Do you think airplanes should be able to sink ships?

[korn469]

Heh, also, try out those 10000 some odd ICBMs on cities maybe the game has a rule that the 8578th ICBM will finally obliterate the city.

They are just fine. If you want the ICBM to destroy the city think of it as an artillery shell on steroids and invade and raze after using it.

see what i am talking about? the minute you mention nukes, the nukes are fine/too powerful crowd comes out, that was actually faster than i could have imagined...so i am guessing that if there was a nuclear exchange in the 80's that everything would be fine right now in the US and Russia?

they should have left nuclear weapons out of civ3

i did some testing with air units, the only way to get them to kill ground units makes them die also, so if you wanted you could make a 40 shield 1 rof 10 bombard strength cruise missile that air units could carry and then you could call it a warhead, or a torpedo, or bunker buster, or whatever you wanted and it could be the way for airforces to finish off those last weakend units

problem solved
if you guys want i'll add it to my mod

[GePap]

Questions

If you allow aircraft to carry this new invention of your, won't they be capable of carrying regular cruise missiles? And thus, sayonara game balance?
Also, can something be carrying something thats carrying something? What I mean is, can a CV carry 6 fighters, all carrying 4 'warheards'? Would that not be a CV carrying 24 air units? If this is possible, fine solution. If its not, it does not address the issue at hand.

[Barnacle Bill]

I think that "Yes, I think that aircraft should be allowed to sink ships BUT NOT destroy ground units." is how it should work, but I voted to make it editable - that way everybody can have it however they like.

And, no, it does not mean you would not need a navy anymore. Real life modern naval combat works like this:

Carrier-based planes are needed to project power ashore (cruise missiles are VERY limited in that capability compared to aircraft). They also can rather easily sink enemy surface ships they catch, unless the ships have air cover or sophisticated defenses (Aegis).

Carriers are very vulnerable to air attack themselves. They have a multi-layered defense - their own fighters are the outer layer. SAM's launched from escorting cruisers & destoyers are the second layer. SAM's and guns on the carriers are the inner (last ditch) layer.

Modern submarines are essentially undetectable until they strike by anything but another submarine. They have the advantage in any combat with surface ships, but ASW escorts with on-board helos are better than nothing. The best way to protect your carriers is to send submarines into the area several days in advance to clean out lurking enemy subs. Subs are sea denial waepons, though, they can't project power ashore and they can't carry troops.

Amphibs have an obvious mission - carry troops. They are vulnerable to everything, and need protection from everything.

They all have a job. You can't get the job done with just transports and land-based air. Civ3 should work like real life. Making aircraft not able to sink ships does not really support that, though.

Ground units are another story. Given that a unit is roughly a division, somebody please name one time in history when an entire division was destoyed by airpower alone. Severly mauled, yes, but that is what being reduced to 1 HP represents.

[korn469]

GePap

first using the "unit carries foot soliders only" and "unit carries tactical missiles" you could set a bomber to carry the warhead units, but not normal cruise missiles, currently in my mod Aegis Cruisers can carry cruise missiles but not tactical nukes, while nuclear submarines can carry both cruise missiles and tactical nukes using the same system, for my mod i would have to choose between either Aegis cruisers carrying cruise missiles or air units carrying war heads

plus if a warhead is a finishing weapon a transport ability of 1 should be more than enough, as far as transport units carrying other transport units i'm not sure how that would work out, probably the main transport would have to have a space for all units

but since aircraft carriers only carry 4 units in civ3 bumping it up to 6 so they could carry warheads probably wouldn't hurt too bad

also i disagree with this

So, realistically, it would take the entire airwing of a CV to sink a BB.

that is SOOO unrealistic its not even funny

take a look at this

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-fornv/japan/japsh-xz/yamato-n.htm

