PLEASE FIX AIR COMBAT!

[dtravel]

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker

ORIGINAL: Nomad

As much as I would like to see some major design changes, just fixing the bugs would at least let us play the game with a lot less pain and frustration. Nothing like finding your USN CV TF commanded by Lt Oi as it sails into battle with KB. [:@] Of course having a Staff Officer( with 0, 0 stats ) is even worse. I will side with Matrix Games and 2x3, getting the bugs ironed out is the first priority since it seems that often new bugs appear with changes in functionality.

Why the staff officer has 0/0 stats is beyond me. Why not 40/40 or somesuch?

12/08/2004 v1.40

New Player Requested Features:

14) Some ground units, ships or task forces had a leader displayed with a rank of warrant Officer “WO”. Except for very small Japanese units, such as a barge, this indicated no leader was present. Tried to bullet proof this, as much as possible, from the saves received. Should this occur again, the leadership abilities of the theater command will be used, with a penalty applied and “Staff Officer” should be indicated as the leader.

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: Jim D Burns

The only major combat ships I’ve lost are 3 BB’s, 1 CL and 7 DD’s. The rest are AK’s, AP’s and MSW’s along with about 30-40 PT boats and 18 Subs. Most of the subs were lost to KB’s uber ASW aircraft sweep north of Darwin within one week. We have since implemented a house rule limiting how many planes in a group may be set to ASW and no search aircraft of any kind may be set lower than 6000 feet. This change has made a huge difference in sub survivability.


Jim

Jim,

Two things. First, what version are you running? The air ASW scenario you describe is vastly better in 1.795 Beta. I know you might want to stay away from a Beta, this is just FYI.

Second thing. The Mohawk is not nearly equal to the Tony ("Yes the Tony’s are better aircraft but not by much" - wrong IMO). Your a/c was distinctly outclassed, you were at long odds, and your pilots' experience was (reportedly) much lower than their opponents'. In this particular case, I would say the only problem is what Tom Hunter pointed out. Maybe a few Mohawks should have survived by not even getting into the fight (being out of position or whatever). In the engagement the way you describe it, I would expect 90-95% losses of the Mohawks in return for 0 or at most a couple of kills.

Sorry to hear your guys got hit by a train...[8|]

[Nomad]

ORIGINAL: dtravel

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker

ORIGINAL: Nomad

As much as I would like to see some major design changes, just fixing the bugs would at least let us play the game with a lot less pain and frustration. Nothing like finding your USN CV TF commanded by Lt Oi as it sails into battle with KB. [:@] Of course having a Staff Officer( with 0, 0 stats ) is even worse. I will side with Matrix Games and 2x3, getting the bugs ironed out is the first priority since it seems that often new bugs appear with changes in functionality.

Why the staff officer has 0/0 stats is beyond me. Why not 40/40 or somesuch?

12/08/2004 v1.40

New Player Requested Features:

14) Some ground units, ships or task forces had a leader displayed with a rank of warrant Officer “WO”. Except for very small Japanese units, such as a barge, this indicated no leader was present. Tried to bullet proof this, as much as possible, from the saves received. Should this occur again, the leadership abilities of the theater command will be used, with a penalty applied and “Staff Officer” should be indicated as the leader.

So, when all your leaders go AWOL, you get penalized? [&:]

[bradfordkay]

Should this occur again, the leadership abilities of the theater command will be used, with a penalty applied and “Staff Officer” should be indicated as the leader.


I think that the penalty is being applied merely to bring your theatre commander's ratings back down to approximate those of a line officer... I had never noticed that line in the update (silly me), this is actually very good news.

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: witpqs
Jim,

Two things. First, what version are you running? The air ASW scenario you describe is vastly better in 1.795 Beta. I know you might want to stay away from a Beta, this is just FYI.

Second thing. The Mohawk is not nearly equal to the Tony ("Yes the Tony’s are better aircraft but not by much" - wrong IMO). Your a/c was distinctly outclassed, you were at long odds, and your pilots' experience was (reportedly) much lower than their opponents'. In this particular case, I would say the only problem is what Tom Hunter pointed out. Maybe a few Mohawks should have survived by not even getting into the fight (being out of position or whatever). In the engagement the way you describe it, I would expect 90-95% losses of the Mohawks in return for 0 or at most a couple of kills.

