While updating NS, I had a good look at the Airship & Aircraft rules, and had some commments/suggestions I wanted to bring up for discussion.


Airships:

Rigid airships used quite a bit of aluminum in their structure. We dont account for that in our rules. I would suggest that a BP cost be included for airships. (ie a  Type 3 would cost $0.7 & 70 tons of BP)

Airship hangars are massive structures and once again, there is no BP cost. I would suggest changing their cost from say (for a Type 3) $5 to $3 and 300 tons of BP (0.3 BP)

Also since airship fields already have most of the requirements that an airplane needs, I would suggest being able to upgrade anywhere where you have an airship hanger to a full airfield for a minimal fee ($0.5? $1?).


Aircraft:

Airfields, in my opinion, are way too expensive (in terms of BP) there just isnt enough equipment on them to justify those costs. Also for example the BP cost of a 1916 to 1918 airfield doubles, while they are basiclly the same. I would suggest a reduction in BP costs for airfields, say (for a 1916) from $1.5 & 0.5BP to $2 & 0.2BP, same (for a 1918) from $2 & 1 BP to $3 & 0.3 BP.

Also airfields should have a limit to the number of airplanes they can hold (say 400 single-engined per field?). Right now I can stuff 2,000 heavy bombers into a single airfield without problem.

Also I would like to see an option for smaller airfields, say $1 will get you an airfield that can only hold a limited number (100?) of single-engined planes. Or else if you add it to a port, you get a seaplane base which can operate a limited number (25?) of long-range flying boats.

The possibility of including a BP cost to aircraft should be looked at. The engine weights of say 100 4-engined bombers is approximately 0.1 BP.

I will commit to this now having chatted with Maddox on the subject last night:

I feel an overhaul of aircraft and airship rules coming, targeted for 1920. These suggestions will certainly be taken under advisement for that effort, as will the other two recent threads on aircraft procurement and abilities.

I generally agree.
With MTBs we already have payments in the 40t range, so 0.04BP for something is just another excel entry.

On  field types, I was thinking more of a primary and satellite fields.  Primary fields have heavy maintenance, depots, training, Squadron HQs.  Satellite fields have to be associated with a primary, but are more primitive.   Somewhat like ports/slips.   Actually, my mental image of current airfields is like the primary and presumes there are some nearby secondary strips.

I think we'll probably end up with type 0, type 3, etc. airfields, which can support units up to a certain size. So you're idea of primary and satellite fields probably fits there, with a bunch of type 0 fields surrounding a bigger one. Or the really big ones like type 5 fields might include satellite fields as well.

I'm also thinking airship hangars are handled more or less like drydocks. Want an airship hangar? Just add it. Airships would count as being equivalent to some aircraft unit size for the purpose of determining how many flying thingies a field can support, more or less like the tonnage limits on ports now.

If you look up to WW2 rough dirt fields would and could be used for mainly aircraft only bombers, most medium bombers, transports and in time jet fighter need a firm fixed runway.  If you look at airpower ground stuff you have the following.

1) The airfield itself this could be simple grass or some type of reinforced surface such asphalt or even concrete to handle larger aircraft.

2) The hangers, barracks, fuel farm and control tower.

3) Some heavy equipment in terms of machine shops, etc to do complex repair and support.

What I suggest is we do the following.

Break runways down into different grades between a rough field and that heavy all concrete runway.  This will affect the size of aircraft and to a point types of aircraft that can fly from the field.  Only the high end fields would need any BP.

Next we have a facilities rating between simple and complex.  This affects aircraft readiness and ability to repair battle damage.  Do this as a rating between 1 and 5, I would expect this to be were most BP cost to be located.

So if people want to they can have a bunch of very cheap airfields with little in the way of facilities but they might have trouble getting large numbers of aircraft into the air.  I would have no trouble with people even having centralized repair air fields that handle much of the specialized support and on going maintenance.  Of course you have problems in war time as the damaged aircraft might not be at that specialized support nod or worse to far to fly to it all together.

