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Does anyone know how to keep allied bombers off jap transports ?
Currently playing scen. 17 and desperately trying to resupply Luganville.
Keep getting my transports hit by allied bombers on naval search missions I guess. I can fly cap over transports to prevent or hinder naval attack bombers, but whether cap or not these fortresses and marauders keep getting hits on my transports after spotting them----subs too come to think of it, although they could be flying asw patrol. No fighters ever interfere with these mystery bombers, and I have yet in the game seen my Jap bombers do the same thing, except attack subs during asw patrol.

yamato wrote:Does anyone know how to keep allied bombers off jap transports ?
Currently playing scen. 17 and desperately trying to resupply Luganville.
Keep getting my transports hit by allied bombers on naval search missions I guess. I can fly cap over transports to prevent or hinder naval attack bombers, but whether cap or not these fortresses and marauders keep getting hits on my transports after spotting them----subs too come to think of it, although they could be flying asw patrol. No fighters ever interfere with these mystery bombers, and I have yet in the game seen my Jap bombers do the same thing, except attack subs during asw patrol.

This has been discussed before as the "search/attack" routine and as far as I know there is no defense against it. It even occurs over any size base with existing CAP even in bad weather when all other planes are grounded.

If you could get your supply transports whereever you wanted them to go without them being threatened by enemy air power, there wouldnt be much of a game.

The whole struggle is keeping your troops supplied, that's one of the major points of the game. Your best bet is flying long range cap over them, but as you know it doesnt work too well.

I about fell out of my chair the other night when a Val from a CV of mine on a serch mishion hit a transport in Port after spoting it. Never sean that before.

Good to see someone else is in the same boat.

It's Christmas 1942, and the IJN owns everything north of Luganville. It's been a stunning campaign thus far, the ship kill ratio is about 8 to 1 in favour of the IJN overall, and the IJN is the only navy with carriers left (6 USN CVs sunk in exchange for 2 IJN CVs and one CVL). Just a couple of USN CVs left at Pearl, and there are still 3 IJN CVs, 1 CVL and 1 CVE in theatre to handle Intrepid and *forgot name, insert here*.

The USN surface fleet was similarly devastated around Lunga, after several USN cruiser/BB TFs were "reasoned" with by Kongo, Hiei, Haruna and about 90 Bettys. The Allies also lost about 50,000 men at Port Moresby, so every service has been given a good trouncing by the Imperial forces.

I hoped the final phase of the war would go pretty easily given all this success. 50,000 Jap troops were transported to Luganville easily enough, to siege out the 20,000 or so defenders.

And then... things went pear shaped.

The reason can be summed up by one word - Fortress.

It doesnt matter how many Zeroes go up against them, they survive. It doesnt matter what I do, how outnumbered they are, how elite, high moral and fresh my pilots are, the Fortress is unstoppable.

After seeing 8 Fortresses elude ~90 Zeroes over Luganville thanks to my carrier air (air wings retooled to be fighter heavy, as there arent many USN ships left to bomb, the Vals are staying at home) and utterly devastate heavily escorted transport squadrons more than once, I have come to the conclusion that once Fortresses start showing up in significant numbers, the IJN is doomed.

Those 500lb bombs the Fortress drops arent enough to send my ships straight to Davy Jones Locker, but all my ports are now packed with Sys ~30-50 CAs, CLs, DDs and APs. About 20 Fortresses have cleaned the clock of pretty much the entire IJ Navy.

Isnt this a little, er, wrong? 90 Zeroes against 8 Fortresses fails to score a single kill, regularly? I know the Flying Fortress was aptly named, but 20mm cannon shells do lots of damage, and 90 pairs of them should really cause some serious suffering.

At least with Hudsons, Lightnings, Dauntlesses et al, you can actually shoot them down. The Fortress is a superweapon, its the Death Star of World War 2.

