How much CAS is too much CAS?

[2brucben]

The "meta" for both multi and single seems to include a lot of CAS... However, at which point is more CAS unhelpful? Has anyone tested to see on average what level of CAS maxes out air support in an average air region?

Personally I have never ventured above 2000 CAS in a region (perhaps even 1000 was sufficient, I did not test). But has anyone tested a higher level or found a lower level to reach the max?

 

[Corpse Fool]

Is this CAS on CAS missions specifically, or CAS spread across any of its missions? Is this CAS specifically or also tac bombers?

The limit is 3 planes per width the enemy is using (before terrain reductions), in each battle in the zone that the planes can actually reach, after losses for mission efficiency. More than that and youre not really gaining anything.

2000 bombers with lets say, 80% efficiency would be 1600, you can support about 533 width, which is maybe something like 6, 90w combats.

 

[Cavalry]

Yeah, looking for battle with under strength CAS. Or for planning, you can assume 5 battles in CAS range at a time, each will have 80w, so the total CAS needed is 80x3x 5 = 1200. The rest of CAS can deploy to other region or save the air strips room for fighters.

 

[Anaraxes]

The air support bonus to land combat scales up in accordance with your extra air superiority points. That is, you start to have a land combat bonus, separate from the damage CAS do directly to divisions, if you have at least one more point of AS than the enemy (which is still yellow air; green air starts when you have 1.5 times the enemy AS value). According to the wiki, every 50 points of advantage is a 1% bonus. +20% would then need 1000 points, which is 1000 CAS or fighters beyond what you needed to match the enemy.

 

[Corpse Fool]

The air support bonus to land combat scales up in accordance with your extra air superiority points. That is, you start to have a land combat bonus, separate from the damage CAS do directly to divisions, if you have at least one more point of AS than the enemy (which is still yellow air; green air starts when you have 1.5 times the enemy AS value). According to the wiki, every 50 points of advantage is a 1% bonus. +20% would then need 1000 points, which is 1000 CAS or fighters beyond what you needed to match the enemy.

The air support bonus is based on whether or not you are saturating the enemy width with your cas/bombers. Last I checked air superiority had nothing to do with it, only the air superiority penalty the enemy suffers.

 

[FStefanak]

The air support bonus is based on whether or not you are saturating the enemy width with your cas/bombers. Last I checked air superiority had nothing to do with it, only the air superiority penalty the enemy suffers.

Do you have a source? I haven't been able to find anything on the wiki.

 

[Corpse Fool]

Do you have a source? I haven't been able to find anything on the wiki.

Its what I remember from trying to test for it a while ago. I might be wrong on a couple of the specifics, but I do know that the air support is from the CAS mission, while the air superiority is from the air superiority mechanics.

I would go into game again now to test it again but I'm away from my gaming computer.

 

[Anaraxes]

The air support bonus is based on whether or not you are saturating the enemy width with your cas/bombers. Last I checked air superiority had nothing to do with it, only the air superiority penalty the enemy suffers.

Thanks. I'll tweak the wording in the wiki. ("Air support" and "air superiority" are easily confused...) It's not unreasonable for CAS to be more effective under more friendly skies.

The only seemingly-relevant parameters I found in 00_defines.lua:

    AIR_SUPPORT_BASE = 0.25,                        -- CAS bonus factor for air support moddifier for land unit in combat
    NUM_HOURS_SINCE_LAST_COMBAT_TO_SUPPORT_UNITS_VIA_AIR = 72,            -- units will be considered in combat if they are just out of their last combat for air supporting

Which doesn't give any hints about scaling, alas. I suppose I'll have to stage some battles with tiny CAS wings.

I'm not entirely sure what that last one even means. If units are out of combat, it doesn't matter if they have air support. If they quickly get into another combat and could use it, well, they're in combat, so no need for this parameter. Does it mean CAS keep flying air support missions (that is, planes get allocated out of the air zone total, suffer accidents, etc) for 72 hours after combat ends, so those planes can't appear over another battle? Or is it an R&R time; those planes are unavailable for 72 hours after the battle they're supporting ends, whereupon they can be assigned to another battle?

