BUFFs - Understanding their use and modelling in-game.

[Puhis]

ORIGINAL: JeffK


You will always get extremes on both sides, there is always a "die roll" affecting the result plus so many modifiers that you cant guaratee the same result twice in a row.

Yes, that was my point anyway. Extreme examples are not very useful.

I think 4E bombers are bit too strong and too hard to shot down. But my main concern is that 4E bombers (or all long range planes) can fly a way too often. For example distance from Luganville to Shortland is at least 1500 km, so there and back is about 9-10 hour flight. I think it's impossible that same plane or crew could fly that same mission next day, or day after day. Of course this is true with japanese long range planes too. The game can't model this kind of long missions. Plane/pilot fatigue as it is now is not enough.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Puhis

ORIGINAL: JeffK


You will always get extremes on both sides, there is always a "die roll" affecting the result plus so many modifiers that you cant guaratee the same result twice in a row.

Yes, that was my point anyway. Extreme examples are not very useful.

I think 4E bombers are bit too strong and too hard to shot down. But my main concern is that 4E bombers (or all long range planes) can fly a way too often. For example distance from Luganville to Shortland is at least 1500 km, so there and back is about 9-10 hour flight. I think it's impossible that same plane or crew could fly that same mission next day, or day after day. Of course this is true with japanese long range planes too. The game can't model this kind of long missions. Plane/pilot fatigue as it is now is not enough.

WinBUGS is a very nice tool for analysing these kind of Monte Carlo systems. Over time as you collect data, you can update your model using Bayesian computation. After a while, you get an overall picture that submerges the effect of the modifiers and allows you to predict the distribution of outcomes. I've been using it to understand LCU combat dynamics.

[Puhis]

ORIGINAL: herwin

ORIGINAL: Puhis

ORIGINAL: JeffK


You will always get extremes on both sides, there is always a "die roll" affecting the result plus so many modifiers that you cant guaratee the same result twice in a row.

Yes, that was my point anyway. Extreme examples are not very useful.

I think 4E bombers are bit too strong and too hard to shot down. But my main concern is that 4E bombers (or all long range planes) can fly a way too often. For example distance from Luganville to Shortland is at least 1500 km, so there and back is about 9-10 hour flight. I think it's impossible that same plane or crew could fly that same mission next day, or day after day. Of course this is true with japanese long range planes too. The game can't model this kind of long missions. Plane/pilot fatigue as it is now is not enough.

WinBUGS is a very nice tool for analysing these kind of Monte Carlo systems. Over time as you collect data, you can update your model using Bayesian computation. After a while, you get an overall picture that submerges the effect of the modifiers and allows you to predict the distribution of outcomes. I've been using it to understand LCU combat dynamics.

Really, why are you doing that, may I ask? To be able to exploit game mechanics?

I admit that statistics can be fun, but I want to play the damn game. And I don't need statistics to tell me that Emilys of B-24s flying 10-15 hour missions can't do it every day IRL...

[Nemo121]

One other thing which I think plays into this issue is that the Japanese fighters often have mixed armament - several MGs, a couple of cannon. Rarely are they "all or nothing" fighters of the British or American ilk ( ALL MGs or ALL cannon ). The more I played the more I became convinced that airplane combat was conducted with per line checking of accuracy - IOW if you hit with the MGs you didn't necessarily hit with the cannon that your Zeroes were carrying. Statistically if you attacked a bomber stream with Zeroes your hits will likely to break down to be 2/3rd MGs and 1/3rd cannon.

This has the effect of making it look like people are getting lots of good hits with cannon-armed fighters which leads people to expect the bombers should be downed whereas, in fact, probably 2/3rds of those hits are just shooting tiny ventilation holes in the fuselage and doing nothing to make the bomber less airworthy.

To test this out in a plane where it really hampers the plane's effectiveness I went to the Jack model which has 2 x 20mm cannon of slightly different types in two separate armament slots. One has accuracy 1 point greater than the other. I modded it so that that plane had 4 x 20mm cannon ( of the lower accuracy ) in a single armament slot.

