Tactics

[Richrd]

Hard Sarge, I always wanted to insult you, hoping I could goad you into sending me one turn, taking your best shot. But, my life will not allow such a reckless profligacy of time. But here is one of my tactics against the AI. The AI unfailingly sends two groups, one P-47 and one P-38 to the Jesi airfield. The way the game plays now, you intercept this gigantic armada with the smallest possible gruppe, as far north as possible, pinning them in place. Right now the game gives a huge advantage to the allies in the way fuel is consumed, so the German, or preferably, Rumanian, Gruppe will still have to exit the fight first, no matter how far the allies flew to get there. This will lead to the slaughter of the axis Gruppe. You can avoid this outcome, however, by inserting a few small 3-plane elements into the melee just before the Rumanians disengage. The first gruppe exits without mishap. Continue until the allies run short of fuel. At about this time send up a host of small 3-plane Patrols to the airspace the Allies will transit on the way home. If you've had any success at all the allied groups will start breaking up and you can bounce all the little bits. I've shot down as many as 40 P-47's from a single group this way. I also use lower exp. units to intercept the withdrawing allies at small risk to themselves. I've got Hungarian pilots with 12 kills. Is anything going to change this strategy in the new release?

[harley]

for the second time today - Freeze Ray bug is FIXED.

HS posts updates... Freeze Ray is in one of the first updates....

In fact, I have totally re-worked allied sweeps. Not sure it Ron wants you to know the full glory yet, but they don't do what they used to do...

They are a very, very powerful tool now, much more value than the original plan.

[Richrd]

With what result? Will the Germans have a counter to this very, very powerful tool? I was able to employ this tactic only after a long, bitter attrition.

[Hard Sarge]

LOL
 
in this version, Sweeps can ruin your day, but they can also get hit and hammered too, the trick will be to slip the sweeps in, where they are not expected, when they are not expected, IE, you have anything you got in the air, and then you noticed fighters inbound
 
I think we have also gotten the Med's to be worth a lot more to the Allied player, so (hopefully) they will not want to change them over to Heavies as soon as they can
 
soooooo
 
Yes the Freese ray has been taken care of, the Dover has been taken care of
 
in the old game, I made a number of "training" missions, so show how I did things, and some of the "named" missions types I would use (cross overs, outriggers, bait and draw) and sent them in, but they never got put on the site
 
(I had a opening turn, when depending on the die rolls, I could get between 300-425 Axis plane kills on the first day)
 
maybe, once things are not so hectic, I will be able to redo some of these kinds of missions

[Richrd]

The freeze bug never bothered me much. After all, what would a formation do if it was intercepted by another. They would engage and maneuver, slowing their forward movement to a crawl, scattering their formation, emptying the sky. Whatever their original intentions might have been, the air combat would take precedence. Could you narrate, perhaps, the course of a sweep mission as it is now?

[harley]

In all of the combat reports I have read, I have never heard of a 0 dimensional dogfight. The freeze ray was a major bug.

I'd rather let HS explain what happens now, as it's his job to trickle info out. But will say there has been 2 other major dimensional shifts compared with the original game, involving Fighter Bombers and Returning Fighters. I'll let HS elaborate if he so chooses...

[Richrd]

Would you agree that a dogfight spreads out to all points of the compass? If a fighter group moving in a direct line towards an airfield objective gets intercepted by a similar number of german planes, will it continue on in a compact group, or a straight line, at the same speed? I would love to see an AAR of an intercepted sweep. Just an idea of the sequence of events. Are there any German fanboys in this development?

[Richrd]

Ok, I realize it's not possible, but here's what I would like to see. A big FG flies over the channel heading for an AF in eastern Holland. It's intercepted about 60 miles out. The big orange square, and the white one, morphs into a half dozen smaller ones, each one heading in a different direction, spreading across the sky. At the conclusion of air combat all the little orange squares, if undamaged, resume their progress towards the objective, attacking, or being intercepted again, individually. Would that fairly represent the encounter?

[Hard Sarge]

Well, had a nice long story all written up, then went to run a test to write about, and lost the story

sooooo

okay, ran a Sweep in the MED, controlling both sides

plot a Sweep with 40 P-40Fs with 2 squadrons of Spit VIIIs flying high cover for them

target was one the It airfields at around the ankle of the boot (starts with a C)

Sweep coming in at 12000, with Spits at 15000

as soon as the Radar picks up the sweep, the planes at the field are ordered to take off and intercept (Mc205s) (along with a Squadron of Mc202s from Bari)

the 205s just get off the ground as the raid is starting to cross the coast

would guess 20-30 miles from the target, they meet, first pass, a P-40 knocks down a 205 and the sweep splits into 2 groups, one or two more passes and the sweep is on top of the target, and the Spits and 205s have split up into many small groups and are in a battle

the P40s hit the field, in 2 groups, doing some damage

about this time, the 202s show up and begin to engage what they can find

some P40s are damaged in air to air, but most of the damage is done by Flak

3 are lost on the trip home to Flak damage, 3 over the target, a couple pancake on the runway, but the pilots walk away

the Sweep, destroy 4 planes on the ground, and damage 4 more, plus get 8 kills air to air, the Spits get 5 kills in the air

the It did not do too well, they did get a number of damaged, but no outright kills

(which part of this is they were the only ones in the air, if other bases had put up planes, it may of been a different story)

for the P-40s, you can see a lot of planes were damaged and the unit will be out of action for a day or more

[Richrd]

That's impressive. Still the key is to catch them outbound, I guess. Harder to do with a lower yield. Who's guarding the German interests here?

[harley]

All we've mentioned is what we've done for the attacker not the Allies or the Axis. You will find that combat changes that affect the allies in BTR will affect the axis in BOB.

Plus, there's some overly simple calulations for FLAK that will be fixed, potentially increasing (read: "fixing") the "slant" range by 10 - 50 percent. That will affect the defender in either game...

German production is streamlined, as will be British in BOB, and there's some other changes HS and I have collaborated on that I don't think has gone public yet. Suffice to say the Luftwaffe will increase its power significantly...

[otisabuser2]

as will be British in BOB

[X(]

[Richrd]

Ok, I'm impressed. I can't resist a couple more. When Bomber command comes over I assign night fighters to every possible group. Restart the turn. Two minutes later the NachtJagdGruppen are all moving to patrol as far as possible from the bomber stream after infuriatingly breaking up into two-plane elements. Painfully I reassign each and every one of these elements back to the bomber stream. Repeat every two minutes. I understand the impact of window, but these units make no attempt to loiter near the last known position of the stream or to take a position on the outbound route, which can be roughly estimated from the target and the location of England. I finally have given up and let the AI handle Bomber command.
 Secondly, you send up a patrol to the perfect ambush spot, within a minute you will order them to swamp a helpless spitfire squadron. Just then a recon flies by the patrol. The entire patrol (sometimes dozens of aircraft) abandons its hard won advantage, and disobeys it's orders, and takes off in pursuit of this lonely recon AC. If an unscrupulous Allied player were to surround his big raids with clouds of recon flights, coming and going, a healthy percentage of intercept groups would ignore their original orders and chase the recce planes, thus insuring the destruction of the Luftwaffe and the Reich.

[harley]

Not answering either of those, as they are not directly related to anything we have done, thus we have nothing to prove wrt bias one way or another.