Air Mission Add Specific Targets - Please

[caj]

Johan,
I love the game but the Air Missions need to have a second choice added besides attack an area province or region. Please add a choice to allow an Air unit or group to attack a specific province. IRL - the pilots were given a mission to bomb a specific factory or target and not fly all around the region lookng for strategic or tactical targets. Air Superiority would work well with the Area Missions but Tactical or Strategic should be able to go area or specific.

Cheers
CJ

 

[unmerged(5023)]

I've backed off this thread also because of the condescending tone, but
wanted to comment on this:

Try launching the aircraft one hour after combat begins in Kristansand and see if that helps..

Maybe I'm way off base here...but if we're sitting around finding ways to get
the AI to do what we wanted it to do -- like "bomb an hour AFTER the fight
starts to get the planes to go where you want them to go"...why the hell
don't we just let the players send them where they want in the first place, *without* the gamey manipulation of the AI like that?

Either way with this system, the game is damned...when someone first buys
the game, they're not going to have read your "use of air power FAQ"; they
are going to try and use their planes intuitively, and will most likely end up
annoyed at their results; then they may find the forum and faq's, and find
ways to try and manipulate the plane-system to succeed in doing what the
current system supposedly doesn't allow - actually target your planes
successfully...they'll try the supposed-magic-cookie of "send the planes in
an hour after...", which might work (unless they have two key attacks going
on in the same area at the same time, and would want 1/2 the planes to
go to each)....or they may try basing the planes such that there is only one
sector in the given target-area, that is within their range...at which point
they will find the bug that planes can exceed their range thru an area if they
can reach just one sector in it...

At some point, they will either successfully (relatively?) find a way to
manipulate the plane-system to make it target where they want -- and then
wonder why, if the code can be manipulated to get the desired results, why
it just doesn't let you do it directly in the first place....or they'll end up
frustrated and not use air power very much, and enjoy the game less.

Sometimes the AI will "shift fire" on stationary units and avoid units they've already hit. .

In my current game (as US), I'm fighting against Columbia..drove their last
units back into the jungle south of their "star" provs...one sector has an
inf that is 93/0 strength/org...an allied TAC bomber came to help at that
point; it's been bombing that same inf for about a year and a half now; and
the inf (which has no way to regen anymore) is still at 93/0, and the plane
still bombs it every day...it's like a bad version of the movie "Groundhog Day"
or something. I guess the key word there was "sometimes".

You can also try to give the order by R-CLICKing on Kirstansand (not CTRL + R-CLICK) and giving the order that way. That sometimes (but not always) sends them to the right place, at least for the first sortie.
That is the best way to work around the problems with AI targeting. If you want close air support, have them launch an hour after combat is engaged and they should, usually, support the active combat.

And again I'll ask -- if we're going to find ways AROUND the problem, to make
it do what we want; why have the problem? Just let the player do what they
want, and the game will be more enjoyable and less "gamey".

 

[mld0806]

And again I'll ask -- if we're going to find ways AROUND the problem, to make
it do what we want; why have the problem? Just let the player do what they
want, and the game will be more enjoyable and less "gamey".

Actually, this one is mentioned in the manual.

And the problems we're working with aren't problems with the system OR the targeting AI, per se, but the reevaluation period of the AI. If you're already flying, your battle may be started and ended before the AI has a chance to reevaluate (most reevaluation in the game is done at midnight, and I'd assume that's where the AI reevaluates air targeting as well).

 

[unmerged(5023)]

Actually, this one is mentioned in the manual.
And the problems we're working with aren't problems with the system OR the targeting AI, per se, but the reevaluation period of the AI. If you're already flying, your battle may be started and ended before the AI has a chance to reevaluate (most reevaluation in the game is done at midnight, and I'd assume that's where the AI reevaluates air targeting as well).

Regardless, the question still remains; if we're going to find ways to "fix" or
circumvent the inability to target specific provences by doing things like
setting the missions an hour *after* combat starts, or by how we click to set
them, WHY have the game not allow us to just do what we want in the first
place without such gameyness?

