AAR swift vs fochinell

[wernerpruckner]

29th August:
weather is getting worse

Limited action in Italy with two fighter-bombing and dive-bombing attacks against the 29th Panzergrenadierdivision...Flak was very accurate and also the 10 balloons assigned to defend this unit were a good investment [:D]

More attacks in the West - RR Lille and Charleroi, RADAR Schaffen and POWER Langenbrugge
Some bigger air battles happened here, but nothing surprising.

BC was active and bombed Wedau - only limited response by the German Nightfighter force.

17 Axis for 50 Allied A/C lost.

highest losses so far:
136 Bf109G-6
143 Spit VB
135 B-17F

[fochinell]

The 8th AF escorts are getting tired (some of them down to the 20% range), but being an Evil Galactic Dark Lord I just order them back into battle anyway as the weather over the channel is just too good not to flog them out into combat one more time. The wearing-down phase of tactic ops should last for another week or so, at least until the P-38J and P-47D arrive in the 8th AF escort units, and the Italian tactical raids will dry up after the invasion and before the Italian bases come online. Which means a boring few turns where the mayhem will be a little limited. Losses of B-17's were high enough for SAHQ to divert all B-17 supplies to the 8th AF and re-equip the 12th AF heavy bomber units exclusively with B-24's, so they'll also be out of action for a few turns as they build up. In short, boredom ahead [>:] But the B-17 stock should be sufficiently high as the B-17G's arrive to allow some massacres after that

[wernerpruckner]

30th August:

tactical victory for the Allied forces in the air in the West - I thought Gavin will go deep inland for a UFAC strike, but his units flew the way back and bombed some tactical targets...A/F Gilze Rijen, ARM Zaamstad, RR Arnheim.

In Italy lots of preparation raids for the Invasion, but also a bigger raid to the Rome area (RRs and POWER attacked )

BC was once again active and bombed Hannover.

77 Axis A/C (49 Bf109G-6 most of them in the West ) versus 102 Allied A/C ( with 43 B-26Bs ) lost

At the end of the turn:
INVASION of Italy.....only four Italian units are still with me...all are dayfighter units...3 Staffel sized units and one Gruppen sized unit.

[fochinell]

tactical victory for the Allied forces in the air in the West - I thought Gavin will go deep inland for a UFAC strike, but his units flew the way back and bombed some tactical targets...A/F Gilze Rijen, ARM Zaamstad, RR Arnheim. [:D]

Every trick works once in a while. Werner has punished that sort of tactic before (supporting raids radiating from the axis of the main attack to catch blue interceptors), but this time the 2TAF Spits struck hard on 109's returning from the B-17 raid. [8D]

On the other hand, the Marauders bombing Rome/Littorio were hammered, and the A-20's following were badly routed to provide any support; not early enough or close enough to help, not late enough to catch blue units breaking off from the Marauders. [:@]

This turn the weather defeats me, and some more RAF weather forecasters find themselves transferred to Burma.

[wernerpruckner]

Gavin plays Nero and burns Rome....
other than that no action

[fochinell]

Gavin plays Nero and burns Rome....

Durn durn durn dah-dah-durn dah-dah-durn

Here's some of my top-scoring minions of doom at the end of August '43.

[wernerpruckner]

1st of September:

Italy - very quiet !!

Westfront:
several tactical raids - RR Abbeville, Hazebrouck, RADAR Ft. Rouge, CFAC Amsterdam Fokker and the 719th Infantry Division.
The raid against my ground troops got a bloody nose - 25+ Marauders did not leave the Low Countries [:'(]

BC action against Halle and a Mossiebomber raid to Berlin.
NI killed some more Wilde Sau pilots - the Bf109 Wilde Sau variant is no longer in production !!


29 vs 61 losses

[wernerpruckner]

2nd September 1943:

limited action in the West only

2:11 losses

[wernerpruckner]

3rd September 1943:

weather
but BC still active

0:2 losses

production of D520 is changed to a different Co-Axis A/C.

