Carrier + Bomber = No go ?

[binhthuy71]

That was because the carrier fleet that they took off from set sail as soon as they were off, otherwise, the Japenese might have attacked the Carriers and other ships...

In civ3, I would make doom fleets with 6 transports, 2 full of marines, the rest Modern Armors, with two or three carriers stacked with bombers.

Nope. The B-25's used on the Doolittle Raid could not have landed on the Hornet. The landing roll for an unmodified B-25 was too long. The Navy did successfully land a PBJ-1H (The Navy version of the B-25H) on the USS Shangri-La in 15 November 1944 but the aircraft was equipped with a tailhook. The aircraft landed successfully but the Navy didn't pursue carrier-based PBJ-1H's any further.

 

[Robi D]

It makes sense that bombers can't use carriers. The problem is that there isn't an alternative. The one disappointing thing about civ has always been the lack of variety of aircraft and that they are so underpowered. Without going over board they could add a dive bomber and attack aircraft. These two should be able to use carriers. Also one of the techs should allow mid air refueling to extend the range of aircraft. Finally there should be more missions, like escort and promotions for air based units.

 

[Neo Guderian]

Actually, to fit the over simplifiication trend of the entire game, there should just be 2 naval aircraft that represent prop and jet technologies. These aircraft should get bonuses vs ships. I don't think naval aircraft should have bombing capabilities like land based aircraft until perhaps Computers (representing precision weapons).

And on a totally irrelevant note, where the heck did SAM infantry come from? That whole unit should be scraped and turned into a promo for other ground based units. A mech infantry with a SAM promotion makes more sense than some guy holding a stinger. At the very least make a Moble SAM unit. That has to be the biggest joke of the game. SAM infantry with shoulder fired rockets intercepting my stealth bomber? PLEASEEEEEE.

/rant off

 

[Mr. Civtastic]

Dont forget you can rebase with your Vassel States, making the "bombers not on carriers" issue even less of a problem.

 

[Stolen Rutters]

Bombers underpowered? My favorite Modern war tactic is to rebase half dozen bombers or more to a nearby friendly city I have open borders with and injure as many large stacks as I can when I attack . It denies the AI freedom of movement when they are constantly healing dozens of units every turn, and if they do attack with weakened units, their losses are phenomenal. The effect is to allow my concentrated attacks to hold their positions rather than get kicked out of a city. You don't need to overwhelm their entire defence force if you can pin most of it down.

Keep defensive land units in the friendly city for defense of the bombers and make sure the city is outside their line of sight (two tiles from the border, or three if the city is on a hill) so they can't see where you attacked from. They tend not to counterattack if they can't see the base but you need defense if they do find it.

 

[Warspite2]

Oh man i was just planing a good revenge the enemy on distant continent as i discovered flight and had a carrier ready so i set to build 4-5 bombers on each large city to send em to my carrier. But it cant be done in the game.
Argh.
Is it just small fighters on carriers then ?

Not to worry, both prop fighters and fighter jets are stronger then they were in CIV3. I don't have a problem wreaking havoc on the land with any carrier fighters. Sure the bombers are more powerful but did you know the fighters are stronger vs sea units? The bombers have a -50% attack vs sea units. My point is, you don't need bombers on a carrier anyway. People always say bombers, bombers, but fighters are cheaper and very vesatile and if they are on a carrier, you get the range too. Maybe not as strong as bombers for city pounding, but they can still attack the city, improvements and weaken units not to mention provide air cover. In fact I use carrier fighters very often to soften up enemy ground units and destroy improvements.

 

[_alphaBeta_]

Fighters (and Jet Fighters) can destroy City Defenses and Tile Improvements, but not combat units.

I think they can. Use the air strike mode. Not sure if you can completely kill a unit, but you can weaken it.

 

[cabert]

I think they can. Use the air strike mode. Not sure if you can completely kill a unit, but you can weaken it.

you can't kill a unit, but can bring it down to half strength.

