Gaining air superiority?

[Searry]

In the Tunisia campaign, how do you get air superiority? I'm asking because the Germans have so many planes there, they can interdict way too much.

[Helpless]

I don't think you can gain any superiority till you have better supply and air base network.

I usually start with expanding some air bases, sent small recon groups first to trigger air base support reallocation, attach AA and Const units. Then start sending fighter groups once air base and supply network goes bigger. It should take some turns before you can challenge LW in the area.

[Searry]

Thanks! Explains a lot.

[Searry]

I noticed, starting the fight at 21k feet makes the planes live longer than 1 turn. Wonder what causes that.

[Helpless]

Obvious reason could be AA fire. Another factor is that lower flying flights have more chances to get op losses as it has less time to fix piloting errors (stalls), which is amplified by the damage taken in air combat.

[Helpless]

On AA fire, all flak has sweet spot band when it does most damage. Most dangerous mid-claiber flak has sweet spot ~15-20k. So the safest altidues are either very low or very high. The drawback is reduced accuracy when too high or probability too miss target and higher chance for ops losses when too low.

Pilots flying way too high (iirc, 28-30k+ should be in patch notes) also suffer extra fatigue, equals to higher ops losses.

[Searry]

Thanks!

[Lovenought]

Germans had air superiority during first half of Operation Torch/Battle of Tunisia. The Luftwaffe was able to support the ground troops effectively. They only lost command of the sky during the end phase.

[Searry]

I did as you said and it worked. The Axis can barely fly any missions due to lack of fuel or aircraft. First I destroyed their airforce and then pounded the ports to dust and naval interdicted every port. The axis are surrendering or routing.