Night Bombing Overpowered?

[Yakface]

FatR.....I think your results, or lack of, are down to weather (4 of the 5 are severe storms or thunderstorms), and the planes involved have pretty small bomb loads.

Heany bombers at low level close bases and massacre aircraft.

[PzB74]

Me and Andy agreed upon a night bombing rule: City attacks only - airfield attacks are overpowered.
- This will last until an improvement is released in a future patch.

What's your experience with night bombing of ports, is that still overpowered as well?
I've not tried this since early stock...

[Hortlund]

ORIGINAL: PzB
What's your experience with night bombing of ports, is that still overpowered as well?

I was on the recieving end of a night port strike where 3 Jap bombers put one bomb each in 4 different CVEs. This after the jap bombers had been intercepted by P-61 nightfighters.

It pretty much sums up my view on night bombing of ports.

[Kaletsch2007]

ORIGINAL: beppi

ORIGINAL: FatR

Well, sorry, but that's what you get for poor play. If you take no countermeasures against a certain sort of attack, and the enemy invests in it heavily, it is reasonable to expect this attack to be effective.

I really do not think that "quality" of play has any effect in this case. As i am the allied player here i can ensure you that there was no heavy investment in anything regarding to 4E in this game as they just kill any balance.

Currently i would say 4E are some sort of void zone generators 43+. Get a lvl 9 base somewhere and after 4 weeks crush any Japanese air resistance in a 16 hex radius.

Kill his night fighters during the day with 4E and AF attack, sweep his day fighters during the day at 40k feet or just nuke them during the night.

An as an allied player i state again, >50% hit rate of 4E @ 15k feet during the night is not even overpowered, it is just laughable ....

Could not agree more !!!
And we are talking about an airfield attack, which is in theory not 1 big airbase, but several smaller ones.

[PaxMondo]

I'm not sure that the night bombing is overpowered ... I think that the operational losses need to be higher, particularly with low experience units.  I beleive it is too easy to get experienced units, so players take this route ahistorically.  If the training losses were higher, this would discourage the use and get it more in line with what actually ocurred.  Particularly for Allied players where their replacement rates are so low in the early war.
 
Allied night attacks were effective.  BUT, the investment to get there was quite large.  It does not appear to me that the requisite investment is being made in game.  Right now, a player can get highly effective night bombing developed in '42.  If the training losses (operational) were kicked up significantly, this would discourage this tactic until late war. 
 
Let's use some current requirement here to get handle on this.  Minimum requirements for most companies is 100 hours of night to even qualify for a job.  That's going to take you 60 days if you fly every night to log that exp.  Realistically, with weather and everything else, figure 120 days.  You are now a green stick that allows you to sit in the right seat.  400 hours later they're going think you are ready to move into the left seat.
 
OK, there is a war on and so time compression is going to happen, but so are the operational losses.  The above numbers would get you approximate daytime operational losses.  In game, that is suggesting pilot exp of greater than 80% in night flying (is that even tracked?).  Since the war is on, and you rush the training, your operational losses really have to get big for low hour pilots.  Like 2% - 5% per mission or more.
 
You cannot overstate how difficult night VFR flying is.  Any pilot will tell you: it is dangerous.  What makes it so easy today is all the instruments and radar.  However, there is still a lot of night VFR being done, and pilots are lost everyday to it.  I work with +10,000 hour pilots who have to routinely fly night VFR.  None of them would ever say it was easy.  And every year, at least once a year, I have to go to a funeral.
 
My final thought on this topic is simple: if it were easy everyone would have gone to it in '42.  The fact is that it didn't really catch on until '44.  Sure the Brits were doing it from '40 onwards.  But look at their numbers, the training involved, the pilot experience, their targets, their effectiveness ... GER, SOV, USA, JAP, ITA ... none of the other really picked it up until much later.  It wasn't a fashion trend, it needed both time and technology to bring it up.   Once units had effective radio guidance (amoung other items) to get them back home safely, night bombing came into being. 

[YankeeAirRat]

<edited numerous times to not seem snarky or annoyed> Jeeze Folks. This is either WAD or it will be NERF'd cause a few of you all are unhappy about how either the IJAAF/IJNAF or USAAF/RAF bombers are able to accurately find thier targets at night or able to achieve a CEP of like half an inch with a stick of bombs. So we NERF the bombers and then neither the fanbois are happy cause the B-17/24/29's can't get through to roll back the Japanese industrial base, meanwhile on the otherside the Japanese aircraft can't seem to drop a stick of bombs on allied targets or even put a torpedo in the water the against a bright red barn.

