Air Combat Mechanics?

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    • Air Combat Mechanics?

      Air combat has a lot of interesting aspects, however, some of them are unrealistic and changing them would make the game more strategic and challenging to play.

      If a plane is ordered to attack, the time it needs to reach the current position of the target is calculated and used as the attack timer. The attack timer does not change if the target moves, often resulting in slower planes chasing down faster ones, which doesn't make much sense.
      It makes air manoeuvres mostly pointless which I don't think is good. I suggest the attack timer is updated relative to the target's current position in short intervals (like 5 seconds). If the attacker is within the distance of 5 of the target at the time the attack timer is updated, the planes engage.

      With the current version of the game, if the target is out of range and the attack timer runs out, the attacker won't deal damage but still has to refuel. This aspect could be replaced by the attacker plane turning around to refuel when it flies out of its range while chasing its target.

      A minor issue:
      I also suggest that planes patrolling from an airport/carrier shouldn't have to refuel when they get out of range. This (don't ask me how) even happens to planes operating from stationary airports/carriers. When an airport/carrier becomes unfunctional, the information should be carried from the airbase to the plane to prevent planes from having to refuel despite their airport being functional the whole time.

      - - -

      Planes tend to always use offensive values to defend, even when grounded. The defending plane also deals damage to the attacker before the attacker engages.

      I suggest that grounded, not refuelling planes and also planes returning to refuel should use defensive values to defend. Planes in the air (except ones returning to refuel) could still use offensive values to defend - you don't expect a plane wing in the air to defend just as poorly as a grounded one.
      To prevent attacking planes from being in disadvantage, though, an attacking plane should strike first, before the defender deals offensive damage back. That way the first side to attack should be in advantage, and it's also quite realistic. When attacking a land or naval target, planes should still receive defensive damage before they strike, though.

      Assuming those suggestions are implemented, if planes go straight up against each other and their attack timers get updated at different times, it can cause one of the planes to strike first. This could be kept as an element of randomness, or, made so that if both planes are attacking each other and one of them engages, both attack each other at the same time (so both still deal full damage) and then both defend using the offensive values. If one of the sides dies in the first full damage round they don't defend.
      Basically would make it so neither of the sides strikes first if they are both assigned to attack each other.

      Just a suggestion. And if ever, it'll probably take a longer time to implement due to the workload with WebGL, but let's hope we'll have it at some point anyway. :)
      "In CoW, don't stamp on things before looking. Rakes are everywhere!"

      "Don't underestimate noobs; if they don't know what they're doing, how can you?"

      Hornetkeeper