Empire Total War:Naval battle tactics

Doc Shorla · 13 Mar 2009 at 16:33

hi guys, ive put this as a seprate thread to the official ETW as wanted to keep it bit more specific.
Im loving the game, but im really struggling to win any naval battles. Land battles, im absolutely fine on.
Im sure im missing something really obvious but any naval battle hints/tactics greatly appreciated. Thanks

TheMightyTen · 13 Mar 2009 at 16:54

If you have enough ships organise them into squadrons. Anything less than 5 ships I work as a single squadron, 6 I split 4 and 2 upto 10 ships then I go to 3 squadrons.

I always work with my squadrons line astern and I try to work them into a position to cut the enemys line of battle perpendicular to it. Once I've cut their line I try to concentrate fire to the smallest number of ships possible to increase effect. I will also intermingle ammunition types within a squadron; for example in a 4 ship squadron I will tend to have the first ships guns loaded with chain, the next two loaded with ball and the last with grape, I will then try to concentrate that fire on a single target damaging all elements of it's stats, you can very quickly get an enemy ship to surrender/rout this way.

Have a good look at web sites and books covering British Naval tactics of the day, divide and conquer was a favoured tactic of aggresive Captains in the period and when fighting in a line of battle you're not going to get anywhere if you're not aggresive.

Don't be put off by losses because you will get them, it's the nature of the type of warfare, if you're decisive you should win through even against superior numbers.

Oh and always remeber, HOLD FAST

Leutrim.23 · 14 Mar 2009 at 13:24

I think ETW as a hole is a total sham compared to RTW & M2TW. They failed with the naval battles. Very slow and boring..

snowdog · 14 Mar 2009 at 13:40

I don't agree, Sea battles > Land battles imo

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Awesome when you outnumber the enemy, you just capture the enemy ship then

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Squark · 14 Mar 2009 at 14:46

Leutrim.23 said:
I think ETW as a hole is a total sham compared to RTW & M2TW. They failed with the naval battles. Very slow and boring..

Just to let you know, that sig goes against the board rules (see FAQ for details), best change it before a wandering mod does.

I don't seem to get any naval battles coming my way at the moment,

I try and capture as many ships as I can.

Do surrendered ships count as captures?