Suddenly the plane went from being decent to being a real downer of bombers. I ran this test a few times and found that this applied routinely. Accordingly when it made sense to do so I've modded fighters such that instead of having cannon on two lines they have it on one line and that some of the later-war planes with mixed armament - a couple of 30mm, a couple of 20mm get nothing but 20mm cannon. Even when the actual firepower of a plane goes down on the plane details screen its actual combat effectiveness increases as, instead of having, perhaps 30% of that firepower hitting 70% of the time ( such that a George actually has no more firepower than an Oscar III most of the time ( 2 x 12.7mm MGs ) ) you have 100% of the slightly lesser firepower hitting 100% of the time.

To compensate I've bumped up the number of B-29s arriving as replacements. I'll post the scenario tonight.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Puhis

ORIGINAL: herwin

ORIGINAL: Puhis




Yes, that was my point anyway. Extreme examples are not very useful.

I think 4E bombers are bit too strong and too hard to shot down. But my main concern is that 4E bombers (or all long range planes) can fly a way too often. For example distance from Luganville to Shortland is at least 1500 km, so there and back is about 9-10 hour flight. I think it's impossible that same plane or crew could fly that same mission next day, or day after day. Of course this is true with japanese long range planes too. The game can't model this kind of long missions. Plane/pilot fatigue as it is now is not enough.

WinBUGS is a very nice tool for analysing these kind of Monte Carlo systems. Over time as you collect data, you can update your model using Bayesian computation. After a while, you get an overall picture that submerges the effect of the modifiers and allows you to predict the distribution of outcomes. I've been using it to understand LCU combat dynamics.

Really, why are you doing that, may I ask? To be able to exploit game mechanics?

I admit that statistics can be fun, but I want to play the damn game. And I don't need statistics to tell me that Emilys of B-24s flying 10-15 hour missions can't do it every day IRL...

It's a intentional way of doing what you do when you learn a game. I find it very frustrating not to be able to transfer real-world experience to a game because there's divergence between reality and the game engine. Being able to pick out the statistical differences between models allows me to adjust my play to the game. It also allows me to treat the game as a theory about how things happen and falsify it. For example, I know the statistical distribution of relative casualty fractions in real one-day WWII battles--a research project from 30 years ago--and I can use it as a Bayesian prior and develop a posterior distribution for the game using the outcome of game battles. The two are very different.

[castor troy]

The 4E in the game are such beasts that you´re most times better off sending them in alone instead of sending a heavy escort with them. Just had a a stupid example of the air routine that saw 75 highly skilled/exp P-38J escorting two dozen Liberators, meeting 6 George and a dozen Zekes over the target. You would expect a bloody massacre, same as happened in real life when such forces met, the end result was a stupid never ending dive for the defending Japanese fighters, downing 22 P-38J for one Zeke shot down and a couple more being damaged. Lol, send in the bombers alone and I expect to lose one or at best two of the bombers and I would trade two Liberators any time for 22 P-38J. As the game is, you´re better off sending in bombers without ANY escort, very realistic and historical accurate.

[Nemo121]

Well if the P38s are consigned to close escort ( which is what escort is in the model ) they are a lot more vulnerable. If you set them to sweep with the same target then they will adopt a freijagd and be much less vulnerable.

[PaxMondo]

ORIGINAL: ckk

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

ORIGINAL: Captain Cruft

Agree totally. What is a BUFF though?

Big Ugly Fat F(ellow)
[/quote


Close[;)][:D]

+1

[:D]

[1EyedJacks]

ORIGINAL: Nemo121

Well if the P38s are consigned to close escort ( which is what escort is in the model ) they are a lot more vulnerable. If you set them to sweep with the same target then they will adopt a freijagd and be much less vulnerable.

