How about a Fighter Aircraft consumeable rewo... overhaul?

[Figment]

How about we apply CV aircraft controls to cruiser/BB fighter consumables? The controls and code exists. It's mostly a matter of balancing and preventing new issues.

 

I would propose the following limitations and adjustments:

 

1. Fighter strength is dependent on a variety of things.
   • Tiering
   • The historic amount of aircraft a ship could have (storage capacity)
   • CV captain skills in fighter power could apply to these aircraft too.
   • Note that combined, ships can make a very effective fighter screen
   • Should be very vulnerable to AA, particularly from DD. Should battle approaching enemy aircraft. 
2. Switching control between ship and aircraft is possible as it was during RTS CVs
   • This should also apply to CVs to reduce AI reliance
   • When switching to ship controls, aircraft go into a loiter/patrol mode and act as currently a CV deployed fighter would. Which means you can leave it circling over a different area
   • When launching aircraft, you by default retain control over the ship until you switch to aircraft manually. Fighter patrols will automatically circle your ship as they would today.
3. Fighter patrols should be possible to be assigned to ships like in the RTS days.
   • On the map you could attach fighter patrols to circle a ship, just as the old RTS CV fighter patrols could be assigned to protect ships.
4. Reduced scouting capacity by relating operation time to distance from ship  in order to avoid stealth play being destroyed much further
   • Limited base (flight) time as today
   • "Fuel" taken into account: once fuel (and thus time) for a return trip runs out, the fighter returns to its ship. Hence the further the fighter flies from its ship of origin, the faster the fighter consumeable runs out as it has to return to its ship of origin.
   • Potentially reduce effectiveness of other detection systems (radar) to compensate for increased team ability to scout
5. Consider rebalancing CVs to mitigate for increased aircraft losses if they lose too many to make it workable.
   • Reduce scouting ability of aircraft by say 10% to compensate for increased air presence
   • Keep an eye on:
     • Aircraft reserve attrition speed
     • Leverage effect of sides with fighter power and those with less/who lost it

 

 

Consider what this would mean for anti-submarine and warfare and tracking the last stealth DD though. The increased scouting prowess should come with some mitigation towards DDs in particular. Of course being able to launch fighters to defend DDs from air harassment would also be possible in this new situation. It also provides a way to counter Tone and Ise attacks.

 

For those who don't want to control their fighters, things remain as they are, for those people who do opt to control their fighters, they get a bit of spotting capacity and improved / teamwork defense against CV attacks at the cost of their consumables duration.

 

EDIT: rewo... overhauled title on popular demand.

[Bindolaf_Werebane]

Please, no more reworks.

[Figment]

45 minutes ago, Bindolaf_Werebane said:

Please, no more reworks.

 

But fine, let's call it an overhaul.

[MementoMori_6030]

Fighter consumable:

[Figment]

15 minutes ago, MementoMori_6030 said:

Fighter consumable:

Consumable fighters.

[El2aZeR]

1 hour ago, Figment said:

 

The CV rework in itself proves this statement wrong - as has pretty much every rework WG has done so far.

 

Meaningful fighter play is not a possibility in the CV rework because it goes against the design philosophy of allowing reworked CVs to dumpster everything without counterplay, without which the rework falls apart as we have already seen.

[Figment]

21 minutes ago, El2aZeR said:

The CV rework in itself proves this statement wrong - as has pretty much every rework WG has done so far.

I'd disagree, the rework had - for all its negatives - also some positive effects: nobody is complaining about map-warriors anymore. :p

 

But in all seriousness, there are some positive sides. The top-down gameplay wasn't extremely popular as it was too detached from the rest of the game and killed emersiveness. At least the CVs are now a bit more balanced towards one another because you can't pick an imbalanced full fighter deck for instance, or get different tier CVs opposite one another. It's also not possible to time a triple angle torp drop trap anymore.

 

Now of course the execution of neither CV design was good due to various sub-design calls and massive AA balance issues, but some improvements were made in some aspects.

