Fleet Management Tips

[unmerged(171609)]

I am looking for some tips on how to best manage your fleet in the tatical battles. Are there any strategies or formations that are proven as best practices.

I frequently find that some ships end up all alone or don't focus on their targets.

In multiple ship battles, is it advisable to set all your ships to gang up on one, or should you send each out to do 1 on 1 battles?

Has anyone written a guide on this? I bought the prima guide but there was no reference on this type of info there outside of ship capabilities.

Thanks!

 

[unmerged(96825)]

If an AI fleet wants to fight it will just charge right at you. If I'm unsure of the outcome I try to keep my ships in a line and at right angles to the enemy as much as possible. I want to always be able to bring my broadsides to bear while they are still sailing directly at me and can't fire. But eventually they will get close enough and you just have to duke it out. If my captain has Feared and Rout skills, then I try to sink their flagship and there is a good chance the others will surrender.

 

[delra]

Keep order, save your ammo and don't hesitate to surrender a ship when it's about to get sunk.

 

[unmerged(105858)]

A question about take over other ships.

For exemple, i have a fleet of 4 Galleons filled with marines and after a battle 3 enemy ships surrendered with a cargo let's say 100t of spices.That makes a total of 7 ships and i can only have 5 in my fleet.
So far as i know i have to switch ships to get the cargo...right?That means i have to give up 2 Galleons for two schooners or sloops or whatever.I don't think you don't do a lot of profit like that and not at all when the cargo is wood or leather.That's why i don't bother taking ships with such cargo.

Or am i completely wrong about this?Maybe it's a dumb question:rofl:

 

[delra]

Yeah, in your way of playing you need to give up some Galleons to get cargo which usually brings you profits but also makes you wait for new Galleons to be built before you go on a next hunt and makes you lose all the crew experience you might have.

I hunt with fleets of 3 ships (3x Cutters very early, then 3x Xebecs, then 1x Brig + 2x Xebecs (my fav. early tbh, Brig has a huge crew and good speed so is very good for boarding, it also has more ammo than Xebec) or later a pair of Frigates (they both are experienced and supported by a back-up war fleet close by which takes out any bigger war fleets of my enemy). I usually sink the flagship of my opponent right away and then just pound at other ships with "Rout" skill and cannons until they give up. I have marines only on one of my ship which is designated to conclude boarding operations, other ships fly empty cargo bays.

This way I can steal 2-3 ships from my opponents after beating them and usually most of the cargo.

And by the way, I think I asked for a "Create New Fleet" button on the after-battle screen long ago in the suggestions thread. Since it wasn't picked, I guess it's intentional that devs make us abandon lots of ships and cargo. A way to nerf human player from conquering too many ships at too short time.

Still, even the way it's now, most of my pre-East-Indiamen fleets are composed of stolen ships. I especially like grabbing Flutes and Galleons and forming huge convoys of them to trade with India (like 1x Galleon + 4x Flutes or 2x Galleons + 3x Flutes). Even most of my Frigates and SOLs I steal from Pirates (my most glorious victory was boarding SOL46 from a Brig, imagine how hard it was even with him having his masts down). The only thing I really build in mass are East Indiamen.

In my last 1.06 Hard game I only unlocked Xebec, East Indiamen and Frigates. Other ships I never built on my own as a house rule. And I think thanks to clumsy pirates I actually assembled a fleet of 5x Galleons faster than I would via saving cash and buying them in a shipyard and waiting months for them to be built. That's something worth trying when you are bored of playing the normal way.

 

[unmerged(105858)]

Thanks for the tips, Delra.In the future i will work with the same fleets as you do.

Another question , how do i know what the enemy flagship is?Usualy it's the biggest one but what if they are all the same size?

Do you play your battles in RTS or DC mode.I never use DC mode because i like to have an overview of the battlefield (seabattle)(?).

 

[Pauvrelieu]

And by the way, I think I asked for a "Create New Fleet" button on the after-battle screen long ago in the suggestions thread. Since it wasn't picked, I guess it's intentional that devs make us abandon lots of ships and cargo. A way to nerf human player from conquering too many ships at too short time.

It seems that the directors cut has the "Create New Fleet" button. I have to admit, it makes things a whole lot more fun. I just tried it out. I had a fleet with 2 frigates and 3 galleons, and came across a fleet with 1 brig and 4 flutes. A sunken brig and a sunken flute later, I had captured not only 3 flutes, but their cargo as well. Then I saw the create new fleet option. That quickly ended any thought I had of paying for any flute blueprints!

It might make it be a bit unfair that the human player can do this, but hey, you can always self-impose a no-create-new-fleet rule.

 

[delra]

Thanks for the tips, Delra.In the future i will work with the same fleets as you do.

Another question , how do i know what the enemy flagship is?Usualy it's the biggest one but what if they are all the same size?

