Air Craft Carriers

Ashmantious

Chieftain
Joined
Oct 24, 2005
Messages
98
Location
Greensboro, NC
They start out with a capacity for only two planes, would love some tips on how to level up besides:

1) Send them to melee attack other ships
2) Let them get attacked by city defenses or other ranged units.
3) Use a Great Admiral whose retirement benefit ranks up a unit
4) Terracotta Army (good luck getting that one that late in the game)
5) Lysefjord Wonder is in your game and you have access to it.

Other than that, the options to level them up is pretty limited. Are there any other tips or strategies I may have missed?
 
You could reap a free first promotion by the benefits of an advanced military alliance or making use of governor Victors Embrasure promotion, when produing the carrier. Of course, further (fast) promoting via 1) and 2) will require then fighting major civs or city states, as vs. barbs and free cities fighting with already an earned promotion reduces further experience gain to one meager point per (melee) combat.
 
Usually what I do is attack a 0 HP and 0 wall city with the Carrier. The Carrier is likely to get dinged up a bit, but won't die. In my experience, Carriers usually get enough XP for a level 1 promotion from just capping 1 city, though I also tend to have After-Action Reports (+25% XP) as well.

If you're more concerned about having enough capacity to shuttle your air force around, the Venetian Arsenal can help. Getting a free Carrier whenever you hard build a Carrier will give you plenty of air capacity, and you don't have to do that many hard builds. 1 or 2 cycles for 2 or 4 Carriers lets you move around 4 or 8 planes, which will easily spear-head any naval campaign.
 
Usually what I do is attack a 0 HP and 0 wall city with the Carrier

Lol, for some reason the idea of an aircraft carrier conquering a city greatly amuses me. I served on an aircraft carrier when I was younger. I'll be the first to say I'm not the conquering type. I'm an engineer, not a soldier. The only thing we conquered was the local beer supplies.

I find the first promotion isn't too hard to get, at least if you are at war. Getting a 2nd promotion is pretty much out of the question if you don't have that natural wonder available.

bumping this thread in hope Firaxis will give aircraft carriers some love in the final balance patch.
 
I use a mod that automatically gives the promotions upon reaching certain techs, same system as with the GDR. At work at the moment and don't recall the exacy name. Regardless, I don't use them much. Not much of a warmonger, most of my wars are defensive.
 
Lol, for some reason the idea of an aircraft carrier conquering a city greatly amuses me. I served on an aircraft carrier when I was younger. I'll be the first to say I'm not the conquering type. I'm an engineer, not a soldier. The only thing we conquered was the local beer supplies.

I find the first promotion isn't too hard to get, at least if you are at war. Getting a 2nd promotion is pretty much out of the question if you don't have that natural wonder available.

bumping this thread in hope Firaxis will give aircraft carriers some love in the final balance patch.
Do aircraft carriers do broadsides?
 
My 2c is aircraft carrier should be reworked completely.

1. Remove their ability to base aircraft (hear me out!)

2. They should not have any melee attack only ranged and their ranged attack is basically an aircraft strike animation

3. The promotion tree can than be reworked to increase the range/damage/number of sorties of their ranged air strike, etc

4. Increase their production cost for balance
 
My 2c is aircraft carrier should be reworked completely.

1. Remove their ability to base aircraft (hear me out!)

2. They should not have any melee attack only ranged and their ranged attack is basically an aircraft strike animation

3. The promotion tree can than be reworked to increase the range/damage/number of sorties of their ranged air strike, etc

4. Increase their production cost for balance

I personally like this idea. Could even do something similar to Rise of Nations and allow the carrier to come equipped with 'N' number of planes, and rebuild them as needed, see here: https://riseofnations.fandom.com/wiki/Fighter_Bomber This allows the carrier to perform multiple attacks per turn, which is the one great thing about the current carrier implementation.
 
Uhhhh I don't like that. If Carriers lose the ability to hold air units, how will air units participate in naval combat or get transported over seas to other land masses? Being unable to use air units from water leaves Battleships and Missile Cruisers as the only way to safely deal with heavily walled coastal cities, and air units still outrange those two units, so a defender can use air units to squash them. Additionally, some land masses are too far apart for air units to rebase, even if one manages land and put down an Aerodrome or an Airstrip.
 
