Trying to understand effect of targets and best use of the air force

[Hoggorm]

Hello,

I'm wondering about a lot, but I'll start with these mysteries

1 - What effect will bombing the different targets have? For example, in strategic bombing I can choose between a large list of different targets, for example AFV, Aircraft, Port, Railyard, Manpower etc. I do not understand why I should choose one over the other? I can understand that during the war U boat bunkers were targeted for example. I understand that this would lead to less U-boats in the Atlantic hence less losses of allied shipping to the UK. But what effect will I see when bombing U-boats in WitW? And what effects will the other targets give? What effect will bombing Manpower, AFV, Aircraft, Railyard and the others have? How do you prioritize the targets? Do you have different priories when playing a scenario with say 12 turns rather than the full game?

2 - What type of aircraft should be used in the different missions? I see that using Level Bombers are good for strategic bombing, but are they also effective against units for example? How about interdiction? Fighters are obviously good for superiority mission and escort, but when do you want to use the fighter bombers? I understand that there might be a lot of considerations here, so maybe someone could tell me what aircraft are basically useless for one type of mission and very good at others?

3 - What considerations do you make when deciding what altitude, and what days, your mission should be flown?

4 - How do you decide, and what are your considerations, when determining how many aircraft should fly on a mission? How many is a minimum in an air directive? How many is "too much"? I would think that one recon aircraft can take just as good pictures of a target as 10, but one (fighter) bomber will not be effective bombing the target the next day.

I appreciate your thoughts and knowledge

[loki100]

very roughly

1 - you have 2 guides. One is the VP system, the other is the in-game logic. So VP, undamaged U-Boats (& after 1944 v-weapon sites/prodution) give the axis VP. So make sure they are damaged (any level is ok). The other source of VP is damaged manpower, HI or fuel production (more damage the better). So you need some of your strategic aircraft hitting those 2. Now the second target list is what works vs the game system. Here I take out German medium tanks and truck production, its a slow return but it can make it increasingly hard for the German Pzrs to replace their losses and retain mobility

2 - crudely if its big and static, hit it with a 4 engined bomber (or if you want heavy bombs), if its small and static hit it with a 2 engined level bomber, if it can move, hit it with a tactical or fighter bomber. There's lot of nuances but that will get you started

3 - altitude is a trade off, higher = less losses & less damage. Days is a judgement, for strat bombing run recon for D1-2, bomb on some selection of D3-6, recon on D6, so you know whats there. I tend to bomb 2 or 3 days a week - more and you run up extra losses and have higher fatigue

4 - feng shui to be honest, with strat bombing usually more is better, not so much for the damage but mutual protection. In the main small missions are a waste and/or vulnerable to fighters.

Have a poke around the war-room and AAR posts, there is a lot of practical advice.

[Hoggorm]

Thank you loki!

You say you take out German medium tanks so as to make it hard for the German panzers to replace losses. When do you see the effect of this? Or do you really see the effect at all? Is it just that many turns later, when you attack a German panzer division, they happen to have less panzers than what they could have had had you not bombed?

Regarding altitude. What range do we speak of here? What is low? 5000'? 10.000'? An what is high? 30.000'?

[MarechalJoffre]

ORIGINAL: loki100
2 - crudely if its big and static, hit it with a 4 engined bomber (or if you want heavy bombs), if its small and static hit it with a 2 engined level bomber, if it can move, hit it with a tactical or fighter bomber. There's lot of nuances but that will get you started

What do you mean by this? What is a big and static target and what is a mobile target? Do you mean 4 engine bombers should go after static infantry while fighter bombers hit panzer divisions?

[loki100]

its a slow fuse.

You have to fight the Pzrs at full strength in Italy and again in NW France. The goal is that after that (& you will pay a price for this), they then can't grab replacements. So they are shell formations for the final stage of the Rhine battles etc. Since you will be at the end of your supply tether at this stage, you want them weak and slow ..

So bomb those Pzr IV/Panther factories in 1943, you get your reward in August 1944

Lack of trucks hits both the mobility of the Pzrs and undermines the German supply capacity. Again you won't get this payback till the second half of 1944

In WiTW unless you have a really good reason, don't go below 15,000' - there is too much light flak around. For strat bombers think of 18-22,000' as low, 25,000' as a good trade off and over 25,000' as high. You'll quickly spot that British bombers can't go much over 22,000 in any case.

