Evil 8.8 cm Flak vs other AA guns

[ivanov]

While playing the DLC's, I try to build my core along the historical lines, so I make an extensive use of the anti-air units. What I have noticed in the process, is the the evil 8.8cm satanic-flak-gun, is universally better than the lower caliber AA weapons. The 8.8cm Flak was mainly designed to protect the aerial objects from the heavy bomber attack and I don't think that it was too effective, when employed tactically against the smaller and faster moving fighter or attack aircraft. In the game however, the infamous flak is much more effective against any type of target.

It is more powerfull not only against the bombers...



...but also against the more agile fighters:



It is not uncommon, that my four star experianced flak, can shot down 8-9 strenght points of the enemy fighter.

Due to that, the Flak is turned into an universal uber-weapon which is quite harmful to overal the gameply experience.

I think that the problem originates from the fact, that the 8.8cm is a dual purpose weapon and due to that has to have a hight attack and initiative stats in order to be able to fight the tanks. Maybe the solution would be if the AA weapons had two AA stats - one against the bombers and another against the fighters and attack planes?

I think that is something worth looking at for the future equipment files, released along with the new patch.

[deducter]

Something along these lines had been discussed before. A change like this requires an expansion, not a patch. And I would be very careful about making PzC a game with too many other combat stats/features, as one of its major appeal is that it is an easy-to-learn game with great depth.

INI is irrelevant in ground/air combat. Ground units always have 100 INI, this is hardcoded.

This actually has been a problem that is bugging me in my mod, which is how to make the other FlaK units useful. The only thing I can think of is to lower the AA of the 88 gun but increase the AA of the other guns.

Personally I think the 88 gun is plenty balanced. I in fact buff the HA of the gun in 1942 to compensate for the well-armored and experienced Russian tanks. I do agree it is probably too destructive to air units.

Do you think fighters or bombers should have better Air Defense (AD)? This is another problem that is bugging me. I don't know enough about the air war to know for instance what kind and how many Soviet/German planes were shot down by fighters or AA fire.

[deducter]

I just thought of another solution: I can set the ROF of the 88 gun in AA mode to something like 5 or 7. That way, there's a good chance that each hit will be a kill, but it won't be super effective on fighters. If combined with a buff to the GD of fighters, it might be about equally effective against both fighters and bombers.

The quad 20 cm and 37 cm FlaK will have 12 and 10 ROF respectively, so they should be more useful.

[ivanov]

I think that increasing the rate of fire of smaller guns, while lowering the air attack of the 8.8cm, could be a solution closest to the reality.

I don't know the exact data about the ratio of the aircraft shot down by the AA vs aricraft shot down by the fighters, but certainly ( unlike in the modern era ), the fighters shot down the was majority of the planes over the Easter-Front. I'd say it could be maybe 20-30% planes shot down by the AA.

[Kerensky]

For the longest time, we had a situation where air defense guns were pretty hard to use effectively and were really struggling to justify taking up a spot in a player's CORE.

We wanted to address that, so in addition to patching them and increasing their power, we also improved on the scenario design of the DLCs to further promote the use of AD weapons.

We're pretty happy with where AD units are right now. They are finally showing up in the single player campaign in decent numbers, (both 88s and a few self propelled versions in DLC 1943, 44, and 45). They are also very useful in multiplayer scenarios, if a side losses the air superiority battle, they pretty typically fall back on purchasing AD units as the battle continues.

Besides, the dual purpose 88 has a lot of history and notoriety behind it, and we really wanted players to enjoy it and see how effective it was for themselves. Effective as it is, and with its bonus dual purpose mode, they don't show up in a player's CORE very often, which is the perfect place for them to be. Strong and useful, but limited in purpose. This makes sure that our players are encouraged and rewarded to use them, but keeps it from being purchased excessively.

Most COREs seem to contain 1 or 2 88s:
viewtopic.php?f=121&t=31618

Going into DLC 43 and onwards, a lot more players are using the self propelled AD units too (definitely a result of scenario design, the Red Air Force gets pretty serious in those later years), which is perfect.
viewtopic.php?f=125&t=32295

Harmful to gameplay? Nah.
Harmful to gameplay would be players never using AD units at all, or using them too much.

