I'm always in favor of situations that can go either way depending on decisions made. For example, I think we have the Battle of the Atlantic fairly well-balanced. I'm getting through many more convoys now that I've refined my process, but you're also sinking convoys here and there so I need to be vigilant. You won it early which really set me back, but now I think the tide is turning and I'd say I have a marginal victory going on there (of course who knows what scheme you have up your sleeves). I'm pretty satisfied with that. I'm not sure we're there yet in every other place...
I agree that Battle of the Atlantic is working pretty well. I think that is partly because the submarines have a good chance to re-spawn, so killing takes some effort. The Allies have to devote some effort to the campaign, but I feel it wouldn't be a waste of time for the Germans to contest even at this point (though there might be better places to put effort).
--BOMBER COMMAND--
Perceived Issue: Bomber Command is slow and plodding, period. Further, the night Allied lineup is not as extensive as day, whereas the Germans get to throw everything at them.
Proposed Solution: Maybe one of the spare unit slots should allow a Mosquito bomber version that can attack similar to the A-20 - A-26 line, meaning it is fast, hard to intercept, and can get out of dodge when it drops bombs. To compensate, it can't carry as many bombs. This might be more useful than "aces" for the Allies. Or, we could simply double up with the night fighters for the Allies and allow them to carry bombs as payload (this would be much easier and saves the slot).
I would prefer to give a bomb to the night fighters, but the more advanced ones already have radar as their secondary attack, so they can't really double up (I have the night ace with rockets and radar, and it is a bit of a hassle). I think I suggested before that we give the night bombers a greater speed, so they are more protected. Perhaps the solution is extra speed, and not expending all the movement points when attacking. Think of these things as added safety at night, rather than the physical capabilities of the planes. With reactive flak, we don't need to ensure that the planes are within range of a counterattack.
--INTRUDERS--
Perceived Issue: I've pretty much abandoned all hope of being able to make any successful attacks with Bomber Command. This is because it is very difficult if not impossible for the Allies to grind down the Luftwaffe by night. The interceptors don't have enough range or speed to go out and hunt, which means that I shoot down your aircraft piece meal. By day, I've had some success in areas where I saturate fighters. At the very least, I know that I can knock down several of your fighters in small little areas, and eventually wrest some control for a very localized area (not sure trying to do two at once paid off). This is impossible by night.
Proposed solution: Decrease cost of interceptors (since they are very expensive currently, but can only be used at night) and increase their MP per turn so they have a good overall range. I'd probably leave their turns aloft fairly short so they can't just loiter numerous turns. I was thinking of starting them at 40 MP.
That's a good point that you can't easily grind down my night fighters. Increasing their range (either by turns aloft or by movement per turn) might fix some of that. However, increased movement per turn would mean that they are more effective at intercepting bombers, which is something to consider. I'm not sure it matters too much, since Germany isn't "supposed" to bomb England, though I did do it a few times for points and to disrupt convoys, so there might be some balance issues if Allied night fighters have their range extended.
--ESCORTS--
Perceived Issue: I have noticed that Fairline's escort fighters are worthless. They don't react better than the bombers they're protecting. This changes eventually (I think the Mustangs react 4 spaces) but for now, P-47s have to literally be stacked on another aircraft to present any real protection, and are easily avoided. I'm quite unhappy with how this is working out and see no need at all to build the escort fighters, and don't find them particularly dangerous -- at all -- in my game as the Axis.
Proposed Solution: I would propose that the Spits react at range 2, the P-47's at 3,4,5 respectively, the P-51s at 6 and 7. This would allow them to cover more bombers, and also would allow them to attack "out of the sun" meaning that they might intercept Germans who didn't realize they are around. They would be much less avoidable and the escort would need to be deliberately dealt with to engage the bombers. The historic tactic of waiting for the escorts to get out of range has never been used so far, by anyone, because there's no need for it. This would give the escorts some bite, and would mix up tactics). Now, on the other hand, I'd probably reduce the P-38's reaction range to 1, meaning they're mostly meant for direct attack.
These changes to the reaction range seem reasonable. Now, it might be a bit of a mistake for me to engage that close to England, at least now that you have a decent number of (cheap) fighters.
