Tankers and AEW/C aircraft in-game?

[Jebediah]

Hey guys, remember me? The "let's spitball every idea I think of because one of them might be good" guy?

I'm back.

The way I see it, in-game there are pretty much only fighters and dropships at the moment. Some have different capabilities than others, sure, but that's it. They're all either combat or transport aircraft.

If the US Air Force had it that simple, they'd crap themselves in ecstasy. Sure, not every type of aircraft needs to be represented in-game, but there are two main ones that I feel like would improve the game without dramatically upsetting the balance or anything like that.

1) The Tanker. Every major air force has a fuel carrying aircraft to allow their combat jets to extend their range. Be it the KC-135 or the IL-78, the pathetic fuel capacities of short-legged aircraft are irrelevant so long as a tanker is around.

Of course, as soon as they were introduced, tankers became the #2 priority for destruction (#1 is coming) for air force planners. The ability to let planes fly as far as they want is a horrible thing in the eyes of the person being attacked by said planes, so efforts were made to plan all future doctrine around denying the enemy that ability. Which is what the aliens would do.

Tankers in-game could be sent to rendezvous with or tail jets who are patrolling or otherwise hunting down a target that's pushing their fuel abilities to the brink. When they need extra gas, they simply slow down and refuel. Tankers are defenseless, notably, so they would be shot down instantly unescorted like the Charlie, and would take the place of a valuable interceptor, so they would be balanced out. Also, the "unlimited" factor may definitely be a bit much, so let's just say each tanker can only refuel three times before being empty and having to go back home. That way it could top off a squadron exactly, and then go back for a refuel session.

Also of note...most real-world fighter aircraft are capable of carrying "buddy tanks", meaning that instead of a dedicated tanker aircraft with massive quantities of fuel, another fighter can attach small fuel tanks to its hardpoints allowing its buddies to refuel off of it. Not only can it keep up with fighters (being a fighter itself), it isn't completely defenseless if attacked. While one or both hardpoints might be fuel tanks, a fighter could still have its cannon and one missile (as per Air Force guidelines) or just its cannon and an afterburner (as per our guidelines) to protect itself.

2) The AEW/C aircraft, Aerial Early Warning and Control. Most notable of this family is the AWACS system, so much so that most people just call 'em all AWACS. They are, in their simplest form, radar emplacements with jet engines. An AWACS jet can detect incoming aircraft from hundreds of miles out and relay that information to the air-battle planners on the ground below.

Even better, most AEW/C aircraft have advanced radar systems that allow them to take over guidance of missiles from the planes that launched them. Whereas a fighter's radar may only reach out for, say, 200 miles, an AWACS aircraft on station can co-opt that missile and feed it the targeting information only it can see to double that to 400.

However, these are the #1 targets for air battle management, and in most plans have the most powerful escort force of anything in the air. The aliens can and will learn what these are, can and will track them (radar is a two-way street), and will generally make their lives hell.

They could be used as a shorter-ranged mobile radar system for probing out areas with no coverage, and the tanker-fighter system could go in when something was detected.

Either of those sound appealing?

[ventuswings]

I don't believe tankers will be worth implementing since range of many aircrafts are already pretty far, thus would offer not much to the game.

However, I agree it could be interesting to remove detection ability from fighters & dropships and give it only to AEW/C aircrafts. Since the base radar itself picks up many UFO, it would not be too unbalancing yet including aircraft separately dedicated for detection would provide interesting options.

My idea for AEW/C

* Available at beginning of the game

* Large fuel

* Is only airplane with radar detection (radar detection removed from other airplanes)

* Works the same as Charlie for air combat; destroyed/grounded when intercepted by fighter, and if has fighter escorts it does not show up on the air combat screen.

Edited November 2, 2013 by ventuswings