Hello there!
I've just read trough this thread, and I very much like the intended changes to airforce in CORE. Good work Baylox, looks like CORE is once again going to substantially improve our favorite game
Being a long time CORE fan I'm still kinda longing for a complex and detailed tech tree of the CORE 1, but we cant have that, I know
so let's improve this one as much as possible, right?
1) Naval Bombers:
Emperor of Europe said:
I really hope that the cost of naval bombers is either dramatically increased, or their performance is dramatically decreased. Better yet: scrap them altogether, since naval bombers (to the best of my knowledge) weren't deployed in that large numbers. Instead "normal" tactical and strategic bombers were used in a naval role, which is perfectly possible with the current system.
I agree 105% on this. Scrap the NAV bombers, and as Baylox suggested in the previous post, replace them by Naval Recon Aircraft with greater range and much lower naval attack. That makes much more sense and is far more realistic then uber stacks of naval bombers ruling the seas instead of ships. I guess that the Naval Recon Aircraft (including the PBY Catalina and such) should have very limited anti ship capability, if any (they should start with minimal naval attack that would SLOWLY increase troughout the tech tree, and have more power vs. subs than vs. ships, if possible). Unfortunately as I understand the scouting effect of these planes still cannot be represented in the game adequately
which would make these planes even more efficient, but still they could be very valuable for countries like USA and Japan.
As for the NAVAL attack role, I agree that regular bombers should be used for this. Their default efficiency for naval bombing missions should be rather low, but it could be increased by researching dedicated adequate doctrines (in NAVAL and AIR tech trees, or better in BOTH trees). These doctrines should be lengthy and/or difficult to research (I think both) in order to make it pretty hard to reach the efficiency level that we now have in the vanilla game (if ever). The players could still choose to pursue this path, but much like the vanilla air doctrines the gains should be in small increments and they should need a capable tech team to make it worthwhile.
As it is now in vanilla game, you get the NAV bonuses in the same (middle) section of the tech tree with the TAC bonuses, IIRC. This is wrong IMHO - Bonuses for naval attack missions should be in the separate path in the air tech tree, and would apply to all bomber aircraft (CAS, TAC, STR and the new Naval Recon Aircraft). I would also lock this mission type so that you need to do some research to be able to do this mission. Also, each of the techs in order should be tied to next year (say, first tech in 1938, next in 1939, next in 1940 and so on), so that the naval bombing power increases slowly over years, and that rushers need to pay a heavy price to get it early. Naval doctrines tree could have some techs that deal with navy-airforce coordination ( extra org. to Naval Recon Aircraft, extra mission efficiency, extra intel/surprise bonuses, whatever you find applicable ).
Is it possible to create new mission type in HOI2, for example "Naval Recon" mission for aircraft? That could be a nice touch
If the missions are hard-coded, maybe you could use the "Naval Combat Patrol" ( existing vanilla mission for navies ) mission for aircraft, too, and maybe just for Naval Recon Aircraft. This missions cover large parts of sea (regions, not areas) and are very well suited for Recon purposes - one Naval Recon Aircraft unit could cover a large area of the sea. This new mission type would make these planes pretty useful, don't you think? Or maybe I'm also dreaming like Baylox
I'm guessing that good part of this is already in CORE2
or at least in plans for CORE3
but remember, you asked for my opinion. Hope you find it useful.
2) The Fighter vs. Interceptor Issue
The one thing that I don't get with aircraft in HOI2 is the strong separation of fighters and interceptors. This separation seems highly artificial to me. Say, you have a BF-109D which was built as a fighter and a BF-109E as the interceptor (or it is vice versa, I don't have access to the game at he moment). So, the interceptor is radically better at attacking bombers, and the fighter is all of a sudden that much more suited at both attacking interceptors and engaging ground targets. To best of my knowledge, this has very little support in real life facts. The fighter planes of the WWII era were optimized for best air performance, i.e. max speed, agility, durability, firepower, turn ratio etc. Everything else came second. So how come fighters are good groud attackers and interceptors are not? Or how come that interceptors are better against bombers (have "interceptor vs. bomber" bonus) and fighters are less qualified for the job? This fighter vs. interceptor difference is artificial. I'm not buying that fighter-models of BF109 (D?) are good vs. interceptors and ground targets and it's successor BF109E (interceptor in HoI2) is suddenly poor vs interceptors and ground targets but it's super-capable vs. bombers, it has more air defence but less ground defence, it has half the range and costs cheaper?!? And please explain how is it logical that air superiority fighters excel at destroying armored targets (big HA)?
What is the sense of this? Paradox wanted anti-bomber and anti-fighter units, right? Or this difference represents different training? Or gamebalance? Whatever it is, it's far from smooth IMHO.
What I really miss is the distinction between the ground attack fighters and the air superiority fighters. I like the CORE 1 aproach much better than the Paradox design for HOI2. In CORE1 we had interceptors (standard single engine fighters), air superiority fighters (state of the art machines, slightly better but more expensive) and multirole single engine fighters (armored, sturdy, and not so fast and maneuverable).
When it comes to escort fighters, I think Paradox got it pretty good, and the things are nicely balanced with them. Long range, excellent durability and mediocre air attacking performance - that's what these planes were built for. Their escorting bonus fits nicely with their special training and tactics, IMHo, and that's more or less ok. But we still don't have the twin-engined hard-hitting ground attack fighter-bomber in HoI2.
To prove that the design and balance have failed, I'll say like many did before me that in practice people never build or even research both interceptors and fighters, because you don't need both, they're to a great degree redundant. I'm under the impression that most people playing IC-rich countries choose fighters over interceptors because of their better stats, while people playing countries that can't afford them go for interceptors, but NOONE researches both. So as Germany you would develop every other BF-109 (like D, F and K, but not E and G) and FW-190A and not FW-190D - highly ahistorical, and without a good excuse, IMHO at least. Surely this isn't ment to be like this, right?
Does anyone else find this STRANGE or am I the only one?
And, Baylox, could you please elaborate a bity on how CORE2 intends to handle fighters
Kep up the good work!
