06-11-2004 22:01									#1
	Air Superiority, the fix: Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

Air Superiority
Ability: attacks air units
Cost: 1
The air superior ability equips a unit with the missiles necessary to attack Needlejets in flight. Air superiority units gain a +100% combat advantage when attacking other air units in flight. Air-to-air combat is resolved by comparing attack factors—the armor value is ignored.

So, in fighter vs. bomber air-to-air combat, the bomber gets weapons and the fighter gets 2x weapons. Unfortunately, this always fails to happen:
1) When the fighter attacks a bomber during the bombers turn (counter-attack via scramble) the bomber properly gets weapons but the fighter improperly only gets weapons, without the 2x combat advantage.
2) When a fighter attacks a bomber on the fighter turn, the fighter properly gets 2x weapons, but the bomber improperly defends with armor.
These are, as far as I can tell, the only bugs in the air war. These “air superiority” bugs are major bugs. The 1st is fixable because fighter vs. fighter combat always works correctly. I’ve got some ideas on the 2nd that I’ll present another time. The game can play much much better. Read on.

(For the rest of this presentation, the term fighters will include SAM choppers, and the term bombers will include non-SAM choppers)

The 1st case: During your opponents turn, your fighters provide air cover for their base and for the units within their base’s air cover umbrella. If the attacking air unit is a fighter, your fighter scramble-counter-attacks, fighter vs. fighter, and the outcome works out the way the designers intended. However, if the attacking air unit is a bomber, things go awry. Your fighter scramble-counter-attacks the bomber. The battle goes weapons vs. weapons but the fighter does not get the 2x weapons it’s supposed to get. The fighter takes more damage that it should:
a) The fighter is supposed to lose and it loses; the bomber should be more damaged.
b) The fighter is supposed to win and it loses; -1 fighter, -1 non-combat unit.
c) The fighter wins; it’s more damaged than it should be for the next battle.
The fighter loses many battles that it should win. Even when the fighter wins, it takes too much damage. When the fighter wrongly loses there is frequently concurrent loss of a non-combat unit it scrambled to protect. Add to this the fact that the bomber costs less to build and has a greater range than the fighter, and you have a huge advantage to the offence. This is not the designer’s intent, and it is somewhat ruining the game.
Take a moment to think about how the game would play if this worked properly, and scrambled fighters got 2x weapons vs. bombers weapons. The offence would have to send in shorter ranged fighters to establish air superiority before sending in the bombers. Preparations for air battles would be different. The game would play much differently and arguably much better.

Establishing air superiority, the fix: The offence must establish air superiority over a base before launching an air attack with bombers against it or a unit within its air cover umbrella. Remember, all fighter vs. fighter combat works correctly. The offence establishes air superiority over a base by attacking it with fighters (or missiles). Once all enemy fighters have been engaged (engaged but not necessarily eliminated) that turn, then it would be free to attack the base or its surrounding units with all remaining air units of any type. Air superiority would have to be reestablished each turn. You would know when you’ve established air superiority when your fighter attack no longer causes a scramble-counter-attack. You could then attack or not if the “show odds before attack” feature is used.
If some of the surrounding units are covered by more than one base’s air cover umbrella, then each base involved must be engaged before those units could be attacked.

I’ve been thinking about this problem since I read about the partial solution to it now in use in the current ACDG, namely, choppers are not allowed to attack bases. I hope this "establishing air superiority" idea generates some discussion and if it stands up to critical analysis, I’d like to see it adapted to future PBEM’s. Hey, if nothing else, this rule will strengthen the AI since it would still be playing the old way.

	07-11-2004 14:42									#2
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

You could also add in that bombers at 50% or less health may attack even when air superiority is not yet gained.

Here are the problems I see with this:

1. How do you determine when air superiority is gained? Especially if you don't yet have infiltration. How would I know once I have eliminated all the air cover without attacking something? I am not going to attack a 1-5-1 AAA with a 10-1-? fighter, but I might with a 10-1-? bomber.

