How do you play the air war?

[Rosete]

I want to be more proactive with how I use my air force, but I don't know how to. I have a max of 6 slots for aircraft. Between AA guns and fighters the AI has at any time 3-4 interceptors. To use my air force on the attack, I need to spend 3-4 of my own slot to airsweep, leaving me with 2-3 free slots. I also need my own interceptors, so 2 slots on interceptor, leaving 1 slot to actually deal any damage.

I don't fully understand how air sweep works. Even when I dedicate 5 slots to air sweep, it doesn't seem to be ever enough, there's still a chance that my 1 attacking plane gets shot by AA. Air sweep doesn't seem to damage enemy aircrafts if no interceptors are found like the tool tips indicate either. I've tried to target the air sweep tile with no units --> no effect, tile with non-AA unit --> no effect, AA unit --> removed intercept but deals no damage, city tile --> sometimes remove intercept, sometimes nothing happened, either way no damage is dealt.

I've tried to use bombers with high evasion. The game of chance is too much for me. If they get hit with AA it is often an instakill.

I've also tried using guided missiles, but these seem completely pointless. On epic speed, you either spend ~1000g or 6 turns to make one of these, only to have them immediately shot down by enemy AA. On the rare chance that they do hit, their damage is quite pitiful as well, about the same as if you hit the enemy with an artillery shot.

So I decided to not bother. I make 6 fighters, park them in my city and turned them on interception. The late game air war seems to be a check if you have enough AA to counter their airforce, it is very un-interactive.

But I'm probably missing something, how do you guys play the air war?

 

[rexx2022]

I can't easily break this into quotes now so to broadly touch on this:

Think of aircraft as force multipliers. You won't have much success if you have a weak/non-existent army and a good air force, but having a decent army and a decent air force can be wildly effective.

Yeah, part of it is the numbers game. Do you have enough fighters to air sweep a clear path to your target? Focus-fire helps here. If you only have 3 fighters ready to air sweep, send them to the same tile that you plan to send your bombers. Even being one tile away from that spot will often be the difference between a clean bomber attack, and a destroyed bomber.

To the extent that you can, use your army to take out enemy AA, and put your fighters that aren't dedicated to air sweeping into cities that give them a wide effective interception range. I often cripple an enemy air force on the ground, by having my army or navy attack the enemy and leaving my fighters on intercept to destroy any enemy planes that my army baits into attacking it.

Which version are you playing? Air sweep should work. Had a CTD that ruined my 3.6 game before I got to that stage, but as late as 3.5, air sweep worked correctly, and is super effective if you have the upgrades for your fighters.

Remember that enemy fighters are likely to have the 2x interception perk. So if I'm in the dark about the enemy fighter's perks, I assume I'll need two air sweeps per enemy fighter, + one per enemy AA.

Guided missiles feel fairly strong to me. Make sure you are targeting units without that air defense perk. They're particularly great for attacking a city's garrison before committing other units to doing so. That plus their range make them nice units imo.

 

[Anarcomu]

The "-50% damages from interception" is very good. This mean that even when intercepted, your planes should survive the encounter. Also, air sweep having no effect on enemy planes in cities looks like a bug for me.

Also, you should know that a bomber that succeed to evade an interception still burn an interception. This mean you should always start with planes with more health / that 50% promotion.

 

[Stalker0]

Here is my take.

AA guns are fine honestly, you can often bomb around them and when they hit you they won't kill your planes normally. So its intercepting fighters that's the real problem.

If your enemy has made real committments to fighters, your goal is to do the same. You want to make fighter with the Air Sweep 3 promotion (normally I focus on Air Sweep over Interception if I think I can kill planes using the techniques below. I only use interception if my oil is so limited that I just can't really make more than a few planes).

Now focus on air sweeping the tile right next to a city (picking a tile that doesn't have AA guns in range if at all possible). Keep sweeping it until the interceptions run out; at this point your Air sweep promotions kick in, and you will now due extra damage to all the planes in that city. Often after a few rounds of this you will destroy all the planes inside, and now you have weakened the air screen. Rinse and repeat until their fighters are destroyed, and now you have air superiority.

Note that if the enemy has a few full interception planes, burning through all their interception may not be viable....but that's ok. You are going to do a lot of damage on the sweep itself, and that plane will take double damage if its intercepts twice. So if you keep pounding it in a few rounds it will either have to pull out of the area or it will get killed.

More Advanced
Often air slots are a big limiter in earlier wars. If you have enough fighters in a secondary city, use that city first. You don't have to get to the city square, just get within 6 squares of the city so that the fighters will still come up and intercept you. This consumes their interceptions, and now send in those air sweep promoted fighters we talked about earlier and go for the city to directly damage the planes.

This is also a good trick to do if you have a mix of interception and air sweep promoted fighters. Send the interception fighters on an air sweep (yes you heard me right) first to soak up initial interceptions. That fighter will take a lot of damage but will survive. Then follow up with the air sweep fighters if you think your close to break through all the interception. The prize is doing all of that extra damage to the planes within the city, so its fine to send a few "non-sweep promoted" fighters to soak up initial interception if it lets you get your air sweepers into the city and start doing some real damage.

I actually think this is more efficient than leaving the fighters on intercept, as if you can actually kill enemy planes you are much better off than leaving a screen that will just drain your fighters long term.


The Final Word

Probably the thing I've learned most having done several big late wars is.... if the enemy has gotten a solid fighter screen up....you need to make nothing but fighters until that threat is addressed. Bombers are basically worthless at this point, and going halfway between bombers and fighters will just make you impotent.

