Airwar Gripes

Gary Grigsby’s War in the East: The German-Soviet War 1941-1945 is a turn-based World War II strategy game stretching across the entire Eastern Front. Gamers can engage in an epic campaign, including division-sized battles with realistic and historical terrain, weather, orders of battle, logistics and combat results.

The critically and fan-acclaimed Eastern Front mega-game Gary Grigsby’s War in the East just got bigger and better with Gary Grigsby’s War in the East: Don to the Danube! This expansion to the award-winning War in the East comes with a wide array of later war scenarios ranging from short but intense 6 turn bouts like the Battle for Kharkov (1942) to immense 37-turn engagements taking place across multiple nations like Drama on the Danube (Summer 1944 – Spring 1945).

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Ketza
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by Ketza »

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

Ketza, it's 1943 and you are inflicting losses at a 10:1 ratio.

My own view is that what 76mm is doing is a huge waste of time and resources. He's actually probably retarding the progression of the Red Air Force by pushing it this way. He's feeding you free kills and preventing his own guys from getting good experience. It's just grossly inefficient. He only gets away with this because of the massive Soviet production edge, but spamming bombing missions this way is, frankly, mulish and counterproductive.

(The real way to crap all over the Luftwaffe is by CAP and flak. Which may well be too effective. That is to say, more or less what Q-ball is doing.)


I certainly wont complain about my air loss ratio but it is something I have managed closely from day one of the 76mm game. (I think its a holdover from my WITPAE days)

I still think airbase attacks are an issue.




JAMiAM
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by JAMiAM »

ORIGINAL: Helpless
I am still generally seeing about a 3:1 overall loss ratio favoring the Axis

In you save ratio is ~1:5. Not all losses are reported immediately after the battle.

Hi Pavel,

That ratio is skewed by the first turn's 4000+ Soviet planes destroyed. After factoring out that, and the last couple of turns recon/interceptor losses, the ratio is about 3:1, pretty reliably. The other skewing factor, of course, is the higher Soviet training losses.
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BletchleyGeek
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by BletchleyGeek »

ORIGINAL: Helpless
It's fixed for all practical purposes. The exchange ratios ought to discourage anybody from doing them. There's easier and better ways to knock down the enemy air force than bombing their bases, which is far and away the most expensive way to do it

That's right, Flavio.
*knocks on wood*
Someone was knocking too hard ;) and this get me back to the CAP code and I found that some limits didn't work as expected.

I'd love that you cared to ellaborate further why don't you think Luftwaffe air losses are out of whack. This would help me to analyze the proper data in an adequate way. Data that I'm painstakingly collecting by hand, by the way.

They do certainly look like as completely out of whack. And I'd love even more that you, or anybody, explained to us in a comprenhensive way how to handle the air war, now or after that revision, because the manual - and the knowledge in the community - is far from adequate, especially wrt explaining actual mechanics and how do aircraft attributes relate to those. Also giving a comprenhensive explanation of how air doctrine sliders work - with actual concrete gameplay examples, mind you - would also help a lot.

Thanks [:)]

PS: Interdiction missions - what some Axis players think to be the "safest" role for the Luftwaffe - really aren't. Last turn I managed - or rather I should say that rather than me, these too black-box mechanics are in charge, so the credit should go to them - to achieve a 2.5:1 exchange ratio in favour of the VVS. Sincerely, the outcomes look like as if the Soviet Union had AWACS planes vectoring interceptors on enemy aircraft. Just far, far too effective, and saying "out of whack" is not a hyperbolic statement by any reasonable measure.
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Helpless
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by Helpless »

They do certainly look like as completely out of whack

I think the one who comes with such bold statement should prove it. So far in many saves I've seen I don't witness any anomalies. Including your game.
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janh
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by janh »

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek
And I'd love even more that you, or anybody, explained to us in a comprehensive way how to handle the air war, now or after that revision, because the manual - and the knowledge in the community - is far from adequate, especially wrt explaining actual mechanics and how do aircraft attributes relate to those. Also giving a comprenhensive explanation of how air doctrine sliders work - with actual concrete gameplay examples, mind you - would also help a lot.

