Wow ... there are some really interesting twists of logic going on here. And apparently a few folks don't remember things they posted only a few months ago about the evils of one groups of players deliberately ruining the gameplay of another.
However ...
Rampant porking is nothing new. All that's really changed is the total numbers involved. The rationalization of "helping the team" is thin, because there's porking of undefended bases, bases 3 levels behind the front, bases being horded, everywhere. The 4 or 5 planes busy blowing up ord during a base attack would probably be more useful taking the town down. But then they couldn't vultch - and get perks - which is all its really about.
I don't think the concern about bigger hordes matters at this point. It's not uncommon to see 20+ planes CAP'ing a base (with FH down) waiting for the C47's to arrive these days. Would 5 more planes make a difference? Nah.
The arguments against hardening ground assets from a historical angle are irrelevent. The point is the current system has given griefers the means to mess things up for others, and waste the time of anyone who tries to chase them down.
In general I'm against adding more AAA to fields, because that leads to too much running to the ack. But given the current war of attrition, some changes may be in order. Maybe adjust the rebuild time on AAA based on how many enemy planes are over a field as a start. So in the 20:0 case I mentioned above, the ack rebuilds in like a minute and loitering around over the field becomes hazardous.
Maybe add more AAA positions, but some only activate when a certain number of planes are over a field. So if your field has 6 auto guns as a base, maybe that goes up to 8 when 10 enemy planes are overhead, 10 when there's 20, and so on. And maybe the additional AAA are M16's that pop onto the field. Something with enough rate of fire to stand a good chance of scoring some hits - and that won't be taken out with one cannon shell.
