AAA weaponry

Team SomeGuy · General **Joined**: 18 Aug 2006

Once again it is time to open the floor for gameplay debate!

Last time I asked what would be better for a barrage firing artillery. (The end answer I am running on is scattered fire, but each rocket does significant damage)

Now the issue has come up in dealing with AAA (aka anti air artillery).

If you were building AAA how would you implement the various forms? A powerful attack yet inaccurate? Constant stream of weak damage but accurate fire? Or constant fire (weak or powerful) but is inaccurate?

Note for use in my mod I have complimentary SAMs built into the techtree as well and also each AAA type can also attack ground for a different function (2 of them are anti-vehicle, the other anti-infantry).

One of my AAA has an issue. It has a very weak attack per bullet but puts out a LOT of them (maximum in-game ROF for RA2 engine) in a very short time. Unfortunately it is inaccurate and relies on splash shots.

Here's the debate. Should a weapon like that one be a constant yet accurate stream of hits or should it remain as so?

Advantages of constant stream: Playability and balance mainly.

Disadvantages: Blatantly unrealistic. Can only be handwaved as saying it fires more bullets than it can, but not all of them are hitting.

Advantages of constant yet inaccurate: More realistic and still playable. Can also splash other aerial opponents.

Disadvantages: Hard to balance. Too much damage and it easily has issues overlapping with other AAA. Too little and it will not be effective enough for any use. (Especially since most aircraft in my mod have very powerful attacks) Additionally, it looks kinda silly against "stationary" aircraft like JumpJet locomotors.

So I ask of PPM, which plays better, which is cooler to use and which frankly sounds a better idea?

Morpher · General **Joined**: 28 Jan 2005

I'd go to the Ace Combat 4 universe and use the Stonehenge weapon system / artillery.

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Jon Fox · Posted: Mon May 04, 2009 1:23 am Post subject:

Yeah. Inacurrate, slow-fireing attacks that do massive splash damage and lots of damage per round.

DaFool · Defense Minister **Joined**: 07 Nov 2006

Now, for each side, there will be multiple aa defenses? I would just make each one designed against a certain type of aircraft.

Take a plane, and ask yourself what is the best way to denfed against it, regardless of the other aircraft. Is the plane fast and weak?

There's three forms of AA that I know of: Missiles, bullets, and flak. I would just make each type most efficent against a specific target, and then varry against the others. So a missile might be good vs a heavy slow moving bomber, but it might not be able to track a high speed fighter.

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Team SomeGuy · General **Joined**: 18 Aug 2006

Each side has 3 principal defenses.

A dedicated anti-ground. (Usually like a bunker or anti-tank turret)

A dedicated anti-air. (SAMs mainly)

A hybrid defense. Not as good at AA as the other, nor as good at AG. But complimentary to either one.

One of which has been built fully (It's a laser weapon so it's dead accurate but has the shortest range of all AA)

The other is a 4 round barrage turret. (Anti-tank/Anti-air)

The last one is a Gattling-esque weapon. Fires at maximum in-game ROF.

The AA design is built on the principle of fighter aircraft being countered by SAMs (often because strike aircraft have very damaging attacks).

Helicopter-style units would be countered by both a mix of AAA and SAMs.

That's where the idea of accurate, constant yet low damage shooting comes in. Attack helicopters in this mod have very painful attacks but have better armor than Fighters. Which means the much slower attacks of SAMs may not be enough when in low quantities to stop them. SAMs have inherently much longer range but a pair of them is not as good at shredding clustered (or even just a few) helicopters than a pair of AAA.

If there were Tertiary weapons available this would be quite moot since I could make an inaccurate weapon for fighters and an accurate one for others. But alas not yet.