Good to know UBER Cap is gone

[castor troy]

And every year again, Bugs Bunny meets up with Santa Clause to bring some eggs for Easter... the more time I spend with AE the more often I think I could have saved my money and could just start another WITP campaign.







Morning Air attack on 21st Ind.Mixed Brigade, at 48,91 (Palembang)

Weather in hex: Heavy cloud

Raid detected at 40 NM, estimated altitude 11,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 15 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A5M4 Claude x 9
A6M2 Zero x 21



Allied aircraft
139WH-3 x 35


No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
139WH-3: 18 destroyed, 6 damaged

Japanese ground losses:
51 casualties reported
Squads: 1 destroyed, 1 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 6 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 2 (1 destroyed, 1 disabled)



Aircraft Attacking:
6 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb
1 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb
6 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb
4 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb

CAP engaged:
Ryujo-1 with A6M2 Zero (9 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(9 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
9 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Raid is overhead
Shoho-1 with A5M4 Claude (3 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(9 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
3 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 6 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 16 minutes
Zuiho-1 with A6M2 Zero (4 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(7 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 3 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 6000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 15 minutes
Hosho-1 with A6M2 Zero (5 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(5 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
5 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 13000
Raid is overhead

Also attacking 12th JAAF Base Force ...
Also attacking 21st Ind.Mixed Brigade ...
Also attacking 12th JAAF Base Force ...
Also attacking 21st Ind.Mixed Brigade ...
Also attacking 12th JAAF Base Force ...


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on 21st Ind.Mixed Brigade, at 48,91 (Palembang)

Weather in hex: Heavy cloud

Raid detected at 40 NM, estimated altitude 9,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 15 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A5M4 Claude x 4
A6M2 Zero x 16



Allied aircraft
139WH-3 x 24


No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
139WH-3: 11 destroyed, 4 damaged

Japanese ground losses:
18 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 4 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 1 (0 destroyed, 1 disabled)
Vehicles lost 3 (0 destroyed, 3 disabled)



Aircraft Attacking:
8 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb
3 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb

CAP engaged:
Zuiho-1 with A6M2 Zero (2 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(2 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
2 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 1 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 6000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 25 minutes
Ryujo-1 with A6M2 Zero (6 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(8 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
6 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 5 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 19 minutes
Shoho-1 with A5M4 Claude (4 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Raid is overhead
Hosho-1 with A6M2 Zero (1 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
1 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 1 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 13000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 19 minutes

Also attacking 12th JAAF Base Force ...
Also attacking 21st Ind.Mixed Brigade ...


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on Sasebo 3rd SNLF, at 48,91 (Palembang)

Weather in hex: Heavy cloud

Raid spotted at 26 NM, estimated altitude 8,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 9 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A5M4 Claude x 3
A6M2 Zero x 6



Allied aircraft
139WH-3 x 17


No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
139WH-3: 2 destroyed, 9 damaged



Aircraft Attacking:
6 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb
8 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb

CAP engaged:
Shoho-1 with A5M4 Claude (3 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Raid is overhead
Hosho-1 with A6M2 Zero (1 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
1 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 13000
Raid is overhead
Ryujo-1 with A6M2 Zero (4 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Raid is overhead
Zuiho-1 with A6M2 Zero (1 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
1 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 6000
Raid is overhead



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on 12th JAAF Base Force, at 48,91 (Palembang)

Weather in hex: Heavy cloud

Raid spotted at 35 NM, estimated altitude 6,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 13 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A5M4 Claude x 2
A6M2 Zero x 2



Allied aircraft
139WH-3 x 9


No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
139WH-3: 1 destroyed, 2 damaged

Japanese ground losses:
8 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled



Aircraft Attacking:
8 x 139WH-3 bombing from 6000 feet
Ground Attack: 3 x 300 kg GP Bomb

CAP engaged:
Shoho-1 with A5M4 Claude (2 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
2 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Raid is overhead
Hosho-1 with A6M2 Zero (1 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
1 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 13000
Raid is overhead
Ryujo-1 with A6M2 Zero (1 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
1 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Raid is overhead



ahh, who cares, kill rate is as least as good as in WITP but the replacement rates have been decreased by a factor of 10. But don´t forget, if you start as the Japanese, you will still be able to build hundreds of superb aircraft, starting in mid 42 until at least 6/45.









50 out of 89 bombers shot down, don´t have the confirmation yet but it seems this was LEAKING Cap from mini KB out to THREE hexes... someone give me some alcohol because pills don´t help when playing this game.

The fact that I´m losing 30 Catalinas a month to ops and only get 17 back doesn´t make the game any better either. This from flying limited nav search...

Edit: and just to point out: NO, this is no Knavey, it´s just something that happened last turn.

