Naval and air attacks are removing ammo of ground units

[El_Condoro]

I have seen a number of times that an air attack or a naval attack (at range one) will remove the ammo of ground units. I do not think this should be the case for air attacks and I wish we could prevent ground units firing back at ships! Actually, should ground units be able to fire at ships at all?

Anyway, apart from the ship issue can anyone think of a justification of why AP or HE ammo should be expended against air attacks?

[edahl1980]

I have seen a number of times that an air attack or a naval attack (at range one) will remove the ammo of ground units. I do not think this should be the case for air attacks and I wish we could prevent ground units firing back at ships! Actually, should ground units be able to fire at ships at all?

Anyway, apart from the ship issue can anyone think of a justification of why AP or HE ammo should be expended against air attacks?

Something is very wrong when a destroyer engage infantry, and the destroyed come out losing. Like rifles and heavy machineguns would do any damage compared to what the guns on a destroyer could do to infantry on land.

[Shrike]

Actually, this "bug" is what gives you a half chance of taking out an IS2 every now and then after they run out of ammo. I am inclined to think this is very much by design. Kind of agree on the destroyer thing though.

[charonjr]

Well, IIRC infantry regiment actually had organic artillery and AT companies, so I think that it should not be completely impossible that they would have been able to inflict some damage on a destoyer.

And yup, I like their use in wearing down those very heavy units, too

CharonJr

[TJD]

Well, IIRC infantry regiment actually had organic artillery and AT companies, so I think that it should not be completely impossible that they would have been able to inflict some damage on a destoyer

CharonJr

I remember during the Falklands conflict the RMs on South Georgia put a Carl Gustav AT round into an Argentine corvette and took out a good part of her firepower..... fwiw.....

Tim

[El_Condoro]

If the only reason to allow a fighter attack to reduce a IS-II's ammo by 25% (to use an extreme example) is because the tank is too strong perhaps either the tank should be nerfed or the HA of tactical bombers should be increased so that they will be used to attack tanks rather than fighters.

[Kerensky]

This is all well and good... except for the fact that the IS-2 does not have [1] air attack anymore. You cannot ammo drain and IS-2 with fighter strafing.

As for relationships of heavy armor and tactical bombers, we cannot increase the attack power of tactical bombers because they will absolutely murder normal units (half track transports, medium tanks, and so on).

That said, lowering the air defense of all heavy armor (m26, is2, su assault guns, jagdtiger, german tanks, and so on) is being debated as we speak.

[El_Condoro]

That's very good news.

IS-2 may have changed but an ISU-152 will still use 25% of its ammo retaliating against a fighter. Any tank will use a round if it has AA value, which seems strange to me.

[rezaf]

As for relationships of heavy armor and tactical bombers, we cannot increase the attack power of tactical bombers because they will absolutely murder normal units (half track transports, medium tanks, and so on).

What's the main change in combat calculations you applied here as compared to PG?
In PG, most ground units have drastically lower air-defense values than in PzC, oftentimes less than half, yet somehow you could play PG without tac's murdering all units as you describe it. Yes, they were a lot more useful than in PzC, but was that such a bad thing?
How did stuff work in PG, where trucks had an air defense of ZERO, while you say even slightly modifying SA/HA of tacs is out of the question because then they'd be overpowered. I'm not trying to mock you, I'm really interested in what changes you guys made caused this difference in behavior.

As it stands, tacs remain vastly underpowered and borderline useless, especially compared to arty - even towed arty.
But I guess this isn't the thread to discuss that.

About ships and ground units, I tend to agree with Condoro. Most ground units have a naval attack of 1, which I guess is to model the fact that with any attack from a seaborne unit any ordinary ground unit will have a hard time firing back in any way. If that's true, why remove ammo, which suggests exactly that happens?
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rezaf

[Kerensky]

Tactical bomber and heavy tank relationships, yea this isnt the thread for it. Suffice to say we're taking a good hard look at it. I personally know exactly what needs to be done (the obviousness of the truth is in the numbers 12v23), but I suppose we do need to make sure changes for the future don't break old content.

As for ships draining ammo.
This is because of the nature of how range works. Cruisers and battleships dont drain ammo when they fire at an adjacent land unit. Destroyers and Schnellboots do.
It's a limit of the game. All units must have a naval attack value of 1 or they cannot oust enemy ships from a port. Since destroyers and schnellboots follow the same rules and ground units with regard to 0 range combat, its an unfortunate side effect these units drain ground unit ammo.

It's something to hopefully address in the future, especially if and when the games moves to more naval orientated content (Pacific theatre) but for now it's just not that high of a priority. Doesn't mean we're not aware of it though.

[charonjr]

Just took a look at the standard equipment of an infantry regiment - they usually had 6 7,5cm and 2 15cm guns which should have been fairly able to damage an essentially unarmored destroyer at ranges up to 4,5km.

[El_Condoro]

The ship damage issue is secondary to the main question in this thread.

My main question is trying to find a justification for armoured units (tanks, mobile ART and AT) to lose AP and HE ammo when attacked from the air. I can justify it for INF, towed ART, towed AT, and other soft targets by saying it represents ammunition exploding from attacks but I can't find a reason for it for armoured units. If it's just a game limitation I can live with it but if it's a design feature I am interested to know why.

