The effectiveness of mid/late game LAA compared to MAA.

[orkel]

Is there much point using LAA (light AA) in mid to late game?

Planes eventually become so fast, that they get to drop their ordnance before LAA even gets a chance to shoot them down. I've also noticed many of Garrison's ships (in the Garrison's Games AAR thread) have only full MAA with not a single LAA. Considering he's part of the NWS team, to me this points towards MAA being better overall.

Is the disruption that LAA gives (even if they don't fire before planes drop ordnance, they still apply the disruption) useful enough? Is it worth replacing 100 LAA with 50 MAA in lategame?

Light AA will fire at aircraft attacking their own ship either before or after enemy aircraft release their ordnance, depending on a random roll compared to the speed of the aircraft. The faster the aircraft is, the larger the chance that light AA will fire after the aircraft has dropped its ordnance. LAA will always inflict disruption before aircraft attack, even if their fire takes effect after the aircraft have attacked

What is your experience with mid to late game LAA? And can some of the developers chime in about this?

[dorn]

Jun 23, 2019 12:23:36 GMT -6 orkel said:

Is there much point using LAA (light AA) in mid to late game?

Planes eventually become so fast, that they get to drop their ordnance before LAA even gets a chance to shoot them down. I've also noticed many of Garrison's ships (in the Garrison's Games AAR thread) have only full MAA with not a single LAA. Considering he's part of the NWS team, to me this points towards MAA being better overall.

Is the disruption that LAA gives (even if they don't fire before planes drop ordnance, they still apply the disruption) useful enough? Is it worth replacing 100 LAA with 50 MAA in lategame?

Light AA will fire at aircraft attacking their own ship either before or after enemy aircraft release their ordnance, depending on a random roll compared to the speed of the aircraft. The faster the aircraft is, the larger the chance that light AA will fire after the aircraft has dropped its ordnance. LAA will always inflict disruption before aircraft attack, even if their fire takes effect after the aircraft have attacked

What is your experience with mid to late game LAA? And can some of the developers chime in about this?

I think it has sence as they disrupt attack which more important than shooting Down enemy aircrafts.

[abclark]

If I remember right LAA doesn’t have a chance to fire against very fast planes in the later part of the game. So MAA can become a better choice to an extent, but I’ve kept a few LAA onboard to get that extra disruption role if they get the chance.

[rob06waves2018]

Jun 23, 2019 14:43:01 GMT -6 abclark said:

If I remember right LAA doesn’t have a chance to fire against very fast planes in the later part of the game. So MAA can become a better choice to an extent, but I’ve kept a few LAA onboard to get that extra disruption role if they get the chance.

I generally work on twice the amount of LAA to MAA, even on late game designs. Neither are very likely to destroy the strike before they drop their ordinance but LAA fires faster (I think) and is cheaper as well as lighter. Disruption beats a lot of air strikes but you can't beat a good heavy DP battery. MAA is really just a nice-to-have thing.

[seawolf]

Jun 23, 2019 17:09:34 GMT -6 rob06waves2018 said:

Jun 23, 2019 14:43:01 GMT -6 abclark said:

If I remember right LAA doesn’t have a chance to fire against very fast planes in the later part of the game. So MAA can become a better choice to an extent, but I’ve kept a few LAA onboard to get that extra disruption role if they get the chance.

I generally work on twice the amount of LAA to MAA, even on late game designs. Neither are very likely to destroy the strike before they drop their ordinance but LAA fires faster (I think) and is cheaper as well as lighter. Disruption beats a lot of air strikes but you can't beat a good heavy DP battery. MAA is really just a nice-to-have thing.

MAA is much more effective than HAA but HAA can help out other ships.
HAA is just flak it's not very accurate

[jorgencab]

Also remember that all AA have a diminishing return and having more than one type of DP gun on a ships also is less effective.

This means that having a mix of all three types probably is the best option. Exactly how much of each is difficult to know. This also means that huge floating mega AA platforms are not very effective for the resources put into them. Make dedicated AA platforms relatively small.

[christian]

i found haa much more effective than maa when i did some tests they did an amazing job of preventing being hit while medium aa did alot worse

[orkel]

HAA is useful yes. I usually mount 24x DP 5 inchers on my battleships. But the question is about MAA and LAA, whether it's worth using let's say 50 MAA instead of 100 LAA in lategame. Has anyone tried building an absolute porcupine of a ship with like, 200+ LAA?

[jorgencab]

Jun 24, 2019 11:15:22 GMT -6 orkel said:

HAA is useful yes. I usually mount 24x DP 5 inchers on my battleships. But the question is about MAA and LAA, whether it's worth using let's say 50 MAA instead of 100 LAA in lategame. Has anyone tried building an absolute porcupine of a ship with like, 200+ LAA?

Yes... there are people who have tried it and they were not that effective... there are a few threads about that which are not too old.

As I said above... the developers have said and confirmed that more of the same AA on the same ship have a diminishing return of effectiveness and they all shoot in different phases, this mean that all types have a role and will be useful in some sense on all ships.

It is in general allot more efficient to have 10 5" DP guns on five ships than 50 5" DP on one ship. You also should not mix different sized DP on the same ship if you can avoid it, that will also reduce the effectiveness of the guns even further.


It is a pretty safe bet you can leave some light and medium AA on all ships and invest on a decent amount of DP guns on all ships and be sure you are quite effective in general.