4E bombing accuracy

[PaxMondo]

ORIGINAL: topeverest

SO , IIRC, as 2E or 4E bomber, if it hits a naval target, it does not calculate remaining bombs. So cant get more than one hit per bomber. Is that correct?

I also thought there was a limitation on the number of the compliment of bombs that could be involved in the attack. Is that so?

Mmm. Pretty sure that at the moment every bomb is calc'd. Nemo did a bunch of testing and has modified his scenario so that bombms come out in sticks of 4. I'm 99% sure that you can get multiple bomb hits from one aircraft.

[mike scholl 1]

ORIGINAL: Alfred
Altitude does affect bombing accuracy but not quite in the manner you posited. The type of pilot training and air mission flown is determined by the assigned altitude. Hence if you want your dive bombers to actually dive bomb, the units assigned altitude must fall within the range of 10-14k feet. Assign them to 9k feet or less they glide bomb, assign them to 15k feet or higher they level bomb. Naturally the level of accuracy and effectiveness will then be reflective of whether the unit dive/glide/level bombed. Other plane types face similar issues albeit at different "altitude bands", such as the difference between skip and level bombing.

Which is really silly when you remember that all the US Dive Bombers at Midway were flying at 17,000 feet. DIVE bombers should never "level bomb"..., they lack the bombsights to do so.

[dr.hal]

Good point Mike. The discourse on B-24's dive bombing is instructive here, as each B-24 carried two bomb sights, the normal one (Norden) and a very simple DB site. As I recall, the definition use for a DB had nothing to do with the altitude. It all depended upon the aim point... if the aim point was within or at 10 degrees of the vertical from the bomb site, then it was a dive....altitude and dive angle were not part of the definition. With this consideration obviously smaller faster aircraft would have to have a steeper attack angle. Has anyone else run across this? Alfred? As I recall you were part of that conversation. Hal

[bigred]

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

I'm not saying that 4 engine low level attacks aren't devastating......I can't say one way or another as I can't seem to duplicate them. Any help anyone can give me in this research would be greatly appreciated. I'd like to experince it and see it for myself, and apparently I'm doing something wrong. Instead of vengeful eagles from the sky , I keep getting "nibbling ducks". [&:]

In Vanilla WITP I saw such attacks as being VERY effective.[X(] In AE , it doesn't seem to be worth the allies time or effort. So please, tell me what I'm doing wrong. Thanks.[&o] [:)]

I did just hammer FatR w/ the b24x1000ft naval attack....replay showed 2 hits on an AV. B24s did take about 50%damage in that attack.

[FatR]

ORIGINAL: bigred
I did just hammer FatR w/ the b24x1000ft naval attack....replay showed 2 hits on an AV. B24s did take about 50%damage in that attack.

I think it will not harm me much to post the results of that attack:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on TF, near Tulagi at 114,137
Weather in hex: Light rain
Raid detected at 40 NM, estimated altitude 1,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 13 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M4 Zero x 11
A6M5b Zero x 6
Ki-44-IIa Tojo x 12

Allied aircraft
B-24D1 Liberator x 25
PB4Y-1 Liberator x 9

No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
B-24D1 Liberator: 14 damaged
B-24D1 Liberator: 1 destroyed by flak
PB4Y-1 Liberator: 8 damaged

Japanese Ships
BB Kongo, Bomb hits 2
BB Kirishima
CL Kiso
CA Tone
AK Aobasan Maru, Bomb hits 1, on fire

Aircraft Attacking:
9 x PB4Y-1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb
9 x B-24D1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb
8 x B-24D1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb
8 x B-24D1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb

CAP engaged:
582 Ku S-1 with A6M4 Zero (11 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
11 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 36775
Raid is overhead
802 Ku S-1 with A6M5b Zero (6 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 38500
Raid is overhead
24th Sentai with Ki-44-IIa Tojo (12 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
12 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 36740
Raid is overhead

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on TF, near Tulagi at 114,137

