Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

CT, what in detail are you trying to prove with that combat report, except that 61 outdated Zeros with a few
more modern airframes are dead meat against more than the double number of Allied high performance fighters? [;)]

He shows a map of a coordinated sweep from 5 different bases, one of which at an extremely different range.

+1 on DivePac's tactic. I use it regularly and it has yet to fail me.

ORIGINAL: alanschu

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

CT, what in detail are you trying to prove with that combat report, except that 61 outdated Zeros with a few
more modern airframes are dead meat against more than the double number of Allied high performance fighters? [;)]

He shows a map of a coordinated sweep from 5 different bases, one of which at an extremely different range.

He shows a saturated battlefield. Which is what you get when 8 different squads are working on the same mission.
Which is not equal to coordinated, but has a similar effect. [;)]

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

CT, what in detail are you trying to prove with that combat report, except that 61 outdated Zeros with a few
more modern airframes are dead meat against more than the double number of Allied high performance fighters? [;)]

nothing that you would ever notice, obviously.

The op asked about what to do to get more than the silly < squadron sweeps over the target at the same time and what the screenshot shows is a good example for "how to do that". Not that it would make any real life sense, but as you´ve explained me already, real life should not be what you compare it to. Not judging about it, just telling the op how to improve his chances to achieve what he wants to achieve.

If people want to, they can believe whatever they want of course, sooner or later they´re going to find out, if they ever get a PBEM beyond 42.

Thank you DivePack , that's a neat idea , I will be giving it a go to force afternoon attacks with the fragile medium bombers +escort , while the sweeps hopefully go in during the AM phase.

Hi CT , Was that the only sweep of Kagi ? or just the biggest ? If it did all co-ordinate then I would be surprised, but then again it can happen (by luck) so eventually it will.

ORIGINAL: DivePac88

One thing I have found (as the Japanese) is that if you have your bombers set on naval attack, then airfield, ground, or port attack as the secondary target. The sweeps will normally go in the morning phase, and the bombers (with escort) will attack their land targets in the afternoon phase.

Great idea.

Another good tactics, at least when you have a bigger force, is to set some squadrons on sweep and some on LRCAP over the target base. Prevents the situations when the initial sweep gets crushed by numbers, and other fail to find enough targets because most enemy planes have dropped out of combat due to various factors.

ORIGINAL: castor troy
Not that it would make any real life sense, but as you´ve explained me already, real life should not be what you compare it to.

And he's right. Sweeps have extremely shaky basis in RL (both free hunt and airfield suppression patrols can well be modeled by LRCAP/routines similar to how transport inteception currently works), they are a gameplay abstraction meant to faciliate more aggressive play, and introduce choices into air tactics, and therefore any complaints that "sweep routine is unrealistic" are automatically invalid.

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

CT, what in detail are you trying to prove with that combat report, except that 61 outdated Zeros with a few
more modern airframes are dead meat against more than the double number of Allied high performance fighters? [;)]

nothing that you would ever notice, obviously.

The op asked about what to do to get more than the silly < squadron sweeps over the target at the same time and what the screenshot shows is a good example for "how to do that". Not that it would make any real life sense, but as you´ve explained me already, real life should not be what you compare it to. Not judging about it, just telling the op how to improve his chances to achieve what he wants to achieve.

If people want to, they can believe whatever they want of course, sooner or later they´re going to find out, if they ever get a PBEM beyond 42.

What I notice is that you again did not take the time to think before jumping conclusions.

When you look closely you would notice that theres a high chance only fraction of the participating aircraft actually flew a fighter sweep.
I am willing to bet many of the aircraft involved were in fact CAP from Pescadores and Takao, probably set to range >1.
These things happen when the distance between hostile bases is very close.

Raid detected at 240 NM, estimated altitude 40,500 feet.
Hm. I wonder how you can detect something at 240 NM which took off only 40NM away.

