Pinned Guide to Naval Warfare for 1.5

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    • Guide to Naval Warfare for 1.5

      Naval forces
      In this guide, we will take a look at how to use the various naval units and tactics in Call of War.
      This guide is the edited version of @General Nightman ‘s COW classic guide. Also a big shout-out for the contributions of both @whowh and @JesterTheSheep @Hornetkeeper

      Types of Ships

      Submarine: Probably the best naval unit in Call of war, the submarine is cheap, fast and easy to build. It's very good against battleships and transports. However, the submarine is quite poor against cruiser, stacked destroyers and aircraft carriers. Naval bombers are also deadly to a sub. Submarines are stealth units that can only be revealed by naval bombers and destroyers of the same level or higher. They are also revealed when fighting another unit.

      Destroyer: A small, quick little ship, this ship is excellent against submarines and transports. The destroyer has most of the strengths of a submarine, but it is not hidden, is 35% faster than subs and costs only slightly more to build. Destroyers also has more AA firepower. Destroyers are the only naval unit capable of finding subs. This is not a joke: you NEED destroyers in every single stack. Send those subs packing!

      Cruiser: The next step up in the naval lines comes the cruiser, the "middle of the road" ship. This ship is fairly fast, has good firepower against naval units, resistant against subs and does a little damage to troops on the ground. But it truly excels in anti-aircraft, having the strongest defense amongst all the ships. However, a cruiser is no match for a battleship or aircraft carrier. It also costs a lot more to build than a destroyer or submarine. Cruisers always need to be stacked with destroyers to protect them against submarines.

      Battleship: The king of the sea, the battleship has a range of 70km, doing devastating damage to naval units and troops on the shore. Additionally, it has a large line of sight of 90km. This is perfect to patrol your coast or to find enemy ships in the ocean. Properly escorted, the battleship will deal immense damage. However, battleships don't stand a chance against submarines or naval bombers. The battleship is quite a bit slower than the rest of the ships and costs more resources to produce. Battleships always need to be stacked with destroyers to protect them against submarines. They also need to be stacked with cruisers to protect them against air units. Naval bombers can be as devastating as submarines.

      Aircraft Carriers: The modern king of the sea, the aircraft is truly the ruling class. They are fast ships, able to keep up with the smaller escort ships. Carriers are just as vulnerable to subs as battleships and a cheaper lv2 destroyer can engage and kill a lv1 carrier. In addition they will not survive a bombardment from a battleship or cruiser. It requires both subs, destroyers, cruisers battleships and or planes to protect it. The aircraft carrier will carry interceptors, naval bombers, attack bombers and tactical bombers. A level 1 carrier can carry two planes, for every research level that you upgrade you get an additional 2 places. For example, a carrier level 4 will carry 8 planes.


      Naval Tactics

      Using an aircraft carrier
      One of the most commonly asked questions about naval units is, "How do I load airplanes onto a carrier?"
      First, sail your carrier out of port. (Ships in port are protected from subs until they sail out for the first time.) Then, check the carriers’ stats to see how many planes you can load onto the carrier. Lastly, fly out your planes from an airbase in range of the carrier and them on the carrier.

      Submarine Blockade
      One of the tactics that Germany used to great effect in World War 1 and 2 was a submarine blockade of Britain and the allies. A submarine blockade will alert you to incoming enemy movements, stop landing troops, and keep your coasts secure. To create a submarine blockade, you'll need to have a sizeable number of subs to cover your entire coast.

      Place a submarine on each "dot" on the ocean to prevent any ships from slipping by. Now, you have to be smart about this. If you are Africa and have conquered Europe, you would not line the underside of Spain, Italy, Greece and Turkey with subs. You would place 2-3 subs at the Gibraltar strait, and cover the entire expanse with only a few subs. Take a look around your maps to see where the "choke points" are. A good idea is to place one sub at each dot, and have a "quick response" team of 2-8 subs (or other naval units) in reserve for every 3-6 dots. The single submarine will hold incoming enemies until your larger force can arrive. Important to know is that without High Command your subs will not engage with ships of a soon to be enemy. If you aren’t at war those ships will continue to sail further and just sail over your submarines. If you have High Command then put your subs on aggressive fire settings and all will be fine. Remember to give all AI nations ROW or shared maps so that you don’t end up in an unwanted war with AI.

      The Naval bomber intelligence written by @Hornetkeeper
      A submarine blockade is a good strategy for keeping track of your enemy, however, for large shorelines, naval bombers are just far better. They can cover a large area and quickly arrive to attack when needed, so you will only need 10 naval bombers where you would need 40 subs to protect with the same effectivity. You can focus down the vulnerable parts of the enemy navy on top of that, while submarines couldn't reach the vulnerable convoys without ramming into the forward ships.

