Whats the point of Jet Fighters?

erebos · Jul 12, 2012

Malachi256 said:
Nuke their airfield-city.

Not an option as he says, it's a rush, therefore I'd guess there are no nukes available, and even then it's luck to have uranium and the range is much shorter.

zeock9 said:
I'd say that is a rather exact representation of the current world affairs at this point in time;
the US, being the only power in the world in possession of such stealth technologies, have no opponents that can stop their B-2 bomber squadrons.

To be fair, these are not available in the quantity as in the game. Also it may be possible to detect B-2 by now (passive radar, radars, that have enough CPU power to calculate plausability of bird-like objects actually being a plane, detection by satellites). Of course then it would be a secret. The best thing for a country able to detect stealth bombers would be a potential enemy that continues to invest heavily in obsolete stealth bombers.

These are pricey. Of course in Civ there is not detection. It would be nice if there were radar stations to build that could see into enemy territory and help detecting fighters/bombers/missiles. Also I want the airfields back. And while were at it, the airports that could transport units were nice, too.

smallfish · Jul 12, 2012

erebos said:
Not an option as he says, it's a rush, therefore I'd guess there are no nukes available, and even then it's luck to have uranium and the range is much shorter.

Look, there's now only a small window of time where can you get away with simple nuking.

Unless, that is, you are so rolling in cash that buying 16 or 20 nukes every other turn is economically feasible.

erebos · Jul 12, 2012

smallfish said:
Unless, that is, you are so rolling in cash that buying 16 or 20 nukes every other turn is economically feasible.

As he said it's MP, I would guess, the one that got stealth first declares war immediatley and uses his OP to quickly seal the deal. Of course if he has stealth and sits on his potential ... as Napoleon said to me last game: Your weakness is my possibility. (or was it opportunity?) :king:

smallfish · Jul 12, 2012

erebos said:
As he said it's MP, I would guess, the one that got stealth first declares war immediatley and uses his OP to quickly seal the deal. Of course if he has stealth and sits on his potential ... as Napoleon said to me last game: Your weakness is my possibility. (or was it opportunity?)

"Your weakness is my opportunity. Placing any trust in me was a mistake."

That one really stung because we were ACTUALLY friends and then he decided to backstab.

PhilBowles · Jul 12, 2012

GhostSalsa said:
The point of jet fighters is tearing up earlier-gen fighters.

This actually fits needs nicely in 1 player because the AI is always using oil filters as bombers for some inscrutable reason. I rarely see it put fighters on intercept like they should be, it just treats them like little gnats nipping at your units. The jet fighter can shut those things up for you in a mid-modern era war, very satisfyingly -- not to mention protect your stupid helicopter which apparently can't land.

Seriously why can't the helicopter land? Or is it that you can try telling it to land, but the pilots never make it 24 hours without taking it out to WaWa for late night hotdogs?

I've seen some very effective use of fighters on intercept by the AI - it surprised me the first time I saw it too. It will still use them as bombers, but if it knows there are enemy aircraft in the area it will set them to intercept. I had one game where Siamese fighters were a continual pain since they kept intercepting my biombers - that's when the jet fighters proved their worth.

thadian · Jul 12, 2012

the purpose of jet fighters is aircraft carriers - in bigger maps where SB's cant hit the whole world, you can use AC's to do the job, but this becomes moot once you have at least one defensible city in another continent.

afedyuki · Jul 12, 2012

There are in fact ways to detect stealth aircraft in RL:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stealth_aircraft#Detection

So, they should just add a special building (as it is pretty big) such as VHF radar that would counter (partially or completely) "evasion" for all incoming hostile aircraft in range. Come to think of it they could get rid of Bomb Shelters, if they do that.

zeock9 said:
I'd say that is a rather exact representation of the current world affairs at this point in time;
the US, being the only power in the world in possession of such stealth technologies, have no opponents that can stop their B-2 bomber squadrons.

Whether such an accurate portrayal of the modern warfare was an intended part of game mechanics, and more importantly, whether they are engaging and fun or not, remains to be seen however.

After all, we are playing a game, not a war simulation.

mabalogna · Jul 12, 2012

Stealth Bombers should just have something like 50% evaision rate - problem solved

I prefere game balance over realism on this issue.

Gucumatz · Jul 13, 2012

smallfish said:
Look, there's now only a small window of time where can you get away with simple nuking.

Unless, that is, you are so rolling in cash that buying 16 or 20 nukes every other turn is economically feasible.

I mean while you can nuke - nuking doesn't always end the game when the formerly 6 players are dwindled to 2-3 major empires.

The close cities will get nuked for sure. But the other side can keep the center a wasteland if they play it right (with bombers and such).

Games in multi rarely go to stealths for me (Even in NQ), but when they do Stealths have even less of a counter than Nukes.

I understand both should be powerful so they SHOULD have advantages. But making it without any potential counter seems a little off (even if its a late game unit).

Anyways I think a simple fix might be better after all (a reduced evasion chance perhaps) than while intriguing the other units would be.

zan_laurin · Jul 13, 2012

Jet fighters are incredibly powerful vs invading Helicopters. This is what I mainly use them for.
Dont think of them as a purely intercept unit, then yes they're bad vs stealth bombers.