Michael

In WW II fully loaded B17's took of from steel mat reinforced fields.
The Spitfires did, and still do take off from grass fields- the Rolls Royce plant at Hucknall has next to the large concrete runway, preciously kept grass landing strips.
To give some ideas and examples.

Henderson Field at Guadacanal....  Don't even think about landing a kite there, still the aircrews did do a bang up job.
Untill the Seabees could upgrade it.

We really do not see concrete airfields until mid-WWII, and then mainly for the big bomber bases. That's why there where alot of inter-war passanger flying boats, but none after-WWII. The boom of concrete fields made during the war ended the flying boat's heyday. We really should not be worrying about hard surface airfields for another 15 years.

pre-war many nations built hard surface runways but yes for several years we aren't going to be building anything that needs such.

Michael

Thoughts?

QuoteAn airfield is broken down into two components, the first is the runway and the second are airfield facilities.  A runway is a single strip of land that aircraft can take off or land on.  It is possible for an airfield to several runways.  Facilities represent barracks, hangers, fuel farm and machine shops needed to support aircraft and their crews.

There are three types of runways to choose from.

Rough: A level surface made of graded dirt many times covered with grass.  A cheap and easy to maintain runway but it is not able to support larger types of aircraft.  Cost is $0.125.

Reinforced: The surface is made of gravel, macadam or asphalt.  While still fairly inexpensive to build and maintain but the surface still can't support the heaviest types of aircraft.  Cost is $0.5

Concrete: The surface is made of reinforced concrete.  This type of runway can handle any aircraft but the runway is very expensive to build.  Cost is $2 and 0.25 BP.

Facility(s) is a level rating with no upper limit.  Each level can support twenty five engines worth of aircraft.  For example an airfield with level four facilities can support one hundred engines worth of aircraft and this can be broken down as the player sees fit.  In the event that more engines worth of aircraft are at an airfield than its rating can support then there is a penalty to the aircraft serviceability chance.  Also an overloaded aircraft will have trouble repairing battle damage and so as time goes by the aircraft serviceability chance will be even lower.  Cost is $0.125 and 0.125 BP per level of rating. 

Base aircraft serviceability is 80%. 

First impression: too complicated. I don't think we really need to be able to sutomize our airfields to this extent.

I wonder if we shouldn't just have type 1-5 airfileds with a table of maximum supported unit size, and treat hardpaved runways and airship hangars as add-ons like docks and slips are for ports.

I think this is pretty close to your idea.

I don't see it as all that complex but I am not locked into any solution for this issue.

For the rating of airfields are you looking for a straight numeric increase in capability compared to cost?

Michael

I've got no numbers yet, but essentially yes. I'm also looking at the idea that the smaller fields would have no long term support capability. More just battlefield airstrips.

Using what I came up with before, here is a series of canned airfields.

QuoteLevel 1: Cost $0.125  A single grass or graded dirt runway with little support facilities able to support up to 25 engines worth of aircraft for short periods of time.

Level 2: $0.375 & 0.25 BP a single grass or graded dirt runway.  There are barracks, hangers, fuel tanks and repair facilities able to support up to 50 engines worth of aircraft on a continuing basis. 

Level 3: $0.75 & 0.5 BP a pair of grass or graded dirt runways.  There are barracks, hangers, fuel tanks and repair facilities able to support up to 100 engines worth of aircraft on a continuing basis. 

Level 4: $1.25 & 1.0 BP a pair of grass or graded dirt runways.  There are barracks, hangers, fuel tanks and repair facilities able to support up to 200 engines worth of aircraft on a continuing basis. 

Level 5: $2.375 & 2.0 BP Three grass or graded dirt runways.  There are barracks, hangers, fuel tanks and repair facilities able to support up to 400 engines worth of aircraft on a continuing basis. 

Concrete Runways Cost and additional $1.875 & .25 BP per runway

Bonuses for Concrete? More resistant to damage and wear and tear?

To me concrete's only real in game benefit would be to allow high gross weight operations, like 4 engine heavy bombers. Maitenance and operational benefits would be mostly role playing.