WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

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Miller
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by Miller »

There is no need to fly CAP at 30k ft+ over CVs as they cannot be "sweeped", hence no need for the alt advantage to counter a strato sweep. I set the vast majority of my CV CAP at between 10-15k and they do just fine (remember that bomber escorts are bascially bullet sponges regardless of what alt they fly at).
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racndoc
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by racndoc »

If the Allied player uses his USN CVEs as in RL....ie CAPing invasions of Japanese held bases....the Japanese player certainly can and will sweep the Allied CAP at high altitude.
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by SqzMyLemon »

ORIGINAL: AdmSpruance

If the Allied player uses his USN CVEs as in RL....ie CAPing invasions of Japanese held bases....the Japanese player certainly can and will sweep the Allied CAP at high altitude.

I've so far been unable to order sweep missions over my own bases, only enemy bases. Are you thinking sweeps, or escort missions that don't coordinate and are treated as sweeps and described as such in the combat reports? I've never tried sweeping an enemy fleet and LoBaron says it can't be done, so I'm curious how the enemy can sweep the carrier CAP when operating over their own base?
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by LoBaron »

ORIGINAL: SqzMyLemon
ORIGINAL: AdmSpruance

If the Allied player uses his USN CVEs as in RL....ie CAPing invasions of Japanese held bases....the Japanese player certainly can and will sweep the Allied CAP at high altitude.

I've so far been unable to order sweep missions over my own bases, only enemy bases. Are you thinking sweeps, or escort missions that don't coordinate and are treated as sweeps and described as such in the combat reports? I've never tried sweeping an enemy fleet and LoBaron says it can't be done, so I'm curious how the enemy can sweep the carrier CAP when operating over their own base?

This. You could Sweep after the base has fallen, but at this point the air cover should be taken over
by LBA ASAP anyway.

I have never seen a fighter sweep over enemy TFs as well. The only theoretical possibility would be
to set sweep/commanders decision and hope the dice hits a TF, if this is at all possible.
I have never seen it, and I experiemented quite a lot with commanders decision as it is a very
useful tool. So if it can happen the chances for that are extremely low.

High alt CAP for fleets only makes sense in one situation: CVE fleets located at a friendly base
hex for whatever reason. But in this situation I still would assign all or the majority of CAP
to low-med alt, and let LBA cover the upper layers.
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castor troy
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by castor troy »

ORIGINAL: Puhis
ORIGINAL: castor troy
ORIGINAL: Puhis

After lot of editing you've done, your post have some points now.


not serious? lot of editing? but hey, nvmd, not intended to start a fight
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castor troy
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by castor troy »

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

ORIGINAL: SqzMyLemon
ORIGINAL: AdmSpruance

If the Allied player uses his USN CVEs as in RL....ie CAPing invasions of Japanese held bases....the Japanese player certainly can and will sweep the Allied CAP at high altitude.

I've so far been unable to order sweep missions over my own bases, only enemy bases. Are you thinking sweeps, or escort missions that don't coordinate and are treated as sweeps and described as such in the combat reports? I've never tried sweeping an enemy fleet and LoBaron says it can't be done, so I'm curious how the enemy can sweep the carrier CAP when operating over their own base?

This. You could Sweep after the base has fallen, but at this point the air cover should be taken over
by LBA ASAP anyway.

I have never seen a fighter sweep over enemy TFs as well. The only theoretical possibility would be
to set sweep/commanders decision and hope the dice hits a TF, if this is at all possible.
I have never seen it, and I experiemented quite a lot with commanders decision as it is a very
useful tool. So if it can happen the chances for that are extremely low.

High alt CAP for fleets only makes sense in one situation: CVE fleets located at a friendly base
hex for whatever reason. But in this situation I still would assign all or the majority of CAP
to low-med alt, and let LBA cover the upper layers.


you will get a sweep over TFs if the escorts fail to link up with the bombers (you even get a message for that), then the fighters will show up on a sweep. And they will actually be on a sweep then because the performance is notably different than the known performance of escorts.

Doubt setting the fighters to sweep with commanders decision will work though.
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LoBaron
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by LoBaron »

ORIGINAL: castor troy
you will get a sweep over TFs if the escorts fail to link up with the bombers (you even get a message for that), then the fighters will show up on a sweep. And they will actually be on a sweep then because the performance is notably different than the known performance of escorts.

