Bombing defenses V Airstike

[obliterate]

When I am launching a blitzkrieg against my enemy with planes and tanks I have the option of injuring the units or destroying the defenses. However I can almost always use airstrike ahead of bombing the defenses. The only time I can think of bombing the defenses is when your army is out of reach at the moment (because defenses don't heal quickly at all) and when the enemy is already at 50% strength. Is there any other time when it is more beneficial to reduce the defenses rather than airstrike?

 

[axident]

When I am launching a blitzkrieg against my enemy with planes and tanks I have the option of injuring the units or destroying the defenses. However I can almost always use airstrike ahead of bombing the defenses. The only time I can think of bombing the defenses is when your army is out of reach at the moment (because defenses don't heal quickly at all) and when the enemy is already at 50% strength. Is there any other time when it is more beneficial to reduce the defenses rather than airstrike?

I may be mistaken, but don't units take less damage from airstrikes if they have high +% cultural defense in that city? E.g., a +60% infantry would take less damage from a bomber, than an infantry in a city that had all its +% blown away?

 

[obliterate]

I don't so. But I may be wrong.

 

[Premier Valle]

I think Axident is right, but for me the question is:

In a Blitzkrieg, can you afford the time needed to weaken the defenses?

 

[Orion071]

I think Axident is right, but for me the question is:

In a Blitzkrieg, can you afford the time needed to weaken the defenses?

When you have enough Bombers to eliminate the cultural defense AND damage all of the defenders in 1 turn, then it doesn't matter.

 

[Woodreaux]

If you can coordinate it, and you have the points to available, use a spy to seed a revolt. This saves 3-5 bombing sorties for air strikes that you would have otherwise used to remove the defense.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

I tend to use bombers/air units to reduce cultural defense and to injure the primary defender. Use your artillery / mobile artillery to bring down the strength of the rest of the defenders. This is especially necessary if the enemy has rocketry. I've noticed that aircraft is intercepted more often now than in Warlords/Vanilla. Not to mention the ability for SAM units to have intercept promotions.

 

[Welnic]

I don't think the cultural defense makes any difference with air attacks. I've never noticed it, but I have noticed when attacking units in a city that has a Bunker that those make a big difference.

If your units are going to be attacking the city that turn, you should go with airstrikes. If all of the good defenders are beaten down as far as they will go, then I would maybe reduce the defense. So if the city's 5 infantry are all hammered, you could reduce defense instead of worrying about the random cavalry and other random units he has in there. On the other hand, a half dead infantry even with 100% culture has high 90% odds against a CRIII tank, so I usually don't worry about that and just bomb the units until it doesn't do anything or I run out of bombers.

 

[Bushface]

An Air Strike by a Bomber will reduce the primary defender's strength by anything up to 45% (depends on target) and do some collateral damage to up to 5 other units. An Air Bomb raid reduces the effective strength of all the defenders by 16%.
So a Strike is more effective against a strong defender, a Bomb is more effective against a city with many units or a high defence (scarcely worth bombing a 20% city unless you've aircraft to spare). Personally, when attacking the typical 40% defence city I usually go for two Bombs and two Strikes before sending in the ground forces, because as a rule I can't get more than four Bombers within range of my target.
Stealth Bombers are of course more powerful but would you believe I've never yet had a campaign go on long enough to use one ? Well, I haven't.

 

[weregamer]

There's no simple answer, but my analysis leads me to say that airstriking is probably better in many situations. Consider:

* Look at the numbers. If the cultural defense is +100%, saturation airstriking (that is, taking *all* the defenders down to 50%) will give you the exact same benefit as completely removing the cultural defense. Since that's a high number for defense, and will take a lot of bombing to reduce too. So usually saturation airstrikes are better. But if there are a lot of defenders, that will also take a lot of hits. Also, either one reaches its limit, and if you have enough strikes you want to do both of course.

* The new limits on air unit basing will keep you from getting too many air hits on one target. You will probably have to use some artillery too to get all the defenders down. Given that bombers don't die from airstriking, and artillery do die and take damage from attacking but not from reducing defense, this is another reason to use the air units to airstrike.

* But, taking down defenses gets no exp for the artillery. OTOH if you are *only* going to use them on city defenses, you only need two promotions on each anyway.

* Fighters don't get collateral damage. If you don't have Bombers yet, or enough Bombers, you should use fighters to bomb because they are way inefficient at striking.

 

[Steiner-Davion]

Recude the defenses to zero in an many for as many turns as it takes. If a city's defenses are not "attacked" for 1 turn they begin to regenerate. The turn immediately following the city's defenses reaching zero, Air Strike with every available unit, then attack with your SOD. Victory is pretty much assured.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

Given that bombers don't die from airstriking, and artillery do die and take damage from attacking but not from reducing defense, this is another reason to use the air units to airstrike.

They sure do die from airstriking. Often, since the advent of airships in BTS, the AI will have 4 fighters flying intercept missions in a target city. Their defense stack often has 1 or 2 SAM infantry as well and if it is a coast city, they can also have a couple destroyers that can intercept bombers. Using 4 bombers to strike, you can easily damage most or all of them and even lose some. In a decent defense stack, the collateral damage done is peanuts in comparison with the loss of bombers or the turns necessary to heal them.

Treat artillery like any other siege weapon in any other era. Give them city raider bonuses upon creating them, and sacrifice your less promoted units. Then send in the veterans to reduce defenders far below the 45% bombers max out at. The AI will send in all it's air defenses for the initial wave of attack. Once you have eliminated the initial air defenses (therefore the AI must devote hammers to building more), the prime time for airstrikes is brought to realization.

 

[Nickzilla]

Yeah, the only time I can think of when artillery bombing beats airstrikes is if they have a solid air defense. Then it'd probably be best to use ships or artillery to bomb.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

I firmly believe that the best initial wave stack includes as many artillery as defenders and city raiders combined. Unstoppable



(1000th post! y@y )

 

[Premier Valle]

When you have enough Bombers to eliminate the cultural defense AND damage all of the defenders in 1 turn, then it doesn't matter.

Then it isn't a Blitzkrieg (or a war at all) you are simply just taking what is "righteously yours"

- too bad that that warrior (hopefully not a spearman ) got squished by your Modern Armor -