Planes can't sink ships, DEAL WITH IT

[Ironikinit]

It's been said before, but it's mainly a matter of play balance. As it is, I don't build much of a navy. If bombard units (including air in this instance) could sink ships I might not bother with a navy at all.

Further, there's an argument for realism concerning the current model.

While ships have been sank by dropped bombs, level bombers aren't good at sinking ships, AFAIK. Air power isn't the end all be all. Most of the famous incidents of ships sank by planes (Pearl Harbor, Midway, or the damage sustained by the Bismark) involved tactical bombers. Currently the game doesn't have a tactical bomber unit.

The example you gave of a missle sinking a ship is covered in the game. The patch improves on that, too.

If bombers could engage and sink ships as they did in Civ 2, then we would have the TOTALLY UNREALISTIC LIKE EVEN WORSE THAN SPEARMAN DAMAGING MODERN ARMOR situation of galleys or other sea units unequipped with AA capability possibly damaging air units.

The current model reflects the reality that air power alone can't win wars, and I applaud that.

There's more to the rationale, and this is just repetition. Basically all I can say is that it works in the game, and if you think about it, it's not unrealistic. There are other aspects of the game I find a lot less realistic, but nothing really laughably absurd.

[Barnacle Bill]

It could easily be modelled to work right.

New factor for all sea & ground units - Air Defense Factor. This is set to 0 for all pre-20th Century units. When the unit is under bombardment, for every round of bombardment it receives it dishes one out with its Air Defense factor to the attacking air unit. Ships can die from bombardment but ground units cannot. Air units can be killed by AD, but will break off if they have already reduced a ground unit target to 1 HP.

New unit ability - Air Defense Unit. Air units attacking a stack get their choice of target (including generically targeting "city" or "terrain improvements" instead of one of the units). If there is a unit with the Air Defense Unit ability in the tile, and the selected target has a lower AD factor than the ADU, the ADU's AD factor is used to shoot back at the air unit instead of the target's AD factor. Of course, Aegis cruisers would have this.

New unit ability - can be destroyed by bombardment. This is the mechanism by which the differentiation is made between ground & naval units (and allows those so inclined to mod it according to their own taste).

New unit ability - can bombard ships. "Level Bombers" and fighters can be denied this ability (see the strike aircraft below).

New unit ability - can base on carriers. "Level bombers" can be denied this ability.

New units - Strike Aircraft and Strike Jets. These would be able to base on carriers, bombard ships, but have the range of fighters/jet fighters and bombardment factors lower than the contemporary "level bomber". Non-fighters will "intercept" and bombard ships passing through their operational radius. Both types of interception work with carrier-based air units.

New order - escort. Fighter-type units ordered to escort a particular unit will intercept any enemy fighter which intercepts the escorted unit. The combat between the escort and interceptor is resolved before the combat between the interceptor and its target. This works for escorted non-fighter units intercepting & bombarding ships as well.

New Advance effect - Improved AD. If an advance has this effect checked, when you get it the effective AD factor for all your units is thereafter some multiplier times the normal value (1.25, 1.5, 2, whatever). Rocketry gets this effect, to reflect that your units are now SAM-equipped.

There are ways to balance all this so that if you plan to do any invading you need warships. Part of it involves a similar upgrade of submarines so that you need ASW escorts for transports and carriers. Of course, the prime of battleships is the era before effective aircraft exist. This should be modelled by additional techs so that the first aircraft you get is a biplane that can only do recon, air intercept & escort missions, and a tech sequence such that you will get battleships a pretty long time before those strike aircraft show up. Before strike aircraft, you will need a navy either to protect your own transports or destroy those of opponents invading you.

All of the above is simple within the techniques already used in the game.

[Deathwalker]

I hate it when people claim it os for balance reasons, in effect ships are super units that can't die by any mean other than another ship. This is total crap. Naval units are veryu powerful tools and depending on what unit you are talking about. They should be able to intercept planes and plane should have a chance to sink them.
The naval warfore and air warfare mdels need to updated. They were ignored not for reasons of balance, but in order to get the (APLHA) game out for Christmas
No other turn based stragegy game I have played has had this in it.

