DFD-R3: 957 vs. 292, 556 vs. 976

[Darkstorm]

I have no clue why you would make two units for the same purpose. Look at MO, the harrier and black eagle are geared towards taking out tanks and armored vehicles, the Barracuda is geared towards knocking out buildings. That is proper implementing of aircraft, each one is made for something specific.

[Beowulf]

The point is that aircraft can't be extended beyond one ammo with high damage or multiple shots with low damage, or beyond using heavy cost to determine strength with the global reload time. With aircraft-specific reload times, you can then add pad helicopters reminiscent of the Hind/Apache in Red Alert that reload exceptionally since they fire multiple bursts and then have traditional aircraft like the Harrier and Black Eagle that fire one very powerful shot but have a longer reload time to prevent their abuse.

The global reload time severely limits the potential application for AircraftTypes. Cost, strength, speed, weapon damage and warhead tweaking only go so far and it's not nearly far enough.

[reaperrr]

I have no clue why you would make two units for the same purpose. Look at MO, the harrier and black eagle are geared towards taking out tanks and armored vehicles, the Barracuda is geared towards knocking out buildings. That is proper implementing of aircraft, each one is made for something specific.

I don't know where I said I would make two units for the same purpose...
Besides, that's precisely my point, Yaks were meant for anti-infantry, MiGs for anti-armor. But most people don't bother using the Yak because the slow reload rate makes it too bothersome to use.

Same for the Orcas, the bomber was meant to be anti-building and anti-infantry, the fighter anti-vehicle. But people use the bomber in all 3 scenarios, since the fast reload rate makes it superior.

Besides, if #349 (Patrol/Guard Area for aircraft) survives DFD, aircraft in general will become more useful and probably see more wide-spread use, so a feature that helps to make each of them behave exactly as wanted without compromises would be very welcome.

The global reload time severely limits the potential application for AircraftTypes. Cost, strength, speed, weapon damage and warhead tweaking only go so far and it's not nearly far enough.

Exactly.

[Darkstorm]

Well I guess I have to concede defeat or this argument will go on pointlessly since aircraft reload times wins out anyways. Though I think that the stupid range limit should be taken off, I don't have much use for it.

[¥R M0dd€r]

Ok, it is rather useful.... But if [316] Ammo= on weapons will include a reload tag, then [976] Aircraft-specific reload times wont be needed, right?

[Black Shadow 750]

But why would Ammo= on weapons include a reload tag? The request is very specific and asks for only one thing Ammo=. On. Weapons. So I doubt that arguement'd work.

[¥R M0dd€r]

But why would Ammo= on weapons include a reload tag? The request is very specific and asks for only one thing Ammo=. On. Weapons. So I doubt that arguement'd work.

Why not include a reload tag? I know what the request say you dont have to tell me. Reload tag on weapon, if ammo exist on weapon, makes sense to add and is useful.

[Renegade]

Administrative Notice:

Since the last post in this discussion was three days ago, it is assumed to be over. We will proceed to judgement.

[AlexB]

Fight 1
Indeed, the deformable terrain wasn't that fun. Artilleries could shoot a hole through the Earth easily. Nice and realistic. I suspect it wouldn't be easy to code and it has graphical issues. Blowing away the snow to reveal... more snow. Paved city blocks would be paved miles deep. Custom storms/weather effects, however, tremendously adds to the atmosphere of the game, and they are versatile. However, I'm not fond at all of the sight, armor and whatever modifiers, as they just overcomplicate the issue and most likely they will turn out to be a coding horror. But still, custom storms.

Fight 2
Both issues are nice, but there can only be one. I vote for the Reload rate on aircraft. Drain weapons are quite a small subset of all weapons, but aircraft is an entire branch on the tech tree. There is no reason this shouldn't get done, as it is a very harsh limit to have only one ReloadRate applied to both bombers and fighters. The issues with the Mig/Yak and Bomber/Fighter are understandable and downgrading the weapons to account for very fast reload cycles would make bombers obsolete and improving weapons to account for longer reload cycles would make the Yak ineffective. This should be resolved.

[Renegade]

Fight 1

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Eww...mean and difficult selection.
I liked the deformable terrain of TS, and I'd like to see it return. But Alex's argumentation is, of course, reasonable - custom storms are worth far more.

Kill: #292
Support: #957

Fight 2

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I must say, I find it silly to put reload rate on aircraft.
For one, we already have requests to put Ammo on weapons. Why would we deglobalize Ammo to not be on units any more, only to then turn around and put other ammo controls on the unit? It makes no sense! Putting the reload rate on the weapon with Ammo makes a whole lot more sense and fixes this issue on the fly.

Secondly, the solution fails its own argumentation: The argumentation is, essentially, "it makes no sense that a bomber has the same reload rate as a strafer".
And that is fair. But it also doesn't make sense that a strafer's machine gun should have the same reload rate as its flare gun. Or that a B-17's carpet bombs would be reloaded at the same rate as its AA machine gun.
And let's be honest here: Even if we just put the reload rate on the aircraft, it wouldn't take long until, after we liberated Ammo, someone would request that exact additional liberation.

Applying the exact same restriction to Ammo-related flags that we're trying to remove on Ammo itself makes no sense at all, especially since we'll inevitably have to put other Ammo-related flags on weapons as well - and if we already have Reload on weapons, why would we want ReloadRate on AircraftTypes to overrule that? It makes no sense.

Ranged drain weapons, on the other hand, have an immediate C&C usage case with Generals's Hacker.

Kill: #976
Support: #556

[DCoder]

Support #556, reluctantly kill #976 in favour of per-Weapon ammo.