Uhhhh I don't like that. If Carriers lose the ability to hold air units, how will air units participate in naval combat or get transported over seas to other land masses? Being unable to use air units from water leaves Battleships and Missile Cruisers as the only way to safely deal with heavily walled coastal cities, and air units still outrange those two units, so a defender can use air units to squash them. Additionally, some land masses are too far apart for air units to rebase, even if one manages land and put down an Aerodrome or an Airstrip.

I can understand your thoughts on not wanting change but it's hard for me to think that the current way is overall optimal.

More reasons to use air fields from military engineers and maybe provide a tech that buffs the rebase action. Seriously, haven't found a reason to ever use these, when you can just rebase a bomber in the city you just captured. Also, you don't have bombers on Carriers in present times(historically have been launched, but you can't land them). So if you want heavy duty aircraft to traverse the seas you could forward deploy an air base and use the 'rebase'. Or maybe a support unit that enables mid-air fueling? Could keep the carriers to enable the landing of traditional fighters on carriers, but if the model was more like Rise of Nations then at least the carrier would be useful faster and have a clear promotion path. Not sure if the above ideas are really the optimal path, but overall the aircraft and carrier dynamic just aren't really satisfying for me.
 
I can understand your thoughts on not wanting change but it's hard for me to think that the current way is overall optimal.

More reasons to use air fields from military engineers and maybe provide a tech that buffs the rebase action. Seriously, haven't found a reason to ever use these, when you can just rebase a bomber in the city you just captured. Also, you don't have bombers on Carriers in present times(historically have been launched, but you can't land them). So if you want heavy duty aircraft to traverse the seas you could forward deploy an air base and use the 'rebase'. Or maybe a support unit that enables mid-air fueling? Could keep the carriers to enable the landing of traditional fighters on carriers, but if the model was more like Rise of Nations then at least the carrier would be useful faster and have a clear promotion path. Not sure if the above ideas are really the optimal path, but overall the aircraft and carrier dynamic just aren't really satisfying for me.
I don't know about optimal, but what's currently available is at least functional; Carriers transport air units, which lets air units participate in naval warfare and also helps them get to further land masses.

When I'm using air units, I build plenty of Airstrips on foreign land masses. Only being able to house 1 air unit in a city is painful, and captured cities won't necessarily have Aerodromes. Aerodromes and Airstrips also have a much nicer air unit selection UI, while air units on cities can't use the same UI for some reason. Your proposal about forward deploying an air base and using rebase sounds exactly like what Airstrips are meant to do, so I'm not sure if you're proposing something new here.

Buffing the rebase action by itself isn't sufficient either; some maps tend to have a lot of water, which could mean significant distance between land masses. Even if only rebase range got buffed to infinity, there'd be large areas where air units can't reach just because there isn't enough land for them to work with.

Could you elaborate on the support unit idea? It's not clear how it's different from how Carriers work currently.
 
I don't know about optimal, but what's currently available is at least functional; Carriers transport air units, which lets air units participate in naval warfare and also helps them get to further land masses.

When I'm using air units, I build plenty of Airstrips on foreign land masses. Only being able to house 1 air unit in a city is painful, and captured cities won't necessarily have Aerodromes. Aerodromes and Airstrips also have a much nicer air unit selection UI, while air units on cities can't use the same UI for some reason. Your proposal about forward deploying an air base and using rebase sounds exactly like what Airstrips are meant to do, so I'm not sure if you're proposing something new here.

Buffing the rebase action by itself isn't sufficient either; some maps tend to have a lot of water, which could mean significant distance between land masses. Even if only rebase range got buffed to infinity, there'd be large areas where air units can't reach just because there isn't enough land for them to work with.

Could you elaborate on the support unit idea? It's not clear how it's different from how Carriers work currently.