Castor said he had 75 fighters VS 18 enemy fighters - better than 3:1 odds. And he lost what - about 18% of his escort flight? And in return shot down 1 zeke? That is a baaaad day. But the George has a gun value of 20 - accuracy of the 4 20mm guns is 23 percent and the 7.7mm is 52%. Top speed on the George is 363 and it has the "bounce" so with a dive the Georges/Zekes are probably closing @ 450mph? B-24s have a cruising speed of 200 and max of 278 so my WAG is Escorts/Bombers are probably cruising between 225-250mph.

Fionn is probably right about the sweep tho. And now the P38Js can use their speed advantage (max speed is 421). On a sweep mission Castor would get the bounce if he flew his sweep @ max altitude (44k).

I often have challenges with sweeps going in after my bombers instead of b4 - and I've seen this happen when both my bombers and fighters were staged from the same base... <sigh!> Sometimes they don't even goto the show, sometimes they perform the sweep but the bombers never attack... Coordination is a crap shot so far in my game with Fionn.

Still, Castor has a point - without escort he would have taken few losses and probably shot down more of the Japanese CAP. What I'm not sure about is how successful his bombers would have been in attacking their target.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Puhis

Maybe big ones or any planes should not fly at all when there's severe storms...

And at night. I think asking why non-specialized night fighters don't intercept, or B-17s don't hit from 8000 feet, in a severe storm AT NIGHT, is asking the wrong question. Better, what sort of fancy drugs were needed to get those crews into the air in the first place?

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: Nemo121

Well if the P38s are consigned to close escort ( which is what escort is in the model ) they are a lot more vulnerable. If you set them to sweep with the same target then they will adopt a freijagd and be much less vulnerable.

yeah and they would have a high chance to come in after the bombers (which in the end would be not bad anyway as the bombers would sweep the enemy). It was a common mission for P-38 to escort bombers in the Pacific and they did VERY well on escort. The funny thing though, when talking about this particular example, is the fact that they failed to escor the bombers so SWEPT!!!!! the base. Which probabyl won´t make it any better in your oppinion, does it?

Here´s the cr if someone is interested.

Afternoon Air attack on TF, near Balikpapan at 64,97

Weather in hex: Overcast

Raid detected at 47 NM, estimated altitude 3,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 16 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M5 Zero x 9
N1K1-J George x 14



Allied aircraft
P-38J Lightning x 74
PB4Y-1 Liberator x 24


Japanese aircraft losses
A6M5 Zero: 1 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
P-38J Lightning: 3 destroyed
PB4Y-1 Liberator: 1 destroyed, 4 damaged

Japanese Ships
DD Hakaze, Bomb hits 4, heavy fires, heavy damage
DD Hokaze
DD Tawakaze, Bomb hits 1, on fire, heavy damage



Aircraft Attacking:
9 x PB4Y-1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb
9 x PB4Y-1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb
6 x PB4Y-1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb
24 x P-38J Lightning sweeping at 44000 feet *
6 x P-38J Lightning sweeping at 44000 feet *
8 x P-38J Lightning sweeping at 44000 feet *

CAP engaged:
252 Ku S-1 with N1K1-J George (10 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(14 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
10 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 4 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 6000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 23 minutes
253 Ku S-1 with A6M5 Zero (9 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(9 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
9 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 6000
Raid is overhead


the losses in the cr are totally wrong as always, most of the P-38 crashed or were write offs, the other Japanese losses you see in the loss list were achieved by Corsairs over Mindanao. This is just one of the very good example of being better off using only the bombers and just keep your fighters grounded as it is senseless to use them for a mission they were used in real life. In this case, it was the usual never ending dive silliness that lead to 22 Lightnings lost for one or two enemies downed here. But to come back to the main point, yes, the losses would have been far lower not to use ANY escorts, I had lots of attacks of one or two dozen B-24 vs KB Cap of 300+ Zekes and the B-24 flew just threw them all the time, wearing down the Cap better than 200 Hellcats could do.