[fochinell]

Werner just reminded me about houserules. It might be worth posting them for reference, so here they are. As I remember them, the rules we play under are:

Allies:

1. No Andrei raids/bombing cheating (maximum alt, daylight/night attacks - apologies to Andrei who first posted on that and had his name associated with it, not that he was a cheat). Maximum bombing altitude of 25,000 feet to keep things in range of HAA.

2. No escorted recon. I would do that with fighter-recce a/c like the Spit FR XIV or F-6 on tactical targets if it was alowed, though.

3. NI's limited to four active over any airfield at any one time (I stagger mine as lone sorties at 20-30 minute intervals to ensure a good overlap coverage on active NJG airfields) at a maximum altitude of 12,000 feet to expose them to airfield flak (I don't think Werner's bothered about that, but it seems fair to me). I've actually killed 30 from an individual NJG Gruppe on one night when playing against the AI with no limit before, so I think some limit is needed.

4. No wild evasion of mandatory targeting. I am reasonable about UFAC and UPEN targeting as well as AVALANCHE and OVERLORD, but I tend to do about a third of the demanded VSITE targeting once I've done substantive damage to all visible VSITES.

5. Basic historical usage of aircraft (no B-17's in 9th AF as extra strategic bombers, etc). This is more for me than Werner, and it hits the Axis more in any case.

6. I also don't deliberately plot recce a/c along with raids on the same track to divert Axis interceptors. If the AI does it during auto-plotting, at least I'm innocent.

Axis -

1. Flak limits (Size x 10) limit to number of AA guns on any site. I prefer a strict limit to HAA as well, as it really destroys bombing accuracy and causes too many losses (as opposed to damaged a/c), but I can't remember if Werner agreed to it or not in our last game. Normally I stick to a maximum of 50 HAA on large sites (size 10 plus) and 25 on smaller ones. Werner can correct me on this for whatever he's doing in this game.

2. Historical usage of aircraft - R&D limited until an aircraft appears in production, to avoid the early appearance of jets.

3. No attacking bombers returning over the continent after making the Allied-held coast. No bomber crew in their right minds would have done that in RL.

That's all I can remember that I use, Werner can correct me and fill in any others, even if they aren't in use during our game.

[Hard Sarge]

Manatory targeting, we fixed a bug that the old game had, that it didn't count everything in the list as being damaged when it really was, so Overlord and AVALANCHE should now work the way it was planned to work
 
 

[wernerpruckner]

4th September 1943:

resting in the Med due to weather

only small skirmishes in the West - A/F Courelles and RR Courtrai

BC targeted Dresden this turn.

8:26 losses - still no Axis ace !!!

[wernerpruckner]

ORIGINAL: fochinell

Werner just reminded me about houserules. It might be worth posting them for reference, so here they are. As I remember them, the rules we play under are:

Allies:

1. No Andrei raids/bombing cheating (maximum alt, daylight/night attacks - apologies to Andrei who first posted on that and had his name associated with it, not that he was a cheat). Maximum bombing altitude of 25,000 feet to keep things in range of HAA.

2. No escorted recon. I would do that with fighter-recce a/c like the Spit FR XIV or F-6 on tactical targets if it was alowed, though.

3. NI's limited to four active over any airfield at any one time (I stagger mine as lone sorties at 20-30 minute intervals to ensure a good overlap coverage on active NJG airfields) at a maximum altitude of 12,000 feet to expose them to airfield flak (I don't think Werner's bothered about that, but it seems fair to me). I've actually killed 30 from an individual NJG Gruppe on one night when playing against the AI with no limit before, so I think some limit is needed.

4. No wild evasion of mandatory targeting. I am reasonable about UFAC and UPEN targeting as well as AVALANCHE and OVERLORD, but I tend to do about a third of the demanded VSITE targeting once I've done substantive damage to all visible VSITES.

5. Basic historical usage of aircraft (no B-17's in 9th AF as extra strategic bombers, etc). This is more for me than Werner, and it hits the Axis more in any case.