[Fimconte]

The ship damage issue is secondary to the main question in this thread.

My main question is trying to find a justification for armoured units (tanks, mobile ART and AT) to lose AP and HE ammo when attacked from the air. I can justify it for INF, towed ART, towed AT, and other soft targets by saying it represents ammunition exploding from attacks but I can't find a reason for it for armoured units. If it's just a game limitation I can live with it but if it's a design feature I am interested to know why.

Since units represent entire Divisions/Battalions/etc. it stands to reason that the lost ammunition comes from their regimental or logistical centres being destroyed.

[rezaf]

Cmon, units should only lose ammo when they are able to fire back, otherwise it's clearly a bug.
Sure, you can say "It represents ammo supplies being destroyed", but that's explaining away a bug, nothing more.

Technically, there should be separate ammo counts for different weapons, like in the later Battle Isle games, but that's beyond the scope of this game, obviously.
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rezaf

[El_Condoro]

Since units represent entire Divisions/Battalions/etc. it stands to reason that the lost ammunition comes from their regimental or logistical centres being destroyed.

I would agree with you to a degree but I remember the composition of PzC units being discussed when we were looking at overruns during the beta. I argued that a unit represents more than just that one type of vehicle - more an organisation, like a regiment/battalion/etc. - but that was disputed as not being the basic philosophy of PG and now PzC. If a unit represents one type of vehicle I will maintain my argument but it's an interesting discussion about what a unit actually represents.

[miki]

Since units represent entire Divisions/Battalions/etc. it stands to reason that the lost ammunition comes from their regimental or logistical centres being destroyed.

I would agree with you to a degree but I remember the composition of PzC units being discussed when we were looking at overruns during the beta. I argued that a unit represents more than just that one type of vehicle - more an organisation, like a regiment/battalion/etc. - but that was disputed as not being the basic philosophy of PG and now PzC. If a unit represents one type of vehicle I will maintain my argument but it's an interesting discussion about what a unit actually represents.

I find ridicolous to think that one unit represents only just one type of vehicle can assault a city, for example. Even for infantry, and for Close assault factor, which seems to depend only on infantry portable AT weapons. Actual PC units represent Divisions or even corps imho.

[TheGrayMouser]

I believe the developer has said several times each hex is 20 kilometers and units represent aproximately Divisions. This of course means units are very abstract and can assume to have multiple types of equipment in them.
PG/ PC are very abstract games that give the feel of combined arms warefare by replacing absolutely realistic tables of euipment , orders of battle with "single type units". Its a winning combo IMHO. I am not sure why players want to change the game to a hyper realistic model in SOME areas but not others. I think that getting too specific in certain areas actually decreases the immersion and believability. If you want detailed models of what a division , corp, regiment etc actually is, then there are many games that do this, The Total Operation Art of War games, Advanced tactics etc etc ( all from matrix)

So, imho leave the ammo loss as is when air armadas and fleets bombard a divisional size unit. After all, infantry and tank can dive off drive off roads on march when the planes dive in, caissons, trucks , ammo tractors cannot

[El_Condoro]

OK, that gives a justification for the current situation - the armoured vehicles themselves are not reduced in ammo but their *supply vehicles* are attacked, too, and thus the unit is depleted. I can live with that! Cheers.

[Molve]

Cmon, units should only lose ammo when they are able to fire back, otherwise it's clearly a bug.
Sure, you can say "It represents ammo supplies being destroyed", but that's explaining away a bug, nothing more.

Technically, there should be separate ammo counts for different weapons, like in the later Battle Isle games, but that's beyond the scope of this game, obviously.
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rezaf

Units do only lose ammo when able to fire back. (That and being level bombed, I suppose)

Relevant here is instead that having an air attack of "0" is much preferable to having one of "[1]", especially when the unit in question has a low ammo capacity.

While it might be historical that units like ISU-152s had limited AA capability, I think we should set their air attack at "0". Preventing the "a fighter flying by steals 25% of available AT/HE rounds" abuse simply is much more important than retaining any historical ability to maybe reduce it from Strength 10 to Strength 9.



Either that, or make it so any unit with "passive AA" (a number within brackets) does not spend ammo. Only units with active AA spends ammo when shooting into the air, representing that the ammo capacity for such units actually were intended (mostly) for air attacks/defense. This solution isn't perfect either, as the case of the 88 switched into AT mode attests to.

But it would be 1) a relatively small coding change 2) not break existing content and 3) solve all extreme cases (such as that ISU) with no equipment-file edits needed.


Regards,

[soldier]

While it might be historical that units like ISU-152s had limited AA capability, I think we should set their air attack at "0". Preventing the "a fighter flying by steals 25% of available AT/HE rounds" abuse simply is much more important than retaining any historical ability to maybe reduce it from Strength 10 to Strength 9.

Although i prefer a historical approach and note that the IS2 could be fitted with a 12mm AA gun on top, I think Molve is right on here. Using a fighter to soak up 25% of a units ammo is far too gamey and advantageous for me (after all isn't that what level bombers are for ? ). Besides that, it seems like tactical bombers take more damage from the heavy tanks than they can dish out in return and this makes no sense. Cutting ISU's air attack to 0 would solve both problems.