If you could, how would you re-balance CAS in Ground Battles?

Game Discussion Realistic Battle
420

I honestly don’t see the former ever being practical, at least not in Ground RB. If we add NPC targets, they could be easily farmable by a CAS player, leading to severe ticket loss without any counterplay aside from spawning a fighter.

So the latter option it is.

Yes to both, though I’d prefer SPAA didn’t become TDs as like with the Falcon, it can cause them to increase in BR past their usefulness for AA work. Hence why I suggested for SPAA to be a secondary vehicle of sorts that you can spawn in while still using a tank. This would also fix the earnings/rewards issue, as you wouldn’t spend so much time in SPAA to begin with.

Gun SPAA always requires planes to get quite close and by then they’ve already dropped their bombs on your team. Tracers are very visible and outside of server desync or snow/desert maps making tracers nearly invisible, an alert pilot can easily fly well within the range of gun SPAAs and remain unharmed.

IIRC the M163A1 added some form of APDS, which wasn’t too shabby. Don’t have penetration data on hand, though I don’t think it would be too useful.

Ostwind did have APCR, it uses the same ammo and is pretty much the same cannon as the BK 3.7 mounted on a few german props. About 110mm of pen, which is quite nice. It also had full caliber solid shot with much less pen, but still better than the current APHE’s 49mm.

I could see that working pretty well.

I really like this, though heavy AA like the flakbus could also get a mechanic where, like naval, the crew has to calculate the aircraft speed and lead, and then it’ll have a lead indicator at much higher distances. AAs like the Flak 88 were used for much higher-flying targets, so this could be an interesting way to model that.

100% agreed.

I don’t doubt that the Stinger is very capable IRL (and it is missing a lot of performance in-game), but the Strela is a much bigger missile and that brings its own set of advantages. It could be big out of necessity (due to less advanced technology), but it could just outright be a better one too. I’m not sure on this though, just pointing it out.

Big issue there, some countries just don’t have better SPAA - and even the Pantsir and Type 81, probably the two best SPAAs right now missiles-wise can’t always do this.
Most countries moved to stationary or multi-vehicle systems to deal with higher-flying aircraft, and/or are accounting for having air superiority. Hence my suggestion to add an artificial ceiling to ground RB, so that even MANPADS can be reasonably threatening.

421

There was AI tanks in GRB at one point, they later removed them though. Basing this off from memory since it was a long time ago.

422

Yes, there were:

-AI tanks
-AI controlled AT guns
-AI trucks
-AI AAA

If I recall correctly only the trucks and tanks affected tickets

Edit: on the Jungle map there used to be an AI destroyer near the beach. It did nothing, but it could be sunk.

2 Likes
423

This was also only in existence while in the “starter pool” of pre-3.0 vehicles from what I recall (Or might have been Tier locked as they altered what Tier does over updates).

Do new players no longer have this starter pool? And did they remove AI from that? Of course when I experienced this we still had the D point spawning at random moments.

424

In my opinion, the only balance would be the mode combination, as this would completely change the game structure and maps,
All players choose whatever they want according to the map, plane, tank, ship, but they stay in the vehicle they choose until they die, the next spawn chooses what they want again. Additionally, if what I wrote above is done, a single spawn always makes more sense.

If there is realism in the game, even if it is an arcade, the player should not be able to jump from the tank and fly into the plane. If this is prevented, then CAS will be as it should be. If there is no realism, then tanks need to be equipped with auto defense so that I can escape from a helicopter firing guided missiles and rockets from 3 km away. Isn’t all the imbalance here?

425

The idea is that the short-range lead marker & undoing old AT belt nerfs are done in tandem.

I also believe the 40mm Bofors is missing an HE-VT shell. Definitely the L/70 model vehicles (AMX-30 DCA, Leo 40/70, Lvkv 42) and frankly I wouldn’t be against giving the Duster such rounds either. A Duster with 120mm pen APDS, short-range lead marker, and HE-VT would actually be kinda terrifying.

Hell, I remember reading that the Bofors cannon is missing a smoke shell. Imagine firing 240 smoke shells per minute and blanketing the whole map.