Do you play your battles in RTS or DC mode.I never use DC mode because i like to have an overview of the battlefield (seabattle)(?).

I just look at their formation before it gets all mixed up and remember their flagship's name...

About exploiting ship-stealing, a good rule (which by the way I formulated when playing X3: Terran Conflict where stealing ships is also a huge exploit) is to only take the ships you need and will be using, never take them for sales.

 

[unmerged(133722)]

About exploiting ship-stealing, a good rule (which by the way I formulated when playing X3: Terran Conflict where stealing ships is also a huge exploit) is to only take the ships you need and will be using, never take them for sales.

In my opinion, selling the ship is less of an exploit. You get 1/2 the value of a new one of that class, minus the repairs because you blew it to smithereens in capturing it. But by keeping and using the ship, you get a substantial profit over the lifetime of the ship itself. Therefore you gain more of an advantage in keeping the ship than in selling it immediately.

 

[unmerged(105858)]

I just look at their formation before it gets all mixed up and remember their flagship's name...

About exploiting ship-stealing, a good rule (which by the way I formulated when playing X3: Terran Conflict where stealing ships is also a huge exploit) is to only take the ships you need and will be using, never take them for sales.

Maybe i'm stupid but i don't find any information of what the flagship is.Before the battle you can't click on the ships and after the start you just get information of the size of the crew and the cannons etc......but that's it.
When i click on an enemy fleet on the map i don't get anything at all.
Help please.

 

[delra]

There aren't that many starting formations. If they sail parallel to you (usual), it's the first ship in their formation. If they sail orthogonal (rare), it's 2nd ship from the right. So even if there's no clear leader (2 Galleons for example) you still can make a very educated guess who to sink.

 

[Forster]

Good info Delra.

 

[unmerged(105858)]

Thank you.

 

[unmerged(133722)]

After you enter in Battle mode, you get the Start Battle button, and the spinning camera. I always immediately click the Start button, and then immediately pause the game. I will then zoom into the enemy fleet. In my experience, the Flagship is always the first ship in their line, finding the front of the line from the back by the direction that the ships are facing. From what I have observed, the Flagship will always be the highest class battle ship that they have - so if they have 1 schooner, 2 sloops, and 1 cutter, the cutter will be the flagship. But, again, it will always be the first in the line.

As for tactics, I am similar to Delra. I go after the flagship first, putting either all of my ships on it (if we are even close to evenly matched), or put my heavy hitters on the flagship and use any smaller ships in my fleet to keep the other members of their fleet occupied. My ships that are harassing their non-flagship ships will have their ammo type set to the one that kills Sails first, and when they run out of that ammo, to the one that kills crew. The idea is that I want as many ships of the enemy to Surrender. Sinking the flagship is key, or getting it to surrender. The other ships loose a ton of morale once the flagship goes down, and will usually surrender rather quickly.

I don't create "lines" until Frigate or above. In my opinion, to have an effective line you must be able to absorb a lot of damage, and having Repair Hull and Repair Sail is almost a requirement. Your flagship is just so exposed that it can be pummeled into splinters by the time the end of your line is in firing range, and if you loose your Flagship, the rest of your ships will be very vulnerable to Surrender.

 

[delra]

My ships that are harassing their non-flagship ships will have their ammo type set to the one that kills Sails first, and when they run out of that ammo, to the one that kills crew.

Exactly what I do. With a small note that if you hunt with 2-3 ships you can safely put everyone on the flagship.

I don't create "lines" until Frigate or above.

Agreed also. With a note that early on the line is great for defense, imagine a fleet 2x Galleons and 3x Flutes attacked by enemy fleet of Galleons and Xebecs for example. Just sail the first Galleon yourself and make sure you keep their flagship in its area of fire so the following ships also get plenty of chance of shooting.

Also, two more things:

1. Since Pirates! I think it was a standard that different ships had different morale. A Flute crew wouldn't be as feisty as a purely military crew of a Frigate. So maybe we should have different morale for different types of ships?

2. Answering the previous question, I use DC quite a lot actually cause I need it for my highly explotative tactics:

- For offensive battles, after my ships all know what to do I like to jump into one of them and help out as much as I can which usually means sailing the thing kamikaze-style in the middle of enemy formation shooting left and right board at once and getting demolished a lot... and surrender seconds before my ship gets sunk.

- For defensive ones I set ammo, set line and jump into my flagship so I know my ships sail the best route there is to outmanoeuvre my enemy and cause chaos in his fleet (which usually means sailing around him so he has to turn around as well but without the order I have enforced).

- I also often (with Xebecs and Frigates especially) just sail right at the enemy fleet (head-on!) to turn my whole line left or right (depending on where their flagship is) when we're close and sail that direction from then on. AI usually turns half their ships to sail my direction and the other half goes the opposite direction to avoid collisions. This splits them into two groups with flagship being vastly outnumbered in that particular part of the battlefield.