Commerce and coastal raiding?

[Baron von Beer]

Bit confused on these.

First: The German CLs in Africa and Rabaul mini fleet. Supposed to be able to interdict British shipping, but how? Do I set raid and leave them in port, set raid and move them into the ocean, not set raid, just move them into the ocean, etc. Didn't see it in the big manual, only what they do, not how to do it. If move into ocean, it would only let me move them into the North Atlantic, and Asiatic sea (Think, western most in the pacific mini section). No Indian, South Atlantic, Pacific, etc... kind of didn't want to go into the North Atlantic, no sense in poking Scapa Flow with a stick.

Second: Coastal raiders. I gather you cannot choose the target, you simply move them into a large sea zone and they choose which mini/coastal seazone, and town/city to hit? Doing this, they seem to be drawn to the mined zones like moths to a light. Freaking admirals always having to prove how fearless they are....

Also, clarification on battle results.

In the end of battle summary, do Out of Combat units also show on the destroyed unit tally? Turn I just did, I had 3 units that went "out of combat", 2 in one battle, 1 in the other. Those also showed 2 and 1 "destroyed" units, respectively. No other units appeared to have been lost, only a couple wounded so this would seem to be the case, but just wanted to make sure I didn't miss something.

Finally, one on forts. The rules say that a fort can act as artillery for a battle in the region. However, in Pre/early August, as Germany, when the French attacked Saarbrucken & Metz I believe, each had a fort, neither case was the fort available in the battle for arty support. Is this a special case for the pre-turn, is it because those armies are "immobilized" that turn, or is there anything that I had to do to get them to show up on the bottom row of units? BTW, patched to 1.06H and using 106i beta if that matters.

Thanks for any and all help.

[dougbush93]

Bit confused on these.

First: The German CLs in Africa and Rabaul mini fleet. Supposed to be able to interdict British shipping, but how? Do I set raid and leave them in port, set raid and move them into the ocean, not set raid, just move them into the ocean, etc. Didn't see it in the big manual, only what they do, not how to do it. If move into ocean, it would only let me move them into the North Atlantic, and Asiatic sea (Think, western most in the pacific mini section). No Indian, South Atlantic, Pacific, etc... kind of didn't want to go into the North Atlantic, no sense in poking Scapa Flow with a stick.

There is no way to do anything with these units, other than move them and possibly get into combat with the British / French units chasing them around. I have been unable to get these units back to the North Sea or into the Med, so they are kind of useless unless you get lucky and sink some other ships. What is worse is that these units can stay at sea for years on end because there is no requirement for fleets to ever go back to port, which makes them really annoying.

Second: Coastal raiders. I gather you cannot choose the target, you simply move them into a large sea zone and they choose which mini/coastal seazone, and town/city to hit? Doing this, they seem to be drawn to the mined zones like moths to a light. Freaking admirals always having to prove how fearless they are....

You are supposed to be able to choose the target, which according to the rules needs to be a zone with a city. I have not been able to get the raid function to work in the last few builds though. It might have something to do with a naval pathfinding bug that hasn't been fixed yet, but I"m not sure.

Also, clarification on battle results.

In the end of battle summary, do Out of Combat units also show on the destroyed unit tally? Turn I just did, I had 3 units that went "out of combat", 2 in one battle, 1 in the other. Those also showed 2 and 1 "destroyed" units, respectively. No other units appeared to have been lost, only a couple wounded so this would seem to be the case, but just wanted to make sure I didn't miss something.

It seems that OOC units are counted as "destroyed". However, I would ignore the battle summary in its current form. It is often completely wrong, even regarding the # of units shaken, etc.

Finally, one on forts. The rules say that a fort can act as artillery for a battle in the region. However, in Pre/early August, as Germany, when the French attacked Saarbrucken & Metz I believe, each had a fort, neither case was the fort available in the battle for arty support. Is this a special case for the pre-turn, is it because those armies are "immobilized" that turn, or is there anything that I had to do to get them to show up on the bottom row of units? BTW, patched to 1.06H and using 106i beta if that matters.

Thanks for any and all help.

According to the rules, the fort should provide arty support for one sub-battle for the first three rounds (for no ammo cost) and then from that point on at a price of one ammo/round. However, if that is happening, it is presently "behind the scenes". For this problem and your previous one, the new "battle logs" in the Gold Edition should help.

Doug