Air warfare

[shri]

With good weather, an Air force should spell death for surface fleets, in bad weather Carriers will be sitting ducks for Battleships.
This somehow needs to be incorporated.

Several campaigns showcase Air Power on Navy- Bombing in Cretan campaign by Richthofen's VIII Korps, Channel Bombing in June-July 1940 by Luftwaffe, Cunningham's Forces destroying Italians at Tarantino, and of-course Nagano's Carriers at Pearl Harbor.

 

[Beagá]

Beaga, you haven't read the thread I started, otherwise you'd understand how it works. Set the air unit to ground support, and any of your ground units in range will get support. Want it more specific for HOI IV? Sure make it so that unit of Stukas only supports that army, or army group, or so on. I'm not saying the old games listed were perfect, but they had good ideas, and now is the chance for PI to take it and run with it to make it better.

If you want to have that unit of Stukas attack something of your choice to soften the enemy up, then send them on an interdiction mission and they'll hit whatever enemy you designated, other than that, keep them on ground support and they'll auto hit within range.

Fine but the issue still remains. If I as a player can set my air wings to focus on breakthroughs by focusing on 2 provinces while the AI, in the same situation will spread it over said 10 provinces of the front, then I as a player will have na advantage. Unless, as usual fantastic maluses lick stacking will have to be implemented, AGAIN, to compensate.

More important than doing a realistic system is doing a system the AI can use. I´m not really saying the system you mentioned is bad; just that any changes should Always have that in mind.

Also how TACs and CAS would work regarding stats and type of mission they excel at? Again with inverted values, or with CAS having more soft AND hard attack (as they should) but being more vulnerable to compensate?

 

[Daelyn75]

Fine but the issue still remains. If I as a player can set my air wings to focus on breakthroughs by focusing on 2 provinces while the AI, in the same situation will spread it over said 10 provinces of the front, then I as a player will have na advantage. Unless, as usual fantastic maluses lick stacking will have to be implemented, AGAIN, to compensate.

More important than doing a realistic system is doing a system the AI can use. I´m not really saying the system you mentioned is bad; just that any changes should Always have that in mind.

Also how TACs and CAS would work regarding stats and type of mission they excel at? Again with inverted values, or with CAS having more soft AND hard attack (as they should) but being more vulnerable to compensate?

I have no knowledge how the devs will throw the air warfare mechanics together for HOI IV. I can honestly say that I too am tired of the same old formula that never was realistic, and the AI never quite got it. Hopefully the new way will make it so the AI doesn't cheat, and the AI gets it quite easily.

 

[Gratch11]

One thing I wonder is that if I understand correctly the airplanes in the old games only had a couple of variables while the planes in HOI has so many more(but not using them all) how do you propose to handle this?

There has been a lot of complaining that HOI doesnt use the variables as it is. Like speed, ceiling armour etc

 

[Daelyn75]

One thing I wonder is that if I understand correctly the airplanes in the old games only had a couple of variables while the planes in HOI has so many more(but not using them all) how do you propose to handle this?

There has been a lot of complaining that HOI doesnt use the variables as it is. Like speed, ceiling armour etc

Not true actually. They had about the same amount of stats.

Maneuverability, Cannon, Speed, Range, Durability, as well as the hidden factor of their bombs. Each bomber or fighter-bomber when engaging ships displayed its bombs, torpedoes, or rockets - whatever was relevant.

 

[seattle]

I have no knowledge how the devs will throw the air warfare mechanics together for HOI IV. I can honestly say that I too am tired of the same old formula that never was realistic, and the AI never quite got it. Hopefully the new way will make it so the AI doesn't cheat, and the AI gets it quite easily.

Hence my proposal to abstract it as much as possible. The less control the player has over the air missions, the less advantage he will have over the a.i.
Simply give orders on a theatre level: air superiority here, bomb there, assign planes, done. There's really no need to be able/forced to control every single air, land and naval unit all over the world. No leader has that kind of control, not even Hitler. So why should we?