Sorry to hear your guys got hit by a train...[8|]

We’ve patched up to the beta’s, but I have no idea if his KB sweep occurred before or after the beta patches. Air search is still too effective in my book but the recent reduction in depth charge lethality is a good change I think. The sad thing was I had set up a very large 3-4 hex deep net of subs to try and intercept a possible invasion at Darwin. KB swept through and detected and attacked every single sub destroying or damaging all of them in deep ocean hexes. I actually plotted my subs to flee from the task force. Needless to say we started discussing house rules immediately.

The Tony is only a 32 in maneuver rating, so it’s not that much better than the Mohawks 30. As the zero bonus applies to its maneuver rating, I assumed this was one of the more important stats when determining an air unit’s effectiveness in actually getting into position to take a shot at their opponents. Obviously I was wrong.

I never argued that I should have even been remotely close to having a chance at winning this combat. But I never should have been completely destroyed in A2A combat and some of my better 70+ pilots should have racked up a few kills. My entire post was initiated from the frustration of severely one sided engagements, not some rant about Mohawks needing to be an effective air frame or anything. Heck I’ll be just as frustrated when my Corsairs start to get these kinds of results against him later on, air combat was attritional in nature and far far less bloody overall.

The blacksheep squadron spent about 12 weeks in theatre with Corsairs and scored about 126 kills. That’s 10.5 kills a week or about 1.5 a day and they are considered to be one of the more successful air squadrons. In WitP they’ll score 10-20 kills a day easily. The model needs severe tweaking.

Jim

[Tristanjohn]

ORIGINAL: Ideologue

ORIGINAL: Tristanjohn

Who's running this phantom account? [8|]

I am.

Another one of these ubiquitous "good" two-word people. No doubt no one will bother to ban you. [8|]

[Tom Hunter]

bradfordkay, I set the fighters on sweep because fighter on sweep score more kills.

fighter on escort fly 2-4000 feet above the bombers, fighter on sweep fly at the altitude you set them at. US fighters score more kills when bouncing the Japanese too, so it is important that some start above the Japs. Mine were at a bunch of altitudes.

In my experience escorts take about double the losses that CAP and Sweep formations do. I cannot explain why, but I am not going to fly escort unless I must.

Sneer my apologies, I was actually replying to String but got confused.

Personally I just want my leaders to stop dissapearing. I can work with the design flaws in the game but the leader bug is gradually lobotomizing my combat forces.

[SurrenderMonkey]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

ORIGINAL: ADavidB


I must be the only regular Allied player and occasional Japanese player who likes PDU. I use it happily to balance out my forces, give myself sufficient replacements, and move obsolete planes to backwater units. I'd like more flexibility with PDU. For example, those Dutch units that we all save from the DEI should be allowed to be given "excess" planes such as P-39s. That's the sort of thing that all "refugee" air units did during the War.

Cheers -

Dave Baranyi

I agree completely, so there's at least two of us...

Make that three.

[SurrenderMonkey]

ORIGINAL: Jim D Burns

The blacksheep squadron spent about 12 weeks in theatre with Corsairs and scored about 126 kills. That’s 10.5 kills a week or about 1.5 a day and they are considered to be one of the more successful air squadrons. In WitP they’ll score 10-20 kills a day easily. The model needs severe tweaking.

Jim

Well, yes .. BUT: WitP players are insanely aggressive with things like CAP and Sweep. How many times do you think the Black Sheep Squadron, for example, flew 100% CAP for days on end? Yet players do it all the time because our soldiers are silicon and no one gives the SLIGHTEST thought to saving human lives. It's just the nature of the beast. What's more, we don't really care (not like they did) about losing. Hey, if we lose 20,000 troops in a bungled amphibious invasion it;s no big deal ... just start over - or, at worst, lose VP's in a GAME.

Wargames will always allow us to be incredibly aggressive vis-a-vis our historical counterparts.