Thanks [:)]

PS: Interdiction missions - what some Axis players think to be the "safest" role for the Luftwaffe - really aren't. Last turn I managed - or rather I should say that rather than me, these too black-box mechanics are in charge, so the credit should go to them - to achieve a 2.5:1 exchange ratio in favour of the VVS. Sincerely, the outcomes look like as if the Soviet Union had AWACS planes vectoring interceptors on enemy aircraft. Just far, far too effective, and saying "out of whack" is not a hyperbolic statement by any reasonable measure.

I would also wish for a more detailed "guide" on how to use the Luftwaffe in a most efficient way. Turn 1 and 2 with extensive airfield bombardments appear to be very successful, and easy to handle. But deeper into the GC I kind of loose the handle on the air war, at least it feels like it. Maybe it is in part because it is a much more abstracted system that doesn't show a lot of events and mechanics going on behind the scenes, unlike in the way in AE that I am so used to. Maybe I am just misusing the Luftwaffe.

Whether the vectoring of CAP is too efficient as BG's questions, I don't know. It would indeed seem that it is comparably effective to vector the majority of "readiness" or "patrolling" fighters from a set of airfields into a CAP action a few hexes away as it is to join up an attacking bombers and fighters for pre-scheduled missions.

I know that I can use that to my benefit in later turns, though. I found that putting together strike packages consisting of minimum of bombers escorted by large groups of good fighters, where large means at least #(axis F/FB) >= expected #(VVS F/FB), can act as a reverse CAP trap. Key to it appears to be the range, though, so I pick targets that are ideally less than 6-8 hexes from my bases, while maximizing the distance to the VVS airbases. Range seems to have stronger effects on losses (operative and loss of damaged returning ones?). This gives a ratio of 4:1 or 5:1, often better, in fighter losses in 41 or 42 -- not too bad. Does sound gamey though?

What I makes me wonder as well is that the bomber losses in general and not limited to single-engine ground support planes as mentioned somewhere above, tend to be "horrendous" when on ground support missions (in the sense of steadily and rather rapidly attriting Luftwaffe assets). Interdiction seems to be less costly, but too often the escorts are too few (perhaps I overused the F in my supply flights or runs the previous turn?) or perform below my expectations.

I know people including ComradeP point out the value of ground support in combat, and also interdiction should lead to noticeable effects, but even with 100 bombers involved I so far rarely find them to play key roles. Not sure what I am doing wrong, but I restricted myself to selective bombing runs of key hexes, and else feel the Luftwaffe bombers best perform supply runs except in winter, where they can recuperate in Germany. I see a few casualties, some equipment hits, and several disrupted elements, which despite a 50-100 bombers involved hardly seems to lower the defenders abilities. The Wehrmacht is in relative terms already strong enough to handle most stacks own, so rather not waste bombers or mission miles on GS.

However, this is a little unexpected as it is commonly accepted that the Germans perfected a close air-ground interaction and that the success of German Blitzkrieg tactics was in part due to the close support provided by Luftwaffe? The way I seem to misuse it, it rather is a fuel hauler...
Any advice is greatly appreciated...
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BletchleyGeek
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by BletchleyGeek »

ORIGINAL: Helpless
They do certainly look like as completely out of whack

I think the one who comes with such bold statement should prove it. So far in many saves I've seen I don't witness any anomalies. Including your game.

If this isn't an anomaly, I don't know what it is.

[center]Image[/center]

As far as I know the A-50 Beriev (or Mainstay as known in the west) first flight was in 1978. I can't find any reference about a PVO network of radar stations as the one available to the British during the Battle of Britain. Sincerely, seeing 120 fighters scrambling to intercept an operational interdiction event is ludicrous and speaks loudly about the air model in WitE.

Local air superiority contests out of the air model = "flying ponies" results as the above become possible.

