Ground unit supply loss when bombed

[Bella]

When a ground unit is bombed, and the raid was effective enough to cause casualties, is there also supply loss?

Seems logical that if the bombs are hitting soldiers, they’re also hitting materiel.

[BBfanboy]

Not necessarily. Units purposely scatter their supplies - even ammo is often in several dumps rather than one big one. If the unit is marching there may be some supplies carried by each soldier, but I don't know if the game models at that level. I think there is just a die roll for supply lost from the attack (and of course calculation of supply usage from shooting at the enemy).

[Yaab]

If a bombed LCU exists in a functioning economy, any supply losses the LCU incurrs will be replaced by supply arriving from suppply-producing bases or supply-storing bases. It is probably better to bomb LI/HI industry or ports/airfields.

[PaxMondo]

When a ground unit is bombed, and the raid was effective enough to cause casualties, is there also supply loss?

Seems logical that if the bombs are hitting soldiers, they’re also hitting materiel.

As BB states, we know that supplies are consumed by the AA activity of the ground unit. Depending upon the devices and altitude of the attack, the supply consumption can be fairly large. This has been tested several times, you'll need to search the forum for the threads about this and the data published. It is a well known tactic to bleed supply out of units prior to attack in 3x terrain which works effectively in PBEM, but less so in all AI, and very much less in AI VH games.

As for supply loss directly connected to bombing, I can't recall that this has ever been tested in units not at a base. The biggest reason being that trying to isolate this loss from the loss above would be pretty hard to do. So, unless a dev were to step in here and give an answer I doubt that we will ever know for sure.

[Bella]

If a bombed LCU exists in a functioning economy, any supply losses the LCU incurrs will be replaced by supply arriving from suppply-producing bases or supply-storing bases. It is probably better to bomb LI/HI industry or ports/airfields.

I have a large Japanese force cut off and trapped outside of Rangoon. Bombing it every day and causing casualties. Interesting that they’re AA uses up supply, so I’ll just keep hammering them. Thanks. Give it a couple weeks, then deliberate attack out of Rangoon and hope I don’t mess up my own army.

[Yaab]

Is that against the AI? I guess a human player would airdrop supplies to his surrounded stack.

[Bella]

Is that against the AI? I guess a human player would airdrop supplies to his surrounded stack.

Yeah, versus the AI. No airdrops that I have seen yet. The AI tried a barge fleet with supplies, but one of my bombardment squadrons caught it and sank them all. I’ve now also mined the delta of the Yangon River that leads up to Rangoon. I do multiple air raids every turn, so I’m hoping I’m grinding him down.