The carrier planes began their attacks in the early afternoon, scoring immediate bomb and torpedo hits on Yamato and sinking Yahagi and a destroyer. Three other destroyers were sunk over the next hour, as the Japanese continued to steam southwards. In all, Yamato was struck by some ten torpedoes, mainly on the port side, and several bombs. At about 1420 on the afternoon of 7 April, less than two hours after she was first hit, the great battleship capsized to port, exploded and sank, leaving behind a towering "mushroom" cloud. Fewer than 300 men of Yamato's crew were rescued. Nearly 2500 of her men were lost, plus over a thousand more from Yahagi and the escorting destroyers. U.S. losses totalled ten aircraft and twelve aircrewmen.

so one of the most powerful battleships ever was sank by 10 WW2 torpedos and several bombs less than two hours after the carrier based planes engaged it...so a few modern precision weapons could most likely take it out

plus why would an entire airwing spend two years trying to sink a single ship?

that's way more unrealistic than them not being able to sink a ship at all

Civ3 isn't realistic at all, it should just try to maintain the facade of realism in the most fun way possible

[mfauzi]

Though I voted that they should destroy both, I think I can agree that they should destroy ships and not land units.

With modern technology, planes carry ASMs (Air to Surface Missiles) with IR which could easily track down a warm ship on the cool sea/ocean. I don't see why they can't successfully destroy ships after a few missiles. And even with just plain bombarding, why can't a ship be destroyed? And about pearl habour, of course those ships can be repaired and reused, they only sank to a certain depth. Imagine if it sank into the ocean. Now, who would want to get that ship and repair it?

Maybe the 1HP remaining after bombing on land units is fair, since the terrain could help shield them (though, eventually they have to be destroyed if the planes were persistent enough).

Maybe 4 cruise missiles in a plane is just overkill. I don't even think planes can carry cruise missiles. They're huge!

[korn469]

f/a-18 hornets can carry the following

AIM 9 Sidewinder, AIM 7 Sparrow, AIM-120 AMRAAM, Harpoon, Harm, Shrike, SLAM, SLAM-ER, Walleye, Maverick missiles; Joint Stand-Off Weapon (JSOW); Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM); various general purpose bombs, mines and rockets

B-52's can carry the following

Approximately 70,000 pounds (31,500 kilograms) mixed ordnance -- bombs, mines and missiles. (Modified to carry air-launched cruise missiles, Harpoon anti-ship and Have Nap missiles.)

so yea cruise missiles are ok

but the question i want all of those in favor of planes sinking ships to answer is how will it make the game game fun without causing any unbalance to the already existing system?

personally a submarine taking 8 years to cross the Atlantic Ocean in the 1940s seems way more unrealistic and low naval movement is more of a problem

[Unregistered]

Well, no one ever claimed Civ modeled combat really well, did they? My biggest nitpick w/ the Civ series has always been that the combat was way too abstracted for my tastes. I would like a *much* more realistic combat model & a much larger set of options for units to build. Having said that, I'll also say that my experience with it so far hasn't been horribly negative either, given the type of game this is.

I'll admit that I was really looking forward to playing this newest Civ because I did like some of the directions that smac took with the game franchise. The unit editor & the terrain model I liked in particular. Some history there...


"Would I like to sink ships w/ planes?" Silly question. Yes, of course I would. Coral Sea, Midway, Pearl, etc. But there are only five plane types to model the entire spectrum of military front line aircraft, so some compromise is unavoidable.

& "Or destroy ground units?" Well, that's a little bit tougher. Hurt them pretty badly, yah, but wipe them out? Has happened sometimes, but very rare. Not very often to a healthy division sized ground force that I know of anyway. Which is about what I tend to think of my ground unit sizes as being. At least. Ground units in the red already? Maybe. Fairly small one. Did they start out green that same turn? Maybe not then. In a turn that represents 5 years of game time? Well...

There's a fine line that has to be walked for tbs of this type to succeed. I've not quite finished my first 'real' game, & so far my fighter's haven't had any incoming bombers to ignore. This is about to change tho, so I'll be watching to see what they do with the bombers I expect to see in about 3 turns after I apply the patch. There are things I have problems w/ in the game, but maybe some of them can be fixed by using the editor. At least there is an editor. Or may be, someday. Soonish. They say.

