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Zulu -> (10/27/2003 2:54:56 PM)
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What I *think* I have learned so far about transports is the following:
1) when you order them to load (at the starting port), immediateley also set a destination. Then set a home base to the base you want them to return AFTER they have unloaded. Of course you do this, only if the base you want them to return is different from the base they started out in first place.
2) I also set the transports to "patrol/do not retire" if: (a) I want the transport to try to go through no matters what; (b) they are reasonably far from enemy threat. If I do not do this, I sometimes have trasports heading back to homebase before unloading because an enemy CV had been spotted perhaps very far away. This is generally reasonable, but sometimes, it is obvious the enemy CV will be busy doing something else and you want to override the understandable tendency of the transport commander to chicken out. I revert them to "retirement allowed" when they are close enough to the target base if I want them to make a run during the night, unload and run out before daylight. If not, I let them to patrol / do not retire, but I think that in this case you have to remember manually to tell them to go back home once they have unloaded.
3) Playing as the US, if you have Japanese sub doctrine on, I understand Jap subs will not attack your transports. Therefore (at least against the AI), it seems to me you can send out detachments of 1-2 transports alone, without sub fear and without escort. It also seems to me that if you send out a lot of groups of 1-2 transports rather than a large convoy, they are less prone to get targeted by the (AI) planes. So much for the big convoy theory which was so popular in the Atlantic. Of course, if they are without escort, they do not have a lot of AA fire to answer an air attack...
4) if they get bombed along the way, you may want to check again their orders. I am not sure what happens in these cases, but (probably depending on the damage they have taken), they may decide to go back home.
Overall I like the way the game allows the player to manage transports and I have not encountered any major bug yet.
Regards,
Zulu
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