of bridges, subs tend to have to rely on their splash damage to actually finish a bridge off. This boost makes it a lot easier for them to actually get through.

Cruisers got a range boost to 20 cells and their inaccuracy reduced to 2 cells.
Sircake mentioned that if you allow a cruiser into your harbor you should be in trouble But the fact of the matter is you're better off with almost any thing else. In the stream Soscared graciously hosted my playtest there was a moment where FiveAces chornoed a mcv into the back of my base. I had a cruiser that was useless despite it being in range. I could never have hoped to kill his MCV. I think with these changes MCV's in particular are much more vulnerable to cruisers.

8 Inch damage vs heavy increased 100%
This is to help cruisers take on ships should they be stationary and also do a bit more to a tank army.

PT boat armor changed to light
For some reason in the latest release their armor was changed to heavy. Considering Allies have an extra ship to the soviets I like them being easily countered by yaks.


Transports:
Reduce speed to 102 from 113
LST speed per passenger count:
102 per 0-1 passengers
92 per 2-4 passengers
84 per 5-8 passengers
76 per 9-12 passengers


I've learned now that there are speed windows which contributed to all the problems I faced when coding the Transports. Previously I had the speed set to 105, which is actually the same as 113. Now at 102, it is properly slower. Additionally, Each speed reduction is one tier down. Due to the nature of speed tiers, having more than 3 would make the transport too slow to be effective.
Speed per passenger isn't evenly tiered either. 0-1 will still give full speed. So demotrucks/engis/etc have the best chances to outrun something. Anything above 9 runs at the slowest speed.


Missile Subs speed up 83%. Rate of turn up 66% Range increased to 15.5 cells. AA speed decreased 4%.
Missile Subs got a big buff. The changes I made honestly probably made them worse than before. They were the same range as V2's, outranged by artillery, and couldn't outrun a sub or avoid torpedoes. They were a great waste of 2400...

Now they act much more like the super destroyer I wanted them to be. with a 15.5 cell ranges they can engage well from within the fog of war. With their speed they can outrun sub/avoid torpedoes. I'm hoping this will make them actually worth it.
The only debuff they received was their AA missile speed. This was to allow Longbows to escape when targeted at maximum range.

Subpen/Shipyard Cloak Detect and Reveal Shroud increased to 10 cells, repairs units 50%, and set Build Time Speed Reduction to: 150, 100, 75, 50 Thanks OMnom!
These changes are pretty straightforward. The build time reduction scales with the recent efforts seen from other playtests.

Added sonar pulse upon infiltration to Tech Center.
This to to allow sonar pulse a better chance of being used. It will be interesting to see if it is actually worth it.

Current map list:
DCF (the original version)
Alpine waters
Thai bay
Singles
Polar Disorder
Winter Storm 2
Ensio Kaivo
Doubles
Doubles Islands 3.5
Tournament Island
Island Conquest
Crossfire
Xlake
Bombardment Islands
Six Below Zero
Doughnut
Unconventional Warfare
Countercross
Duel Islands
Isle of man
Aquarius

added doubles 3.5 to the map list.
Attachments
Blackened Naval Playtest Maps.zip
(403.16 KiB) Downloaded 209 times

SirCake
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Post by SirCake »

Hey, played some games on your new playtest.
Was very difficult this time to get some games going ...l lots of leavers and connection problems..-.-

Anyway - here are two complete game replays on Doubles
Basically feedback was that cruisers and missile subs are useful now. ;) I think so too, gj.

EDIT:
Played more games on Bombardment Islands, got a elite Battleship once :). But I have the feeling that the missile sub is too strong now:
It it is good vs Defenses, Arty, Air, Ships and Harvesters.
Cruiser is only good vs Defenses, Arty, Infantry slower and not invisible.
Maybe reducing the missile turn rate and/or range would help.
Attachments
Naval-Doubles-2.orarep
(1.54 MiB) Downloaded 215 times
Naval-Doubles-1.orarep
(2.29 MiB) Downloaded 202 times
Naval-BombardmentIslands.zip
Four games on Bombardment Islands inside
(2.13 MiB) Downloaded 197 times

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Blackened
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Post by Blackened »

Had my own game on bombardment islands. Gotta say If you control the sea with subs you can win the game pretty handily. This could be because Missile subs are too good now however, in the game I played they hardly countered it. When they actually had a decent sized navy i lost quite a few subs. But they always tried to use a few hinds/ destroyers and those are easy to pick off. Eventually I just had too much of a death ball.

So far no one has used radar jammers which literally will end missile sub harassment of the shores. I haven't seen longbows/migs either. Gap gens seem to be a soft counter or at least a temporary solution.
Attachments
Subsandmoresubs.zip
(735.29 KiB) Downloaded 183 times

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