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Naval bases were protected by barrage balloons, usually deployed at 5000 feet. No port attack against a prepared enemy should be allowed at an altitude of less than 6000 feet.

That's a strange logic (read: faulty).

The game engine should not allow attacks against prepared enemy positions?
What kind of game would that be?

As with anything the arguments devolve into "shouldn't"/"should" type matches.

In reality in any realistic simulation anything which was physically possible according to the laws of physics should be allowed BUT if you do something which would have been a bad idea in real life ( attacking into barrage balloons at 1,000 feet ) then you should be punished for it.

Nothing should be banned but the consequences of actions should be modelled.

Right [:)]

ORIGINAL: crsutton

ORIGINAL: herwin

Naval bases were protected by barrage balloons, usually deployed at 5000 feet. No port attack against a prepared enemy should be allowed at an altitude of less than 6000 feet.

No I can't buy into that. Perhaps heavy bombers but I doubt that as well.

Love the photo..., perfect rebuttal. The truth seems to have been that the Japanese were rarely "prepared" for ANYTHING after December, 1941. A good supply of barrage balloons and the units to operate them seem to have been just another in a great number of shortages Japan fought the war with.

As mentioned earlier, the game does model barrage balloons and people have seen casualties to them. I remember one being posted early after the release of AE with some excitement by the poster.

ORIGINAL: witpqs

As mentioned earlier, the game does model barrage balloons and people have seen casualties to them. I remember one being posted early after the release of AE with some excitement by the poster.

They add a touch of "color" to the reporting whether they were at the location historically or not. But they certainly weren't a ubiquitous enough presence anywhere in the Pacific War to justify herwin's suggestion...

ORIGINAL: mike scholl 1

ORIGINAL: witpqs

As mentioned earlier, the game does model barrage balloons and people have seen casualties to them. I remember one being posted early after the release of AE with some excitement by the poster.

They add a touch of "color" to the reporting whether they were at the location historically or not. But they certainly weren't a ubiquitous enough presence anywhere in the Pacific War to justify herwin's suggestion...

And since they are accounted for in the game, one would have to show that they are badly accounted for to justify banning low-level attacks.

AE has done away with the need for house rules of this sort. Pilot training is segregated by type and (for naval and ground attacks) by altitude. Flak Does work. I recently had a port attacked that was stacked with AA units. Even though only 41 total dive bombers were reported as attacking (two waves) in the combat report, 45 were reported destroyed by flak that day.

The defenses work. No need for those house rules.

I use skip bombing with caution because I fear an increase in casualtes.  Is this a valid assumption?
 
And I would think that US bombers are better because they have more armor and face inferior flak.
Skip bombing by Japanese is suicide right?
 

ORIGINAL: jomni

I use skip bombing with caution because I fear an increase in casualtes.  Is this a valid assumption?

And I would think that US bombers are better because they have more armor and face inferior flak.
Skip bombing by Japanese is suicide right?

why should it be suicide? Because they attack at 100ft instead of 200ft like all Betties/Nells/Kate with torps do?

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: jomni

I use skip bombing with caution because I fear an increase in casualtes.  Is this a valid assumption?

And I would think that US bombers are better because they have more armor and face inferior flak.
Skip bombing by Japanese is suicide right?

why should it be suicide? Because they attack at 100ft instead of 200ft like all Betties/Nells/Kate with torps do?

It's not exactly suicide..., but it's a lot different than releasing a torpedo several hundred to a thousand yards from the target. Even then Betties and Nells took a beating if the TF had good flak.

To skip bomb you have to fly right over the target..., not a healthy proposition for a lightly built A/C with a thousand gallons of AvGas in it's unprotected wing tanks..., especially one without massive forward armament to suppress the target's AAA

ORIGINAL: mike scholl 1

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: jomni

I use skip bombing with caution because I fear an increase in casualtes.  Is this a valid assumption?

And I would think that US bombers are better because they have more armor and face inferior flak.
Skip bombing by Japanese is suicide right?

why should it be suicide? Because they attack at 100ft instead of 200ft like all Betties/Nells/Kate with torps do?

It's not exactly suicide..., but it's a lot different than releasing a torpedo several hundred to a thousand yards from the target. Even then Betties and Nells took a beating if the TF had good flak.

To skip bomb you have to fly right over the target..., not a healthy proposition for a lightly built A/C with a thousand gallons of AvGas in it's unprotected wing tanks..., especially one without massive forward armament to suppress the target's AAA

don´t mix up real life with the game. I´m aware about the difference between torp attacks and skip bombing in real life, but what makes you sure that the game treats the torpedo as a "standoff weapon". Making a guess, I would say the game only looks at the altitude and not at the distance the weapon is released.