[treespider]

Well, yes .. BUT: WitP players are insanely aggressive with things like CAP and Sweep. How many times do you think the Black Sheep Squadron, for example, flew 100% CAP for days on end? Yet players do it all the time because our soldiers are silicon and no one gives the SLIGHTEST thought to saving human lives. It's just the nature of the beast. What's more, we don't really care (not like they did) about losing. Hey, if we lose 20,000 troops in a bungled amphibious invasion it;s no big deal ... just start over - or, at worst, lose VP's in a GAME.

Wargames will always allow us to be incredibly aggressive vis-a-vis our historical counterparts.

So build elements into the code (as has been done, but probably not to the extent it should have) to introduce fatigue and morale for those silicon pilots and soldiers. Make fatigue a greater factor by increasing the fatigue rate so those silicon pilots and soldiers become in effective unless they are rested and fed. So players would be foolish to abuse them so...

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: SurrenderMonkey

Well, yes .. BUT: WitP players are insanely aggressive with things like CAP and Sweep. How many times do you think the Black Sheep Squadron, for example, flew 100% CAP for days on end? Yet players do it all the time because our soldiers are silicon and no one gives the SLIGHTEST thought to saving human lives. It's just the nature of the beast. What's more, we don't really care (not like they did) about losing. Hey, if we lose 20,000 troops in a bungled amphibious invasion it;s no big deal ... just start over - or, at worst, lose VP's in a GAME.

Wargames will always allow us to be incredibly aggressive vis-a-vis our historical counterparts.

Not true, the Black Sheep were very active, it's just that massive squadron decimating casualties didn't occur and days where many victories or casualties occured were very rare.

Below is a short account of the Black sheep squadron’s two tours in the Solomon campaign, taken from here: http://www.acepilots.com/usmc_vmf214.html

The first tour lists a daily record of their flights, they were in the air a lot but contact with the enemy didn’t result in huge battles all the time. In fact the big battles with lots of kills were an exception and most days saw few if any kills.

Jim

Black Sheep 1st Tour
In early September, 1943, the new VMF-214 moved up to their new forward base in the Russells, staging through Henderson Field. They flew their first combat mission on September 14, 1943.

The grinding, day-in-day-out nature of that war cannot be re-created, but the following daily summary of thier first combat tour gives a sense of it. A typical mission involved 2 divisions (eight planes). Two missions a day would mean 16 sorties, using 20-25 healthy & available pilots. So a pilot typically flew 2 days out of 3.

Sep. 14 - first combat mission, a raid over Kahili

Sep. 15 - photo escort

Sep. 16 - escorted Dauntless dive bombers to Ballale, a small island west of Bougainville where the Japanese had a heavily fortified airstrip. In a big aerial battle, the Black Sheep claimed 11 confirmed (5 by Boyington) and 8 probables, but Bob Ewing was lost.

Sept. 17 - AM: escort photo reconnaisance over Choiseul; PM: search for Ewing. The Squadron moved up to the primitve facilities on Munda.

Sep. 18 - CAP over landings on Vila, 31 sorties, Case and Magee scored

Sept. 19 - AM: search for missing pilot, PM: escort strike on Vila

Sept. 20 - 1AM: Boyington tries to intercept 'Washing Machine Charlie'; AM: escort Adm. Halsey in PT boat; PM: escort SBD's and TBF's to Kolombangara

Sept. 21 - AM: barge-strafing, Magee threw grenade; PM: Kahili strafing

Sept. 23 - AM: escort 24 SBD's and TBF's to Jakohima, near Kahili; PM - missing pilot search

Sept. 26 - 3 divisions took part in large inter-service mission, flying cover for SBD's and TBF's over Kangu Hill near Kahili. Rinabarger's and Mullen's Corsairs badly shot up. Mullen got one kill.

Sept. 27 - AM: dawn patrol; PM: escort B-24's to Kahili, and missing pilot search; 4 claims; Case returned late to find his belongings already shared out.

Sept. 28 - routine patrols

Sept. 29 - PM: barge-busting off Choiseul

Sept. 30 - Lt. Bob Alexander killed in friendly-fire accident with PT-126 Bruce Gamble gives a well-written narrative of this tragedy in The Black Sheep. The squadron relocated back to the relative comforts of Banika in the Russells.

Oct. 2/3 - Missions scrubbed for bad weather.

