Bombers and Scripting

[Edwin P.]

Originally posted by Blashy:

20MPPs Berlin, 16 Paris, 20 the German mine, 16 Benelux. That alone is 72 MPPs. 3 Bombers at level 2 can easily keep all those locations at 0.

4 Bombers at level 2, add 2 German cities and that is 92mpps....

Anytime you loose 92mpps in SC2, you are hurting really bad.

I wonder if the AI knows how to use bombers if it purchases them? Will the AI automatically moved bombers from the USA to UK or if Germany can it be told to deploy Bombers to the Russian front?

More importantly for scripting purchases, now I have the basis for an Allied bombing strategy, if only it was easier to coordinate production and research strategies.

[ April 28, 2006, 04:00 PM: Message edited by: Edwin P. ]

[Timskorn]

I've definitely noticed the US AI transfer their air to Europe. In my current game they have 2 bombers leveling cities in France. Not sure about how the Axis AI would handle bombers though, would be interesting to see.

[Hubert Cater]

Air units are essentially handled automatically by the AI. In general they move themselves towards the current #GOAL_POSITION and in a manner that puts them in range of the #GOAL_POSITION as well.

For example, if a bomber is automatically assigned to a SEA_TRANSPORT plan then it will move towards the destination position. If it is automatically assigned to an OFFENSIVE plan then it will move within range of attacking the #GOAL_POSITION etc.

[Edwin P.]

So, if I want to operate move a bomber to Egypt to bomb the port at Tobruk, I have to send a corps there too. Even so, the AI may not send a bomber with the corps, correct?

[Timskorn]

In my last game the AI had 2 US and 1 UK bomber in Europe. I noticed the AI like to focus in on bombing a specific resource to 0 before moving onto another one. A lot of times a resource will be at 1 and a bomber will hit it, and then the other bombers will target another resource. On one hand I suppose this is good as it's an 'easy hit' for the bomber, and will increase their experience. On the other it's not utilizing the bombers as well as they could be, where they could essentially hit 3 different targets and really put the hurt on German MPP's.

[Edwin P.]

Good observation.

Too bad that bombers don't have a a strategy option that you can set for them in the scripts. This strategy would affect bombers [#Min,#Max] within range [#Min,#Max] of a tile.

Example:

Strategy 1 - Bomb Cities Until They Reach 0 and keep them at zero, move to another city

Strategy 2 - Bomb Cities until they reach zero and move to another city

Strategy 3 - Bomb Ports, then Cities (for North Africa)

Example:

Bomber_Strategy= 3 [x,y] [0,5][1,2] - i.e. Use Strategy 3 for 1 to 2 bombers within 5 tiles of Tile x,y.

[Timskorn]

Would be nice to have, but also a Strategy 4 for tactical support. However, for the most part I think bombers behave pretty well on their own. They tend to switch targets to tactical if they see an open target in France, for example.

On one hand it's nice to have more control, on the other I'm glad HC has a non-script AI that can assess things on its own. When we script TOO much, the AI becomes less flexible and relies more on us to have scripts to accomodate different situations and can 'break' when up against something unexpected.

[Edwin P.]

Excellent point, the only item with bombers is that sometimes you want them to hit ports - i.e. Malta or Tobruk and sometimes the cities.

[Hubert Cater]

Originally posted by Edwin P.:

So, if I want to operate move a bomber to Egypt to bomb the port at Tobruk, I have to send a corps there too. Even so, the AI may not send a bomber with the corps, correct?

Not necessarily, it could go there on it's own if it doesn't have a current target or is not assigned to a current plan, i.e. it could automatically be assigned there as part of the Tobruk OFFENSIVE plan.

Note, assigning a SEA_TRANSPORT plan etc., does not always assign a Bomber or AF to that particular plan, it has to be available for the plan otherwise it will stick to its originally assigned plan.