Air RB sucks for attackers and tactical bombers, yet in Combined modes fighter-bombers are unquestionably better due to better speed and agility. Such planes make up considerable portions of many trees, yet have no mode of their own to truly call home. Part of the point here is to effectively make a better version of what Air RB once tried but got whined into oblivion by fighter mains saying how “skill-less” nonfighters were/are. Especially since snail has said repeatedly how dedicated CAS planes are increasingly intended for use in Combined. Why for instance would you ever take an A-26B over an F6F-5 - the latter can drop more accurately and then defend itself far better. There are no targets well-suited to the former currently in the Combined modes.

The main reason for the AI targets, however, is that every piece of ordinance thrown at an NPC is one less potential whiner on the forums. It’s to give the folk in entrenched camps on either side of the CAS debate something else to shoot at besides getting enraged at each other, thereby bleeding steam off of the pressure cooker feeling of the mode.

Planes can exclusively go kill enemy artillery support and supply bases to bleed tickets. Planes and sometimes tanks can go kill supply line trucks to prevent the enemy team from gaining substantial amounts of tickets. Both can kill the NPC defensive units added around combined objectives that replace current spawns and caps. All players would have default planes in their decks like Naval does - if the enemy team kills your side’s Arty and nobody goes to stop them, well that’s the fault of the players who had the tools but chose not to use them.

426

The worst offender of this is that all allied cannons that can pen nearly 40mm dont pay extra SP. For reference the Mk 103 with its nerfed pen sits at 165 SP for 58mm of pen at 10m for its API and 77mm for its HVAP with 70-240 shots. At the same time US, Russia, GB etc. pay literally nothing extra for being able to destroy any tank with plane cannons or HMG´s especially in context to their abundance of Ammo. For comparison at BR 5.0 the D-28 has 8x.50´s with 30mm of pen at 10m, 8 HVAR´s, 6 M8´s, 2x 1000lbs and 1x 500lbs (yes all in one setup), the F-8 has two low velocity 20mm with 27mm pen at 10m, one 1000kg or 500kg, 4x 50kg or 2x Mk103 with 70 rds or 14 Pb2 rockets.

One can delete a postcode on its own, the other in a best case scenario two postboxes yet same BR and same SP for their maximum setup.

1 Like
427

Well, they aren’t wrong. Pressing spacebar a couple times isn’t anywhere as involved or skill dependent as getting a couple fighter kills provided your enemies aren’t paid actors. And in a mode without respawns, the fastest and most reliable way to win is to shoot down everyone else.

Giving Bofors HE-VT would send their BRs up through the roof, would also not be particularly good for the slower attackers and tactical bombers you want to facilitate.
Same would go for 120mm pen APDS - you’d send anything with a bofors all the way up to 6.0 and beyond.

I can only say two good things about the 190 F8 there, the 1000kg bomb can be hilarious if you find a nice group, and it makes for a decent low alt CAP fighter, unlike the D28.

428

I think the original poster was well thought out and solution oriented. I just had to acknowledge that. I only wish I could be more like the OP is.

For me, I’m still trying to level through my first tree. At this point its become very hard to play at all. I’ve taken far too many beatings by airplanes while trying to improve in tanks and trying to level in tanks.

For me this goes back to a common problem across all PVP games. There is a portion of the PVP world who cannot function without unfair advantages. Those are the players who hunt new, untrained or unleveled players in many games. They’re in it for bragging rights and slink away like cockroaches when the consistency of their failures and their methods are exposed. They steal and cheat in the grey areas and in so doing cause all manner of controversy. I’ve exposed a few in other games. They moan almost as loudly as they used to brag.

  • Simply remove tank kills for planes. If you kill a tank in a plane, that’s an aviation kill. You should not be able to advance your tank tree with an airplane. I review far too many replays of very high level players who can’t kill a tank, die, jump in a plane and get their kills harassing the spawn.

  • Remove credit for any kills by planes over the spawn. The planes are being used to suppress movement from the spawns which destroys game play. I just bought new premiums and this is day 2 of not playing them at all because of aircraft harassment. I’ve just been hollowed out by it all.