6. I also don't deliberately plot recce a/c along with raids on the same track to divert Axis interceptors. If the AI does it during auto-plotting, at least I'm innocent.

Axis -

1. Flak limits (Size x 10) limit to number of AA guns on any site. I prefer a strict limit to HAA as well, as it really destroys bombing accuracy and causes too many losses (as opposed to damaged a/c), but I can't remember if Werner agreed to it or not in our last game. Normally I stick to a maximum of 50 HAA on large sites (size 10 plus) and 25 on smaller ones. Werner can correct me on this for whatever he's doing in this game.

2. Historical usage of aircraft - R&D limited until an aircraft appears in production, to avoid the early appearance of jets.

3. No attacking bombers returning over the continent after making the Allied-held coast. No bomber crew in their right minds would have done that in RL.

That's all I can remember that I use, Werner can correct me and fill in any others, even if they aren't in use during our game.

Allied 4:
mandatory Avalanche includes not only the area given by the game - we go around it and there is also Southern France, Dalmatia, parts of Croatia, Albania and Greece included. Mandatory is not only the targets given by the game - in our houserules it includes all targets in the given area
( info for non/or not yet btr gamers: mandatory in the original only includes tactical targets like troops, RR, A/F, Radar, ports and Vsites )

Allied 6 + Axis: Axis will not concewntrate in recce killing, because it was not historically done and it is too easy to kill recce in the game!!

Axis 1: size +1 x10 => size 1 can have up to 20 AA added
AA will not be overused by the Axis
RR-Flak units do not count ( moveable railroad flak units - there are 2 original versions - light and heavy; the OBOA we use has also a third one JAVA with additional radar )

[Hard Sarge]

ORIGINAL: swift

ORIGINAL: fochinell

Werner just reminded me about houserules. It might be worth posting them for reference, so here they are. As I remember them, the rules we play under are:

Allies:

1. No Andrei raids/bombing cheating (maximum alt, daylight/night attacks - apologies to Andrei who first posted on that and had his name associated with it, not that he was a cheat). Maximum bombing altitude of 25,000 feet to keep things in range of HAA.

2. No escorted recon. I would do that with fighter-recce a/c like the Spit FR XIV or F-6 on tactical targets if it was alowed, though.

3. NI's limited to four active over any airfield at any one time (I stagger mine as lone sorties at 20-30 minute intervals to ensure a good overlap coverage on active NJG airfields) at a maximum altitude of 12,000 feet to expose them to airfield flak (I don't think Werner's bothered about that, but it seems fair to me). I've actually killed 30 from an individual NJG Gruppe on one night when playing against the AI with no limit before, so I think some limit is needed.

4. No wild evasion of mandatory targeting. I am reasonable about UFAC and UPEN targeting as well as AVALANCHE and OVERLORD, but I tend to do about a third of the demanded VSITE targeting once I've done substantive damage to all visible VSITES.

5. Basic historical usage of aircraft (no B-17's in 9th AF as extra strategic bombers, etc). This is more for me than Werner, and it hits the Axis more in any case.

6. I also don't deliberately plot recce a/c along with raids on the same track to divert Axis interceptors. If the AI does it during auto-plotting, at least I'm innocent.

Axis -

1. Flak limits (Size x 10) limit to number of AA guns on any site. I prefer a strict limit to HAA as well, as it really destroys bombing accuracy and causes too many losses (as opposed to damaged a/c), but I can't remember if Werner agreed to it or not in our last game. Normally I stick to a maximum of 50 HAA on large sites (size 10 plus) and 25 on smaller ones. Werner can correct me on this for whatever he's doing in this game.

2. Historical usage of aircraft - R&D limited until an aircraft appears in production, to avoid the early appearance of jets.

3. No attacking bombers returning over the continent after making the Allied-held coast. No bomber crew in their right minds would have done that in RL.

That's all I can remember that I use, Werner can correct me and fill in any others, even if they aren't in use during our game.