      If you leave bombers patrolling they will save the enemy ships within the patrol circle as intelligence reveals. The reveal is saved when the plane is patrolling over the unit, and it needn't finish patrol and do damage, so even if the enemy has a lot of AA defence your bomber will save the enemy ships as intelligence before it dies. If you then wake up to your dead sub you have to scout the area well as the only you know is the name of the enemy army (from newspaper reports). If it says flotilla, could be one with 1 battleship and 3 destroyers, or 10 battleships, 10 destroyers and 20 transports.

      However, if you use naval bombers, the patrol saves not only the composition but also the current orders of the enemy army, so you know where it was heading to as well. The time you'd arrive to the place with enough subs would be very late usually, but naval bombers can arrive within 1 hour max if you have proper air transfer.

      If you're active you can scout a large area as well, subs could also do that by spreading into single units but if then a fast naval force struck through the subs couldn't do anything before merging, and quite a few would probably get destroyed. With naval bombers, you can just merge them at airports and draw them all to the place, and arrive far quicker than subs would.
      The only downside for naval bombers I see is the airports. You have to secure them by upgrading them and building a lot of buildings in the province to reduce the chance of the airport being targeted.
      Other than that, and chokepoints like Gibraltar, I don't see sub defence making much sense. The bombers are limited to range from their airports or have to go on vulnerable carriers, making subs a valuable scouting and hunting unit for sneaking behind the main front and destroying unescorted or unmerged ships. They do well if you focus on upgrading and massing them and can destroy fleets, even those with destroyers. But they are just not suited for passive defence of a larger area, they only work that way on chokepoints.
      True, this is for the 95%, but I still think naval bombers are just more specialized in defending your shoreline, subs only defending chokepoints and scouting or sneaky attacks far in the enemy seas.

      A naval blockade
      A naval blockade combines both a submarine blockade and the intelligence of naval bombers in the most probable pathways used at sea for an invastion. Behind the line of subs there are small stacks of destroyers, submarines and battleships that can sail to anything that slips trough.

      On the pictures below you can see a coastline protected by 17 subs, 15 naval bombers, 4 destroyers and 4 battleships.









      Escorting Transports and Planes
      One of the best ways to lose a map without fighting much is losing all your army at sea. Unescorted transports have about 50 to 70% of their original health when at sea, at a 12HP each. The best way to try and prevent this is escorting your convoys with naval units.

      Cruisers are a good choice, they provide protection against air, subs and destroyers. Submarines are always a wise decision. It's also not a bad idea to send ahead a submarine ahead to scout the route and see if any unpleasant surprises await along your planned route. If you want to be a 100% sure also put battleships in your stack and enough carriers so that your entire air force can land on them. Remember also to make naval bombers so that they can take out large stacks of subs when needed.

      In 1.5 Plane transports, can be escorted by naval units. However it's still better to load them on a carrier so that your planes can operate at sea. Carriers are good shuttles across the ocean, and they can protect your transports (and carrier) while at sea.

      Stop and Drop
      You see a large force of transports coming. You want to lose as few of your naval units as possible. So what do you do? You use the "stop and drop" tactic. Have a submarine or submarine squadron stop the transports. While they are halted, bring up your ranged naval units and bombard them without taking any damage to your bigger ships.

      Bombarding Land Units
      Sometimes, you can bombard land units from cruisers and battleships, to soften up a landing or clear out a coastal city. Battleships work best for this, because they have a longer range and can do more damage to infantry and armour. While destroyers look like they can bombard the shore, they do no damage to land units, only naval units.

      Doctrine Tips written by @JesterTheSheep

      Allies
      DO: keep those upgrades handy! It's better to outfit your boats with the latest technology than it is to replace destroyed navies, especially aircraft carriers.
      DON'T: worry about mixing stacks. Speed isn't really relevant on the sea, just focus on getting to your target in one piece.

      Axis
      DO: Save battleships for last. Given how expensive they are to begin with, producing battleships isn't really possible until mid-game. I'd say wait until about day 8 to start looking into it.
      DON'T: waste all of your resources on capital ships, like battleships and carriers. They're very, very expensive, and difficult to replace. Instead, focus on using what you already have, and build new infrastructure as needed. If you can get away with not using a capital ship, do so.

      Comintern
      DO: Mass produce destroyers as soon as possible. They're basically your best seaborne option.
      DON'T: Don't have a ranged battle with Axis powers if you don't have the numerical advantage. Axis have a higher attack bonus while comintern has reduced attack power, you're never going to do any worthwhile damage. Don't be afraid to retreat and pull your ships out of a battle

      Pan-Asian
      DO: As you have 10% less HP you need to avoid to be locked into melee combat. As you are 20% faster your battleships will be almost as fast as a cruiser from another doctrine but you will have a longer range. The Pan-Asian battleship has an additional 10% HP which nullifies the Pan-Asian -10% HP penalty. On top of it your battleship deals an additional 10% damage to all units, so both air, land and naval units. This makes the Pan-Asian Battleship one of the best naval unit in the game. They should be the core of your navy but well protected with destroyers and cruisers so that you are safe from both air and subs.
      DO: Destroyers are your friend. Station destroyers sporadically across your waters. You have longer viewing distance, meaning you can hunt down subs even more efficiently.
      DO: Hit and run. Pan-Asian is faster than the other doctrines so you can just shoot with your battleships and sail out of range without taking counter damage.
      DON'T: get too close. Especially if you see enemy subs or battleships. You have reduced hitpoints, and you're much easier to sink.
      DON'T: be afraid to retreat. If you don't pull your ships out of a deadly battle, you may lose them altogether, and that doesn't help at all.