In the end though, players can always tweak the values, such as RoF, for themselves if they want to adjust the game as they see fit. One of the wonderful aspects of Panzer Corps is its ability to be modded and tweaked.

[ivanov]

I think that the issue mentioned above is not that the AA weapons in general are too effective, but that the 8.8cm Flak is too strong against the fighters, which turnes it into a "super weapon". I'm all about using the AA weapon systems. I have three 88mm Flaks and three 37mm self propelled units in my core. The problem I see, is that the later is always less effective, however it's a dedicated AA system while the 8.8cm is a dual purpose weapon. Due to that the balance 8.8cm Flak vs lower caliber AA should be changed. The only question is how?

[Kerensky]

And Tigers outperform Panzer IIIs, that's sort of how the game works.
But like the Tigers and Panzer IIIs, heavy AD is more expensive than light AD.

[boredatwork]

And Tigers outperform Panzer IIIs, that's sort of how the game works.

Your analogy is flawed. AA gun perfomance was tied to the altitude of the target - with smaller, faster firing weapons with impact fuses being much more effective against aircraft below 4000', ie typical fighter bombers. The reason for larger guns was to fire at targets at high altitude - 9000'+ which took a larger shell. The longer flight times and slower rates of fire made direct hits unlikely so you had to rely on time fuzes to hopefully burst your shell at the right altitude and shower the target with shrapnal - again requiring a larger shell.

[kverdon]

One thing to keep in mind here, and it does add to balance, is that the one thing SP AD units have over the 8.8cm is that they can move AND shoot or, more importantly, can move AND defend against air attack. This makes them very valuable for escorting moving formations. Keep in mind this is a game folks.....

Kevin

[Kerensky]

This has been brought up before, along with light AD not being able to reach high flying level bombers.
viewtopic.php?f=125&t=27960

[Kerensky]

One thing to keep in mind here, and it does add to balance, is that the one thing SP AD units have over the 8.8cm is that they can move AND shoot or, more importantly, can move AND defend against air attack. This makes them very valuable for escorting moving formations. Keep in mind this is a game folks.....

Kevin

Absolutely, those light AD guns that are self propelled are very handy when you need an air defense umbrella for a mobile attack force.

[ivanov]

And Tigers outperform Panzer IIIs, that's sort of how the game works.
But like the Tigers and Panzer IIIs, heavy AD is more expensive than light AD.

It's a really devilish analogy Kerensky Tigers and Panthers were a new generation compared to the earlier panzers, while 8.8cm Flak and lower caliber AA systems were a different purpose weapons and their performance is mirrored incorrectly in the game.

[ivanov]

One thing to keep in mind here, and it does add to balance, is that the one thing SP AD units have over the 8.8cm is that they can move AND shoot or, more importantly, can move AND defend against air attack. This makes them very valuable for escorting moving formations. Keep in mind this is a game folks.....

Kevin

Absolutely, those light AD guns that are self propelled are very handy when you need an air defense umbrella for a mobile attack force.

That's the theory but experienced players know, that because the AI ground and air forces attack in waves, as soon as the enemy counter attack is encountered, the whole friendly formation basically has to stop or move very cautiously. Due to that I never felt that the mobility of the other self propelled systems, gave them an edge over the 8.8cm Flaks that have their fire range of 3 hexes AND can move and fire one hex.

[robman]

Here's a solution that would work (in principle) with a slight mod of the existing game:

(1) Ground units have two separate air attack values, low altitude (light AA) and high altitude (heavy AA). This is very intuitive, even the newest player would instantly grasp the concept.

(2) Some units (tac bombers) could switch (with the "switch" button) between low and high altitude ground attacks. Again, this is intuitive, much easier to grasp than, say, "initiative." At low altitude, greater chance of doing damage but more vulnerability to light AA. At higher altitude, less damage and less vulnerability to light AA, but more vulnerability to heavy AA.

This would actually be quite fun, and very much in the rock/paper/scissors spirit of the game.

[ivanov]

Here's a solution that would work (in principle) with a slight mod of the existing game:

(1) Ground units have two separate air attack values, low altitude (light AA) and high altitude (heavy AA). This is very intuitive, even the newest player would instantly grasp the concept.

