Jutland Tutorial:  Commanding in Battle

By Bullethead

Purpose:

            This tutorial is intended to familiarize players to the interface and some of the various methods for giving orders to their units during battles.  While the interface is in general rather similar to that of Distant Guns:  The Russo-Japanese War at Sea^TM, there are numerous changes and new features in Distant Guns II:  Jutland^TM.  Thus, even experienced RJW players will find this tutorial useful.

            This tutorial assumes that you have either played the RJW game or have at least skimmed through the Jutland manual and are vaguely familiar with most of the basic features of the interface.  Therefore, this tutorial will not rehash the manual, but will show you how some of the interface features actually work.

1.  The Basics

            The focus of the Distant Guns games is to put you in the role of senior naval officers, from the captain of a single ship to the overall fleet admiral.  This means that you are limited to deciding where your ships go, how fast they travel, and what they shoot at.  Your AI crews handle all the details of actually aiming and firing the weapons, performing damage control, taking emergency evasive action, etc.  Your job is to put them in the best position to perform these tasks, by maneuvering your forces to advantageous positions relative to the enemy and by selecting the best targets for your weapons.  This tutorial, therefore, will focus on these two tasks.

2.  Units

            For command purposes, there are three types of units in Jutland:  single ships, divisions, and your whole fleet (task force).  This tutorial will focus on commanding divisions.

A.  Divisions

Divisions are the basic maneuver element and contain from two to twenty ships.  In the 3D world, the division leader will have a flag in its name label while the subordinate ships do not.  Ships within a division will follow their leaders and attempt to remain in formation (see below) with the rest of their division.  Turning and speed change orders given to any one ship in a division will apply to all ships in the division, so for maneuver purposes it does not matter which ship you select.  Therefore, during play, you will give the vast majority of your maneuver orders by selecting a ship within a division, which will maneuver the entire division.

You can add ships to and remove ships from divisions during play via the “Form New Division” command.  You can also make one division follow another with the “Guide on Other Division” command.  See the manual for more details.

Fig. 1:  A division of four ships, all of them selected.

B.  Single Ships.

Single ships are not part of a division and are not in formation with other ships.  They are maneuvered exactly like divisions, but of course the orders only apply to the individual ship.  Because each single ship requires its own orders, it’s best to keep as many of your ships as possible in divisions, to reduce the amount of micromanagement you have to do.

Single ships are treated as divisions for purposes of the “Guide on Other Division” command.  Thus, you can make a division or another single ship follow a single ship.  Single ships also have flags in their names.

Fig 2:  A single ship. 

C.  Task Force

For command purposes, “Task Force” means every ship you have in the battle, whether in a division or not.  Thus, selecting “Task Force” means that your orders apply to all of your ships.  As such, having the whole “Task Force” selected is only really useful for a few global commands, such as fleet-wide speed changes or Cease Fire/Target Nearest Ship.

3.  Division Formations

            The ships within a division can assume two basic types of formation:  line astern (all ships in single file behind the leader) and line of bearing (all ships strung out along a line at an arbitrary angle from the leader).

A.  Line Astern

In most cases, divisions will begin battles in line astern.  This is the easiest formation to maintain through maneuvers.  To remain in line astern, divisions can only turn in succession (see below).

Refer to Figure 1 above.  That division is in line astern formation.

B.  Line of Bearing

If a division executes a simultaneous turn (see below), it switches to a line of bearing formation.  You can make this at any angle desired, from a slight echelon, to line abreast, even to line ahead.  Regardless of the angle, the division lead ship remains the same, even if it ends up being the furthest to the rear.  While in line of bearing, all ships in the division are still considered in formation, so maneuver commands given to one of them still affect all of them.  This is a change from the RJW, where divisions were only in formation if they were in line astern.

Line of bearing formation can be used to prevent the smoke of leading ships from interfering with following ships, as shown below.

Fig. 3:  Two divisions in line of bearing formation.

