The tojo as uber.....

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: mike scholl 1

ORIGINAL: Shark7
The key to it is that altitude can be traded for airspeed whenn you need to make a quick get away. The higher you are, the more room you have to trade. Also, if the attacker starts at a higher altitude he can gain an airspeed advantage over a target that is flying at a lower altitude or one that is trying to climb up to meet him.

Only up to a point. The reason Dive Bombers have "dive brakes" is that without them they would gain too much speed and become uncontrollable. Fighters don't have "dive brakes", so unless you are flying a tank like the P-47, an altitude advantage will soon become a disadvantage..., from which you will have to "spiral down" to maintain control of your A/C---or lose your wings "pulling out".

Right, but I'm not talking nose diving straight down, most of the time they make banking turns downward to pick up a little airspeed. Try nosediving stright down, the wings will rip off of structural stress points being exceeded.

Hence the 'Never Exceed Speed' referenced on all aircraft.

[Shark7]

OK Guys here are a few points to rembmer:

1. THE ZERO BOMUS IS GONE. That means no false early war advantage for Japanese aircraft other than the fact that they are more manueverable and have better trained pilots. Both of these are self correcting for the Allied player over time.

2. THE SPEED ADVANTAGE WAS CORRECTED. This means the F-4U 'Uber Butcher Bird' syndrome is gone in game. Once again, the thing that really matters is aircraft and pilot. Yes some planes and pilots are just better than others.

3. You will have to adjust your tactics to match your enemy. If he is sweeping at 20k, you need to maybe cap at 21k, etc.

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: Shark7

OK Guys here are a few points to rembmer:



3. You will have to adjust your tactics to match your enemy. If he is sweeping at 20k, you need to maybe cap at 21k, etc.

and if your opponent is sweeping higher than your fighter can reach? Abandon?

[m10bob]

I'm sure original poster was referring to early mod Tojo's, but the later models were far from being an inferior plane, with ample firepower and climbing ability beyond maybe 80% of anything flying (IRL).
If its' climbing ability is being as it is, more of the Tojo's at a base are gonna be in that high altitude position to be able to hit the opponent, at an inferior altitude.
The Tojo also could turn on a dime, and while not portrayed in the game, the plane was tiny,(not much larger than the diminutive Polikarpov I 16, thus, a harder target to hit.

The plane looked like a huge engine with a small plane bolted on...
Personally, I prefer it on many missions to the Tony.

[freeboy]

What...wait...you mean that in a dogfight, the aircraft with an altitude advantage tends to win? Thats unpossible

Some people on this forum whine way too much...you know who you are. The whole "OMG a fighter sweep with altitude advantage and better pilots shot down my fighters on CAP with inferoir pilots...TEH GAME IS BROKEN!!!111"-routine gets really old really fast.

OK sorry to offend but folks need to feel th efreedom to honestly express there wtf moments... so I suggest you live wit hit.. it seems odd that papaer airplanes with terrible armaments should not be so much meat.. there should imo be so adjustments to this issue, much like the sub factor...
If poeple do not use their forces in a historical or reasonable way then odd things shoudl happen.. granted.. but soem odd things in a pattern show us game imballance... one time this happening is fine.. terrifically outclassed planes flying way past there ability as a rule show us a pattern to be addressed.. there u go, if you feel like I am whining too bad

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: Shark7

OK Guys here are a few points to rembmer:



3. You will have to adjust your tactics to match your enemy. If he is sweeping at 20k, you need to maybe cap at 21k, etc.

and if your opponent is sweeping higher than your fighter can reach? Abandon?

Then you are just SOL. It happens. You may want to reverse it and start sweeping him.

[vonTirpitz]

This.

In general, I think it is safe to say that commanders and pilots knew (or quickly learned) when the planes they flew were outclassed by an enemy plane. That is why, historically, they would change their tactics to try and take the advantage away from the enemy.

It is no different that reducing the range of your Kates to stay within the range of their escorts. The same can be said about abandoning an area of operation if the threat was too great. Bomb those high flying planes on the ground day or night. Bombard them. Whatever you chose to do there are ways to help offset the advantage your opponent might have found.