Why can't we just accept that this is a dang game that is doing its best to simulate combat based on someone's rating system for platforms/people/supplies suck/weather/other things. If you want a game that will replay the 2nd World War where all the player has to do is just make the same selections as the real life people, then go and find one (if not then build your own). I won't buy anything like that because it is boring. I would rather have this game with all its blemishes, mainly because I love the challenge of trying to do things differently.

Is it wrong that I decided to try and build up a bunch of level 9 airfields in places and then stack as many 4e bombers (if I am the allies), NO! It is wrong that I train all of them so thier experience levels are 100 to the 10th power for night bombing? I then turn around and just terrorized all the Japanese air bases around me for a while so I can do combat ops? NO! It is how I think would be the best strategy to win in that sector. So if I get my butt handed to me in another sector cause of this, then so be it. That is how I am playing my game.

[Kaletsch2007]

@PaxMondo

Using your arguments, the solution would be:

- start night attacks not before Jan43 (to reflect the technical aspect)
- allow only units with 80+ Exp to conduct such missions

???

Of course the coding of a complete night training und exp routine would do the job even better [;)]

[PaxMondo]

ORIGINAL: Kaletsch2007

@PaxMondo

Using your arguments, the solution would be:

- start night attacks not before Jan43 (to reflect the technical aspect)
- allow only units with 80+ Exp to conduct such missions

???

Of course the coding of a complete night training und exp routine would do the job even better [;)]

HR testing would confim this. And yes, this is basically the result of what I propose...

[Nomad]

ORIGINAL: Kaletsch2007

@PaxMondo

Using your arguments, the solution would be:

- start night attacks not before Jan43 (to reflect the technical aspect)
- allow only units with 80+ Exp to conduct such missions

???

Of course the coding of a complete night training und exp routine would do the job even better [;)]

It would be more realistic to just say no night bombing, how many 80+ experience bomber units will anyone have? And is that 80+ for all pilots? Or just the average? How are you going to moniter/verify it?

[Nikademus]

a useful house-rule would be no city bombing by night till at least 43.

[beppi]

ORIGINAL: Kaletsch2007

@PaxMondo

Using your arguments, the solution would be:

- start night attacks not before Jan43 (to reflect the technical aspect)
- allow only units with 80+ Exp to conduct such missions

???

Of course the coding of a complete night training und exp routine would do the job even better [;)]

80+ exp would mean no night bombing by B-29 and even if you husband your pilots i doubt that anyone can get more than 2 or 3 units with an average of > 80 exp. Better rule would be ->

- No night bombing of airfields and ports ever.

And this rule would kinda suck as we get a nice feature and cant use it cause it overpowered.

[Tullius]

It seems that the attacks are not to powerful. They are simply to accurate so that the size of the target did not matter. Also should be the experience of the pilots factored in. Less skills (esp. leaders) should mean less accuracy and more accidents. It seems to me also that bad weather has no real effect besides search planes.

Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-45 KAIa Nick: 3 destroyed on ground
A6M2 Zero: 4 destroyed on ground
Ki-43-Ic Oscar: 13 destroyed on ground
Ki-44-IIa Tojo: 3 destroyed on ground
Ki-46-II Dinah: 1 destroyed on ground

In total 50 aircraft were destroyed

3 + 4 + 13 + 3 + 1 = 24 (not 50).

[Kaletsch2007]

@All

- is verifying needed ? I feel sorry for those of you, playing against somebody, you do not trust (i know, i am spoilt in this case with my opponents)
- why can't you use B29's ? micromanage your pilots
- maybe 80 Exp would be to high (depending on total numbers)

All in all it was an idea, worth trying i thought.
Any AFB willing to check in his game (late43+), how many units he could put in night action under this circumstances ?

[Alfred]

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

...My final thought on this topic is simple: if it were easy everyone would have gone to it in '42.  The fact is that it didn't really catch on until '44.  Sure the Brits were doing it from '40 onwards.  But look at their numbers, the training involved, the pilot experience, their targets, their effectiveness ... GER, SOV, USA, JAP, ITA ... none of the other really picked it up until much later.  It wasn't a fashion trend, it needed both time and technology to bring it up.   Once units had effective radio guidance (amoung other items) to get them back home safely, night bombing came into being. 

With the greatest respect, this is simply not true.

