How to simulate Air-War correctly

[Lennartos]

This thread is for suggestions regarding the Air-War of the HOI series

According to the suggestions this first post will be edited, and linked to the Armageddon Improvemt thread.
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Edited 18/3-08 12:53
Rewrote some points added some new.

General discription:
First draft of improved Air-War

gameplay and rules:
- Planes should be able to move more than one province per hour. ( make jets matter)
- Bombers should be harder to spot, but be actively targetted by aircraft on air superiority missions and ground AA if detected.- Radar is about enemy detection, not jamming enemy bombing bays and guns.
Radar effects should include:
guide INT/FGT to enemy planes if /when detected
greatly increase AA efficiency in provinces with radar cover.
reduce night attack malus in provinces with radar cover.
-If planes on air superiority are much faster than detected aircraft,it can catch the bomber before it can leave the fighter range and vice versa, if bomber is much faster it has a chance to get past unharmed.'
- Add a new mission called "interception"...
If Aircraft are on this mission, they are not just wandering aimlessly around. But are on standby for enemy detection and lauch immidiatly when needed.
The mission can be assigned an area, or just launch when inside range.
- New Air rule: Like ships each plane division will engage a specific division.
- Add stacking penality for multiple squadrons attacking the same division(plane/ship/division). .. should only occur if all targets are engaged.
- Rebase mission should cost much more ORG, and allow ORG to go negative.
No mission can be executed whilee ORG <= 0
- One cannot rebase to a airfield more than 2,5* range
- Option to use Strategic redeployment when rebasing over longer ranges
- Now missions for strategical bombing: instead of shifting regularly between infra,installations and strategic bombing, merge all those to one new general mission(f.ex. strategic bombing),
- Remove the "if you can reach one, you can reach all" region rule...having cas patrolling back and forth 1500km+ into the sea or extremely deep into russia is a little over the edge. Needs smaller provinces and some balancing thoughts.
- While using Strategic bombing it should be possible to target a region instead of area.
- Planes and rockets should be coordinated with each other: if 10 ICBMs attack one region they should spread to maximize damage and not all hit the same province. A simple solution would be to have a counter on how many planes are heading for each province... if a STR/ICBM is already heading for current province choose next province.
-Planning missions should take some hours. you cannot plan an effective bombing campaign in under 1 hour as you do now.
so when assigning mission, mission starttime = now + 6hrs ( time is variable in misc.txt)
- flyng should cause attriction to squad. (mechanical failures/ pliot errors)
Should be modifiable with tech.

Uncertain:
Should Radar level affect its modifiers or range or both?
Did i miss something?
Is there a better way of doing things?
Should CV-CVLs CAGs be simulated as planes?

 

[Draigh]

- Bombers should be harder to spot, but be actively targetted by aircraft on air superiority missions and ground AA if detected.

Aren't planes already automatically fired at by AA?

greatly increase AA efficiency in provinces with radar cover.
reduce night attack malus in provinces with radar cover.

Why is that? In the first case, I don't see how AA can have much of an advantage from radar... They're immobile, so can't be guided by air radar (and I believe radar wasn't advanced enough to use for AA targeting) and you bet that a whole air division won't be flying over AA stations undetected. In the second case, as you said radar was used to vector interceptions onto the bombing squadrons, it had no use during the battle itself.

- Add a new mission called "guided interception"...

Could be useful, but if radar already vectors in any units on air superiority I don't really see the need for that.

- New Air rule: A enemy division can only be attacked from one Air division at a time. (regardless of enemy type: planes,ships and divisions).
So like ships each plane division will engage a specific division...
If all targets are engaged, the remaining planes should get drastically reduced attack efficiency.

First of all, several ships can engage one target at the same time. Secondly, I don't see why two air wings can't bomb one division at the same time. A division is big enough to be spreaded around over a large area, and remember that not all aircraft are right on top of their targets at the same time. They fly in, drop bombs and fly back.

- Rebase mission should only be availible on 100% org planes, a option for rebasing while low on org should be availible(panic rebase), but should decrease STR and give a much longer "disorganized" trait.