Oct. 4 - escort SBD attack on Malabeta Hill near Kahili

Oct. 7 - staged through Munda to cover naval task forces

Oct. 10 - strike with B-24's over Kahili. Wildly inaccurate, most of the bombs dropped in the water, and thus (as Frank Walton noted in the official squadron War Diary) "killing many small fish." Ed Olander got his first victory.

Oct. 11 - 3 divisions covered bombers over Kahili. More bombs landed in the water, presumably killing more "small fish." Bill Case scored a lucky kill when test-firing his guns, bringing down a Zero at extreme range.

Oct. 13 - Lt. Virgil Ray, who had been traumatized in an earlier accident and therefore given light flying duties, was lost while flying a mail run.

Oct. 14 - Case led a division on shipping patrol, and scored another lucky credit.
In October VMF-214 moved up from their orginal base in the Russells to a more advanced location at Munda. From here they were closer to the next big objective -- the Jap bases on Bougainville. On another big day, Oct. 17, the squadron claimed 12 kills on a fighter sweep. Two days later they flew their last mission of the first tour, then went for R&R in Australia.

Black Sheep 2nd Tour
Since the Black Sheep had left, the Americans had captured a perimeter on the western side of Bougainville, at Empress Augusta Bay. They returned to Espiritu Santo in late November, where John Bolt conducted his ammo tests. By the 28th, VMF-214 had settled into their tents at Barakoma, on Vella Lavella; their base for the entire second tour.
On Nov. 28, three divisions flew a routine patrol over Bougainville, code-named 'Cherry Blossom'. These patrols, an hour's flight from their base, occupied much of their air activity for the next three weeks. They were largely uneventful, as the Japanese planes were nowhere to be found.

On Dec. 5, Boyington, Walton, Doc Reames, and others took a PT boat to Kolombangara, to search for Bob Alexander's remains. They found them, "the plane in a million pieces, and the boy, too, his bones huddled up in a pitifully small pile. We scooped out a shallow grave, laid his remains in there, painted his name on one blade of the propeller, and set it up as a headstone." as Frank Walton wrote to his wife.

Three days later, some Black Sheep touched down at a brand-new airstrip on Torokina Point, at Empress Augusta Bay, Bougainville, the aircraft to use it. While the Black Sheep remained based at Vella Lavella, they would use Torokina as a refueling and emergency strip. Later squadrons, notably the Navy's VF-17, the Jolly Rogers, would operate from Torokina.

After conferencing with ComAirSols, Gen. Ralph Mitchell, a large fighter sweep of eighty planes (from the Marine Corps, Navy, and RNZAF) was organized to go after Rabaul, the main Japanese base in that part of the Pacific. The idea was that they would have to come up and fight over Rabaul. They took off at 0515 on December 17. "Come up and fight." Boyington taunted over the radio. Edward Chikaki Honda, a Hawaii-raised Nisei who had ended up wearing a Japanese uniform, called back, "Come on down, sucker."

In late December and early January, they engaged in a series of large and deadly dogfights with the Japanese over Rabaul; eight Black Sheep pilots (including Pappy Boyington) were lost in an 11-day period from Dec.23 through Jan. 3. In these final days, Henry Miller moved up to Exec when Major Carnagey was lost, and then to acting CO when Greg Boyington disappeared. A few days later, the 'Black Sheep' flew their last combat mission, and, as with the 'Swashbucklers', they were broken up, and a new team was designated VMF-214.

[treespider]

ORIGINAL: Jim D Burns


Not true, the Black Sheep were very active, it's just that massive squadron decimating casualties didn't occur and days where many victories or casualties occured were very rare.

Below is a short account of the Black sheep squadron’s two tours in the Solomon campaign, taken from here: http://www.acepilots.com/usmc_vmf214.html

The first tour lists a daily record of their flights, they were in the air a lot but contact with the enemy didn’t result in huge battles all the time. In fact the big battles with lots of kills were an exception and most days saw few if any kills.

Jim

Black Sheep 1st Tour
In early September, 1943, the new VMF-214 moved up to their new forward base in the Russells, staging through Henderson Field. They flew their first combat mission on September 14, 1943.

The grinding, day-in-day-out nature of that war cannot be re-created, but the following daily summary of thier first combat tour gives a sense of it. A typical mission involved 2 divisions (eight planes). Two missions a day would mean 16 sorties, using 20-25 healthy & available pilots. So a pilot typically flew 2 days out of 3.