Hey,

When I go out for a full out invasion with a large number of transports ships, I use a number of smaller ships as decoys, mainly PC, PG and mine sweepers, which are worthless in victory points. I also have a taskforce with good AA, following the transports. I feel that the heavy bomber commanders like to send the bombers to targets of high value, DD,CA, even a CV thus leaving ur AP, AK intact, enough to unload/load. Regarding CAP, i feel that its just slows the bombers down, maybe giving them abit of extra fatigue, or maybe some damage to them. Is it worth it? I think yes, that extra one bomb/torp could sink ur ships, so u could do without that. I dont think they is another way to protect ur transports other than the weather, but thats mostly based on luck sometimes.

Billy

EUBanana, The forts may not be as tough as you think. They can be damaged quite easily, and then a number will crash on the long way back to their base. For December 42, not a lot of them are showing up it appears. Allied bombers are deadly against ships docked and in port. Thay are fairly useless against moving ships. Also, the zero did not have 20mm cannons- firepower was a huge weakness for it.

I'm at work, so I can't check, but I thought the Zero was armed with 2 x 20mm? I noticed the Oscar only had machineguns, and I also noticed it seemed to be markedly inferior to the Zero in battle. But I could be wrong. (And my Oscar crews are all rookies anyway, so maybe they aren't doing their kite justice.).
I'm more of a Battle of Britain man myself, I'm not too familiar with the intricacies of this theatre. 8 machineguns was considered too weak there, I pity the Zero if it only had 2 machineguns...

And yes, I had thought about operational losses, it doesn't seem to be bothering the Forts much though, every day the same lot amble over to Luganville to wipe me out. Tonight I'll have a look and see how many Forts have been lost operationally.

Incidentally there are a lot more Forts in theatre than the ones at Luganville, but the other ones are elsewhere. The AI is sending 40 or so Forts against Port Moresby and Gili Gili - I have to admit that the much feared strategic heavy bombing which I expected later in the game (this is my first long (17) campaign so everything is unfamiliar) hasn't really materialised. I've got a squadron each of Zeroes and Oscars at PM and GG, and while they never shoot a Fort down, the Forts have never succeeded in making an airfield inoperable yet. I'm happy that the AI doesnt have them bombing my navy at Luganville, or I probably wouldn't -have- a navy by now...

I expected Fortresses to make my life miserable by bombing airfields very effectively, thus far that hasnt really happened, to my pleasant surprise. I was more shocked by how good the Forts were at mauling my navy, which I did not expect. I also assumed that Forts would be poor against warships and would be "relegated" to a mainly strategic role (ie bombing supplies and airfields rather than ships) , but they don't seem to be bad at bombing ships at all. My own level bombers at 6000 feet can't hit the broad side of a barn, but Forts seem to be able to. (Drop enough bombs and one will hit, I guess

Maybe they are more accurate because they are getting the transport TF when it is unloading and thus stationary?

(In other news I was impressed by how the Lightning seems to rip up Zeroes. Is the Zeke any good? Not got that baby yet, here's hoping it gives the IJN a chance in the air war when it shows).

Mind you, I suppose I should shut up and put up. Earlier in the game, right after the Siege of Port Moresby, the AI controlled USN made a major push towards Port Moresby. Lots of APs and AKs and a few CA level taskforces, but no carriers (all on the bottom *evil*) and thus no air support. They got mauled, -really- mauled, by my Betties, who took out about 60 ships. The Forts have had about 20 of mine in the same time, so I guess I shouldn't bitch too much. The difference is that Betties do at least get shot down... and against 90 Wildcats a mass Betty attack would suffer horrible losses, whereas Forts are immune to CAP it seems.

*eyes the hole in Kongo caused by a 500lb GP bomb carried by The Indestructible Aircraft, sighs*

RE. Billy, thats pretty much exactly what I did. I've got two air combat TFs about eight hexes north of Luganville providing air cover, four transport TFs constantly shuttling back and forth which are about 15 APs each plus about 5 decoys (MSWs, PCs, PGs, the odd DD) and one surface combat group at Luganville itself (CAs, CLs, DDs, a CS as a big decoy). I've lost (as in had sunk) only a handful of APs, but the system damage is really starting to mount up on that surface task force, and a lot of the transports are afloat but hurting. I've already pared down the air combat TFs to the absolute minimum to free up as many cruisers as possible, the IJN in my game really is scraping the bottom of the barrel for combat capable surface combatants at the moment. Even with the USN effectively not existing, I need these warships for the Final Big Push.

