I agree with this.cool-toxic said:
I don't believe in missions á la HoI, nor losing control over explorers. The game is not a historical simulator; the player is supposed to keep all control over his nation.
The missions idea have the pro that they make it less tedious (if you find it tedious) to control naval warfare, but the have the cons of removing the skill factor of players who have mastered this aspect of the game. Also, allowing control of your ships to some ship AI is a risky move, as these ship AIs don't have a sense of strategy or awareness, and so may (or even are likely to) do some horrendous mistakes. Better to keep player control and player mistakes.
Furthermore, being able to block a port without naval superiority isn't easy, so the argument that the enemy may engage the blockading force on their way back and forth isn't really necessary. Besides, blocking a single port doesn't really affect the game. Blocking many may, but then again, that demands naval superiority (or end in destruction).
Perhaps the exploring may be enhanced with a simple "explore" command to a navy (with explorer or sufficient NT), that would order the ships to sail through Terra Incognita automatically (either region-wise or player-selected sea zones) and return to port by themselves when needed. Similarily an anti-pirate command could be designed. These would however be very inefficient when war engages, as those kinds of missions rarely involve a larger amount of ships. Still, it should always be possible to keep manual control over these actions. A dedicated human will always be better than the AI anyway.
Port range is a good idea for keeping the AI away from some silly naval decisions and actions. I also like the "port support" thing, however it seems at most unnecessary. In SP, there's rarely any need (atm) for larger forces of ships (because the AI can't handle theirs), and in MP, it would be too easy if the opponents knew where the enemy ships were (the largest port, simply).