I´d be careful selling this as "coordinated sweep". It is an interesting mix, but for sure not a proof how to get 100ac arriving over target at the same time [;)]

Rob, I doubt this is more than a onetime result, his opponent cannot afford such losses more often or at least should not repeat that stunt more than once.

ORIGINAL: Rob Brennan UK

Thank you DivePack , that's a neat idea , I will be giving it a go to force afternoon attacks with the fragile medium bombers +escort , while the sweeps hopefully go in during the AM phase.

Hi CT , Was that the only sweep of Kagi ? or just the biggest ? If it did all co-ordinate then I would be surprised, but then again it can happen (by luck) so eventually it will.

it´s the usual happening when you try to sweep from more than one base. You regularly get better results when you put your squadrons onto different bases instead of having them in one big base. Range doesn´t matter than, nor ac type. At least that´s my opponent´s and my experience. Others may have different exp but those that post combat reports usually post the same "type" of sweeps I´ve been putting up for over three years.

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

CT, what in detail are you trying to prove with that combat report, except that 61 outdated Zeros with a few
more modern airframes are dead meat against more than the double number of Allied high performance fighters? [;)]

nothing that you would ever notice, obviously.

The op asked about what to do to get more than the silly < squadron sweeps over the target at the same time and what the screenshot shows is a good example for "how to do that". Not that it would make any real life sense, but as you´ve explained me already, real life should not be what you compare it to. Not judging about it, just telling the op how to improve his chances to achieve what he wants to achieve.

If people want to, they can believe whatever they want of course, sooner or later they´re going to find out, if they ever get a PBEM beyond 42.

What I notice is that you again did not take the time to think before jumping conclusions.

When you look closely you would notice that theres a high chance only fraction of the participating aircraft actually flew a fighter sweep.
I am willing to bet many of the aircraft involved were in fact CAP from Pescadores and Takao, probably set to range >1.
These things happen when the distance between hostile bases is very close.

you bet? lol, you shouldn´t bet chap!


Raid detected at 240 NM, estimated altitude 40,500 feet.
Hm. I wonder how you can detect something at 240 NM which took off only 40NM away.

as soon as you will have more exp with the game (means more turns) you will notice that this happens often enough, referre to 50 pages of combat reports in my AAR.

I´d be careful selling this as "coordinated sweep". It is an interesting mix, but for sure not a proof how to get 100ac arriving over target at the same time [;)]

Rob, I doubt this is more than a onetime result, his opponent cannot afford such losses more often or at least should not repeat that stunt more than once.


as said above, as soon as you get some more experience with the game you will find out more. If you haven´t noticed yet, that you got a better chance to see more squadrons on a sweep over the target at the same time when you got them spread out over several bases then you haven´t got enough experience yet. It´s so easy. The only one that jumps onto conclusions, assumptions and abstractions is you my friend. And I wonder what it got to do with "what my opponent can afford". Nothing to be honest, it just got nothing to do with what I´ve said.

Like I´ve posted above, the op asked how to get more fighters on a sweep over the target and having them spread out gives you a better chance than having them all at the same base it seems. And like I´ve posted above and said many times before, the more you try to screw up the engine, the better results (in terms of numbers over the target at the same time) you get, because if you manage to screw up the escorts, the most likely show up sweeping and THESE SWEEPS ALWAYS show up BEFORE the bombers, whereas ORDERED sweeps may well show up AFTER the bombers.

ORIGINAL: FatR

ORIGINAL: castor troy
Not that it would make any real life sense, but as you´ve explained me already, real life should not be what you compare it to.

And he's right. Sweeps have extremely shaky basis in RL (both free hunt and airfield suppression patrols can well be modeled by LRCAP/routines similar to how transport inteception currently works), they are a gameplay abstraction meant to faciliate more aggressive play, and introduce choices into air tactics, and therefore any complaints that "sweep routine is unrealistic" are automatically invalid.