There are other things that we're all forced to accept due to the nature of this type of tbs. I'm still having fun with it, but I had hoped for a little more. esp after playing eu this summer. But then, it only attempted to model 300 yrs of history. & was *much* more abstract. & has a few probs of its own imo. So...

Anyway, d/l complete,

C ya,

[GePap]

Further replies

Korn469
The thing you quote says it all- it took seven torpedoes (i.e seven torpedo bombers at least) and several bombs (i.e., several dive bombers, since they carry only one main bomb each) to sink 1 BB. Remember, many of the aircraft in a CV are fighetrs, for air protection. A typical essex carrier could carry 80 planes. If 50 of them are attack (dive bombers, torpedoes) then it took at least half the carriers attack wing (remembering sorties that miss) to sink the BB. The Musashi took even more punishment, so saying that it would take the whole carrier airwing (in WW2) to sink a BB is not utterly unrealisitc.

Also, I doubt that a aircraft carries could carry many planes with warheads. I base this on the armies, which are treated as 4 ground units (in a 3 unit army) for purposes of carrying. Why would a fighter carrying 'warheads' not be treated as 2 (if it only carries one) air units?, thus fitting few on a carrier.

[GePap]

Why it would be better

Korn469:
I would first state that I don't think giving bombarment the chance to sink something would in any way unbalance things, especially as they are so utterly unbalanced as is: Do you ever build carriers? I mean, whats the point? (currently) If I don't even need the for air protection to counter enemy air attacks (which will fail) on my invasion transports, so long as I have enough BB's around to sink any enemy warships (except those invincible uber-ironclads).
If anything, letting bombarment kill would balance this game. It would force persons to build combined fleets, perhaps force the A.I. to understand the power of arty and aircraft, make people think twice about wars or invasions unless they are trully well prepared, so forth and so on. I think it would make for richer, more complex(and thought provoking) strategies, while letting defensively minded players a chance to live without having to build either coastal cities they don't want because without a navy they have no way to stop overseas attacks. The current system forces things upon the player, while making this change would allow for more varied strategies.

[korn469]

GePap

to sink the Yamamoto it took ten torpedos and several bombs
they sent 400 aircraft to sink it

but the thing is it only took them 2 hours and in Civ3 from 1750-1950 each turn is 2 years long, so big deal it took 400 aircraft 2 hours out of the 17,544 (1944 was a leap year) hours available in that turn that is less than one tenth of 1% of the time available in that turn

Also, I doubt that a aircraft carries could carry many planes with warheads. I base this on the armies, which are treated as 4 ground units (in a 3 unit army) for purposes of carrying. Why would a fighter carrying 'warheads' not be treated as 2 (if it only carries one) air units?, thus fitting few on a carrier

Carriers only carry four planes
to me that classifies as not many, by increasing the carrying capasity to 6 then you could carry four planes and two warheads, and unless you are carrying bombers fighters aren't going to weaken a battleship enough to use a warhead on it anyways

what i was saying is that if you play around with the editor you can fix almost all of the problems with combat balance, certainly not all but most of them, i just provided you with a solution to aircraft sinking ships so why aren't you happy?

Unregistered

I'll admit that I was really looking forward to playing this newest Civ because I did like some of the directions that smac took with the game franchise. The unit editor & the terrain model I liked in particular.

i don't know about you but i am actually looking forward to Brian Reynold's foray into RTS games, it might be just what we are looking for

also i think you're take on the combat model pretty much sums up it civ3 is, an abstract empire building game with a semi tactical and very abstract combat system

[Moraelin]

I don't know why many people assume it has to be an "all or nothing" situation, though. It does not have to be EITHER having Civ 2 all over again, OR having air units that don't do anything, but never anything in between. Again:

1) You would need several airstrikes in a row to sink a battleship, or to destroy any kind of target for that matter. They would not stay there and keep shooting at the ship until you destroy it. Each plane or helicopter would take one shot, return to base, that's it.