Every time I send my attack bombers to hit an airfield/port, I see the "B-25D1 damaged by barrage balloon" note.  I've attacked Rabaul, Truk, Kwajalein and Ambon with them and there are apparently barrage balloons at all these bases.  Is there a certain base size and supply requirement before barrage balloons show up, or are they automatic at all bases?

ORIGINAL: John Lansford

Every time I send my attack bombers to hit an airfield/port, I see the "B-25D1 damaged by barrage balloon" note.  I've attacked Rabaul, Truk, Kwajalein and Ambon with them and there are apparently barrage balloons at all these bases.  Is there a certain base size and supply requirement before barrage balloons show up, or are they automatic at all bases?

IIRC it depends on what base forces are at the base. There´s a difference in the balloons they use though, with different alts, can´t remember the alts though. Flying at 10,000ft means not meeting any balloons nor anything lighter than 75mm flak. Of course you can´t attack at 10,000ft with attack bombers.

Are you hitting something with your bombers and if so, which skill is used?

I believe it's size and (maybe) supply. I do not know the size criteria.

ORIGINAL: witpqs

As mentioned earlier, the game does model barrage balloons and people have seen casualties to them. I remember one being posted early after the release of AE with some excitement by the poster.

Yes, and the occurance is infrequent enough to represent the fact that they were either not the best defense or not enough of them. I like to send my heavies in at about 7,000 feet and maybe have lost one or two to barrage ballons. This is about what I would expect.

ORIGINAL: castor troy

don´t mix up real life with the game. I´m aware about the difference between torp attacks and skip bombing in real life, but what makes you sure that the game treats the torpedo as a "standoff weapon". Making a guess, I would say the game only looks at the altitude and not at the distance the weapon is released.

"Real Life" is the only yardstick we have to judge the game by. And the Japanese simply lacked any A/C rugged enough and well-armed enough to practice "skip bombing". It was an Allied specialty, period.

I copied and pasted this to notepad awhile back, a response from Michealm in the barrage balloons thread.
 

The Balloon effect is determined by maximum value of (a) plus (b) below. The overall maximum of the sum is 9.
(a) Balloons are present in a base if the AF + port > 6. The value is the fort level of the hex.
(b) Balloons can be added to a base/LCU by creating a device of type BALLOON. The value is the number of devices. [not currently in use]
They affect aircraft flying below 6000'.
Twin-engine or higher planes increase the number of balloons by 4.
Balloon level is not reported but is usually the fort level if the combined value of the base is >6.
Pilot experience should help to avoid balloons (except for the bug I just found which is not always using the right pilot!!!)

ORIGINAL: mike scholl 1

ORIGINAL: castor troy

don´t mix up real life with the game. I´m aware about the difference between torp attacks and skip bombing in real life, but what makes you sure that the game treats the torpedo as a "standoff weapon". Making a guess, I would say the game only looks at the altitude and not at the distance the weapon is released.

"Real Life" is the only yardstick we have to judge the game by. And the Japanese simply lacked any A/C rugged enough and well-armed enough to practice "skip bombing". It was an Allied specialty, period.

yeah, but since when do you think that this game is real life?[&:]

Do you KNOW that 200ft torp attacks are treated as standoff attacks in the game and therefore wouldn´t suffer as much as a 100ft skip bombing attack or do you THINK it should be that way in the game because it is in real life? I´m not arguing about real life, I just don´t believe that there´s a difference between 100ft bombing and 200ft torping in the game. I could be wrong about it of course, never heard about it though and therefore would say there is no difference (even if I would hope to be wrong).

I don´t know what´s going on with attack bombers but they really seem to be completely borked. That´s happening in my PBEM now:

Afternoon Air attack on Tulagi , at 114,137

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid spotted at 46 NM, estimated altitude 14,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 12 minutes


Allied aircraft
B-25D1 Mitchell x 16


No Allied losses



Aircraft Attacking:
16 x B-25D1 Mitchell bombing from 10000 feet
Port Attack: 6 x 500 lb GP Bomb



the replay showed STRAFING. And now look at which skills improved, ground bomb [8|] and strafe. I can only advise every Allied PBEM player NOT to have his B-25C upgrading, then you will still get 20 B-25 level bombers each month and not non working attack bombers. Attack bomber, bombing from 10000ft, strafing at the same time, not hitting anything, improved skill "strafe" and "grd"... it´s borked.

ORIGINAL: castor troy

yeah, but since when do you think that this game is real life?[&:]

Nobody gets killed, so it isn't real life. But the only yardstick we have to judge if it succeeds as a "game" about the War in the Pacific is the actual history of that war. If events in the game can't duplicate events in reality, then the game is "borked" (as you put it).

And the success the Allies had with low-level/skip bombing in reality are not being re-created by the "game"..., so the "game" has a problem.