  • Aircraft bombs should have no effect after the plane is destroyed or about to die. So if a player is dropping bombs properly as a skilled player, it counts as an aviation kill because the plane is still flying when the bomb is supposed to go off but if the player is suiciding bombs on people or trying to grey area the situation by trying to be barely alive until the bombs go off, the bombs never go off. This encourages skilled use of bombs.

As a final note I offer this. I have the cash and the desire to just buy a BR 11 and have fun BUT my in game friends tell me this is not the honorable way to do things and this ruins the game and is not appreciated by other players so I don’t… Yet I can’t even play my Rank 4’s for spawn harassment by higher level players in planes, the vary players who will cry foul if I just buy my way to top tier. So my point is that the kinds of harassment we’re talking about here is actually encouraging players to give up the grind and just buy top tier.

(Full disclosure: I had to have an apache so I bought one at too high a BR. I only played with it in test drive until I unlocked choppers and then only in PVE till I reach its BR. Just full disclosure)

1 Like
429

CAS at 5.0 - 8.0 should be disabled. It is too strong for the current game mechanics which do not allow interception of CAS before they’re over the battlefield. Interception would help to balance the mechanic without removing it.

1 Like
430

You already can’t. This is not and has never been a thing.

No.

No.

They don’t. Once the pilot is dead they can’t release bombs.

No. Unrealistic trash.

1 Like
431

But the plane can count as “killed” while they’re still able to drop bombs ans fire rockets and guns.

432

Thanks to the new kill credit system, the only remaining situation where this is possible is the fuselage being cut in half… at which point no one is dropping anything with any degree of precision whatsoever; if you get killed by bombs from half a plane flinging bombs in some random direction, it’s something to laugh about.

I would have gone one step further and made kills only credit when all of the crew are dead or bailed, but this is the next best thing, really. And covers essentially every situation.

I would also be in favour of allowing guns, ordnance, and their systems to be able to take damage. For some bizarre reason despite gun damage being a core gameplay element of tanks and ships, aircraft guns cannot be knocked out.

1 Like
433

Hazarding a guess it might be detrimental to ARB, adding an extra way for the cannon/mg to be knocked out (over heat and low round count) in a one life mode. So guessing this is why cannon/mgs are removed from the damage model, apart from wing mounted where they have been severed by attacks.

If so it is a shame they cannot just turn it on for GF and from a player perspective does not seem impossible.

1 Like
434

He ment that after a bomb drop the plane dies before the bomb explodes. and he thinks it should not explode if the plane dies.
i don’t agree with that at all, but you just answered the wrong thing and i wanted to clarify.

1 Like
435

And I responded to that specific point of his post with this rather aggressive response.

436

no you responded with:

437

And yet ironically making such planes fit better into Air RB doesn’t even have to disadvantage fighter pilots. Simply making each current win condition now only bleed 50% of the ticket bar and instead having match victory be “best 2 of 3 - A2A, CAS, Bombing” would be a sufficient foundation to build upon. But trying to remotely suggest that meets claims of so-called “skill,” when the people making such claims never stop to think “huh, maybe if there is room for nonfighters to matter they can then be given objectives that actually require more flying/aiming skill to perform!”

And yet frankly I see such changes like that as vital. If we’re ever going to see the arguments on CAS to settle down or even end completely, then the intended counters must purposely be so straightforward to use with minimal learning curve that anyone who dares whine “CAS OP” must first give a serious reason why they aren’t using or learning to use the appropriate counters. And no, any variation of “but I don’t wanna!” isn’t a serious reason.

In order to encourage SPAAG correct use, average joes must be convinced that moving beyond the confines of their own spawn is not a self-induced death sentence. That is what undoing the nerfs to SPAAG antitank capabilities and adding new rounds for some of them aims to achieve.