Just leaving the area where he/she spent so much time setting you up can probably annoy the heck out of them sometimes. [:D]

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: Shark7

OK Guys here are a few points to rembmer:



3. You will have to adjust your tactics to match your enemy. If he is sweeping at 20k, you need to maybe cap at 21k, etc.

and if your opponent is sweeping higher than your fighter can reach? Abandon?

Then you are just SOL. It happens. You may want to reverse it and start sweeping him.

[vettim89]

The title of this thread should be changed as I think the issue is not the Tojo but instead the effectiveness of high altitude sweeps. I would have to agree with those that say if your opponent has adopted this technique, you must counter it. It doesn't really matter if it is "ahistorical" or not. I thought the point of playing WiTP or WiTP-AE was to see if different tactics and strategies can bring different results. Is this just another exploration into that realm? Yes far away from the historical model but still plausible. I am not saying that I approve or agree with the tactic just that if your opponent is using it, deal with it.

That said, when the game engine does not accurately represent reality there is a break down. The concept of "Sputnik" sweeps is silly at beat. Considering even a good aircraft with a sustained rate of climb of 500 ft/minute would take an hour and fifteen minutes to just climb to 38k ft. This should greatly increase fatigue and wear and tear on the airframe. Second the aircraft would about have it's rivets ripped off diving at max dive speed for 15-20,000 feet not to mention the G force endured during pull out. This would wear plane and pilot out pretty quick if it was used routinely. Visibility is an very big issue here. We are talking three to five miles of verticle distance separation not counting horizontal. That is about the maximum range a WWII fighter pilot might be able to spot another fighter with perfect visibility (no clouds, no haze, no rain). Add to that the fact that the looking down is very hard in an aircraft. This only worsens as the horizontal separation narrows. Considering the Sputniks would have to be on top of there quary before the range closed enough for a sighting, it is very likely that sweeping a/c 15-20,000 ft over the enemy would never see them. So yes when the game allows things to happen that would be rare if not impossible then there is a problem.

I think one of the basic House Rules that should be in every game is to both players should follow the operating principle of "if the RL commanders wouldn't have done it, I shouldn't either". That refers to tactics only not strategy. This applies to things like people putting TF's with a single AK out in front of their invasions to trigger the enemy into attacking them thus revealing their position. Perhaps it should apply here. It is safe to assume that the RL commanders knew the abilities of their men and aircraft better than we do. The reason JFB (and assumingly late war AFB) use this tactic is that they found that it brings atypical results. In other words, they found a way to game the system. That's not good tactics. That's just being gamey. Quit patting yourself on the back for being such a great player. You just found a flaw in the game engine and are using it to your advantage.

[crsutton]

ORIGINAL: Panzerjaeger Hortlund

ORIGINAL: Miller

ALTITUDE. Forget pilot exp, plane stats.........max altitude is the winner. Whichever plane can fly the highest will win most of the time. Needs loooking at I'm afraid.

What...wait...you mean that in a dogfight, the aircraft with an altitude advantage tends to win? Thats unpossible [X(]

Some people on this forum whine way too much...you know who you are. The whole "OMG a fighter sweep with altitude advantage and better pilots shot down my fighters on CAP with inferoir pilots...TEH GAME IS BROKEN!!!111"-routine gets really old really fast.

Hmmmm.....Thanks for the public scolding.

[crsutton]

ORIGINAL: Mark Weston

ORIGINAL: castor troy

wonder what get´s old faster though, the fact that people are whining about 20:1 kill rates that are completely off, the fact that airwar in the AE Pacific happens near 40.000ft or the fact that there are still people that think both would be correct [:-]

Has anyone here seen a result anything close to this one?

Yes.

[crsutton]

I just sent the file to Ark and we are going to run the turn over a few times with different settings. We will run the turn with the same settings a time or two to see if the outcome varies.