While I understand the reasoning behind this, I'm afraid the "no rebasing under 100%" would be too much of a bitch to cope with. I'd agree on some penalties, though, but not a strength reduction, rather a lower organisation regain or the inability to receive orders for a certain period, depending on the organisation before the rebase.

- Remove the "if you can reach one, you can reach all" region rule...having cas patrolling back and forth 1500km+ into the sea or extremely deep into russia is a little over the edge. Needs smaller provinces and some balancing thoughts.

Agreed. Also, the ability to specifically target one province (or at least designate priorities) would be neat.

- Planes and rockets should be coordinated with each other: if 10 ICBMs attack one region they should spread to maximize damage and not all hit the same province.

I could be wrong, but I believe that you can already target a specific province using missiles...

Should Radar level affect its modifiers or range or both?

What do you mean? Otherwise there wouldn't be much use in researching radar past the first tech, right?

Should CV-CVLs CAGs be simulated as planes?

IIRC, it was done like that in the first HOI. I've never played that, but I haven't heard anyone complain about the change either, so I guess there was a reason for that. However, it would be a solution to the Carrier Air Gun problem.

 

[henryjai]

Radar will give ground units a signal when there are planes incoming, not just wait and look into the sky finding enemy planes, in this case, the efficiency is increased.

I could be wrong, but I believe that you can already target a specific province using missiles...

you are wrong. only the nuke mission performs like what you say.

Could be useful, but if radar already vectors in any units on air superiority I don't really see the need for that.

sometimes an area is too big.

Bombers should be harder to spot

i like this, but i hope the new air system gives us a much more detailed one.



currently i think the rate of downing planes is too low.

 

[Lennartos]

Aren't planes already automatically fired at by AA?

My thought is that planes are, like subs unseen until detected.
Few planes flying at night might make several provinces before detection, if no fighter / radar / aa coverage is used.

Why is that? In the first case, I don't see how AA can have much of an advantage from radar

At least gemany used radar for that purpose.
Namely the würzburg radar was used for the purpose of FLAK targetting.
Freya was mainly used as long range sea/air detection, as it was not accurate enough to be used as a direct targetting device.

Could be useful, but if radar already vectors in any units on air superiority I don't really see the need for that.

No roaming around, giving better interception time, interception distribution (do not send all planes against 1 stack) are a few of the possible optimisations. I see Air superiority as a desperate attemty to detect enemy planes by swarming the sector with ones own planes... not fuel efficient

First of all, several ships can engage one target at the same time. Secondly, I don't see why two air wings can't bomb one division at the same time. A division is big enough to be spreaded around over a large area, and remember that not all aircraft are right on top of their targets at the same time. They fly in, drop bombs and fly back.

1) What i am saying is that the is not only a stacking multiplier for the stack but for engaging a single target.
How efficient can 800 torpedo planes attack 1 BB at the same time?
a much more agressive stacking penality should apply when multiple plane divisions attack the same target.
Ex. 100 planes attacking one 10K division is very effective, and could propably kill or wound around 500 men...
if 1000 planes however target the same 10.000 men they will not likely kill or wound 5000men.. you see what i mean?
2) It will be much easier to balance the game and make it more realistic.

IIRC, it was done like that in the first HOI. I've never played that, but I haven't heard anyone complain about the change either, so I guess there was a reason for that. However, it would be a solution to the Carrier Air Gun problem.

The though was to help make air cover important. You can actually help defend your BBs with land based fighters. i am not saying we should allow planes to rebase to ships(HOI1), but to model CAGs as planes during fights...

Link
Link2

 

[Radu]

If we really are talking about modding the air war correctly,we cannot use the same "template" as land armies do (but HOI2 does that,unfortunately).The player should not care that at hour H the squadron is in province P. This is a grand strategic game.

The air war should be abstractized to the maximum (i.e. numbers interacting in the background,player sees reports) much like what we see in The Operational Art 3.

