Suggestions for fixing Air Power?

[Gluegun]

Hi there... I'm looking for some suggestions for how to make Air Power in Alpha Centauri more fun, gameplay-wise... So far, all I've come up with is making the "Combat penalty % -> Air superiority unit vs. ground unit" 0, and doing something so the AI always builds interceptor units...? So it's possible to have all your planes be interceptors, and it would have to be an attrition war of interceptors to win...? Would that work? Anyone else have any suggestions? What really irks me is a bunch of planes roaming around free over my lands, where I can really do not much of anything to stop them... at least until I get "1/best/Clean/AAA" units everywhere... hmm... maybe moving AAA somewhere very early? Anyone have any idea where?

[Maniac]

Reduce the movement points of chopper.

[Gluegun]

Well, ya, but what about the Needlejets BEFORE ya get choppers? Any suggestions?

[The Mad Monk]

I don't see anything that needs fixing.

Except choppers.

[Maniac]

I agree with Mad Monk. Having a difference between penetrators and interceptors at least adds a bit of strategy and choice. What's fun in a pure interceptor war of production and attrition?

Oh yeah, something else to make air combat more vivid might be to put the air carrier ability earlier in the tech tree. Say Doc:Ini or so.

[GeoModder]

Re: Suggestions for fixing Air Power?

I refer to my Marssurvivors scenario on Maniac's link . I did put 'choppers (with low movement points) on Doctrine: Air Power, and Needlejets (with 3 flying turns and increased range) on Mind/Machine Interface.

The idea was that needlejets became some kind of low orbit space fighters capable of attacking halfway the planet

[johndmuller]

Gluegun, If I'm understanding you correctly, you're getting harassed by the AI's planes and are struggling to defend yourself, so you may need to adjust your strategy. (my apologies if you are coming from somewhere else.) Particularly, it would help to get Doc:AP yourself, sometime in the same general timeframe that they do by trading or stealing it from them or in the old fashioned way (researching it yourself). Then you can take the fight to them - it is easier to actively take out their planes (like in their base) rather than to defend against them in your territory (although you may find SAM rovers and interceptors to be useful as well).

Many posters here find that the AI handles aircraft in too wishy-washy a fashion - i.e., the AI seems to be reluctant to attack bases with planes, especially when you have AAA and/or AeroComplexes, even if it could knock out your defenses with the loss of only a couple of NJ's. The AI also is relatively non-competitive when it comes to aggressive use of Choppers (hardly ever using the 'Chop and Drop' attack). Mostly, the AI airforce seems to specialize in flying around doing nothing; occasionally picking off formers and crawlers. Consequently, people try to think of ways to diminish the power of aircraft, particularly choppers, to avoid taking advantage of the AI to such an unseemly extent.

The power of choppers does seem somewhat great IMhO compared to NJ's, particularly considering how easy it seems to be for individuals on the ground to shoot them down in the real world. Cutting back the movement allowance of the choppers seems to be a reasonable balancing act, even thought it doesn't reallly address that particular disconnect, but unfortunately that adjustment is one of those things that are driven by the Alpha(x).txt file [i]on each individual's computer[i] and are not bound into the game file for PBEMs, so it would have to be changed on everlyone's machine in a PBEM, which is a big PIA and generally a show stopper.

I've often thought that delaying the onset of Doc:AP would be a good idea, especially with respect to Doc:Flex. I think that this could be easily done by inserting an extra tech before Doc:AP (using Doc:AP's prereq's for the new tech and making the new tech the prereq of Doc:AP). The Doc:AP would remain the prereq for the NJ chasis, but the new tech could release a new predesigned basic Gun-NJ unit (a 'Biplane') that would not be very dangerous, but would still have its uses. Something similar could be done for MMI to further delay the destabilizing effects of Choppers and drop units. I think that such changes to the tech tree are bound into the PBEM files, but I would have to check that out to be sure.