4.  Maneuvering

            Units are capable of two basic maneuvers:  turning and changing speed.  For single ships, turning is simply right or left.  Referring to Figure 2 above, you see that the maneuver orders fly-out has only a single button for a single ship.  Because divisions contain multiple ships, however, turning for them has two subtypes:  having one ship turn at a time (Turn in Succession), or having all ships in the division turn at once (Turn Immediately).

A.  Turn in Succession

Turn in succession is used by divisions that are in line astern formation or in line of bearing that’s very close to being line astern.  The lead ship turns, then the second ship turns when it reaches approximately the point where the lead ship turned, and so on.  After all ships have made the turn, the division will be in a line astern formation.

B.  Turn Immediately

Immediate turns mean that each ship in the division turns at the same time.  If the division was previously in line astern, this puts it into a line of bearing.  If the division was already in a line of bearing, this changes the angle of the line.

Fig. 4:  A division being ordered to Turn Immediately.

C.  Turn Immediately and Reform

This makes all ships in the division turn at once, but instead of staying in the resulting line of bearing, the ships then maneuver individually to form a line astern formation.  However, they form up behind the ship that is closest to the head of the pack after making the initial turn, and this ship becomes the new leader of the division.

D.  Changing Speed

The important thing to remember about speed changes is that the ships of a division might have different maximum speeds, due to design, weather conditions, or damage.  Thus, it’s possible to order the faster ships to run away from the slower ships, which spreads the division out and hampers your control over it.  It’s usually better either to restrict the division’s speed to that of the slowest ship, or remove the slower ship(s) from the division to allow the others to go faster.

E.  Waypoints

New in Jutland, divisions (and single ships) can be given multiple waypoints.  The primary use for this is to plot multiple turns in advance, which prevents you from having to micromanage the division’s maneuvers as much as in the RJW.  To set waypoints, first enter the Course Change menu as normal.  When the yellow arrow appears, move the cursor to where you want the division to make its first turn, and hit the “W” key.  Then move the cursor to where you want the second turn, and hit the “W” key again.  The yellow arrow will go to the first waypoint, and then bend there towards the second, and so on until you run out of waypoints.

Note that you can also use the waypoint system to make delayed turns.  Without waypoints, turns always begin at the current position of the selected unit.  However, if you stretch the yellow arrow out directly in front of the unit and hit the “W” key, you can make the unit go straight ahead until it reaches that waypoint.

Once you enter all the waypoints you want for the time being, select one of the turn types from the fly-out menu.  At present, all waypoint turns will thus be of the same type, either in succession or simultaneously.  In the future, perhaps you’ll be able to use different types of turns at each waypoint, but no promises.

Fig. 5:  A division with multiple waypoints plotted.

F.  Using the Map Display to Maneuver

New in Jutland, you can use the 2D map display to give orders to your forces.  In fact, it’s possible to play the entire battle while just looking at the map, although then you’ll miss all the eye candy.

To give orders on the map, hit the “M” key once or twice until the map expands to fill most of your screen.  Now move the cursor over the map and note how it turns opaque.  At this point, you can use the cursor on the map exactly like you can in the 3D world.  Click on units to select them and bring up the orders menu fly-outs as normal.  When plotting turns, you can see the yellow path arrow on the map display, move it around as if you were looking at the water in the 3D world, and enter waypoints.

Note that all orders are now available on the map view.  You can give targeting orders or have divisions guide on others, for example.  However, when dealing with single ships or divisions, you’ll probably want to zoom in.  When you zoom, the map recenters at the camera’s location, which at long range can put some of the stuff you want to see off the edge of the map.  Thus, it’s a good idea to move the camera to the center of the area you want to zoom in on before you zoom.  Also note that rolling the mouse wheel will now zoom the map.

Refer to Figure 6 on the next page for an example of using the map to give maneuver orders.

Fig. 6:  A division being given a waypoint path using the map.