I don't want to enter a pissing contest with anybody, much less with you Pavel. Honestly.
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Helpless
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by Helpless »

If this isn't an anomaly, I don't know what it is.

Depends how you look at it. Unit interdiction is highly abstracted (as many other aspects of air war), in reality it consist of many small flights along the path. So your analogy doesn't seem valid to me.

Also if you look above, CAP is affected by the bug - from this POV it is an anomaly and your example could be used to prove it. Besides I just found another flak bug, which can make some fighters and high speed bombers too vulnerable to the flak fire. So it may add up to the proof of "anomaly".

In any case, posting a save on tech forum is much more appreciated. I can't load into debugger "feeling of out of whack" as I see plenty examples where in general it works as expected (btw, your game with Q-Ball is just one of them).
I don't want to enter a pissing contest with anybody, much less with you Pavel. Honestly.

Cheers. Merry Christmas! :)
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ComradeP
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by ComradeP »

I know people including ComradeP point out the value of ground support in combat, and also interdiction should lead to noticeable effects, but even with 100 bombers involved I so far rarely find them to play key roles. Not sure what I am doing wrong, but I restricted myself to selective bombing runs of key hexes, and else feel the Luftwaffe bombers best perform supply runs except in winter, where they can recuperate in Germany. I see a few casualties, some equipment hits, and several disrupted elements, which despite a 50-100 bombers involved hardly seems to lower the defenders abilities. The Wehrmacht is in relative terms already strong enough to handle most stacks own, so rather not waste bombers or mission miles on GS.

Note that when I say "ground support" I mean actual ground support and not bomb unit attacks. Interdiction can be suicidal for the Luftwaffe in the long term as it's pretty easy to set up traps for the enemy bombers as the Soviets. Ground support, however, is useful (with medium bombers, Ju 87 losses will soon become high), primarily because the Soviets tend to get massive (in the thousands) disruption from them, which reduces their defensive capabilities significantly.

The air war still seems to suffer from the problem that when sides are evenly matched in terms of number of aircraft involved (even though we can't see the individual flights), barely any aircraft are shot down. Dogfights mostly seem to happen when one side (often the attacker) is outnumbered. That is: the vast majority of air to air losses in my current game are not caused during battles where my VVS goes toe to toe with a similar number of Luftwaffe aircraft.
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Q-Ball
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by Q-Ball »

I just opened my last turn v Baelfiin, and he has now lost 412 Luftwaffe Level bombers in the last 2 turns. That's a ton.

When I am getting over 100 fighters up, he is getting lots of planes shot down, regardless of the escort. On one combat, I put 267 Fighters up over W Moscow, and shot down 41 Level Bombers.

Same thing happened in my game vs. Bletchley Geek, only the roles were reversed of course.

Maybe Baelfiin and I made the same mistakes as Luftwaffe, and B_G and I made the same brilliant moves as VVS. What I am doing is not rocket science: Set Intercept to 300, and stack every fighter I can at the front. That's it.
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Helpless
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by Helpless »

I put 267 Fighters up over W Moscow, and shot down 41 Level Bombers.

That would be a third time in this thread when I say that this is a bug. As limit for the CAP doesn't work the same as limit for the strike. It becomes obvious when you launch very big attacks.

Germans did loose a lot of planes when they tried to bomb well protected areas (Moscow, Leningrad), but even then they didn't do this on the second week of the war. VVS was still very active.

By analogy if you run a hasty attack against big fortified stack behind the river in bad terrain would you be surprised to loose many squads?
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gingerbread
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by gingerbread »

By analogy if you run a hasty attack against big fortified stack behind the river in bad terrain would you be surprised to loose many squads?

Then there should perhaps be the equivalent of 'Hasty turns into Scouting Attack'. A chance that the mission is cancelled if the CAP is (much) larger that the escorts.
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Helpless
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by Helpless »

Then there should perhaps be the equivalent of 'Hasty turns into Scouting Attack'. A chance that the mission is cancelled if the CAP is (much) larger that the escorts.