 

But the progress made on specific design choices has largely been outdone by other new design choices that worked out quite poorly, plus a lack of restraints and unnecessary buffs to survivability, even if this did diminish the lobsided leverage gained for one CV killing the other asap (or even just destroyed all its aircraft) so it could reign unthreatened for the rest of the match.

Quote

Meaningful fighter play is not a possibility in the CV rework because it goes against the design philosophy of allowing reworked CVs to dumpster everything without counterplay, without which the rework falls apart as we have already seen.

That wasn't the design philopsophy, just the consequence of severely lacking foresight regarding consequences of their specific design choices, a lack of a coherent all-encompassing vision of class interaction and generally a half-hearted and therefore incompetent implementation under time constraints and reluctance to spend more resources on it. The problem here is that WG implemented a system before they could figure out if it would be appreciated by either side of the aiming reticule and called it a day rather than make some further iterations with extensive player feedback.

 

Of course, with the negativity some players provide and their unwillingness and inability to see beyond existing design choices, getting the right constructive feedback is tricky.

 

But let's not discuss this too much, I'd rather keep it on topic of what this design change to the cruiser/BB fighters would bring to the game.

[UnterSeeBot]

AI fighter control was recently mentioned by one of the CMS, as part of WG's intentions to redo Operations (and I assumen as a consequence, CooP AI too) next year, I will try to hunt that info down for the OP. But if I recall correctly, the CM stated that the AI code needed to be revised and improved, which would have a knock on effect for AI fighters in other game modes.

edit : silly me, this info was in the "Important Message..." OP

Quote

Operations. CV rework rendered a lot of AI-related internal tools obsolete and made working with AI-aircraft-related stuff very difficult or impossible. Right now we're in the process of removing this obstacle. It's being worked on for many reasons, not just for the sake of Operations, but one of the benefits we will have when this project is done is that we will be able to return some of the old Operations in 2022

A rare admission that the CV Rework caused intestinal issues for WG devs.

[El2aZeR]

1 hour ago, Figment said:

The top-down gameplay wasn't extremely popular as it was too detached from the rest of the game and killed emersiveness. At least the CVs are now a bit more balanced towards one another because you can't pick an imbalanced full fighter deck for instance, or get different tier CVs opposite one another. It's also not possible to time a triple angle torp drop trap anymore.

 

The rework is currently significantly less popular on all servers except SEA due to the recent rocket change, reinforcing my point about how CVs will inevitably die if they cannot dumpster everything.

CV play is just as, if not even more detached compared to before. It is also not immersive at all given that literally nothing in the way of how CVs currently operate makes any actual sense.

Pure fighter/strike decks no longer existed towards the end of RTS. In fact ironically to quote my fellow CV main stratmania, reworked CVs are pure RTS strike loadouts on steroids.

Cross dropping is still perfectly possible and just as unavoidable as before.

 

1 hour ago, Figment said:

That wasn't the design philopsophy

 

It was, actually. WG even listed the ability of surface ships to shut down strikes as one of the big issues they sought to solve. It is also pretty much the only thing they managed to solve.

And from a pure design standpoint this makes perfect sense. This is because reworked CV play is not a PvP game, it is a PvE game as most challenges you face are borne from automated mechanics rather than the interaction with enemy players.

 

As such your idea cannot succeed.

[Figment]

2 hours ago, El2aZeR said:

The rework is currently significantly less popular on all servers except SEA due to the recent rocket change, reinforcing my point about how CVs will inevitably die if they cannot dumpster everything.

The rocket design change is not the only way they could have gone about things (max damage reduction towards DDs would probably have satisfied everyone) and is largely a very specific detail design for which easily twenty alternatives exist, most of which could have been acceptable.

 

WG overdoes buffs and nerfs at times and this is probably one of them as some CVs were balanced around doing damage with them (particularly the German ones got most cruiser damage from rockets).

Quote

CV play is just as, if not even more detached compared to before.

I mean they are flying in the world, as part of it in third person, rather than from a god-view from above that distances emotionally and emphatically. It is a significant change in immersion.

