Bombardment efficency

[Nikademus]

Bombardments in the game are magnified by two primary factors.

1. All bases with port ratings (size 0-10) are eligible for bombardment. In real life many ports could not be bombarded "Lunga style" (which is the template on which bombardment is based) Examples would be Rangoon. (Located too far up river, water is too shallow) or Port Morosby (some of the airfields are located well inland) or Moumein. You might bombard Rabaul but getting in an out of Stimpson harbor at night quickly without good maps would be interesting.

2. Bombardment affects both LCU's, support and aircraft simotaniously to varying degrees. Nature of the beast here as Frag related. Ideally it would be nice if the damage was more specific. (airfield/craft damage or LCU damage but not both) For example the "night" at Lunga where most of the airforce was knocked on it's keister had little impact on the Marine Perimeter surrounding Lunga.

Bombardment effects were tweaked downwards but results at time can still be spectacular....no free ride though against a player who's clever. I just got a major ship torpedoed....twice bombarding off Malay. I own the peninsula for the most part in terms of air superiority but its amazing what even one small squadron of torpedo bombers can acomplish when they have a good turn of luck. [:@]

[Ron Saueracker]

Well, the way it is now, naval bombardment in WITP has become a staple tactic for shutting down bases, something not doable in WW2. This really needs to be reversed, or add yet another house rule to my games. Simply change the ability to refuel/rearm warships at bases not of a specific port size (like the restrictions for torps, mines etc) and reduce the effectiveness of naval bombardment. This would stop the "express" nature of bombardments and limit the returns vs risk. Adding ops point maximums for ports would go along way as well...[;)]

[Nikademus]

well thats not completely true (Lunga was indeed shut down for a bit) but more variance would be nice i'd agree.

The bombarder as it stands certainly doesn't escape from risk. Ise and Hyuga will attest to that.

[;)]

[Mr.Frag]

Really, all it takes is a couple of PT boats or a handful of mines and no more bombardments for quite some time. [:D]

[Nikademus]

in my case for sure....i have terrible luck with bombardments. The ghost of Tanaka does not walk with me. [:'(]

[EUBanana]

Battleships werent very good at shelling emplacements at Gallipoli.

The angle of fire for a naval gun is very flat, unlike a howitzer which has a high trajectory. Which made them poor at shelling in hilly terrain, and poor at doing much damage to emplacements and trenches.

That said one battleship did wipe out an entire Turkish company with a couple of rounds in one encounter, so if the targets were exposed they could put the hurt on.

WW1 again, but the same guns pretty much.

[Ron Saueracker]

ORIGINAL: Nikademus

well thats not completely true (Lunga was indeed shut down for a bit) but more variance would be nice i'd agree.

The bombarder as it stands certainly doesn't escape from risk. Ise and Hyuga will attest to that.

[;)]

But only after the gunnery officer from Yamato had been landed many weeks earlier to direct the Kongo and Haruna's fire. Taking the Lunga example and painting all bases with the same brush was a design flub. Lunga was the exception, not the rule.

[Nikademus]

I dont agree that Lunga was an exception since both the Japanese and Americans incorporated shore bombardment as part of their amphibious doctrines. However Lunga does provide a case set example that results can be devastating, but they can also be negligable, same as with air bombardments. The 2nd Japanese attempt to bombard Lunga did little real damage as the shells fell on the boneyard instead of the airfield.

[Ron Saueracker]

ORIGINAL: Nikademus

I dont agree that Lunga was an exception since both the Japanese and Americans incorporated shore bombardment as part of their amphibious doctrines. However Lunga does provide a case set example that results can be devastating, but they can also be negligable, same as with air bombardments. The 2nd Japanese attempt to bombard Lunga did little real damage as the shells fell on the boneyard instead of the airfield.

Steve. I remember you had a solution to this problem back in Beta but it was not adopted for some reason. Had something to do with base resiliency I think. What was it again?

Naval bombardments were nowhere near effective vs entrenched troops either. One of the lessons of Tarawa was the ineffectivness of direct fire shelling. It was found that plunging fire was best but basically really reduced the range of bombardments and forced bombardment TFs away from beach (and out of range of any CD batteries aside from landed naval rifles.

[Nikademus]

cant take credit for that one.

It was Drongo's idea. Its been so long i've forgotten the exact specifics but it involved the port size. Maybe he can elaborate. I see him lurking around here when he isn't busy plotting evil moves against me in PBEM.