Mesix · Jul 13, 2012

mabalogna said:
Stealth Bombers should just have something like 50% evaision rate - problem solved

I prefere game balance over realism on this issue.

They could easily implement a technology driven approach. As you increase technology, your ability to detect incoming aircraft improves (i.e. +50% and radio, another +50% at satellites, etc.). On the other hand, aircraft of newer eras could have a chance to avoid detection (stealth could start high with effectively 100% for civs with radio, but only 50% or 25% for civs with stealth or future tech). Perhaps buildings could also provide modifiers.

PhilBowles · Jul 13, 2012

Mesix said:
They could easily implement a technology driven approach. As you increase technology, your ability to detect incoming aircraft improves (i.e. +50% and radio, another +50% at satellites, etc.). On the other hand, aircraft of newer eras could have a chance to avoid detection (stealth could start high with effectively 100% for civs with radio, but only 50% or 25% for civs with stealth or future tech). Perhaps buildings could also provide modifiers.

It would be more compatible with typical Civ tech progression to simply unlock a Radar Station building at Radio (or add Radar as a tech) which improves the ability of units in that and nearby hexes to detect stealthed units (or more generally a Monitoring Station - that way it could conceptually include sonar and also work to detect subs).

Lexicus · Jul 13, 2012

In Rise of Nations, Stealth Bombers are completely immune to ground-based anti-air, but can still be attacked and shot down by planes. Maybe 100% evasion of anti-air units (including destroyers and missile cruisers) but only 50% evasion vs. planes.

Dai · Jul 13, 2012

The game graaaaaadually shifts more and more in favor of offensive options being more powerful than their defensive counterparts in order to help the game end. That's why seige weapons start out vulnerable to counterattack from city defenses before increasing in range and then losing the setup time, and why bomber units start out relatively easy to counter and become less so. Stealth bombers are the ultimate offensive unit in the game, requiring end-game technologies that you have no particular reason to get if you're pursuing any victory type outside of domination. They need to be positioned in a place where they allow their controller to end the game so the game doesn't stagnate.

Malachi256 · Jul 13, 2012

Dai said:
The game graaaaaadually shifts more and more in favor of offensive options being more powerful than their defensive counterparts in order to help the game end. That's why seige weapons start out vulnerable to counterattack from city defenses before increasing in range and then losing the setup time, and why bomber units start out relatively easy to counter and become less so. Stealth bombers are the ultimate offensive unit in the game, requiring end-game technologies that you have no particular reason to get if you're pursuing any victory type outside of domination. They need to be positioned in a place where they allow their controller to end the game so the game doesn't stagnate.

Nice analysis, makes sense.

Furycrab · Jul 13, 2012

What kind of multiplayer game are you playing where getting Stealth is considered a rush? You get bombers 11-12 techs before hand, and to rush it means you are skipping nukes, Nuclear and Solar plants, Diplo Victories, and a few other nice goodies.

I've used fighters a lot to airsweep for my own bombers or to give regular bomber coverage. Sure you don't need 50 of them, but they are damn nice anyways.

Gucumatz · Jul 13, 2012

Furycrab said:
What kind of multiplayer game are you playing where getting Stealth is considered a rush? You get bombers 11-12 techs before hand, and to rush it means you are skipping nukes, Nuclear and Solar plants, Diplo Victories, and a few other nice goodies.

I've used fighters a lot to airsweep for my own bombers or to give regular bomber coverage. Sure you don't need 50 of them, but they are damn nice anyways.

Again the no quitters league. Everyone is in general a very good player. There were three empires in my game all with 10-20 bombers. in a pretty much all out war.

We still had nukes - When you are fighting with good players you should know Diplo can easily be stopped, so can space, etc. in such a war.

Its actually not hard as it sounds. I ended up retreating my bombers city to city until I got stealths myself (only had 6-8 though as I couldnt evacuate all my bombers and didnt have much aluminum as I began losing cities quick).

mabalogna · Jul 13, 2012

How about this: Make SB cost 2 Aluminum instead of just one. Limiting the amount you can use.

Minor Annoyance · Jul 13, 2012

This does seem like a unit missing a clear purpose as interception is a fighters primary role. Stealth does come after the jet fighter so you would have them first. If you opponent doesn't have aluminum they wouldn't have stealth bombers. The JF does have higher strength than the bomber so unpromoted it would be better than the bomber. With promotions it would still be better at attacking sea targets.

Gunships. It's still the best for attacking gunships.

afedyuki · Jul 13, 2012

That sort of make sense as it is neither fast nor agile and does not have any anti-air capabilities. So, if a fighter gets close enough to get a visual, it's over. The fighter probably won't be able to get a lock but it can simply gun it down with it's auto-cannon at a point blank range (as another poster pointed out).

Lexicus said:
In Rise of Nations, Stealth Bombers are completely immune to ground-based anti-air, but can still be attacked and shot down by planes. Maybe 100% evasion of anti-air units (including destroyers and missile cruisers) but only 50% evasion vs. planes.

Whats the point of Jet Fighters?

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