The player should choose which squadron(or wing) fights where (or supports which corps) and to set a casualty threshold that the air unit tolerates,and that's it. The player should not run around,babysitting bomber squadrons,having to order them home when jumped by fighters and other silliness.

Numbers should be crunched daily in the background and a report in some shape or form be presented to the player.

P.S.:This should also be the case for naval units as well.When two fleets meet,the player doesn't need to know about how the fleets close the distance and all that.The admiral does.The player only needs to know how the battle is going,who is winning and that's it.The rest is just numbers being crunched correctly.

 

[Balesir]

- Planes should be able to move more than one province per hour. ( make jets matter)

I'm not sure how this could be well displayed, but yes, I agree.

- Bombers should be harder to spot, but be actively targetted by aircraft on air superiority missions and ground AA if detected.

Agreed - but I think certain missions - the key one being Air Superiority - should be radically altered as follows:

• A unit on certain missions (Air Superiority, Ground Support, Interdiction, Naval Interdiction or Reconnaissance*) is displayed on-screen at its base, but selecting it will highlight the Area in which it is operating. Any enemy elements in the operational area may be affected by the selected mission. The highlight colour should depend on the mission assigned (so that selecting multiple air units can give a picture of coverage generally).

The idea of ~100 plane patrols is just silly - that's not how these missions work. Air combats take place when either (a) operational areas overlap or (b) a 'Strike' type mission (which is still done using the old 'fly to target' method) passes through the zone of operation. Land or Naval units that are within the zone may be hit (if they are seen) with each attack going to a random, visible and eligible unit.

*: New mission type; low fuel use, low visibility (and hence vulnerability to enemy air cover or AA) and just gives visibility of the area covered without causing damage.

- Radar is about enemy detection, not jamming enemy bombing bays and guns.
Radar effects should include:
guide INT/FGT to enemy planes if /when detected
greatly increase AA efficiency in provinces with radar cover.
reduce night attack malus in provinces with radar cover.

Right - radar greatly improves visibility and effectiveness of Air Superiority attacks against Strikes in the same province or adjacent sea provinces.

-If planes on air superiority are much faster than detected aircraft,it can catch the bomber before it can leave the fighter range and vice versa, if bomber is much faster it has a chance to get past unharmed.'

As with sea combat, combat should go on not until one side breaks off, but until the side that decides to break off manages to leave the other side's range (or is shot down/sunk)...

- Add a new mission called "guided interception"...
If Aircraft are on this mission, they are not just wandering aimlessly around. But are on standby for enemy detection and lauch immidiatly when needed.

If the Air Superiority mission is changed as I suggest above, this should be unnecessary - it just factors into how the mission works when there is radar to help. Radar might act by reducing fuel consumption, maybe, in this case?

- New Air rule: A enemy division can only be attacked from one Air division at a time. (regardless of enemy type: planes,ships and divisions).
So like ships each plane division will engage a specific division...
If all targets are engaged, the remaining planes should get drastically reduced attack efficiency.

Actually, given the way that most missions worked I think just the opposite should apply. For the missions that I list as 'Area-type' above, attacks are spread out among all targets in the area of operation. I do think that additional air units assigned to the same area will add effectiveness on a 'diminishing returns' basis, however. The 'Area' chosen for operations could be a province (at minimum) or an 'Area' as now defined, but the best would be to click multiple, adjacent provinces to define a 'freely definable' zone of operation...

- Rebase mission should only be availible on 100% org planes, a option for rebasing while low on org should be availible(panic rebase), but should decrease STR and give a much longer "disorganized" trait.
- Aircraft that have been "panic" rebased or strategically redeployed should get the disorderet trait where they regain org at a much slower rate, for a certain time.
- One cannot rebase to a airfield more than 2* range away
Strategic redeployment should be used instead to rebase over longer ranges

Simpler - say that rebasing (to max. 2.5 * range away, the 'extra' 0.5 being because 'range' includes some 'mission time' at the end) reduces ORG (by 100, say). This may reduce ORG to a negative number; if ORG is negative it recovers as normal, but the unit may take no action at all until it is >0.