[AW1Steve]

Guys, I've read a LOT about B-17s, and I find the game models them very accurrately. Subaro Saki himself lamments how difficult it was to bring one down, and he flew mainly against the c and D models. They were extremely rugged, and well armed. The Japanese would have entire squadrons taking turns on a B-17 , and litterally run out of ammo without bringing one down. And the B-17e was an even greater nightmare, as their previous tactics (tail attacks) were very , very dangerous. B-17 pilots had back and side armor, and bullet resistant glass. If a B-17 group employed "combat box" tactics, it took a very couregous pilot to attack , and a even more skill full one to survive. What the game also accurately models is the damage that B-17's took .It didn't take much to cause them to scrub the mission. Martin Caidan and others describe B-17 engines having entire cylinders shot out and still running. Japanese planes while very maneverable, were lightly armed and very fragile.

The Germans seldom did any damage to a B-17 with less that at least one 20mm cannon. But then again their guns were heavier (20,and 30mm) and they carried more of them, and much more ammunition. Plus being radar and ground controlled vectored, they generally had a higher concertration of planes in the right place, with pilots trained to shoot down B-17s (often using captured B-17s from KG 200).

[ChezDaJez]

ORIGINAL: Nemo121

One other thing which I think plays into this issue is that the Japanese fighters often have mixed armament - several MGs, a couple of cannon. Rarely are they "all or nothing" fighters of the British or American ilk ( ALL MGs or ALL cannon ). The more I played the more I became convinced that airplane combat was conducted with per line checking of accuracy - IOW if you hit with the MGs you didn't necessarily hit with the cannon that your Zeroes were carrying. Statistically if you attacked a bomber stream with Zeroes your hits will likely to break down to be 2/3rd MGs and 1/3rd cannon.

This has the effect of making it look like people are getting lots of good hits with cannon-armed fighters which leads people to expect the bombers should be downed whereas, in fact, probably 2/3rds of those hits are just shooting tiny ventilation holes in the fuselage and doing nothing to make the bomber less airworthy.

To test this out in a plane where it really hampers the plane's effectiveness I went to the Jack model which has 2 x 20mm cannon of slightly different types in two separate armament slots. One has accuracy 1 point greater than the other. I modded it so that that plane had 4 x 20mm cannon ( of the lower accuracy ) in a single armament slot.

Suddenly the plane went from being decent to being a real downer of bombers. I ran this test a few times and found that this applied routinely. Accordingly when it made sense to do so I've modded fighters such that instead of having cannon on two lines they have it on one line and that some of the later-war planes with mixed armament - a couple of 30mm, a couple of 20mm get nothing but 20mm cannon. Even when the actual firepower of a plane goes down on the plane details screen its actual combat effectiveness increases as, instead of having, perhaps 30% of that firepower hitting 70% of the time ( such that a George actually has no more firepower than an Oscar III most of the time ( 2 x 12.7mm MGs ) ) you have 100% of the slightly lesser firepower hitting 100% of the time.

To compensate I've bumped up the number of B-29s arriving as replacements. I'll post the scenario tonight.

I have been seeing the same results that you have with B-17 defensive effectiveness. It's too high for the reasons you state. My fighters are most often driven off before firing a shot.

The mixed armament is not necessarily a bad thing when the right weapons are used as proven by the Me-109. However, the cannon on the A6M2 is a low velocity cannon with lousy accuracy and it only carries 60 rounds. One or two passes and the cannon is out of ammo so it doesn't surprise me that I don't shoot them down in droves but it does bother me that I seldom shoot them down at all.

Brad has been sending 30-40 B-17s to Noumea daily from Suva. And day after day they are met by a daitai of Zeros with an average experience level well over 70. This unit also has one of the best air leaders in the game: leadership 70, inspiration 70, aggressiveness 74, air skill 70. Brad has lost only 15 B-17s to air combat for the entire war despite near daily raids on my bases and shipping for the past few weeks. Ops losses account for 46 B-17s most likely due to lower their experience and higher fatigue from long range missions.