 

[Dalwin]

One bit of evidence supporting the idea that it will be more abstract than previous versions is the dev diary discussing land doctrines. The Americans' firepower doctrine gives land units a bonus based on having air superiority. It is pretty hard to say that any side really establishes superiority in an area in the system with air units running here and there conducting sorties.

I picture it something like this. Define air zones on the map. Players allocate interceptors or fighters to the air superiority battle in these zones. This reults in one side or the other having AS or it being contested (probably determined daily, but perhaps an aggregate over a longer time period). The AS status in turn determines how effective things like tactical support missions are and the attrition faced by those units.

Such a system would ultimately result in less micromanaging and be easier for the AI to handle. In my opinion, it would also yield a more realistic overall effect than previous versions of HOI have done.

We also know that they won't go too far in this abstraction because of the parts of their vision for production lines which have already been revealed.

 

[seattle]

One bit of evidence supporting the idea that it will be more abstract than previous versions is the dev diary discussing land doctrines. The Americans' firepower doctrine gives land units a bonus based on having air superiority. It is pretty hard to say that any side really establishes superiority in an area in the system with air units running here and there conducting sorties.

I picture it something like this. Define air zones on the map. Players allocate interceptors or fighters to the air superiority battle in these zones. This reults in one side or the other having AS or it being contested (probably determined daily, but perhaps an aggregate over a longer time period). The AS status in turn determines how effective things like tactical support missions are and the attrition faced by those units.

Such a system would ultimately result in less micromanaging and be easier for the AI to handle. In my opinion, it would also yield a more realistic overall effect than previous versions of HOI have done.

We also know that they won't go too far in this abstraction because of the parts of their vision for production lines which have already been revealed.

Oh yeah, wouldn't that be a dream!?! The same system is perfect for naval warfare as well.
The only reason we need the option to micromanage land warfare is encirlements really. You can perform strokes of genius in land warfare, not so much in air and naval. There's no "surround the hostile fleet and tear them apart"-manouver you could perform in any previous HoI-installment. Micro'ing air and navy doesn't increase depth, it's simply poor game design.

I didn't even notice the doctrine you mentioned. This does indeed raise the hope of an abstracted system. All your proposals sound just right. Hope they have the same idea.

 

[Sachaztan]

This. While I liked HoIs, the main problem I had with each game was that you could happily ignore airforce and navy and win. That's IMO extremely unrealistic. The problem as I see it is that HoI (by Paradox's own admission) is a war game. But war has at least three elements - the actual fighting, logistics and economy to support both. While the actual fighting is the most interesting bit of it, the other two are the most important parts of it. A great example of that is actually ACW - South had better generals, arguably better morale troops, but North had the logistics and economy to support the army. There are ways how to deal with it - either win quickly, or make the war unpalatable to the other side, both of which South tried and failed with.

Unfortunately, I doubt Paradox will spend much time on that, as both the logistic and economy would make the game much more boring to the vast audience. So we'll have an effectively fantasy world, so that we can get the outcomes that Germany was lucky to get most of the time - but it's likely to make for a game that's playable a bit more, unless one wants to play real what-if scenarios of USSR vs. USA (and West Europe)

Sure you can ignore the airforce and still win against the AI, but then again the AI is shit and you can do all kinds of silly stuff against it and prevail. But try ignoring the airforce in a MP game and you will get obliterated.

 

[Beagá]

Yeah. To say airforce was weak in hOI is bollocks. It was boring to use, not weak.

Oh yeah, wouldn't that be a dream!?! The same system is perfect for naval warfare as well.
The only reason we need the option to micromanage land warfare is encirlements really. You can perform strokes of genius in land warfare, not so much in air and naval. There's no "surround the hostile fleet and tear them apart"-manouver you could perform in any previous HoI-installment. Micro'ing air and navy doesn't increase depth, it's simply poor game design.

I didn't even notice the doctrine you mentioned. This does indeed raise the hope of an abstracted system. All your proposals sound just right. Hope they have the same idea.

That´s because by nature air war was Always one of attrition. You can´t "pull strokes of genius".

I´ll say again, the reason why I´m not very optimistic about the system above is that it will quickly make players lose interest in what´s happening if the only way to access damage is by report. It simply is more boring that watching a battle. It will be like ground warfare - all you care about is designing divisions and see the border expand. I can see many people think that is boring.