Combined Ground becomes friendlier towards dedicated attackers and tactical bombers by incorporating targets which are best dealt with by such aircraft. That is what the addition of bombing targets (which used to be standard on tank maps til 1.63), supply lines, and cap zone AI defenses all can help achieve. A large enough quantity of mission-critical targets that the larger ammo supply of dedicated attackers actually matters more. Plus in the case of the cap zone defenses, player tanks can also kill them. Especially derp HE vs bunkers like it was designed to be used on.

438

So the entire enemy team is dead but the game doesn’t end? Because if not, all the fighting usually happens right in the middle of the map, over all the ground targets. Gonna be pretty hard to have a good impact there.

Like what? Pressing spacebar when your bombsight is pointed at an enemy marker? Pointing your guns at an immobile or slow-moving target on the ground? That’s never gonna change.

And as I said, making them that easy to use against both air AND ground vehicles will increase their BRs and restore the current situation. The Falcon was pretty good at both, it’s now 8.0 because such a vehicle is just too good.

Imagine what would happen if the Ostwind got its 110mm pen HVAP. Now it can frontally pen pretty much anything it meets, and it’s got the rate of fire to make the lack of postpen damage simply not matter - it would be a monster. What do you think will happen to its currently 3.7 (RB) battle rating?

It will be one way or another. If you’re looking for ground targets because you’re much closer to the frontline, you’re probably gonna miss the plane coming right for you. If you have your eyes on the sky, you’re probably not gonna see that tank pulling out around the corner as well.

Hence why I think SPAA would do much better as a secondary spawnable vehicle, like scout drones.

I don’t think adding PvE targets would help. I’d at least like to see a public beta test for all this.
And y’know… if slow attackers have to get anywhere close to the battlefield, the fast firing HE-VT Bofors is gonna put a stop to that very fast.

439

Yes. Such a change also means that bomber airfield rushes will no longer be a thing (on the few maps where its even still an option), and CAS zergrushes will no longer be a thing. Both are far less common than “no active players left on hostile team” but are just as destructive to the game mode.

Attackers and bombers’ main role is not supposed to be PvP, thus having PvP alone be able to win games means they remain irrelevant beyond personal grind. Only way to change that is to make PvP not be the be-all-end-all.

  • A2A of all players and AI attackers bleeds 50% of the tickets.

  • A2G of all AI ground units bleeds 50% of the tickets.

  • Base respawning is disabled, and the number of bases active at start is increased from 3-4 to 8-10. Taking them all out bleeds 50% of the tickets.

Best 2 of 3 wins.

Under a system like that, all plane types’ efforts stack towards a common goal, fostering teamwork.

Under a system like that, there is now reason from a dev perspective to work on bomber cockpits, as more people will be wanting to use bombers. There will be more reason to add premium bombers (many possibilities). There will be far more reason to add new and better objectives for attackers and bombers to kill, or even objectives needing both classes or all three classes to take out.

For example, an objective could be a large factory complex guarded by a nearby runway and long-range heavy AA. First air superiority has to be secured by fighters. Then CAS comes in and disables the heavy AA. Then bombers take out the complex.

Or things like bombing train stations, radar units, and a ton of other options.

PvP alone being all it takes to win rounds is quite literally strangulating the mode to death.

That is what most heavy attackers and tactical bombers are meant to kill, so yes. Hell even fighter-bombers mostly killed these, not tanks directly.

I expect it to go up significantly, but it would remain effective against most props, so if it shot up to 5.3 it would hardly make a difference.

And, increasing some AAs’ BRs opens gaps to add other AA in, as many nations’ AA lines are kinda barren.

I hard disagree with making SPAAG a vehicle you can instantly swap to anywhere on the map without penalty. Leave that Quake crap to Arcade, or better yet to other games entirely. You pick a vehicle class fully aware of its benefits and drawbacks - being able to switch mindlessly means your choice of a tank with no/poor AA ability suddenly has no drawback. Do you not see how that same logic could also be extended to every other vehicle class and asking to swap to anything whenever you want, and how destructive it would be to gameplay? For example - someone spawning a light tank to rush a power position and then swapping to a slow superheavy risk-free.

Swapping vehicles at cap zones and spawns I can see. OG Battlefront 2 had that more than a decade ago.