Recon Missions 20k high Flak losses? BUG

[Zovs]

Does anyone know of the historical loss rate of Recon units?

I have tried 15,000, 17,000 (the default), 20,000, and currently using 23,000. And I am seeing a lot of air losses to flak. Its worse if you use auto(auto) for Req AC(Esc). But even if you set the Esc % to 25 (most cases you'll get 12(4)) there is still a high amount of flak losses for Recon missions.

In this screen shot granted there is 137 76mm and 36x 85mm AA guns but those 12 recon units should be flying at 22k and should not be easily detected. I can buy into a GA mission of 30 or more planes, or a GS mission of 50-100 getting / receiving a lot of flak losses but to me this seems excessive.

Please note that weather does not seem to matter (clear its still the same, you'd think worse weather would be harder to detect 6 recon planes).



Here the loss was 100%, 2 recon aircraft shot down?


Here is the listing of the 12 Recon missions:



It basically breaks down to:

Recon Units flown to Lost

Code: Select all

28 | 8
 14 | 5
 17 | 4
 14 | 4
 16 | 3
  6 | 3
  4 | 2
  5 | 2
  2 | 2
  8 | 2
 12 | 1 (seems reasonable)
  2 | 1
 

The flak losses for Recon just seems excessive to me.

[Fraggo5]

Did a bit of digging on the internet about this subject as like you Zovs I would like to know the best altitude to fly my Recon
In my own campaign iv'e been flying at 9000 ft without too many losses but keeping away from urban areas.
So to the detail from internet searching, No 1 photo recce unit R.A.F flew heavily modded spitfires at altitudes between 25 to 30 thousand feet basically the plane was a giant fuel tank with a camera to get the range needed.
Mk32 Mosquito's flew to 42 thousand feet but that was in 1944,I haven't managed to find any examplesl of recce heights for german planes but obviously max ceiling on the aircraft info tab will be your guide as these examples of recce aircraft in game do bf 109G-8 38000 ft ceiling ,Ju188D_F31170 ft ,fw189A only 22966 ft .

My own assumption was that they flew fast and low, but in order to get decent pics like that it would have to be on individual feature and you wouldn't get too much detail. The higher you are the larger the area you can get in one image, this also brings in the quality of the lens and camera in to the equation too.

The allies made more use of photo reconnaissance than the axis powers by all accounts using stereoscopic viewing techniques to find hidden detail you wouldn't see in a single image
Happy hunting!

[Denniss]

The recon losses may still be too high.
Tac recons or mission with low alt cam should actually get a surprise bonus as many missions were flown at low alt with minimal warning for flak crews.

[Dreamslayer]

ORIGINAL: Zovs
Does anyone know of the historical loss rate of Recon units?

FW.189 losses on Eastern Front in 1941
Hs126 losses on Eastern Front in 1941
German long range recon losses on Eastern Front in 1941-43
All articles in Russian.

[Zovs]

Yeah flak losses for Recon is just way too high.

I put a lot of extra care into the following missions and flew no more than 12(4) and most were at 6(2).

[Zovs]

Attached is a save with the AD set and then the following start of the ground phase (turn 7). Pull up the Air Execution Phase Summary or view on map. Flak losses for Recon air units flying at 22k should not be this high IMO.

Can't load a file here, some weirdness about fakepath - fake lies

[Stamb]

Probably it has a wrong format if it says fake path.
At least this was a case for me

[Tailspintommy]

Whilst I agree that the flak losses on recon flights seem ridiculous, am I the only one thinking that the mission size itself is also ridiculous?

I'm not having a go at anyone, just making a general comment but the whole recon system seems wrong to me.

Surely tac recon would be one or two planes, possibly with escort but if you just count the recon element over a one week turn, flying every day is going to be around 14 planes. Flying a recon mission with 100+ aircraft simply feels wrong.
That being said, the amount of aircraft being committed to ground support in a single battle also seems excessive. Maybe it's a programming trade off between quantity and effect. The game is still a pleasure to play but there are certainly some aspects of the air element which don't feel as realistic as they could be somehow. I don't want to call it a bug but it feels like a work in progress with a workable compromise until the wrinkles get ironed out.

[Hardradi]

I now fly all recon missions with only 1 to 4 aircraft. My losses are significantly reduced. I think I lost 19 on the previous turn. I am getting about 2/3rds of the recon info that I used to get. Still trying to improve it. I do this via the Required function in the Air Directive as Zovs pointed out in the first post. When you lower the numbers to these levels, strike numbers are also important.

This requires a lot more work. The more macro way is to get the losses down with the Air Doctrine %. I think I had to crank it down quite dramatically. Going from memory, test at 5% and then raise to taste.

Above I specifically talking about interdiction recon (revealing counters) and airfield recon.

[Hardradi]

ORIGINAL: Tailspintommy
Surely tac recon would be one or two planes, possibly with escort but if you just count the recon element over a one week turn, flying every day is going to be around 14 planes. Flying a recon mission with 100+ aircraft simply feels wrong.

