AAR swift vs fochinell

[fochinell]

At theend of the day the Luftwaffe and its Allies have lost 36 A/C with no losses on the ground

My airfield strafing was never too hot - last turn was an exception to the rule. My cunning plan of losing millions of fighters while the bombers slip through to try to do some SB damage has been exposed, but I'd still prefer to lose slightly less fighters. I felt the lack of a "sweep", as opposed to "strafe" mission this turn, as my Fighter Command Spit Vb sweeps plotted over Brussels as top cover for the Forts decided to drop down from 25,000 feet to strafe the Brussels rail yards instead just when OKL's interceptors finally turned up. Good move, guys..

[wernerpruckner]

21st August 1943:

only a few Allied daylight missions...nothing important.

BC flew its first bombing mission - my Wilde Sau fighter got distracted by the Wellington ECM planes.

No German losses during the turn, but it seems that the SAS got one Bf109G-6.
5 Allied A/C were lost, 4 of them due to AA.

[Hard Sarge]

a sort of just in case
 
I had run a sweep, that I was going to show some snapshots of, but didn't want to steal the thread
 
had a Cane IV as the lead, with another Cane IV and 2 Whirlwind Squadrons on Close Escourt (these will act if they on lead, so all will sweep) then I place a lot number of Tiffies on High Escourt for protection
 
odd battles, a 190 got damaged when it bounced the escourts, then a Tiffie got shot down when it counter attacked the 190s
 
then the battle settled down to a good back and forth, between the escourts and the Jerries as they tried to get though to the strike force
 
the sweep was poor, heavy AA fire and lot of damaged and a few shot downs, but then the Canes and Winds let loose and got into the fight
 
one of the northern 190 Gruppen, got into the back trail and made a mess of a nice battle, picking off a number of damaged and retireing planes, but they had flown too far to stay in the battle too long
 
 
but over all, the Tiffies did well, the Canes traded losses and the Winds kicked !
 
so, yea, sweeps will fight back now (even more so, if you put sweepers on Escourt with them)
 
 

[wernerpruckner]

22nd August:

The Allied Forces start to make bigger and more powerful attacks - my forces in Italy were not able to respond to all of those attacks.

MAin targets in Italy were once again coastal sites, but there was also a deeper attack to Bari and surroundings on the Adriatic coast

[wernerpruckner]

In the West the Allied forces continued to hit the peaceful Low Countries and the cities of Antwerp and Ghent

[wernerpruckner]

In the night Bomber Command attacked one of the major RRs near the Ruhr valley.
There were lots of sightings by my nightfighters, but only very few attacks and even fewer kills.

At the end of the day I had lost 33 A/C ( 21 of them Bf109G-6) for another 73 Allied A/C and once again many Spitfire VBs ( 36 !! )

[fochinell]

At the end of the day I had lost 33 A/C ( 21 of them Bf109G-6) for another 73 Allied A/C and once again many Spitfire VBs ( 36 !! )

I'd forgotten how heavily the Spit Vb's got hammered in the early stages if you use them seriously. More annoying was the bug (or was it weather?) that made my B-17 raid attack the road junction rather than Foggia RR; I seem to remember this being a bug similar to that UFAC near Kiel which I could never bomb despite repeated missions to it.

Time for a rest turn and a chance to replenish those fighter losses while the weather clamps down. At the moment Supreme Allied Command is moving the preferred aircraft types to the preferred units. For example, the light A-20 bombload plus the abysmal bombing accuracy of the mediums means I prefer to allocate them to the 12th AF while the heavier bombload of the B-25 goes to the RAF medium bomber units (24 x 6 x 500lb making them fractionally more useful than 24 x 4 x 500lb in the A-20C). I've tried using Stirlings with their heavier bombloads to make the RAF tactical bomber units more effective before, but I can't remember if they made any difference. At the moment my main fighter problem is replacing the Spit Vb losses, which I normally do by converting the 12th AF Spit units to the P-38 while upgrading the RAF Spit Vbs to the IX. I also convert a couple of MAC Spit Vb squadrons to the P-40 for their higher bombload as fighter-bombers when the flow of P-38's is sufficient to re-equip the 317-319 FS.

Tactically, I'm prepared to do some deep-penetration unescorted raids when the weather is right, but until then short-distance tactical raids to the Bay of Naples and occupied territories are the order of the day. BC is just going to tick over generating terror damage (although with the prospect of some SB score by targetting the larger Axis RR sites) while 5 Group will do some (attempted) precision bombing in the near future.

