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Modeling the Air War


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I'm curious as to people's thoughts on the following. I am a great fan of SC and have been for years but I think the air war could use some improvement. In particular the establishing of air superiority.

Historically, the Allies were able to establish total air supremacy in the European and Pacific theaters. By that I mean at the fighter cover and net competing air forces level. Eventually, the Luftwaffe and Japanese air force were essentially wiped out.

So far, in SC, I don't see how this happens except when the Axis economies are completely bankrupt. My experience instead is that the U.S., Soviet, and German fighters swipe at each other while the tactical air units make their regular runs. In short even if the U.S.. has say 7 fighters in the theater and the Germans 2 or 3 the Germans can keep up an "air front."

What I would suggest should happen is that when disparities as large as that appear, the minority air force should start to attrit heavily.

How might this be mechanized in the game? I think simply, in principle. First fighter units should be able to attack enemy fighter units effectively (right now I find direct fighter attacks on fighters do little). Think of this not as attacking them on the ground but rather forcing them to come up and duel. Alternatively make the fighter vs fighter combat as it currently occurs in say escort duty more bloody. There might be better ways of course.

Then, for say Germany, the choices become "compete in the East in the air or compete in the west in the air... " but not "put up a reasonable fight on both fronts."

One last way to put this issue. Right now to me fighters seem necessary but vital. They are required to allow tactical air attacks (via escorting) but otherwise play a fairly minor role in the air competition. Given that intercepts occur at 2x escorts ... the defender can keep up. Which suggests one last way to address the issue. Remove the 2x intercept. Then the allies could overwhelm on one front because not enough fighters are available to the axis to intercept everything.

I would like to hear if others agree that air superiority as seen historically is not captured well enough yet in SC. Also suggestions for fixes if so.

Strategic Command Fanboy :-)

Luke

p.s. as a secondary but related issue allowing air superiority would also address in my mind the still over effectiveness of Tactical Air. It is late war 1944 for me and I can maintain an effective TA force despite allies having more fighters. Maybe the fighters should be allowed to "break through" more to the TA.

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OK Luke, cut the "wise" crap and I'll tell you, Bombers! They have double strikes, same as the fighter intercepts. Thing is, you'll need to tech them up so that they have a greater AD value. The rest you're going to have to figure out yourself, that's the fun of the game, and there will always be a counter.

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Ok not only wiser... but smarter too. That's just too cruel. Please pick one or the other.

Interesting about bombers. I'd noticed the high level ones were fairly ftr resistance but hadn't thought to use them to attack fighters! Bombers I just don't think of as especially good anti-unit units as opposed to bombing for strategic resource impact.

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Yep that's what I meant: higher bomber tech (same as SeaMonkey) ^^ .

You can attack a ressource with the first strike then use the second to attack the figther that just intercepted you. That will show a second figther/interceptor unit if any around ;) . Rince and repeat with your next bomber unit, it should wear down enemy air force quite a bit.

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