How to deal with Axis bombing of HQ units

[Harrybanana]

I am playing a pbem game where my opponent has been successfully bombing 2 or 3 of my Army HQs every turn. He hasn't had much luck yet in killing my leaders (though I did lose a 7 infantry leader this way), but he is killing a lot of men every turn. For some reason my fighters do not intercept these bombing missions, even though they do intercept his ground support missions in force. I have tried beefing up some of my Army HQ units with AA Regiments and battalions, but they do not seem to have much effect. I very seldom manage to inflict any losses on his bombers.

Does anyone have a solution?

[mmarquo]

Stack them with a ground unit or hide them in forests.

[Harrybanana]

ORIGINAL: Marquo

Stack them with a ground unit or hide them in forests.

I've tried the first suggestion but my experience is that when you have a stack of units the HQ is usually the one that can be seen by air reconaissance. Certainly my opponent has had no problem finding them in a stack. The second suggestion works well in the North, but in the South there is often no convenient forest to hide in.

What I don't understand is why fighters refuse to intercept and why the flack is so ineffective. I would really appreciate it if one of the developers could explain this to me.

[JAMiAM]

ORIGINAL: Harrybanana

What I don't understand is why fighters refuse to intercept and why the flack is so ineffective. I would really appreciate it if one of the developers could explain this to me.

Odds are, the attacks are being made by night. If you have no fighters set to NM, then there will be no interception.

As the Soviets, I will use my Partisan air supply assets during my player turn to conduct night Ground Attacks against enemy stacks that I intend on attacking, or against HQs identified during recon. These, in addition to the swarms of U2VS biplanes that the Soviets get stuck with, can soften the defense, and score some lucky hits against HQs.

As the Axis, I don't bother with the switching to and from NM status that is necessary to make night attacks. Mostly, bacause I'm generally running more of a Ground Support oriented air force, instead of Ground Attack. Also, because I usually have enough of a local air superiority that I actually want to pull Soviet air forces into combat where my fighters can shoot them down.

[mmarquo]

Stacking HQs with other units really diminishes the effectiveness of airstrikes against the hq.

[Farfarer61]

The Soviets produce thousands of 85mm AA guns, whch go unused as I tend not to build AA units. Perhaps you can build some AA Regiments and attach the to the HQs. I am assuming they will defend the HQ as well as subordinate divisions.

[Harrybanana]

ORIGINAL: JAMiAM

ORIGINAL: Harrybanana

What I don't understand is why fighters refuse to intercept and why the flack is so ineffective. I would really appreciate it if one of the developers could explain this to me.

Odds are, the attacks are being made by night. If you have no fighters set to NM, then there will be no interception.

As the Soviets, I will use my Partisan air supply assets during my player turn to conduct night Ground Attacks against enemy stacks that I intend on attacking, or against HQs identified during recon. These, in addition to the swarms of U2VS biplanes that the Soviets get stuck with, can soften the defense, and score some lucky hits against HQs.

As the Axis, I don't bother with the switching to and from NM status that is necessary to make night attacks. Mostly, bacause I'm generally running more of a Ground Support oriented air force, instead of Ground Attack. Also, because I usually have enough of a local air superiority that I actually want to pull Soviet air forces into combat where my fighters can shoot them down.

Thanks. I'll try putting some fighters onto night missions and see if that helps.

[Harrybanana]

ORIGINAL: Marquo

Stacking HQs with other units really diminishes the effectiveness of airstrikes against the hq.

I hadn't noticed this, but I'll try it some more and pay more attention.

[Harrybanana]

ORIGINAL: Farfarer

The Soviets produce thousands of 85mm AA guns, whch go unused as I tend not to build AA units. Perhaps you can build some AA Regiments and attach the to the HQs. I am assuming they will defend the HQ as well as subordinate divisions.

I've tried this, but admittedly i only built 1 and it didn't hit anything. I'll build some more and see if they help.

[Cavalry Corp]

To just bomb HQ to kill leaders is silly - I thought that was fixed ( to a very low chance).