Oh, yes..

But for now you can run air recons much more often and easier than ground attack recons. Also you can always make a smaller strike considering it a "hasty" attack. IOW, there are ways to predict enemy presence in the air.

P.S. I know that air model could be improved a lot and it is already reworked a lot in WITW. basically it will be a game within a game. But for now, imho, current WITE air model is quite adequate to match the needs of the main task it served - ground support.

"Best PVO is a tank on enemy's airfield" (c)
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BletchleyGeek
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by BletchleyGeek »

ORIGINAL: Helpless
If this isn't an anomaly, I don't know what it is.

Depends how you look at it. Unit interdiction is highly abstracted (as many other aspects of air war), in reality it consist of many small flights along the path. So your analogy doesn't seem valid to me.

Also if you look above, CAP is affected by the bug - from this POV it is an anomaly and your example could be used to prove it. Besides I just found another flak bug, which can make some fighters and high speed bombers too vulnerable to the flak fire. So it may add up to the proof of "anomaly".

In any case, posting a save on tech forum is much more appreciated. I can't load into debugger "feeling of out of whack" as I see plenty examples where in general it works as expected (btw, your game with Q-Ball is just one of them).

I'm glad that you still work on the air model, fixing any problem you find on it.

However, before posting on the tech support forum I try to figure out what's WAD, or what's reasonable to expect. While I do indeed see your point regarding abstraction, what I question is that the way these outcomes are presented to the player is misconstrues badly what's actually happening defeats analysis attempts unless I had "insider" knowledge. Not to mention that some of these abstractions are - from my completely amateurish POV - far fetched. Being the air model so focused - or rather, exclusively driven by - on-land activity is something I honestly hope you'll revise.
ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek
I don't want to enter a pissing contest with anybody, much less with you Pavel. Honestly.

Cheers. Merry Christmas! :)

Merry Christmas to you as well, Helpless.
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RCHarmon
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by RCHarmon »

I'm still learning this game, but is the following an example of this "bug"?

1941 I have reached the mud.  I have cut off both Leningrad and Sevastopol.  They both have ports and I begin attacking the ports with my air forces.  Sevastopol is going well.  No Soviet airfields so my bombers fly unmolested and are causing 10 to 15 percent destruction every turn with the loss of a few bombers.  Leningrad is a different story.  I am causing 3 percent damage a turn ( not near enough to block supplies) and the Soviet air force is active and quite good.  I fly a mission of 41 109's and 68 JU 88s against 23 -  I 153s, 24 - I 16s, 12 - Mig 3s, and 22 Yak - 1s.

I lose 2 fighters and 5 bombers and the Soviets lose 3 fighters.

In comparison to Sevastopol the difference is the more numerous and capable Soviet air force.

Shouldn't the German BF 109s be cleaning up these obsolete Soviet aircraft and clearing the skies for my bombers?


In my initial post I had 1942 as the year. That was a mistake it is only 1941.

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Helpless
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by Helpless »

Shouldn't the German BF 109s be cleaning up these obsolete Soviet aircraft and clearing the skies for my bombers?

Just one example, Soviet AF in Sevastopol was operation till the last days before the city fall in 1942. I see nothing wrong in your example.
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Helpless
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RE: Airwar Gripes

Post by Helpless »

However, before posting on the tech support forum I try to figure out what's WAD, or what's reasonable to expect. While I do indeed see your point regarding abstraction, what I question is that the way these outcomes are presented to the player is misconstrues badly what's actually happening defeats analysis attempts unless I had "insider" knowledge. Not to mention that some of these abstractions are - from my completely amateurish POV - far fetched. Being the air model so focused - or rather, exclusively driven by - on-land activity is something I honestly hope you'll revise.

Yes, providing more insides for the air combat would be good, but it is very difficult in current situation. Besides we changing a lot in WITW, so it is better to back port it to the WITE, which probably will be called WITE-2.
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