      Advanced tactics: how to stack?

      How many destroyers in a stack
      The answer is simple, for every battleship you need a destroyer and for every two cruisers you need one destroyer. As battleships are more vulnerable to sub attack you need to protect them better. Some players will argue that only one destroyer to spot a submarine is enough and that the cruisers and battleships bombardment will do the rest. That might work against one or two subs but not against larger stacks of subs.

      The wolfpack stack
      One of the cheapest and most effective stacks is 10 subs stacked together. They will almost take out anything. If you see those 9 juicy battleships protected by only 1 destroyer. Put your wolfpack stack on forced march and get in there. Subs are faster than battleships so even if they try to fire and retreat you will still catch up with them.

      The multi functional stack
      You make two stacks of 5 destroyers, 5 cruisers and 5 battleships. With 5 destroyers you are safe against subs and with 5 cruisers you are safe against air units. Use those two stacks to outflank your enemies from two sides and there’s no escape. If you encounter larger enemy stack then pull back, merge your two stacks and go in for the kill. It’s always handy to keep a wolfpack stack close by. Lock the enemy in melee battle with your cheap subs and bombard the enemy without taking counter damage.

      The invasion stack
      Taking your army at sea to invade another country always presents a high risk. Add 5 carriers’ level 2 to both of your multi functional stacks. Each stack can now be protected by 20 planes which is great. Put all your land units in one stack and use the other stack to scout ahead. You can use your planes to scout even further. You should definitly have fully upgrade naval bombers to detect and destroy any subs or wolfpack stacks that you might encounter. Remember also to upgrade your transport ship technology. This will give your convoys better defensive stats and it makes them faster too. "Researching transport ship lv4 is highly recommended for any larger naval invasion, and also the militia strategy related to that. You just spam 50 lv1 militia, embark them on transports and merge with your navy and the valuable transports. This is vulnerable to nukes, but before those get released, this strategy rocks.": @Hornetkeeper

      Other out of the box suggestions written by @whowh

      1 destroyer is the core of every naval stack. That leaves 9 more fighting spots, and 10 additional HP meat shields. Add 1 cruiser for the view range (have to see what's around you) and some AA cover. That leaves you with 8+10 slots left.
      (This is definitely not recommended as it’s too easily countered with a wolfpack stack of 10 subs. The suggested stack has a very low anti air value and would be torn to shreds by naval bombers. Using both the wolfpack stack and naval bombers against this would be very effective.)

      What kind of stacks does this open up?

      1. Bombardment Stack.
      The most basic, most universally applicable stack is bombardment. You have 1 destroyer detecting subs, 1 cruiser detecting surface and air units, leaving 8 slots for Battleships. That can do a lot of damage to coastal targets and normal surface fleets. (again not recommended for the reasons stated above)

      This is my go-to stack. My typical setup is 1 DD + 1 CL + 8 BB.

      2. Anti Air Stack.
      You're going to need this to support naval invasions, or counter surface fleets carrying naval bombers. In addition to the standard 1 destroyer + 1 cruiser, the AA stack has a mix of carriers and cruisers. Depending on your carrier research, that could mean 1-2 carriers with 8-10 Interceptors each, or 3-4 carriers with 4-6 interceptors. The rest is filled with 6-7 cruisers. They protect the fleet from bombers while the interceptors are away, or refuelling. And the cruisers provide some bombardment ability against small groups of destroyers/subs.

      My typical setup is 1 DD + 8 CL + 1 CV carrying 10 interceptors. This is enough for most invasions. Assuming your opponent has similar research levels as you, the opponent would need 30+ naval bombers to stop you. If you're afraid of rockets, just add some HP in the form of transports (next). By the time the opponent builds enough rockets to sink your fleet, you should be able to take 1 province, build an air field, and move your interceptors. The carrier group has done its job, and it can go home.

      3. Meat Shield Stack.
      Research level 4 transports. Take a standard bombardment stack. Add 10 transports filled with cheap, disposable army units. That's an extra 250 HP in your navy stack. It's like an extra 5 battleships. You can now get into gun fights with fewer losses.

      4. The Nasty Surprise Stack.
      Take a stack of 10 submarines, and add 10 level 4 transports. You have just over-powered your submarines. A greedy opponent will see 10 undefended transports and rush in with their surface navy. Your subs will tear them to pieces. Even a good opponent, who knows how to detect subs, will get more than they bargained for. The transports can effectively double the HP of your submarines, making them more effective in battle. 10 destroyers attacking 10 subs + 10 level 4 transports, who do you think will win that fight?