The other quirk here is that up to mid-44,the main German fighters don't perform well > 21,000', so that may bias you to bomb over that just to maximise the value of your escorts vs any interceptors.

[Hoggorm]

Makes sense! Thank you.

So on those smaller scenarios lasting only a few turns manpower, HI and fuel should be the target, not panzer or aircraft factories?

[GloriousRuse]

1a. Strategic VP targets.

+ VP targets (German nationality HI, German nationality manpower, Fuel & Oil anywhere) pay off at (Damage x factory size / modifier). The modifier starts low in '43, and really takes off by late 44.

So a size 40 HI target in Essen at 100% damage in 43 is (40*100 = 4000)/(1943 GC modifier = 3000) = 1.33 VP. As it repairs, it pays less and less each turn. Each turn all damaged factories are added up for the bombing total.

- VP targets (u boats in 43, V weapon factories and launchpads in '44 and beyond). They are either damaged, at least 1% damage, or not. If not they contribute a somewhat randomized amount of their size/modifier to a negative VP count. If Cherbourg's size 32 launch pad is untouched after you've landed in France, you could lose up to 6 VP a turn in the campaign. At 1%, you will lose nothing.

1b. Strategic Body Blows

All units pull from the same industrial base for replacements and upgrades. Each factory produces X tanks, aircraft, or trucks a turn. When damaged it has a Damage % chance to not produce anything. So a size 15 Stug IIIG plant at 40% damage has a 40% chance to produce no stugs, and a 60% chance to produce 15 Stugs (assuming it gets all the other stuff it needs. Based on logistics stuff, those Stugs get sent to the national stockpile, and if needed, drawn by units at the far end (or, hopefully, not drawn because you've wrecked their supply network).

Honestly, this is one of those areas where you kind of need to decide what you're doing. Trucks are almost universally a good idea to hit, but making a significant dent means making a reasonably concerted effort. And arguably the greatest enemy of the German truck is the German player, so you may want to keep an eye on losses before commiting.

AFVs come in two types: small batches not used by many units (Tiger plant at Kessel?), which you can beat up on but won't drastically alter the combat formations, and broader production like Stugs that get used by virtually everybody but you have no chance of shutting down entirely - and often have alternates like Madders that units might backfill with. That said, if one third of the German army is rocking Marder IIs instead of Stug IIIs, you're going to find a lot of combats going more favorably than the numbers suggest.

1c. Operational Targets.

Ports and Railyards are the basis of the depot network in WitW. Not only does damaging them limit their actual ability to ship and receive supplies (and units in the ground phase), there's a chance that supplies coming out are considered damaged. Oh, an trying to compensate forces the other side to burn trucks making up for the freight shortfall. It won't be a miracle cure where suddenly the enemy chokes to death, but a good rule of thumb for the WA is that they want every enemy railyard up to two layers back from the front to be damaged. You'll be paid off three turns in to your offensive when the German line starts having serious trouble recovering from your attacks.

2. Loki covered it. 2 engine bombers for unit attacks and some GS, FBs with small bombs and rockets for interdiction, 2 engine bombers and FBs with heavy bombs for GS. 4 engines for strat and operational targets, or when you absolutely need to add more firepower and there aren't any other good options left.

3. Day management is really, really, quite advanced. The return is not particularly high, so look to other things before determining if you should run this mission on this day in support of that day. Generally the defaults are fine; you might want to go to three day a week strat bombing in some cases - just be aware it means more formations you'll have to rest next week.

4. Except recon, more is better. There are "shotgun" strat bombing strategies, but generally a big honking pile of bombs gets the job done. And if you outnumber the other side 3:1 in the air, it doesn't matter if they're aces in the best FW.

[loki100]

ORIGINAL: GloriousRuse

...

When damaged it has a Damage % chance to not produce anything. So a size 15 Stug IIIG plant at 40% damage has a 40% chance to produce no stugs, and a 60% chance to produce 15 Stugs (assuming it gets all the other stuff it needs.

...

The relationship is actually damage *2 = chance to produce anything. So a factory at 25% damage had a 50/50 chance of production, one at 50% production can't produce (it will also be shown as red on the map)

[GloriousRuse]

Ah, good to know. I know we ran into that issue during our last AAR where the living manual still says/demos it being a straight damage % chance.