(2) Some units (tac bombers) could switch (with the "switch" button) between low and high altitude ground attacks. Again, this is intuitive, much easier to grasp than, say, "initiative." At low altitude, greater chance of doing damage but more vulnerability to light AA. At higher altitude, less damage and less vulnerability to light AA, but more vulnerability to heavy AA.

This would actually be quite fun, and very much in the rock/paper/scissors spirit of the game.

Rob, your proposals sound interesting but that would be a huge change for the game and we couldn't expect it to be implemented any time soon. But yes - the best solution would be if the AA units had two anti-air paramenters - one against bombers and one against the fighters/attack aircraft.

[Gwaylare]

So overall I could not understand this discussion. So I am playing multiplayer most of the time, may be this is different in the DLCs.
My feeling is, that AA is not strong enough overall. The only one reason I use AA for, is to guard drawn back units not to be bombed.

The main problem in multiplayer games is a weak aircraft. So anti aircraft is weak, because it is a counter unit against a weak unit. The battle is won or lost on the ground, not in the air. So I almost never buy aircraft or AA, I just repair those one at the beginning and then I ignore enemy aircraft. That works pretty good, because to gain air superiority in most cases means to loose ground superiority and then to loose the game.

For me a solution would be to split the maximum number of core units in a scenario into air and ground units. So this will strengther air units, because they could not be replaced by ground units.
So in Return to Kiev for example on the allied side, I did dispand the core unit AAs in the early game to more infantry within kiev.
Another idea would be not to count any unit as 1 unit against the maximum of core units. So if Tiger would count 100% against core units limit, but a PzIII just 75%, we would see more of those units on the battle field. Infantry is the only kind of units, where every units makes sense to buy and I have many types of infantry within one battle. In most other cases (tanks, AT, Ari) it is better to buy just the bigger one

Best regards
Gwaylare

[ivanov]

So I am playing multiplayer most of the time, may be this is different in the DLCs.
My feeling is, that AA is not strong enough overall. The only one reason I use AA for, is to guard drawn back units not to be bombed.

Well, in the DLC's the airpower is absolutely crucial. The only question is what's the best way to gain the air superiority - by using your aircraft or the AA units. Most players would probably say that the figters are more efficient in this role, but as I said, I use a lot of AA units to achieve a historically balanced core.

[Zhivago]

If I remember correctly, Panzer General dealt with this issue by having two separate categories of AA--Air Defense units and Anti-Aircraft units. I can't remember exactly the stats for both, but I believe the anti-aircraft were generally for the more low-flying fighter planes and tactical bombers, and the air defense units were for the more higher-flying planes. I could be mistaken though.

[alex0809]

I don't play much MP, but IMHO just like with artillery there is just a certain limit for aircraft. If you have none, you will often wish you had some, but if you have too many you will find that you are just missing enough actual forces on the ground. So I always try to have a balance, but 2 ground attackers can be very useful. They are great against well-placed artillery that you couldn't reach otherwise. And another thing that I think many players forget is that it really annoys the opposing player even if the use is rather limited If you have no aircraft the enemy can feel safe when moving units in trucks behind the front etc - but if he knows you have some ground attack aircraft ready to attack any weakspots, then moving the valuable stuff around can cost a lot more nerves!

[ivanov]

I don't play much MP, but IMHO just like with artillery there is just a certain limit for aircraft. If you have none, you will often wish you had some, but if you have too many you will find that you are just missing enough actual forces on the ground. So I always try to have a balance, but 2 ground attackers can be very useful. They are great against well-placed artillery that you couldn't reach otherwise. And another thing that I think many players forget is that it really annoys the opposing player even if the use is rather limited If you have no aircraft the enemy can feel safe when moving units in trucks behind the front etc - but if he knows you have some ground attack aircraft ready to attack any weakspots, then moving the valuable stuff around can cost a lot more nerves!

I think that depending on the map you should have 3-4 attack aircraft, plus the escorting fighters. That along with the AA weapons can usually protect your advancing formation and cause a damage to the enemy. Usually at the end of the scenario, I have to withdraw some of my planes due to the damage they take from... the enemy AA