Re: [FT] Crew Professionalism and Ship Quality (longish)

At 08:57 10/01/00 +1000, you wrote:
>G'day guys,
>
>OK any chance of me getting an html version of the survey up in the
very
>near future are rapidly approaching zero (eventually, maybe as a
general
>curosity thing on the web, but not any time soon), so we're going to
have
>to live with the ditsy one I posted before. So here's your opportunity
to
>tell me what you think of the various nations, even if you don't like
the
>idea of incorporating it in the game tell me anyway, it'd be fun to
know
>and you can get a warm cuddly feeling that you helped me out (cos so
far
>I've only got 5 people's responses/opinions and that's a pretty small
>sample size) ;)
>
>Thanks
>
>Beth

Gday Beth,
	I've been offline for a week or more so forgive me if some of
this is
repedative, here are my thoughts on what you are asking. I've thought
about
your levels in terms of percentage of each fleet that would fall into
each
level.

Crew Quality.
	You can really see this as being the ability of the crew to make
the most
of their vessel and keep it running under battle conditions. This is
mainly
a function of training (its realism, its frequency etc) but is also
effected by the general education level of the crew (we are talking
about a
very technical piece of equipment after all) and their professionalism
and
length of service. Short term conscripts are not going to have the time
to
aquire those skills. Elite crews are likely to have had combat
experience.

Level 5: 20% NAC fleet, 10% NSL, 7-8% FSE (language problems), FCT
30-40%,
10% UNSC, 30-40% NI (a portion are conscripts but constantly recalled
and
retrained regularly), 2-3% OU, RH, Jap, Swiss, 3-4 "Banner" ships ESU 
Note: Most of these crews would serve in small vessels which tend to see
more action than the larger fleet units.

Level 4: 30% NAC, 30-40% NSL, 30% FSE (conscription keeping it down),
60-70% NI, FCT, 20-30% UNSC, 20-25% OU,RH, JAP, Swiss, 10% PAU, IF,
LLAR,
KNG, ESU (mostly large fleet units)

Level 3: Rest of NAC, NSL, FSE, UNSC, OU, RH, Jap, Swiss, KNG, 30% PAU,
IF,
LLAR, ESU

Level 2: 50% PAU,ESU,IF, LLAR possibly the odd FSE ship

Level 1: Rest of PAU, ESU,IF,LLAR

Professionalism. Crew.
	The main thing	that is likely to effect overall professionalism
is reason
for being in the service. Volenteers are going to take the whole thing
much
more stoically than conscripts who are thinking that they never wanted
to
be here in the first place. This all ties in with basic morale as well.
Crews with high morale tend to be more professional but also the more
professional crews keep their morale longer. Level 5 crews would be
highly
motivated and trained crews with a record of combat success, level 1's
would have been conscripted at gun point.

Level 5: 5-10% NSL, 5-7% NAC, 5% FSE, 20-25% NI (never again), 0% FCT
(profession of arms, whats that? go and salute yourself Sir), 2-3% OU,
Jap,
Swiss, KNG and UNSC (we do things other than fight)

Level 4: 45-50% NAC, 40% NSL, NI,UNSC,OU, Jap, Swiss,KNG, 30% FSE, FCT,
5%
ESU,RH,PAU 

Level 3: Rest of NAC,NSL,OU, NI,FCT,Jap,Swiss,KNG,UNSC, 45% FSE, 25%
ESU,PAU,RH, 5% LLAR, IF

Level 2: Rest of FSE,RH, 50% ESU,PAU,LLAR,IF  

Level 1: rest of ESU,PAU, RH,LLAR,IF 

Professionalism. Officers.
	The thing to consider here is that the professionalism of the
officer corp
is not just about the appraoch of its members to the profession of arms
but
also how up to date they are in tactical and technical thinking about
their
profession. British cavalry officers at the start of WWII were very
profeesional if we just consider "soldiering" but hopelessly out of date
with tank tactics as Guderian was to show. Still even Guderian was
restrained by more senior officers who did not understand the type of
warfare he was waging, witness the famous "Stop" order. Therefore
professionalism would also drop off a bit with rank particularly in
those
nations were advancement is on things other than merit (corruption,
ideaology, patronage, religous devotion etc). For example if looking at
officers for NAC,NSL,OU and ESU

				Junoir Officer	Ship Captain	       
Flag Rank
NAC		Level 4 	40%			60%		
       40%
		Level 2 	10%			0		
       5% (out of touch)

NSL		Level 4 	50%			70%		
       50%
		Level 2 	0			0		
       5%

OU		Level 4 	40%			60-70%		
       40%
		level 2 	10%			5%		
       15%
(this last is based on my own experiences in the RAN and the influence
some
Admirals have on their sons careers)

ESU		Level 4 	35%			40%		
       5%
		Level 2 	25%			25%		
       40%

Leadership.
	Well this is an easy topic.(okay no more sarcasm) Military minds
have been
arguing over this snice the first armies were organised. Anyway my
thought
is that any nation will produce the same proportion of good and bad
leaders
as any other nation. The question then is are the bad leaders weeded out
or
does the system promote people on factors other than ability? Much the
same
ideas as I gave for officer professionalism would apply.

Ship Reliability.
	This is tricky. This is partly a result of the quality of the
ships
design, partly a result of ability of the crew to find a fix problems
and
parlty of the "train" services being able to stock and supply spare
parts.
There were some interesting rules for ship class proformance posted
quite
some time back. The second part can really be determined by crew
quality.
That leaves supply. Needless to say that the richer nations will far
much
better here. I did like the idea that someone posted that ESU are only
3/4
as effective as NAC but should be cheaper. the missing 1/4 being the
time
the ship spends in dry/space dock having minor repairs done. I'm going
to
leave this one to you.

Oppotunism.
	I really don't think you can quantify this in any meaningful
way. After
all the ability to make the most of every oppotunity in battle is the
result of the interplay of crew and officer quality, morale, motivation
and even ship reliabilty (this is want we want to do but can the ship do
it?) Really all these other factors that you have asked about determine
this one. If you come up with rules to simulate the other factors then
you
will have already dealt with this one.

Anyway I hope that some of this might be useful.

Wilko.