Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

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PaxMondo
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Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by PaxMondo »

Just want to throw out a thought or two on pilot experience gains, in particular bomber pilots, based upon attack mode.

- Ground attack, I think the pilot exp gain is appropriately balanced with fighter pilots. Put a group onto ground attack and after some weeks you will see some exp/skill gains. It is slow, but I think it needs to be that way to prevent exploits.
- Air Base attack - I've never seen a bomber gain any skill or exp in this, I assume it is the same as ground attack? If so, it is likely ok.
- Port Attack- I've never seen a bomber gain any skill or exp in this, I assume it is the same as ground attack? If so, it is likely ok.
- Naval Attack - I've never seen a bomber gain any skill or exp in this, I assume it is the same as ground attack? If so, I'm thinking this one should be tweaked. The issue is that hits, unlike with the above 3 attacks, are not a given at all. A hit in naval attack should be closer in experience gain to what it is with fighter pilots. And sinking a ship should be like a kill for fighter pilot, good chance of skill/exp gain.

Examples: I have a CV .vs. CV battle. My fighter pilots (those that survive) will all generally gain a couple of exp and skill points by battle end. This makes sense, combat is a hard teacher and survivors learn a great deal. My DB and TB pilots though have rarely ever gained any exp/skill. Even after having hit and sunk capital ships. Granted these are not newbie pilots, but surviving combat should enable them to gain exp/skill just like the fighter pilots. I'm sure the code does, but that the modifiers are akin to ground combat. Unlike ground combat, you can't run naval bombing missions for weeks at a time for naval combat. It comes is very short, intense bursts. Or rather to say, you do have your groups on naval attack for weeks at a time, but targets to attack are not a sure thing .. they come along only once in while. Unlike ground attack where the target is more or less guaranteed.

The game balance issue here is that unless you put your bomber pilots into ground bomb missions, they will never gain exp/skill beyond the training limitations.* It seems to be rather silly (and contrary to the game goals) to have to assign your TB groups to ground attacks to complete their training as their real role, ship attack, will likely never provide any combat training for them.

I know this has been brought up in the past. I bring it up now to see if based upon more game experience if we are ready for a tweak on this.

*Yes, allied 4E pilots gain exp/skill, but that is through air2air kills, not via naval bombing missions.
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by Oberst_Klink »

Just out of curiosity Kamerad Pax... which version are you referring to?

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PaxMondo
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by PaxMondo »

version?  not sure I understand. Pilot exp gains are hard coded. Mod or scen doesn't matter.
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Dan Nichols
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by Dan Nichols »

I concur with PaxMondo. I just started a game as Japan. After 6 days, and Mini KB hitting shipping south of the PI for 4 days, no TB pilot has gained any experience or skill. It's a small sample size and I will monitor it more in the coming days to see if things change.
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by btbw »

What exp/skill level your pilots? What leadership of leader?
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by Commander Stormwolf »


have some ideas to correct the exp gain model

1) pilots can be trained to 70 in any particular skill, only gain more in that skill if engaged in combat

2) instead of general exp, replace it with an ops skill

- governs navigation , ops losses, fatigue etc

so by doing any type of training or flying, you gain the ops skill (that will help future navigation / reduce accidents)


3) definitely torpedo pilots need to gain skill improvements by performing sorties

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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by Chickenboy »

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo
It seems to be rather silly (and contrary to the game goals) to have to assign your TB groups to ground attacks to complete their training as their real role, ship attack, will likely never provide any combat training for them.

I hear ya, but I get around that by naval attack training. They (TB and DBs) certainly gain experience in these skills with 'naval' training programs. Yes, it would be more realistic were they to *also* gain skills during the attacks, but it's not critical to have a late-war cadre of well-trained naval aviators.

I don't think that the 'requirement' of having TB and DB pilots train against ground targets for maximum 'experience' and 'defense' gain is inherently worse than having fighter pilots have to switch over to 'strafing' attacks to get them additional experience or defense after their 'air' skills top out at ~70. My take home here is that if you want well-rounded fighter pilots (with high experience or defense per se) that you need to train them in something other than a2a skills. Don't know why that same analogy doesn't hold for DB or TB pilots.
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obvert
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by obvert »

Regardless of training modes, if the fighter pilots are gaining experience from combat but the DB/TB pilots are not, that seems to be an issue, right? Especially since they are used much less often in their intended role. Even transept pilots gain experience from daily transport runs, right, and that is certainly less likely in real life to teach as quickly as an attack run that is both successful and survived.
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by Chickenboy »

ORIGINAL: obvert

Regardless of training modes, if the fighter pilots are gaining experience from combat but the DB/TB pilots are not, that seems to be an issue, right? Especially since they are used much less often in their intended role. Even transept pilots gain experience from daily transport runs, right, and that is certainly less likely in real life to teach as quickly as an attack run that is both successful and survived.

