Aircraft Carriers

[dexters]

Originally posted by skywalker
Huh? You don't always (in fact, not very often) have cities in range of the target. Thus, staging platforms are useful.

You've misunderstood the conversation. It's not about staging platforms. Operational range hasn't been touched and it is not unsual for the player to rebase to an intermediate point before launching the attac.

I think that's why the rebase was fixed because people usually did have a city within range of their targets and all that was needed was to rebase aircraft to the city and launch from there.

The rationale for the fix was to force people to not rebase from their military producing core to a city within range of their target, but require a mobile platform that can be moved into range to strike at the enemy. So yes, you are correct in assessing that staging platforms are need, the question really was, what kind of platform. The fix was suppose to make people use carriers more. But has it really?

The idea being thrown around now is, was the change sufficient to have its intended effects in smaller maps where even the reduced rebase range can often times still be more than enough for players to play like they always have, which is never use any carriers and rebase burely on cities. My answer is that the change probably didn't have as big an impact, if any, on the smaller maps.

All my 4 epic games are played on standard maps, only 1 saw really intense air action (from what I could see) and all of it took place on city based air platforms and not on carriers.

Long story short. The discussion = rebase distance not operational range.

[PrinceBimz]

I find many of times I need to extend my aircraft range which is another use for carriers. For example, say I am invading across the ocean on another continent, I want air support. I do not have any cities on that enemy continent, also the distance is too far from my closest city on my continent to launch aircraft from there. Another thing, even if I had a coastal city that my planes can fly from, a carrier will still greatly increase my range. This gives my planes the ability to launch strikes far inland from a carrier just of the enemy coast. The ability of a carrier to increase aircraft range by parking just off an enemy coast is invaluable. So if you don't have a nearby city (or airbase) to rebase, you will definitely need carriers if you want air support. The AI certainly does use carriers, even in vanilla CIV3. I once seen 3 of them attacking me with planes.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by dexters


You've misunderstood the conversation. It's not about staging platforms. Operational range hasn't been touched and it is not unsual for the player to rebase to an intermediate point before launching the attac.

I think that's why the rebase was fixed because people usually did have a city within range of their targets and all that was needed was to rebase aircraft to the city and launch from there.

The rationale for the fix was to force people to not rebase from their military producing core to a city within range of their target, but require a mobile platform that can be moved into range to strike at the enemy. So yes, you are correct in assessing that staging platforms are need, the question really was, what kind of platform. The fix was suppose to make people use carriers more. But has it really?

The idea being thrown around now is, was the change sufficient to have its intended effects in smaller maps where even the reduced rebase range can often times still be more than enough for players to play like they always have, which is never use any carriers and rebase burely on cities. My answer is that the change probably didn't have as big an impact, if any, on the smaller maps.

All my 4 epic games are played on standard maps, only 1 saw really intense air action (from what I could see) and all of it took place on city based air platforms and not on carriers.

Long story short. The discussion = rebase distance not operational range.

Oh, ok. What you mean is it didn't change anything.

[dexters]

No biggie. by the number of typos in my post, you can tell im all alcoholed up.

I really like your avatar.

Originally posted by PrinceBimz
I find many of times I need to extend my aircraft range which is another use for carriers. For example, say I am invading across the ocean on another continent, I want air support. I do not have any cities on that enemy continent, also the distance is too far from my closest city on my continent to launch aircraft from there. Another thing, even if I had a coastal city that my planes can fly from, a carrier will still greatly increase my range. This gives my planes the ability to launch strikes far inland from a carrier just of the enemy coast. The ability of a carrier to increase aircraft range by parking just off an enemy coast is invaluable. So if you don't have a nearby city (or airbase) to rebase, you will definitely need carriers if you want air support. The AI certainly does use carriers, even in vanilla CIV3. I once seen 3 of them attacking me with planes.

Aye. Carriers have always been of use in continents game when you've got a big ocean where there's no way for you to move aircraft.

But usually, if you could get a foothold on the continent (in maps smaller than large) you can rebase directly from the home continent.

I think the air power area can still use some work. Airbases need something extra to make them useful.

[Cerbykins]

Heck yeah, I've yet to make ANY
Perhaps a performance bonus for the airccraft using it?

[Shogun Gunner]

Originally posted by Cerbykins
Heck yeah, I've yet to make ANY
Perhaps a performance bonus for the airccraft using it?

Not a half bad idea! It could be cities have the default civilian airport and you could build a military airbase for the performance bonus. GOOD IDEA!

[CerberusIV]

Originally posted by dexters
I think the air power area can still use some work. Airbases need something extra to make them useful.

I use them for 2 reasons.

Somewhere on my home continent to park aircraft so I can find them rather than have to go through several cities.

On smaller islands after capturing cities when it is easier and cheaper to slap down an airbase than rush an airport.

[dexters]

I do pretty much the same. I have a central repository of planes on my home continent where I rebase planes to for distribution. Kind of like a large warehouse.

But it's really more of a management issue for us humans. The fact the the AI never builds them tends to underscore how it lacks any real value.

But thinking about it, there really isn't much that can be done to modify the airfields since airpower is a fairly straighforward part of the game.

I've thought about increase rebase for airfield based planes.

I've thought about auto air superiority (kind of like a free sam over several tiles) but this may lead to abuse with people building too many of these.

So i guess airbases will remain an artifact of human play. it's too bad really since they've historically meant much more militarility. But then again, Civ isn't a military simulation.