5.  Firing Orders

            As a senior officer, your job is to give the order to commence or cease firing, and to select targets.  Your AI gunners determine whether or not you hit anything.  This section describes how you give these orders, as well as some other helpful hints.

A.  Separate Orders for Guns and Torpedoes

New in Jutland, players now have the same degree of control over torpedo tubes as they had over guns in the RJW.  This means that players can have ships hold fire with torpedoes while firing their guns, or vice versa, and can select separate targets for guns and torpedoes.  Note, however, that neither weapons system will fire unless you tell it to.  This means that you want to fire both, you have to give orders to both.  Torpedoes will not fire if you only give gun orders, and vice versa. 

Both guns and torpedoes have the same orders:  Target Free, Target Nearest Leader, and Target Ship.  All of them are on the same targeting fly-out menu.  Those for torpedo tubes are indicated as such.  Those that don’t say “Torpedo” are for guns.  Refer to Figure 7 below to see all the fire orders buttons.

B.  Automatic Distribution of Fire

At ranges above about 5km, gun directors are almost required for hitting the target with any kind of regularity.  However, if more than two ships are firing at the same target, the gun directors are rendered almost useless.  Therefore, at these ranges, you should try hard to limit the number of ships firing at one target to two or less.  You can do this the old-fashioned way, by giving each of your ships individual Target Ship orders, but that can be a lot of micromanagement in large battles.  Thus, in Jutland, there’s a way to have your ships automatically spread their fire out among multiple targets to prevent this overconcentration.

Obviously, automatic distribution of fire can only work at the division level.  If you’re dealing with a single ship, there are no other ships to distribute.  To use automated distribution of fire, first select the entire division, then give the “Target Free” order.  This will result in targets being assigned to each ship in the division in such a way as to prevent more than two ships firing on the same target.  Each ship might not always fire at the target you would have given it had you assigned each ship a target manually, but divisions in real life often made similar mistakes.  Consider this part of the realism, and remember that in this case, you’re acting as the division commander, so you in real life you could not specify targets for each of your ships.

Note that, because of the need to distribute fire at long range, the “Target Nearest Leader” order is only useful at short ranges.  It’s actually counterproductive at long range.

Refer to Figure 7 on the next page for an example of using automatic distribution of fire.

Fig. 7:  A division using automatic distribution of fire.  The entire division is selected and is given the Target Free order.

C.  Opportunity Fire

At night or in poor weather, often only a few of your ships can see targets at one time.  However, you want your other ships to open fire as soon as they see the enemy.  To do this, give your ships the “Target Free” order (for both guns and torpedoes, if desired).  When the enemy appears, they’ll immediately open fire.

6.  Notes on Torpedoes

            In WW1, torpedo performance was an order of magnitude better than it had been in the RJW, nearly equal to WW2 in terms of speed and range.  Most torpedoes also had two different settings, one for high speed and short range, and another for slower speed and longer range.  Generally speaking, these settings averaged about 40-45 knots out to about 4-5km, or about 30-35 knots out to about 8-10km.  In Jutland, your AI torpedomen decide which setting to use, based on the conditions, but most of the time they’ll use the long-range/slow-speed setting in daylight and the short-range/high-speed setting at night.  Sometimes, to hedge their bets, they’ll fire two torpedoes, one with each setting.

            Maneuvering your ships into a good torpedo launch position in Jutland is therefore a bit more difficult than in the RJW.  Instead of just getting close to the target, you’ll have to lead it and maneuver so that the expected point of impact is within both the torpedo’s range and its arc of fire.  Maneuvering your forces into this position relative to the target requires having a mental picture of the firing solution.  You have to think in terms of triangles, with the vertices being the positions of your ship and the target at the time of launch, and the position of the impact point.  The lengths of the sides are proportional to the speeds of the torpedo and the target.