The Forts showed up to blunt my Big Push most rudely...

Am I doing this wrong btw? I am still using conventional transport TFs from Lunga to Luganville. Should I be using fast transport more perhaps? I did try it a couple of times but my fast transport TFs get jumped by bombers anyway, and they don't carry the amount of supplies an army of 50,000 needs. Seem to suffer all the pain (being bombed) but none of the gain (don't deliver the required supplies).

The Zero, A6M2 had two Type 99 MKI 20mm Cannons one each wing with a 60round drum each., the A6M3 had the same gun package then later in the production run was up guned to have two Type 99 MK II's with 100 rpg, and the 7.7mm's in both planes in the engine cowl. The 20mm Type 99's Fired a very effetive cannon round, the ammo loads used were primarly HEI heavy, with the tracer round being the APT type.

EUBanana wrote: I've got two air combat TFs about eight hexes north of Luganville providing air cover, four transport TFs constantly shuttling back and forth which are about 15 APs each plus about 5 decoys (MSWs, PCs, PGs, the odd DD) and one surface combat group at Luganville itself (CAs, CLs, DDs, a CS as a big decoy).

I'm just started playing UV, so was wondering how to assign an air combat taskforce to provide CAP to a transport (or other) TF...do you assign it to follow with the fighter squadrons set to long-range CAP.

Does this also apply to aircover for routine convoys controlled by the computer?

My search found NO reference in the manual to "Set TF to Follow" option, which is what I am referring to. Does this command do anything, except make one TF follow another like a dog on a lead?

In other similar games, a covering task force will steam ahead of its master TF it is covering, while a supporting TF will steam behind...this allows a carrier TF to have a surface TF steaming 2-3 hexes ahead of its master TF and a supporting air combat TF 2-3 hexes behind.

swagman wrote:I'm just started playing UV, so was wondering how to assign an air combat taskforce to provide CAP to a transport (or other) TF...do you assign it to follow with the fighter squadrons set to long-range CAP.

Does this also apply to aircover for routine convoys controlled by the computer?

My search found NO reference in the manual to "Set TF to Follow" option, which is what I am referring to. Does this command do anything, except make one TF follow another like a dog on a lead?

In other similar games, a covering task force will steam ahead of its master TF it is covering, while a supporting TF will steam behind...this allows a carrier TF to have a surface TF steaming 2-3 hexes ahead of its master TF and a supporting air combat TF 2-3 hexes behind.

The obvious way to do this is to have your main force set to "following" your cover force and have your supporting force set to"follow" the main force. If your main force is an air combat TF, it will "not react" if it is following another TF.

The zero vs forts debate has been beat to death in this forum. Historically, zeros did not have a lot of sucess against forts. The 20mm cannon was effective but has a slow rate of fire and low muzzle velocity. Problem was not the 20mm cannon but the zero itself. The 50 caliber MG typically found on the fort had great range and hitting power and could really hurt the fragile zeros before they could close. Good zero pilots could counter this by skilfull maneuver but this limited the time that a zero pilot could fire and required exceptional aim.

German pilots were sucessful against undefended forts but they developed exceptional group tactical skills-a must for taking out the big bombers, (something that Japanese pilots tended to disreguard) and developed sturdy heavily armed fighters that could take punishment.

In my scen #19 as the allies, I am not losing many bombers to zeros but losing about 3-5 bombers due to operational losses and AA per raid. With the woeful B17 replacment figures-this has really kept me from bombing Lunga into the ground. I expect later in the game this will be different.

I don't think that the zero vs fort results need to be changed much. I would rather see the effectiveness of forts vs ships reduced even more than they have been. Those that have been playing for a while remember how extremely deadly Allied medium and big bombers were against Japanese ships. Those of us that like to play the Allies fondly recall it as the "big happy bomber time". (Would you believe that I just made that up off the top of my head? What a genius!).

