Things need to be done in air combat

Absolutely, the air problems need to be adressed, the current air system is still SERIOUSLY flawed and changes are necessary!

1)

A airfield must be changed to a carrier like building, with a limited number of planes that are allowed to land or patrol from it. I think the number of planes on level 1 airfield must be between 10 and 20. On a level 2 airbase can be stored the double of planes form level 1 and on level 3 the double from level 2.

A damaged airfield have effect to the maximum of planes that can be positioned on it. (at 50% = half capacity)

Good suggestion, though there is a problem when air bases are damaged and planes are operating from it. I would suggest this check (maximum basing) should ONLY be done when an attempt is made to change bases to the air port, and NOT continuously. Yes, that means, you can keep operating planes from a damaged air base if you flew them there before the damage to the air base.

2)

Rise the time for dealing damage on patrol from now 15 minutes to 60 minutes, like all other units have in CoW. (Why only planes have this special timer?)

In future the flight option patrol is more to scouting or to protect land units. If you want to attack a unit you need to use the direct attack order.)

[maybe for all 24/7 hardcore game enable the 4x speed maps, than the patrol time is still be every 15 minutes]

Also a very good suggestion. The current design flaw / exploit as discussed in november is alleviated (though not solved!!! Grrr...)

[/quote]

3)

Make all planes that be part of a dogfight visible for the opponent. Sometimes enemy planes will not displayed if they patrol radius has only a small overlapping with the target that you try to attack, even they will not shown when you try to spot them before.

Good suggestion, do it!

4)

If planes on patrol and they airbase was destroyed or captured they have to flight to a new airfield in range immediately an there they need to refuel first.

Good suggestion, do it!

5)

If we did all this changes we have to do one thing for the planes. I think planes are to damageable for rockets, so I think we have to rise the hit points on ground from 5 to 10 points. If we rise the HP for planes we had also a chance to recapture a airfield with planes on it from a fast attacker.

Yes, this is a problem if refuelling occurs more often. But this would also apply to trucked planes because they were overrun by ground units? If so, I don't agree to that, any AC should be able to destroy trucked planes easily.

Furthermore, I would STILL support the change to air-to-air combat mechanics as discussed before. In my experience, the prevent-tick-exploit has become more serious, simply because more people are aware of it. Air combat is either simply unfair because newbs are unaware of it, or air combat can't be fought because both people are aware and capable players. This flaw is still on the edge of driving me away from the game; in fact the only reason to stay is the vague hope that Bytro will adress the issue at some point. The change to the mechanics which was first supported by Bytro, then later decided NOT to be implemented, should STILL be implemented, cause the current situation is hardly bearable!!!

Just change the number of air defending stacks on tic like I've suggested before and go from there. If you want to make planes weaker just knock 1 HP of all stats and continue if needed. I don't think changing a bunch of basic game mechanics at once is a good idea. Most people like planes, because they are powerful. To make them weaker reduce their power, range and speed.

@DxC: I think you suggestion is more complicate to implement for the devs. In witch way you choose witch stack is allowed to defend and who not? what about stacks from a third nation? What is happens if a new stack is arrived?

And what is with the other problems like i post in no. 3 or 4?

like it has to do already, it just goes through each stack in range. if there is a newone there it makes no difference.

for 3, it seems to make a special view range for planes under certain circumstances, i don't like it. I don't understand 4.

On number 5:

It would be nice, but what K. Rokossovski said does pertain. Aircraft moving from one place to another should not have many hit points. Maybe aircraft could have a special refueling status whereby they have 10hp as long as they remain refueling on the airfield?

To No. 4) Now we have the mechanics in this way, if planes on patrol they start from airfield A. If airfield A is captured or destroyed the planes will be associated to a other airfield in range but they still go one with their patrol. If no airfield is in range they will land in the old province with the destroyed or captured airfield.

This is a logical error in my eyes, I think they need to go first to the "new" airbase to refuel If this things done they can be send back to patrol, but not automatically.

I really like the proposals 1) and 4)!

1) and 4) would be enough to regulate the disproportionate dominance of tactical bombers. Additionally 2) would be too hard for them.

2) is more complex than it looks at first glance. Imagine someone lets several stacks of planes patrol with overlapping patrol circles. If that guy's online at least once per hour, it would be impossible to attack these (if he's not, the only way to attack would be to bring more patrolling stacks to the same spot and to use the "dog-fight exploit", which is not a desirable way air combat works, either). So 2) would not only make 5) required, but also these changes:

* Patrolling planes may no longer react on direct air-to-air attacks within their patrol circle - only on direct air-to-ground or air-to-sea attacks.

