Battle of Britain- How common is it?

[Lebatron]

I got a question for you guys. After France falls where do you station your bombers? Do most of you move them to the Mediterranean theater? That's what I like to do because it makes sense to bomb the heck out of Malta and project airpower into the Eastern Med. But in real life why weren't they used in such effective rolls? Answer, because the German bombers were being used in the Battle of Britain from Summer40 thru Spring41. How common is it to see the whole German air force focused on Britain from the fall of France up until Barbarossa? In my experience it's not that common to threaten or really attempt Sealion. Maybe your experience differs.

I would like to see the Battle of Britain take place on a regular basis(what good WW2 game doesn't have a B.O.B.) even if Sealion is not the ultimate goal. This would have the effect of drawing German bombers out of the Med thus giving this theater a more correct feel. But where's the incentive for the German player to do so? As it stands now to many German bombers get cut down by fighters until Germany reaches range 2 with his own. By then the historical Barbarossa has already started. Should Germany have to delay Barbarossa just to have a little success in damaging British factories? I feel that should not be the case. I know this discussion has come up before, but don't some of you think that perhaps the game would play more interesting if Germany and Britain began the game with say 3 tech points in fighter range? In this way, if the German player really wanted to, he could have range 2 fighters stationed in France ready to begin the Battle of Britain in the historical time frame.

This is a change I'm willing to experiment with for the Uncommon Valor 2.0 scenario so the German player has new choices. I hope to be able to allow the German player the option to escort his bombers without making a successful Sealion more likely. You guys think that's possible?

[MrQuiet]

Hi Leb:
 
Interesting point.
I would also like to see fighters get to range 2 a little quicker but after that I would like to see it take longer and more expensive investment to get to range 3. In my opinion range 3 fighters are a little 'to flexible' in there ability to project threat.
 
So I guess what I am saying is start WA, GE, and maybe even SU with a few points in fighter range but lower the WS so range 3 is more expensive and most likely wont happen till mid/late war. Keep Japan the way it is, they can hardly afford to feed the troops.
 
-MrQuiet

[a511]

Hi Lebatron
 
great to see u around again, let me know when u would like to have another game with me!
 
i really like your idea re: fht range.
in my own exp, i have only done no BOB as its just no pt to do so if the CW decides to def england and sealion only happens when the WA player is really careless ... by leaving scotland virtually undefended.
with proper fht escort and a few more bombers in construction in the early turns, WA shall think twice b4 sending the royal navy and CW army to NA.
 
btw, whats the other changes in Uncommon Valor 2.0?
 
how abt a transport in central Med, just like what someone (that's Wanderinghead, right?) has already done in another mod?
as that really prevents the mass up of nearly the whole royal navy in central Med which effectively making it impossible to commence the NA campaign.
i think it also helps to prevent the "no-italy" axis strategy, as i have encountered such strategy for several times understanding that italy has been viewed as a "liability" for the axis to defend rather than a member for axis in the Med campaign (although, the historical performance of italy in WWII was not that satisfactory ...)
 
i shall definitely give it a try when Uncommon Valor 2.0 is ready.
 
a511
 
 

[christian brown]

You guys think that's possible?

Never know 'til you test it out..........why not see what happens?

Also, the idea of giving most nationa a few points toward speed 2 but making it harder to get to 3 seems really solid.

[Forwarn45]

It may not be a bad idea to give most countries a few points to range 2, but I don't think it will achieve the desired effect. Range 2 fighters are useful not just in Britain but in the Mediterranean area and against Russia - so it may not affect Axis planning too much. As it is, the Germans can try to steal Japanese tech and can usually get to 2 range fighters early.

[WanderingHead]

As everyone from testing days would know, I think there is a single realistic solution to the lack of Battle of Britain: a heavy penalty for air operating at maximum range, coupled with an increase of starting fighter range research points.

Maybe there is an except for units that have only moved one region (even over double border), so that CAGs for instance are not penalized attacking adjacent sea zones over a double border.

It is simply unrealistic to say that fighters and bombers are equally effective 1000 miles from their bases and 100 miles from their bases.

If all attack (to air and to land) values had a 1 die penalty at maximum range, and Germans had range 2 fighters by the end of Spring 1940, then the Germans would be able to overwhelm the English in quantity of air units hitting England, but would suffer greatly in their effectiveness.

The main thing is, it doesn't just solve this one problem. I think it solves the problem of air over exerting itself at long ranges just about everywhere. I think it is pertinent to MrQuiet's comment about range 3. It is quite realistic to say that air can get somewhere and do something useful but at a degraded capability. It is not so on/off as the game currently portrays, you can either get their or you can't. You just can't do as many bombing runs 2000 miles away as 200 miles away.

Now, if there were sufficient interest in this I could conceivably enable it for mods.

[Lebatron]

I went ahead and added the tech points along with a coresponding drop to world standard fighter range. It may or may not lead to more Battle of Britain's but at least the option is more attainable now. I will post a new UV 2.0 update in a minute over in Mods for those interested in my new map and scenario.

Brian, I would be very interested in trying out the range penalty if you enable it.

