How to use the 2nd RAF Tactical Air Force

[melnibonian]

Hello again

I am having a problem on the usage of the 2nd RAF Tactical Air Force (TAF). Usually I am setting a large Air Superiority box by RAF Fighter Command and inside it I set a similar or smaller box for the 2nd TAF with instructions to attack airfields and rail facilities in France. The problem is that although the damage it inflicts is substantial it also takes huge losses. So far (December 1943) the production ratio of my Typhoons is at -200 and in this rate I will run out of planes and pilots by March 1944!

Clearly I am doing something wrong, so any ideas or suggestions are most welcome

Thanks a lot in advance

[loki100]

ORIGINAL: melnibonian

Hello again

I am having a problem on the usage of the 2nd RAF Tactical Air Force (TAF). Usually I am setting a large Air Superiority box by RAF Fighter Command and inside it I set a similar or smaller box for the 2nd TAF with instructions to attack airfields and rail facilities in France. The problem is that although the damage it inflicts is substantial it also takes huge losses. So far (December 1943) the production ratio of my Typhoons is at -200 and in this rate I will run out of planes and pilots by March 1944!

Clearly I am doing something wrong, so any ideas or suggestions are most welcome

Thanks a lot in advance

Your tactics sound ok, but a few things to check. Are your losses due to flak or enemy air? If the latter perhaps draw your AS box smaller so that the fighters are where you need them rather than off guarding some other part of the box.

But, I'd think about why you are doing this. Since interdiction is only for the turn, I've started scaling down usage of 2 Tac Air in 1943, especially the Typhoons, so they are ready for 1944. In 1943 I go after infrastructure in France (rail yards and ports) as those in turn do long term damage rather than immediate damage.

That tends to mean using the shorter ranged Level Bombers and let the Typhoons etc rest. Airfields are hard targets for low level aircraft, again I'd do that using level bombers or if in real need. The sort of time I'd trade higher mission losses for the damage inflicted by airfield attacks is for a very specific reason. Its one way to drive off the Luftwaffe in advance of a naval invasion, while they can replace the planes, it'll take a few turns and the airfield will have reduced capacity etc.

This does seem to be a 1-1 (perhaps even worse) loss ratio, so something to do for a very direct purpose and perhaps think of which planes are assigned to the task.

[melnibonian]

Thanks for the quick reply. Most of my losses come from flak but i do see what you mean and I will try your suggestions.

By the way are you using the short range bombers in strategic or tactical role to hit the rail facilities? (I assume you are using them in a strategic role but better be safe than sorry I guess)

On a totally different topic I must say I love your AARs on both East and West

[HMSWarspite]

Do not use FB on airfields. Use LB and from a reasonable height. Save Tiffies for interdiction or unit attack after the invasion.

[melnibonian]

ORIGINAL: HMSWarspite

Do not use FB on airfields. Use LB and from a reasonable height. Save Tiffies for interdiction or unit attack after the invasion.

Thanks for that. Most appreciated

[Musikka]

Hi,

I am having similar problems with my tactical air, losses are terrible for both 2nd TAC and 9th AF. I am already running out of Typhoons on start of 1945 when production stops. P-47 squadrons at least get a steady stream of replacements to cover losses.

It seems that I am running out of recon planes also and those are not produced either, a bunch of them just magically appears on pools.

Luftwaffe does not seem to be the problem, allies have lots of fighter escorts to take care of that, but flak is slaughtering my jabos and tac bombers. So can anyone know answers to these questions:

1. How to minimize fighter bomber losses due to flak? I am already using jabos only for ground interdiction. I try to avoid big urban centers when possible. My understanding of history is that fighter bomber losses were high, but allied got pretty good at supressing air defences.

2. How to minimize tac bomber losses losses due to flak? Is there any kind of altitude sweet spot? Whats the difference between using strategic and tactical bombing?

3. How to minimize recon plane losses? I have been using low altitude cameras for interdiction recon, maybe high altitude cameras should be used whenever possible, even when common sense tells me that it would be difficult to spot a panzer from 35000f?

4. Did Brits really stop producing their most effective weapon (rocket armed fighter bomber) at the end of war? Tempest is still produced but in pitiful numbers.

Couple of things I have noticed:

1. Even when set to fly every day of week, British jabos seem to fly only in maybe day 1 and 2. Maybe this has something to do with excessive losses, still Brits seem to have less morale loss than Americans, who need to be rested every other turn.

2. With default settings P-47s seem to be less effective as jabos than Typhoons/Hurricanes/Mosquitos. This seems to be related to fact, that much less airplanes fly per sortie. Upping manually requested airplanes per sortie seems to at least partially fix this.

[LiquidSky]

The allies tried to avoid bombing areas of high flak concentrations....you should do the same. You should also try and avoid using the rocket armed FB's just because. Better to use them as an emergency weapon....when you want to break out of a Beachhead....and should be rested otherwise.

The Hurricane II makes a good Rocket FB...convert them all to bombers. If you let the computer manage your air upgrades automatically, you will end up with about 15 squadrons of them. Use them for the more flak intensive targets since they can be replaced...and you can always upgrade them with spitfires to increase your hurricane pool.

The altitude sweet spot to avoid flak is over 30k feet for slow aircraft. If you cant fly that high...fly at night.

