wwii naval air battling - setting level of ambition

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Kaspar

I don’t feel an abstracted combat system would be fun enough to be the core of an entire game campaign. What meaningful tactical decisions can the player even make in an abstracted system?

In anything Spaceships-based the important decisions are how aggressive or defensive you want to be.

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by Kaspar

I don’t feel an abstracted combat system would be fun enough to be the core of an entire game campaign. What meaningful tactical decisions can the player even make in an abstracted system?

And therein lies the problem - meaningful tactical decisions were few and far between in context, and most of them in the preparatory phases and involving complex matters of carrier logistics: for example how many aircraft in the CAP, how often are they replaced, what is the priority between strike groups and CAP? When and for how long can the carrier fly off aircraft (bearing in mind that doing so may require a radical course change)? How high will your CAP fly - high is good against level and dive bombers, but if you expect your attackers to attack with skip bombs, masthead bombing or torpedoes, perhaps the CAP should be low instead? Can you contact and control your CAP effectively once they are up? How do you respond to incoming contacts (if you have radar). If you have scramble fighters, what is the balance between launching them and defensive manoeuvres for the carrier?
The actual combat, as previously stated, pretty much runs as its own train - the individual pilots have control of their own aircraft as far as technology and situational awareness allow them, anything else is just noises off. In gaming terms it will likely be a lot of repetitive dice rolling and few decisions.

[mlangsdorf]

Originally Posted by Kaspar

I don’t feel an abstracted combat system would be fun enough to be the core of an entire game campaign. What meaningful tactical decisions can the player even make in an abstracted system?

Just from reading through the Path of Cunning rules:
* Do I scan the sky or focus on piloting this round?
* if I'm focusing on piloting, do I attempt to close on my target, stay at my current range and try shooting, attempt to Feint, attempt to evade someone attacking me, attempt to Hide from someone attacking me, or attempt at Fast pass against my target or attacker?
* If I'm closing, do I risk a dedicated close which might let someone else ambush me when I can't dodge?

All of which seem like they accurately reflect the actual tactical chooses of WWII aircraft pilots.

As I've said, I'd expand on the Path of Cunning rules to add more details to formation and vertical movement. But there are clearly tactical decisions to be made even without that additional detail.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by The Colonel

And therein lies the problem - meaningful tactical decisions were few and far between in context, and most of them in the preparatory phases and involving complex matters of carrier logistics: for example how many aircraft in the CAP, how often are they replaced, what is the priority between strike groups and CAP? When and for how long can the carrier fly off aircraft (bearing in mind that doing so may require a radical course change)? How high will your CAP fly - high is good against level and dive bombers, but if you expect your attackers to attack with skip bombs, masthead bombing or torpedoes, perhaps the CAP should be low instead? Can you contact and control your CAP effectively once they are up? How do you respond to incoming contacts (if you have radar). If you have scramble fighters, what is the balance between launching them and defensive manoeuvres for the carrier?
The actual combat, as previously stated, pretty much runs as its own train - the individual pilots have control of their own aircraft as far as technology and situational awareness allow them, anything else is just noises off. In gaming terms it will likely be a lot of repetitive dice rolling and few decisions.

There's a shortage of effective central tactical control (not just between ships and planes, even between a ship's bridge and its own weapons) but what the pilots do constitutes meaningful tactical decisions...whether or not they're thinking it through as such and despite their limited perspective.

Mostly falling to doctrine-as-practiced in combat, and flight leader decisions on navigational-scale things. (Since one of the things the ships can't really do is track or direct their own aircraft during sorties.)