You're right, my ideas weren't really fleshed out and a bit scattered. So for the mid-air refuel idea it's not really a great one but I meant that as a mechanism to enable longer rebase range. My main disappointment which I didn't directly state before is carrier is useless without aircraft. So lets say the only thing to change was that carrier comes with a fighter or has a way to build a fighter without an aerodrome and i'd be happy. Obviously a different genre but in rise of nations you get 7 fighters when you build an aircraft carrier, that's a great return on investment. Then if they die, you can rebuild them. But also in rise of nations the normal aircraft can't land on the carrier, which actually makes sense as land aircraft are different specifications from Navy ones. So for me personally I much rather have carriers come equipped with planes, and let them rebuild them in friendly territory or something.

To be honest, I do like how the deployment works in civ 6 where you can deploy fighters to a tile, that's a step up from civ 5. But I also think it's kind of weird that planes just don't sit on tiles like helicopters do. It's not like supplies and fueling is a thing in this game so why are bombers and jets even tethered to an airport/airstrip in the first place? But this topic is more about aircraft carriers so I will get back to that.

By having carriers come with fighters, you can still do naval air assaults, just not bombing runs. Perhaps you could upgrade one that allows for bombers (super carrier). I'd also be okay with a carrier carrying land-based planes, but I don't think bombers need to be launched from carriers. I am not sure how to really model bombers in real life to the game so I can see why they let carriers carry bombers and stuff like that. But really, you will never see a plane like a B-52 on a ship, it's just too massive. They are refueled in the air. having mid-air refuels are one of the logistics challenges they face, but their range is also extremely far. So that's why I'd be okay with 'nerfing' bombers from carriers, especially if it enables the carrier to be more viable. I don't no what the proper fix would be to enable long range bombing runs, but they could certainly come up with something. Maybe allies can play a role in this (United States station their planes in foreign countries after all).


Buffing the rebase action by itself isn't sufficient either; some maps tend to have a lot of water, which could mean significant distance between land masses. Even if only rebase range got buffed to infinity, there'd be large areas where air units can't reach just because there isn't enough land for them to work with.

To me, that actually sounds like an interesting challenge to overcome. Jet bombers in civ 6 are just way too good so being forced in the late game (when you are probably already snowballing) to adjust attack methodology would be interesting. I know that's not someone everyone would agree with, but it's quite common for people to wait until artillery for a big military push and the same for bombers. The reason is that it just makes it way to easy and the AI doesn't respond well. If the AI built in a remote location that you can't reach by rebasing, then maybe that gives you a reason to adjust to meet up to the challenge? Island hoping with many airstrips? I don't know, just a thought. A bit more punishing to the player who built the bombers, but a bit more rewarding when the plan is executed. Especially since you don't have an easy 'win more' button.
 
You're right, my ideas weren't really fleshed out and a bit scattered. So for the mid-air refuel idea it's not really a great one but I meant that as a mechanism to enable longer rebase range. My main disappointment which I didn't directly state before is carrier is useless without aircraft. So lets say the only thing to change was that carrier comes with a fighter or has a way to build a fighter without an aerodrome and i'd be happy. Obviously a different genre but in rise of nations you get 7 fighters when you build an aircraft carrier, that's a great return on investment. Then if they die, you can rebuild them. But also in rise of nations the normal aircraft can't land on the carrier, which actually makes sense as land aircraft are different specifications from Navy ones. So for me personally I much rather have carriers come equipped with planes, and let them rebuild them in friendly territory or something.
A bit of a tangent, but in Advance Wars: Dual Strike, Carriers had a similar problem; they sported the longest ranged anti-air atack in the game, but were very expensive, and absolutely pointless in matches without air units. In Advance Wars: Days of Ruin, Carriers lost their long range anti-air, but could build Sea Planes when they had capacity. Carriers were still expensive, and building SPs on top of that was absurdly expensive, so trying to go all in with Carriers + SPs was a bit of a joke. However, it meant that at minimum, Carriers didn't have a strict dependency on requiring the map to have airports to be useful. SPs may have been expensive, but they had the unique ability to hit any unit in the game, and they actually hit quite hard too!

