You get more cash from reparations (IE, peace term points left on the table) than from possessions. That said for the US I'd definitely want to take Polynesia and/or New Caledonia since that gives you a presence in the South Pacific, and with it (plus the Panama Canal activating in 1914) a route to Southeast Asia with no breaks in the supply chain.
Sounds good. Now I have a chain of bases all the way around the world!
In retrospect, it's obvious why my ships seemed to not be performing optimally - they were worn out from extended operation without proper bases. Turns out it's rather foolish to fight a war in Northern European waters when you don't have any bases there. (Which is why I won three wars like that... maybe I should keep being a fool!)
***
For starters, let's have a look at my prize.
What a piece of junk! A Short-ranged ship can't move from region to region during wartime, and I'd have to refit the 14" guns to make some use of them. I could make it over into a next-generation Inflammable, sort of, but it just doesn't look very good.
Besides, what better insult is there than scrapping your war prize and shipping the scrap steel back to France? "Look at your ship. Look at what I think of your ship."
Wow, the Secretary of the Navy continues to be a petty jerk.
Incidentally, while it might've been the ship's poor condition, its scrap value was minuscule.
June sees me develop the quadruple torpedo mount; I soon lay down a destroyer armed with three 5" guns and three quad torpedo mounts.
In October, for the first time in the entire game, I reject an opportunity to sell technology abroad:
December 1916:
As I point out, unrest is still high. Turns out the people aren't happy with the new territories secured for the USA. It's a shame, because there's some lovely sights to see - the lemurs of Madagascar, the beaches of Tahiti and our new Caribbean holdings...
Maybe we should offer cruises. Maybe on cruise ships, but why not on cruisers instead?
Speaking of new cruisers, meet the new destroyer leader class of the US Navy:
Broadside's only two guns less than the forest of guns on the Bethesda-class, but this version has a lot more torpedoes, along with better turret top armor - and is over $2 million cheaper.
Remember the time I blamed a Balkan war on Japan? Well, I've been asked to comment on Balkan affairs again:
Next month, I develop my refit for the Mako-class:
I could've refit the machinery and gone up to 14" guns, but that would've been a much more expensive rebuild, so I held off on that for now. I'm only going to refit two of the Makos, though; the third will wait until a war approaches, I think.
In November, more technical developments:
Nice. Would've been nicer earlier, but still nice. Now can you start making discoveries about mine warfare?
Here's where things stand at the end of 1917:
Hurray, we have the budget lead over Britain! Then why do they have more battleships ... oh. Because I'm replacing the entire Potomac, Koi, and Coy classes at once.
Maybe I'm overdoing things a bit on light forces?
One more update for today, since I've already played up to the end of 1918. Big things are afoot...
February 1918 sees the development of a new Fire Control System:
Over the course of the year, refitting my ships with Improved Directors gives me a chance to reassess them. I wind up scrapping my two 13"-armed battleships - they have very weak protection, and inadequate torpedo defense to boot.
March 1918:
Not just a jerk, but someone who enables jerks to act all jerky, too. Secretary of the Navy's a real piece of work. And now France is as annoyed with us as the Germans!
That's all irrelevant, though:
The world's two biggest navies are now allied. Everyone else's opinions no longer matter. Even yours.
The one downside (other than making this Let's Play potentially more boring for a while) is that the budget gets cut. But even that goes away:
France is actually building new BCs of her own, but nothing to really worry about.
Money does still get a bit tight - around August, I've 'only' got $10 million banked away.
Over time, though, with my light cruiser program finishing up, the budgetary issues fade away, enough that we hold a sailing regatta.
January 1919 sees tensions with France rising yet again:
February sees the old foe making noises about naval rearmament:
March sees the Alliance starting to bear fruit, or at least cash:
April ... sees a return to WAR:
After a failed demonstration off the French Atlantic coast in May, the US Navy achieves its first success of the new war in June:
This was France's sole armored cruiser.
July sees the US Army entering the war:
August makes me wonder about the accuracy of my intelligence:
I suppose technically you can scrap a sunken ship.
In September, spurred on by a new 30-knot Russian battlecruiser, the US Navy lays down the USS Rainbow:
To be honest, I probably should have accepted a larger, more expensive version with 14" guns. Ah well.
October 1919:
The war continues to go well. Not exactly hard to predict, in light of it being the two biggest naval powers bullying one of the weakest.
Sometimes, bullying doesn't go so well. Sometimes, they fight back:
To be fair, I didn't expect to run into 3/5ths of the French destroyer force escorting a single convoy. And sometimes, luck just doesn't pan out.
Oh, you ain't seen nothing yet in terms of meanness.
January 1920 sees the war continue on:
Wartime budgets are a beautiful thing.
March 18, 1920 sees a French destroyer force smashed up by one of my light cruisers in a minor evening action:
The latest espionage, as of April 1920:
France has two of these. On the plus side for the French, it has a good belt and good deck armor. On the minus side... 20 knots. That's laughably slow.
August 3, 1920 is a triumph for the Destroyer Force:
As you can see, the destroyers Brie and Chili got within very very close range of the Dunkerque-class battlecruiser Duquesne, braving her twelve 14" guns and her secondary battery, before torpedoing her. Prior to this, two of my battlecruisers (with fourteen 13" guns between them) tangled with her in the last hours before dusk, with the USS Lesbifriends losing a turret from incoming fire at a range of 15600 yards.
September 1920 sees the war wear on:
France is feeling the strain. The US? Not so much.
With $30 million in the bank, and with a battleship about to commission, I order the first ship of a new class:
The USS Insurance is my first 10-gun battleship, and my first fast battleship at 26 knots. I contemplated using 17" guns, but decided the weight and cost penalties were too severe, especially since only the US even uses the 16" gun right now.