For what it is worth, I don't fear P47s unless they are in position to dive. I tend to attack them last, since they only have light machine guns anyway.
--RADAR--
Perceived Issue: We've both been placing radar in cities protected by flak. There's no reason to place it anywhere else. This makes it all but impervious to attack, when it should be something that is very useful to attack.
Proposed Solution: I'm really not sure what to do about this. I suppose we could check what type of tile it is on and teleport it off of it, but this gets rid of its handy "paradrop" deployment, making it far too slow without it.
Perhaps we make it so that the radar only works if it is on an installation terrain (I think I should be able to do this without too much difficulty, but I'd have to check to know for sure). That would make radar rather more difficult to deploy, since you would need both a city to build it in, and an engineer nearby, but would also mean that it naturally doesn't hide in cities. This change would render my current radar network almost worthless, until I bought more engineers. On the other hand, it would mean that undeployed radar stations wouldn't get caught in the "scan all" command, which is a minor hassle at the moment. I think it is the nature of things that radar will be protected by flak if it is anywhere vulnerable.
Regarding the difficulty of deploying radar under this system, it does raise the concern that the player might favour scout patrols instead of radar installations, and that would be rather tedious.
--15th AIR FORCE--
Perceived Issue: Escorts are incredibly late-game arrivals.
Proposed Solution: Here it might make sense to have an earlier (and correspondingly weaker) escort unit that operates the same was as the 15th (build it in England and it teleports south). As it stands it makes little sense for me to send anything there as it will be torn up with no recourse.
In sum, anywhere that I can never hope to get a fighter to (currently, night and Italy) is a lost cause in a game that requires me to attack the Luftwaffe fighters and knock them out. The only place I'm marginally successful are areas where I can saturate fighters. Now, I might choose the wrong place to saturate, or perhaps you commit more resources than I do and I don't commit enough, and then I lose, but at least I have an option/chance.
I tended to view the 15th airforce as something that I had to maintain in order to force the Germans to keep some fighters in the south, rather than something to use. One option is to give the 15th airforce the same movement allowance as the B24s, so even if they are vulnerable to annihilation, they at least get to reach their target.
I think you're right that the way the game works, it only makes sense to attack in situations where you can down enemy fighters. A strategic target takes 1 fighter's worth of shields to build (two, if it is urgent to get it up and running, and trains must be brought in), and some lost production. Since it takes 6 or 8 bombers to have a reasonable chance to destroy the target, the attrition doesn't work unless your fighters can down the enemy fighters. Reactions are unlikely to kill the enemy from full health in most circumstances, and the bombers can't select the weakened ones to kill outright. So, any damage done is only temporary.
I'm lead to the conclusion that bombers must either do a lot more damage, or be much more survivable.
If we go for survivability, one option is the "submarine" option, where "killed" bombers show up alive later (which kind of ruins the B17's advantage), or, maybe, a killed bomber puts shields into an airfield (I would suggest the home airfield, except that we have payload...).
Another survivability option is to change combat so that severely damaging a bomber (or, perhaps any air) is not too difficult, but actually scoring the kill has a lower probability than ordinary combat would dictate. For example, once the aircraft is below 3 hp, any munition just has a 20% chance of killing, regardless of other factors. This would increase the value of the light gun aircraft, and dampen the rockets.
Since the B17s must be killed twice, they would be quite rugged. Escape into the night would also be significantly improved this way. This might also mean that dogfights actually peter out, as highly damaged fighters don't want to risk reactive attacks and instead fly home, or the effort to kill actually means that turns aloft have some impact on the result.
If we go for extra damage, then we make bombs more powerful, or, perhaps better, reduce the defensive stats of the strategic targets. Or, we make each bomb do a minimum damage using the resolve combat event.
Another option for extra damage is to stop aircraft from healing (by setting the 'has moved' bit for all aircraft between turns). This way, damage done to fighters is permanent, or at least forces planes to be disbanded for a 50% "kill." Without healing, leaving a damaged plane doesn't mean that it is a free full health (and probably veteran) plane in a few turns, but a permanently weakened entity, so trying for the final kill is less appealing. Perhaps the allied advantage would be that they
do get replacements for damaged aircraft, so they
can heal, while the Germans can't.
