island op-fire

[MrQuiet]

ORIGINAL: Lebatron

MrQ, I totally agree with what you said earlier "I think the strength of Island op-fire is very important and should be preserved against naval units that get themselves into bad situations." As I said, in general I like the idea of placing op-fire before, instead of after, island passings because it's more intuitive and uniform. My post was a warning that it would seriously effect game balance. I can already imagine how I would exploit such a change. As is it just can't be reversed without opening a big can of worms. But if op-fire was toned down then reversing it could work well.

A truely intuitive and uniform op-fire system should look like this.
1. Have air on islands op-fire immediately on hostile ship entry.
Why not make island based air act like the CAG/CV combo? disregard my balance objections for now. Just think in logic and principle.
2. Have air on sea zone CAP op-fire immediately on hostile ship entry.
Isn't a CAG on sea zone CAP inherently the same as a CAG on a CV? Then op-fire in both cases immediately.
There should be no difference between whether air is on the island or on CAP.

Glad you agree about the importance of Island air based op fire.

As is it just can't be reversed without opening a big can of worms.

Not sure what you mean by that.

But if op-fire was toned down then reversing it could work well.

I agree with that, It currently is very potent. The best Idea I can think of is to limit air vs naval opfire to the airpower ship attack or torpedo attack only (whichever is greater after armor considerations). If keeping everything uniform is a concern I could live with that same rule applied universally includeing CAG/Carrier, narrows etc opfire.


I am not big on the idea of having the air units on the island auto involved in the sea battle. Maybe a way to flag them as available for sea battle but I really dont want my HB flying off to meet its fate when a HF with 10 fighters enters the Island zone. Even better would be to allow a player to place airpower on CAP on the same turn it has moved strategicly if the region is a Island (0mp to fly CAP) and the player expends 1supply.

Now when you say they 'fire imediatelly' I presume you mean after the player reads the op-fire warning and agrees to it. Because its very possible a player does not even know there is airpower on that island until he enters the sea zone, so they would have to be warned first.

[Lebatron]

Now when you say they 'fire imediatelly' I presume you mean after the player reads the op-fire warning and agrees to it. Because its very possible a player does not even know there is airpower on that island until he enters the sea zone, so they would have to be warned first.

Yes there would have to be an op-fire warning first. By immediately I'm refering to applying the suppression points immediately for combat purposes once the  attacking fleet enters combat with the defending fleet.

"As is it just can't be reversed without opening a big can of worms." "Not sure what you mean by that."

Reversing when islands op-fire is what I meant. When entering the sea zones vs leaving it.

I am not big on the idea of having the air units on the island auto involved in the sea battle. Maybe a way to flag them as available for sea battle but I really dont want my HB flying off to meet its fate when a HF with 10 fighters enters the Island zone. Even better would be to allow a player to place airpower on CAP on the same turn it has moved strategicly if the region is a Island (0mp to fly CAP) and the player expends 1supply.

Yes, we won't want our HB's doing that in all cases. The idea of allowing air to go on CAP immediatley after a strategic move was argued before. If I remember right it didn't fly because testing and programming time didn't allow for it. With Brian volunteering his time, this may be a non-issue now. So it's possible this could return to the debating table. However I still think my earlier way to handle islands is still the better way to go. At least it would make it unnecessary to expend supply to move air units out on CAP every turn. So how do you prevent air units on islands from participating in combat you ask? Well how about using the current CAG to CV linking that now exists, and apply it to any air on islands that you want to use for island CAP. In other words link your selected air units to the island like it was a CV and they will act like they are on an unsinkable CV and provide the incoming op-fire and participate in the naval battle. Those that you don't link to the island would sit there like they currently do. This would be a simple way of telling the program what orders you are giving. Two possibilities. Either sit at the island and do nothing unless attacked at the island itself, or provide air superiority over the sea zone.

[WanderingHead]

Hmm.

Well, I was proposing a simple fix to what I consider an obvious problem. I didn't expect any controversy.

Giving air units op-fire when naval units move into the sea zone makes the op-fire much too powerful, IMO. It also removes most of the motivation to actually post CAP. Op-fire is already rather disproportionate since it hits every target unit the same.