Allied 4:
mandatory Avalanche includes not only the area given by the game - we go around it and there is also Southern France, Dalmatia, parts of Croatia, Albania and Greece included. Mandatory is not only the targets given by the game - in our houserules it includes all targets in the given area
( info for non/or not yet btr gamers: mandatory in the original only includes tactical targets like troops, RR, A/F, Radar, ports and Vsites )

Allied 6 + Axis: Axis will not concewntrate in recce killing, because it was not historically done and it is too easy to kill recce in the game!!

well, it will be a little HARDer to kill them off now, of course, the trick is to catch them, if you can catch them you can kill them, but they are HARDer to catch, (was reading some stories of the war, one was talking about a mission his unit had, to escourt a Recon 38 with there P-51 Ds, they met up flew to the target, the recon bird took the snaps and made his turn, they seen the pilot looking at them, wag his wings, and poured the coals to the fire and left them behind)

plus, we got the bug that had the AI drag intercepting units to the Recon mission


Axis 1: size +1 x10 => size 1 can have up to 20 AA added
AA will not be overused by the Axis
RR-Flak units do not count ( moveable railroad flak units - there are 2 original versions - light and heavy; the OBOA we use has also a third one JAVA with additional radar )

[wernerpruckner]

5th September 1943:

more or less a resting turn:
tactical raids in the West (A/F Longuemesse; RR Lille ) that were missed by the JG26 Fw190s
and BC active with bomber raid to Magdeburg and a Mossie bomber run to Berlin.

3:3 losses

[wernerpruckner]

forgot one Axis houserule:

Co-Axis units stay in their area ( or very close by )
Italian: Italy, Dalmatia, Croatia, Dodekanes ( some Greek islands )
Bulgarian: Bulgaria
Romanian: Romania
Hungarian: Hungary

[wernerpruckner]

6th September 1943:

good weather
Hard day for my pilots....too many lost for too few kills [:(]

Italy:
many raids in the Rome area - RR Rome, Rome/Littorio, A/F Centocelle and POWER Acquaria Nova
there was also a raid across the Adriatic Sea to RR Florina

Westfront:
several tactical raids - RR Amsterdam, Utrecht, Tilburg, Cherbourg and ARM Phillips.

In the night Bomber Command attcked Leipzig, also once again a Mosquito bomber raid to Berlin.

50:60 losses - very bad ratio for me [:(]

The picture shows the Allied advance in Italy

[fochinell]

Hard day for my pilots....too many lost for too few kills

Heh heh [:)] A satisfying day, with 2TAF and especially MAC Spits inflicting some useful losses rather than dying by the score as per usual. The MAC squadrons followed the 12th AF raids over Rome to cover their withdrawl and 93 Sqn in their Spit V's alone got 6 190F's. The P-38H's fought hard, despite substantial losses.

Meanwhile the cowardly NJG forces have yet again hidden in their bunkers as BC devastates another German city; rumour has it the population are beginning to refer to Reichsmarshal Werner as "Meier". The 8th AF will rejoin the battle soon now that their new escort units are equipped with the P-38L and P-47D.

Complete Allied victory is only a matter of time...

[wernerpruckner]

7th September 1943

major action around the map!
Italy - most targets were in the Rome area
West: tactical raids to RR Liege and to ARM Fabrique d´Arms and a big raid by the 8th AF to the PORT Dortmund Herne
BC and the 205thGroup were active - raids to Florence, Berlin and Falkenberg

a really bad day with 76 Axis lost vs 79 Allied [X(][:(]


8th September 1943:
bad wether in Italy
8th AF targeted the PORT Duisburg Ruhrort
the tacticals attacked the RRs of Eindhoven and Nijmwegen
Bomber Command attacked Kiel

much less action by my Luftwaffe units - a major reorganization is going on, units with low morale are moved into the hinterland and high morale units to the frontlines

18:29 losses

[wernerpruckner]

9th September:

weather turn - no missions by the Allied forces....