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid detected at 43 NM, estimated altitude 7,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 14 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M4 Zero x 11
A6M5b Zero x 6
Ki-44-IIa Tojo x 2



Allied aircraft
B-24D1 Liberator x 3

No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
B-24D1 Liberator: 2 damaged

Japanese Ships
CL Kiso

Aircraft Attacking:
3 x B-24D1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb

CAP engaged:
582 Ku S-1 with A6M4 Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 11 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36775
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 20 minutes
802 Ku S-1 with A6M5b Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 6 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 38500
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 21 minutes
24th Sentai with Ki-44-IIa Tojo (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36740 , scrambling fighters to 1000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 100 minutes


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Afternoon Air attack on TF, near Tulagi at 114,137

Weather in hex: Heavy cloud

Raid detected at 40 NM, estimated altitude 3,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 13 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M4 Zero x 7
A6M5b Zero x 6
Ki-44-IIa Tojo x 8

Allied aircraft
B-24D1 Liberator x 19
PB4Y-1 Liberator x 5

No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
B-24D1 Liberator: 14 damaged
PB4Y-1 Liberator: 4 damaged

Japanese Ships
BB Kongo
AK Asosan Maru
BB Kirishima, Bomb hits 2
CA Chikuma
AK Aobasan Maru, on fire


Aircraft Attacking:
5 x PB4Y-1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb
6 x B-24D1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb GP Bomb
4 x B-24D1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb
9 x B-24D1 Liberator bombing from 1000 feet
Naval Attack: 5 x 500 lb SAP Bomb

CAP engaged:
582 Ku S-1 with A6M4 Zero (7 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
7 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 36775
Raid is overhead
802 Ku S-1 with A6M5b Zero (6 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 38500
Raid is overhead
24th Sentai with Ki-44-IIa Tojo (8 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
8 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 36740
Raid is overhead

The key factor was presence of battleships. Well, and it is a modded game, so Japanese flak is a bit stronger overall.

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

In a recent PBEM I tried using several squadrons of B-24's to attack my opponents CV's. Despite many,many attacks at 1,000' , not one scored an attack. 2 Squadrons of Ventura/Harpoons did score, four times. I've tried many attacks against the AI , and almost never got a hit. I suspect that I need to use crews with experince in the high 80's. While USN PB2Y's and 4Y's were deadly, I've always found USAAF planes to be useless. Just my experince, just my 2cents. [:)]

If your air crews don't have naval bombing scores of at least 40, they will rarely hit any ship, no matter how high their actual XP is. You want to hit ships, you have to train at naval bombing. If you have some with skill 40, they will start getting random hits...the higher their individual naval bombing skill, the more hits they score.

IJA and USAAC planes start with extremely low naval bombing skill (I've seen some in single digits).

[Shark7]

From all the accounts I've been reading, for the most part on strategic missions, the heavy bombers tended to stay at high altitudes (15k+) and for two reasons:

1. Higher altitude makes light flak less deadly (or irrelevent if you are flying above its maximum ceiling)
2. A lot of early war fighters weren't capable of intercepting at higher altitudes.

For example B-17s primarily flew at 20k and the A6M2 was largely ineffective at intercepting them at that altitude.

[Erkki]

ORIGINAL: Shark7

From all the accounts I've been reading, for the most part on strategic missions, the heavy bombers tended to stay at high altitudes (15k+) and for two reasons:

1. Higher altitude makes light flak less deadly (or irrelevent if you are flying above its maximum ceiling)
2. A lot of early war fighters weren't capable of intercepting at higher altitudes.

For example B-17s primarily flew at 20k and the A6M2 was largely ineffective at intercepting them at that altitude.

With AAA fire, also less turbulence, easier navigation and considerably better fuel efficiency. You just didnt fly and navigate a 50-plane formation of heavy bombers at wherever one wanted, the target or at least target area had to be visible dozens of nms away and course straight to it already to allow level bombing at all. The 6,000ft limit witpae uses is probably pretty accurate.