I agree that the mechanism for experience / skill build is different. Is it an 'issue' though? Dunno if I'd say that.
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by SqzMyLemon »

I just wanted to add this thought. I was hoping to be able to deploy 80+ experienced JAAF bomber pilots into TRACOM, but they just don't seem to gain experience like their fighter jockey buddies. Considering the number of bombing missions a typical bomber unit will fly in China, I'm disappointed with the experience gain by these pilots. It's really hard to get elite bomber crews.

Of course, I'm guessing the same applies to Allied bomber pilots. I wonder if they gain experience faster by shooting down enemy fighters. Anybody track this before?
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by aphrochine »

I have reservations about "upping" any Exp gain for bomber pilots. It's far too easy to simply set bombers on routine bombing of near defenseless (but legitimate) targets and send their experience through the roof.

In A2A, losses are much heavier per engagement, so fighter pilots should get more experience I think. If they do not gain experience at a fast rate, very few pilots will ever survive the needed volume of engagements to see themselves through to the TRACOM experience band.

In A2G, it's quite possible to locate targets and bomb the snot out of them with little chance of casualties for extended periods. Once air superiority over a light AA target is won by the fighters, the Bombers get days/weeks of open skies to get free experience gain at low risk. So if Bomber pilots were to gain exp at the same rate as fighter pilots, it would be far to easy to have vast numbers of TRACOM+ bomber pilots. This would lead to exploitation and min/maxxing, which I detest.

Regarding pilot training and growth in general, it's already far too easy to train bomber pilots in 1 or 2 key skills up to 70 before a pilot hits the 50's in Exp. If you are willing to continue training up to 60 exp, its easy to have 3 skills at or near 70 with an additional skill or two trained into the 50's. So with skills being at levels of high competence, I dont think it should be overly easy to get Exp un naturally high, and thus lower the impacts of negative effects from ops/fatigue/morale which is what really keeps LBA flying continuously.

While an AFB, I'd have to admit that 4E bombing in the early and mid game would be ridiculously strong if the allies were granted a large cadre of 80+ bomber pilots early, which would virtually eliminate ops losses on the big birds. It would also minimize the pilot exp/skill advantage that IJNAF needs early on, if the allies can easily and simply catch up in terms of skill (no matter how unhistorical it may be).
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SqzMyLemon
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by SqzMyLemon »

I should clarify. I agree that bomber pilots shouldn't gain experience as fast as fighter pilots. I actually didn't say anything about upping the experience gains. I just said I was disappointed in the current slow rate of gained experience and how my hope of putting more pilots into TRACOM this way wasn't likely to go as planned. [8D]

I do still wonder if they gain experience faster by shooting down enemy fighters though. We all know that this applies 99.9% to Allied bomber pilots, as I have yet to see a confirmed kill by a Japanese bomber pilot in almost 3 years of playing this game. [8|]
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by jcjordan »

The biggest problem w/ the slowness of bomber types gaining exp is that it is so slow. I've had pilots fly several hundred missions over the course of the war (I'm in early 46) & still have only gained into the upper 60's lower 70's from starting in the 50's whereas fighter types go through that in a few months. I do start to see gains when I train them in more skills into the 60's. I've also seen the same thing the few times I've peeked at the AI side of things with pilots having over 1000 missions & just now approaching upper 70's despite combat roles.
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by Chickenboy »

Interesting stuff guys. Thanks for sharing your experiences...
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PaxMondo
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by PaxMondo »

ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

ORIGINAL: obvert

Regardless of training modes, if the fighter pilots are gaining experience from combat but the DB/TB pilots are not, that seems to be an issue, right? Especially since they are used much less often in their intended role. Even transept pilots gain experience from daily transport runs, right, and that is certainly less likely in real life to teach as quickly as an attack run that is both successful and survived.

I agree that the mechanism for experience / skill build is different. Is it an 'issue' though? Dunno if I'd say that.
Well CB, consider it. I am asking for opinions here. This would likely fall into Michael's realm of adjustment/bug if we can come to some sort of a concensus.

As articulated by several others, I am not suggesting bomber pilots gain exp/skill at the calendar rate that fighter pilots do. Particularly ground attacks, if not opposed are scarely more than milk runs. But naval attacks .... particularly DB and TB ... the attack profiles by definition exclude the concept of milk run. And truthfully, there aren't that many during an entire game (as compared to ground/port/air base attacks).

Again, not looking for the ability to create uber pilots. But, you have a 72 exp/skill TB pilot. After surviving +50 naval attack missions, 4 years of combat, and putting his ordnance on target many times, he is still 72 exp/skill. That same fighter pilot will gain 1% for each kill on average ... if he survives even 10 combats, he is likely to be 80%.

