ould disagree. Hoi4 is a world war, if I destroy airfields then the airforce is neuterd temporary and just in a specific region. If my airfields are destroyed then i just can move my undestroyed planes to another front then.
There are a number of flaws in this assessment when facing competent opponents in HOI4.
1) Tactical employment of aircraft is similar in many ways to the tactical employment of armored units. Concentrating them in the most important location is a key component to doing well. Sure, the RAF can defend Britain with 2500 fighters if all the airfields in Egypt have been bombed, but if the airfields in Egypt are bombed to death and the RAF can't defend the Suez anymore, then the number of planes the RAF has doesn't matter and the Axis will use its advantage in aircraft to take the Suez. You can do this same thing with any crucial part of the front in any theater of the war, from Kiev to Manila.
2) Planes are expensive. They are also vital equipment, but they require those airfields. If I produced 5000 aircraft in four years, but someone has blown up my airfields preventing me from using 4000 of them, ask yourself this simple question: would it have been better to invest more MIC in something besides those 4000 planes? The answer to that question can be found in the employment of no-air strategies by various Soviet players in MP over the years.
3) Due to how air to air mechanics work, even just losing the ability to employ half the planes you planned to use in an air region carries with it vast consequences. If I would normally put 3000 fighters over Kiev to defend the city during Barbarossa, but now I can only put 1000 fighters there, the Luftwaffe is going to punish me severely since they can still employ the same number of fighters. There are no diminishing returns in air to air combat until you reach a 3:1 ratio in terms of aircraft, so losing a bunch of your fighters due to airfields getting bombed is a great way to set your air force up to be slaughtered. Even at 1.5:1 ratios, assuming equal planes and doctrines, the side with more planes will do much better
killing more planes than the other side.
Even when on a mission it's very unlikely that the planes are up in the air 24 hours a day, every day every week, every month. A portion if the crafts is always on the ground, on standby, maintenance, refueling, recrewing, being repaired.
Well, this is why I didn't like the old mechanic. You'd never get the planes on the ground since the game acted like they were constantly flying.
Aircrafts is also harder to rebuild due to the fact they need rubber, airfields just require civilian factories.
One reason STRs are banned in some MP games is because it is possible to neutralize so many airfields at the same time that the enemy air force is completely grounded. Once the air force is grounded, nothing stops those 5000 STRs from then obliterating the MIC and CIC of the opposing country.
What costs more? 5000 planes, or having 50% of your IC bombed to death in 30 days? Before you answer, consider that Germany's rubber can also be obliterated in this fashion.