      By specializing your stacks, you can beat enemies who follow more traditional tactics. The typical enemy stack looks like this: 5 DD + 3 CL + 2 BB. Your bombardment stack will tear it to pieces. If the enemy starts to load more battleships, you're going to run into something like this: 3 DD + 2 CL + 5 BB. Time to add some transport meat shields. When the opponent tries to copy you, stacking battleships, that's when you flip the script. Time for a Nasty Surprise stack of subs and transports, tearing his battleships to pieces.

      5. The Cruiser Spam
      Going only for cruisers is a very good strategy and is often used by the more experienced players in the game. Starting the game with a cruiser spam and upgrading them afterwards is probably the best opening strategy. You put a single destroyer in that stack and you can take out subs from a distance. Going exclusively for cruisers makes them resistant against subs so you need one destroyer in a stack. They are very effective against air and they are faster then a battleship and can win against them with an equal resource output.

      "One cruiser is vunerable to battelship but two cruisers aren't.
      See a fight with about equal resources - 32 lv2 cruisers against 25 lv1 battleships.
      This depends on the size of the front, on a smaller one the cruisers have to split to do full damage, exposing themselves to focus fire unless the player really manages them well.
      But just a straight-up comparison:
      201.6 damage * 1824 hp (cruisers) VS. 215 damage * 1300 hp (battleships).
      The research costs are in favour of the cruiser so we used level 2 ones there. If we used lv1, yes, the battleships would win with equal resources.
      520 hp * 59.8 damage (cruisers) VS. 468 hp * 77.4 damage (battleships).

      Not even mentioning that the battleship player needs cruiser research for AA defence anyway, so we could add two extra cruisers to the cruiser player to match the research costs for the battleship player. Battleships are slow on top of that, so whenever split up you can send your cruisers after them and hunt them before they merge back with the other part of their army. The extra view range helps the cruiser a lot there.
      I just don't use battleships at all. Cruisers suit me far better." written by @Hornetkeeper
      BMfox
      Moderator
      EN Community Support | Bytro Gmbh

      Check out my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/BMfoxCallofWar


      Found a bug or need help? Send a ticket here!
    • one thing, in naval warfare movement is much more free, so there are no Set in stone stacks that will work throughout a round, always use manoeuvrebility to your advantage.

      (Also In 1.5 destroyers have no range, the comintern DONT tip is only applicable to 1.0 events)
      "In my humble opinion, on the subject matter, topic and content discussed beforehand; I would like to humbly propose, convey my idea on the subject and remark; this, with the help of the afforementioned post" - Karl von Krass

      "The Golden Spire is looking for members, Anyone with good sense of game mechanics and a discord account can apply"

      Secretary of Nova0213
    • whowh wrote:

      You can still bombard at point blank range though
      That's not bombardment... more like attacking as it'll be considered melee...
      "In my humble opinion, on the subject matter, topic and content discussed beforehand; I would like to humbly propose, convey my idea on the subject and remark; this, with the help of the afforementioned post" - Karl von Krass

      "The Golden Spire is looking for members, Anyone with good sense of game mechanics and a discord account can apply"

      Secretary of Nova0213
    • They are now close range only, you cabt bombard with them.
      Because they were haveing range buth were not able to damage land units, players were confused why arent their destroyers damaging land units even tho they were bombarding them soo devs decided to remove the range as it wasnt usefull at all.
      Фарис Синановић, Суна
    • Karl von Krass wrote:

      one thing, in naval warfare movement is much more free, so there are no Set in stone stacks that will work throughout a round, always use manoeuvrebility to your advantage.
      There are waypoints at sea so just like you are obligated to pass by province centers on land, with ships you are obligated to pas by those waypoints.
      BMfox
      Moderator
      EN Community Support | Bytro Gmbh

      Check out my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/BMfoxCallofWar


      Found a bug or need help? Send a ticket here!
    • Several suggestions:

      1. Don't let your destroyers hunt submarines. Since, they removed the range of the destroyer, hunting is not an option. You have to be very active and careful with the placement if you try to hunt for submarines. If you are not active a submarine will easily take out your battleships or cruisers. I suggest you should directly escort your battleships.

      2. My standard battleship stack consists of one battleship, one cruiser, and two destroyers. The reason I place my stack in this composition is because the enemy is far more likely to spam submarines. A level 1 destroyer won't be able to protect against a level 2 or 3 submarine. Some of you may claim that my stack is small. The only reason I do this is to ensure that my entire stack doesn't get blown up by a nuke or naval bombers when I am unprepared. I usually string out my battleships and have them converge when I face large amounts of enemies. Make sure to have escorts by the battleship at all times in order to ensure its safety.