2) I've already said that there should be a chance to miss, based on experience and the unit's defense. So even though that BB has 3 lines of health, it wouldn't be guaranteed that 3 air strikes will sink it.

3) There's been already another request that modern ground and water units be able to shoot back at airplanes and helicopters. So each time your airplane attacks that battleship, it should be not just another guaranteed taking 1 hp off it. It would be a gamble that also includes the chance to lose your plane instead.

4) You can always stack several ships together, effectively making a very realistic battle group, in which case they should protect each other with their AA defense.

As for Barnacle Bill, I'm thinking that it is actually very possible to destroy an armoured division for example with airplanes and/or helicopters. Again, I don't mean I could actually kill every single soldier soldier in it, including those who are currently on leave and not even there, but... frankly, if you reduce it to a company of infantry from an armour division, for all practical purposes it counts as destroyed. I doubt that any general would think that's still one unit fit to fight. Plus that's a lot less left of it than 1 hp out of 4. Since we don't have a way in the game to model "a quarter hp left and zero offense power against a full enemy division", I'd say "destroyed" is a close enough equivalent.

Plus, IRL you'd need to at least rebuild all those destroyed tanks. Effectively, you'd need to build as many new tanks as for making a new division. IMHO having to build a new unit in the game to replace it is a pretty darn close equivalent. A better one than "I'll set it on fortify for 3 turns and mysteriously that company will grow back into a full size armour division."

Besides, if we're to think that destroying a unit means totally wiping out every single man in it, and as long as there's one soldier alive the unit still has 1hp out of 4, it should be impossible for ANY unit to destroy any unit. Ever. In any battle, there have been survivors. There are people who are wounded, not killed, and in fact the majority tends to fall in that category. There are people who were scared senseless and just hid or retreated without being ordered to. There are people who weren't even there, e.g., because they had already been evacuated to a hospital or were on leave or whatnot. And so on. Yet it doesn't stop us from assuming that the unit was destroyed.

[GePap]

Even further responses

Korn469:

For me a turn is a turn, what the year interval the game decides to attach to a turn (whether it be 50,25, 20,10,5,2,1) doesn't mean a damn , and I simply ignore it, or 1 turn=1 year based arguments. You said they sent 400 planes to sink the ship. Well, that was the full load of at least 5 Essex class carrier, so in fact, i was being rather generous, it seems, when I said that it would take just 1 full airwing to sink.

As for your solution. It is a fine second place, but in no way does it trully FIX the situation, which is why I will neither cry for joy, nor utilize it. WWe don't create an exxtra unit for tanks to carry called 'shells'. Why not? Becuase we assume that a tank carries shells, and that it is using them when fighting (hence, the fighting animation). I expect planes to come with thier armament built in (hence their combat animation), not be expected to fool around with the editor to bring some sanity to the game.

On the editor, while I am on it, I used the Civ2 editor to make scenerios for my own enjoyment, not to change the fundamental rules of the normal civ2 game. I think that the whole 'but just use the editor' argument is INVALID, yes, INVALID. I will not stop criticising design decisions that I belive are very detrimental to the overall gameplay just because there is an editor that allows me to sort of mimick a solution. If I could, with the editor, implement the concept I want, fine. BUt I do not accept, nor will i condone, half-fixes and other ducktape measures to save the sinking ship.

[korn469]

GePap

For me a turn is a turn, what the year interval the game decides to attach to a turn (whether it be 50,25, 20,10,5,2,1) doesn't mean a damn , and I simply ignore it, or 1 turn=1 year based arguments. You said they sent 400 planes to sink the ship. Well, that was the full load of at least 5 Essex class carrier, so in fact, i was being rather generous, it seems, when I said that it would take just 1 full airwing to sink.