I think you are looking at the information provided in the wrong way. In the case of recon I am pretty sure that 100 aircraft could be 10 planes flying 5 days of the week twice on each day or it can be 50 planes flying twice on day 1. It depends on how the Recon Air Directive was set up. The battle report is an amalgamation of the total sorties.

Likewise, I understand that that flak numbers are also an amalgamation of the sorties. So often you might see the same AA gun listed more than once in the battle report. Your planes flew over it multiple times and it shows up multiple times. It all depends on the Air Directive setup.

EDIT: You can see it in Zovs post above. He said he flew Req. 12(4). On the screenshot you can see on Day 1 120 recon planes flew with 40 escorts. This means the 12(4) flew 10 times on Day 1. Likewise on Day 7. On map I am pretty sure the battle report will show 120 recon and 40 fighters flying on Day 1. What the battle report doesnt show is the number of sorties/strikes on a given day. Each day shows as a separate battle report.

[Gunner Garidel]

Greetings:

First let me suggest you take a look at the YT series by 'Strategy Gaming Dojo', in particular the episode titled: 'Air War - What I've Learned'. It is a very informative and eye-opening look at recon and air attacks. In essence, the lesson learned [at least for me] is stay below 9K feet.

Second -- if you've watched 'A Bridge Too Far', you may recall the scene of the Dutch boy bicycling down a road when he is buzzed by a British Recon Spitfire. It is a single aircraft flying 'low and fast'. Anytime you fly multiple aircraft at a high altitude on a mission, they WILL be noticed, and, subsequently, shot at. Recon missions flown at high altitude were normally a single aircraft flying as fast as possible, to increase chances of survival.

If you're looking for a perfect recon picture of what's going on, you're wasting your time. There's a reason both sides were often caught by surprise when the 'other side' launched an attack because multiple aircraft lazily flying over enemy territory taking pictures provided a target-rich environment for the other side.

I was the S-2 for my battalion in Desert Storm, and, even with all the modern technology at our disposal, after-action studies conclusively showed Coalition Air Forces BDA reports during the 'air phase' were GROSSLY EXAGGERATED. Don't be surprised by significant losses by recon aircraft.

[Stamb]

The idea to flow at higher altitude is to avoid low range flak which is the most flak, as i understand and as i do it myself, while flying < 9k or 10k disable AA fire from adjusted hexes?

[Zovs]

I still believe this is bugged for Recon, all the above was on 1.02.13 beta patch.

I have a server game with thedoctorking we are on Soviets turn 4 ( I just uploaded Axis turn 4).

[Zovs]

If you fly below 9k then you’ll get pegged by lots of 37mm flak and AA MG.

Seems 23k gets you out of those 37mm range, but 4(auto) is still getting whacked. Check out my turn 3 AAR. We been on 13 for over a week, in general flak losses are lower except for recon missions.

[Joel Billings]

I'm getting about 25 flak losses when I run the turn 1 recon missions with nothing else flying. About 1500 sorties flown. The bulk of the losses to the recon in that situation is from air to air. These are at 15k feet. I downloaded your saves, but one is in the air planning phase with no air directives set up, and the other is in the next Soviet turn. So I can see the results, but can't duplicate them without recreating all your ADs. On your next turn, can you save the game just before you start air execution, and then save it again just after air execution and email me and I'll download the files. That way I can run them and have Gary/Pavel run them to see what's going on. I'm not sure why you are taking such high losses at 22k feet.

[Zovs]

Will do Joel!

[Stephan61]

I have very little Flak loses on Recon Missions (GCNEE)
I tend to fly at 22000 (if possible) and navigate my flight path through the FLAK Map to ensure I stay clear of as much Flak as possible.

Can you post a picture of the Mission? including the Flak Map and Flight Path?

[Zovs]

So I think I may have found a solution to reduce flak losses for Recon missions.

I ran the Recon missions on D1 and D7 and I set an area (usually 1-3 hex area range) and the set the number of strikes to 1 and then set the Required AC(Esc) to 1(auto). I got get very minimal losses at 22k (), however the DL is only 0 for a few few missions) and +1 in most cases. In the last run in my solo test game (turn 9) I had 393 sorties and lost 41 aircraft and had 18 damaged.

Of those 41 losses it breaks down to:

11 Recon planes lost to flak
6 Fighters in escort
2 Bombers on Naval Patrol

That equates out to 19 losses.

Here is the loss screen:



The DL of +1 to +2 is not a lot (in the bigger missions I was doing I was getting larger numbers of DL, but massive Recon losses hence this post).

So I still think there is some issues with Recon and Flak.

[Joel Billings]

Is this in your MP game? Having 20 a/c by type of loss and 41 by a/c type is clearly off and if I have before and after saves with this big of a difference we could find out what is going on.

[Zovs]

Not my MP game I’ll send you the files.