I really don't think there should be all this op-fire before naval units can even engage. I'm not even fond of the CAG op-fire. I want the combat to be represented in the combat, not some funky disproportionate pre-combat phase (every CAG gets to fire on every ship coming in).

I'm a bit perplexed why one would prefer to keep it the same versus letting ships run away from the air units that threaten them. This has to be one of the more unrealistic mechanics out there ... "I'm too scared to run away from the planes, so I'll just sit here 200 miles from the airfields a few more seasons."

Op-fire on-entry provides a defensive only benefit. Why should the defense get this great benefit when the offense doesn't? This is a 3 month turn game, each turn represents offensives and counter offensives and regroups and minor retreats. If air needs to be more powerful against shipping, increase the stats. Air op-fire doesn't need to be extended.

[WanderingHead]

Actually, this discussion and the other discussion about the effectiveness of naval units at anti-air (suggestions like letting HFs double fire against air) make me think that

1) all land based air should get an antiship boost.
2) HFs should get an anti-air boost (maybe also LFs, probably not)
3) oh, and I still think island op-fire should be removed for ships leaving their starting region

You've still got to CAP your land based air to help defend your navy in a sea zone, which IMO is perfectly reasonable.

Only #3 is a code change .

[Lebatron]

ORIGINAL: WanderingHead

1) all land based air should get an antiship boost.

I don't think that's necessary. Besides increasing SA or Torp values removes any incentive to invest here.

2) HFs should get an anti-air boost (maybe also LFs, probably not)

Perhaps. I already have them at 4 AA in UV2.x. Would still like to see HF's get 2 shots. LF's don't need this boost as they already have a nice dedicated job in ASW. HF's should be the Flak support.

3) oh, and I still think island op-fire should be removed for ships leaving their starting region

I know I'm never going to see it, but I envisioned a great combination of gameplay improvements working together. Namely the whole approach to op-fire I outlined above in combination with the stacking limits discussed before. Reversing op-fire so that it occurs when ships enter instead of when they leave in addition to air limits on islands would limit the potential impact this suppression would have on combat. In addition, the stacking limit would prevent to much abuse of the linking of air units to islands I also suggested above. You would never see Wake island turn into an unsinkable CV with a dozen aircraft attacked to it. CV would therefore still have their uses.

In general I dislike the idea of downplaying op-fire in the way you suggest. If you got yourself into that mess with a fleet just deal with it. The idea was to make it absolutely important that you achieve air dominance before sending the fleet in. In other words the Allies should be trying to remove the air threat on Sardinia before they attempt to sail to the Central Med, not bypass it by stopping at Sardinia and then continuing on the next turn. That would be cheap. And no, the one turn delay does not in my mind make up for this. What if most of Germany's air was out of range, other than what was posted on Sardinia? The best this game can do is simulate that threat on Sardinia though op-fire. Waiting around for one turn should not give one a free pass to ignore that threat. I agree with MrQ. Either we leave it alone or change it to a more uniform and intuitive system. That is having op-fire happen during entry and the associated weakening needed to go along with this change.

[MrQuiet]

ORIGINAL: Lebatron



In general I dislike the idea of downplaying op-fire in the way you suggest. If you got yourself into that mess with a fleet just deal with it. The idea was to make it absolutely important that you achieve air dominance before sending the fleet in. In other words the Allies should be trying to remove the air threat on Sardinia before they attempt to sail to the Central Med, not bypass it by stopping at Sardinia and then continuing on the next turn. That would be cheap. And no, the one turn delay does not in my mind make up for this. What if most of Germany's air was out of range, other than what was posted on Sardinia? The best this game can do is simulate that threat on Sardinia though op-fire. Waiting around for one turn should not give one a free pass to ignore that threat. I agree with MrQ. Either we leave it alone or change it to a more uniform and intuitive system. That is having op-fire happen during entry and the associated weakening needed to go along with this change.

Pretty much my sentiment.

[Lebatron]

Here's a simple example of how reversing op-fire can have the same impact as before.

Lets use Sardinia again. The current system: A British fleet sails past Sardinia to the Central Med heedless of the suppression its going to recieve. It takes 8 suppresion on every ship from Sardinian air, then does combat with the Italian fleet.

