Pilot replacement

[KenchiSulla]

Hey people,

First things first, thanks for putting this baby on the market again.

I have a question about pilot replacement. I can't find somekind of training pool (except maybe the german "school" units so I guess its abstracted.

How many replacement do the various nations get ( I am mostly interested in German and Italian at the moment, since I am playing that 43 campaign) and what is the experience level of those replacements?

Thanks for taking the time to answer!

[Fallschirmjager]

I could be wrong but I think you get a 'free' pilot with every plane produced. I am not sure what the baseline exp is for these pilots but I don't think there is any kind of pool.
Again I could be totally wrong.

[harley]

ORIGINAL: Fallschirmjager

I could be wrong but I think you get a 'free' pilot with every plane produced. I am not sure what the baseline exp is for these pilots but I don't think there is any kind of pool.
Again I could be totally wrong.

Yes, you are totally wrong.

<yes, I'm being a smartarse, but I will reply in more detail to Cannonfodder>

[harley]

ORIGINAL: Cannonfodder

I have a question about pilot replacement. I can't find somekind of training pool (except maybe the german "school" units so I guess its abstracted.

How many replacement do the various nations get ( I am mostly interested in German and Italian at the moment, since I am playing that 43 campaign) and what is the experience level of those replacements?

Thanks for taking the time to answer!

Pilot training is very abstracted. In the past you got XX pilots per nation per turn, with the US getting the most, and the minors like Italy and smaller Commonwealth nations getting the least. There was no pool, it you didn't use XX you lost them. We, the gamers, worked out that the XP was based on the XP of the unit for a while, then a generic seed value after that.

That system stays in place, but I added a little twist. I created a pool, but the pool is only one or two days worth of pilots. If you don't use your full allocation, these pilots stay in the pool, but receive a bonus to their XP when they come online, it's like an extended training pool. The purpose of this is the stop the stockpiling of men, which I don't believe would have ever been allowed to happen, but to give a bonus to a player who protects his men.

2 questions I won't answer are: "What is the base XP?" and "How many pilots do I get?"

h...

[Nemo121]

Why won't you answer those things? Surely it makes sense to let, for example, the German player know what loss level will result in barely trained recruits entering his units?

E.g. If I knew I was getting 50 pilots a day and was losing 60 planes a day that might alter my tactics so that I intercepted fewer raids and kept my losses below 50 pilots a day.

I can't see the rationale for allowing us to know the number of planes produced etc but not knowing ( even roughly ) what number of pilots we're getting and whether or not that varies over time.
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I don't think we need exact figures but a rough ideas is a must... After all this was hardly data which was hidden to the leaders at the time and DID have a major impact on the prosecution of the air war.

[KenchiSulla]

So, without talking about actual figures it all breaks down into this:

- early in campaign replacement pilots are of higher experience. If you loose more then your allocated on a daily bases your units will go "under strength".
- later in campaign experience of replacements will drop but you'll still get a basic amount of pilots.
- The more pilots you loose, the less time they have to train so lower experience
- If you manage to loose less pilots then your allocated on a random day the ones that stay in pool get a small experience bonus (capped at x).
- In theory pilots could stay in "pool" for ever and ever and ever
- Pilots that stay alive while in units get experience while in combat

Thanks for your help mate

[harley]

Yep, that sounds right. The 2 functions of the pool are to level out the replacement arrival rates, allowing one or two days of high losses to be soaked up easier, and to give that little "advanced training" edge.

[harley]

ORIGINAL: Nemo121

Why won't you answer those things? Surely it makes sense to let, for example, the German player know what loss level will result in barely trained recruits entering his units?

E.g. If I knew I was getting 50 pilots a day and was losing 60 planes a day that might alter my tactics so that I intercepted fewer raids and kept my losses below 50 pilots a day.

I can't see the rationale for allowing us to know the number of planes produced etc but not knowing ( even roughly ) what number of pilots we're getting and whether or not that varies over time.


I don't think we need exact figures but a rough ideas is a must... After all this was hardly data which was hidden to the leaders at the time and DID have a major impact on the prosecution of the air war.

This has been argued out over many years, I am continuing the tradition of my programmatical forebears like Gary and Keith.

I dispute your assertion that "this was hardly data which was hidden to the leaders at the time". It may not have been hidden, but I disagree that it would be readily available, even to those in high command. The best way I can give you a response is to ask you to consider the following statement, which in my opinion would sum up the leadership's knowledge of replacement rates.

"If your units do not have enough pilots to be combat ready, you are losing too many pilots"

[Hard Sarge]

and what is going to throw a monkey wench into this, is my pilots, units that I had info on, I added in Real Pilots, and these come in based on a date, but will be better trained then most of the replacements that will come in

and as Harley says, the leaders didn't know that info, even as early as 1940, the German units were complaining that new pilots were not ready for combat, so they went with there own training systems, a new pilot didn't join the JG right out of school, but when the Training Staffel for that JG (so, once you got out of school, you went back to school)

later on, some advance Training schools were set up, which would be some of the JGr's you find in the OOB, but, these were training schools for the whole Air Div, but, they tended to also fly combat missions, so oddly, you could have a very good Experten flying with a both of total Noobs, trying to train them, and as you can expect, losses were heavy within the training schools

as the war went on, even these started to fail, and pilots came right out of school, and right into combat, many never making it to there 2nd mission, rookies to made it though 5 missions, were seen to be either good, or pretty lucky

the LW's weakness is pilots, even a poorly trained pilot is better then nothing (but at times, not by much)

if the LW can get to the advanced planes, in mid to late 44, with pilots to fly them, they are going to be Very HARD to defeat

[TechSgt]

From what I've read, even the Allied pilots were being sent to schools after arriving in theater and before joining a unit.

The pilot question is, IMHO, the most important aspect of the game. Period! So keep it sealed in a mayonnaise jar on Funk & Wagnal's Doorstep.

That part about the pilot pool's? I thought that was already in the game!

TS