Morning Air attack on Noumea , at 115,160

Weather in hex: Overcast

Raid detected at 40 NM, estimated altitude 16,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 12 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 27



Allied aircraft
B-17E Fortress x 41


Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 1 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
B-17E Fortress: 6 damaged



Airbase hits 5
Airbase supply hits 1
Runway hits 21

Aircraft Attacking:
4 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
5 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
5 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
5 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
10 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb

CAP engaged:
Chitose Ku S-1 with A6M2 Zero (6 airborne, 13 on standby, 8 scrambling)
6 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 4000 and 16000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 32 minutes

This is a typical result. My losses tend to be low despite what the replay shows but his losses are zilch except for the occasional ops loss. I did try something slightly different on out last turn. I brought in some Ki-45s to help...

Morning Air attack on Noumea , at 115,160

Weather in hex: Overcast

Raid detected at 40 NM, estimated altitude 15,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 12 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 19
Ki-45 KAIa Nick x 26



Allied aircraft
B-17E Fortress x 36


Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 1 damaged
A6M2 Zero: 1 destroyed on ground
Ki-45 KAIa Nick: 2 damaged
Ki-45 KAIa Nick: 1 destroyed on ground

Allied aircraft losses
B-17E Fortress: 7 damaged



Airbase supply hits 1
Runway hits 6

Aircraft Attacking:
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
4 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
5 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
9 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x B-17E Fortress bombing from 12000 feet *
Airfield Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb

CAP engaged:
Chitose Ku S-1 with A6M2 Zero (6 airborne, 13 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 12000 and 16000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 9 minutes
5th Sentai with Ki-45 KAIa Nick (8 airborne, 18 on standby, 0 scrambling)
8 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 9000 and 17000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 9 minutes

The only difference I can see is that the majority of my fighters were able to intercept before his bombers reached the target causing a reduction in bombing accuracy. Otherwise same ol' thing.

I would leave the accuracy of the B-17 tail gun as is. This position probably has the best accuracy as the fighters have a much slower approach from the tail and tend to be approaching much more directly. The waist guns on the other hand should be significantly reduced in accuracy given their much reduced field of fire and requirement to apply much more lead to hit.

Chez

[AW1Steve]

OH BTW, a B-17 was the Queen (especially the F model). A B-52 is the BUFF. And the A-7 is the SLUFF.

[Anonymous]

all you ever do castor troy is complain about everything if it doesnt go your way. And maybe you have found something in the past but I have never seen you even aknowledge that the designers did something from that and never ever heard you say thank you. If I was a designer I would green button you and ignore you if I didn't tell you to ondergang first.

MO

it is people like you that made me leave the forum in the first place. I am sorry that people like you are still here. I will leave for another six months and hope that you get dicouraged and go away in the meantime.

[JeffroK]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: Puhis

Maybe big ones or any planes should not fly at all when there's severe storms...

And at night. I think asking why non-specialized night fighters don't intercept, or B-17s don't hit from 8000 feet, in a severe storm AT NIGHT, is asking the wrong question. Better, what sort of fancy drugs were needed to get those crews into the air in the first place?

They were a lot braver than you or me.

[PaxMondo]

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

Guys, I've read a LOT about B-17s, and I find the game models them very accurrately. Subaro Saki himself lamments how difficult it was to bring one down, and he flew mainly against the c and D models. They were extremely rugged, and well armed. The Japanese would have entire squadrons taking turns on a B-17 , and litterally run out of ammo without bringing one down. And the B-17e was an even greater nightmare, as their previous tactics (tail attacks) were very , very dangerous. B-17 pilots had back and side armor, and bullet resistant glass. If a B-17 group employed "combat box" tactics, it took a very couregous pilot to attack , and a even more skill full one to survive. What the game also accurately models is the damage that B-17's took .It didn't take much to cause them to scrub the mission. Martin Caidan and others describe B-17 engines having entire cylinders shot out and still running. Japanese planes while very maneverable, were lightly armed and very fragile.