      3. For the wolf pack tactic I have several suggestions. I usually place 2 high leveled submarines in a single deck. I string all my submarines out so they can operate independently and detect more targets. If a large battleship stack is spotted then all submarines will converge on the target. I suggest the use of high level submarines because of their advanced stealth ability. There is almost no way your enemy will build a destroy greater than level 3. I always try to build mine at level 4 so they can raid enemy convoys and battleships undetected.

      4.Make sure to have both submarines and battleships. Most enemies can have only a large surface fleet or a large submarine fleet if they don't place their navy at first priority. Therefore, you should have a mixture of both. Use submarines to deal with spammers(I learned this the hard way). When the enemy has majority submarine or they also use destroyers or crusiers. The odds will be even and you will be able to engage them on the surface.

      5. I suggest using your submarines to penetrate deep into enemy territory to sever their supply lines. Once, when playing against Turkey I used many submarines and destroyed 20 of his convoys. He was beyond surprised and even worse he had no navy.
    • vietcong2005 wrote:

      Some of you may claim that my stack is small. The only reason I do this is to ensure that my entire stack doesn't get blown up by a nuke
      Yes, makes sense to me.

      vietcong2005 wrote:

      or naval bombers when I am unprepared.
      This makes no sense. It's far easier to destroy two stacks of 5 than one stack of 10 with naval bombers. Bombers are all about finding the weakest armies to engage effectively.

      vietcong2005 wrote:

      3. For the wolf pack tactic I have several suggestions. I usually place 2 high leveled submarines in a single deck. I string all my submarines out so they can operate independently and detect more targets. If a large battleship stack is spotted then all submarines will converge on the target. I suggest the use of high level submarines because of their advanced stealth ability. There is almost no way your enemy will build a destroy greater than level 3. I always try to build mine at level 4 so they can raid enemy convoys and battleships undetected.

      4.Make sure to have both submarines and battleships. Most enemies can have only a large surface fleet or a large submarine fleet if they don't place their navy at first priority. Therefore, you should have a mixture of both. Use submarines to deal with spammers(I learned this the hard way). When the enemy has majority submarine or they also use destroyers or crusiers. The odds will be even and you will be able to engage them on the surface.

      5. I suggest using your submarines to penetrate deep into enemy territory to sever their supply lines. Once, when playing against Turkey I used many submarines and destroyed 20 of his convoys. He was beyond surprised and even worse he had no navy.
      Agreed, not a bad strategy:)
      "In CoW, don't stamp on things before looking. Rakes are everywhere!"

      "Don't underestimate noobs; if they don't know what they're doing, how can you?"

      Hornetkeeper
    • BMfox wrote:

      is a bit slower and costs a lot more to build.
      Destroyers are about 35% faster than subs, and are just slightly more expensive.


      BMfox wrote:

      However, a cruiser is no match for a battleship or aircraft carrier. It also costs a lot more to build than a destroyer or submarine. Cruisers always need to be stacked with destroyers to protect them against submarines.
      A cruiser isn't. But two cruisers are.
      See a fight with about equal resources - 32 lv2 cruisers against 25 lv1 battleships.
      This depends on the size of the front, on a smaller one the cruisers have to split to do full damage, exposing themselves to focus fire unless the player really manages them well.
      But just a straight-up comparison:
      201.6 damage * 1824 hp (cruisers) VS. 215 damage * 1300 hp (battleships).
      The research costs are in favour of the cruiser so we used level 2 ones there. If we used lv1, yes, the battleships would win with equal resources.
      520 hp * 59.8 damage (cruisers) VS. 468 hp * 77.4 damage (battleships).

      Not even mentioning that the battleship player needs cruiser research for AA defence anyway, so we could add two extra cruisers to the cruiser player to match the research costs for the battleship player. Battleships are slow on top of that, so whenever split up you can send your cruisers after them and hunt them before they merge back with the other part of their army. The extra view range helps the cruiser a lot there.
      I just don't use battleships at all. Cruisers suit me far better.

      BMfox wrote:

      The modern king of the sea, the aircraft is truly the ruling class. They are fast ships, able to keep up with the smaller escort ships. The carrier has amazing defence against subs and small ships. However, they will not survive a bombardment from a battleship or cruiser. It requires planes to protect it.
      1.0 information, already outdated for a long time. Carriers are just as vulnerable to subs as battleships and a cheaper lv2 destroyer can engage and kill a lv1 carrier. The point of carriers is to allow planes to operate out of reach of normal airports, but I don't like fighting over just worthless water, which makes them very situational for me. I would definitely not call them a "ruling class".


      BMfox wrote:

      Place a submarine on each "dot" on the ocean to prevent any ships from slipping by. Now, you have to be smart about this. If you are Africa and have conquered Europe, you would not line the underside of Spain, Italy, Greece and Turkey with subs. You would place 2-3 subs at the Gibraltar strait, and cover the entire expanse with only a few subs. Take a look around your maps to see where the "choke points" are. A good idea is to place one sub at each dot, and have a "quick response" team of 2-8 subs (or other naval units) in reserve for every 3-6 dots. The single submarine will hold incoming enemies until your larger force can arrive.
      A good strategy for keeping track of your enemy, however, for large shorelines, naval bombers are just far better. They can cover a large area and quickly arrive to attack when needed, so you will only need 10 naval bombers where you would need 40 subs to protect with the same effectivity. You can focus down the vulnerable parts of the enemy navy on top of that, while submarines couldn't reach the vulnerable convoys without ramming into the forward ships.