Quote

It is also not immersive at all given that literally nothing in the way of how CVs currently operate makes any actual sense.

That is a completely separate issue from third person vs top down view.

Quote

Pure fighter/strike decks no longer existed towards the end of RTS. In fact ironically to quote my fellow CV main stratmania, reworked CVs are pure RTS strike loadouts on steroids.

Cross dropping is still perfectly possible and just as unavoidable as before.

The CV A2A game was severely dumbed down due to not micromanaging multiple units. That’s because they made it impossible to direct multiple units at the same time due to direct control, including the triple drop at the same time. You can do consecutive strikes that crossfire, sure, but they can more easily be negated, even if I prefered the single drop as . It isn’t as easy.

Quote

It was, actually. WG even listed the ability of surface ships to shut down strikes as one of the big issues they sought to solve. It is also pretty much the only thing they managed to solve.

And from a pure design standpoint this makes perfect sense. This is because reworked CV play is not a PvP game, it is a PvE game as most challenges you face are borne from automated mechanics rather than the interaction with enemy players.

 

As such your idea cannot succeed.

There is however a difference here, stopping all strike capability is not what happens here per se. What it does is give players a sense they can fight back more effectively, have actual deterrents and provide a sense of control.

 

Given fighters are limited use, you would not shut down CV strikes, but you can mitigate them, depending on the fighter power. And yes, combined fighter power may stop a strike completely, but then it can do so now as well. With more “fuel” (time) a CV could also wait out the fighters  or have them be used on just a few aircraft - meanwhile giving players more time to do something before being struck.

 

The dynamics would change, but volume of aircraft sent by CV would not be fully stopped by cruiser / BB fighters.

 

Edit: I just want to make it clear that any design is a combination of hundreds of decisions that together either work or don’t. Often it hinges on just a couple or a dozen choices not working together as a whole. The problem with a lot of people is that they can’t see past choices that have been made (can’t imagine alternatives or can’t extrapolate from there without conflating with issues of another design) and come to the conclusion something therefore can’t be done, while in reality the issue lies with the decisionmaking quality that leads to a specific construct of choices, a specific, detailed concept, with issues, rather than the basic, more abstract and interpretable concept of a class wielding air power at sea.

 

I doubt any of this will be done, but I at least offered an alternative I think is a workable system. But just because their vision was flawed, doesn’t mean it can’t or won’t be done. Time’s change and so do conclusions drawn from lessons learned.

[Ronchabale]

5 hours ago, Figment said:

EDIT: rewo... overhauled title on popular demand.

Whole game needs reworking..

Edit: I mean overhauling

 

 

[SkollUlfr]

would be a good way to homogenise controls between catapult equipped ships, full cv, and the eventual flight deck/hybrid cruisers.

 

fighter consumables as a whole where and i assume still are, complete trash.

[El2aZeR]

1 hour ago, Figment said:

The rocket design change is not the only way they could have gone about things (max damage reduction towards DDs would probably have satisfied everyone) and is largely a very specific detail design for which easily twenty alternatives exist, most of which could have been acceptable.

 

The rocket change hasn't actually changed anything at all aside from making rockets harder to use. And yet it has completely obliterated what little CV population was left to begin with.

Thus it once again reinforces what has always been true with reworked CVs. If it becomes more balanced, it will die because the average CV player is not interested in that. What they are interested in is playing a hilariously unfair and overpowered class.

 

1 hour ago, Figment said:

I mean they are flying in the world, as part of it in third person, rather than from a god-view from above that distances emotionally and emphatically. It is a significant change in immersion.

 

Exactly. That's a lot less immersive given that it makes no sense as pretty much all current CV mechanics.

I suppose this is subjective.

 

1 hour ago, Figment said:

The CV A2A game was severely dumbed down due to not micromanaging multiple units. That’s because they made it impossible to direct multiple units at the same time due to direct control, including the triple drop at the same time. You can do consecutive strikes that crossfire, sure, but they can more easily be negated, even if I prefered the single drop as . It isn’t as easy.