[Random Passerby]

Oh yeah, naval units are very powerful units, I always hate it when I'm trying to destroy a battleship halfway around the world and it gets away because I can't destroy it with bombers--in several centuries it could concievably manage to crawl its way over to my continent and destroy a road or two or something. Curse those over-powerful naval units!

[korn469]

unless you completely changed the model around simply allowing planes to sink ships would not balance the game at all

like Ironikinit said, to make the game "More Realistic" you would have WW2 bombers sinking Aegis cruisers

everyone complaining about how unrealistic it is not to be able to sink ships should instead complain about how modern warships have a top speed of about 8 kilometers a day

aircraft killing all units is one of the reasons that the SMAC combat model was unbalanced, and i think that this is the number one reason why they changed air units around in Civ3

i would say the major thing about this is that units have too few hit points, so being at 1hp isn't the liability it should be

[Barnacle Bill]

Originally posted by Deathwalker
The naval warfore and air warfare mdels need to updated.

Originally posted by Random Passerby
Oh yeah, naval units are very powerful units, I always hate it when I'm trying to destroy a battleship halfway around the world and it gets away because I can't bomb destroy it with bombers--in several centuries it could concievably manage to crawl its way over to my continent and destroy a road or two or something. Curse those over-powerful naval units!

You are both right. What they should have done was apply the same general principle to naval units as with air units. They would be based at a port. They would perform missions within an operational radius around that port, only measured as a path through connected water tiles not "as the crow flies". Of course, modern ship operational radii would be very big compared to aircraft. They could intercept enemy ships performing missions within their operational radius, if they performed no mission themselves during their previous turn and were ordered to attempt interceptions. The "explore" mission would let you reveal a number of tiles depending on the ship type (i.e. speed) - you would pick the first tile as one within the ship's operational radius which you can already see and which borders one or more "blacked out" tiles, every subsequent tile that turn would have to be adjacent to the last. With all the right rules for fleet movement/combat, interceptions, base changes, interaction between air & naval units, naval economic warfare, etc... of course, but that would be the basics of it. Maybe Civ4 (or an expansion to Civ3, but I can't see it in a patch).

[dowish]

Can't resist adding my 2 cents worth.

Generally I think this whole discussion highlights the oversimplification of the combat model in Civ3.

Balance wise, I don't think it would unbalance combat as much as some people here seem to think, but me personally would rather have a realistic (planes sink ships) unbalanced game than a "balanced," unrealistic game.

As far as the WWII bomber/Aegis arguement, it is possible, though unlikely for that to happen. WWII heavy bombers (B-17, etc) were actually pretty unefficient, that is why they had hundreds and even thousands of bombers on one raid, just to make sure they could hit one target. From what I've read, Aegis cruiser only have 30 or40 SAMs anyway, so while you'd be guaranteed to kill 30+ of the bombers, you still have 100's of bombers dropping hundreds of bombs on you. The best way to model that is to give the WWII era bombers weak bombard/attack strength and giving modern ships high air defense strengths. It was also mentioned that the Japanese showed how ineffective ship air defense was then with the kamakazi's, well, somewhere (I think it was some History Channel thing) I heard that only about 20% of kamikazi's got through to actually hit their targets. To me, that is pretty decent defense against that kind of attack.

Anyway, that's my 2 cents for now.

[roalan]

Planes Vs Ships

I don't undsrstand what the problem is ? It seem ,at least I can,that planes can damage ships down to the last red dot.Not sink them but put them in a position where there is only 1HP left.This applies to land units also.For land units thats fine.Planes do not wipe out armys.For ships? perhaps if each land unit represents an army then each sip may reprsent a task force? Planes buy themselves do not wipe out Task Forces,ex.for Midways CVA's. So just assume that if a ship has 4 HP and three are lost it equals 3 of 4 ships in the TF.

[Ballz1998]

Re: Re: Planes can't sink ships, DEAL WITH IT

Originally posted by notyoueither


Is this for real?

Care to explain that to the Japanese navy after Midway?

Of course, I have to agree with your other comments about the passive nature of Aegis Cruisers while they are being blown to 1 hp by piston engined bombers.