Which goes to support Monkey's claim that even IRL they were only using 66% of their assets as opposed to 100%

Sep. 14 - first combat mission, a raid over Kahili

Sep. 15 - photo escort

Sep. 16 - escorted Dauntless dive bombers to Ballale, a small island west of Bougainville where the Japanese had a heavily fortified airstrip. In a big aerial battle, the Black Sheep claimed 11 confirmed (5 by Boyington) and 8 probables, but Bob Ewing was lost.

Sept. 17 - AM: escort photo reconnaisance over Choiseul; PM: search for Ewing. The Squadron moved up to the primitve facilities on Munda.

Sep. 18 - CAP over landings on Vila, 31 sorties, Case and Magee scored

Sept. 19 - AM: search for missing pilot, PM: escort strike on Vila

Sept. 20 - 1AM: Boyington tries to intercept 'Washing Machine Charlie'; AM: escort Adm. Halsey in PT boat; PM: escort SBD's and TBF's to Kolombangara

Sept. 21 - AM: barge-strafing, Magee threw grenade; PM: Kahili strafing

Sept. 23 - AM: escort 24 SBD's and TBF's to Jakohima, near Kahili; PM - missing pilot search

Sept. 26 - 3 divisions took part in large inter-service mission, flying cover for SBD's and TBF's over Kangu Hill near Kahili. Rinabarger's and Mullen's Corsairs badly shot up. Mullen got one kill.

Sept. 27 - AM: dawn patrol; PM: escort B-24's to Kahili, and missing pilot search; 4 claims; Case returned late to find his belongings already shared out.

Sept. 28 - routine patrols

Sept. 29 - PM: barge-busting off Choiseul

Sept. 30 - Lt. Bob Alexander killed in friendly-fire accident with PT-126 Bruce Gamble gives a well-written narrative of this tragedy in The Black Sheep. The squadron relocated back to the relative comforts of Banika in the Russells.

Oct. 2/3 - Missions scrubbed for bad weather.

Oct. 4 - escort SBD attack on Malabeta Hill near Kahili

Oct. 7 - staged through Munda to cover naval task forces

Oct. 10 - strike with B-24's over Kahili. Wildly inaccurate, most of the bombs dropped in the water, and thus (as Frank Walton noted in the official squadron War Diary) "killing many small fish." Ed Olander got his first victory.

Oct. 11 - 3 divisions covered bombers over Kahili. More bombs landed in the water, presumably killing more "small fish." Bill Case scored a lucky kill when test-firing his guns, bringing down a Zero at extreme range.

Oct. 13 - Lt. Virgil Ray, who had been traumatized in an earlier accident and therefore given light flying duties, was lost while flying a mail run.

Oct. 14 - Case led a division on shipping patrol, and scored another lucky credit.
In October VMF-214 moved up from their orginal base in the Russells to a more advanced location at Munda. From here they were closer to the next big objective -- the Jap bases on Bougainville. On another big day, Oct. 17, the squadron claimed 12 kills on a fighter sweep. Two days later they flew their last mission of the first tour, then went for R&R in Australia.

Black Sheep 2nd Tour
Since the Black Sheep had left, the Americans had captured a perimeter on the western side of Bougainville, at Empress Augusta Bay. They returned to Espiritu Santo in late November, where John Bolt conducted his ammo tests. By the 28th, VMF-214 had settled into their tents at Barakoma, on Vella Lavella; their base for the entire second tour.
On Nov. 28, three divisions flew a routine patrol over Bougainville, code-named 'Cherry Blossom'. These patrols, an hour's flight from their base, occupied much of their air activity for the next three weeks. They were largely uneventful, as the Japanese planes were nowhere to be found.

On Dec. 5, Boyington, Walton, Doc Reames, and others took a PT boat to Kolombangara, to search for Bob Alexander's remains. They found them, "the plane in a million pieces, and the boy, too, his bones huddled up in a pitifully small pile. We scooped out a shallow grave, laid his remains in there, painted his name on one blade of the propeller, and set it up as a headstone." as Frank Walton wrote to his wife.

