martin wrote:Is naval nuking really that useful? surely as soon as the enemy launches a single nuke, and nothing else you can guess it's probably a naval nuke and move your fleets about a bit?
Very useful when you understand the two main reasons/times to use it.
1. Psychological: You force the enemy fleet to become reactive instead of proactive, defensive instead of offensive, you can scatter his forces (panic) and break his lines, and you might just make yourself appear stronger than you are in certain areas.
2. Actual fleet damage: You might just actually hit some ships, like subs that just surfaced. This is especially the case in tight quarters where you can move an enemy into a choke point.
Combine the two like so...
Enemy is moving south by Iceland, you throw in a few nukes ahead of him in a first wave so he begins to move back. "Oh noes! Retreat!!!" While he's retreating, you then have a second wave ready to nuke his ships now clustered together in the panic with almost nowhere to go for a few moments.
Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast...