The early air war

[HardLuckYetAgain]

ORIGINAL: Stelteck

The production of soviet planes is so high. Is it really important how many (obsolete) planes are destroyed on turn one ?

I love a the new air model linked to national morale that seems to emerge from this thread.

Of course i hope everybody understand that it is quite a nerf of the luftwaffe in the late years.

It will become apparent in due time . But I'm afraid by that time WITE 2.0 will be close upon us.

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: Stelteck
The production of soviet planes is so high. Is it really important how many (obsolete) planes are destroyed on turn one ?

No - and if destroying the many bad planes near the front distracts you from the fewer good planes further in the rear it is actually a bad thing for the Axis.

ORIGINAL: Stelteck
I love the new air model linked to national morale that seems to emerge from this thread.
Of course i hope everybody understand that it is quite a nerf of the luftwaffe in the late years.

Only followed the formula slightly. But I assume it should eventually be the national morale + elite bonus as the analogue to ground units. The Luftwaffe always had the greater number of party members and was described as better displaying "national socialist fervour" than the army - so I hope the formula will be tweaked to reflect they were the last fanatics rather than the collapse in morale of the ordinary rank and file soldier.

[morvael]

Politics aside I think that quality of LW plummeted once they couldn't train their pilots properly because of lack of fuel, fanatics or not, new pilots had only rudimentary skills when going to the front.

[morvael]

Already testing new morale rules. Have added "can fly" setting, so maybe you won't have to use night missions for that, and it will be possible to restrict changes in night mission mode to one per turn.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

ORIGINAL: morvael

Already testing new morale rules. Have added "can fly" setting, so maybe you won't have to use night missions for that, and it will be possible to restrict changes in night mission mode to one per turn.

When is the estimated date on having this patch out? I think I may play a game as Germany when it does.

[tyronec]

Have been doing some experimenting with air settings, have two games on the go with soviets using aggressive air tactics in both. The question for Axis is, how to defend against:
Massed ground bombing causing high fatigue for the Luftwaffe fighters.
Followed by air base bombing which will cause lots of operational losses even if the bombers don't get through.

If the intercept value/percentage to fly is too high then the fighters get fatigued even quicker.
If the intercept value/percentage to fly is too low then you get results like below, not enough fighters for normal air base defense let alone the fatigue factor.

The best defense I can find is a combination of the following:
Default settings for fighter intercept/percentage to fly (100% & 50%).
Keep fighter fatigue low in Axis turn.
Keep the air bases out of soviet fighter range, i.e. 20 hexes from the front line.
Have a second line of defense (usually 110s) that are so far back that they will cover the air bases but not the front line, and so are harder to get fatigued.
Good AA with HQs, stacked with air bases.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

ORIGINAL: tyronec

Have been doing some experimenting with air settings, have two games on the go with soviets using aggressive air tactics in both. The question for Axis is, how to defend against:
Massed ground bombing causing high fatigue for the Luftwaffe fighters.
Followed by air base bombing which will cause lots of operational losses even if the bombers don't get through.

If the intercept value/percentage to fly is too high then the fighters get fatigued even quicker.
If the intercept value/percentage to fly is too low then you get results like below, not enough fighters for normal air base defense let alone the fatigue factor.

The best defense I can find is a combination of the following:
Default settings for fighter intercept/percentage to fly (100% & 50%).
Keep fighter fatigue low in Axis turn.
Keep the air bases out of soviet fighter range, i.e. 20 hexes from the front line.
Have a second line of defense (usually 110s) that are so far back that they will cover the air bases but not the front line, and so are harder to get fatigued.
Good AA with HQs, stacked with air bases.

IMHO stop flying 109's in night missions(set them to day mode) since all the screen shots here are for night bombing(your loses are more than likely caused by night flying in general). Fly the 110's for night missions only (if you fly any night missions at all. May be worth it not to fly night missions or a very few squadrons of 110's to fly nights) & crank the intercept up to 200% minimum or more on the 110's and set percentage to fly ~35-55% at the end of your turn. 42%-45% has been the sweet spot when the planes aren't fatigued (higher the number the less sorties they will fly if the Soviets keep coming) and when they are higher fatigued I drop them down to 35% or lower. I'm sure you already know all of this but give it a try.

You should be able to set up a scenerio to try it out before actually trying it in a live game. Good luck.