 

[Anaraxes]

I suppose I'll have to stage some battles with tiny CAS wings.

Foiled, because I don't know how to observe the actual value of the air support modifier. I didn't see it in any of the tooltips for a trial land battle I set up. The icon appears -- but where can I see the actual modifier, to see how it scales (if indeed it does, rather than just being a flat value)?

 

[Corpse Fool]

Foiled, because I don't know how to observe the actual value of the air support modifier. I didn't see it in any of the tooltips for a trial land battle I set up. The icon appears -- but where can I see the actual modifier, to see how it scales (if indeed it does, rather than just being a flat value)?

It should be a stat boost to your formations, like experience.

 

[bitmode]

Thanks. I'll tweak the wording in the wiki. ("Air support" and "air superiority" are easily confused...)

Not using the wording of the game will be confusing too though? I think the main issue right now is that large chunks of air support info are just missing, which leads readers to conflate it with other concepts.

Which doesn't give any hints about scaling, alas.

AIR_SUPPORT_BASE (25%) represents the maximum bonus possible before modifiers.
The actual bonus scales linearly up to that value according to the ratio of CAS present versus maximum CAS capacity.
The CAS capacity is: enemy width * LAND_AIR_COMBAT_MAX_PLANES_PER_ENEMY_WIDTH = enemy width * 3
If the CAS get disrupted, they contribute less to the bonus, proportional to how much they are disrupted.

The bonus is affected by the air_cas_present_factor ("Ground support") modifier.

Lastly, the air_superiority_bonus_in_combat ("Air Superiority Bonus in Combat") modifier of Camouflage Expert does double duty of reducing the penalty from enemy air superiority and reducing the friendly CAS bonus.

 

[bitmode]

I'm not entirely sure what that last one even means. If units are out of combat, it doesn't matter if they have air support. If they quickly get into another combat and could use it, well, they're in combat, so no need for this parameter. Does it mean CAS keep flying air support missions (that is, planes get allocated out of the air zone total, suffer accidents, etc) for 72 hours after combat ends, so those planes can't appear over another battle? Or is it an R&R time; those planes are unavailable for 72 hours after the battle they're supporting ends, whereupon they can be assigned to another battle?

This define is from the AI section of the defines file; it has no impact on the combat simulation itself. As far as I understand it, it is used to smooth out short interruptions between battles so automatically assigned CAS do not switch back and forth between regions as much.

 

[Anaraxes]

It should be a stat boost to your formations, like experience.

Thanks! Silly me, looking at all the airplane bits of that dialog box to try to find it.

Not using the wording of the game will be confusing too though?

I agree. Two close terms is confusing, but adding a third one doesn't help. "Ground support" has a larger Hamming distance with "air superiority", but it's not to be found in the tooltips. So no point in introducing that into the wiki.

AIR_SUPPORT_BASE (25%) represents the maximum bonus possible before modifiers.
The actual bonus scales linearly up to that value according to the ratio of CAS present versus maximum CAS capacity.

That matches my little quick-and-dirty test, with minor variations -- except that it seems like the max was 30%. That could include additional modifiers, though, which might also explain the biggest variance from my expectations that I saw.

Raw numbers, if anyone wants them.

Spoiler

CAS​	% Max CAS​	Modifier​	30% Max​
54​	100.00%​	​	​
1​	1.85%​	​	​
7​	12.96%​	4.00%​	3.89%​
12​	22.22%​	6.60%​	6.67%​
15​	27.78%​	8.20%​	8.33%​
28​	51.85%​	15.40%​	15.56%​
36​	66.67%​	22.20%​	20.00%​
49​	90.74%​	27.00%​	27.22%​

Changes to wiki in this section.

 

[Corpse Fool]

"Ground support" has a larger Hamming distance with "air superiority"

The total irony of this, is that the 'ground support' chief of air boosts air superiority. There is no winning.