To set the record straight I lost 36 P40s and kittyhawks in actual air to air combat that turn. All combat was in that one hex. I lost another 10 or so to crashes for a total of around 45 total in the battle. My P40s did not fight anywhere else that turn. We had a second fight in the same turn but I only had about 10 fighters left and only 2-3 were shot down in the second fight. So about 40 planes were lost as a result of the first high sweep and over 30 of those were air to air combat.

Watching the combat replay about 30 P40s engaged the initial 38 tojos and I saw at least 26 more join the fight during the engagement.

In this game we had one other very unbalance battle where a sweep of oscars shot down about 40 hurricanes and P 40s over Dacca for the loss of about 5 or six oscars. I have had a few big air combat wins but usually when fighting as CAP over my own base. We are in July of 42 and the air war has not been unbalanced with him losing slightly more airplanes than I. I have lost more fighters to air to air but he has lost more bombers and being the attacker has a much higer number of op losses. Ark, says that this is the first really high sweep he has used and I can pretty much confirm that. I recall Ark used fairly high sweeps in the PI and I suffered some heavy losses. I eventually put my fighters on max altitide and they did much better. But all of the air combat was then occuring at 29,000 feet. But I have seen enough of the high sweep in my two games to know that they are whacked. There are plenty of others in the forum who agree with me. This is not an isolated incident and I am not the first to bring it up.

Over the past seven months, fighter to fighter in air to air I would say he has about a 3-2 to 2-1 advantage. Not unexpected considering my obsolete aircraft and inexperienced pilots in the early months. Except for the high sweep, I don't see a whole lot out of whack with the way the air combat has been working.

Of course experiences will vary. Ark is a good player and only uses his fighters in mass and rarely fights in the air outnumbered. If you have an opponent who likes to spread his AF around then result could be greatly different as just in WITP the game seems to handle smaller combats better.

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: Shark7

OK Guys here are a few points to rembmer:



3. You will have to adjust your tactics to match your enemy. If he is sweeping at 20k, you need to maybe cap at 21k, etc.

and if your opponent is sweeping higher than your fighter can reach? Abandon?

Then you are just SOL. It happens. You may want to reverse it and start sweeping him.

if you get shred due to 38.000ft sweeps then you should sweep yourselve with your P-40s at 29.000ft to get again shred by the Cap at 38.000ft? Sorry, but that´s an advice you would follow only once if you actually try it. [;)]

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: castor troy




and if your opponent is sweeping higher than your fighter can reach? Abandon?

Then you are just SOL. It happens. You may want to reverse it and start sweeping him.

if you get shred due to 38.000ft sweeps then you should sweep yourselve with your P-40s at 29.000ft to get again shred by the Cap at 38.000ft? Sorry, but that´s an advice you would follow only once if you actually try it. [;)]

You'd be surprised some of the things I'd try. [;)] Remember I play as Japan, you have to get creative. [:D]

Might I also suggest:

1. Night low level bombing of the airfields.
2. Use of Heavy Bombers in large numbers to knock out the airfields.
3. Naval bombardment if possible.
4. Pull your A/C off cap into something or somewhere else, then come back and try to sweep him when he lets his guard down.
5. If all else fails, just wait, you will get better A/C later in the war. (not an option as Japan)

Trust me, I know it isn't fun for allies at first, but remember it isn't fun for Japan in the end.

[viberpol]

ORIGINAL: crsutton
I just sent the file to Ark and we are going to run the turn over a few times with different settings. We will run the turn with the same settings a time or two to see if the outcome varies.
To set the record straight I lost 36 P40s and kittyhawks in actual air to air combat that turn. All combat was in that one hex. I lost another 10 or so to crashes for a total of around 45 total in the battle. My P40s did not fight anywhere else that turn. We had a second fight in the same turn but I only had about 10 fighters left and only 2-3 were shot down in the second fight. So about 40 planes were lost as a result of the first high sweep and over 30 of those were air to air combat.

Ok, my (J) intel says the results from that day in question were as follows:
54 allied fighters shot down (42 A2A + 12 Ops due to CAP 2 hexes away and damages)
3 Tojos shot down (2 A2A + 1 Ops)
It's 18:1 ratio.

