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Developer Corner | Aerohydrodynamics

Hello everyone!

It has been a while since the last dev corner, as many of us (including myself) went on vacations - but now I have returned, even if it has been quite hard to readjust my brain back to the work frequencies. As usual, keep in mind that everything discussed here is in a relatively early stage, and as such is subject to change, especially all the numbers and values. There is also quite a number of placeholder art.
Today we will talk a bit more about Islands, Carriers (and changes to them) and also about a new branch of Special Forces, so buckle up!

Strategic Locations

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Truk is what we call a ‘strategic location’, a place that can have increased building capacity or potential. In this case, currently it is a ‘placeholder’ name of Natural Harbor increasing the level cap of Naval Base Truk in Caroline Islands from 6 to 8. (note, that doesn't mean all the Caroline Islands have that increased level cap). This increased level cap of 8 can be quite important as it will allow…

As I mentioned in the Hydrodynamics Dev Corner, not all islands will be equal under the new system. We have created a concept called ‘Strategic Locations’ - that due to specific circumstances, historical importance, geographical location etc. deserves to be a bit more unique, while also having increased gameplay importance. Those locations will have increased limits for certain buildings, depending on the type of the strategic location. Some of the ‘Islands’ like Truk or Guam, may have increased Naval Base caps, others could have increased Airfield or Fort Caps. Or have a mix of them.

Defending Against Naval Strikes

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In this screenshot, you can see that planes from the British Carriers shot down some of the incoming German Naval Bombers performing Naval Strike.

One of the things that didn’t sit quite right with me for a long time, was the fact that whenever Naval Strike was performed on the Taskforce that included Carriers, Carrier Planes would sit idle and twiddle their thumbs. Now, carrier planes will participate in defense of the taskforce against Naval Strikes - with numbers depending on a few factors.

Carrier Missions

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In these screenshots you can see that while the task force is executing the mission (in this case it was naval exercises), planes on that carrier can also perform the air missions at the same time. In the second screenshot I’ve selected all planes to do exercises, while in the last screenshot I’ve opted for fighters to provide air cover and superiority, while I ordered my taskforce to operate in the North Pacific Sea Zone.

Another update when it comes to the Carriers that we will be doing, is the ability to set and execute air missions for the Carrier Air Groups, while the taskforce that contains Carriers are performing the missions. Planes will be executing the missions selected in the same region that the taskforce is currently operating in.

Carrier Hangar Detection Changes

And another change for Carriers, is the introduction of ‘Carrier Sub/Surface Detection’ values on the Hangar modules. Essentially what it does - it provides increased Sub / Surface detection to the ship scaled by the % of the planes it currently has.

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Deck Space / Hangar for the ‘regular’ carriers provide +2 Carrier Sub Detection and +5 Carrier Surface Detection. For example, a carrier with 3 hangars, will have a Deck Size of 60, and +6 Carrier Sub Detection, +15 Carrier Surface Detection. If it would have a full compartment of 60 planes, then it would get +15 Surface and +6 Sub Detection, while if it would have only 30 planes, it would only provide +3 Sub Detection and +7.5 Surface Detection. As usual, keep in mind those values may be adjusted down the line.


New Special Forces

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Who will guess which one is the new branch of Special Forces?

To fight in all the jungles and on the islands, we are introducing a new branch of Special Forces - which we internally called for quite some time ‘Jungle Specialists’. This temporary name was great as long as they remained on the design board, but for the actual implementation finding the right name for them proved to be quite challenging to me. They went under a few ‘name iterations’ (amongst them some like: Jaegers or Chindits), but finally decided to name them Rangers. But hold up, aren’t there Rangers in-game already as a Support Company unlocked by the Mountaineers Special Doctrine, you will ask? Yes, and they will be renamed to Recon Rangers. Recon Rangers will be now unlocked by either picking Mountaineers Special Doctrine OR Rangers Special Doctrine. Rangers specialty will be fighting in the Woods and Jungles, and of course they can be further customized and boosted by the Rangers Special Forces Doctrine branch.

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And this is the new special forces doctrine branch in all its FINAL_BACKUP_DRAFT_FINAL_V5 glory and form.

And that’s pretty much it for this dev corner from my side. In time we will return with more dev corners, including me talking more about things that are opposite to dry amongst others. I am really curious to see and read all your feedback and opinions on what I mentioned today.

Thanks for reading and until next time, farewell!

/Zwirbaum

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I am going to leave you with another teaser for one of the new ‘toys’ we will talk about in the future. This shouldn’t be a hard guess, I think?
 
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Good plans for the islands. Good use for the Rangers as well, as other have said above, this is better then the orignal idea of the Chasseurs Ardennais. Would work with so many other countries as well.

If anything, I think now is also the perfect time for you to look at the geographic features of a country to allow certain special forces. Netherlands shouldn't get Mountaineers, desert countries shouldn't get Rangers and landlocked countries shouldn't be able to get Marines (at least until certain requirements are met).
 
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Also a question about the maximum value of ports on islands. Previously I thought that this value would depend only on the size of the island (geographical factor), now you say that there is also a factor of historical importance, so the question is whether there could be a situation where I have two identical small islands with a maximum port level of 3, but one of them, due to the so-called historical importance, has level 6. This would be strange, because if I could build a port of level 6 on one small island, why can't I do it on the other. I hope there won't be such magical situations.
 