My suggestion was to incorporate a greater degree of variableness (same as with air bombardments) that could go so far as to make the entire raid a complete miss. (The "raid killed alot of monkeys and downed alot of trees raid) such as often happened during the Buna-Gona campaign. (would also work for night bombing)

Naval bombardments were nowhere near effective vs entrenched troops either. One of the lessons of Tarawa was the ineffectivness of direct fire shelling. It was found that plunging fire was best but basically really reduced the range of bombardments and forced bombardment TFs away from beach (and out of range of any CD batteries aside from landed naval rifles

I agree....if firing against extensive fortifications. Tarawa was an eye opener for US Planners who thought nothing could have lived on such a moonscape (after the bombardment)

[Ron Saueracker]

Well, in one of those oh so common massive stacking of units in base hex duals (this one at Yenen between 100,000+Chinese vs 150,000+Japanese), I have just gone one entire week where my 600+ artillery pieces have failed to register one casualty on my opponent. He, because he fires first, does all the damage. This is getting more than annoying. Initiative for bombardments is a bit much. How dumb does one have to be to always fire late? These are timed barrages and everyone starts their day at the same time.[8|] He who has the initiative craps first.

[BlackVoid]

I agree that casualty rates for naval bombardments sometimes are a bit high. There are many times though, when the bombardment is not really effective, so there is variance.

BBs should be able to shut down airfields. An airfield cannot be dug in. The japanese at Lunga made piecemeal attacks with only a few large ships. Many times in the game players bombard with 4-6 BBs. This should crater an airfield nicely (repaired in a few days by the millions of US engineers anyway). Sometimes even large bombardments with many BBs yield very little result (look at PzB vs Wobbly AAR).

Again, this seems to be a complaint from allied players. Not surprisingly, they never complain about the ability of the allies to keep operational a large number of bombers almost anywhere and their ability to shut down airfields with a few raids.

THIS IS A GAME, balance is also important. If all the allied players would have their way, soon the only thing that will play Japan is the AI. I am all for historical accuracy, but it should apply to both sides.


Ground unit bombardment is broken, I fully agree. Naval bombardment maybe needs a few tweaks, but it is quite good.

[Nikademus]

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker

I have just gone one entire week where my 600+ artillery pieces have failed to register one casualty on my opponent.

Got a save?

[Ron Saueracker]

ORIGINAL: Nikademus

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker

I have just gone one entire week where my 600+ artillery pieces have failed to register one casualty on my opponent.

Got a save?

Playing Mogami, he can verify this.

[moses]

WITP_Dude and I have been bombarding each other for 4 months at Chungking. There's around 4000 artillery pieces firing every turn. A normal turn has each side lossing 50 casualties or so although it varies and on occasion I've seen 200 casualties in a turn to one side.

This would probably be OK until I remember that these are pretty much all disabled. Are kills going to happen here in 1.5 as with retreats?

[moses]

Ron Saueracker:

He, because he fires first, does all the damage. This is getting more than annoying. Initiative for bombardments is a bit much. How dumb does one have to be to always fire late? These are timed barrages and everyone starts their day at the same time. He who has the initiative craps first.

I don't think initiative is the problem. It seems more to me like some kind of odds calculation is goning on. Your 600 guns will kill a bunch if I only have 6 guns. If I have 3000 guns your 600 will be ineffective.

I have seen bombardment attacks where the attacker takes losses and the defender losses nothing.

Simple test: Have a unit with 6 guns bombard a force with 1000 guns. I'll bet the attacker takes casualties and the defender is not touched.

[Nikademus]

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker

Playing Mogami, he can verify this.

A save would be more useful. I've never seen such a phenomenum

[Ron Saueracker]

Need your email address again, Steve. Lost it on this end.

[mc3744]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

Really, all it takes is a couple of PT boats or a handful of mines and no more bombardments for quite some time. [:D]

I'm afraid I can't agree with this.
In one of my games, PM before being invaded, has been shut down by naval bombardments. It had 600+ mines. Not one enemy ships in several days has it one mine [:(]

[Ron Saueracker]

ORIGINAL: mc3744

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

Really, all it takes is a couple of PT boats or a handful of mines and no more bombardments for quite some time. [:D]

I'm afraid I can't agree with this.
In one of my games, PM before being invaded, has been shut down by naval bombardments. It had 600+ mines. Not one enemy ships in several days has it one mine [:(]

Mines only seem to hit the odd ship in an invasion convoy. Haven't seen a mine hit on a BB TF yet.