The alternate system placing op-fire first with reduced results: A British fleet sails into the Sardinia sea zone and takes 4 suppression, then sails onto the Central Med taking 4 more suppression upon entering. Fleet engauges with 8 suppression on each ship like before. Granted this is an oversimplification, but does illustrate that reversing it could work as long as suppression was reduced, because in effect moving a couple sea zones can place the attacker into a cituation where he recieves suppression twice. First from the sea zone he passed through then the one he finishes up in. This change also makes the case for removing op-fire on ships that started in the sea zone at the beginning of the turn moot.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: Lebatron
The idea was to make it absolutely important that you achieve air dominance before sending the fleet in. In other words the Allies should be trying to remove the air threat on Sardinia before they attempt to sail to the Central Med, not bypass it by stopping at Sardinia and then continuing on the next turn. That would be cheap. And no, the one turn delay does not in my mind make up for this. What if most of Germany's air was out of range, other than what was posted on Sardinia?

Unfortunately I very strongly disagree. What if the rest of Germany's air is out of range? That's Germany's fault. They aren't there, they're out of range. That's the whole point of having range for them.

If you are forced to pause then op-fire did exactly what it was supposed to do. It prevented you from skirting around enemy strongholds while he was asleep during your turn, making up for the IGO-UGO system. If you pause, you give the air unit the opportunity for one shot just like it should have.

It's not cheap. It is quite explicitly giving every air unit in range of the sea zone one chance to fire once, fixing (to a reasonable extent, at least) the problem with the IGO-UGO. For that matter, it also means that the other player has a WHOLE TURN to see what is coming and do something about it.

As it is now, it __introduces__ a problem with IGO-UGO. Which is that fleets can get stuck when air moves into an island in the fleet seazone.

I don't think that op-fire on entry is any more or less intuitive than on exit. Although I do think that op-fire for fleeing an island air base is very counterintuitive (I know that I would have done it many times if not for the pop-up warning).

I could never support island based op-fire on entry. CAP based op-fire on entry might make sense, but you've got to at least be actively patrolling to get such a huge benefit. I don't even care for that, but at least it makes more sense.

Op-fire on entry would also give air units two opportinities to op-fire on amphib landings.

These other changes only work if you're completely rejiggering op-fire. I don't think that is appropriate at this stage, even if I wanted the work and risk clearly we'd never get enough agreement.

[WanderingHead]

Hey, I've got an idea that maybe we can all agree on. Not everyone's wish list, maybe, but I think it satisfies all the main points and makes much more sense than what we have now.

First of all, I would posit that air on CAP in a sea zone should always be "more effective or equal to" air on an island. After all, it is exposing itself to fighters and can be dispersed by ships. Yet I also observe that this "more or equal" concept does not currently apply in the specific aspect that started this thread: island air will op-fire on naval units starting in the sea zone and moving, while CAP air will not.

Hence, I propose three rules changes:

1) island based air will not op-fire on ships leaving the sea-zone if the ships start their turn in that sea zone.
2) air on CAP will op-fire on ships (non-sub) leaving the sea zone, even if those ships start their turn in the sea zone.
3) air units that have experienced combat can post CAP over enemy controlled regions.

Look at the implications of this. Air units on an island can try to trap enemy naval units that end their turn in the sea zone, but to do so they must be proactive (and have supplies) and post CAP. The air units would now be able to attack the ships, and then fly out again on CAP.

Now, if the ships move into the sea zone they can pause to avoid op-fire. But then the air attacks and posts CAP. Now the ships can leave, but they face op-fire from the CAP air. The naval ships can disperse the air by initiating combat, meaning they get fired on (a SECOND TIME from the same air, so defensively the air is now more powerful). Then the air returns to its island base. The naval units are now free to leave the sea zone without op-fire. However, since the naval units have already experienced combat THEY CANNOT ENTER COMBAT AGAIN.

So this mechanism lets the naval units run away from island air if they start in the sea zone (suffering some losses on the way since they either suffer op-fire from CAP or must combat the CAP), but they can never leave the seazone to initiate combat unless they suffer the CAP op-fire.

I think this should make everyone happy, and it makes much more sense since it makes proactive CAP op-fire better than passive island op-fire.

Give me some quick feedback, maybe I can do this tonight!

[SGT Rice]

Sounds like a good compromise to me.