The Germans seldom did any damage to a B-17 with less that at least one 20mm cannon. But then again their guns were heavier (20,and 30mm) and they carried more of them, and much more ammunition. Plus being radar and ground controlled vectored, they generally had a higher concertration of planes in the right place, with pilots trained to shoot down B-17s (often using captured B-17s from KG 200).

I tend to agree with you here. THe germans and eventually the Japanese went to medium to heavy cannons for a very good reason. You just could not hurt a B-17 with rifle caliber guns. Gene, a good friend of my Dad's (and still with us, Bless him) was a belly gunner based first in Africa and then in Italy. He said they never really feared the Me's. But the FW's with their cannons would blow 1' to 2' holes in the plane. Very scary. His comments, not mine.

So, I've always thought that the ineffectiveness of the IJA fighters accurate.

[Nemo121]

Castor,

Again with the hyperbole and lack of hard facts....

You are complaining about fighters sweeping and getting dived on in a thread about four-engined bomber modelling in-game. It isn't germaine and even if it were your comments are disingenuous.


1. In your example the P-38s did NOT escort the bombers. They swept. So talking about them as bomber escorts is disingenuous as that bit of code wouldn't have impacted their use.

2. The P-38s went in at 44,000 feet. This was well ABOVE the ceiling of the Zeroes and Georges so the P-38s MUST have had the first dive. The game simply isn't factored any other way.

It looks like, yet again, your losses are probably due to poorer pilots, leaders or tactics than anything to do with the game code. I'd be willing to be the P-38s were at extreme range and very fatigued. That always leads to massive losses.

Seriously, will you ever get to using facts and analysis instead of hyperbole? If you spent just 1/4 of the time thinking things through as you do on exclaiming the game is against you and ueber-broken I think you'd be able to figure this stuff out for yourself.


As re: B-17s.

ChezDaJez,
In real life the mixed armament isn't a problem at all. I think that in-game it can lead to issues though.

15 B-17s to air combat for the entire war? That seems far too low. Even in May 1942 Mike has done a lot better than that vs my B-17s. And over 3 days of combat in 1945 I downed about 150 B-29s in A2A combat - of course I stacked the deck with cannon-armed fighters and high-aggressivenes and Air skill leaders ( which really, really helps ).


Aw1Steve,
SLUFF? Can you explain the acronym. I'm curious what it translates as. I'll take the clean version and dirtify it mentally myself


PaxMondo,
Well, the ineffectiveness is very prominent in the early war but becomes less so as time goes by. This occurs as you make the move from multiple MGs to multiple cannons.

Even still though the sight of fighters habitually being hit and downed before they even get a shot off seems wrong to me.... I think that reducing defensive accuracy is a good cure.... Unfortunately after I made about 3 hrs of final changes to the release version I managed to save it wrong. *sigh* I'll make those final changes again tomorrow and then package it up for release. I'd be interested what external people make of the model with these changes.

[AW1Steve]

B-52 BUFF= Big ugly fat "fellow". A-7 SLUFF Short little ugly fat "fellow". And of course the "Queen", was a tribute to the affection crews had for the B-17's, especially the F model.

[PresterJohn001]

The self defending bomber concept didn't work, at at least in Europe, and the B-17 wasn't a huge hit in the Pacific, relying at least early on on being higher than the Japanese aircraft for protection. Something is out of kilter. B-17's out of the box were vulnerable, is 3 b-17's a box? If the allies get to use ETO methods then they should get ETO losses when the Japanese use ETO methods too.

It may well be that losses are about right, but damage done by bombers is too high. Consider the damsge done by a single raid versus that done by a days artillery bombardment, or the air field suppression caused by a raid.

edit add

Nemo's suggestion for altering accuracy of bombers defensive fire seems to be a very good one, changes to game balance can be pretty tricky