Air Interception thoughts

[daringly]

If an air fleet intercepts another air group, there is one combat before the attacking fleet does its mission. If the attacker loses 1-2 factors, it still does a majority of the damage it would normally do.

Why don't interceptors also disrupt the attacking mission? Many bombers abort that weren't actually killed. A different way to handle it: For every 2 factors of interceptors, 1 factor aborts after combat. So if a 10-factor bomber attacked a target, was intercepted by a 10-factor air fleet, and the bombers lost 1 factor, only 4 of the surviving bomber factors would attack the target (with the other 5 aborting due to the interception).

With the current system, there is little incentive to intercept - especially when the German air is so much more effective due to advanced aircraft and HQ.

[Colin I]

I'd suspect loss of morale/readyness caused by the interception simulates this adequately.

[Retributar]

By the same token,...i think that daringly has a point.

Air-Fleet's that suffer damage, should then reflect a corresponding amount of damage that a reduced strength unit should be able inflict,... and not the full regular damage that a full-strenth unit would be capable of carrying out!.

[jon_j_rambo]

I don't know...Doolittle kept going.

[Hubert Cater]

Interesting ideas and just to clarify... if an AF attacking at 10 and is intercepted and reduced to 8, then the resulting combat between the AF and its original target would be with the AF at strength=8.

FoW may not show this when viewing the expected combat results as an interceptor may be hidden, but when playing without FoW (or if the interceptor is not hidden) the expected combat results take interceptor action into full account and probably why it might seem that the AF has still performed its maximum damage despite interception.

[daringly]

Originally posted by Hubert Cater:

Interesting ideas and just to clarify... if an AF attacking at 10 and is intercepted and reduced to 8, then the resulting combat between the AF and its original target would be with the AF at strength=8.

Historically, many more bombers aborted their missions than were shot down. Defensive air cover was therefore good to protect your own troops. Offensive air was much less effective, until you gained air superiority/dominance.

In this game, defensive air cover does very little to help your ground troops - too little actually. From my limited experience with SC2, defensive air is useful only for attritioniong the other side in air exchanges, and that is only of marginal value if they are winning the exchanges.

I don't mean to sound negative in all my suggestions - I love this game (and its entire genre). I just want this game to be better.

[Edwin P.]

I would like to see air fleets have a chance to prevent an opponent's air unit from spotting friendly units adjacent to your air unit until they take some action - such as attacking or intercepting.

Example: 1 Armor unit is next to your air fleet. Enemy air will only spot this armor unit 50% of the time.

This reflects the use of combat air patrols to conceal the location of friendly forces.

Refinemnent: Chance to avoid spotting = 50% +/- Intel Advantage/Disadvantage

Example: Two corps are next to an air fleet and the owner has Intel Advantage +2. Enemy will spot these units 30% (50% less 20%) of the time. If the enemy had Intel advantage of +1 he would spot these units 60% of the time.