2. What about the bomber's extra range? Is that to be just given up? That certainly removes a level of strategy from the game. What if your strategy is to disrupt a distant city at all costs and you would be willing to send wave after wave of bombers to wear down air defenses, even if it meant heavy losses?

I see how air combat is broke, but it is still fair to all involved. Personally, I prefer broke with more strategy to fixed with less strategy. But I don't play PBEMs, so maybe I am missing the point.

Last edited by livid imp on 08-11-2004 at 21:43

	07-11-2004 19:36									#3
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livid imp,
You wrote: "You could also add in that bombers at 50% or less health may attack even when air superiority is gained."
Did you really mean when air superiority has not been established? Because, if so, I see no problem with attacking with bombers that have 50% or more damaged, at any time.

You wrote: " How do you determine when air superiority is gained?"
I did address that. "You would know when you have established air superiority when your fighter attack no longer causes a scramble-counter-attack. You could then attack or not if the “show odds before attack” feature is used."
I was thinking further that if you had infiltration then you wouldn't need that last attack because you'd know all fighters were engaged that turn.

Your point about bombers going on suicide missions to wear down air defenses is valid and you would have to give that up. In the real world this would never happen (I hope) and even in the game it's of limited use. I guess the bottom line is that you have to give something to get something. Here I think it’s worth it. Thanks for your thoughtful feedback. I think that if we were all playing by this new rule then we’d all be building more fighters in the normal course of the game and these (desperation?) bomber attacks wouldn’t be an option as frequently too. Besides, you only play against the AI, so let the AI keep the extra punch with its bombers while you give it up. It should make for a better game.

Last edited by Net Warrior on 07-11-2004 at 22:55

	07-11-2004 23:39									#4
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How would that rule be implimented? Air combat is hard wired.

Here is a partial fix I made by editing alpha.txt as part of the development of the TurboSMAC mod:

1. Make SAM ability and AAA ability both free (favoring SAM rovers and cruisers; AAA is not free for units with weapons).
2. Increase instrinsic base defense bonus from 25% to 50%.
3. Increase sensor defense bonus from 25% to 50%.
4. Eliminate the 50% non-combat unit penalty (makes it a little harder to pick off formers and crawlers)
5. Doubled cost of all air units.
6. Prototype surcharge increased to 100% for air units only.

Not perfect, I agree, but together these changes work to restore balance in air combat.

	08-11-2004 02:18									#5
	Increase Your PM Length

Interesting, though a bit of a houserule-style fix.

	08-11-2004 04:30									#6
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DilithiumDad,
As endgames points out, it would be a houserules-style fix. For new PBEM's, the "air superiority" rule would have to be spelled out, and then all the players would have to agree to abide by it, just as they now do with other PBEM rules.

I'm not partial to editing the alpha text for many reason, not the least of which is because I fear that there would be many unintended consequences resulting from the comprehensive edit you propose. I think a simple "air superiority" addition to the agreed upon PBEM rules would be the best solution to restore the balance in air combat. It might be a little difficult to determine whether someone had abided by the rule at times but you simply have to trust people to play honorably.

	08-11-2004 22:31									#7
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quote: Originally posted by Net Warrior Did you really mean when air superiority has not been established?

Yes that is what I meant. Damn aixelsyD! I edited my post to make sense.

quote: Originally posted by Net Warrior Your point about bombers going on suicide missions to wear down air defenses is valid and you would have to give that up.

It is vaild. I bring it up cause I use it on occasion when the AI is beating me to a SP and I don't have the crawlers, cash, or tech to take it myself. I usally only have to send in 3 or 4 suicide bombers to take out the defenders in a city, then the AI switches to a defensive unit and losses the SP. Even fission suicide bombers can travel 24 tiles, enough to get you most places.

quote: Originally posted by Net Warrior In the real world this would never happen (I hope)

One date: 9/11/2001

Need I say more? If feel like playing evil Yang, I will have suicide troops.

quote: Originally posted by Net Warrior Besides, you only play against the AI

True, and while this doesn't affect me personally, I am all too happy to play devils avocate. I am a livid imp after all.