November 1920 sees the last French light cruiser sunk:
December 8, 1920 is another black day for the French Navy.
This time, the Lesbifriends and the USS Mako got the better of the exchange with the French dreadnought Friedland, but evening fell before they could put her away. So instead, it was time to send in the destroyers. I lost two in the attack ... but put at least three torpedoes into Friedland.
And here's where things stand at the end of the year:
In January 1921, I finally develop mine rails for light ships, along with twin turrets for destroyers. (Not for light cruisers yet, though, of course).
February 1921 sees a dramatic event that might even turn the tide of the whole war!!!!
Yeah, sinking one of my minesweepers isn't going to do it, France. Step your game up.
See, I could've sent you French Lenin in March 1921, but if that's all you can do, he's just not worth my time.
Look, you didn't even need French Lenin! You managed a revolution in June all by yourselves!
Your prize sucks again.
At least she's worth a lot in scrap value.
In September, seeing the British and Germans laying down 10" gun cruisers, I lay down one of my own:
Based on January's intelligence report, something is either wrong with my spies or with the French navy's design teams:
What's particularly odd is that CLs are supposed to be 7900 tons or less.
In March 1922, the first foreign CA to commission in years enters service with our British allies:
... she's fast.
At last, in May 1922, I get double mounts for CLs.
I immediately lay down a single unit of a 6"-gunned cruiser with triple turrets ... then realize I'm getting a significant weight penalty for not having gun shields (single 6" mounts with 2" or less of turret armor), so I leave it to just a single unit.
In October, my response to the HMS Diadem is finally laid down:
As seems to be typical for me, she has fewer guns but tougher armor.
In November, the US Navy bullies foreigners again:
And here's the situation at the end of the year:
You know what, that's all a bit dry (who are you kidding, anon_user, the whole game is dry - ironic for a naval game). Let's make this a double update.
January 1923, and America remembers her old friend:
July 1923 sees America killing Frenchmen again:
I see the Navy's in full victim-blaming mode here. I'm sure France will take that just fine.
(please don't take this lying down, you're so weak and easy to beat up)
(... wow, this game is really bringing out the bullying side I didn't know I had)
September shows that the real rival isn't France, it's the old foe, Germany:
The teapot of tension hasn't boiled over yet as of January 1924:
Let's close things out with another war with Germany.
The first half of 1924 sees the US slip over the brink into war with Germany:
Look, it's been so long, and Germans make such good villains...
Especially when, as on June 17, I get to sink an entire class of their ships at once:
In August, the Germans decline to fight the blockade fleet, but they do torpedo one of my ships:
See also my new battlecruiser design. She's like the Flight II design, except that I actually remembered to set the armor scheme to the right type for AoN, and then used the tonnage to up her deck protection and give her 14" guns.
August 30 sees a German force led by a battlecruiser attempting to harass local shipping off the Northeast. They sink a destroyer off the coast of Connecticut, the BC evading two attempts at torpedo attacks, but they utterly fail to hit any actual merchant ships.
It's still rather unnerving to the Merchant Marine.
Just under a month later, on September 29, the US Navy raids Emden, sinking a minesweeper and a transport and battering a 12" gun battery and a light cruiser:
October sees the US proving superior at submarine warfare:
It also sees (not shown) a botched night raid in the Baltic. The USS Rainbow took a torpedo very quickly, and took on a lot of water - but not enough to sink it. Though ultimately only moderately damaged, she was in no shape to take on the Germans.
November sees the Germans lose a light cruiser:
It also sees (not shown) a Flight IV Lesbifriends-class, the USS Gertrude Stein, armed with ten 13" guns, laid down.
Here's the situation at the end of the year:
My budget is over a billion dollars. I'm one BC order away from having more tonnage afloat and under construction than Britain.
VICTORY!
In March, German raiders suffer ignominious defeats:
The USS Hot drove off a cruiser over twice her size. That's impressive.
On April 22, 1925, the American and German scouting forces of the main battle fleets encounter each other in the evening:
Germany loses her oldest battlecruiser, SMS Moltke, with a mere four heavy guns, to a lot of torpedoes. A capital ship kill is a capital ship kill, but it doesn't award me any prestige this time.
The Germans have a good month in June.
Good for them, because they've already lost Angola, so they need something to keep their spirits up.
August 11, 1925 sees an action in the North Sea: USS Unanticipated, ranging ahead of my battlecruisers, encountered and got battered by German battlecruisers; since mine were outnumbered, and since it was getting close to dark, I turned away before they could get into range of my BCs. The task force ran into an armed merchant cruiser in the night near Heligoland, rolling it with contemptuous ease.
September shows the US submarine force's superiority:
October 25, 1925 is another triumphant day for the US Navy, though it perhaps could've been an even greater success:
The eight-gun destroyers proved pretty valuable, seriously damaging German light forces attempting to intercept my flotilla attack... but the German BC was lost to a flash fire. I could have probably taken out the other BC, but instead I pulled out, having already won and not wanting to risk German coastal artillery.
In November, I get a new technical advance:
It's funny, in this game, I keep finding that I don't get intermediate steps like 3 centerline turrets, Torpedo Protection II, or twin torpedo mounts, but am instead always skipping ahead.
December sees a humiliating loss for the German navy:
December is also the end of the game. And while I could've played on after, I decided not to.
With that, I conclude my first Let's Play.
LOL at the end of the game signalling the beginning of aircraft carriers being a thing. That's amusingly symbolic. Congratulations on finishing your LP (indeed, I think you're the first person to get to the end of one!).
This time, the Lesbifriends and the USS Mako got the better of the exchange with the French dreadnought Friedland, but evening fell before they could put her away. So instead, it was time to send in the destroyers. I lost two in the attack ... but put at least three torpedoes into Friedland.
