Fuel at Bases

[MiG Eater]

re: the ability to destroy all fuel at a base.  If fuel goes to 0 then a captured base would be worthless until the fuel tanks regenerated even if the hangers are up.  

Bad idea.

It would only take two fighters to de-ack a feild and render it unusable using a half dozen strafing passes per airplane.  It would just as easy for a single fighter to strafe a base into submission even though it would take a little longer.  This would severely impact gameplay in the main arena.  You wouldn't need bombers anymore to hit anything but HQ's and carriers.  Why have hangers at all if killing a couple of fuel tanks has the same effect as destroying those huge buildings?  

MiG

[SpitLead]

Well, I can see this thread has digressed into a gameplay issue.  Wobble, Soda, Lepton, Wardog, MiG Eater you are ALL making good points.  However, I feel the gameplay needs more balance regarding fuel tanks.  

Wobble is correct, by reducing the fuel to 25% you do NOT deter point defense of that field.  One can still take off and get to 10k to shoot down incoming bombers or kill cons.  Period. That is a FACT.  With that fact established, there's not a whole lot of point then to take fuel bunkers out as most fighters get vulched or some such thing.  Also, Soda et. al. you also make a good point in that if one only takes the fuel down there's NO POINT in going after the FHs.  That would make it TOO easy to capture a field.  Now, let's look at the reality of the game.  ALL countries have a hard enough time as it IS to even organize a single coordinated strike against one field let alone fly to all the surrounding fields and knock down their fuel to 25%!!! (gee that sounds like fun don't it).  So, in AH reality that strategy (IMHO) is worthless in its execution (don't get me wrong - strategically it's very sound but in reality it just won't happen).

So... how does one balance it out fairly and make the fuel a worthy target (which by the way Strategic Daylight Bombing in WWII definitely went after refineries because of its importance and we do have refineries in the game).  I like Wobble's suggestion to limit only 5 (or some other number of vehicles) fighters to take off after fuel has hit zero (0).  Zero fuel would then prohibit anything from taking off for a SHORT period of time (i.e. 2,3, or 5 minutes or whatever) at which point it would bump back up to 25%. This would add some real importance to the fuel.  Heck make them harder to take down but it adds another strategic element to the game.  Right now, it's only a nusciance to be at 25% fuel while defending a field.  I will only blow them up for the fun of it and to get perk points on my missions.  Tactically, I see them of little importance.

[Soda]

SpitLead,
  I've been with many missions where we get "organized" enough to take a field with little or no trouble.  I've been on missions to take out fuel at fields nearby, both in offense and defense.  Same with dar.  Often it goes un-noticed but it's big thing to strategic play.

Hitting fuel is a great tactic, 25% is a huge disadvantage at any base, though I agree not as much at the actual "Attacked" base.  Then again, the attacked base should have the hangers levelled, not just 4 fuel strafed.  Ever faced the dilema of flying from a nearby base with only 25% fuel to try and help defend, it's almost suicide since you know you can't gain any alt or use WEP or you'll be out of fuel by the time you get there.

I'm still convinced that this would just be a way to take advantage of a slightly suppressed base; take out the ack, hit the fuel, wait till 4 or 5 newbies spawn and die so you know you have a window to get the goon in, and then you capture the base without ever disabling a hanger.  Sounds like a way to wreck gameplay, not improve it.

I'm all for people suggesting things to improve gameplay but this just appears to have too many problems that would make it worse.  I'm just pointing out the way I can see people abusing this system.

btw, comparing bombing refineries to bases isn't quite the same though I agree more targets like this that effected game play would probably be a blast.  Imagine train/truck hunting to slow supplies to the front...  

-Soda

[SpitLead]

I'm already picturing myself in a P-47D with rockets booming a train :-)

Hope they simulate the steam flying out of the train engine for effect.

[Soda]

Damn, I hope you're right... and bridges, trucks, depots... problem is, you'll see 100's of C-Hogs hitting everything with 20mm then, not the P-47's that historically did that sort of thing a lot.

-Soda

[SpitLead]

I remember playing Dynamix's (Sierra's) A-10 Tank Killer sim years ago.  You use to be able to attack truck convoy's and blow bridges with laser guided bombs.  Very fun.  MiG Alley also has sort of the same thing.  They actually have trains you can attack too. Just take out the lead engine and she's dead on the tracks.  Then you take your time and pick off the rest of the cars.  I don't recall any train cars though set up with ack guns which might make it tricky.  I think the germans did that.

[Tac]

The current rebuild times in hangars are so ridiculously low that you can bomb the FH of 3 nearby fields (near the field you plan to attack), and by the time you are hitting the 3rd field, the 1st is already up!

Hangars should take TWICE the ack rebuild time. Id love to see someone patch together a hangar faster than he can mount a gun on a tripod.

[Soda]

Tac,
  Hard to put a really high re-gen time hangers since it is pretty damn easy to take every hanger at a field out with a single Lanc flying at 30K.  It's a game balance thing I think since you do have 15 minutes while the hangers are down that should be enough time to take a field if you do it right.

Hitting hangers has nothing to do with real life, so while it might actually take weeks/months to replace a real hanger in real life planes just didn't sit in hangers waiting to get hit.

Damn, I remember the days of the endless spawning. hangers? what hangers?

-Soda