      BMfox wrote:

      Cruisers are a good choice, they provide protection against air, subs and destroyers. Submarines are always a wise decision. It's also not a bad idea to send ahead a submarine ahead to scout the route and see if any unpleasant surprises await along your planned route. If you want to be a 100% sure also put battleships in your stack and enough carriers so that your entire air force can land on them. Remember also to make naval bombers so that they can take out large stacks of subs when needed.

      Plane transports, for some reason, cannot be escorted by naval units and must go by themselves unless loaded on a carrier. Carriers are good shuttles across the ocean, and they can protect your transports (and carrier) while at sea.
      They can be escorted now.

      Agreed, but you forgot researching transport ship lv4 (highly recommended for any larger naval invasion), and also the militia strategy related to that. You just spam 50 lv1 militia, embark them on transports and merge with your navy and the valuable transports. This is vulnerable to nukes, but before those get released, this strategy rocks.


      BMfox wrote:

      The answer is simple, for every battleship you need a destroyer and for every two cruisers you need one destroyer. As battleships are more vulnerable to sub attack you need to protect them better. Some players will argue that only one destroyer to spot a submarine is enough and that the cruisers and battleships bombardment will do the rest. That might work against one or two subs but not against larger stacks of subs.
      Not sure if this makes any sense. You should have a constant value of how many destroyers per naval stack. If you have 5 battleships and 10 destroyers together, 10 subs won't do anything. If you split them up into stacks of 1 battleship and 2 destroyers, the subs will get rid of you easily. This isn't about the ratio between battleships and destroyers, as fewer battleships doesn't make you less vulnerable to subs to justify using fewer destroyers.
      Sure escorting every ship stack with many destroyers is a pain and most don't do it, but it doesn't work like that.

      If you have 2 destroyers, they will deal the same damage regardless of how many battleships are with them. Ironically, it's the opposite of what you're suggesting, as more battleships soak up more damage making you need fewer destroyers, though yes, as it's a lot of battleships you don't want to get damaged and should still use enough destroyers.
      "In CoW, don't stamp on things before looking. Rakes are everywhere!"

      "Don't underestimate noobs; if they don't know what they're doing, how can you?"

      Hornetkeeper

      The post was edited 1 time, last by Hornetkeeper ().

    • vietcong2005 wrote:

      1. Don't let your destroyers hunt submarines. Since, they removed the range of the destroyer, hunting is not an option. You have to be very active and careful with the placement if you try to hunt for submarines. If you are not active a submarine will easily take out your battleships or cruisers. I suggest you should directly escort your battleships.
      Destroyers are the best naval unit to hunt down submarine, that is their job. If you have submarines in range of your naval bombers, those are more efficient and faster to deal with them than destroyers. Of course as written in the guide a 1 battleship needs the protection of 1 destroyer and every 2 cruisers need to be protected by 1 destroyer. Anyhow, if you are inactive you will lose every battle on land, air and sea.


      vietcong2005 wrote:

      2. My standard battleship stack consists of one battleship, one cruiser, and two destroyers. The reason I place my stack in this composition is because the enemy is far more likely to spam submarines. A level 1 destroyer won't be able to protect against a level 2 or 3 submarine. Some of you may claim that my stack is small. The only reason I do this is to ensure that my entire stack doesn't get blown up by a nuke or naval bombers when I am unprepared. I usually string out my battleships and have them converge when I face large amounts of enemies. Make sure to have escorts by the battleship at all times in order to ensure its safety.
      It is always a good tactic to protect your capital ships this way. However upgrading units is important. Your destroyers always need to have the highest level of research if you want to be able to locate all the different levels of submarines. Level 1 units are weak and will easily lose against a level 3 units both on land, air and sea. I try not to make bigger stacks then 10 but to have two stacks of 10 closely working together so that they can still merge when necessary and don't become a target for nukes. However, I've never been nuked before.


      vietcong2005 wrote:

      3. For the wolf pack tactic I have several suggestions. I usually place 2 high leveled submarines in a single deck. I string all my submarines out so they can operate independently and detect more targets. If a large battleship stack is spotted then all submarines will converge on the target. I suggest the use of high level submarines because of their advanced stealth ability. There is almost no way your enemy will build a destroy greater than level 3. I always try to build mine at level 4 so they can raid enemy convoys and battleships undetected.
      The point of the wolfpack is having a stack of 10 submarines taking out everything et encounters in a very cost effective way. The string of two stacked submarines is more the tactic used in the naval blockade. Personally I prefer 1 higher level sub with Naval Bombers and a QRF naval stack close by to deal with everything that arrives. My net of subs are merely a forward ring of listener posts to spot the enemy.

