C-evo advances affecting air units

Many of C-evo's advances add some factor to future unit design or allow a building that strengthens all units in a city. This page concentrates on advances affecting air units but notes effects of those advances on other services.
==Table summarizing benefits==
:Notes: 
::The Manual divides advances into four groups, based roughly on chronology, but an alphabetical listing has advantages and is used here. Other arrangements of these data are possible and are likely to be created as alternatives by selective copying from this table when it has all links in.
::Abbreviations:
:::"Cost to" stands for "Cost multiplier increased to"; "Cost +" (used for a Future Technology) means Cost multiplier increases by the specified amount; see http://c-evo.org/forum/p-397-1.html and http://c-evo.org/forum/p-397-1-1-1.html for relevant forum postings about cost
:::"Max wt" stands for "Maximum weight [of that type of unit] rises to"
:::"Str" stands for "Strength multiplier"
:::"Trans" stands for "Transport multiplier"
:: The term "multiplier" is perhaps misleading for additive "factors" but its use is actually correct.
{| class="wikitable"
!Advance (and prerequisites) || Air units ||Ground units || Naval units 
|-
|Advanced Flight (Flight, Robotics) || Allows Airport, Bombs, Carrier; Max wt 7 || - || -
|-
|Advanced Rocketry (Computers, Rocketry) || Allows Air Defence, SAM Missile Battery || - || Str +32, Cost to 38
|-
| Artificial Intelligence (Smart Weapons)(25 possible) || Str +7, Cost +4 || - || Str +14, Cost +4
|-
|Combined Arms (Advanced Flight, Mobile Warfare) || Allows Air Transport || Allows Air Transport || -
|-
|Communism (Industrialization, Philosophy) || Allows Fanatic air units || Allows Fanatic ground units || Allows Fanatic 
|-
|Composites (Metallurgy, Plastics) || Str +8, Cost to 26 || Str +8, Cost to 15 || -
|-
|Electronics (Atomic Theory, Radio) || Str +6, Cost to 20 || - || -
|-
|Flight (Combustion Engine, Physics) || Allows air units || - || -
|-
|Intelligence (Invention, Tactics) || Allows Spy Plane || Allows Special Commando || -
|-
|Medicine (Mysticism, Pottery || Allows military bases || Allows Supply Ship;allows military bases || Allows military bases
|-
|Miniaturization (Plastics, Tactics) || Str +8, cost to 24 || - || -
|-
|Rocketry (Ballistics, Explosives) || Allows Jet Engines || - || -
|-
|Smart Weapons (Advanced Rocketry, The Laser) || Str +11, Cost to 32 || - || -
|-
|Stealth (Composites, Radio) || Allows Stealth || - || -
|-
|Steel (Iron Working, Railroad) || Max armor +1, i.e. up to 4 || Allows Command Bunker; Max armor +1, i.e. up to 3 || Allows Command Bunker; Max wt 9, Max armor +1, i.e. up to 4
|-
|Tactics (University, Warrior Code) || Str +6, Cost to 17 || Str +5, Cost to 10; Allows Military Academy; Allows Alpine || -
|-
|}
==Advances for carrying capacity of future air unit designs==
*Advanced Flight allows "Bombs" - "Attack base value +2 for first attack to a ground or sea target after start from city, carrier or military base."
*Combined Arms allows Air Transport - "Troop transport base value +1". Use discretion, because each transport module adds two to the weight. Such aircraft cannot land on carriers.
==Advances for strength of future air unit designs, with cost increases==
Unlike ground and naval units, air units have a simple progression with strength and cost increasing together. 
Cost levels and strength increases:
*14, initial strength 12: Flight - allowing, for example, a fighter with 48/12/8.5 costing 70, or for the same construction cost a reconnaissance-and-blocking craft 0/12/8.5 with four reserve fuel tanks and therefore total range of 42.5 MP between refuelling stops; however, at no additional cost you can research Rocketry to increase the range
*17 +6: Tactics (requiring University and Warrior Code) - also adds to ground unit strength and enables Military Academy and therefore often researched before Flight, regrettably making your earliest air units more costly; however, if you avoid Electronics and Miniaturization and Composites before researching Combined Arms you can have a cheap multipurpose plane 0/18/12.5x5 costing 102 (or 51 after the first with Line Production) and a similar spy plane that has a greater range than your earlier model
*20 +6: Electronics (requiring Atomic Theory and Radio)
*24 +8: Miniaturization (requiring Plastics and Robotics)
*26 +8: Composites (requiring Metallurgy and Plastics) - also adds to ground unit strength and is therefore commonly researched before Miniaturization and can be researched before Advanced Flight
*32 +11: Smart Weapons (requiring Advanced Rocketry (which requires Computers and Rocketry) and The Laser) (which requires Miniaturization and Physics)).
