[RN] Fleet Air Arm - introduction to air battles

Day 3,341, 04:25 • Published in United Kingdom United Kingdom • by The Royal Navy


Stand easy recruits.

Welcome to the Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm How To Fly Your Sky-Boats* introductory course. In this simple (very simple) course, we’ll tell you everything you need to know about air battles, how to fight in them and - most importantly - why you NEED to be fighting in them.

So put your miniature bottle of rum down, settle in and prepare to be educated to within an inch of your life.

Air Battles? What are they then?

You must have seen them by now. Every fourth battle in a war is an air battle. They’re easy enough to spot because they’ve got strange-looking planes rather than tanks and jeeps and little men…



What’s so special about them?

Air battles differ from standard battles in a number of very important ways…

> They’re worth twice as many campaign points as a standard battle. You need 94 campaign points to win a war; standard battles are worth 11 campaign points each, while Air battles are worth 22 campaign points. There will always be at least two air battles in a war - and possibly more - so winning them is key to success.

> They aren’t split into divisions - everyone fights in the same battle.

> This is the big one - strength doesn’t count in air battles. That means that you have just as much chance to do damage and influence a battle as some Div4 mega tank who normally does as much damage with one hit that the rest of us can muster in a week.

> For now, weapons are insignificant in air battles. Technically Q1 air weapons exist, but they’re very expensive and utterly useless, so nobody uses them. That means you don’t need any money to fight effectively in air battles.

> The only way anyone can increase the amount of damage they do with each hit is to fight in air battles. There’s no training yet (perception training will arrive one day - more on that later), so the only reason one person does more damage than another is that they’ve fought in more air battles. In other words, to be good at air battles all you need to do is fight in air battles. Simple, huh?



That all sounds great, but what does it mean?

Let me give you an example using three people: one of our newest members of the Royal Navy Ska2D2, me and eUK battlefield legend fragUK...



As you can see, FragUK does enormous amounts of damage on a standard battlefield. Ska2D2 would have to do over 600 Q7 hits to match one of Frag’s. However, in an air battle a single hit from Ska does 75% of the damage that a hit from Frag does. And, to be honest, with a bit of selective fighting it wouldn’t take long for Ska to overtake Frag and do more damage than him.

Or look at it another way. I’ve been playing for almost three years, and diligently strength training throughout. I currently do about 20% of the damage that Frag does on a standard battlefield. However, I do more damage than Frag in an air battle.

And remember, air battles are worth twice as much as standard battles when it comes to winning wars.



Oh. So what you’re saying is, I can have a bigger impact in air battles than normal ones?
Yes! That’s exactly what I’m saying. And you don’t need to buy any weapons to do it. What’s not to like?

The old advice for young, low level players used to be “don’t fight - strength train instead”. But, as you can see, it’s too late for that. I’ve been doing it for three years, and I’m nowhere near strong enough to match some of the tanks out there. I’m in Division 2, and yet I regularly see other D2 players with double my strength and damage. And soon I’ll go up to Division 3, where I’ll be even weaker. Oh, and the recent introduction of Maverick packs means that even if I was strong enough in Div 2, higher division tanks can move into my battles and blow me away.

However, if I concentrate on air battles I can rank up quickly and cheaply without affecting my level. And then I’ll do more damage than the big boys. That’ll make me an air tank, even though the name “air tank” is clearly ridiculous (tanks can’t fly, durrr) but we don’t have a proper name for them yet. I guess “bomber” is the best candidate so far.



So what should I do exactly?
Good question, glad you asked.

> Only fight in air battles. Hunt them out (preferably allies’ ones). They’re easy to spot on the Wars tab - they’ve got a different icon...




> Keep an eye out for air battles that have COs on them (look for the little red icon next to an air battle on the Wars tab), so you can earn some cash while turning yourself into a badass pilot.

> Read the eRep wiki about air battles so you know what you’re doing.

> Hunt around eRep for air battle articles that give you more info (and stick links to the good ones in the comments please).

> DON'T buy (or manufacture) Q1 air weapons - they're a waste of time and money.

> And, with one eye on the future, save your money and gold up to pay for perception training when it comes along. We know it’s coming because the admins have added Perception to all of our profiles…




...so it’s safe to assume that perception training will be coming too. And we’ll all start off on an equal footing.


Signing off
So, that should be enough to get you started. Now it’s over to you. Help the eUK and our allies win important wars by contributing to the air battles, and help turn the Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm into the baddest, knarliest, rum-swilling arseholes in the sky.


Obligatory Top Gun gif


Your training instructor today was:
VoodooMike71
Royal Navy: 2nd Commander, Captain Regiment 2 (HMS Sheffield)
Not very good at air battles yet, as I've only just worked this stuff out myself.



* OK, OK. Traditionally they're known as "planes".





What MU are you in? Really? Well it’s the wrong one. You should join the Royal Navy instead.


Royal Navy newspaper: https://www.erepublik.com/en/newspaper/the-royal-navy-paper-189799/1