[Stelteck]

IL-4 production is only 15 per turn and the soviet need also them to supply partisan. I'am not sûre it is a good idea to loose a lot of them for the soviet.

Still, the numbers of plane destroyed on ground from night raid on airfield are impressive.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

ORIGINAL: Stelteck

IL-4 production is only 15 per turn and the soviet need also them to supply partisan. I'am not sûre it is a good idea to loose a lot of them for the soviet.

Still, the numbers of plane destroyed on ground from night raid on airfield are impressive.

That is a night raid. That is the only way possible that the Germans are loosing so many fighters. A daylight raid those bombers would have been torn to shreds. Unless, the Germans fatigue is extremely high but Tyronec is too smart to have that happen. So I'm 100% sure that was a night raid. I'm pretty sure these are operational loses do to flying at night, but need verification.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

ORIGINAL: HardLuckYetAgain

ORIGINAL: Stelteck

IL-4 production is only 15 per turn and the soviet need also them to supply partisan. I'am not sûre it is a good idea to loose a lot of them for the soviet.

Still, the numbers of plane destroyed on ground from night raid on airfield are impressive.

That is a night raid. That is the only way possible that the Germans are loosing so many fighters. A daylight raid those bombers would have been torn to sherds. Unless, the Germans fatigue is extremely high but Tyronec is too smart to have that happen. So I'm 100% sure that was a night raid.

Plus I'm sure those aren't destroyed by the Russian bombers either. If we can get confirmation of this that would be great.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

All of these planes manned by Germans? I see IAR-80A and CR.42s in the mix with 109's

[Dinglir]

ORIGINAL: morvael

Thinking about using axis elite bonsu for German (until training program collapse in late 1944, could this be tied to Rumanian surrender?) and Finnish air groups, as well as Soviet elite for Guards groups. Plus use formula from land units to slow down excessive growth and decline.

I really LOVE the changes you people are working on. I think they will go a long way towards making the air war more realistic. I hope you will also let Air Group losses cost more experience - is this part of the plan? I also think it is great that you are crashing the Luftwaffe quality late war.

Another idea, you might want to consider is this: On the airfield, make it possible for Air Groups to fly "less than 10", "less than five" and "less than 2" as well as keeping the current options. It would allow to set up an airfield tasked solely with protecting the other bases in the area.

Also, if you could set the U2-VS to be able to fly ONLY at night, I think that would be great. Historically they flew low and slow, and using them during daytime would mean that even the German MG-34 would be quite lethal against them.

As HardLuck and others, I am concerned with the losses that can be inflicted upon airbases through using level bombers to attack them. Reducing that ability seeems to be the right thing to do. However, that leaves the Soviet level bombers with no real purpose during the early war. I have no answer to this, as there is no "logistical bombing" mission hitting trucks, fuel and supplies.

Finally, I would like to hear your opinion on options for reducing the numbers advantage in a dog fight. Currently, I continuously see things like 100 HE-111H bombers winning a dogfight against 10 Yak-1's and similar situations. Is it possible to limit the number of times a fighter or fighterbomber aircraft can be fired upon to two or three, recalling it afterwards (for instance)?

To sum up: I think what you are doing is GREAT, but being the ungrateful B...... that I am, I would like to have more.

[tyronec]

Plus I'm sure those aren't destroyed by the Russian bombers either. If we can get confirmation of this that would be great.

I cannot tell how they were destroyed, however would concur that it was very probably a night bombing raid (this is my other opponent, the previous set of combats were vs. Grognard who is not using night bombing) and most likely the majority were shot down by bombers or operational losses. There were a few Romanians there as well as the Luftwaffe.

However, that leaves the Soviet level bombers with no real purpose during the early war. I have no answer to this, as there is no "logistical bombing" mission hitting trucks, fuel and supplies.

I think they are quite useful for ground bombing armor if used in sufficient numbers - they take a lot less losses from AA than the IL2's.

[Dinglir]

ORIGINAL: tyronec
I think they are quite useful for ground bombing armor if used in sufficient numbers - they take a lot less losses from AA than the IL2's.

I guess it has to do with the way I am using my U-2VS against enemy infantry. Doing that tends to free up a lot of IL-2's to hit German armored units. With the massive production numbers, I am not overly concerned with losses to enemy AA.