* Fix of the direct-air-to-air-attack-is-suicide-bug (see Air Battle Algorithm ???? 9 vs 4 Loses ???) would become obligatory.

So for fixing the "dogfight" problem (see Change back the dog fight mechanics), I would still tend to either remove patrolling for bombers completely (and to do the above changes), or to go for the suggestion by @Peter Mat (let's call it proposal 6) ) : Making the patrol tick synchronous to server time for all plane stacks. To avoid performance trouble on the server the moment the tick elapses, a different point of time might be chosen for each game (i.e. just let the tick clock start the moment the game round begins).

Bottom line is I suggest 1), 4) and 6).

Maybe if Devs have spare time also 5), but that's not important as long as 2) is not done.

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K.Rokossovski wrote:

[...] But this would also apply to trucked planes because they were overrun by ground units? If so, I don't agree to that, any AC should be able to destroy trucked planes easily.

So yes, I would let change 5) also apply to truck planes.

In the German part of this forum, it gave a other suggestion to reduce the influence from airstrikes in the game.

The idea is to give air attacks a minus point if they attack ground units in different terrains:

In wooden terrain -25%

In mountains -50%

In cities -25%

What should we do again monsterstacks of land units wich sneaked on your backdoor, while you fight two or more other player with 80+% of strikeforces?

Yes, airforces are strong, but without strong airforces it would be impossible to win alone against more then two enemies.

There is no need to make airforces useless toy. Little changes would be enough. may be 5%-10% more expensive and 10%-20% less range.

Xarus wrote:

In the German part of this forum, it gave a other suggestion to reduce the influence from airstrikes in the game.

The idea is to give air attacks a minus point if they attack ground units in different terrains:

In wooden terrain -25%

In mountains -50%

In cities -25%

On woods/hills, I don't think there should be a nerf to attack. Aircraft can attack wooded and hilly areas just fine, but spotting the targets you are looking for would be more tricky. So, instead of decreasing attack, how about reducing the patrol radius of any aircraft flying over the respective zone? It would logically make more sense.

Also ok with the city one.

push up

I would be more inclined to accept a lower chance modifier (RNG) of the air units doing damage. This would be applied in city, forest, and mountain terrain.

This would also open the possibility of a new Scout Plane with long range, but little to no attack value. When coupling a scout plane with tactical and fighters, the random modifier of doing damage is increased.

what.is.the.difference.between.attacking.and.patroling?

abdoler wrote:

what.is.the.difference.between.attacking.and.patroling?

A "patrolling attack," or simply a "patrol," is a form of air attack by which an aircraft unit (or wing of air units) patrols an identified circular area ("patrol radius") and attacks all ground, air and naval units and buildings within that area. Unlike the direct attack, a patrol attack delivers 25% of its offensive potential every 15 minutes (the "patrol ticker") and can remain on patrol indefinitely without refueling (with certain limitations). Within the unit command menu, the button with the circular arrow is used to designate the patrol area for an aircraft patrol mission.

Keep #3 as a feature--not a bug!

K.Rokossovski wrote:

3)

Make all planes that be part of a dogfight visible for the opponent. Sometimes enemy planes will not displayed if they patrol radius has only a small overlapping with the target that you try to attack, even they will not shown when you try to spot them before.

• Keep #3 as a feature--not a bug!

i would

1. When patrol rdius is changed, Planes need to refuel

2. Hitpoints of Airplanes in the air must be reduced. There is no reason why they have more then tanks.

3. Flaks need to be stronger of have more hitpoints and a attack and/or defense radius.

kurtvonstein wrote:

1. When patrol rdius is changed, Planes need to refuel

2. Hitpoints of Airplanes in the air must be reduced. There is no reason why they have more then tanks.

3. Flaks need to be stronger of have more hitpoints and a attack and/or defense radius.

1. That would definitely solve the current tic movement problem

2. Planes move very fast. imo the hit points reflect the fact that they are hard to hit. However, when you get lucky and hit them, they are somewhat fragile depending on what you hit them with. P51 Mustang 437 mph, ME 262 559 mph & F4U Corsair 446 mph. Try to hit those with a fixed mount gun in an emplacement. Not easy.

3. If a radius, it would need to be small given the map scale, I am not sure the radius circle would actually show up on the map. WWII AA was pretty much limited to what was overhead when shooting at aircraft.

sorry peter but you can not argue with realistic here. Because you cant kill ships with artilly for example..in real life ships are very carefull attacking a coastal fortress.

anyway i dont know if the hitpoinst reflect the difficulty to be hit...