Trouble With Sweeps

[geofflambert]

Alfred the Great. [&o]

[geofflambert]

ORIGINAL: crsutton


The solution is simple. If the target us in range place two or three squadrons on Long Range Cap over the target. Then sweep with one or two other units. In most all cases the units on Long Range Cap will join in the fight over the target and support the sweep. They also tend to support each sweep even if they are not coordinated. This is not guaranteed but will happen most all of the time. It makes for a very powerful sweep. In doing this it actually becomes more desirable for the sweeps to go in one at at time as you will have multiple opportunities to engage the defenders in large air battles. If you are trying to suppress an airbase or cause attrition to the enemy then this is my preferred tactic.

I would not advise layering your units. Place them all at the highest altitude allowed by your HRs.

Agreed. Also if you're sending in bombers, multiple sweeps will wear out the defenders and their reserves and your bombers get in free gratis. The sweeping fighters being faster get there first.

Ugh, that's an improper usage of free, gratis but you get my meaning.

[Lokasenna]

ORIGINAL: Icedawg

ORIGINAL: Alfred

Sweeps do not coordinate. Read this thread.

tm.asp?m=2804256&mpage=1&key=sweep%2Ccoordination

There will be subtle changes between the two fighter units in question which will reduce the chances of both arriving simultaneously. More info provided by screenshots (several) would need to be provided to identify what the relevant differences are.

Alfred

Very helpful thread.

How do you manage to use the search function so efficiently? I try searching before I post most of my questions on this forum and get either: no results at all, or a couple hits with pretty much no relevance to my question.

I'm the same way with Google. I can search all night for some info on particular home/lawn/garden projects I'm in the middle of and won't find anything. I'll tell my wife of my frustrations and she'll find something in 2 minutes! Maddening to say the least! [:@]

Google-fu is something of an art form. It's intuitive to some, and others get frustrated.

Using Google to search these forums actually isn't a bad idea, either. Just add the "site:matrixgames.com" and then go through those results. It's probably faster than searching on the forum engine itself.

[crsutton]

ORIGINAL: Icedawg

ORIGINAL: crsutton

Yes, I have been doing is with great success for over 1,000 turns. I also never escort bombing raids but put LRCAP over the target. Mind you this works for one day turns but does not work so well if you are playing two day turns.

You can forget about trying to coordinate. Let us know if this works for you.

Will do.

Just a quick question though. Does this LRCAP technique incur huge amounts of plane and/or pilot fatigue? With sweep and escort, it's just a single round trip to the target and back. But with LRCAP, it would involve constant shuttling of planes out/back and out/back and out/back . . . all day long. Have you noticed crazy levels of fatigue compared to simple sweep and escort missions?

Yes, fatigue will be high. That is the down side. I think that more than compensates for the much fewer casualties that you take. Best to rest LRCAP after one mission.

[topeverest]

Alfred,

Many thanks, what I am seeing must be cooperation and not coordination.

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: Alfred

Why do I even bother to do the research and post the primary material when people can't be bothered to do the work themselves or read CLOSELY, not read into what I write their own interpretation. I spent over 6 hours on Saturday researching the various answers before I posted to several threads. Today, just on this single thread I spent 2 hours researching the topic before selecting the most comprehensive single thread on the subject.[sm=00000018.gif

Coordination is only available to synchronise multi bomber and their escorts from one/several airfields to strike the enemy at the same spot. Any other aircraft groups on different mission profiles may co-operate sufficiently that they appear over a target close to each other. This may look as coordination but it is not.

When a dev says sweeps do not coordinate, what part of the message from the dev is unclear. When I retrieve the answers there are too many more interested in the opportunity to find offense in my posts or contradict me, rather than thinking through what I provide on my own time.

And no, before some smart alec wants to accuse me of just playing with semantics, there is a difference between "coordination" and "cooperation". In the former the code, as stated by theElf in 2009, once it realises the player wants to create a coordinated strike package it attempts to do so. But the player must utilise that key otherwise there is no possibility of coordination only at best some cooperation. Everything else which players are told is necessary to get "coordination" (for which the link I gave is invaluable) is required in order to facilitate, in a 0,1 virtual world the "physical" arrival of the aircraft. With "cooperation" there is no similar trigger key. Which is why it is rarer to witness cooperation.

Sure it is possible for players to anecdotally witness 150 fighters arriving over the target. They did well with the factors necessary to facilitate their "physical" arrival but that is not coordination which is favoured by the code provided the trigger is set and it is "physically" possible in the virtual world.

So the next person who wants to find fault with me is really complaining about the devs. I doubt too many will undertake the requisite research or think through the issues. Far easier to attack me publicly on the forum, or privately via PM/email which allows them to say things which would get them banned from the forum.

Alfred

Again, many thanks for your efforts. I did not realize the difference between the two different operations as in your actual first post you didn't mention two terms, and I was traveling so didn't have the time to read through the thread that was linked.

Providing contradictory information is not a personal attack, however, especially if based on solid evidence and presented in an objective manner. While I didn't provide combat reports or other evidence, it is all in the AAR if someone cares to look, and is probably in my opponent's AAR as well. The interest is that this provides a pretty clear advantage when it happens, as the fighters do overwhelm the defenders with those numbers, however rarely it may occur.

The OP was concerned mostly with sweeps getting over the base with many groups arriving at once, so I was trying to encourage him that it could happen, while tempering that with the information I've learned based on game play that it is fairly rare. I guess that could be anecdote, but much of the information is necessarily anecdotal on this forum. We have to share experiences if we want to learn. The manual and the developers can tell us a lot, but to me it's much more interesting to learn about these particulars with the addition of actual game play examples.

While it may be much more rare to see 'co-operation' with sweeping groups it can happen, which is really the point. Hopefully by stating that it can happen this thread continued to generate interesting ideas and other players were able to pitch in to provide examples whether I used the wrong descriptor or not. Sometimes after your authoritative posts some may feel 'the case is closed' and not offer other information. There is usually still more to learn, and as it turned out in this case, more to be interpreted. If several of us hadn't chipped in to give our little anecdotes maybe you wouldn't have been able to explain the difference between the 'coordination' and 'cooperation' which I at least found quite interesting.