Strats effect regeneration times of dar, ords, troops, and fuel porked at airbases. The city effects strat regeneration time.
Strats were never a goal as envisioned by HTC for game play (see above). They were easy to hit and fun to blow up. Almost no one said, "if I do this then this will happen."
Now strats are not easy to hit and you can get more points hitting easier things closer.
So, translation: It's Too Hard!! Again.
wrongway
It has been stated by HTCs many times that the strats are to be a secondary objective to the main front-line action(s) going on in a map. They however have also expressed though that they should bear some notable relation and influence on a map and thus be considered more-valuable than-not to a country and its war effort(s).
I don't know if the point of this thread is a whine for them being too hard or for them wanting to see a measurable impact on gameplay. As it is there is no shortage of players willing to put in the effort to bomb strats, or players to put in the time and effort to defend them (which is no trivial task, taking a prop-fighter up to 30+k to intercept a buff), so I think the proof in the pudding is obvious that they aren't too hard and that players have been participating in attacking and defending the strats for arguabley a questionable reward.
That questionable reward, for those that have been overlooking it, has been a noticable impact to players egaged in combat or operations elsewhere on the map:
Furballing - long prolonged engagements between specific bases, going back and forth, with each one taking stabs at each other's bases and supporting facilities at the bases, there's always something not at 100% anyways. Those engaged locally in that furball are unaware of any difference between the fuel refinery getting leveled at the distantly-located strat and a single con "breaking through the line" with ord and bombing the local fuel storages on the airfield the fighting is taking place out of.
Organized Smash n Grabs - these people are looking for bases to grab where either fighting has died off or been non existent for a very long time. They are looking to avoid the bases engaged in fighting and take a base the defenders are currently not massed at (can't blame them, it's a smarter investment of their effort if they're determined to capture a base). These bases have typicaly been left to regenerate, absent of battle, for hours of not more. When you're looking to target a base that hasn't been beaten on in hours, and capture it in 15 minutes or less if possible, the strats have no noticable influence. If things are regenerating variabley at between 40 minutes or 20 minutes, and a base hasn't flashed in over two hours, of cource it's going ot be 100% up, the attackers don't even think about it - it's a given. As for the defenders, they may try to foil the base take and not loose it, but chances are that not one of them were spending the previous hour or two defending the strats so that facilities on the assaulted field can respawn quicker (and a shorter/smaller defence required to defend the base attempting to be captured)... or in other words, hoping they can put up enough of a defence for a furballing situation to develop, or the attackers to just give up. Again, to these participants in this situation, weather the strats are thriving or burning make absolutely no difference or noticable impact.
