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Mehring,
 
Are your opponents placing their airbases too close to the front?
 
Marquo [X(]

ORIGINAL: Marquo

Mehring,

Are your opponents placing their airbases too close to the front?

Marquo [X(]

To start with, I'd say so, yes. But this is, I believe, because they have all under estimated the potential the 1.03 game gives- rightly or wrongly- a 1941 Russian airforce.

Having withdrawn his airbases to a more prudent distance and resorted to using empty staging bases to mount their missions, I still find myself able to raid airfields and destroy planes, as the screenies show. The game rightly does not tell a player whether or not his fields are in my escort range and every base placement is, at best, an educated guess. The chance of interceptors making a sortie and actually finding their target also declines with the range to target. The interceptors also seem to base their sortie on the bombers' target hex, rather than their flight path which means I can fly unescorted bombers right over fighter bases to hit distant targets without risk of interception.

With his bases further back the losses I inflict decline as do the losses they inflict on me. Either way, the Luftwaffe is increasingly neutralised or marginalised. I believe 1.04 reduces losses anyway, but it is with enormous relief that I can now move on land without fear of 250 losses per interdicting aircraft.

As of turn 15 I'm just starting to get some Pe-3 regiments combat capable. These have a significantly greater range than the other russian fighters and good armour, though they lack other qualities desirable in a fighter. I've yet to see how effective they'll be as long range escorts, further enhancing my target options.

@Helio: Put your IL-4's you want to use on resupply missions on night ops and it should be a lot better. Don't forget you can use TB3's for this duty as well and that is all they should do, which in turn would give you some more IL-4's to work with.

I have to say that all this proves is the air model still needs a lot of work.

As far as the Germans having their airfields too close to the front, that is sort of tough. The 109 is a short ranged aircraft. It has to be near the front in order to provide escort for ground missions and also to provide CAP for front line units. Having them back from the front may be more defensive, but then the German units can be bombed to pieces and we have another issue.

The Air War certainly needs more work and is known throughout the team.

As for planes I use in VVS - as Klydon says the IL-4. I also use TB-3 and DB-3. I even use SB-2's if needed. Basically any transport and non-PE2 level bomber is my approach

Mehring -
 
I was thinking that at least the Axis player should at least place his airfields beyond the radius of the biplanes...
 
Marquo

In truth though the Axis player shouldn't have to
If he is! Especially in 41.

I wouldn't have thought so either. Perhaps this situation can arise in large part because German players often give up bombing Russian airfields after turn 1. That's my experience, anyway. Did the Germans continue bombing airfields historically? If so, then maybe the game is more accurate than it's being given credit, allowing the Russian to punish German players for not maintaining pressure. If the Russians send all their air units to reserve they'll pay a terrible price for the Axis ruling the skies. Challenge the Axis airforces and they'll lose planes by the thousand- if the Axis bombs them.

I still bomd the Soviet airfields quite frequently after turn 1. You can usually maintain a 4-1 kill ratio or better.

The games I have played we had a house rule against airfield attacks past the first turn. I was the Soviet both times and the rule seemed fair. Presumably IRL if the Soviets were capable of destroying the German air force through repeated attacks on bases they would have done so.

ORIGINAL: hfarrish

Presumably IRL if the Soviets were capable of destroying the German air force through repeated attacks on bases they would have done so.

It's not that simple, even assuming that a protagonist does everything they are capable of. Is the Russian player able to do something historically impossible because of a design error or because the German play deviates greatly from historical actions, thereby creating an ahistorical opportunity? I don't know enough about this aspect of the war to say, I'm just highlighting the issue because going by my opponents and the comments I frequently read about not bombing Russian airfields after T1, it may not be an issue that a lot of players are dealing with.

I patched and continued a PBEM towards the end of the 1941 blizzard - what a difference [:)]
 
My Soviets are now banging their heads againts Axis units which fight back with defensive SU and reserve committment - it is much harder to push 'em back. So, let's see what spring/summer 1942 holds...
 
Good job, thanks.
 
Marquo

Any numbers on how many sorties were made against airfields in the opening days? Read lots of CAS/Interdiction was flown, so I know in WitE I'm hitting the Red's airfields a lot harder than historically done.

I've read that the Soviet Air Force was thrown against the Germans in the first few weeks with some pretty bad ideas; the bombers went out in large numbers without fighter escort, and got clobbered.

That might explain why in game the Russian bombers do the exact same in interdiction missions and auto formed recce missions.