[MrQuiet]

Sounds pretty good WH.
Couple questions:
1) would all air units be able to go on a active CAP (i.e. enemy warships in area) after combat, or only island based air units? Would it use a mp if not a island based air unit?
2) Would the CAP op-fire on units trying to amphib (ex. africa to s Italy)? Would it matter if the transports started the turn in the CAP zone?
3) Would the naval units be able to supply land bombardment with a active CAP over them?
 
My guesses are
1) all air units can go on CAP and yes use a mp if not a Island based air unit
2) yes, CAP would op-fire amphib assaults in there CAP zone and it would not matter if transports started in the CAP zone or were brought in
3) No, naval units would not be able to supply land bombardment with active enemy CAP over them.
 
Kudos for Very creative thinking, I think you have me sold.

[WanderingHead]

My intent was that ONLY the three rules I mentioned would change, so the answers depend on how it works today.

ORIGINAL: MrQuiet
1) would all air units be able to go on a active CAP (i.e. enemy warships in area) after combat, or only island based air units? Would it use a mp if not a island based air unit?

All air units, but if not on an island it costs another MP. Basically, it is just a consistently applied rule, no longer prohibit air that did combat from CAP over enemies.

I'll need to be careful that this doesn't accidentally allow the air to attack multiple times, but that should be OK.

ORIGINAL: MrQuiet
2) Would the CAP op-fire on units trying to amphib (ex. africa to s Italy)? Would it matter if the transports started the turn in the CAP zone?

That would be the same as today. An amphibiously assaulting land unit would have to enter the sea zone (from land) and exit the sea zone, so the CAP would op-fire.

ORIGINAL: MrQuiet
3) Would the naval units be able to supply land bombardment with a active CAP over them?

Same as today. I am pretty sure that in this case the naval units cannot do bombardment.


Thanks for the encouraging words . I'm pretty happy about this, it is much better than the simpler fix I originally envisioned. So thanks for forcing more thought on the problem.

[Lebatron]

I like it. Will you have something for the patch testers to try out anytime soon? 

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: Lebatron
I like it. Will you have something for the patch testers to try out anytime soon? 

Good!

I am maintaining the status list here: tm.asp?m=1663442

I can say that this implementation requires some inconsistencies, something I don't generally like. But in this case I think the overall impact is important enough to bite the bullet and accept some inconsistencies, which is easier than trying to get a consistent implementation to work.

The inconsistencies:
1) CAP will op-fire on units leaving their starting region if they are at sea, but not at land (if land were included then whole stacks of armies would be easily immobilized).
2) air units may post CAP at sea after combat, but not at land (allowing land would be OK for play, I think, but the combat button GUI gets screwed up for some reason and that would be harder to fix than seems worthwhile).

I do think that this change is big enough to warrant at least a little sanity check testing. As I think through the impact, I also think this makes CAP pretty powerful for putting fleets out of commission for a season. So some other eyes playing with it and looking for potential unintended consequences would also be good. For example, now a CAP from Sicily to E Med would effectively prevent any fleets in the E Med from attacking C Med. Is that too powerful? Or is that effectively what you guys wanted all along?

I have a fear that it may need more tweaking to make it work right. I am suspecting that an additional rule might be necessary, namely require that the CAP air unit be adjacent to its base in order to allow it to op-fire on units moving from their starting region. That way you can only shut down fleets that are ridiculously close to your airfields.

I could send it out to a few testers tomorrow, if you want something which is not quite the completed patch.

[SGT Rice]

We could use it in the Lightning Tourney ... it's supposed to be for feedback purposes anyway. I'll be happy to test functionality solo if you post a new beta.

[Lebatron]

Brian, the other significant reason for asking that you email the testers this update is to also check the function of the new unique targeting for CAG. There are a few other changes I'd like to test out but for the most part the new CAP op-fire rule and the new unique targeting should get some play time on them for obvious reasons.

SGT Rice, I don't think we should use the test exe out on the Lightning Tourny. Besides, I'm sure that all involved in it are not cleared to recieve test exes. You may have mistaken what I meant when I asked Brian to email this exe out to those of us on the tester list. This is not going to be listed in the members section for everyone to download. Soon maybe, but not before its checked over for bugs and problems with the new rules.

[Vilhjalmr]

Very creative solution, well done.