Mike Scholl
Posts: 9349
Joined: 1/1/2003 From: Kansas City, MO Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: jimwinsor Well, thats the thing, when you ask "what is a ship" in this game I can't really answer definitively because I'm not the designer. I can make some good speculations, however; when you ask how the CSA gets 50 ships, I show you 50 ships; when you say they were generally pretty crummy ships, I say true, but there are 50 pretty crummy Union ships in their too...why are are we counting Union crummy ships, but not CSA crummy ships? That does not sound consistent. My problem with this approach is that if you get down to counting "Revenue Cutters" and "Coal Tenders" and "Harbor Tugs" that the Union would wind up with a LOT more than 80-90 "ships", (I said 900, but I pulled that number from the sky. But if you count all the support vessels and tenders and other "ash and trash" that you had in your list, it's going to be considerable number.) Like I said, if the consensus here is for all crummy ships to be dropped, sure that can be done. If that means the CSA gets no navy, well fine, I wouldn't have a problem with that. As long as we are being consistent. Just keep in mind, however, that an alternative does exist, you know...ships in the game can be graded according to Quality (ie, Morale), and if you give crummy ships (on both sides) crummy ratings, then we can include them all...it's just that the crummy ones will perform...um, crummily. Which is what we are aiming for. If you've fought enough Quick Combats (in both CoG and FoF) you'll know exactly what I mean...morale 1 units are rather useless and cowardly, and will flee to the Routed Area pretty quickly, meaning the side with them loses the battle (and quite possibly a LOT of ships in pursuit). This is something to consider, but it really doesn't address the issue that the South simply didn't have the kind of Ocean-Going Navy that the "Ship" and "Fleet" units in the game represent. What "naval actions" they fought were in sheltered coastal waters like Mobile Bay or Hampton Roads..., and with the exception of the Virginia's one brief day of Glory, they were fought in support of the Harbor defenses. High seas encounters were limited to single-ship events like the Alabama vs. the Kearsage, which was hardly a "fleet action". I would think a CSA player saddled with a navy of crummy ships would do precisely as Mallory did, and that is pursue a "fleet in being" strategy of keeping his ships in a harbor defense posture, rather than sending them to certain doom on the high seas. I'm pretty certain that would be my play. To which I would say that they had no choice but to be Harbor Defense because they weren't "Blue Water" capable. Which is why I think they are better reflected in the game as "fort upgrades" rather than Ships and Fleets. What ships the South could find that were "blue Water" capable were "blockade running", not fighting "Fleet Actions". For the South to have a "High Seas Fleet" just gives the game a "wrong" feel. I think we are having an impass because you are maintaining that the the South had 50 "pretty crumby ships", and that the north had 50 "pretty crumby ships" as well..., and I am maintaining that while the North may well have had 50 "less-than-terrific WARships" among their 90, they also had hundreds of additional "pretty crumby ships" like the one's you want to count for the South. Whereas the South only had 50 "pretty crumby ships".. We are back to those "apples and oranges"...., and hopefully can reach some agreement soon.
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