air balance

[wild_Willie2]

Can air balance points be used to "gamely" determine the aircover over an unreconited enemy base??

e.g

Low air balance = no fighter cover ???

[freeboy]

what is air balance???

[wild_Willie2]

If you hover your cursor over a friendly or enemy base, an air balance number will appear number in the top right corner of the base info screen. This represents the amound of air power the owner can project over that base.......
No sceenshot available, due to TO SLOW COMPUTER (videocard kicked the bucked on my AMD 64 2200, and now using my backup amd 1600 [>:][>:][>:][>:])

[wild_Willie2]

ok, fired up the old girl and voila, Air balance points over a base

[wild_Willie2]

Nobody has an opinnion about air balance ?

Maybe It is imbalancing the game..........
Maybe It gives the Japanes an extra advantage......
Maybe It gives the allies an extra advantage.........
Maybe It makes allied ASW to effective (RON ??)

THAT's a first on this forum................ [:D]

[fbastos]

I once argued that the air balance number is gamey, to what one of the game designers answered it reflects intelligence. I found that a quite convincing answer.

F.

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: wild_Willie2

Can air balance points be used to "gamely" determine the aircover over an unreconited enemy base??

e.g

Low air balance = no fighter cover ???

I don't think so. In my new PBEM game as allies I checked my air balance numbers for Manila and Clark, Clark is higher even though Manila has far mor fighters stationed there. So I suspect it's an overall value for air units stationed there. To be sure find a base with recon assets only (I don't have 1 yet) and see if the air balance number appears.

Jim

[doktorblood]

I think it is primarily of some mysterious use to the AI. I'm not sure it means anything to humans.

[Iron Duke]

Hi,

I look at as a type of Air ZOC , a zero or minus number does'nt mean no a/c based there , it means that there are greater opposition a/c in surrounding enemy bases cancelling their strength out

my 2 pence

cheers

[Feinder]

All types of AC project air-bal. (fighters, patrols, whatever). They also project to the extent of their range. Most patrol sqdns have a bas airbal of about 180. They also "project" this airbal over a substantial distance (because they have very long legs). Most medium bomber formations project an airbal of about 250. If they're Bettys/Nells, again, very long distance.

So yes, you can "read" a base by it's airbal. But since all formations project airbal at range (can't remember if it's to extended range, or maximum range), it can skew the numbers a bit (again, all type project airbal, so a 600 air bal could be 4 or 5 patrol sqdns, or 2 sqnds of B-17s, or about 3 fighter sqdns, who knows...?) So in the example above (Manilla/Clark), the effects of planes at both fields stack, but are also reduced by the proximity of Japanese planes.

-F-


*** A negative air-bal means you do -NOT- have air-superiority over your base. If you have a neg air bal enemy level bombers will be more likely to bomb your base, even unescorted. Remember, enemy aircraft are projecting their own airbal (at range). So if Allies have got a single sqdn of F4F4s (with say 250 airbal), and Japan has a base with 2x Zero sqdns (about 500 airbal), plus 2x Betty sqdns (about 500 airbal), at about 5 hexes away..

The airbal of Allied base at range 0 is about 250.
The airbal of Japanese base at range 0 is about 1000.
The airbal Japan projects at range 5 (Allied base) is about 600.

The net is -350 airbal over Allied base (so 350 in favor of Japan). So the Japanese sqdns are much more likely to launch, since the airbal is in their favor. This does -not- mean that you must have a positive airbal to launch. It just means you're more likely to launch if the target has a negative airbal.

[freeboy]

Something I completely ignored..???
I just looked in pbem game late war, and saw those interesting neg number over enemy airspace, go figure its 12 44 and I can bomb them sometime this game jsut gives you interesting information!

[Charles2222]

ORIGINAL: Jim D Burns

ORIGINAL: wild_Willie2

Can air balance points be used to "gamely" determine the aircover over an unreconited enemy base??

e.g

Low air balance = no fighter cover ???

I don't think so. In my new PBEM game as allies I checked my air balance numbers for Manila and Clark, Clark is higher even though Manila has far mor fighters stationed there. So I suspect it's an overall value for air units stationed there. To be sure find a base with recon assets only (I don't have 1 yet) and see if the air balance number appears.

Jim

I always had the notion that it was total airpower, not just fighters. Even so, if it is just fighters I believe it's taking into account the ranges of planes, such that if Clark has twice the a/c of Manila, if there's a base with aircraft that is within range of most of the planes to Manila and not Clark, Manila could actually have a higher rating. OTOH, if I'm thinking correctly here, if Clark is closer to Japanese concentrations, that is taken into account too. So if Manila is out of range of Japanese planes for what ever the rating is for (overall a/c or just fighters) then that would offset Clark's usual superiority in numbers of planes such that Manila might have a better rating.