      I fully agree with your point 4 and 5.
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    • Hornetkeeper wrote:

      Destroyers are about 35% faster than subs, and are just slightly more expensive.
      Thanks, I edited that.


      Hornetkeeper wrote:

      A cruiser isn't. But two cruisers are.
      See a fight with about equal resources - 32 lv2 cruisers against 25 lv1 battleships.
      This depends on the size of the front, on a smaller one the cruisers have to split to do full damage, exposing themselves to focus fire unless the player really manages them well.
      But just a straight-up comparison:
      201.6 damage * 1824 hp (cruisers) VS. 215 damage * 1300 hp (battleships).
      The research costs are in favour of the cruiser so we used level 2 ones there. If we used lv1, yes, the battleships would win with equal resources.
      520 hp * 59.8 damage (cruisers) VS. 468 hp * 77.4 damage (battleships).

      Not even mentioning that the battleship player needs cruiser research for AA defence anyway, so we could add two extra cruisers to the cruiser player to match the research costs for the battleship player. Battleships are slow on top of that, so whenever split up you can send your cruisers after them and hunt them before they merge back with the other part of their army. The extra view range helps the cruiser a lot there.
      I just don't use battleships at all. Cruisers suit me far better.
      You made a fair point and I'll add this to the guide as an additional strategy. Going only for cruisers is a very good strategy and is often used by the more experienced players in the game. Starting the game with a cruiser spam and upgrading them afterwards is probably the best opening strategy. You put a single destroyer in that stack and you can take out subs from a distance. However, we are talking about maybe the 5% of COW players wou have both the skill and the necessary game activity to pull off a cruiser vs battleship battle. That 5% don't even need this guide. This guide is written for the 95% who use navy but that don't use it to it's full potential.

      Hornetkeeper wrote:

      1.0 information, already outdated for a long time. Carriers are just as vulnerable to subs as battleships and a cheaper lv2 destroyer can engage and kill a lv1 carrier.
      I'll edit that too

      Hornetkeeper wrote:

      A good strategy for keeping track of your enemy, however, for large shorelines, naval bombers are just far better. They can cover a large area and quickly arrive to attack when needed, so you will only need 10 naval bombers where you would need 40 subs to protect with the same effectivity. You can focus down the vulnerable parts of the enemy navy on top of that, while submarines couldn't reach the vulnerable convoys without ramming into the forward ships.
      On this one I will have to disagree. Naval bombers are more effective that is true but they cannot block your shoreline. As you aren't always online, the enemy could pass trough your patrol circle without ever being detected. You could go to bed and waking up with troops disembarking on your shoreline. If you have subs however you will see that one is missing (If you have HC for agressive fire settings), you will get a message which country surprise attacked you and you can scan your shore straight away. I usually have a ring of subs and 4 naval bombers for every 10 subs. I also keep a small stack of ships available as a QRF force.

      Hornetkeeper wrote:

      They can be escorted now.

      Agreed, but you forgot researching transport ship lv4 (highly recommended for any larger naval invasion), and also the militia strategy related to that. You just spam 50 lv1 militia, embark them on transports and merge with your navy and the valuable transports. This is vulnerable to nukes, but before those get released, this strategy rocks.
      I'll edit that too

      Hornetkeeper wrote:

      Not sure if this makes any sense. You should have a constant value of how many destroyers per naval stack. If you have 5 battleships and 10 destroyers together, 10 subs won't do anything. If you split them up into stacks of 1 battleship and 2 destroyers, the subs will get rid of you easily. This isn't about the ratio between battleships and destroyers, as fewer battleships doesn't make you less vulnerable to subs to justify using fewer destroyers.
      Sure escorting every ship stack with many destroyers is a pain and most don't do it, but it doesn't work like that.

      If you have 2 destroyers, they will deal the same damage regardless of how many battleships are with them. Ironically, it's the opposite of what you're suggesting, as more battleships soak up more damage making you need fewer destroyers, though yes, as it's a lot of battleships you don't want to get damaged and should still use enough destroyers.
      Players don't escort their capital ships. So I give them a standard that will offer them more protection. 1 destroyer for every battle ship or 1 destroyer for every 2 cruisers makes sense based on their stats. However a stack of 10 battleships together with 10 destroyers would make little sense. A stack of 5 cruisers, 5 destroyers and 5 battleships on the other hand is also a good idea. My suggestion is an indicator to help less experienced players and not exact science :thumbup:
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    • BMfox wrote:

      On this one I will have to disagree. Naval bombers are more effective that is true but they cannot block your shoreline. As you aren't always online, the enemy could pass trough your patrol circle without ever being detected. You could go to bed and waking up with troops disembarking on your shoreline. If you have subs however you will see that one is missing (If you have HC for agressive fire settings)
      If you leave bombers patrolling they will save the enemy ships within the patrol circle as intelligence reveals. The reveal is saved when the plane is patrolling over the unit, and it needn't finish patrol and do damage, so even if the enemy has a lot of AA defence your bomber will save the enemy ships as intelligence before it dies. If you then wake up to your dead sub you have to scout the area well as the only you know is the name of the enemy army (from newspaper reports). If it says flotilla, could be one with 1 battleship and 3 destroyers, or 10 battleships, 10 destroyers and 20 transports.