Instead go fighters hard, and sweep them into the grave. Then once your air superiority is established, you can use your fighters to attack (they aren't bombers but do ok against units, and can actually survive an interception if a new fighter comes online that you missed), and then if you have more oil you can start bringing bombers online.

 

[Zanteogo]

The Final Word

Probably the thing I've learned most having done several big late wars is.... if the enemy has gotten a solid fighter screen up....you need to make nothing but fighters until that threat is addressed. Bombers are basically worthless at this point, and going halfway between bombers and fighters will just make you impotent.

Instead go fighters hard, and sweep them into the grave. Then once your air superiority is established, you can use your fighters to attack (they aren't bombers but do ok against units, and can actually survive an interception if a new fighter comes online that you missed), and then if you have more oil you can start bringing bombers online.

I find bombers are, for the most part, kind of meh still. Fighters are almost always the better build and should be 75% of your air force.

Air units overall are kind of weak right now. They are sort of good if you can get them up and going before anyone else can, but quickly become a minor part of your overall military. AA units and fighters just make it more of a hassle. Your often better building other units.

 

[Stalker0]

I find bombers are, for the most part, kind of meh still. Fighters are almost always the better build and should be 75% of your air force.

Air units overall are kind of weak right now. They are sort of good if you can get them up and going before anyone else can, but quickly become a minor part of your overall military. AA units and fighters just make it more of a hassle. Your often better building other units.

So I agree that early aircraft (aka you get flight before others do) is the high mark of air power. You can just bomb people indiscriminately. Once fighters come out in force air power really shifts in scope, but I don't think its "weak" necessarily, it just changes form.

At this point aircraft to me are more assassins, I use them to take out critical targets, or to finish off a unit I just couldn't get another land unit in range to kill. They can also be used to soften up a unit to allow for a charging tank to take out kind of thing.

AA Guns weaken aircraft and slow them down with their interceptions but don't "stop" aircraft imo. I will still target units surrounded by AA guns and take them out. The AA guns may soak up some shots and beat up my planes but if I'm careful with them they won't die. Its only fighters that really "shut down" airpower in the area.



As for bombers vs fighters, bombers do more damage but its really the double attack they get that ultimately gives them the far superior damage. they are also MUCH MUCH MUCH better against cities. That said, I do agree if there is any counter-air in the area, its better to go all fighters then to risk a bomber getting shot down.

 

[Rick Drayson]

I use bombers to last hit enemy units that would otherwise retreat from the frontline and heal.
As the first response said, they are force multipliers. I rarely use bombers on cities.

 

[Civrinn]

First I'll air sweep, then I'll air sweep. After utilizing air sweep I'll transition to a period of using air sweep. Once things are all sweeped up I'll use my fighters(zeros) to target cities (if I need to) or weak units.

Bombers? I'll pass on those.

 

[Starfleet1701]

First I'll air sweep, then I'll air sweep. After utilizing air sweep I'll transition to a period of using air sweep. Once things are all sweeped up I'll use my fighters(zeros) to target cities (if I need to) or weak units.

Bombers? I'll pass on those.

I'm not sure how you're able to this successfully. I my find fighters do absolute nothing, when it comes to interceptions, even if I have a big stack of them all set to superiority missions, my fighters always fail to shoot down a single plane. In the WW2 Pacific scenario, my F4Fs do nothing even set on superiority missions. As for Flak, omg they're even worse because they're practically useless. In one of my games Aparri was bombed by the Japanese (like as if there was no tomorrow) I had a stack 12 flak, all set to fortify. My city's population was reduced from 10 to 1 and the flak failed to shoot down a single dam bomber. So, I was like "screw it" grabbed a new unit mod set AA rating to 34, now planes are no longer problem.

Point being is how we're you able to get fighters to work like that?

 

[Stalker0]

I'm not sure how you're able to this successfully. I my find fighters do absolute nothing, when it comes to interceptions, even if I have a big stack of them all set to superiority missions, my fighters always fail to shoot down a single plane. In the WW2 Pacific scenario, my F4Fs do nothing even set on superiority missions. As for Flak, omg they're even worse because they're practically useless. In one of my games Aparri was bombed by the Japanese (like as if there was no tomorrow) I had a stack 12 flak, all set to fortify. My city's population was reduced from 10 to 1 and the flak failed to shoot down a single dam bomber. So, I was like "screw it" grabbed a new unit mod set AA rating to 34, now planes are no longer problem.

Point being is how we're you able to get fighters to work like that?

Your goal is to remove all fighter inceptions through sweeps and then start sweeping the area right next to a city containing aircraft. This is when your air sweep promotions really kick in, as now you do a large amount of damage to ALL planes in that city if the sweep is not intercepted. Rinse and repeat a few times and you will kill all the aircraft in the city.

 

[Starfleet1701]

Your goal is to remove all fighter inceptions through sweeps and then start sweeping the area right next to a city containing aircraft. This is when your air sweep promotions really kick in, as now you do a large amount of damage to ALL planes in that city if the sweep is not intercepted. Rinse and repeat a few times and you will kill all the aircraft in the city.

So, you just have the fighters conduct normal bombing missions to do these sweeps? because setting to air suppority doesn't seem to do much.

 

[Stalker0]

So, you just have the fighters conduct normal bombing missions to do these sweeps? because setting to air suppority doesn't seem to do much.

Air Sweep is a command you can give fighter type aircraft. Instead of a normal attack, it automatically forces an interception to attack it (and it gets a bonus in these engagements if you have teh air sweep promotions). The goal of an air sweep is to first consume enemy interceptions...but the real reason is that once you burn through those interceptions, if you air sweep next to a city, you start directly damaging all of the aircraft within it (again assuming you have taken the air sweep promotions).