Matrix Games Forums

This is about my game with Quantas.
We are up to December '44.

It seems that the AI prefers to assign 109s to Map units while better aircraft go to WE, is there a reason for this ? There are ample 190s in the pool which I think are better fighters as well as 262s.
Or maybe I have this wrong and the later 109s are better ?

Earlier in the game I was manually assigning 190s to map units but when I put them on Auto the AI swapped them out for 109s.

It is not so easy to control it all manually:
It takes a couple of turns as they have to be moved away from the front line and then forward again - and there is a dire shortage of fighter units available to cover the front.
You need to keep a check on them to make sure any particular mark of aircraft is not running low.
Am not sure about this one - but is there a malus for manually changing aircraft that doesn't apply to auto ?

playing either side I usually manually control the fighter change outs

An yes if the you let the pools build up it will send the FW190s to the air units in the TBs

Same with the soviets if you let pools build up the AI will start taking the good fighters for the TBs

Manual control is best to make sure you have the correct fighter types in the right spots.

An yes if the you let the pools build up it will send the FW190s to the air units in the TBs

I can understand that it would send the 190s to the TBs, that is reasonable enough.
What doesn't seem reasonable is that there is a glut of 190s in the pool but instead the AI prefers to equip map units with 109s.
Maybe the only solution is to keep them on manual.

In my current game as Axis the only eastern front air groups with FW190s are the ones I manually converted not a single one did it automatically with AI.

You could say almost historical as the Luftwaffe thought the Me 109 was more than good enough to defeat the soviets and did prioritize the FW190s for the Western front and Italy due to better Western Allied aircraft and pilots.

Without doing a lot of research:
"In certain ways, the Fw 190 would prove to be a more reliable aircraft than the Bf 109. It handled well on the ground, and its wide undercarriage suited it to the frequently primitive circumstances on the Eastern Front. Because of its radial engine, it could also withstand more damage than the Bf 109 and survive. A Fw 190 returned to base with two-cylinder heads shot off on one flight in mid-1943.

The Luftwaffe, deployed multiple Fw 190 units to the Eastern Front during the war, including Jagdgeschwader (JG) 1, JG 3, JG 26, and JG 51."

This one is interesting, seems that the 109s were in the majority but far from 100%
https://airpages.ru/eng/lw/fw190abp.shtml

yes in general the FW190 is regarded as a better plane than the ME109.

Priority and first use did go to the Western front.

Alot were used on the eastern front later as well tho....esp the FB versions.

Is alot of equipment switching that goes on in the game....the spaghetti code im sure is an amazing mess for this game being that originally i think much of comes from the game made 20 years ago and has just been modified over and over again for new versions.

Each version has gotten basically better but many under the hood issues have never been fully addressed or fixed.

As the American bomber offensive was hitting full stride in 1944, it was generally accepted within Luftwaffe circles that the more heavily armed FW-190 was best equipped to deal with the B-17s. In fact one variant of the FW-190 was so heavily laden that they actually needed 109s to escort them against the American fighters. This coupled with the fact that just comparing aircraft, the last 109K version (Kurfurst) was perfectly capable of dealing with any Soviet fighter plane. Of course by this time, pilot skill disparity had greatly narrowed as there simply wasn't enough aviation fuel remaining for a proper training program for new Luftwaffe pilots. As a result a lot of them perished in the west towards war's end.

many laterwar 109s hade a higher-alt engine but that was not really needed in the East (/AS,G-10,K), the G-6 and the Methanol-update G-14 was all they needed there.