Q&A · 4:02:13-4:06:49

Ace Combat's land battleships and the scale of a credible air attack

The criticism concerns the quantity of missiles and drones the defenders could launch against only one or two attacking squadrons. An attack by hundreds of aircraft is judged more credible than the game's small force.

Question

What is implausible about Joker and Queen flights destroying the land battleships and escorts in the Ace Combat scenario?

Short answer

The criticism concerns the quantity of missiles and drones the defenders could launch against only one or two attacking squadrons. An attack by hundreds of aircraft is judged more credible than the game's small force.

Notes

The fictional attack destroys two completed land battleships, their escorts and eleven incomplete battleships. The objection concerns the defensive firepower that such a force could produce, including missiles and drones making suicide attacks. Pilot skill carries considerable weight in a game model compared here with World War II fighter combat. Modern missiles can sustain manoeuvres beyond a human pilot's tolerance, undermining that explanation for survival. The targets are mobile and return fire, making the small attacking force still harder to accept. Ten or twenty squadrons are offered as a more credible scale, with a later clarification specifying aircraft arriving in the hundreds. A joke about a fighter carrying 200 missiles raises a separate objection to the game's ammunition capacity. Both criticisms concern the distance between the fictional combat model and plausible attack requirements.