From very early on after entering the war, the Italians quickly switched over to flying night bombing operations, particularly in the eastern Mediterranean using their 3 engined transport planes. Not surprising this has been missed, few people ever seem to look at the Italians relying instead on stereotypes for their knowledge. Much harder to understand is the overlooking of the widespread night bombing during the London Blitz in 1940 and of course the German bombing campaigns against Britain in subsequent years. Then of course there are all those night operations conducted by both the Germans and the Soviets, all prior to 1944 on the eastern front.

Let us not confuse the relative lack of effectiveness due to lack of suitable equipment and mass with some sort of aleged late fashion trends.

Alfred

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: beppi

ORIGINAL: Kaletsch2007

@PaxMondo

Using your arguments, the solution would be:

- start night attacks not before Jan43 (to reflect the technical aspect)
- allow only units with 80+ Exp to conduct such missions

???

Of course the coding of a complete night training und exp routine would do the job even better [;)]

80+ exp would mean no night bombing by B-29 and even if you husband your pilots i doubt that anyone can get more than 2 or 3 units with an average of > 80 exp. Better rule would be ->

- No night bombing of airfields and ports ever.

And this rule would kinda suck as we get a nice feature and cant use it cause it overpowered.

I´m in 4/44, have not suffered horrendous heavy bomber crew losses and if I would take my best pilots with hundreds of missions each I would probably fail to find 16 to form a >80 exp squadron with 12 bombers (4 reserve crews). This is AE, not WITP but ppl still talk about WITP experiences.

[Nikademus]

ORIGINAL: Alfred

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

...My final thought on this topic is simple: if it were easy everyone would have gone to it in '42.  The fact is that it didn't really catch on until '44.  Sure the Brits were doing it from '40 onwards.  But look at their numbers, the training involved, the pilot experience, their targets, their effectiveness ... GER, SOV, USA, JAP, ITA ... none of the other really picked it up until much later.  It wasn't a fashion trend, it needed both time and technology to bring it up.   Once units had effective radio guidance (amoung other items) to get them back home safely, night bombing came into being. 

With the greatest respect, this is simply not true.

From very early on after entering the war, the Italians quickly switched over to flying night bombing operations, particularly in the eastern Mediterranean using their 3 engined transport planes. Not surprising this has been missed, few people ever seem to look at the Italians relying instead on stereotypes for their knowledge. Much harder to understand is the overlooking of the widespread night bombing during the London Blitz in 1940 and of course the German bombing campaigns against Britain in subsequent years. Then of course there are all those night operations conducted by both the Germans and the Soviets, all prior to 1944 on the eastern front.

Let us not confuse the relative lack of effectiveness due to lack of suitable equipment and mass with some sort of aleged late fashion trends.

Alfred

Everyone night bombed. It just wasn't very effective overall. At the tactical level it was mainly used as a harrasement tool. Often the target wasn't even hit. (airfield/port facility-docked ship etc)

[Yakface]

ORIGINAL: Tullius

It seems that the attacks are not to powerful. They are simply to accurate so that the size of the target did not matter. Also should be the experience of the pilots factored in. Less skills (esp. leaders) should mean less accuracy and more accidents. It seems to me also that bad weather has no real effect besides search planes.

Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-45 KAIa Nick: 3 destroyed on ground
A6M2 Zero: 4 destroyed on ground
Ki-43-Ic Oscar: 13 destroyed on ground
Ki-44-IIa Tojo: 3 destroyed on ground
Ki-46-II Dinah: 1 destroyed on ground

In total 50 aircraft were destroyed

3 + 4 + 13 + 3 + 1 = 24 (not 50).

Your'e maths is spot on. However the game under reports losses to airfield attacks. The info screen at the end of the turn has information that is basically accurate. That's why I had to post the actual number rather than people being misled by a the combat report

[PaxMondo]

ORIGINAL: Alfred

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

...My final thought on this topic is simple: if it were easy everyone would have gone to it in '42.  The fact is that it didn't really catch on until '44.  Sure the Brits were doing it from '40 onwards.  But look at their numbers, the training involved, the pilot experience, their targets, their effectiveness ... GER, SOV, USA, JAP, ITA ... none of the other really picked it up until much later.  It wasn't a fashion trend, it needed both time and technology to bring it up.   Once units had effective radio guidance (amoung other items) to get them back home safely, night bombing came into being. 

With the greatest respect, this is simply not true.