 

[shmily_dana]

There needs to be promotions to aircraft. I want to promote my planes to interceptors or fighter-bombers. There could even be torpedo planes.

The navy has wanted stealth planes. The A12 one such example.

As a side note, the stealth bomber needs a much longer range. I believe the B2 can hit any target from the home base. No need to redeploy like the B52.

 

[justin_t]

The answer has been mentioned here but looked over.

In real life, B-2s are able to fly such long missions because of Air to Air refuelling (AAR). They certainly cannot land on a carrier.

A new unit should be created, like a KC-10 or KC-135 that would effectively operate like an airborne carrier. If you had several of these placed stategically, you could fly from one side of the globe to the other.

I like playing Civ4 for the modern warfare aspects - but unfortunately the Air Force has been well and truly left behind - considering it is one of the most important components of any modern conflict. I think we should have the following units (with example real life aircraft):

Fighter (F-18) - as implemented. Perhaps have different units for naval aircraft and air force aircraft. Can participate in AAR.

Strike/Bomber (B-2) - as implemented. Can participate in AAR

AAR (Refueller) (KC-10 or KC-135)

Transport (C-17 or C-130) * should have a promotion to allow paratroops. Basically would operate as an airborne transport. Would work better than the current airport system, which I always found stupid. Could also have a promotion for tactical transport, which would allow it to land on any flat surface.

Maritime Strike and Surveillance (P-3)
Act as your eyes over maritime assetts, ability to bomb ships and subs.

AEWAC (E-3)
Give you real time surveillance over a large amount of land, and increase the effectiveness of air units.

The other issue - you should not be able to create air units or move air units to a city which doesn't have an airport. Perhaps that could even be an improvement, and airfield just outside the city. That way you could target an airfield by itself and not just the city.

I haven't even looked at the SDK - anyone know how difficult it would be to program the above units? Also, any way to slow time down in the modern era? (Instead of 1 turn per year, perhaps up to 12 turns per year). Would allow for more time spent playing with the cool stuff.

 

[Gaizokubanou]

To best simulate the mid air refueling, the range of modern stealth bombers should be based on your (or your friends') cultural border + bomber range (whatever that might be for balance reason). The logic behind this is that you have your refueling aircrafts in friendly skies (or areas where you have total air control I suppose).

But bombers are very powerful as they are... if they recieve any more range buff, wouldn't that just break the game balance?

justin those are cool ideas for a mod, but they seem more suitable for scenarios rather than a full civ game which starts from stone age because those ideas seem to put awful lot of attention on aircrafts compared to rest of human history.

 

[smeiter.de]

I know it was marginally mentioned before, but bombers and fighters are very very effective against improvements. if you have the chance bring air units in range of your opponents capital or large cities. First you destroy strategic resources like Iron... then go and make some manslaughter destroy irrigated fields. You can easily destroy all of these fields in 2 rounds and you will see that the city will die out really. Some with cottages or better cottages that have become towns. Attack them and his economy will be in ruins. This strategy is even more effective if the attacked nation has no Anti air units yet....

 

[EquinoxOmega]

I must commit, I was a little suprised about it, when I play CIV4 for the first time, but I isn't so very bad, at least bombers have a large range then fighters.

 

[achilleszero]

There needs to be promotions to aircraft. I want to promote my planes to interceptors or fighter-bombers. There could even be torpedo planes.

The navy has wanted stealth planes. The A12 one such example.

As a side note, the stealth bomber needs a much longer range. I believe the B2 can hit any target from the home base. No need to redeploy like the B52.

The B-52's range is without refueling is actually 2000 miles longer than the B-2's, and both can refuel in the air. The b-2 wins out obviously for its stealth but then again it costs 10 times as much as the b-52.

B-52 crews have a saying thatwhen the last b-2 is flown to the wrecking yard a b-52 willbe there to fly them back. That stems from the fact that the b-52 wont be decommissioned until 2045 giving it a 90 year life span.