- Now missions for strategical bombing: instead of shifting regularly between infra,installations and strategic bombing, merge all those to one new general mission(f.ex. strategic bombing),

I rather like the 'raid planning' methodology now used if you assign a mission for just a short time (1-3 days); maybe just allow such orders to be 'stacked', so you can plan several at one time? I also think that, in general, a 'repeat last mission order' button for both naval and air units would be very handy!

- Remove the "if you can reach one, you can reach all" region rule...having cas patrolling back and forth 1500km+ into the sea or extremely deep into russia is a little over the edge. Needs smaller provinces and some balancing thoughts.
- While using Strategic bombing it should be possible to target a region instead of area.

If some of the very large provinces/areas are shrunk a bit, this actually doesn't bother me too much - maybe change to 'if you can reach area centre, you can cover all'? The 'range' for each aircraft type should be at most ~80% of the full range, anyway, to allow for some 'mission time' at the far end, so 'stretching' it a bit is not too big a deal.

The 'strike' missions (Logistical Strike, Runway Cratering, Strategic Strike, Port Strike and Installation Strike) should always be targetted at an individual province in any case, IMO.

- Planes and rockets should be coordinated with each other: if 10 ICBMs attack one region they should spread to maximize damage and not all hit the same province. A simple solution would be to have a counter on how many planes are heading for each province... if a STR/ICBM is already heading for current province choose next province.

Have all these 'Strike' missions hit a specific province and this is not needed.

Uncertain:
Should Radar level affect its modifiers or range or both?
Did i miss something?
Is there a better way of doing things?
Should CV-CVLs CAGs be simulated as planes?

By 'radar level', do you mean technology or 'size'?

For a 'better way of doing things' see what I think above

CAGs should:

• Be split, with carrier model defining how many such 'brigades' may be carried.
• Be differentiated fighter/dive bomber/torpedo plane.
• Work like 'Air Superiority' and 'Naval Interdiction' air missions, as air units, not naval units and with a range from the carrier and the zone of operations always centred on the carrier. 'Port strikes' might need special handling - not sure how.
• Be part of the same force as the carrier, so sharing visible enemy, etc.

 

[Lennartos]

boah... long post...

soooo.... what you and radu want is this: ( based on current engines limitation)
assigning a air squadron to a area with the mission "ground attack"..
will increase enemy divisions attriction in that area... nothing more and nothing less.
assigning fighters on air superiority will add attriction to the enemy planes assigned to the area.
That sound pretty boring (the current engine has its limits) and its hard to follow whats happening. ( you have to click on planes all the time to follow str/org declines)

The real solution would be to remove the airwar over provinces as we know it and redefine the planes as playing-bricks each expanding the airdominance in a radius over the airfield. That radius will grow and shrink depending on floating borders with enemy.
Fighters will increase dominance, bombers increase damage caused by the the air dominance.
I find that this system would be perfect for HOI4' s floating borders engine
But modding HOI2 or even EU3s engine to do that seems a bit optimistic. ( at least i know i wont have time to implement such a grand modification)
So sticking with the current engine and its limits is the only real viable option.(exept if we get enogh people together to code a HOI4 of our own )

however it may be possible to simulate smaller squadrons...
say each plane division contains 5 brigades(so 20 planes each)..
now if you assign the division to make a air superiority mission these 5 brigades will split and patrol around the map as 5 seperate air squadrons...
if one of these is detected and destroyed, only one brigade needs to be repaired.... something along these lines anyway...
Or maybe only one squadron flies around to find enemys and 4 remain stationary.. ready to take off and intecept detected enemys.
Would that be a viable strategy?

-Reconnaissance mission is a very good addition to the game. planes on this mission will always try to avoid engagements and flee if met by fighter resistance.

As with sea combat, combat should go on not until one side breaks off, but until the side that decides to break off manages to leave the other side's range (or is shot down/sunk)...

Agreed.