[wernerpruckner]

23rd August 1943:

as Gavin said - a resting turn for the Luftwaffe.
Many enemy recce missions were flown - also two nightbombing raids ( Genoa and Saarbrücken ) with only 3 enemy A/C being lost.


Gavin seems to prefer total bomb load -
when I play the Allied side I prefer as one of the most important things high morale before fatigue before experience !!
I also think ( that is only my opinion ) that it makes a big difference at what altitude what kind of target is being attacked ( the same also for the flytime/range )


on the Axis side it is also Morale which should be kept as high as possible - but with the time of the game an Axis player will use lower and lower morale units.
For example: in 1943 I only try to use 70+ morale dayfighter units; but in late 44 it will always be 50+ or even lower.
With NF units I also use only high morale units - but in difference to the day fighter, I use only 80+ morale units for night interceptions throughout the war.

[wernerpruckner]

24th August 1943

better weather = more raids.....

Western Front:
The Allied started with a Typhoon raid against the RR Rouen - my fighters got there not fast enough ( starting delay was 16 min due to the low radio activity )

Later a big Marauder raid aginst the RR Eindhoven - the Allied escorts were very agressiv here and it ended with an tactical victory for the Allied pilots with 22 German A/C lost here!!

Southern Front:

the typical stuff with many raids ( look at the pic )
But as long as there are many obsolete A/C used here ( on both sides ) it could get very bloody ( hehehe [:D] 25 Aircobras killed here )

two Italian units were hit hard ( morale now below 30 !! )
I will start to pull some units back to northern Italy sites for resting.

[wernerpruckner]

BC was active this night and made an big raid against the Bunawerke Schkopau (RUBBER).
once again many sightings, but only few kills.
NIs got lucky a few times.

[Hard Sarge]

ORIGINAL: fochinell


At the end of the day I had lost 33 A/C ( 21 of them Bf109G-6) for another 73 Allied A/C and once again many Spitfire VBs ( 36 !! )

I'd forgotten how heavily the Spit Vb's got hammered in the early stages if you use them seriously. More annoying was the bug (or was it weather?) that made my B-17 raid attack the road junction rather than Foggia RR; I seem to remember this being a bug similar to that UFAC near Kiel which I could never bomb despite repeated missions to it.

Time for a rest turn and a chance to replenish those fighter losses while the weather clamps down. At the moment Supreme Allied Command is moving the preferred aircraft types to the preferred units. For example, the light A-20 bombload plus the abysmal bombing accuracy of the mediums means I prefer to allocate them to the 12th AF while the heavier bombload of the B-25 goes to the RAF medium bomber units (24 x 6 x 500lb making them fractionally more useful than 24 x 4 x 500lb in the A-20C). I've tried using Stirlings with their heavier bombloads to make the RAF tactical bomber units more effective before, but I can't remember if they made any difference. At the moment my main fighter problem is replacing the Spit Vb losses, which I normally do by converting the 12th AF Spit units to the P-38 while upgrading the RAF Spit Vbs to the IX. I also convert a couple of MAC Spit Vb squadrons to the P-40 for their higher bombload as fighter-bombers when the flow of P-38's is sufficient to re-equip the 317-319 FS.

just in case, the Meds had some trouble in the old game, and it was something to do with the FBs, get the FB to fight back and the Meds couldn't hit the side of a barn, let the FBs get clobbered and the Meds could hit, we got that screwed away, and the Meds can now hit and the FBs can now fight back, the early A-20s should be a nice plane, as it is fast, and HARD for the LW to catch (heck, HARD for the Allies to escourt too)(the Boston III has a small bombload, but once the IIIA is out and the Havoc, they are going to be nasty light bombers)


Tactically, I'm prepared to do some deep-penetration unescorted raids when the weather is right, but until then short-distance tactical raids to the Bay of Naples and occupied territories are the order of the day. BC is just going to tick over generating terror damage (although with the prospect of some SB score by targetting the larger Axis RR sites) while 5 Group will do some (attempted) precision bombing in the near future.

[fochinell]

we got that screwed away, and the Meds can now hit and the FBs can now fight back

Excellent. Meanwhile Supreme Allied HQ laugh the laugh of an evil galactic dark lord at the P-39 losses . Their poor MVR and short range mean that I like to use them as strafing cannon fodder. The only problem is that OKL have moved their Italian units out of strafe range. I mean even the D.520's. Where's the fun in that? I was hoping to see the worst Allied and worst Axis fighters go head to head whilst Werner and I laughed and drank beer at their losses.