From very early on after entering the war, the Italians quickly switched over to flying night bombing operations, particularly in the eastern Mediterranean using their 3 engined transport planes. Not surprising this has been missed, few people ever seem to look at the Italians relying instead on stereotypes for their knowledge. Much harder to understand is the overlooking of the widespread night bombing during the London Blitz in 1940 and of course the German bombing campaigns against Britain in subsequent years. Then of course there are all those night operations conducted by both the Germans and the Soviets, all prior to 1944 on the eastern front.

Let us not confuse the relative lack of effectiveness due to lack of suitable equipment and mass with some sort of aleged late fashion trends.

Alfred

Agree with all of your examples, at least the ones I am familiar with. Using the London night bombings and working from memory here.. compared to the early day bombings where they tried +1000 bombers, the night bombings (as I recall them) were done by small, select groups. Even then, op losses were high.

Using your Eastern Front example: was night bombing the primary bombing tactic of either the SOV or GER? What I recall is that the vast majority of bombers on both sides were used in daylight support of ground troops ... not to suggest there wasn't night bombing (of course there was), but what percentage of bombing missions? 2%? Less? Any training program? Not that I recall, only select, high time pilots were culled from all groups.

I still maintain, and I might be overlooking the ITA, that ENG was the only significant night bombing nation that I recall. Significant meaning, the majority of their bombing missions and their crew training for a theatre of war was centered around night bombing operations for a period of time. Their rationale was, as I recall, that night ops losses (high as they were) were lower than day ops air-air losses. They were absolutely correct in that as proven by early USAAF losses that were staggering. It should also be pointed out that, unlike the GER, ENG had no ground support bombing mission for over 3 years in Europe. This drove the need for an effective retaliatory bombing operation, and night bombing was their choice.

So circling back. Yes, maybe accuracy is also too high but I defer to others on that subject. I still beleive that op's losses have to bumped up significantly for both IJ and Allies. Neither side (except ENG, but not sure if their night training program carried to the FAR EAST, but you could argue that it could have) had a significant night bombing training program or mission profile. Lacking that (night training program and night experience), you are then faced with using high time pilots and accepting high ops losses.

I wouldn't suggest that pilots<80 could not fly night ops, just below 80, the op's losses should start to be high enough to be a deterrent in themselves. Think about it: at 50 we say that pilots have a high chance of not forming up correctly in daylight. What chance do those pilots have of flying blind 400 miles each way correctly? A slight NAV error and they end up in the drink, and that is exactly the outcome that ocurred.

Again, late war, a large amount of technology starts to come into play that helps significantly. You cannot overvalue the radio direction gear that started appearing in 45 (or late 44?). Saved a LOT of pilots, particularly DAYTIME in bad weather.

Nerf night bombing? No. But, you have to pay the price to make that decision, particularly in the early war. Does IJ want to spend her crack pilots on night bombing of Singers? I have little doubt it would have worked (meaning bombs on target and the associated damage). But just like many players do not bomb PH for a 2nd day due to high pilot losses to AA, the ops loss attrition of the night bombing missions in 42 should mean after a week you see significant losses of even those highly experienced pilots. Those guys are +90exp. What would happen to 80? 50?

BTW: I associate 90 exp pilots to be 10,000 hour type. 80 exp to be 2000 hour, 70 to be 500 hour, 50 to be 50 hour.

[oldman45]

In May or June of 42, the bombers assigned to 10th AF, all 3 that were able to fly, bombed Rangoon docks at night. They made it there and back and had no losses. Damage to the docks was not excessive but they rattled some cages, it took almost a week to get the planes ready to fly again but they did and hit the docks a second time. What is the real concern? You too many planes at night when your hit? What kind of overhead shelters do you have on your airstrips? I would guess none and they are parked in the open. The real problem is players concentrate all their planes into big raids that were not done for various reasons. So the choice really is, do we force players to not concentrate the squadrons or nerf the bombers? Personally I think finding a logistic solution is the best.

[Patbgaming]

I have used night bombing fairly often in my PBEM and have never seen those kind of results. I as a rule I have my Heavy Bombers fly at 15k for daytime raids and 10k for night raids ( its just my way of toning down the damage from 4E without complicating things too much ). It seems to me the results from the initial post are based on the following

1 ) The low altitude of the attack ( increasing accuracy )
2 ) The large number of bombers involved in the raid.

I believe the altitude of the attacking bombers had a greater effect than the number of bombers did.