[Hoggorm]

GloriousRuse,

Thank you for that nice addition! Very helpful!

You mention + VP targets and - VP targets. Do I understand you correctly if the + VP targets are lowering the axis Victory Points, while the - VP targets increases my VP?

[loki100]

yeah basically working u-boats and v-weapons give the axis VP, the damage to other targets gives you VP

[Hoggorm]

Thank you!

[Hoggorm]

I'm following up with a couple of more air force questions:

1 - What is the difference between Ground support missions and Ground attack missions? I see that the Ground support mission is supporting a specific HQ unit, while Ground attack missions target a region. When should I use one over the other?

2 - Some squadrons have an asterisk behind their name. What does this mean?

3 - Unfortunately I have no screenshots, but I set up this strategic recon and target over Frankfurt where I was to target Railyards. I set the recon to fly on Days 1,2 and 5,6 and 7. The bombers (without escort though) were to fly on Days 2 and 6 with one raid a day. A total of around 50 bombers were assigned to the missions. For some reason no raids were flown at all. Why can this be?

4 - I see in several AARs and tutorials that one should try to get the Air interdiction up. Even though I have 300 aircrafts flying interdiction missions I seldom get the interdiction level over 10... Usually around no more than 4 or 5. What am I doing wrong here?

5 - If I choose not to fly some squadrons in a turn due weather or if a squadron is not flying due other reasons - are they then automatically rested for that turn or do I need to place them in rest mode for them to rest?

[loki100]

1 - in effect little, they both aim to damage/disrupt the target unit before an actual attack. Best double teamed to be honest if you have the planes, otherwise not too important which you use. GA might be a bit easier to ensure hits the desired target but GS can be more effective

3 - assuming its not weather, the most likely is you don't have enough planes assigned. The routine will decide it wants say 100 bombers for the mission and can only find 70. This can be controlled (at a risk of it going very wrong) by reducing your mission % (if you set this to 50% then the mission will occur even if it only has half the planes it wants, set it 200% and the mission will only occur if it can use double the planes it wants)

4 - it depends. If you want low level attrition and to undermine the logistics system then #1-#3 is fine. If you want a wall of interdiction that will shred any unit that tries to move beyond it then you want #6+. Interdiction comes from type of weaponry (often small bombs or rockets are best), type of planes (its for tactical bombers or FB), terrain (clear is best, you'll struggle to get much in mountains) and can be disrupted by flak and/or using low morale/exp planes. My advice is to use the breakout scenario, play it solitaire and just practice on T1 with interdiction missions and then move the German units to see the impact - its very informative

5 - no, you only get the specific advantage of rest if that is their mission

[GloriousRuse]

2. Sans screenshot, my guess is that you're running FBs "off role." If you look in the squadron info you'll see as TRAINED AS line, with either FIGHTER or BOMBER. You'll also see a line up top that lets you switch the FBs between roles. If you use FIGTHER trained FBs for bombing type missions, or vice versa, you get an asterisk denoting they are only running at 80% base efficiency in that mission. You can use the TRAINED AS line to retrain them, though it does take 8 weeks where they are withdrawn from theater. They will return into the national reserve 8 weeks hence for re-assignment.

Basically, swapping FBs in roles lets you add a short term less-efficient weighting to a specific air effort if you really need more aircraft right now, but long term it is significantly better to do a full conversion to the role you want them in by training the pilots. Generally you can do this in small batches during operations, or do massive conversions during lulls (early '44 for example.)

4. On Map it only goes from 1-9. If you mean "10" interdiction on the mission (a 1 on the map), know that even following Loki's advice it is hard to generate massive interdiction areas until mid '44, and even then it can be a burn out effort. You might want to look at the total area you're asking for. If all of that still doesn't work for you, you can adjust the aircraft per strike number; the default 24 is actually pretty good for wide areas as it ensures the whole area gets coverage from strikes, and that each strike does something, but sometimes in very small areas you just want everyone to arrive as one big hammer. Just be aware flak might give your clever 120 plane strafing run a really bad day.