Another problem will soon be the lack of Italian bases to cram my MAC units into. JC did something to add the 15th AF bases in Corsica and so forth in his OB, but I'm hoping for MAC to get some more bases (like Montecorvino, which they moved a Spit wing into during the Salerno landings). A similar problem came up with the number of 2nd TAF bases, which also reminds me that the 85 Group Tempest units arrived after the post-D-Day breakout switch of UK 2TAF bases to the 8th AF, which seemed to make those squadrons disappear just like the old 12th AF -> 15th AF FS bug. Have you got that far in beta testing, HS?

Hot news flash: Wimpey III now gone out of service as 205 Group move to the Wimpey X. Two new CW P-40 sqns languish due to lack of replacements, but get moved forward into Sicily for slaughter anyway.

[wernerpruckner]

25st August 1943:

more of the same all over the map:
- small scale sweeps and raids in the West
- bigger pre-invasion attacks in Italy
- BC attacked Bremen
- NI´s killed 7 Wilde Sau fighter [:(]

My best defence weapon at the moment is the Flak.....
Lots of moving stuff around...RR-Flak units to more important sites...AA to RRs and A/Fs...evacuating more units from southern Italy....

[wernerpruckner]

good weather and daring attacks by the 8Th AF !!
what a bloody day!

The Allied tried a maximum effort day in the West!
The 8th AF made deep strikes against some UFAC sites. But luckily half of the missions did not hit their primary target.
The heavy bombers attacked the UFACs F.Schichau GmbH and Flenderwerke and also the ARM Wenzendorf and a single RADAR site.

Meanwhile the tactical air forces hit the RRs Montzen, Einhoven, Tilburg and Zeebrugge.

In the south not only Italy was the target, there was also a low level strike against the Greek PORT Piraeus.
Other than that Gavin continued with his pre-Invasion raids in southern Italy with raids against various targets.

In the night there was the first Berlin raid of the Bomber Command - losses were light on both sites during this one.

I am not happy with the outcome of this turn, because even against un-escorted B-17 raids my Bf109G-6 had often a 1:1 loss ratio.
But the cannon version did fine, as did some other units.

84 lost Axis A/C versus 146 lost Allied A/C ( including 118 B-17F Fortress )

[wernerpruckner]

another picture of the combats against the B17´s

[wernerpruckner]

and another one:

[fochinell]

The 8th AF made deep strikes against some UFAC sites. But luckily half of the missions did not hit their primary target.

[:@]

The losses were, if anything, slightly lower than I suspected. On the other hand the B-26 raid over the occupied territories was too late to distract from the 8th AF as they approached over the German Bight, and my failure to hit the Dutch radar stations didn't help confuse OKL, so I might have done better than that. The poor bombing was the real annoyance, but the weather wasn't 100% and I was getting bored waiting.

In the meantime, the B-17 losses were heavy enough to reduce the chances of further unescorted raids until long-range escort fighters turn up. Roll on thos P-38J's and P-47D's.

Meanwhile I offer the traditional expressions of sympathy given by Galactic Dark Lords to their minions after heavy losses - by posting the B-17 bombardiers to the first wave to hit the beach at Tarawa.

[wernerpruckner]

and on the next day the Dark Lord Gavin is resting all his daylight forces - including the recce birds !!!

There were only a few night missions ( Rome and a target in the Ruhr Valley ).
Nothing important was hit [:)].

Luftwaffe is resting and continuing the relocation of the Southern Italy stuff....

[fochinell]

In reference to Werner's morale/fatigue strategy, I usually ground my bombers if they are below 50% morale unless it's either a maximum effort, or if they're mediums, where I'll run them down to 40% morale. I normally use about 50% of my tactical bomber units every turn in order to keep Axis fatigue up and cause some attritional losses in between strategic attacks. I use my fighters more, but nomally select the highest morale units and leave at least a couple with the lowest morale to rest. I've found lower altitudes increase the accuracy of mediums - e.g. three CW sqns of B25's can do some damage to RR targets below 14,000 feet. But when the heavy Flak arrives, it massacres them

[wernerpruckner]

28th August 1943:

Gavin continues with his pre-invasion attacks in Italy.
I let him do this for the most part - but one raid attacked a target near Rome and therefore got butchered.

In the West there was a RR-raid with tons of escorts - the P-47Cs did fight quite well against my Bf109G-6s.

In the night only a small BC raid - no German counteraction.

23 Axis lost A/C
and 62 kill Allied A/C
and still no Axis aces - but 6 pilots with 4 kills.