ORIGINAL: crsutton
In this game we had one other very unbalance battle where a sweep of oscars shot down about 40 hurricanes and P 40s over Dacca for the loss of about 5 or six oscars. I have had a few big air combat wins but usually when fighting as CAP over my own base. (...) Ark, says that this is the first really high sweep he has used and I can pretty much confirm that. I recall Ark used fairly high sweeps in the PI and I suffered some heavy losses. I eventually put my fighters on max altitide and they did much better.

Really? I do not remember that. Can you please try to tell the exact date?
I am surprised, because I always thought Oscars have so great mvr rating at band below 10000 that I usually sending them at 9500. If such a high ratio in my advantage was achieved, this is definetely not because of high alt sweep with Oscars.

ORIGINAL: castor troy
and if your opponent is sweeping higher than your fighter can reach? Abandon?

ORIGINAL: Shark7
Then you are just SOL. It happens. You may want to reverse it and start sweeping him.

ORIGINAL: castor troy
if you get shred due to 38.000ft sweeps then you should sweep yourselve with your P-40s at 29.000ft to get again shred by the Cap at 38.000ft? Sorry, but that´s an advice you would follow only once if you actually try it. [;)]

Castor, I really think you exaggerate a bit with that doomed effectiveness of high alt advantage.
As Crsutton mention we try to rerun the same turn with different setting to find some more evidence.
And here are the results from the second part of the turn in question (the quoted losses were mainly generated by the sweep at 29000 and then the esorted raid I also posted somewhere earlier).
While Ross (crsutton) placed his CAP at max alt this time, the results were as follows:


Morning Air attack on 3rd Army Tank Brigade, at 76,129

Weather in hex: Clear sky

Raid spotted at 47 NM, estimated altitude 12,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 13 minutes

Japanese aircraft
Ki-44-IIa Tojo x 36
Ki-48-IIa Lily x 17

Allied aircraft
P-40E Warhawk x 26

Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-48-IIa Lily: 1 damaged

Allied aircraft losses
P-40E Warhawk: 9 destroyed

Allied ground losses:
46 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Non Combat: 2 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 1 (0 destroyed, 1 disabled)
Vehicles lost 1 (0 destroyed, 1 disabled)

Aircraft Attacking:
17 x Ki-48-IIa Lily bombing from 8000 feet *
Ground Attack: 2 x 100 kg GP Bomb
4 x Ki-44-IIa Tojo sweeping at 8000 feet

CAP engaged:
49th FG/7th FS with P-40E Warhawk (6 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 29000
Raid is overhead
49th FG/8th FS with P-40E Warhawk (6 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 29000
Raid is overhead
49th FG/9th FS with P-40E Warhawk (5 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
5 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 29000
Raid is overhead
28th CG/11th FS with P-40E Warhawk (9 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
9 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 29000
Raid is overhead

So as you see, my fighters went at 8000 with bombers again CAP at 29000 but still I received a 9:0 ratio this time.
I think we have more factors in play than the pure altitude selection & I am quite happy with it.


[EDIT] (spelling, sorry, my English is not that good as it should be)

[Miller]

I suppose a HR could be agreed whereby both sides set an altitude ceiling of 30k ft or whatever, regardless of a/c performance.

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: viberpol


Castor, I really think you exaggerate a bit with that doomed effectiveness of high alt advantage.

I don´t exegarate at all and everyone who closesly watches the replays can clearly see it or is ignoring what he sees.

Last turn in my PBEM.