[QUOTE=crsutton]The zero vs forts debate has been beat to death in this forum. Historically, zeros did not have a lot of sucess against forts. The 20mm cannon was effective but has a slow rate of fire and low muzzle velocity. Problem was not the 20mm cannon but the zero itself. The 50 caliber MG typically found on the fort had great range and hitting power and could really hurt the fragile zeros before they could close. Good zero pilots could counter this by skilfull maneuver but this limited the time that a zero pilot could fire and required exceptional aim.

German pilots were sucessful against undefended forts but they developed exceptional group tactical skills-a must for taking out the big bombers, (something that Japanese pilots tended to disreguard) and developed sturdy heavily armed fighters that could take punishment.

In my scen #19 as the allies, I am not losing many bombers to zeros but losing about 3-5 bombers due to operational losses and AA per raid. With the woeful B17 replacment figures-this has really kept me from bombing Lunga into the ground. I expect later in the game this will be different.
....
QUOTE]

Personally, I am just finishing reading a book that covers this subject fairly well. (It should, as it is over 700pp long..) "Fire in the Sky: The air war in the South Pacific" by Eric Bergerud. If this wasn't used as background by the programmers, it should have; in addition, I think that all players should check it out. It covers a lot of the subject matter that is "beaten to death" in this forum and answers a lot of questions that I had thought about. One of which is the Fort vs Jap fighter question.

One passage I just read dealt with a gunner's view of the action. On page 551;
"...Then they'd climb up to one side of you. Then one at time, like kids jumping off a rope swing, they'd come down through the formation. That meant the gunners could concentrate on one at a time. ..."

Now compare this type of tactic to the camera films of German fighters attacking Forts over Europe; Entire Schwarms and Staffeln attacking simultaneously against the front/flanks of the formations. The author thinks that this is a combination of the poor/no radios in most Japanese fighters and the tradition of dogfighting that the Japanese Army/Navy air had developed in the 30's over China.

It also covers fighter usage and tactics and the disparity in the weapons and abilities of the planes. And the effectiveness of anti aircraft guns, both land and sea based. All in all, worth the week plus to read it for me. I hope some of you look for it (if you already haven't read it); it is worth the time.

Just a little food for thought...

Attacking the runway that happens to have B-17's at is the most effective way of destroying them. Planes don't manuver well when parked

Ship speed is inversely proportional to hit rates. Fast Transport TF's can get supplies in, barges are pretty immune can get supplies in. AP/AK are target practice. Don't use them for front line duty.

Smaller TF's are less likely to be spotted and attacked then larger TF's. They also spread out the planes into smaller groups which increases the odds on not getting a 500 pounder through the deck.

Other more drastic options. Give the AI something else to target. A tasty Capital ship will generally be targeted over a Transport. Transport makes it through, Capital ship shoots back and perhaps grounds the B-17 for a few extra days (possible operational loss on the way home too since plane is damaged).

Sounds like you are hording your ships in theater, so this may not be an option.

Finally put the time in to finish that game where the B17s were plaguing me to bed - I won.

While I was sieging Luganville those B17s sank over 30 APs. They were heavily escorted APs, as well. Didn't make any odds in the long run though, turns out I had enough APs to land a reasonable force in Luganville (though a lot of Japs had to swim home), and while I couldnt get in B17 range of Noumea without getting bombed, the USN was pretty much nonexistent at that point so it didnt matter. Luganville ran out of supplies, got whittled down by constant air bombardment, et voila, IJN victory.

I noticed that, behind torpedo bombers, the B17 had suffered the most casualties of all aircraft at the point the game ended. So I guess my Zero LRCAP and heavy warship escort did something after all.

Now I'm playing again as the Allies, to see what its like when I got the B17s under my own control. Bombing ships from 3000 feet with B17s is very effective - but not as good as Bettys/Nells. Having had a fleet practically wiped off the face of the planet by Bettys/Nells from Rabaul, I will not whine about the B17 any more.

500lb bombs send ships back to the repair yard, 18 inch torpedoes send them to Davy Jones Locker...

500lb bombs send ships back to the repair yard, 18 inch torpedoes send them to Davy Jones Locker...

Torpedoes sink ships, bombs provide air conditioning and skylights