Making Carriers Carry: a Mass Combat tweak

[Michele]

Originally Posted by Tyneras

A carrier without an airwing is like a tank without it's turret, it's most potent attack is now ramming. This isn't combined arms changing tactics, it's a weapon platform without it's weapon, it can move around but little else. The wises course of action is to leave the battle and get a new weapon.

Of course. When Anthony wrote that carriers don't attack by themselves, I replied carriers can go around alone and could theoretically give battle alone - meaning without escorting warships. Not that they could go around, let alone attack, without their aircraft.
Indeed, the point you make above would confirm that the author was right in considering the carrier and the aircraft it carries as one element in GURPS Mass Combat.

BTW, hybrid aircraft carriers which are capable of attacking with weapons other than their aircraft didn't exist just in WWII. The Admiral Kuznetsov carries a small number of Su-33s and also a brace of P-700/P-800 SSMs, which also are the main armament of Russian battlecruisers. If the NATO/OTAN called the initial version of that missile the SS-N-19 "Shipwreck", there is a reason.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Michele

Of course. When Anthony wrote that carriers don't attack by themselves, I replied carriers can go around alone and could theoretically give battle alone - meaning without escorting warships. Not that they could go around, let alone attack, without their aircraft.

The thing is, the aircraft can attack without the carrier -- they just need alternate basing. They can also be destroyed separately from the carrier, and under some conditions (alternate landing options) the carrier can be destroyed without destroying the air wing. Also, a destroyed air wing can be replaced at the speed of aircraft movement, rather than being limited by the speed of the carrier.

All of this indicates that the carrier is a support unit that allows bringing a unit of aircraft to a fight, rather than a combat unit.

[Michele]

Well, good point there, too.