Originally Posted by Erendil
You're making a huge assumption there - and a shaky one at that. With an either/or tiered AA system like the OP suggests, high altitude aircraft will will have a huge effect on the ground and will become a lot more common than you think in the form of high altitude bombing runs and Reavers/Mossies who will make divebombing strafing runs from up high down to the low-mid altitudes to fire, and then AB back into high altitude to escape.
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Reavers and Mossies have zero ground effectiveness at high altitude. If you were able to fly above the flight ceiling in PS1 (on any continent that isn't Searhus) you wouldn't be able to do
anything to ground targets in either of those vehicles. You could barely see the ground, let alone hit anything at ground level. In that case, your only option is to do divebombing runs, which puts you well in range of any ground-based AA.
If they aren't in range to hit you, then you aren't in range to hit them. The sole exception to that rule is the bombers, Liberators and Vultures. But they also lose some combat effectiveness as well. If they wish to bomb from above AA range, their projectiles have an immense travel time, can be seen on radar, and can be avoided. But again, the bomber is not invulnerable from that high altitude. You're still vulnerable to any enemy aircraft
Increasing the flight ceiling without increasing AA range just adds an additional third-dimensional battlefield where aircraft can dogfight for control of the skies. The biggest and more important benefit for the empire controlling high-altitude is having a better chance of controlling mid and low altitude, but it doesn't make you any more effective at those levels without actually having to go there and put yourself in range of ground-based AA.
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I can tell you right now that not having a high altitude counter would be a HUGE problem. Were you around before the Burster MAX could hit flight ceiling, but after they nerfed the Striker so it couldn't either? The TR had no weapons that could hit flight ceiling and just 2 libs could shut down a TR courtyard with little opposition because it was logistically impossible to get aircraft from other bases up in the air fast enough and often enough to constantly chase away the libs. And the NC/VS knew this and used it quite often to their advantage. So yes, high altitude aircraft do need a hard counter.
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You don't seem to be using my definition of high altitude. I mentioned high altitude starting
above the current flight ceiling in PS1. Any ground-based AA would be just as effective in PS2 as they were in PS1, up to that range. But above that range, the effectiveness of both ground-to-air and air-to-ground begins to fall off dramatically.
In PS1, the most effective AA for aircraft flying at the current flight ceiling is already other aircraft. At that height and beyond it, which again is the definition I'm using for "high altitude" in PS2, the emphasis is going to shift even stronger toward aircraft-based AA. That opens the door for a layer of the battlefield whose focus is dogfights, adding more depth to the game in an area where I and many players had the most fun.
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The problem that I see is not whether or not high-altitude AA is effective enough, but instead it's the speed/versatility of aircraft, compared to how hard/time-consuming it might be to switch from low/mid altitude AA to high altitude AA. I think it'd be way too easy for aircraft to exploit the low/high weakness and constantly shift their attacks such that ground forces wouldn't be able to adapt and switch between AA types quickly enough.
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You're concerned with how hard it "might be" to alternate between them when there is no evidence that:
1) It would be hard to switch from low-mid altitude AA to mid-high altitude AA.
2) That high-altitude AA is even necessary.
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Aircraft are already the most maneuverable units on the board and usually they get to choose when and where engagements take place with ground units. I'm concerned that the only way to counter altitude-shifting aircraft would end up being forced to prepare for both altitude contingencies, which would require setting up a lot more AA than what is required in a system where at least some AA can be effective at all altitudes. This would be especially true against organized air Outfits, where they could all coordinate all of their attacks so they come in either high or low. Hence my statement about having to deploy double the amount of AA needed for the same protection.
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And again, I don't think you're using the same definition for "high altitude" as what I've described it as in my other post. The further away you get from the ground, the less effective aircraft become at attacking the ground.
If it helps to imagine it, shift it horizontally and picture tanks. The further a tank gets from a facility, the less effective its cannons become. A Prowler lobbing shells from its absolute maximum distance is relying more on luck than anything to get kills. The same is true if you imagine a Flail firing at a base without waypoints to help it aim.
In either case, no one complains that the Prowler or Flail needs an absolute hard-counter that someone at that base can use to hit it from that range. The solution is to pull a vehicle and bring the fight to that Prowler or Flail, just like the solution for high-altitude aircraft would be to pull an aircraft of your own and take the fight to him.