Matrix Games Forums

Is it a worth while endevour to disband Heavy Bomber Squadrons or any squadron for that matter? I had several Squadron commanded by people who were apparently not smart enough to come in out of the rain, or atleast not look up at the sky with there mouth open until they drowned. I disbanded thier groups and placed them in with BS groups with very good comanders. I now have several BS of B-17's with experience near 70 with comanders with Leader ship and Inspiration near 75. I know that if you reduce the number of squadrons it makes it more difficult to keep fatigue down by rotating them, but are there any positives? If you have larger formations with better leaders are you more likely to get bigger formations flying? Is it going to be a mistake or does it matter?

UB

I do this quite a bit with B17 squadrons when I decide to use them in an aggressive manner. You usually end up with 15-20 squadrons with 3-6 planes each in them (because the replacement rate is so low) and its just a pain to reset all of them from night ops to day ops so you can stand them down. As you point out there are some minor advantages.

The minor disadvantage is a loss of flexibility but this isn't really very significant. Small groups of bombers aren't very potent weapons and still need size 4 airfields and so distribution of bombers to a bunch of bases isn't really useful (you usually concentrate all the sqns at one or two bases). Use of bombers for naval search can be done by specifying the per centage even for larger squadrons. Three-plane squadros can be useful for recon and I sometimes use them for this. I rarely use them for supply because they can't carry troops and they are too valuable for the relatively small amount of supply they carry.

I've not found any really significant advantages or disavantages to combining remnant squadrons, though. Its purely a convenience thing for me. What I'd like is to be able to split fighter squadrons to create smaller units for use at size 1 and 2 airfields. I believe that this option is one of the improvements in WitP and so a retrofit may be done some day for UV.

DJAndrews wrote:I do this quite a bit with B17 squadrons when I decide to use them in an aggressive manner. You usually end up with 15-20 squadrons with 3-6 planes each in them (because the replacement rate is so low) and its just a pain to reset all of them from night ops to day ops so you can stand them down. As you point out there are some minor advantages.

The minor disadvantage is a loss of flexibility but this isn't really very significant. Small groups of bombers aren't very potent weapons and still need size 4 airfields and so distribution of bombers to a bunch of bases isn't really useful (you usually concentrate all the sqns at one or two bases). Use of bombers for naval search can be done by specifying the per centage even for larger squadrons. Three-plane squadros can be useful for recon and I sometimes use them for this. I rarely use them for supply because they can't carry troops and they are too valuable for the relatively small amount of supply they carry.

I've not found any really significant advantages or disavantages to combining remnant squadrons, though. Its purely a convenience thing for me. What I'd like is to be able to split fighter squadrons to create smaller units for use at size 1 and 2 airfields. I believe that this option is one of the improvements in WitP and so a retrofit may be done some day for UV.

I recently bought the Morison hsitory of the Navy in the war and apparently B-17s were used at lest once to carry troops for a para landing in New Guinea-I think these were australian solders that were laoded and dropped. I've been skipping around a lot with my readingin these boooks trying to bring myself up to the point where I knew a bit more about soem of the details of this period. Splitting up squadrons is a good idea and as you say especially for smaller airfields or for the Pbys for scouting misssions.

Peter, B17s may have carried troops historically but I don't think they can in the game (at least I haven't been able to figure out a way). Their mission list include supply, but not troop transport.

DJAndrews wrote:I do this quite a bit with B17 squadrons when I decide to use them in an aggressive manner. You usually end up with 15-20 squadrons with 3-6 planes each in them (because the replacement rate is so low) and its just a pain to reset all of them from night ops to day ops so you can stand them down. As you point out there are some minor advantages.

The minor disadvantage is a loss of flexibility but this isn't really very significant. Small groups of bombers aren't very potent weapons and still need size 4 airfields and so distribution of bombers to a bunch of bases isn't really useful (you usually concentrate all the sqns at one or two bases). Use of bombers for naval search can be done by specifying the per centage even for larger squadrons. Three-plane squadros can be useful for recon and I sometimes use them for this. I rarely use them for supply because they can't carry troops and they are too valuable for the relatively small amount of supply they carry.

I've not found any really significant advantages or disavantages to combining remnant squadrons, though. Its purely a convenience thing for me. What I'd like is to be able to split fighter squadrons to create smaller units for use at size 1 and 2 airfields. I believe that this option is one of the improvements in WitP and so a retrofit may be done some day for UV.

Look closely at the leader's stats before you choose which groups to withdraw and which groups to beef up. Good leaders are important. Regularly cull out the weaklings and send them back to "train up" another group. When they show up again, just repeat.

In my opinion you are better off with fewer, somewhat overstrengthed groups with good leaders. Mass these against one target at a time and you can achieve good results while losses are replaced at about equal rates.

Normally I regularly disband or withdraw the b-17's when I get near that 3-4 plane range. As mentioned earlier its due to the poor replacement rate, and I'd rather have fewier larger sq's then many smaller ones. But I have disbanded other sqds if they don't seem to be up to snuff. Most notable was a P-39 squadron that got shot all to @#$% over PM. Even sitting them back at Brisbane for a month didn't help the matter.