Air Warfare

[DarkCloud]

By Sidgames' DLT-

quote: 1. All air units (discounting missiles) must land at the end of turn. 2. They can land only on certain areas (air strips, cities, etc.) 3. Upon landing, they provide an (to borrow) "umbrella" of influence. 4. This umbrella denotes the range of the air unit. 5. BOMB RUNS: Air units when LEFT AS THEY ARE deal damage to hostile surface units within their umbrella. They take damage if these units have anti-aircraft capabilities. 6. AIR COVER: Air units when SENTRIED provide anti-aircraft capabilities to friendly units within their umbrellas targetted by Bomb Runs. These air units take damage. 7. ESCORT: Air unites when FORTIFIED provide added defense for friendly air units doing Bomb Runs at tiles within their umbrella. This is represented by added damage to any hostile units providing air cover, as well as taking a portion of the damage dealt by hostile anti-aircraft units that were meant for the units doing the Bomb Run. 8. Air units should have at least 2 capabilities: Anti-Aircraft and Bombing. A unit with strong Anti-Aircraft capability provides good Air Cover and Escort. A unit with strong Bombing capability provides good Bomb Runs.

By Krikkit One-

quote: I agree that air combat in civ is totally wrong, It should be treated as an artillery type attack. Here is how I think they air units should operate. 1. Air units can move as far as they want in a turn as long as they refuel every X spaces. Missile units should move like land units, on launchers. 2. To attack, a group of air/missile units are given the attack command like a paratrooper, X/2 spaces away from their base. 3. To defend, the fighter units based in cities either help defend against attacks on that city or attacks within X/2 spaces of the city (depending on their setting (fortified or "sentried")) 4. Air units would Have to be grouped so that fighter-bomber groups could be used to invade (the fighters protect the bombers from defending fighters) 5. Also, for missile/bomber type units that are attacked, the option should exist for retaliatory strike instead of defense (MAD idea)

By Timothy-

quote: How about having squadrons or groups of aircraft function as some sort of umbrella. If they have a lot of airpower, the umbrella extens up to the maximum range. If the group has a lot of mudmovers, enemy units under the umbrella suffer more damage per turn, or frienly units get a bigger bonus in ground attacts.. I think that one must make a clear difference between all the aspects of air-combat. 3 aspects come to mind: 1 Air control. Shooting down other aircraft, be they fighters or bombers, and escorting one's own bombers. 2 Tactical bombing. Ground forces are supported by medium bombers or mudmovers. Tactical bombers are probably not as vunderable to lack of good aircover than strategic bombers. 3 Strategic bombing. Bombing enemy cities, factories or transport lines. This probably requires direct player control, while the other aspects require only stationing of aircraft. I can be somewhat more specific about the "umbrella" aproach. Fighters, strategic and tactical bombers each make their own umbrella's. These umbrella's perform seperately from eachother. Off course, fighters still need to protect the bombers, so the fighterumbrella should cover the theatres of operations of the bombers quite well. Another important aspect is the intensity. To put it simply, more fighters mean more enemy aircraft shot down and less bombers lost due to enemy fighters. The umbrella indicates where aircraft perform their missions, while intensity indicates how often and how well they do their missions. Intensity means strengh and a greater distance means less intensity. Final point/example. When building and managing fighters one has to look at 2 things. Fighting capability and range. The maximum range indicates the maximum size of the umbrella. So if no enemy fighters would impede our fighter, it could fly all the way to the edge of the umbrella to perform a mission. Fighting capability and numbers go hand in hand, together they make up for the intensity. Crap fighters don't shoot down other fighters well, however if you have loads of them, they might protect your bombers far enough to perform a mid range mission.

By freemen-

quote: I agree with the idea. The air combat must be redesign. I know. What bother me more then the air type unit( fighter and bomber) is that when you launch an attack against a ennemy city defend by phalanx, your bomber or your fighter take damage. It is more realist with conscript or marine becaus of the "anti-air" ability decerning by the modern warfare. But Phalanx. How they do to damage a plan flying at 40000 feet above the ground. I know that arrow could fly great distance but not 40000 feet. Even musketeer. Their lack of precision and range could not make them able to damage or destroy a group of bomber or fighter. The idea to assign specific ability to a type of aviation unit is good. But we couldnt assign specific ability to bomber and fighter. Fighter can carry mission that bomber do. Even if it is a fighter and not a fighter-bomber. The corean force as special squadron that are form to protect groud target and not assuming the escort to funit or anything like that. Those force are able to deploy within minute and protect strategic groud form the main groud assault. So, they are able to do the same mission as a bomber. Maybe we must make a new type of plane. The spyplane. Even from the beggining of aviation, the military use aircraft to gather information from their ennemy. In WWI, a fighter plane was used as spyplane. In WWII, fighter plane and even bomber were used to gather information. In the cold war, new way have appear but mainly, aircraft are still use to gather info about a specific area. Think about the U2. Is conception was in the 1960 and it is still used by the USAF and maybe in other countrie. But the U2 was used by the CIA to gather information about countries and people. So maybe, a modern type of spyplane could be add to act as a conventionnal spyplane or for economic war that could occur. Why destroying city, when u could destroy their economy. Less unhappy people and a good way to capture city

[Shogun Gunner]

Very interesting. These ideas all seem to introduce more of a tactical element to the air game. I like that. I always thought the fighters role was not well developed -- especially the escort role. Basically the fighter in Civ II is a weak bomber or air interdiction unit -- possibly spy plane also, but cruise missles are better for that.

Who can disagree with the aircraft attacking archers, musketeers, etc. These unit shouldn't be able to hurt airplanes. If anything, your airpower would be ineffective against these units at worst.

Excellent compilation.

[Tical_2000]

What if a lucky archer put an arrow right through your cockpit window and straight through your temple? You and your plane would surely go down.

[Shogun Gunner]

quote: Originally posted by Tical_2000 on 11-24-2000 04:54 PM What if a lucky archer put an arrow right through your cockpit window and straight through your temple? You and your plane would surely go down.

What like Rambo??? That's a good one!