Not surprising you fail to note that it´s not about the sweep, escort or bombing mission but the fact that AIRCRAFT (on whatever mission) achieved to show up over the target at the same time when coming in from FIVE different directions and at least three different ranges when you regularly fail to see that when they all are coming in from the same direction or even the same base. You should come up with your "wrong" argument again.

In that case I can´t post statistics for you again but would have to copy in whole books but also here, neither stats nor books about real life have got anything to do with the game (as ppl were so kind to point out to me), so discussion about real life and the game have never and will never make any sense. Lol, all the forum of the last 10 years ad absurdum [:D]

To bring this to an end, do whatever you want, think whatever you want and as long as none of you got anything else than a continous AAR to show detailed results of your phantastic knowledge and gameplay it´s mood to discuss about it.

Have fun.

Dear Gnome. What CT is trying to tell you is:



- let your opponent capture a base which is encircled by your own bases from
3 sides at a 120° angle.
- stack these bases with fighter, set them on random missions, the details
are not extremely important because leaky CAP and range circles overlap anyway.
- run the turn

You will get something more or less resembling coordination.

Talk about representative examples... [:'(]

CT, you don´t need anything like coordination if you own the skies quality- or
quantity-wise. Oversaturation has one flaw: it only works if you got much more stuff
than the opponent.

Thats nothing new and it has nothing to do with gaming the engine. [;)]

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

Dear Gnome. What CT is trying to tell you is:



- let your opponent capture a base which is encircled by your own bases from
3 sides at a 120° angle.
- stack these bases with fighter, set them on random missions, the details
are not extremely important because leaky CAP and range circles overlap anyway.
- run the turn

You will get something more or less resembling coordination.

Talk about representative examples... [:'(]

Lol, not only have the one and only AE expert explain you just everything about the game (even those things he never even came close to experience because he´s two years of turns away from it), but also have this guy explain you what happens in a PBEM he´s NOT the one who plays it. Ladies and gentelmen, we truly have a genius on this board.

Thanks. [:)]

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

CT, you don´t need anything like coordination if you own the skies quality- or
quantity-wise. Oversaturation has one flaw: it only works if you got much more stuff
than the opponent.

Thats nothing new and it has nothing to do with gaming the engine. [;)]

oh, yeah, you can own the sky quantity wise, especially if you got three times more fighters than the enemy but fail to get them over the target in a way you could take advantage of it and end up being outnumbered OVER THE TARGET while you´ve got a total numerical superiority on the map. And that´s exactly what the op was asking about, how does he get more fighters over the target at the same time. Go ahead and post a guide how to do that if you wish, hope it actually works in the end and helps the op.

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

Thanks. [:)]

you´re welcome

ORIGINAL: castor troy
oh, yeah, you can own the sky quantity wise, especially if you got three times more fighters than the enemy but fail to get them over the target in a way you could take advantage of it and end up being outnumbered OVER THE TARGET while you´ve got a total numerical superiority on the map. And that´s exactly what the op was asking about, how does he get more fighters over the target at the same time. Go ahead and post a guide how to do that if you wish, hope it actually works in the end and helps the op.

Again: LRCAP the target with half of the squadrons. Easy. In case of closely positioned bases even simple CAP will work, as possibly happened in your example.

I know this is referencing naval air groups but I wonder if there is something hard-coded in the game that gives all allied air groups a disadvantage to coordinate stikes when they fly out of the same hex...


The coordination of air strikes is affected by how many Carrier aircraft are based in the TF launching a strike. The chance of uncoordination is doubled under the following circumstances:

»» Allied TF in 1942 and the number of aircraft in the TF is greater than 100 + rnd (100).

»» Allied TF in 1943 and the number of aircraft in the TF is greater than 150 + rnd (150).

»» Allied TF in 1944 or later or a Japanese TF at any time and the number of aircraft in the TF is greater than 200 + rnd (200).

Hah, ok well, didn't intend to kick a hornets nest on this one. If I find any way to reproduce having a number of sweeping squadrons showing up on the same combat report (or coordinated if you want to call it that) I'll post back.

Thanks to all for taking the time to share your info.