Salve

{RANT}
This is a game, the decision was made for game balance most likely. The planes at midway had naval support as well or did you skip the WW2 section in your history class. Some things need to be done for game balance and who gives a rats ass if its realistic or not. If you let the differences between Civ3 and Civ2 disuade you from liking the game. There is something wrong with your line of thought.
{/RANT}

[sachmo71]

How many times are we going to see this same, tired argument? yell and scream all that you want, but the recoding that would have to be done to make air vs. naval units the way some seem to want it (i.e. realistic) ensure that this will not be done. I'm sorry if it takes away your enjoyment of the game, but there isn't much point in ARGUING this again.

[sachmo71]

How many times are we going to see this same, tired argument? yell and scream all that you want, but the recoding that would have to be done to make air vs. naval units the way some seem to want it (i.e. realistic) ensure that this will not be done. I'm sorry if it takes away your enjoyment of the game, but there isn't much point in ARGUING this again.

[Encomium]

In Civ II bombers could sink warships including battleships; we all saw Pacific War scenarios starting in 1941.

In Civ III we can't even make scenarios! Worse, hordes of bombers cannot sink ANY warship!! Yet the AI is permitted ocean-going galleys!

Naval warfare is a farce in Civ III. Submarines and privateers cannot attack trade and commerce - and Sid and Firaxcis apparently never heard of Pearl Harbor or Midway.

SOLUTION:

Bombers can sink warships who will have an AIR DEFENSE factor reflecting both anti-aircraft and their ability to avoid bombs and torpedos. That, combined with correct use of fighters, should reflect reality.

Ships should not be impervious to air attacks - four or five bomber attacks should have a decent chance of sinking a battleship, as happened to the British Prince of Wales and Repulse in 1942.

Historical reality: ships, after bombers came into being, NEED AIR COVER FROM FIGHTERS. And that is where they should be able to get most of their protection from. Fighters protect ships, and that was a truism of the Pacific War starting in 1941.

Bombers being unable to sink warships in Civ III not only is STUPID, it's a step DOWN even from Civ 2.

[candidgamera]

Well as a first post have to add a voice to: its just stupid & silly that planes can't sink ships - and a step back from civ2. E is right.
Especially coupled with HMS Victory's and galley's sailing the seas in the 2030's! Comments about "game balance" are just appologizing for poor game design/concept. In Sid's world the US cruisers at Midway would have had to close with the Japanese carriers and sink them "by hand" - yeah right. The whole idea of carriers period was to sink ships from distance, and that was how it was done. Also in Sid's world/reality Force Z would have had nothing to fear sailing off merrily without aircover - although they might have been sunk by the transports when they closed to engage

And air attack also is just not the same as artillery bombardment.

Like your ideas Barnacle: I'd refine it to add an antiship and anti ground rating. Level bombers could attack ships but just wouldn't be as effective - like how early war B17s weren't that effective against Japanese shipping. Would make it "Naval bomber" units and "Naval fighter" units able to fly off carriers and make them more expensive too. Naval bombers could cover both Torpedo, Naval high level, and Dive bombers. Maybe tie in caps to naval surface and naval air unit numbers based on number of harbors built - just can't be a naval power in a vacuum? Wondering if even having Naval air ought to be a tech unto itself - not everybody did it. Have to get it even if not building carriers to reflect training to use planes better against ships - Rabaul. Naval bombers could fly off land as well.

Here's another one: Level bombers should be allowed to do recon missions - principal role for B24 and B17 in the Pacific. And how about a PBY air unit?

Could see also breaking down the battleship into dreadnaught and WWII types - WWII type having an air defense rating, slightly faster.

Note on AA: South Dakota shot down 32 planes all by itself defending Enterprise at Santa Cruz - I'd call that pretty effective. However, understand that Bismarck couldn't get the Swordfish because its light AA couldn't track slow enough. Finally, US went to 3".50 cal. after WWII because they felt 20 and 40mm hadn't been enough hitting power to knock down planes.
Guess one could say it just depended . . . with regard to ship AA.

final air unit issue: bring back the airfield.

[kimmygibler]

The game isn't supposed to mimic what really happens in real life war. The rules are you can't sink ships. While this should be included in the editor, you may as well accept the basic rules as they are.

[yin26]

the recoding that would have to be done to make air vs. naval units the way some seem to want it (i.e. realistic) ensure that this will not be done

Care to round off to the nearest one-hundreth of a second how long it would take, since you clearly were there coding the game from the ground up?