[tyronec]

IMHO stop flying 109's in night missions(set them to day mode) since all the screen shots here are for night bombing(your loses are more than likely caused by night flying in general). Fly the 110's for night missions only (if you fly any night missions at all. May be worth it not to fly night missions or a very few squadrons of 110's to fly nights) & crank the intercept up to 200% minimum or more on the 110's and set percentage to fly ~35-55% at the end of your turn. 42%-45% has been the sweet spot when the planes aren't fatigued (higher the number the less sorties they will fly if the Soviets keep coming) and when they are higher fatigued I drop them down to 35% or lower. I'm sure you already know all of this but give it a try.

You should be able to set up a scenerio to try it out before actually trying it in a live game. Good luck.

This is indeed good advice. I did some testing and as you say the 109s are worse than useless at night, dropping out of the sky faster than they do any damage.
The 110s seem to have a kill ratio of around 6:1 or a little better, against good bombers at night. This is just for shooting each other down, if the bombers get through then they may get a few for each bombing run. See combat results below.

So at night fatigue is not the issue. If Axis use their 110s then the Soviets can probably attrition them down to nothing (only 4 production week), then get free bombing runs and likely do a bit more damage than they should but not a game changer.

IMO the more serious issue is a mass assault on the Luftwaffe at daytime which works because of fatigue build up on the Axis fighters. The screen shots posted on 11/21 are for day bombing.

[Stelteck]

Is this daylight results as you said ? I'am a little confuse.

[Denniss]

for a heavily mauled raid the first attack seems to successful plus I can't spot the airfield AAA listed as defenders.

This reminds me a bit of a bad tactic used by a russian player in Second Front/War in Russia to get rid of the Bf 110s by setting up raids outside of Bf 109 range but near known Bf 110 bases. Those would intercept the raids but get mauled by single engine soviet a/c.

[Stelteck]

In WITP, which air model may have similarities, a raid can be attacked on the way in to target but also on the way back. So you can get destroyed on the way back while still having bombed the target. It depends of how much the raid was detected early. (With radar helping).

[tyronec]

quote:

IMHO stop flying 109's in night missions(set them to day mode) since all the screen shots here are for night bombing(your loses are more than likely caused by night flying in general). Fly the 110's for night missions only (if you fly any night missions at all. May be worth it not to fly night missions or a very few squadrons of 110's to fly nights) & crank the intercept up to 200% minimum or more on the 110's and set percentage to fly ~35-55% at the end of your turn. 42%-45% has been the sweet spot when the planes aren't fatigued (higher the number the less sorties they will fly if the Soviets keep coming) and when they are higher fatigued I drop them down to 35% or lower. I'm sure you already know all of this but give it a try.

You should be able to set up a scenerio to try it out before actually trying it in a live game. Good luck.



This is indeed good advice. I did some testing and as you say the 109s are worse than useless at night, dropping out of the sky faster than they do any damage.
The 110s seem to have a kill ratio of around 6:1 or a little better, against good bombers at night. This is just for shooting each other down, if the bombers get through then they may get a few for each bombing run. See combat results below.

So at night fatigue is not the issue. If Axis use their 110s then the Soviets can probably attrition them down to nothing (only 4 production week), then get free bombing runs and likely do a bit more damage than they should but not a game changer.

IMO the more serious issue is a mass assault on the Luftwaffe at daytime which works because of fatigue build up on the Axis fighters. The screen shots posted on 11/21 are for day bombing.




Attachment (1)

These combat results are from night bombing. It is a test scenario, not a real game - hence the lack of AA.
The previous set of results, posted three pages back in this thread, were for day bombing.

for a heavily mauled raid the first attack seems to successful plus I can't spot the airfield AAA listed as defenders.

I ran quite a few other attacks and the results were similar, air combat between 110s and good Soviet bombers at night had a kill ratio of around 1:6. Given the pool of DB3Bs there should be enough for the Soviets to wipe out the 110s.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

ORIGINAL: tyronec

for a heavily mauled raid the first attack seems to successful plus I can't spot the airfield AAA listed as defenders.

I ran quite a few other attacks and the results were similar, air combat between 110s and good Soviet bombers at night had a kill ratio of around 1:6. Given the pool of DB3Bs there should be enough for the Soviets to wipe out the 110s.

Yes, I think ~70-80% of the old bombers should be considered scrap metal/wood and removed from the game. Did the Russians really keep all of these bombers flying in 41? How about the old fighters? I know they would keep some but to the qty that we see in the game?