[TulliusDetritus]

35 [American] Catalinas? [X(]

7 PBY4s
8 PBY5s

15 here (search: 12 hexes, 50% search + 30% train = 80% of the guys are earning their daily lentils, hehehe)

EDITED: anyway, 5 feb = 2 months of game. Total losses (28 + 7) / 2 = 17,5 per month (more or less my losses). Am I missing something? I mean, you said 30 per month [:)]

[sven6345789]

actually, if you use your fighters as bombers, approaching at 6000 feet, giving the japanese both the maneuver advantage and the height-advantage, what do you expect?
i mean really[8|]

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: TulliusDetritus

35 [American] Catalinas? [X(]

7 PBY4s
8 PBY5s

15 here (search: 12 hexes, 50% search + 30% train = 80% of the guys are earning their daily lentils, hehehe)

EDITED: anyway, 5 feb = 2 months of game. Total losses (28 + 7) / 2 = 17,5 per month (more or less my losses). Am I missing something? I mean, you said 30 per month [:)]

PB4s have been lost also. 30 per month was overrated, but more than I get as replacements. Those are only the op losses and replacements can´t keep up with them.

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: sven6345789

actually, if you use your fighters as bombers, approaching at 6000 feet, giving the japanese both the maneuver advantage and the height-advantage, what do you expect?
i mean really[8|]

you´re not serious that those were fighters? [&:]

or do you think those Dutch "fighters" would drop 3x300kg bombs?

[bradfordkay]

ORIGINAL: sven6345789

actually, if you use your fighters as bombers, approaching at 6000 feet, giving the japanese both the maneuver advantage and the height-advantage, what do you expect?
i mean really[8|]

sven... while I do not agree with Castor's thesis, those are Martin bombers (in the USAAC they were known as B-10s), not fighters.

[sven6345789]

right, got them mixed up with the AVG
but, these bombers are from the 1930s. You know how Luftwaffe bombers performed unescorted, or generally unescorted bombers. So the point i am trying to make becomes more clear. It shows the air model is working. Sending bombers in unescorted is a bad mistake. Has been in real life, has always been.
And some of them still got through and pressed home the attack.Tht is what i call brave.

[tazaaron]

Ive never had any luck with the Dutch 139WH-3 either, they get shot down in droves anywhere they go and they did get jumped from above and got what they deserved. Not a very good plane and shouldnt be used anywhere around fighters unless the fighters have 2 tiers of wings on them. Dont know if you can blame the cap on this one, i would blame the plane and getting jumped from above.

Aaron

[Nemo121]

Hmm, it seems to me that we shouldn't be at all surprised that cannon-armed defending fighters would be able to shoot down slow, under-armed bombers in relatively high numbers.

You may have been unlucky in those raids but I think that vs cannon-armed defender you must expect the 139WH3 to die in droves and that doesn't seem too unreasonable to me.

[aprezto]

Umm, I am seeing half your bombers making it to the target and bombing, despite having no fighter escorts and being opposed by naval piloted zeros. In WitP Vanilla none of your bombers would have made it, any remnants bugging out and going home.
 
I think this is a great indicator of how CAP is not uber and how bombing missions can still get through. And how doing so is a very bad idea if you want to continue a bombing campaign, as bombers without escort DO get chewed up, if not completely destroyed as in Vanilla.

[castor troy]

50 out of 89? 30 perhaps but not 50. Or is someone trying to explain me that two dozen Zeroes all shot down 2 bombers? Well, they did here, but 50 is a number that you guys seem to know from WITP. But mixing WITP with reality is odd.

Guys, 50 bombers. But hey, of course those bombers could be that slow that the Zeroes were flying back to their carriers, landed, rearmed and took them on once more. The carriers are 120 miles away and the fighters get vectored in by radar. This is mini KB and radar vectors the fighters in. All really reasonable and fine. Good thing about it is that everything that I´ve learned on this forum the last couple of years was complete BS. Wow, you all lulled me into something the last couple of years.

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: aprezto

Umm, I am seeing half your bombers making it to the target and bombing, despite having no fighter escorts and being opposed by naval piloted zeros. In WitP Vanilla none of your bombers would have made it, any remnants bugging out and going home.

I think this is a great indicator of how CAP is not uber and how bombing missions can still get through. And how doing so is a very bad idea if you want to continue a bombing campaign, as bombers without escort DO get chewed up, if not completely destroyed as in Vanilla.

anyone open eyes please? You tell me I should be glad that bombers got through? Heck, there were 2 dozen Zeroes, do you think that one out of 89 bombers would have made it through if there were 40 Zeroes then?