[ceyan]

The problem with the Battle of Britain taking place in the game is that the game doesn't scale its actual effects. The reason for conducting the raids was to support Sealion, and in that respect the Battle of Britain failed miserably (not to mention was so highly improbable of actually succeeding that its hard to argue that it could have worked). What it did do however was divert a lot of English resources to the defense of the Home Islands and not used elsewhere. This can sometimes happen if the English player fears a more determined attack, but otherwise its too easy to cause more damage than its worth.

Likewise it also caused a panic among the populace, which has its own barrel of problems associated with it that aren't even modeled in the game.

What really needs to happen is a sort of suppression on factories. Somehow you'd have to model the reduced output (well, not so much reduced as diverted to balloons, airbase reconstruction, AAA, radar stations, etc...) and panic effect of the bombings.

P.S.
Why don't Fighters start with a range of 2? Taking the Battle of Britain as an example every German fighter had the range to escort the bombers. Granted the 109s only had an average of a few minutes combat time, but other fighters generally didn't have much concern over fuel. So in that context its justified. Also having a starting value of 1 makes it nearly impossible to obtain an equivalent to the Mustang

[mek42]

Would an alternative to Fighter speed 2 be to make air units able to crossover narrows without paying movement for the sea?  Not sure how difficult this would be to code though.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: mek42
Would an alternative to Fighter speed 2 be to make air units able to crossover narrows without paying movement for the sea?  Not sure how difficult this would be to code though.

The complete set of rules that seem to make the most sense is:

1) attack value penalty for all air units that are at max range and are more than 1-move-away from their homebase (e.g. with range two, crossing a double border still leaves you 1-move-away from home base and the penalty does not apply).
2) air units may cross a narrows with the expenditure of a single move (generally 1 point, or 2 points if either source or target is a double border region [Arabia->IEA])
3) a move across narrows does not count as "1-move-away" for the attack value penalty (i.e. from France to England incurs the penalty, even though the narrows rule makes it 1 move point away).

That way, you can get the planes across the channel without the effects of increased range in all the other theaters of the world, and the German's will initially face a big attack penalty for doing so. I imagine the penalty being -4.

This is tough to do. I have a bunch of stuff nearing patching status, I may put this off for a subsequent patch.

of course, it will be mod-able only. Joel doesn't want new rules (unless there is a real clamor for it [;)])

[tcart]

I have a slightly different perspective on this issue. Surely at the grand strategic level what we want here is an opportunity to contest control of the air over the UK, especially but not always in order to facilitate Sealion. But it's already possible to do this within the existing rules. I have successfully invaded England in a number of recent games, at least one of which is posted as an AAR. The battle played out more or less as it might have historically. German bombers attacked the RAF on the ground, pounding it into submission. Though I never cleared the air of fighters, I managed to suppress the RAF enough to facilitate a landing. It was costly to the Luftwaffe, as was the case in real life and surely would have been if a landing had been attempted.
 
Thus to my mind the Battle of Britain can be played out under the existing rules. If the British throw all of their resources into FTR and AA it won't work, but then that's probably historical as well. The key issue is that the German bombers must go in without fighter cover. Obviously this doesn't look historical on the face of it, but I think if you play it out you'll see that the BoB comes off more or less as one would expect.
 
As the Germans the trick is not to push for FTR speed 2, which obviously takes too long, but to get both HB and TAC to EV 6, which makes them pretty survivable versus the RAF throughout 1940-41.

[rjh1971]

ORIGINAL: tica

I have a slightly different perspective on this issue. Surely at the grand strategic level what we want here is an opportunity to contest control of the air over the UK, especially but not always in order to facilitate Sealion. But it's already possible to do this within the existing rules. I have successfully invaded England in a number of recent games, at least one of which is posted as an AAR. The battle played out more or less as it might have historically. German bombers attacked the RAF on the ground, pounding it into submission. Though I never cleared the air of fighters, I managed to suppress the RAF enough to facilitate a landing. It was costly to the Luftwaffe, as was the case in real life and surely would have been if a landing had been attempted.

Thus to my mind the Battle of Britain can be played out under the existing rules. If the British throw all of their resources into FTR and AA it won't work, but then that's probably historical as well. The key issue is that the German bombers must go in without fighter cover. Obviously this doesn't look historical on the face of it, but I think if you play it out you'll see that the BoB comes off more or less as one would expect.

As the Germans the trick is not to push for FTR speed 2, which obviously takes too long, but to get both HB and TAC to EV 6, which makes them pretty survivable versus the RAF throughout 1940-41.

Tim was able to launch a succesful Sealion because of several mistakes, this nonetheless doesn't take away his merit to such a succesful attack:

1. Even though I was fearing a Sealion, I thought that 4 fighters and 2 flaks (iirc) were going to be enough to fend off the german bombers, I was proved wrong.

2. I did not check on german TB and HB evasion ratings: fatal error, because otherwise I might have not moved the armour to Transjordan, in this case I don't think units would have been able to land.

3. France was taken in Wi40 a turn earlier than normal, I decided to risk attacking TLC in Autumn 39 searching to damage/destroy german units. Doing so early in the game can prove fatal in the next years for Germany, but left me without enough units to defend France, rolls favoured Tim.