      However, if you use naval bombers, the patrol saves not only the composition but also the current orders of the enemy army, so you know where it was heading to as well. The time you'd arrive to the place with enough subs would be very late usually, but naval bombers can arrive within 1 hour max if you have proper air transfer.

      If you're active you can scout a large area as well, subs could also do that by spreading into single units but if then a fast naval force struck through the subs couldn't do anything before merging, and quite a few would probably get destroyed. With naval bombers, you can just merge them at airports and draw them all to the place, and arrive far quicker than subs would.
      The only downside for naval bombers I see is the airports. You have to secure them by upgrading them and building a lot of buildings in the province to reduce the chance of the airport being targeted.
      Other than that, and chokepoints like Gibraltar, I don't see sub defence making much sense. The bombers are limited to range from their airports or have to go on vulnerable carriers, making subs a valuable scouting and hunting unit for sneaking behind the main front and destroying unescorted or unmerged ships. They do well if you focus on upgrading and massing them and can destroy fleets, even those with destroyers. But they are just not suited for passive defence of a larger area, they only work that way on chokepoints.
      True, this is for the 95%, but I still think naval bombers are just more specialized in defending your shoreline, subs only defending chokepoints and scouting or sneaky attacks far in the enemy seas.
      "In CoW, don't stamp on things before looking. Rakes are everywhere!"

      "Don't underestimate noobs; if they don't know what they're doing, how can you?"

      Hornetkeeper
    • The biggest mistake I see made by many players, is that they do not split their units to engage in combat. (If I overlooked this topic I am sorry.) I will split my Battleships, Cruisers and Destroyer into 3 groups. All of my Battleships into one group with a Cruiser or 2 for AA coverage and a couple of destroyers for sub protection. The rest of my Cruisers with a couple of Destroyers once again for sub protection. Finally a group of Destroyers to draw fire or close in on the enemy and keep him from escaping. I do this so I do not have to move my Battleships into range of his Cruisers and thus all of my ships can fire on the enemy and my Battleships are almost always at full Health while my more replaceable units are taking the damage.

      Also excuse me as tbh I just skimmed most of the article as I now rarely build any navy other than a few carriers (used to allow planes crossing between Africa and South America esp in the WAW map) and some destroyers to protect the carriers from subs. I find most players waste to much research time and resources building large navies that are most ineffective once you land any ground forces.
      "Strategy is the art of making use of time and space. I am less concerned about the later than the former. Space we can recover, lost time never." ~ Napoleon Bonaparte

      "Anyone who has to fight, even with the most modern weapons, against an enemy in complete command of the air, fights like a savage against modern European troops, under the same handicaps and with the same chances of success." ~ Erwin Rommel
    • It depends very much on the situation, and who you are facing. If I research and build battleships at all, I usually find I'm researching less levels of battleships than other ship types, and in that case you DO want them to take the damage from enemy fire. It also depends on which side wants to close the range, and if they have the speed advantage or not. When you block him with a destroyer attack, you need to estimate for how long they will survive. Then there's the question if either side is protecting troop transports. If there are no naval bombers (or AB's) around, there's no need to keep cruisers in every substack, if there are subs in the battlezone and if they can be spotted, and so on and so on. There's really no "template" for how to do naval battle, which makes naval warfare (against a potent enemy) one of the best experiences in CoW.
      When the fake daddies are curtailed, we have failed. When their roller coaster tolerance is obliterated, their education funds are taken by Kazakhstani phishers, and their candy bars distributed between the Botswana youth gangs, we have succeeded.
      - BIG DADDY.
    • K.Rokossovski wrote:

      It depends very much on the situation, and who you are facing. If I research and build battleships at all, I usually find I'm researching less levels of battleships than other ship types, and in that case you DO want them to take the damage from enemy fire. It also depends on which side wants to close the range, and if they have the speed advantage or not. When you block him with a destroyer attack, you need to estimate for how long they will survive. Then there's the question if either side is protecting troop transports. If there are no naval bombers (or AB's) around, there's no need to keep cruisers in every substack, if there are subs in the battlezone and if they can be spotted, and so on and so on. There's really no "template" for how to do naval battle, which makes naval warfare (against a potent enemy) one of the best experiences in CoW.
      It is difficult for those people with less vocabulary distinguish "tactics, operational art, strategy, formation or battle doctrine" from "plan, program, procedure, method, principal, templates, order, arrangement, process, sequence or protocol".

      I hope your to understand some author's feelings.