[cfulbright]

3 - make sure both the recon and the bombing mission have Target set to Railyards. If you're letting the Air Doctrine screen set target priorities, and you haven't changed the doctrine to include this new target type, it will continue trying to bomb targets (e.g., fuel, vehicles) which may not be present in the targetd hex, in which case the AI doesn't fly missions for that air directive.

2 - if you start in the 1943 campaign as the Allies, and if you're able to successfully attrit the Luftwaffe over time, over time you should start retraining fighter bombers trained as fighters ("FB-F") to be trained as bombers ("FB"), particularly in the tactical air forces (9th US AF, Tactical AF, 2nd Tactical AF), because you won't need as many escorts in Ground Attack missions.

Cary

[cfulbright]

5 - one more tweak to improve results: Rest the air units you assign to Ground Support during the Air Phase (in which they don't fly), then remember to change them back to Day/Night before the start of the Ground phase. They recover morale during the Air Phase if rested.

[Hoggorm]

Thank you very much!

ORIGINAL: loki100

4 - it depends. If you want low level attrition and to undermine the logistics system then #1-#3 is fine.

I see no more than 0-2 on the map. Hovering over a hex with 0 gives the normal 3-4 interdiction. Hovering over a hex with 2 (that I can see very few of if any at all) there can be a number between 20-29 I guess.

ORIGINAL: GloriousRuse
4. ... If all of that still doesn't work for you, you can adjust the aircraft per strike number; the default 24 is actually pretty good for wide areas as it ensures the whole area gets coverage from strikes, and that each strike does something, but sometimes in very small areas you just want everyone to arrive as one big hammer.

Would it be in the REQ AC(ESC) field where I enter 24? if that is the number I need? I guess that if less aircraft are ready no mission will be flown? What happens if more than 24 aircraft are available? Will they join or remain on ground?

ORIGINAL: cfulbright

5 - one more tweak to improve results: Rest the air units you assign to Ground Support during the Air Phase (in which they don't fly), then remember to change them back to Day/Night before the start of the Ground phase. They recover morale during the Air Phase if rested.

This is done in the Commanders Report, correct?

[cfulbright]

quote:

ORIGINAL: GloriousRuse
4. ... If all of that still doesn't work for you, you can adjust the aircraft per strike number; the default 24 is actually pretty good for wide areas as it ensures the whole area gets coverage from strikes, and that each strike does something, but sometimes in very small areas you just want everyone to arrive as one big hammer.


Would it be in the REQ AC(ESC) field where I enter 24? if that is the number I need? I guess that if less aircraft are ready no mission will be flown? What happens if more than 24 aircraft are available? Will they join or remain on ground?


quote:

ORIGINAL: cfulbright

5 - one more tweak to improve results: Rest the air units you assign to Ground Support during the Air Phase (in which they don't fly), then remember to change them back to Day/Night before the start of the Ground phase. They recover morale during the Air Phase if rested.


This is done in the Commanders Report, correct?

4 - Keep in mind that "REQ AC" means "requested aircraft", not "required aircraft", which is handled by "MIN AC".

5 - Yes, in the Commanders Report.

Cary

[GloriousRuse]

The map shows in the tens row, which is important because it is the row that determines movement penalties (it also gives you a rule of thumb for damage and disruption) - when Loki says 1-3, he's talking the on map numbers. If on the defaults with 300 well armed FBs you're getting nothing above a 2, the odds are you are asking for too large an area. I would look to that first before muddling with aircraft per strike numbers, lest you end up with a scattered pattern of some hexes interdicted and others not. With Allied airpower (or the WA in general), I've found the thought of the game is you can only do a few things well in a turn, possibly as few as one in Italy. the trick isn't looking for the way to do ten things well, because you'll just fail at all of them. Its realizing that you can do those good things wherever you want and the Germans can't really stop you unless they're prepared to burn themselves down for it. And they can't do that for too long.

With that in mind, while mileage may vary, I usually don't run interdiction boxes larger than size 2, preferably size 1. Consider that it increases geometrically. A size 1 mission has 7 target hexes (maybe more if it does a weird tail thing). A size 2 has 19 target hexes. A size 3 has 37 target hexes. If you threw 500 FBs at a size three, you'd onyl have actually allocated 13 planes a hex. (Simplistically. What will actually happen is it will try to provide enough strikes to ensure every hex is hit, and then repeat some, until out of aircraft miles. But you get the idea)