Morning Air attack on Meiktila , at 58,47

Weather in hex: Extreme overcast

Raid spotted at 41 NM, estimated altitude 42,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 9 minutes

Japanese aircraft
Ki-43-Ib Oscar x 12
Ki-43-Ic Oscar x 30



Allied aircraft
P-38E Lightning x 24


Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-43-Ib Oscar: 3 destroyed
Ki-43-Ic Oscar: 3 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
P-38E Lightning: 2 destroyed



CAP engaged:
24th Sentai with Ki-43-Ic Oscar (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 14 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 38000
Raid is overhead
50th Sentai with Ki-43-Ic Oscar (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 16 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 6000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 39 minutes
260th Sentai with Ki-43-Ib Oscar (12 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
12 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 38000
Raid is overhead



The Lightnings come in and score an easy 10:0 during their bounce, there were too many Oscars to be bounced endlessly and then the Oscars suddenly bounced the Lightnings. So what do you think was the result then? The Lightnings taking down halve a dozen Oscars more? No, the Ligthnings didn´t get a single Oscar damaged or shot down and the Oscars achieved a 3:0. Another clear example (and I can repeat those example ten thousand times). First losing 10:0 while being bounced, then reverting the 0:10 into a 3:0 when the bounce changed sides. So everyone who thinks their ac work best at the alts they really worked best in real life is in a nice dream so to say. Get higher as your opponent is the way to go and everyone who noticed this (how there can be someone who hasn´t noticed is beyond me) and this of course leads to everything flying at max alt.

why you keep showing the cr from an escort mission is beyond me too, because this is just not what I´m talking about. It´s all about stratosphere sweeps and the way it is modelled, the fighters would need heatshields.

[Hortlund]

What exactly are you complaining about?

P38s who bounce Oscars shoot down many Oscars. When the Oscars bounce the P38s they shoot down many P38.

...yes? ...so?

So far we have seen complaints about aircraft with an altitude advantage winning most of the dogfights. Now we get "aircraft who bounce other aircraft tend to shoot down many opponents"? OH NOES, THAT REALLY NEVER HAPPENED IN REAL LIFE!!!11111!!

[viberpol]

ORIGINAL: Miller
I suppose a HR could be agreed whereby both sides set an altitude ceiling of 30k ft or whatever, regardless of a/c performance.

Maybe. But what's the use of it?

See above. My 36 Tojos escorting at 8000 shot down 9 P40s at CAP 29 000 -- more than 21 kfeet difference. This is a fact confirmed by the CR from PBEM I play with crsutton.
Is there really such a thing as high altitute mythical advantage? This result says no, there is no such a thing
I received a 9:0 ratio even if the high alt odds should be against me.

Should fighters set on higher altitude get an advantage over those sent below? IMHO, definetely, yes, in the first phase of combat.
Should they miss the target if sent too high above - say with 20000 feet difference. Yes, of course. They should not fulfill the task. Did not engage the enemy. Did not sweep the skies for bombers.
I think it should work this way. If it isn't that's bad, but not the end of the world. There are too many factors that have impact on the results.

[viberpol]

ORIGINAL: castor troy
why you keep showing the cr from an escort mission is beyond me too, because this is just not what I´m talking about. It´s all about stratosphere sweeps and the way it is modelled, the fighters would need heatshields.

It's not about the stratosphere sweeps. The stratosphere starts at... 31 500 feet?
My sweep, that was the core of this discussion has been sent at 29 000. Exactly at the max level available for P40s.
This thread, named "Uber Tojo" was started by Ross trying to find rationale of our last amazing fight's result.
Received ratio of 18:1 was out of whack, I admitt.

But it was not received because of the high altitude advantage, as the next results quoted show.
My escort sent 21 000 below his CAP received 9:0 ratio.
Maybe that's the Tojo advantage. Maybe just good dice roll.

I don't really know. Every fight is different. [&:] I feel we're chasing the shadow of a rabbit in sleep trying to find a formula for his behaviour without even knowing the rabbit exist. [;)]

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: Panzerjaeger Hortlund

What exactly are you complaining about?

P38s who bounce Oscars shoot down many Oscars. When the Oscars bounce the P38s they shoot down many P38.

...yes? ...so?

So far we have seen complaints about aircraft with an altitude advantage winning most of the dogfights. Now we get "aircraft who bounce other aircraft tend to shoot down many opponents"? OH NOES, THAT REALLY NEVER HAPPENED IN REAL LIFE!!!11111!!

lol