            To make this work, I use the following rules of thumb.  For the long-range/slow-speed setting (day), I assume the torpedo moves about the same speed as the target.  This means I’m picturing an isosceles triangle, which puts my ideal launch point about forty-five degrees off the target’s bow.  For the high-speed/short-range setting (night), I assume the torpedo is about twice as fast as the target.  This makes me picture a 30-60-90 triangle, so that the ideal launch position is about sixty degrees off the target’s bow.

            Remember, however, that the expected impact point must be within the arc of fire of the torpedo tube, because the torpedo has to be fired towards the impact point.  Thus, not only do you have to position your ship at the correct range and bearing from the target, but you must also turn your ship so that the tubes bear on the impact point.  At longer ranges, this often results in your ship pointing either parallel with or on a diverging course from the target, instead of having the target on your broadside.

7.  Notes on Fire Control (Aiming) Systems

            In Jutland, individual weapons have one of three different types of fire control systems (aiming systems):  director, central, and local.  You can see this on the Ship Information Screen when you mouse over individual weapons.  Director means WW1 state-of-the-art, with analog computers, averaged range-taking, controlled spotting, follow-the-pointer, the works.  Central means the best equipment available short of an actual director installation.  This is the same sort of equipment as used in the RJW, but improved by the passage of time.  Think if it as “director lite”.  Local means the guncrew uses the Mark 1 Mod 0 eyeball and open sights, without any outside help.

            Note that central and local aiming systems are not the same things as the central and local control in the RJW.  In the RJW, players could select targets for centrally controlled weapons, but not locally controlled weapons.  In Jutland, the player can select the target for the main and usually the secondary battery, even if they both have local aiming systems.

            Directors are more accurate than central aiming systems, but this difference only becomes really significant at ranges beyond about 10km.  Therefore, if you have directors and the enemy doesn’t, try to keep the range above 10km.  At 5km and less, there’s no advantage to using directors so ships with directors switch to central aiming, for reasons that will become clear below.  The local aiming system only begins to be effective within about 5km and only becomes really accurate at 2km or less.  But at that range, all aiming systems are more or less the same.

            When ships are using director and central aiming systems beyond 5km, their rate of fire slows to allow salvo spotting.  Thus, rate of fire at long range is a function of shell time of flight, which is a function of the range.  Ships using directors fire one gun per turret per salvo, while ships using central fire all guns at once.  Salvos from director-equipped ships are considerably tighter than for those without.

            Not all directors are created equal.  Over the long haul, there’s very little difference in accuracy between German and British directors.  However, the Germans are more likely to find the range first, thanks to their ladder firing, so have a chance to inflict some damage before being hit in return.  Some British ships are also less accurate than the norm, notably their battlecruisers (except Queen Mary) and their battleships with the foretop abaft the fore funnel (Dreadnought, the Colossi, and the Orions).

            Besides their initial accuracy, the Germans have other fire control advantages.  All their director-equipped capital ships also have directors for their secondary batteries.  In addition, all of their newer light cruisers have directors, while no British light cruiser does until the appearance of “Tyrwhitt’s Dreadnoughts”.  These latter effects make it more difficult for the British to conduct daylight torpedo attacks.

8.  Advanced Critical Hit Settings

            At the top of the Simulation Control options menu, there are two settings for Advanced Critical Hits.  One of these toggles the propensity for the British to suffer magazine explosions and the other toggles the propensity for British shells to break up on impact instead of penetrate.  These options have a very significant effect on game balance.

            If you want historical accuracy, turn both settings ON.

            If you want to play balanced multi-player scenarios where the issue is decided over the long run, without British ships exploding and skewing the balance, turn the magazine explosion setting OFF but leave the fragile AP setting ON.

            If you want to see what would have happened at Jutland if the British had possessed Greenboy shells in 1916, turn the fragile AP setting OFF, but leave the magazine explosions ON.

            If you want to make battles practically unwinnable for the Germans, turn both settings OFF.  Here, the larger number of bigger British guns will quickly smash the Germans, without the Germans being able to even the odds by quickly disposing of British ships.