 

On the contrary the required skills ironically haven't changed much at all. Quite literally the only significant thing that has changed is the basic control scheme, which is a big part but not something that fundamentally changes CV play. Map awareness, target priority, vectoring, movement and combat predictions, all the soft skills from RTS directly transfer over. And while the micromanagement has been removed, it has on the other hand upped the load on everything else due to a much faster gameplay pace, leveling out at roughly the same skill ceiling.

This is ironically why the majority, if not all of the most successful rework CV players have also been successful RTS CV players. Once you look beneath the surface you realize there is little difference.

It should also be noted that funnily enough for terrible players the CV rework is a lot less user friendly as they're hitting lows never before seen in years of RTS play.

 

As for simultaneous cross drops, that wasn't exactly an option in RTS anyway due to the UI and as such was often less successful than one that was executed sequentially as the UI could easily trip you up. Hence why the majority of cross drops were done sequential - which it is also done in the rework and again, is just as unavoidable.

 

1 hour ago, Figment said:

What it does is give players a sense they can fight back more effectively, have actual deterrents and provide a sense of control.

 

That is precisely what must not exist in the rework. Again, you're thinking that CV play is a PvP game on its fundamental basis which it is not. You are not fighting against players, you are fighting against automated mechanics. If your target can actually fight back in any way and the average CV player actually has to start thinking about how they play, the rework is going to die (well, more so than it already is).

We have had a somewhat reasonable implementation of AA in the past for one month. It allowed surface ships to fight back and punish poor decision making on part of the CV but at the same time was also insufficient to actually deny CV strikes. In that month the rework died so hard that WG had to overbuff CVs to the state in which they mostly still are in to save what little remained of the CV playerbase - up until they recently obliterated it again.

 

In the CV rework balance and popularity are two different ends of the same spectrum. If you want to lean towards balance, you might as well scrap the rework altogether and start anew. It is not some kind of notion that people hold on to due to misconceptions or sth, it is a now twice proven fact.

[Figment]

1 hour ago, El2aZeR said:

The rocket change hasn't actually changed anything at all aside from making rockets harder to use. And yet it has completely obliterated what little CV population was left to begin with.

It was the only reliable self-defense and offensive tool for many CV-players with respect to DD. It made it a frustrating tool to use, time feels wasted with way more passes needed to deal any significant damage, where the damage output before was frustrating to DD (could do 50% or more if aimed well) Against cruisers it significantly reduced citadel chance as dodging for both DD and cruisers was made a lot easier. Disappointment by a negative experience change is a likely factor here. The reason for the negative sentiment can be that the part that got harder changed a fundamental balance that caused too much frustration.

Quote

Thus it once again reinforces what has always been true with reworked CVs. If it becomes more balanced, it will die because the average CV player is not interested in that. What they are interested in is playing a hilariously unfair and overpowered class.

Honestly I think this is a conclusion based in prejudice for it seems to argue towards a desired outcome including projection on what people want. You forego any other reasons by default. The fact it is so obvious to you without any research or solid evidence, just an unverified hypothesis based on a single parameter suggests you want to be able to conclude something. You probably created a stereotype image of CV players given your nomenclature use and then selectively try to  find agreeing arguments.

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Exactly. That's a lot less immersive given that it makes no sense as pretty much all current CV mechanics.

I suppose this is subjective.

A flat 2D world you look at from above as distant observer or a 3D world where you personally move through terrain features and ships and you see height changes and ship features, which world do you feel more a part of? Which mode makes you feel more in the same 3D ship world as the other ships? And thus more in the same world as those other ships?

 

Either way, I’m not sure if immersion means the same to you as it does to me…

 

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On the contrary the required skills ironically haven't changed much at all.

Didn’t say it did?

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Quite literally the only significant thing that has changed is the basic control scheme, which is a big part but not something that fundamentally changes CV play. Map awareness, target priority, vectoring, movement and combat predictions, all the soft skills from RTS directly transfer over.