Three days later, some Black Sheep touched down at a brand-new airstrip on Torokina Point, at Empress Augusta Bay, Bougainville, the aircraft to use it. While the Black Sheep remained based at Vella Lavella, they would use Torokina as a refueling and emergency strip. Later squadrons, notably the Navy's VF-17, the Jolly Rogers, would operate from Torokina.

After conferencing with ComAirSols, Gen. Ralph Mitchell, a large fighter sweep of eighty planes (from the Marine Corps, Navy, and RNZAF) was organized to go after Rabaul, the main Japanese base in that part of the Pacific. The idea was that they would have to come up and fight over Rabaul. They took off at 0515 on December 17. "Come up and fight." Boyington taunted over the radio. Edward Chikaki Honda, a Hawaii-raised Nisei who had ended up wearing a Japanese uniform, called back, "Come on down, sucker."

How was the AAA over Rabaul? Why didn't they come down? How is that simulated in the game?

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: treespider
Which goes to support Monkey's claim that even IRL they were only using 66% of their assets as opposed to 100%

Well I can’t speak for others, but I always set my cap to 60%. If they scramble and get a 100% intercept fine if not then only 60% defend agaisnt the raid. So most days 60% fly, only an incoming raid sees more than 60% of my CAP squadrons fly in a day. Bombers can't fly more than 2 or 3 days straight before their morale plummets, so at best you can average 2-3 strikes a week, so overall I'm not using 100% of my forces, not even close.

How was the AAA over Rabaul? Why didn't they come down? How is that simulated in the game?

You're joking right? [;)] Actually Boyington did eventually come down when he was shot down and taken captive by a sub.

Jim

[tsimmonds]

House rule for PBEM starting this week: Max CAP 50%. We are even discussing whether we should have all fighters not on LRCAP always set to 50% CAP.

[Kwik E Mart]

Oct. 13 - Lt. Virgil Ray, who had been traumatized in an earlier accident and therefore given light flying duties, was lost while flying a mail run.

...the irony here is especially poignant...

[witpqs]

Jim,

Here is a comparison of the Tony vs. the Mohawk IV (from CHS, not sure what you're playing).

Mohawk-IV-------Stat---------Tony
323-----------Max-speed------368
2800------------ROC----------2970
31--------------MVR----------34
30--------------DUR----------31
0--------------Armor---------1
8---------------Gun----------12

In two of the most important categories, speed and gun rating, the Tony is way ahead. The guns were 4 x .303's versus 4 x 12.7mm.

[el cid again]

Historically groups were kept in the front lines for months on end and flew missions every day.

Only the player who has air superiority can do this currently. The other player is forced to withdraw groups after only 1 or 2 days fighting. Had air units taken those kind of losses historically, even the massive US production would not have been able to keep up with all the air frames falling from the skies.

You are quite correct - but I am not sure if you understand what it means?
You also are incomplete: you should add that SOME units lost all or most of their planes in a day or two - and on both sides. Obviously it was the side that did NOT have air superority that lost planes fast. The model is working if it show this effect. Gamers must work in a simplified world - else we need a few million men and billions of dollars to go reinact the battles!

My first ship had four WWII era twin gun mountings, complete with WWII era conical scan fire control radar. I didn't know when I got there that I would need to understand the interesting things the chief gunner's mate was doing with them a year and a half later - to defeat guided missiles! This chief ran a competition - each mount crew as a team - and ONLY the WINNER got the prize (3 out of 4 would not get extra liberty, or whatever the prize of the day was). The crews got really, really good. The chief reduced the number of rounds per team to only TWO per pass! [One per tube for twin guns]. He reasoned "if you solved the fire control problem correctly, the first round should hit the target - how close that first round is to the target is what I want to know - so no other rounds will distract me you get no other rounds at all". They got so good that it was NORMAL to hit on the first round, and in an afternoon of shooting at targets (towed by planes) we would count the times a team missed - it was a smaller number - and the lowest total was the winning team! Later I used this system (on ships with two mounts) to get back up gun crews to the skill level needed in case a missile got through my ECM or the SAMs. [In 1973 Israel got to demonstrate this gun layers works - repeatedly. It also appears that in 1982 a RN frigate did the same thing.]