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Also a question about the maximum value of ports on islands. Previously I thought that this value would depend only on the size of the island (geographical factor), now you say that there is also a factor of historical importance, so the question is whether there could be a situation where I have two identical small islands with a maximum port level of 3, but one of them, due to the so-called historical importance, has level 6. This would be strange, because if I could build a port of level 6 on one small island, why can't I do it on the other. I hope there won't be such magical situations.

As I said in the Hydrodynamics Developer Corner: "Right now those caps are based on the Island state categories (Tiny Island, Small Island, Large Island), and upon one concept we will talk about in the future."

By historical importance in that case I mean that some of the islands were chosen and used as Resupplying/Advance Base/Refueling Stations etc. - because of their geographical factor, as well as other factors. This is a nod towards that historical element, and respecting the fact that each island is not equal to another in the chain.

State limitations work for entire state, while one specific island in that chain can provide that extra capacity. Alternative solution would be to splitting those specific islands in their own states, but that brings another problem - of having extra airbases, setting the limitations, potentially having to devise new state categories and so on.
 
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As I said in the Hydrodynamics Developer Corner: "Right now those caps are based on the Island state categories (Tiny Island, Small Island, Large Island), and upon one concept we will talk about in the future."

By historical importance in that case I mean that some of the islands were chosen and used as Resupplying/Advance Base/Refueling Stations etc. - because of their geographical factor, as well as other factors. This is a nod towards that historical element, and respecting the fact that each island is not equal to another in the chain.

State limitations work for entire state, while one specific island in that chain can provide that extra capacity. Alternative solution would be to splitting those specific islands in their own states, but that brings another problem - of having extra airbases, setting the limitations, potentially having to devise new state categories and so on.
hey could I get a response to my previous question I think you went past it
 
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I'd like to see simplification or unification of getting additional Special Forces branches. Now, for example, any country after 39 (as I remember) can open an additional branch. At the same time, the USSR has to spend a mountain of focuses on it, which otherwise it would not even take. As a result, playing for the Union you either give up everything and rash the second branch, or get it at best in the year 43-44.
With the Soviet unions geography you either pick Alpine cold troops or Rangers and you also have penal battalions and cossacks no?
 
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Changes to carriers are great, been needed for a while. I'm very interested in the addition of detection to the hangar modules.

I'm curious how these new forest/jungle special forces will work out. Will mountaineers lose their forest bonuses? Will marines lose their jungle bonuses?
 
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1) Will the 4 carrier limit per battle be removed/reworked in any way? Most players seem to dislike it.

2) Will carrier overcrowding get changed? It's not very intuitive and is difficult to utilize without accidentally shooting yourself in the foot, and outside of naval battles it does nothing (which means you mustn't overcrowd your carriers if you want to use them for e.g. invasion support).
If there are no plans yet, my suggestion is to change overcrowding to extra deck size instead. It's easy to understand and works equally well in and outside of naval battles.
 
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Honestly, most of these navy changes don’t mean much to me personally. If it’s mainly mission tweaks or behind-the-scenes adjustments, it doesn’t really shift the core gameplay loop - just watching 2D sprites enter and clash in what still feels like random chaos.

I’m glad improvements are being made, and maybe I’m just someone who tends to ignore the navy because of how it plays, but it still doesn’t feel like naval warfare carries the weight or impact it really should - while continuing to be one of the more tedious aspects of the core gameplay loop.

Maybe I'm missing something, or maybe we'll see more changes.
 
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The rangers seem like a completely redundant thing from my perspective, we already have the Rangers support company from the Mountaineer branch specialisms for wilderness warfare and jungle warfare bonuses from the Marines branch, why extrapolate it into a whole new special force type? Feels like the wheeled tank vs armored car debacle all over again. Can't comment on the navy changes because idk how it works anyways.
 
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hey could I get a response to my previous question I think you went past it

I'm not always responding in the order of when the posts are posted. Sometimes I go back to make sure I didn't miss something, sometimes I need to think a bit about answer, but in the meantime can do reply somewhere else etc. Also I will not be able to answer all the questions.

However in this case about Naval Raids / Japan - it is outside of the todays topic, so I will have to skip that part and say, sorry can't answer that now. :(

On the remaining part, about production costs, rebalancing etc. - as someone linked my answer from previous dev corners, it is somewhat high on my to-do lists. :)
 
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In regard to Escort Carriers, while you have Converted BB and CA carrier hulls, any thoughts on adding Converted Freighter Hulls?

My thoughts on this, is that this hull would have a limit of 1 hanger deck and at most 4 free slots.

Converted Freighter Hull:
-, -, -, -, -, -, -
-, x, AA, (R), (E I), S, -

The above template is a modified Converted CA.
The (E I) module is fixed and cannot me modified or upgraded.

This could also be a special project that would open a dedicated Escort Carrier template for a

The following was copied from Wikipedia.
The Bogue-class escort carriers were based on the Maritime Commission's Type C3 cargo ships hull.[1] They all were named for sounds.[2]
The Casablanca-class escort carriers were designed keel up as Escort Carriers. They all were named for sounds.[2]

Escort Carriers were the most numerous Carriers during the war, and it seems unwise to not show them off.
Also, as a side note, it would be nice to split the name list "Historical Light/Escort Carriers" into separate lists.
CVLs had different capabilities that CVEs.
CVLs could operate with Fleet Carriers, but with less capability (i.e., flight component).
CVEs did not operate with Fleet Carriers. They were mainly used as a Core unit in Submarine Hunter/Killer TFs and as Island Invasion CAS support until an operational land airstrip could be captured or built.
 
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