Air superiority should have a small chance of detecting enemy planes even if in the same sector ( its a very large area to cover)

Actually, given the way that most missions worked I think just the opposite should apply. For the missions that I list as 'Area-type' above, attacks are spread out among all targets in the area of operation. I do think that additional air units assigned to the same area will add effectiveness on a 'diminishing returns' basis, however.

Please note that we are talking about planes attacking the SAME target (squadron/division/ship)... as long as there are enough targets to attack there is only a "area stacking penality", not a limit/diminisheing effect.

Simpler - say that rebasing (to max. 2.5 * range away, the 'extra' 0.5 being because 'range' includes some 'mission time' at the end) reduces ORG (by 100, say). This may reduce ORG to a negative number; if ORG is negative it recovers as normal, but the unit may take no action at all until it is >0.

Almost...
Air squadrons are not just planes... shifting planes with pilots is easy... getting the mechanics, spareparts and HQ shifted is much harder.
maybe there should be a few hours preperation time for any mission.

 

[Balesir]

Air squadrons are not just planes... shifting planes with pilots is easy... getting the mechanics, spareparts and HQ shifted is much harder.
maybe there should be a few hours preperation time for any mission.

Indeed - but this is simulated with the negative ORG. Negative ORG I envisage as 'having no ground crew etc.'! That is why the 'planes can do nothing at all until the ORG is positive once more...

 

[Balesir]

I find that this system would be perfect for HOI4' s floating borders engine
But modding HOI2 or even EU3s engine to do that seems a bit optimistic. ( at least i know i wont have time to implement such a grand modification)
So sticking with the current engine and its limits is the only real viable option.(exept if we get enogh people together to code a HOI4 of our own )

Heh - sorry, I tend to automatically go into 'suggestions for HoI3' mode! Mind you, you did call the thread 'How to Simulate Air War Correctly', so what do you expect?

 

[henryjai]

As with sea combat, combat should go on not until one side breaks off, but until the side that decides to break off manages to leave the other side's range (or is shot down/sunk)...

for air war it's no no, planes will run out of ammo very quickly (mostly down 1-2 planes), but of course they do more damage than they do now in HOI2.

for sea combat it's "of course" a transport ship shouldn't be able to outrun a destroyer.

 

[Balesir]

for air war it's no no, planes will run out of ammo very quickly (mostly down 1-2 planes), but of course they do more damage than they do now in HOI2.

I'm thinking the main deciding factor would be that the winning side will have to break off itself before too long due to running out of endurance/range. The point remains that a slow bomber should not be able to outrun a fast fighter unless they are at the very limit of the fighter's range.

 

[unmerged(94832)]

- Add a new mission called "guided interception"...
If Aircraft are on this mission, they are not just wandering aimlessly around. But are on standby for enemy detection and lauch immidiatly when needed.

I think that is a good idea and can make differance in large areas. It would be better with an option to leave selected area(i mean assaining air superiority everywhere in range) divisions can help conflict in neighbor areas and defend better against transport planes tring to break through defens line.

 

[henryjai]

you might also make high altitude bombers more deadly, so level 1 interceptors won't be able to even harm it...

 

[Lennartos]

Edited first post!

Should flyng height be simulated?

 

[Balesir]

As an alternative to the 'area missions' idea I explained above for Air Superiority, Interdiction, Ground Attack, Reconnaissance and Naval Intercept, how about this:

Units on such missions are shown in a province nominated, circling (like with CAGs now). They can 'see' into adjacent provinces, and when they detect a target (air unit for Air Sup., enemy in combat for Ground Att., enemy moving or in combat for Interdiction, enemy naval unit for Naval Intercept) they immediately move to it and attack. The 'patrol' stage (circling) is at reduced fuel use rate. Radar greatly increases effective visibility in own and adjacent sea provinces - air units are invisible until detected. This simulates better (though not as well as the original idea) patrols of ~1 flight/squadron finding the enemy and then all squadrons being vectored in.

 

[Lennartos]

now you have hit the nail on the head.

granted you have added lower fuel usage( but thats a good thing), but else we are once again in an agreement on how to use the egine limits, as they are now...
when we get the code i will experiment on changing air-code, but we will have to see for results.