 

[barleyman]

And again I'll ask -- if we're going to find ways AROUND the problem, to make
it do what we want; why have the problem? Just let the player do what they
want, and the game will be more enjoyable and less "gamey".

Well, I for one found the way things worked a huge PITA in HOI. So much in fact that my air farce was being utilized maybe 20% of the time when I wanted to crack a tough nut and went to the trouble of reassigning everyone. Most of the time the planes were just hitting empty provinces.. And interception? Ooh.. Yuck.

However, considering how badly the targeting AI is FUBARed, how the planes can space-warp to sea-provinces 500km beyond their range so Aregorn has raped NAVs into uselessness to stop major exploit, how the engine will not reset air missions expect on reload, how every bloody bomber in UK wants to target the SAME HQ unit making force-concentrating my interceptors a piece of cake, how the stupid planes will not break off at nightfall (WAD? Well design it better!), ...

Much could be remedied by making air units sort of "area effect" instead of treating 100 planes as a single "unit" which can only exist in 1 province at 1 time. Maybe in the later parts of the war during the strategic bombing campaign things actually worked like that. Oh and how fighters/interceptors ever only seem to cause "org" damage while only FLAK seems to cause actual loss of planes.

Another way to remedy things would be to give separate rules to CAS and TAC.

 

[barleyman]

If you're already flying, your battle may be started and ended before the AI has a chance to reevaluate (most reevaluation in the game is done at midnight, and I'd assume that's where the AI reevaluates air targeting as well).

I'm sure the game engine would just keel right over if the air missions were evaluated every time the planes are taking off.

And if you witness the vindictiveness of AI on reload, not a lot of re-evaluation happens without restart.

 

[unmerged(5023)]

Well, I for one found the way things worked a huge PITA in HOI. So much in fact that my air farce was being utilized maybe 20% of the time when I wanted to crack a tough nut and went to the trouble of reassigning everyone. Most of the time the planes were just hitting empty provinces.. And interception? Ooh.. Yuck. .

I hear ya...I just don't see why there is such resistance to the obvious on
this subject...some people say air units are "too uber", but then they point
out that air stacks are essentially useless against big ground stacks...others
point out that planes shouldn't be able to be targeted against a single
provence (even though carrier planes already can), but then they come up
with approaches/FAQ's on how to best get your planes to be able to do just
that -- hit when/where you want them to. Its the "nature of the beast", if
you modify a game to make a given task harder but still somewhat possible,
people will micromanage and find ways to get the game to do what they
wanted...this forced "area" thing just encourages people to be "gamey" with
it...the area-attack is a great option to give the player, but don't force it.
Scale plane power to make them fit within the game. And for those who
think the forced-area-attack-only thing is a GoodThing, look at your own
efforts to better control where/when your planes hit as proof to the
contrary.

 

[barleyman]

In a perfect world you would have a "call for air support" button/tick box/whatever in the combat screen.

And air units DEFINITELY should be bombing your guys by mistake, same as ships. Oh, and there should be a sliding stack penalty/bonus. in a target rich environment the CAS should become more, not less effective! Maybe give a big stacking penalty to land units air defence?

 

[unmerged(46319)]

air targets

Johan,
I love the game but the Air Missions need to have a second choice added besides attack an area province or region. Please add a choice to allow an Air unit or group to attack a specific province. IRL - the pilots were given a mission to bomb a specific factory or target and not fly all around the region lookng for strategic or tactical targets. Air Superiority would work well with the Area Missions but Tactical or Strategic should be able to go area or specific.

Cheers
CJ

or when you select a region you can select a province that is prefered and maybe every third run it will hit there depending on conditions.

 

[unmerged(46319)]

If you fail to address my points or make an actual counter argument I can only repeat myself in the hopes you'll actually respond to them



Again you spam out endless quotes without actually providing any analysis or an opposing argument.

Why should Paradox model carpet bombing in game when it was only used once, and hit friend and foe alike?

What about the Eisenhower quote isn't modelled?

strategic bombardment was ineffective in the war. I enjuy the lenel that paradocs has put it at. doog work !!! keep it up

 

[Mik1984]

I'm happy that there were threads dissussing what I' ve said before I joined this forum. What I think on the subject is posted here.

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?t=208382