I like DilithiumDad's suggestion to make SAM a freebie. SAM really doesn't add to your unit, but rather specializes it (can attack air, but limited ground attacks). That would at least make fighters and bomber cost the same (I never did understand why fighters cost more anyway).

	11-11-2004 20:34									#8
	Got spare money?

DilithiumDad,
I've been thinking some more about your alpha txt fixes idea. I've noticed that scrambled fighters do not get the base defense bonus or the sensor defense bonus (or the air complex defense bonus either for that matter). Have you found a way around this too?

livid imp,
You wrote: "Need I say more? If feel like playing evil Yang, I will have suicide troops."
I can't deny suidide troops are a valid ploy. I've been thinking about an alternative to my "establishing air superiority" idea. One of my main objectives is to find a way to stop more expensive fighters getting killed off by less expensive bombers. A <4>-1-8 fighter costs 1 more row of minerals than a 4-1-10 bomber. Yet, the bomber is just as likely to win during a scramble. I wanted to make up for this and to make up for the fact that the fighter is supposed to be winning more of these battles but doesn't due to not getting the 100% attack bonus it deserves. My alternate idea is to mandate that all bombers be build with best armor. Then players will not be so ready to risk them against the cheaper fighers.

	11-11-2004 21:36									#9
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

Then you have the odd effect of penalizing players who go for silksteel, which is rare enough as it is in my experience.

	11-11-2004 21:52									#10
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

quote: Originally posted by Net Warrior My alternate idea is to mandate that all bombers be build with best armor. Then players will not be so ready to risk them against the cheaper fighers.

That makes sense. Aircraft is way too cheap as is anyway. But mandating "best" armor? Wouldn't that unfairly discourage a player from choosing a armor upgrading technology? Can't you just say all bombers must use at least plasma armor, or something to the effect?

Here is another possible angle.....is it possible to give the Air Superiority ability a -1 or -2 value and then increasing the base cost for the jet chasiss?

	11-11-2004 22:09									#11
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How about a rolling cap on bomber armor. Perhaps we could try something like Synthmetal up to 2175, Plasma Steel up to 2225, and Silksteel beyond that. That might be enough of a disinsentive to keep those bombers out of dogfights.

	11-11-2004 22:28									#12
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

A special ability can never have a negative cost. If you give it a negative value in alphax.txt, you get one of the special costs, such as attack/defense (trance), or armor + speed - 2 (artillery).

	12-11-2004 02:36									#13
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What would armor + speed -2 be for a noodle?

	12-11-2004 02:51									#14
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Presumably the game would use the chassis value as speed, but I can't say for certain. If needlejets still have a chassis of 8, then 8 + 1 (no armor) - 2 = 7, which is an additional cost of 1.75* the base cost (subject to rounding)

	12-11-2004 14:50									#15
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If you want to set a rule for bomber armor, perhaps the armor should always equal or exceed half the weapon value of the aircraft.

	12-11-2004 17:43									#16
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Hmmm...thinking more about it, placing armor on bombers may work well in some form or another once all players have built fighters. The problem is if you have D:AP and your opponent doesn't, or he does too but hasn't built fighters yet. So, any time your opponent does not have air superiority for any reason, you ought to be able to attack with unarmored bombers, right? Oh well, ....back to the drawing board

	12-11-2004 22:48									#17
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Well, like I said before, it maybe broke, but at least it is fair. Your fighters maybe ravaged by bombers, but your bombers can do ththe same to him.

I would like to see better protection for formers and crawlers. I think AAA/SAM units should exert a limited form of ZoC on air units. That would solve a host of problems.

Until then, just stack up your formers with a AAA defender. At least make them earn those former kills.