What a pity no PBEM is far enough to field a 200 Hellcat Cap and a poor strike of 100 Betties gets chopped to pieces, hence resulting in only a .5 kill rate of every fighter while these achieved a 2:0

[aprezto]

I don't see 89 bombers arriving in one flight, I see 3 or so flights of bombers. IMO the fighters get time to regroup to fall on the next incoming raid. In each raid you appear to lose about half the unescorted bomber force - I find that acceptable. I do agree with you that since this is a stand off force that maybe the fighters should fall more rapidly in number as they retire to re-arm. And I certainly agree with you that 2 fighters doing the bulk of the killing is off the mark - but then you've only just supplied that info.
IMO (again) I would be a little miffed if I had managed to put CAP above a target that didn't then take a largish chunk of an incoming group of unescorted raids.
I do take your point about the 200 hellcats. I would imagine an unescorted, multiple of 100 betties would get creamed. But then I'd expect that. Potentially we have a difference of that opinion.

[sven6345789]

actually i count
30 fighters vs. 35 bombers
20 fighters vs. 24 bombers
9 fighters vs. 17 bombers and
4 fighters vs. 9 bombers

looks a little different than 24 vs. 89

[Panther Bait]

Sorry, CT, but I have to agree with the others.  This might have been an example of a really good result for the IJN, but it's not completely incomprehensible.  30 fighters shooting down 50 bombers isn't impossible, especially when the bombers are obsolete and unescorted.

[khyberbill]

Dont expect much from the early Dutch. I generally end up withdrawing the fighters and bombers and save on the points and deny the Japanese the combat experience. You can cut down drastically on your ops losses with the Catalinas by reducing their range by 25% and flying no more than 50% of the squad per turn. Ops losses drop considerably, I see less than 1 a month now. As for going back to WITP, I can't until they bring sub patrol zones, way points etc.

If you dont train up your Allied pilots, they will also have a tough time engaging the Japanese.

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: sven6345789

actually i count
30 fighters vs. 35 bombers
20 fighters vs. 24 bombers
9 fighters vs. 17 bombers and
4 fighters vs. 9 bombers

looks a little different than 24 vs. 89

you are talking about fighters I am talking about Zeroes, of which not 24 were there but 21. Didn´t know the 75mm cannon armed Claudes are now bomber eating beasts too.

[aprezto]

Did the claudes do a large amount of the damage?

[castor troy]

people, I´m not saying there shouldn´t be a slaughter. All the books you´ve read, what were slaughters? How were the loss rates? A slaughter in this case would be 30 bombers lost, a slaughter for the Dutch that they probably couldn´t believe.

How many incidents can you bring up with all the thousands of examples you´ve all together read in all your books that saw two dozen fighters take down 50 bombers? No matter what bombers, no matter what fighters. How many?

Perhaps I´ve just broke the record for the war in the Pacific and perhaps it never happens again. Ok, but where´s the difference to WITP? Where´s the difference to WITP when sweeping land based Zeroes take out P-40s on Cap at a 6 or 7:1 rate? I can´t see it other than the fact that in WITP there are three times higher replacements. [&:]

I love both WITP and AE but the common feeling at the moment from playing and reading a lot of AARs (that actually show the combat reports) is not really convincing me about a lot of things said that now turn out not to be what it was "expected". Even with WITP Nikmod I can make it less bloody. This is just one instance, there are many other things going on (as you can see on the forum). I´m not complaining about the EUR 50, nor about what I paid for WITP. Spending these amounts of money are peanuts, it´s more about the blood and sweat you put into your ongoing games and AARs and the expectations you have (due to what you´ve been told) that then seem to turn out being only exploding bubbles at times.

Meeting those fighters over Palembang was a good move of my opponent and you can only applaud it. But the Dutch losing 70% of their total bombers in one strike... and we´re not talking about ongoing fights during the day, this was one base launching 89 bombers to attack a troop stack in the same hex sitting at the front fighting Dutch units at Palembang. Two dozen of fighters against three times as many bombers, just too many losses IMO and something that perhaps never happened in real life, no matter what fighter met what bomber. And if it happened, how often? Even if you are a slow bomber, if the one that is attacked bails out to the West and you´re going East you gain a lot of ground, and if ther are three bombers for every fighter, you have a lot of choices. Waiting to get shot down surely wouldn´t be a choice, no matter what crap you fly

[frank1970]

Castor, I see 45 Zeros in your reports. Can you verify they were all the same or is it possible, that MiniKB could have managed these numbers by permanently replacing them??

http://books.google.de/books?id=IzJUlCp ... q=&f=false

As for destroying lots of enemy aircraft with little losses on one day in little missions, just follow the link above.
Unprepared Soviet pilots and planes were lost in masses to German fighters in the beginning days of barbarossa.

Don´t forget the extremely heavy losses of the Brits when attacking the panzerships on monday, 18th december 1939. And that were quite stable Wellingtons getting the stick, loosing more than 60% of their number. 44 attacking bombers, 34 shot down (offical German numbers)Brits say 15 lost of 22.
This is quite in the range of the losses your forces suffered.
So, it isn´t that unrealistic loosing heavily when using unescorted bombers.