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Post by generalvikus on Jul 19, 2023 16:15:37 GMT -6
There has been a lot of discussion of SAM effectiveness, but has anyone made a study of the effectiveness of AA? I have a few questions:
What do AA directors do?
How effective are light, medium, and heavy AA respectively, both at disruption and inflicting losses?
Does the relationship between light / medium / heavy AA change over time?
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Post by t3rm1dor on Jul 20, 2023 4:11:51 GMT -6
It is all explained in the manual. In order:
AA directors improve both Medium AA and Heavy AA. Heavy AA factor is shown in the designer, so it's easy to tell the effect.
AA before sams from experience is more about disruption than outrigth killing planes. By disruption I think L AA is the most weigth effective, hv AA as the bonus of protecting other ships as well. Heavy AA doesn't outrigth compete with the other twos as it is also anti ligth forces, and mixing medium AA and Ligth AA works perfectly fine as really what limits anti air capacity is topside space most of the time.
The relation change, early on you are much more limited in DP batteries and what form they can take, and MAA and LAA are less topside efficient. Radar directed MAA comes into play around 1946 and it is very effective against prop planes.
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Post by asdfzxc922 on Jul 21, 2023 0:44:31 GMT -6
Having at least one director dramatically increases your HAA score, and has some unknown effect on MAA lethality (depending on which AA techs you have).
Light AA has a very high disruption value against slow planes, but is much less effective against fast or high-flying planes. It's also the least likely to actually kill anything that it hits. In the late game it's replaced with CIWS, which can sometimes shoot down missiles but still sucks against jets.
Medium AA has a lower disruption value, but it works much better against faster attackers and is the most likely to actually shoot down planes. Late-game MAA can be upgraded with radar, making it somewhat effective against any jet foolish enough to attack with bombs/rockets.
Heavy AA has low to moderate disruption and lethality, but nearby ships have a chance to contribute to the defender's HAA score. You'll probably be putting large numbers of 4-5" guns on everything you build anyway, so there's very little reason to not give every ship a large DP battery. Mid-game HAA can be upgraded with autoloaders, but it's sometimes more weight-efficient to just add another turret.
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