Recon tips

[Stamb]

I was tired of a recon results where half of my hexes that i selected had 0 recon value while other half had great recon results. So i decide to make a test and share results with community.
Maybe somebody find this post useful.

This test were performed with a Soviet recon planes SB-2 in clear weather.

Here are our recon targets:


this is WRONG recon settings, just to show what results it will produce:


i specifically set fly path not to go over a units and to get only pure recon results
also i changed loadout to 3x mid lvl camera
as by default there are none

Its a poor result, 5 hexes with 5-30 recon value, other with 0



Now here is a proper setup if you want to get at least 1 recon value in each of the hexes:
there are 22 hexes where we want to fly recon

So i decided to fly with the following setup:
every day of the week
which gives 7 days * 3 strikes per day = 21 (hexes in theory) which gave 20 hexes checked
and 3 planes (Req AC) to get more recon value, as i was also experimenting with a one plane per strike

All other settings are the same.

Results:
in swamp/light woods there is at least 1 recon value
in clear hexes: 12, 8 , 9 recon value



It means that if you want to cover more hexes - you should increase strikes count OR/AND days when recon is flying
while increasing planes count - increases quality of a recon


For example this 2 setups will work the same.
1. 3 days per week with 7 strikes per day
2. 7 days per week with 3 strikes per day

Result will be - 21 hexes checked. (unless area for recon was smaller than 21 hexes)


I was testing many more setups with a high level cameras, medium level cameras, different altitudes and so on.
It does not matter in the end. Ops losses and recon results were the same.

But i have to admin that there is difference if planes do not have any cameras equipped. Recon will be much worse. So remember to check planes loadout before flying recon.

Also i was even asking for a 12 planes per strike but still did not manage to identity unit type in non clear hexes. And for a clear hexes it was enough to have 3 SB-2 with cameras per strike.

[homer82]

This is very interesting, thanks for the time and effort that went into this, Stamb.

[loki100]

Given the longer term I don't think you can sustain a 7 day/week allocation. The Soviets start with a lot of recon but even being careful it gets very short come mid-42 and you usually only have 2 air groups/front come 1943.

So this sort of real commitment is probably not sustainable and only really worth it if you really need a lot of information?

[Stamb]

7 days per week is irrelevant without specifying number of strikes.
As i wrote above.

Just run a test and here are results:

1.png (482.51 KiB) Viewed 1579 times

There will be same losses if i fly 3 days with 7 strikes per day.
In my opinion it is well worth it and it will be rarely used and then frontline will be static.

For example only because of a proper recon i was able to achive this:
https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 0#p4989950

[TheFerret]

Given the longer term I don't think you can sustain a 7 day/week allocation. The Soviets start with a lot of recon but even being careful it gets very short come mid-42 and you usually only have 2 air groups/front come 1943.

So this sort of real commitment is probably not sustainable and only really worth it if you really need a lot of information?

The game suggests a far higher cadence for recon missions. For example, if I designate a 3-tile area for recon, it suggests 6 recon sorties per day. The number of days is up to doctrine, but a) it would be odd if the suggested sorties were for one day only ("in Soviet Russia, we only do recon on Tuesdays") and b) if we had 6 sorties, wouldn't it be better in terms of ops losses to assign 1 per day across 6 days?

[Stamb]

b) if we had 6 sorties, wouldn't it be better in terms of ops losses to assign 1 per day across 6 days?

i thought the same,
but tests shows that ops losses gonna be the same in both cases

[Stamb]

here is a save if someone is interested
test setup is near Pskov

Save turn 003 7-6-1941 So.zip

(1.95 MiB) Downloaded 37 times

[Stamb]

previous save is with a rain,
here is with a clear weather:

no rain finally lol.zip

(1.96 MiB) Downloaded 30 times

[Lurberri]

Although the initial images are no longer visible, I understand the intended message. I agree that this is the best approach. The way the game handles reconnaissance is clunky and overwhelming, leading to massive losses. The system proposed here requires more micromanagement, but it is infinitely better and more sustainable in the long run. Small groups of reconnaissance aircraft (or even individual planes) attract far fewer fighters and, if managed effectively over the seven days, they can cover large areas with less overall mileage (and therefore, fewer operational losses).

[Stamb]

Although the initial images are no longer visible, I understand the intended message. I agree that this is the best approach. The way the game handles reconnaissance is clunky and overwhelming, leading to massive losses. The system proposed here requires more micromanagement, but it is infinitely better and more sustainable in the long run. Small groups of reconnaissance aircraft (or even individual planes) attract far fewer fighters and, if managed effectively over the seven days, they can cover large areas with less overall mileage (and therefore, fewer operational losses).

Hello. I think images were lost when forum got an update. But text itself should be sufficient, i hope, to show how to use recon. I still use the same approach in my games.

[Lurberri]

But text itself should be sufficient, i hope, to show how to use recon.

Yes, that's clear

[terry1040]

I have a further complementary approach to the above.

While all of what has been said about the number of hexes, daily sorties and number of aircraft is very valid, I also started playing around with the specific routing of the recon directive.

What you see in the picture below, is an assignement of 6 sorties/day within 4 days covering a total of 21 hexes.

The inbound route (green) was intentionally using the northern route to finally end in the center hex (which is the target hex for that recon directive). The outbound route is the purple line.

SCE01-VL-Recon.jpg (4.31 MiB) Viewed 84 times

As you can see, the recon values of the northern inbound segments are significantly better than the later legs for outbound. All planes are equipped with Mid-Level cameras and the flight altitude was 9000ft.

My conclusion is, that all cameras are always active while following the legs.

The later into the flight, the less accruate the recon becomes (probably due to fatuge/disruption etc.), but overall this strategy delivers great results as well.

Cheers
terry