As it stands, this game is already amazing and I’m enjoying every moment of it. Guiding my craft gently or otherwise among the clouds and filling my sky with fire, bullets, and explosions is pure joy. And to my great pleasure there is an engaging and well balanced strategy and tactics game behind it all. And then I wonder, what about airplanes? So I spent some time reading old posts and thinking about how they would affect play and how to get them in the sky to begin with. Here is the result of my ponderings. I apologize in advance for the length of the post, as there is a lot to cover.
The two big challenges to implementing airplanes are the physics and the game balance. Below are my ideas for a low effort method of implementation with the necessary features to maintain the balance of strategic and tactical play.
Physics:
Use the existing ship physics. Reduce mass and drag, increase acceleration and top speed, and lock the throttle to full. Lastly, adjust the collision damage locations such that the plane takes extra damage from collisions and even more extra damage from frontal and bottom collisions so a head on crash is guaranteed death as is any contact with the ground. For extra fanciness, increase the degree of pitch when flying up and down.
The upside is that this can be implemented with significantly less time and effort.
The downside to this technique is that you won’t be able to do a barrel roll. I know, this makes me sad too. Maybe someday someone will have time to do a full airplane physics simulation.
Balance (the harder part):
Planes should be a new type of turret, not a replacement to ships. They should require a new type of turret hardpoint not currently on any ships. This is because none of the existing ships are properly balanced to have a plane. And they would look weird and out of place.
A new ship should be added to be balanced around having an airplane hardpoint. This ship should be large and slow with fewer and weaker guns than other large slow ships and minimal overlap in the turret firing arcs. This is because the freedom of movement with the plane once launched will enable it to overlap its firing arc with any of the other firing arcs on its own ship or any other allied ship.
Planes should have a limited flight time via a fuel supply. If the fuel runs out, the simulation should treat the plane as though its main engine and balloon have been destroyed giving it a guaranteed meeting with the ground and thus death. Something similar should happen if the pilot ejects mid flight. A few seconds after launching, the hard point on the carrier should convert from a launch point to a catch point that lands the plane if it comes within a small radius of the catch point. Upon landing the fuel refills. This serves two important balance functions.
Firstly, all ships in the game have one or more directions where there they have no firing arcs. The freedom of movement of the plane allows a carrier ship to project damage in any direction. By limiting flight time via fuel, the “blind spot” becomes one not of space but of timing.
Secondly all ships in the game, even with the longest ranged guns on the most open maps, have some limit to range. A plane would allow a carrier to project damage outside of this range even around obstacles that would otherwise block shots. By limiting flight time via fuel, you also limit the effective range to maintain balance between the ships.
To keep the fuel meaningful, the repair effort needed to replace a downed plane should be significantly more than a normal turret. This is so that pilots who choose to treat the plane as a form of large ammunition, either by intentionally crashing it into enemies or by continuing to fly towards a distant enemy after half their fuel is consumed, place their ship at a disadvantage and thus must be tactical about the use of these techniques rather than finding them to be an always optimal use of the plane. This will also enhance the above mentioned balance issues of blind spots and overlapping firing arcs by rewarding enemies who manage to shoot down the plane with a reasonable time period of tactical advantage to attempt to exploit. Remember that, as it is technically a form of turret, the planes would be extra susceptible to shatter type damage and, if not using heatsink rounds, would have no way to put out a fire without returning to their carrier and landing.
Extra Bonus Stuff:
While the use of the existing physics saves a ton of time, all the balance stuff that would be needed is still a lot of work. Here are some extra ideas that are unnecessary, but would be neat if extra time could be taken to implement them.
Adding a plane adds some nice new dimensions to strategy and tactics, and even more depth could be gained from multiple types of planes with different damage types in line with the different types of guns. machine gun plane for armor piercing, shotgun plane for shredding, rocket plane for shattering, and mortar plane for explosive hull damage. I’m generally of the opinion that, given their maneuvering and positional advantages, plane weaponry should be in line with small turrets in terms of firepower but that will need testing to be sure.
To make flying planes and flying against them even more interesting, a slight rework of the interface could allow the operator of a plane to use piloting equipment in addition to gunner ammunition. For example, map keys 1-4 to piloting gear and 5-8 to ammo selection. This could have the interesting side effect of making a 2 pilot crew viable.
In Conclusion:
There is no completely effortless way to get planes into the game, but I feel like this is a viable method. I left vague a lot of details that really can’t be narrowed down without some extensive testing, such as how many hit points to give a plane, how long the fuel supply should last, etc. I do think that making a carrier with more than one airplane hardpoint would be a mistake in terms of game balance, but that’s just my opinion based on how I feel the meta would unfold.
I really love the game as it currently stands. I know that planes are going to be part of the adventure mode which I’m super excited for. I really believe that, if implemented with game balance in mind, planes could even further enhance what is already an amazing strategy and tactical environment. I hope this gets read and considered for what it might bring to the glorious action in the sky.