You can't fly every single day of a week...try and pick different combinations. I fly strat bombers on D2, D4, and D6. For armour nuking missions, I send them on D2 and D5...or sometimes only on one day. No point sending them more often for diminishing returns, and higher losses.


I haven't really played long enough to notice a lack of REC aircraft, but I do notice they attrit faster then I get replacements...same thing with Coastal Command flying AUTO Naval patrol. Again, I just try and minimize flying....fly only when I really need to...not every day. I don't really need Coastal command in 1945...and I probably wont need as much REC either....so I don't have to finish the war with max squadrons.

I have no idea what a default setting is anymore, I change everything [;)]

[Musikka]

ORIGINAL: LiquidSky



The allies tried to avoid bombing areas of high flak concentrations....you should do the same. You should also try and avoid using the rocket armed FB's just because. Better to use them as an emergency weapon....when you want to break out of a Beachhead....and should be rested otherwise.

Problem is, that after invasion there seems to be a constant emergency situation AI is very good at creating solid defence lines, and air power is needed to break through.

It also seems to be so that anything worth attacking witch tactical bombers (ports, railyards, airfields) is well protected by flak, so flak cannot be avoided. In interdiction role tac bombers seem to be quite ineffective.

But yes, I clearly seems that I overuse my tac air since I have these problems.

The Hurricane II makes a good Rocket FB...convert them all to bombers. If you let the computer manage your air upgrades automatically, you will end up with about 15 squadrons of them. Use them for the more flak intensive targets since they can be replaced...and you can always upgrade them with spitfires to increase your hurricane pool.

I am manually handling upgrading, and that is part of the problem. Before invasion of France there was lotsa Typhoons in pool, and I upgraded too many many squadrons to Typhoons, didnt even realize then that production is going to stop in 1945.

Using hurricanes as bombers is a good point, and I have actually been doing that already.

The altitude sweet spot to avoid flak is over 30k feet for slow aircraft. If you cant fly that high...fly at night.

Do tac bombers even go that high? Even if they do, do they hit anything? Do they even find mainland Europe if used by night? I have given up flying at night, even with Bomber Command results are way better when using them as daytime raiders if properly escorted. With strategic bombers I do not have any problems with unsustainable losses.

You can't fly every single day of a week...try and pick different combinations. I fly strat bombers on D2, D4, and D6. For armour nuking missions, I send them on D2 and D5...or sometimes only on one day. No point sending them more often for diminishing returns, and higher losses.

So there is seems to be no silver bullet for avoiding losses, I am just overusing my tactical air. Well, British do refuse to fly every day even when ordered

Thanks for your comments.

I haven't really played long enough to notice a lack of REC aircraft, but I do notice they attrit faster then I get replacements...same thing with Coastal Command flying AUTO Naval patrol. Again, I just try and minimize flying....fly only when I really need to...not every day. I don't really need Coastal command in 1945...and I probably wont need as much REC either....so I don't have to finish the war with max squadrons.

I have no idea what a default setting is anymore, I change everything [;)]

[carlkay58]

I fly my tactical bombers in 9th USAAF at 21,000 ft. They are more than capable of that and it avoids the light flak (ceiling about 18,000 ft). I send the Stirlings from RAF BC to the 2nd RAF Tactical AF and thus set their altitude to 16,000 ft. I try really hard not to use the 2nd RAF Tactical AF unless I absolutely have to. It is my RECON air force. When I do use them, it is in the Ground Support missions although the occasional Bomb City mission vs VW Launchers work well.

Many tactical bombers and fighter bombers use dive bombing. That means that if you have their altitude > 11,000 ft they will dive down to 5,000 ft over the target to release their bombs. So you can fly them about 20,000 ft without a loss of accuracy since they will dive down to the 5,000 ft to actually bomb. I think their accuracy is actually better this way but I am not sure, it probably just feels that way.

Dive bombers take large losses if their targets have AAA. Just a fact of life. So only use them when you have to.

[Smirfy]

FB's basically become a shock weapon in game they suffer too many losses to be treated as anything else. Keep them for big pushes. I play to try and minimise losses but unlike their twin and four engined brothers and sisters your kind of limited with things you can do in that regard. I am hoping that flak losses get tweaked down again slightly in subsequent patches until a happy medium exists.

I actually get some quite spectacular results with every aircraft except Typhoons. P40's and P47's have decimated some units on occasion.

[HMSWarspite]

Also, as has been noted, you cannot convert sqds to use all the Tiffies in your pool. You need to keep several hundred in pool at D Day, and then use them to keep the units you have got fully equipped. I cannot remember how many is optimum (if I have even found that yet), but in RL there were only some 20 sqds (18 in 2TAF) I believe. Bet you've got well over that?

[Musikka]

ORIGINAL: HMSWarspite

Also, as has been noted, you cannot convert sqds to use all the Tiffies in your pool. You need to keep several hundred in pool at D Day, and then use them to keep the units you have got fully equipped. I cannot remember how many is optimum (if I have even found that yet), but in RL there were only some 20 sqds (18 in 2TAF) I believe. Bet you've got well over that?

I got almost 30 squadrons, now I have only 10 left

[HMSWarspite]

Too many squadrons, over used . The snag with this style of game is you have to use the AF largely as historical or you get out of sync with production...