:With all of those, a typical attack plane with one spare fuel tank could have A/D/M of 255/51/12.5 and cost 224 materials.
:At that stage you could almost certainly produce ground units with greater strengths more cheaply, but the ability to overfly water and enemy zones of control can be of great value. In addition, however, by replacing Weapons modules with Bombs modules you can double the attack strength, e.g. getting 0/51/12.5 with 510 "bombs" - the disadvantage being that you have only one shot per flight and then have a civil unit until it returns for refuelling and restocking of the bomb bays.
:At the 224 material cost, line production would certainly be appropriate unless you expected to produce fewer than four such units.
*Finally: +4 cost +7 strength (for each of 25 possible steps) Artificial Intelligence (requiring The Laser and Smart Weapons); the first step adds 12.5% to the total cost but 14% to the strength of each weapons or armor module; each subsequent step adds a fraction less in percentage terms
A potential increase in defensive strength comes (as with ground and naval units) with Steel, which allows a fourth defensive module for air and naval units (and a third for ground units) without an increase in total weight allowance or module strength. However, because air units have no part in city defense, if you stick to single-trip aircraft (i.e. craft without extra fuel) you may have no use for any defensive modules. Steel is not essential for any other aspect of air units except Combined Arms, though it may have been a contributor to your discovery of Mass Production and it is virtually compulsory for well-armored ground units and naval units.
==Advances for maximum weight of future air unit designs==
*5: Flight
*7: Advanced Flight, which also allows an Airport, which heals air units faster and produces hardened units (i.e. 50% stronger than the base strength)
==Speed and other factors==
;Speed
Glider speed is 4.5. Not everybody who can builds a glider. One particularly good use for them is to explore the Arctic and Antarctic strips where oceans are difficult to cross. They are not damaged by landing on hostile terrain.
Your, and your rivals', first new air units are likely to have a speed of 8.5 if built under urgency. You cannot buy more speed - the only possible upgrade is to research Rocketry, after which your new air units all have a speed of 12.5. 
;Range
Related to speed is range: the number of turns you can stay in the air before having to return to a city, aircraft carrier, or military base. 
You extend the range using modules of the Unit Capacity called "Fuel", which are available without prerequisites but add to the construction cost and take up some of the weight quota. 
After you have discovered Flight and Rocketry, you can, for example, build a Jet Fighter with A/D/M 32/32/12.5 with 3 fuel modules, costing 130, possibly of little use for attacking but able to explore a long way from your cities or carriers or bases (two turns out and two back - but be careful to avoid the risk of having your return route blocked). If you wait for Advanced Flight before designing, your additional weight allowance will let you have 5 fuel modules or significantly more strength. 
However, you may design cheap early air units whose main function is to block enemy air and naval units: 0/12/12.5 or 0/12/8.5 with four fuel spares is possible if you have researched Flight and Rocketry before Tactics; cost 70.
;Spying
Intelligence allows Spy Planes, which can investigate cities and unit stacks in the same detail as can the much cheaper ground unit, the predesigned Special Commando. See exactly what an enemy city contains and is building, so that you know, for example:
*what force will be needed to capture it
*whether you should delay capture to let it grow or finish a building
*whether to sacrifice something for an early capture so as to prevent the completion of a strong defender
If you can delay designing Spy Planes until you have Advanced Flight, they can have the same range as your early blocking units (because of the additional weight allowance) and will be cheaper (and can therefore supersede them) if you use line production.
;Fanatics
Communism allows you to design Fanatic units, which deal more damage and can therefore be used for tactical kamikaze if their attack strength (weapons or bombs) is at least half the target's defensive strength: both die. That can be the cheapest way to get ground units into an enemy city.
;Stealth
Stealth lets you design air units that are generally invisible to enemies. Probably pointless unless your enemies have air units.
==Standard AI==
Opponents with Standard AI cannot build air units; so against them you need no defensive modules except the compulsory one and you need not build air defenses in cities or in ships.
==See also==
*C-evo advances affecting units
*C-evo advances affecting ground units
*C-evo advances affecting naval units
*Adv
*Air
Category:Lists (C-evo)
Category:Guides (C-evo)