 

[Daelyn75]

Yeah. To say airforce was weak in hOI is bollocks. It was boring to use, not weak.



That´s because by nature air war was Always one of attrition. You can´t "pull strokes of genius".

I´ll say again, the reason why I´m not very optimistic about the system above is that it will quickly make players lose interest in what´s happening if the only way to access damage is by report. It simply is more boring that watching a battle. It will be like ground warfare - all you care about is designing divisions and see the border expand. I can see many people think that is boring.

Well ok, I'm not sure what system you are referring to. The old SSI games would display both sides air forces in that single air battle and then show losses, and I always found it one of the most exciting parts of the game, especially when there were many opposing aircraft, and not just some mop up by your side.

 

[Beagá]

Could you post a screenshot? I thought the game was only about sending orders and then showing the losses by report. Easier to use pictures than talking about it only.

 

[Daelyn75]

I had it on 3.5 diskettes from 1994. I no longer have ability to play those games anymore. I think you can download them for free now since the original creator, Gary Grisby allowed them to go free about ten years back. There is one company that used to mod the game and allowed free downloads of it. It's been ten years since I fooled around with all that, I don't even remember what the company was called anymore. No it's not pirating if you happen to run across it, though you may find some websites like GOG.com that might sell it for cheap.

You get the full results of the losses right when that particular air battle is complete, and then once the entire week long turn is finished you get a full tally of all losses sustained by both sides.

 

[PlacidDragon]

yeah, you are almost talking C-64 days now (ahh, good old memories).

I dont know how many hours i logged on "War in Russia" and "Pacific War", but the amount was very considerable

Also logged quite a lot of hours on "Gary Grigsby's War in the Pacific" from Matrix Games (probably the company you talked about ?).

 

[Daelyn75]

Yeah that's the name. Matrix Games. They modded Gary Grisby's Pacific war with his permission or something like that, and allowed it to be downloaded for free. Was still the best Pacific War Strategy game I've ever played.

 

[Dalwin]

Yeah. To say airforce was weak in hOI is bollocks. It was boring to use, not weak.



That´s because by nature air war was Always one of attrition. You can´t "pull strokes of genius".

I´ll say again, the reason why I´m not very optimistic about the system above is that it will quickly make players lose interest in what´s happening if the only way to access damage is by report. It simply is more boring that watching a battle. It will be like ground warfare - all you care about is designing divisions and see the border expand. I can see many people think that is boring.

It wouldn't have to be boring at all. Anything is better than having air units cruising all over the place conducting raids. Most of these didn't matter much and tended to clutter up the alerts.

Picture instead something with say an air war map showing who has superiority in various zones and perhaps even the degree of superiority. At that point, you decide where to commit your air assets.

Heck, even if your stukas just become something as simple as giving a percentage bonus to friendly attacks if they are deployed in areas where you have superiority. This would give you enough reason to care about the air war and try to do well in it, without making it ultimately a chore that was anything but fun.

 

[Alex_brunius]

I´ll say again, the reason why I´m not very optimistic about the system above is that it will quickly make players lose interest in what´s happening if the only way to access damage is by report. It simply is more boring that watching a battle.

Do you think that the HoI3 system where you either bomb unopposed, or order airplanes up and have the air-wing torn up within hours and back to spending 3 weeks in repair before fighting again is more fun?

 

[aruon]

yeah, you are almost talking C-64 days now (ahh, good old memories).

of what? the loading screen? :rofl:jk

 

[aruon]

Do you think that the HoI3 system where you either bomb unopposed, or order airplanes up and have the air-wing torn up within hours and back to spending 3 weeks in repair before fighting again is more fun?

it also doesn't help that the base organisation cut from just having a plane take off from an airfield is 50% from what I remember. when even 10% is kinda BS. and defeats the purpose because all your research is invested elsewhere. that's the main reason why i just never even bothered with air power in most playthroughs.

 

[PlacidDragon]

of what? the loading screen? :rofl:jk

hehe, not exactly, no