Agreed.

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And while the micromanagement has been removed, it has on the other hand upped the load on everything else due to a much faster gameplay pace, leveling out at roughly the same skill ceiling.

Skills like situational awareness acquisition became much more important and amount of control over bombers en  changed.

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This is ironically why the majority, if not all of the most successful rework CV players have also been successful RTS CV players. Once you look beneath the surface you realize there is little difference.

Agreed, also because it is a dot unit. You need to plan andpriorities to optimize output.

 

Quote

As for simultaneous cross drops, that wasn't exactly an option in RTS anyway due to the UI and as such was often less successful than one that was executed sequentially as the UI could easily trip you up. Hence why the majority of cross drops were done sequential - which it is also done in the rework and again, is just as unavoidable.

Eh was a matter of timing distance and drop point between aircraft. Was quite doable in my experience, but then that sort of timing management gameplay may or may not suit people. I mean, I could mostly time artillery shots on fast moving targets in WoT as well (even if overshooting was still likely as height angle info was limited).

Quote

That is precisely what must not exist in the rework. Again, you're thinking that CV play is a PvP game on its fundamental basis which it is not. You are not fighting against players, you are fighting against automated mechanics.

When players control the drones that fight each other it is PvP. If you play chess you don’t play PvE just because the units are made of wood.

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If your target can actually fight back in any way and the average CV player actually has to start thinking about how they play, the rework is going to die (well, more so than it already is).

Meh, I think you’d get the RTS crowd back or retain.

Quote

We have had a somewhat reasonable implementation of AA in the past for one month. It allowed surface ships to fight back and punish poor decision making on part of the CV but at the same time was also insufficient to actually deny CV strikes. In that month the rework died so hard that WG had to overbuff CVs to the state in which they mostly still are in to save what little remained of the CV playerbase - up until they recently obliterated it again.

Stacking AA was the issue iirc

Quote

In the CV rework balance and popularity are two different ends of the same spectrum. If you want to lean towards balance, you might as well scrap the rework altogether and start anew. It is not some kind of notion that people hold on to due to misconceptions or sth, it is a now twice proven fact.

Disagree.

[El2aZeR]

30 minutes ago, Figment said:

It made it a frustrating tool to use, time feels wasted with way more passes needed to deal any significant damage, where the damage output before was frustrating to DD (could do 50% or more if aimed well) Against cruisers it significantly reduced citadel chance as dodging for both DD and cruisers was made a lot easier.

 

Except rockets if aimed properly are still just as effective as before.

The time to target for AP rockets has not changed, machine gun fire merely replaces the previous rocket travel time. That part is straight up untrue.

 

30 minutes ago, Figment said:

Honestly I think this is a conclusion based in prejudice for it seems to argue towards a desired outcome including projection on what people want.

 

It is actually based upon population data which was publicly available, but has since been lost as maplesyrup purged old snapshots.

Here are percentages for EU only, first for before and during the first year of the rework, then as they currently are courtesy of @mcboernester.

0.8.5 was the patch that made AA viable. 0.8.7 undid that. The massive cave in at the end of 2019 was likely caused by the T8+ exp on loss nerf as well as the Hosho TB nerf, the former making CVs less economically viable and the latter rooting out some of the seal clubbers.

 

 

 

As for some hard number comparisons, thanks to this post from me in August 2019

https://forum.worldofwarships.eu/topic/105510-cv-rework-discussion/?page=316&tab=comments#comment-3113950

 

We know that there were total of 2463 active RTS CV players that week divided into 1101 high and 1362 low tier players on EU.

Compare that to 1489 now, divided into 801 high and 688 low tier. Alternatively if you want a figure that mirrors the August 2019 date, that'd be 909 high and 646 low tier players as I recorded here:

https://forum.worldofwarships.eu/topic/153462-cv-rework-rewind/?page=4&tab=comments#comment-3972202

 

(Note that the figures in the charts use unit based numbers, while my figures use player based numbers which has a at least 10 battles played that week restriction hence the difference in player numbers. This is because unit based numbers were not available during RTS.)