How big a deal is this? Nardling to be truthful. As much flavor as anything. More like an irritant ... you have all the bomber pilots flying all of these missions and they don't improve exp/skill.

Anyway, keep the thoughts pouring in ....
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by Sredni »

Something that always bugged me about naval attack units is they need to sit at readiness for long periods of time without any guarantee of action. They're just lazing around doing nothing if nobody shows up, and thus you lose the opportunity to conduct training.

It got me thinking of carrier dive bombers and TB's during the war, they weren't "set to training" the way we do it in witp, but they still gained experience and skill while preparing for air strikes that may or may not have happened as time went by. It would be nice if pilots in game skilled up also while standing at readiness for combat. Like if a carriers DB unit is set to naval attack for a month, but the fortunes of war just don't pan out and no carrier battle happens, those pilots should have experience and skill gains to reflect that they weren't just standing around while waiting for combat. Some portion of training gains for units set to opportunistic combat that never happens would seem more realistic to me.

The same with nav s and asw missions. That unit you have setup in hawaii doing Nav S might never see an enemy unit during the course of the war, but they should still have skill gains. Or the asw unit in some port that may never actually see a sub, they should still have gains just from going through the motions.
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by crsutton »

I was concerned about the lack of experience gain with my bomber pilots. Fighter pilots do gain exp faster, but seem to die a lot faster too. However after a long campaign, I can say that it does not matter. A level 50 bomber pilot with moderate skills does just fine. I am bashing Japan pretty well with what I have. I don't think this focus on getting everyone to high experience levels is worth the effort. I get my fighter pilots and Naval attack planes up to as high a skill as possible but it is definitely not an issue with bomber pilots.

I have yet to see a skip bombing attack in my campaign. Does not matter. Medium attack bombers do well enough and it really does not matter if they skip bomb or not.

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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by JSG »

I think my G4M and B5N units meant for training are doing fine in pushing torpedo attacks kill up to almost 70. The lack of parallel training in naval search bothers me, for my carrier TBs are busy with naval search mostly. Torpedo supply is too small on CVs and they're inferior 250 kg bombers in comparison to DBs.

I usually add an exp 70+ pilot or two to every such training unit, add an inspiration and leadership 60+ leader to the unit and let them train naval attack with torpedo attack switched ON (not bombs). Torpedoes do not need to be supplied by a HQ on the base, they wills till gain NavT skill nicely (and NavB skill if I switch to bombs). The base needs to be well-supplied.

Army bomber crews are more of a problem because of inferior leaders and less well-qualified example pilots for training the recruits.

Early in war I attempt to push all crews to exp 45 with such methods, then add them to reserve and induct a new class of replacements.
Once in a front-line unit, the exp 45 pilots benefit from about 20-40% training setting, and CV TB pilots get to train NavSearch up to 90% when in harbour while G4M crews get additional ~30% general training because I cannot set part of the unit to NavSearch, part to naval attack and part to NavSearch or Ground Bombing Training.
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by LoBaron »

Just my 2c´s:

I think that bomber experience gain is so slow for a reason, not neccesarily related to reality but for gameplay. Fighters gaining exp by performing in A2A
usually have more than remote chance to die in combat.

Bomber pilots on the other hand, even more so as far as 4eng heavies are concerned, live a pretty safe life if they do not fly in the middle of a CAP/AAA trap.

By bombing remote isolated units or bases without defense you have a platform for experience gain not in any way comparable to the danger of this mission.


My assumption is that the slow exp gain is to balance it over the whole campaign as compared to fighter pilots who might have more chances for notable exp gain,
but only if they fly into the thick of it.

The drawback of this, naturally is the exp gain of anti naval units, who do not profit from regular combat missions against land based targets. But it is possible
to counter by letting those units fly NavS missions. It has the advantage of building up secondary skill important for the job, and it is not too hard to train pilots up
to good exp values with that mission.


That said, if it is wrong or right, I have really no opinion. I just want to point out that bomber pilots, at least in some services, have a pretty high survivability.
Not sure if upping exp suddently leaves us with lots of vet/ace bomber pilots which again mess with hit probability...
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PaxMondo
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RE: Pilot Exp - Bomber Pilots

Post by PaxMondo »

Lo,
 
I agree with you regarding ground exp and I think ground exp gains are fine as is, that is why my proposal only relates to nav attack mission exp.  Pretty hard to come up with unending targets for this and work the system.  I also would agree with Sredni regarding NavPatrol missions.  Patrols should be gaining exp ... there should be some % chance for patrol to gain skill/exp when spotting a ship.  Low %, but it should happen ....
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