Airports are an important hub for all air units, being the only tile that is able to deploy, repair and resupply them, while also providing funds. Freshly built units may not take actions on the same turn they are deployed.
In standard gameplay, the primary use of an airport is to deploy B-Copters, which are a highly useful unit in the mid- and late-game. They are usually not captured before any neutral Bases as they generally do not speed up the capture game in a noteworthy way except on maps with significant quantities of offshore island properties that an APC cannot reach, but capturing them relatively early can still be viable on maps with very heavy terrain where Anti-Air are not easily able to zone air units.
Leaving an airport unused is not uncommon in standard however, so the airport can be used for air units to return to in order to replenish fuel supplies - important, as air units will crash if they run out. Many airports are however located quite far from the front - on such maps, ghosted airports are sometimes included to allow aerial units a place to repair without spending many turns returning to the back corner of a map. Keep this in mind when noticing airports that are suspiciously far forward on a map.
Airports become much stronger in High Funds games - with an increased availability of funding, it becomes more viable to build air units every turn to boost unit count, and the higher cost of air units in general is easier to absorb. This makes early T-Copters for transport and speedier capturing a reasonable option, and late-game Bombers in particular are exceptionally powerful in the High Funds metagame. Because of this, capturing an airport early is much more viable in High Funds than Standard, in some rare instances becoming an even more important capture than a Base, especially on maps with heavy terrain where air units are strong.
Missiles can be used to lock airports, though due to a Missile's very low mobility this is rarely a concern on most maps. Doing so can however greatly shift the battle in the favour of the Missile-owner, occasionally justifying the attempt on maps where airports are surrounded by Pipes such that they are forward but air units still take some time to reach the front.
Kindle and Lash can benefit from attacking from airports due to the effects of their day-to-day powers, including Kindle's air units unlike Lash. Eagle enjoys having strong air maps in particular, boasting stronger air units that are able to utilise Lightning Strike very effectively. He can also build two air units in a turn this way by building a unit before using his SCOP and moving the unit away so he may build a second one, though the high cost of air units usually makes this prohibitively expensive for anything other than B-Copters.
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