 

30 minutes ago, Figment said:

A flat 2D world you look at from above as distant observer or a 3D world where you personally move through terrain features and ships and you see height changes and ship features, which world do you feel more a part of? Which mode makes you feel more in the same 3D ship world as the other ships? And thus more in the same world as those other ships?

 

Either way, I’m not sure if immersion means the same to you as it does to me…

 

Yes. If I play an Aircraft Carrier, I expect to command multiple strike and fighter wings over the combat area as they did in real life and fight accordingly, not play a knock off PvE arcade flight sim.

As I said, this is probably subjective.

 

30 minutes ago, Figment said:

When players control the drones that fight each other it is PvP. If you play chess you don’t play PvE just because the units are made of wood.

 

That's not the point. In CV play you primarily fight against automated mechanics, aka flak and DPS. Skill has absolutely no influence over these things, you take the same AA when fighting a potato as you do when you fight a unicum because it is not controlled by a player but by a bot.

Chess is a PvP game because typically players are controlling the pieces. Chess can be made into a PvE game by replacing one player with a bot. Now, imagine how many people will want to play against said bot if that bot is practically unbeatable. Same thing.

[Sink_Different]

17 hours ago, Figment said:

How about we apply CV aircraft controls to cruiser/BB fighter consumables? The controls and code exists. It's mostly a matter of balancing and preventing new issues.

 

I would propose the following limitations and adjustments:

 

1. Fighter strength is dependent on a variety of things.
   • Tiering
   • The historic amount of aircraft a ship could have (storage capacity)
   • CV captain skills in fighter power could apply to these aircraft too.
   • Note that combined, ships can make a very effective fighter screen
   • Should be very vulnerable to AA, particularly from DD. Should battle approaching enemy aircraft. 
2. Switching control between ship and aircraft is possible as it was during RTS CVs
   • This should also apply to CVs to reduce AI reliance
   • When switching to ship controls, aircraft go into a loiter/patrol mode and act as currently a CV deployed fighter would. Which means you can leave it circling over a different area
   • When launching aircraft, you by default retain control over the ship until you switch to aircraft manually. Fighter patrols will automatically circle your ship as they would today.
3. Fighter patrols should be possible to be assigned to ships like in the RTS days.
   • On the map you could attach fighter patrols to circle a ship, just as the old RTS CV fighter patrols could be assigned to protect ships.
4. Reduced scouting capacity by relating operation time to distance from ship  in order to avoid stealth play being destroyed much further
   • Limited base (flight) time as today
   • "Fuel" taken into account: once fuel (and thus time) for a return trip runs out, the fighter returns to its ship. Hence the further the fighter flies from its ship of origin, the faster the fighter consumeable runs out as it has to return to its ship of origin.
   • Potentially reduce effectiveness of other detection systems (radar) to compensate for increased team ability to scout
5. Consider rebalancing CVs to mitigate for increased aircraft losses if they lose too many to make it workable.
   • Reduce scouting ability of aircraft by say 10% to compensate for increased air presence
   • Keep an eye on:
     • Aircraft reserve attrition speed
     • Leverage effect of sides with fighter power and those with less/who lost it

 

 

Consider what this would mean for anti-submarine and warfare and tracking the last stealth DD though. The increased scouting prowess should come with some mitigation towards DDs in particular. Of course being able to launch fighters to defend DDs from air harassment would also be possible in this new situation. It also provides a way to counter Tone and Ise attacks.

 

For those who don't want to control their fighters, things remain as they are, for those people who do opt to control their fighters, they get a bit of spotting capacity and improved / teamwork defense against CV attacks at the cost of their consumables duration.

 

EDIT: rewo... overhauled title on popular demand.

Simpler idea: remove fighter CAP the ability to stop so they can be used against enemy air.

Add a PBY to each team that wall roam along the map the whole game and be the only source of air recon. Makes it immune to AA and fighters, basically it flies to high.

Radius fo detection is open to discussion.