Back on topic, in Civ 6, I wouldn't mind if Carriers could start with an air unit or two of their own whenever they were built, and these could be special air units that were only available via Carriers, or they could be Air Fighters (though that gets complicated with the Alum maintenance cost). I would normally be okay with Carriers being able to produce air units, but building planes on Carriers is highly ahistorical from my understanding.
To be honest, I do like how the deployment works in civ 6 where you can deploy fighters to a tile, that's a step up from civ 5. But I also think it's kind of weird that planes just don't sit on tiles like helicopters do. It's not like supplies and fueling is a thing in this game so why are bombers and jets even tethered to an airport/airstrip in the first place? But this topic is more about aircraft carriers so I will get back to that.
I agree! I definitely like the air unit model moreso in Civ 6 than in Civ 5, precisely due to Air Fighters being able to deploy to tiles. And even then I think that's not quite enough. What I've always really wanted are now considered hover units, like the hover units in Civ BE, or the airships in Empires of the Smoky Skies, or even how air units used to work in Civ 2 (or how air units work in AW lol).

I think having air units tethered to an Aerodrome/Airstrip is actually a supply and fuel abstraction. IIRC, back in Civ 2, air units could actually sit on tiles like regular units could, but if they stayed out too long w/out refueling, they'd crash. Assuming there were no other tile to land besides where they'd started from, that'd basically mean air units could at most spend half their maximum movement (rounded down) to go do something, then use the remaining movement to go back to where they started. The air unit model in Civ 6 is just enforcing the need to refuel, instead of letting air units crash. An air unit's real move range is double what their actual movement is; that's why an air unit's rebase range is double their movement.
By having carriers come with fighters, you can still do naval air assaults, just not bombing runs. Perhaps you could upgrade one that allows for bombers (super carrier). I'd also be okay with a carrier carrying land-based planes, but I don't think bombers need to be launched from carriers. I am not sure how to really model bombers in real life to the game so I can see why they let carriers carry bombers and stuff like that. But really, you will never see a plane like a B-52 on a ship, it's just too massive. They are refueled in the air. having mid-air refuels are one of the logistics challenges they face, but their range is also extremely far. So that's why I'd be okay with 'nerfing' bombers from carriers, especially if it enables the carrier to be more viable. I don't no what the proper fix would be to enable long range bombing runs, but they could certainly come up with something. Maybe allies can play a role in this (United States station their planes in foreign countries after all).
I kind of already answered this, but I wouldn't mind seeing Carriers come with their own Sea Planes or Air Fighters :) And yes I also agree that Air Bombers are ridiculously strong in Civ 6.
To me, that actually sounds like an interesting challenge to overcome. Jet bombers in civ 6 are just way too good so being forced in the late game (when you are probably already snowballing) to adjust attack methodology would be interesting. I know that's not someone everyone would agree with, but it's quite common for people to wait until artillery for a big military push and the same for bombers. The reason is that it just makes it way to easy and the AI doesn't respond well. If the AI built in a remote location that you can't reach by rebasing, then maybe that gives you a reason to adjust to meet up to the challenge? Island hoping with many airstrips? I don't know, just a thought. A bit more punishing to the player who built the bombers, but a bit more rewarding when the plan is executed. Especially since you don't have an easy 'win more' button.
I like air units but also agree, I wouldn't mind seeing a bit of a nerf to Air Bombers, as long as that also comes with making walled cities a bit more approachable.
 
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I don't have time for proper post CoconutTank, but I agree with a lot of the things you mentioned. With regards to planes it's definitely too late to do a real overhaul in Civ6, but maybe in Civ7 the model would be different? I understand the abstraction that aerodrome provides, I just think it's strange aircraft are the only units that are forced to play under a fueling abstraction, though I guess the supply lines and even ship refuels could be something that happens in the time jumps between turns. As for Carriers building planes, I agree, but I don't think you need an aerodrome in realife to build them either, just to launch them. For game play reasons it makes sense to have the aerodrome district be the restriction however. If we really wanted to carriers to build sea planes, I guess you could enable it only when carrier is docked at harbor/city to simulate a city is building it. (Though I wouldn't be disappointed if this never happened).

P.S. I really enjoy the Advance Wars series and I see the you changed your icon away from the Neotank to a plane, very appropriate for this discussion. I have Days of Ruin but never got around to playing it all the way through. I like the style and theme of the first three a lot more. Maybe I should give it another shot.
 
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