4. Tim still has to conquer Scotland, we are presently in Fa41 and probably will fall this turn but he has neglected the eastern front and this can prove fatal unless they reach an automatic victory.

Overall he has performed terribly well and he will learn from his mistakes, like not commiting into an attrition battle in Scotland, noway I could have hold if he had done it with just the factories in Canada and the Commonwealth.
I have also paid a very high price to keep Scotland alive RN is a shadow of what it was, Africa is all grey and India and Australia are in jeopardize.

Regards.

[Petiloup]

My feeling would be more that if you increase Germany Fighters speed closer to 2 than you should increase British Fighters Evasion and Air Attack closer to 6 as well. After all the Spitfire was more than quite a match for the Me-109 and the Hurricane was perfect to attack the German bombers.

[Lebatron]

What I ended up trying was adding an extra British fighter to London to compensate for the free points in fighter range. I could of coarse try making British fighters tougher, but went with quantity instead because it just seemed right. Germany starts with 2 fighters so I wanted England to have the same.

Major powers starting fighters.
Germany 2
Italy 1
Britian was 1 now 2
US 2
Russia 2
Japan 2

After seeing it like that, it seems out of place for Britian to only have 1 starting fighter. So I'm trying out the balance using 2, using the free tech points and reducing the world standard of fighter range to 1. So far it seems to work much better than the standard setup. 

It could be interesting to see what Brian could add to the game engine to allow air penalties at range, but so far I'm finding that the changes I made satisfy my expectations rather well.

[WanderingHead]

BTW

It is actually possible in v1.011 to make land-to-land movement over a narrows (e.g. W France to England) a 1MP move. Make that border "impassible" and air units will be the only ones able to move over the border.

I've implemented the max-air-range penalty, so that air experiences a penalty at max range unless it is 1 move away from its airbase or CV. 1 move means 1 region, not 1MP, i.e. it can be a double border.

The exception to this "1 move from airbase" exception is when that one move is over an impassible borders, in which case the max-range penalty is still assessed.

Hence, air striking England from W France will have the penalty. I think this works better than increasing fighter range because it only applies to narrows, not everywhere.

IMO, with narrows movement, with air penalty at max range, some reduced German fighter tech (more in par with Britain), and fighters at cost 3, a very good BofB can be obtained.

I have much of this (except that fighter cost increase) in the latest version of Global Glory, but it only works with the test build.

[a511]

i really like the narrows movements rule!
i also support the fht cost 3 as its really annoying to find damaged RAF fhts just kind of re-generated after every GER air-raids.
these changes will surely encourage sealion as GER can do it right after the surrender of france.  that really opens a lot more options to the GER.
 
however, im not sure abt the propose change in GER fht tech. without doing any indepth research, i have the impression that in the early WWII, except for navy, the Gerries have a general adv ito quality (could be due to hardware, training or both) over the WAs. while philippe could correctly point out that quality of spitfire can at least match with that of me-109, i intend to leave the current AA and EV adv of GER fhts unchanged to reflect the quality diff.
 
in addition, taking into account the "max-air-range penalty", GER fhts under the stock game will be more or less in par with the RAF's in the battle of britain. accordingly, reduce of the GER fht tech further tend to over weakening them.
 
a511

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: a511
however, im not sure abt the propose change in GER fht tech. without doing any indepth research, i have the impression that in the early WWII, except for navy, the Gerries have a general adv ito quality (could be due to hardware, training or both) over the WAs.

I'd be interested in anyone who does have some research on the subject ... I don't really know myself.

My thinking is that for the B of B to work, Germans have to be at a real disadvantage over England. This is because the Germans have the numbers the British can never match. So, if the tech is on-par, then with the max range penalty they are indeed at a disadvantage over England.

I have a test version with GG, if you want it you can send me and Joel an email requesting it and promising not to further distribute the playtest executable. Actually, getting any games going on it is good since it gives more testing before the patch is released.

[Lebatron]

I believe during the B.O.B. Me-109's had fuel injection allowing them to preform negative G maneuvers. While not a killer advantage, it was something Allied pilots wished they could do. Eventually they could. Another reason I'm willing to accept an early German tech advantage is from the experience they recieved during the Spanish Civil war. It was a proving/training ground for the new German fighter. Hence by the time WW2 started they had really worked out the kinks and neared its peak potential. Even though it wasn't spanking new, there are advantages to having well tested designs. Lastly, it's my hunch that lowering the German fighters to be on par with Britian's would only deter the BOB and make the German player move his air power to the Med were it would be more useful, just as I stated in my opening paragraph of this thread. So to make it an option that a savy German player would consider, its got to be balanced so that the BOB does enough damage to the British to make the loss in German manpower worth it. If in the end, all it costs the Allies is some small loss in production its going to be very worthwhile for them to sucker the German player into this exchange to weaken Barbarossa and eventually win the game to easily. The balance tweaks I intend to try will leave the German advantage in place for now since the Allies can get to fighter EV 6 a few turns after France falls.