if you are ignoring the turn amount of time that passes by with a turn, because hey it's just a game then ignore the fact that airplanes can't sink a ship

because if we start to focus on realism in the modern era then the only way to ensure even a shallow basing in realism is to completely overhaul the game

no game can hope to have a real depiction of WW2 if WW2 is only a matter of 3.5 turns giving the fastest ship (battleship movement=5) a total movement of 20 tiles at most

first the map is incorrect, it would take more time to cross the earth at the equator than close to the poles

the earth has a total surface area of 5.10x10^8 km^2 as stated by nasa (http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/phys_props_earth.html), so since the map is distorted that means each square tile has an area of (5.10x10^8/(100x100)) 5100km^2...or each side of each tile is about 145 miles

that means ships are traveling at a speed of less than a mile per day
unrealistic

with an area of 145 miles per side, bombard should be removed from the game because it highly overrates the range of artillary pieces
unrealistic

battleships have a bombard range of 2, or that means a battleships guns can fire nearly 300 miles instead of about 30
unrealistic

a B-29 bomber has a range of 5,830 according to boeing (http://www.boeing.com/companyoffices...oeing/b29.html) so its operational range should be at least 40 squares
unrealistic

according to the already presented site (http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/ops/desert_storm.htm) america dropped an average of 47,777.78 tons of bomb a month in world war 2...even assuming that every bomber was a B-29 with a 10 ton bomb load, to equal the tonnage dropped by the americans doing one mission every two years we would need about 1146 air units (@100 real planes to an air unit) on an average sized map just to equal the amount of bombs the americans dropped
unrealistic

i can keep on going but i think i have proved my point

civ3 isn't realistic

plus if you allowed air units to sink ships, with a value of stealth bombers equal in shields to the invading force it would be immpossible to invade your landmass since the chance of intercepting a stealth mission is so low and the ground units would give the stealth units enough numbers to sink your fleet (this is assuming they implement a return fire system for ships)

they did this for balance reasons
without a return fire system and an equal number of shields, bombers alone would be able to most most amphibious invasions because they would always get at least one attack on the invasion fleet if there was more than six water spaces between landmasses

once air units could sink naval units there would be zero reason to waste money on useless navies

[korn469]

plus another thing

if there is a 1 hp regular galley and you attack it with a nuclear weapon, it only has a 50% chance of being destroyed...a low ball estimate of a nuclear missile in Civ3 is 120 100kt warheads (1 nuclear sub unit=an ohio class nuclear ballistic missile submarine; 1 tactical nuke is equal to the same capacity or 24 missiles which i recently read carried 5 instead of their design of 8 warheads, so 24*5=120; W-76 Trident I/II 100kt warhead, W-88 Trident II 475kt warhead)

so yea complete realism is what civ3 strives for

EDIT: the reason i wanted to see a destructive implementation of nuclear weapons along with M.A.D. wasn't realism per se but more just the feeling of looking eyeball to eyeball trying to find out who is going to blink first, nuclear weapons actually restrained massive conventional wars in the 20th century, and nuclear weapons alone held quite a grip on people...without fearing the destruction of major parts of our world i'm sure the cold war would have been a little less exciting...the cuban missile crisis was certainly one conflict that nuclear weapons dramatized, a simple small buildup of soviet troops in cuba without nuclear weapons wouldn't have been anything to write home about, the fact that nuclear missiles were about to go operational that could obliterate washing D.C. five minutes after launch was certainly something to fear

[korn469]

GePap

one last little thing about realism for the night

i doubt any single aircraft could sink a BB without either getting a lucky hit or carryng a blockbuster or daisycutter

A blockbuster (also tallboy) is a 10,000lb-12,000lb
bomb, and a daisycutter is the largest dumb bomb we have. Both would do vastly more damage than a harpoon, a couple of mavericks, or a bomb 1/5 their explosive power.

i just remembered that the daisycutter as you call it is only dropped from the MC-130, and they don't drop it like a bomb, they push it out of the back of the plane through the cargo door

one little thing to note is the MC-130 has a top speed of about 300 mph (maybe a little less) and it certainly can't take off from a carrier so you are saying it's realistic that a plane that flys slower than a WW2 mustang would be in the forefront of attacking a battleship?

the MC-130 with a BLU-82 would probably be about the last thing used to attack a battleship

hows that for realism


you're right realism sucks