Modern anti-air warfare is lethal. Just as the AAA can be trained almost to perfection, so can fighter pilots. In Viet Nam we got to shoot down a missile with SAMs only once - and with guns never - not because either was not deadly - but because we never allowed the missiles through the fighters and the ECM. [I suspect that one time - USS Sterette got a Styx and two MiGs with SAMs in 1972 in one attack - we may have deliberately engaged with SAMs to proove we could.] While overall SAM rates in Viet Nam were 60 shots per kill, the anti-missile ships were selected because they NEVER missed in more than 100 live fires. The difference between good and not good is the skill of the crews combined with the organization for AAW. IF the game makes optimistic assumptions about your staff competence and training levels, your fighters are going to be lethal - mostly - because they would be. [I worked in software integration labs that "flew" planes on computers even before they were built or modified.
I love to take the "lesser" plane - and I have offered USAF to fly against their F-22 in simulation - but they are afraid to let me I think - since they want to show it can always win - not that some inferior thing can beat it. In China a commander of the aggressor squadron at Nanjing was offered new Su-27s to replace his J-7Es. The J-7E is a modified MiG-21. In the west we think it has zero chance to compete. But the 7E is well reengineered, with a different wing, and it outmaneuvers even a Su - which says a lot. He offered to take on a loose duce - 4 planes - without a wingman - and he drove them from the sky - 2 kills 2 ran. In 1945 Saburo Sakai - JNAF - stopped teaching and went back to air combat again - in a hopelessly obsolete Zero - in spite of being blind in one eye and having no legs able to reach the controls. He became an ace all over again. My point is that professionalism is going to make a fighter - any fighter - very lethal.]

[el cid again]

The man's point was that 1) there's too much CAP to begin with in many cases and 2) it's entirely too effective, all of it engaging each incoming wave. To assert that CAP eventually gets "tired" by the fourth or fifth or sixth strike hardly argues that the air-combat system makes sense. It patently does not make sense for most (if not all) situations. CAP ought to "parceled out" to bandits, and all fighters on both sides need to be severely limited as to how many combats they're able to engage in, this to broadly simulate the limited quantity of ammo they were loaded with (an incredibly inept omission on Gary's part,

First, let me remind everybody that I am almost finished with a data mod that will address air combat lethality in a big way. Second, let me say that someone we know got a Matrix programmer to admit the module has problems. So I am not saying that there are no problems here.

However, the allegation that CAP is entirely too effective is actually false.
CAP is not able to do what Japanese CAP could really do - engage in OTHER hexes. [See the record of Genda's Blade for one - and there was a similar JAAF outfit. They used recon planes to find enemy strikes far from their targets and engage them with fighters en route. They used electronic warning systems to find the strike packages. NONE of this is EVER possible in WITP - so you NEVER have to worry about what real commanders had to face.] CAP is also anything but 100% effective. I have had 1 or 3 or some other small number engage - when I assigned vastly greater numbers. And the post I responded to specifically said CAP never gets tired - but it does.

As for ammunition - please give Gary a break. He did it RIGHT. WE (players) ASKED for a "fix" of the "too weak" fighter problem - in UV days - and they took the ammo limits out. It is still there and can be put back in - and should be. But it is NOT a design flaw.

[el cid again]

I couldn't care less about VPs.

Shortsighted - unless you don't care when the game ends? Victory points will trigger automatic termination of play on certain dates. I don't like this - but there it is.

[el cid again]

Well, I've been around here for some time now and that's the first occasion I can recall someone calling Oleg on his neverending bullshit in such a frank and, if you don't mind my saying so, refreshing manner. (He's been called any number of times on his rudeness with regard to the work of others, especially modders, but not for this type of completely misleading feedback.) Except for me, of course. I get into it with this company yes man frequently. Of course that won't change him a jot, but it does keep my tools sharp.

First of all, this post is not factual. I am a modder and you may find dozens of compliments Oleg has made about me. Second, I have actually played Oleg (who has real military rank by the way) and he is as skilled as his attitude implies. Third, in the case this post was commenting on, Oleg made quite useful and germane comments. He is not as diplomatic as I am - but English is also not his first language. You need to come to terms with the reality that things said across language barriers don't always sound smooth. Finally - criticism for being rude ought not to be rudely put in its own right - if you wish it to stick.