Recently playing the Pacific…and I’ve almost been lulled to sleep with the constant, ear-soothing sounds of AA guns being fired from every conceivable nook and cranny.
To that end, some ideas for the Pacific (I don’t think they’ll translate well to Stalingrad, for example):
Switch AA guns with the MG nests. Engineer I gets the MG nest, Engineer II gets the AA gun. Allow the MG nest to elevate the MG up to 45-60 degrees from horizontal, making it potentially viable against planes.
Reduce buildable number of AA guns from 2 to 1. Increase buildable MG nest number from 1 to 2.
Increase the cost to build AA guns. Double or triple the cost to “resupply” them. This will help to make the engineer perk for more resources actually mean something for the Engineer class (it already works wonders for defenders and players who prioritize RP building).
Add a significant “concussion” effect for AA guns fired from indoors. This effect should be felt by the operator of the AA gun.
I mention that this should only be used in the Pacific campaign because the Pacific marks the introduction of SPAA. This gives a window of opportunity to tweak and change some of the gameplay mechanics that I think aggravate a lot of people. However, with the Pacific already a few weeks old now, it may be (probably is) too late.
I understand (and even agree with) where you’re coming from. I turn off movies the instant I see some yahoo fire a RPG from within a room/hallway and then act like nothing happened…I’ve actually searched a little on the interwebs to see if I could find some reference to a manual or guide on AA guns WRT WW2, just to see if it’s mentioned somewhere how incredibly STUPID it would be to fire one of these things indoors.
Alas, no luck.
But, my hunch is that the less drastic model and/or code changes they have to do to the game/engine, the more likely the changes are to be adoptable. So, I’ve looked for the path of least (coding) resistance with what I suggested.
current state of AA that it is relatively bad for killing planes (cause of overheat) and it is still relatively good for killing infantry. so my suggestion is to remove gun shield and remove overheat mechanic from it. biggest problem now is actually killing it, not damage potential. and also make it impossible to build indoors.
My grandfather served in an AA regiment and was a gunner for the AA presented in the game.
The only thing they did (he told me), when they had the time and fun was building fake wooden barn structures around it which fell off before they launched the counter attack to gain maximum surprise.