Doubt setting the fighters to sweep with commanders decision will work though.

Yes, they will sweep - IF they continue to target after losing cohesion and do not return to base.

But they do so they will sweep at strike altitude, since escorting fighters coordinating with a strike go in at bombers alt setting plus 2k.

If you set escort mission at strato alt you have two possible outcomes:

Either they do not participate at all, or if they do - and that chance is pretty low - your fighter alt setting will be ignored for the offensive mission.
Trying to force that does makes no sense at all, as you effectively reduce your protection for the strike - or even the chance of the strike taking place at all
against a TF with many fighters on CAP.

You wont get a stratosweep by losing cohesion, and protection against stratosweep is what we are talking about, no?
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castor troy
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by castor troy »

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

ORIGINAL: castor troy
you will get a sweep over TFs if the escorts fail to link up with the bombers (you even get a message for that), then the fighters will show up on a sweep. And they will actually be on a sweep then because the performance is notably different than the known performance of escorts.

Doubt setting the fighters to sweep with commanders decision will work though.

Yes, they will sweep - IF they continue to target after losing cohesion and do not return to base.

But they do so they will sweep at strike altitude, since escorting fighters coordinating with a strike go in at bombers alt setting plus 2k.


no, they will sweep at the altitude they were set to, no matter what altitude the bombers were set to (escort). Example: have your bombers at 10000ft, your fighters at 30000ft. Your fighters will miss the bombers and the fighters will fly onto the target, showing up as "sweeping at 30000ft". Not here to start a fight but what you describe is just not happening in the game, at least in none of the versions I have been playing over the last years.

If I don't forget I will post a combat report next time it happens in my game.


edit: just remembered my game against Rainer79 when I had my carriers very often in range of targets that were attacked by LBA and me being pissed off by my Hellcats trying to escort LBA strikes (and 100% missing them) with my fighters always showing up over the target shown as "xy Hellcats sweeping at x altitude" - and the altitude always was the escort/Cap altitude the fighters were set aboard the carriers. Never ever been the bombers' altitude plus 2k.

Same goes for land based fighter squadrons that miss the bombers they were assigned to escort. And that's the only way I know of sweeping naval targets. As a workaround to get that "feature" you can have several bases in range of a naval target, some of the bases having bombers and fighters, some of the bases only fighters. All fighters set to escort and you have a fair chance that some of the fighters that aren't at the bomber fields will miss the bombers they try to escort (if the fighters fly) and end up sweeping the CV Cap.

edit 2: just wanted to dig up my AAR of the game against Rainer79 but the AAR section ends at page 8 which means everything before some time in 2011 is gone. [:(]
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by btbw »

ORIGINAL: castor troy

edit 2: just wanted to dig up my AAR of the game against Rainer79 but the AAR section ends at page 8 which means everything before some time in 2011 is gone. [:(]

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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by castor troy »

ORIGINAL: btbw
ORIGINAL: castor troy

edit 2: just wanted to dig up my AAR of the game against Rainer79 but the AAR section ends at page 8 which means everything before some time in 2011 is gone. [:(]

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hey that's great. thanks for the info, will have a look
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by btbw »

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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by castor troy »

ORIGINAL: btbw

tm.asp?m=2330675

yeah thanks, have found it too myselve and have been digging through already
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by castor troy »

here's one of the examples out of my AAR vs Rainer79, plenty of them more in the AAR. I just copied it out of the AAR, together with the notes I have been putting in with the AAR. You can see lots of CV based fighters doing one HUGE combined sweep (something you never manage to do when you set them to "SWEEP"). These "sweeps" were one of many failed attempts of my CVs escorting a land based strike of bombers (having their own escorts), because my carriers ended up in range of the LBA bombers' target. Have a look yourselve.




Afternoon Air attack on Manila , at 79,77

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid detected at 48 NM, estimated altitude 23,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 20 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M5 Zero x 2
A6M5b Zero x 3
J2M3 Jack x 4
N1K1-J George x 9
Ki-43-IIIa Oscar x 6
Ki-44-IIc Tojo x 3
Ki-61-II KAI Tony x 3
Ki-84a Frank x 2



Allied aircraft
F4U-1A Corsair x 84
F6F-3 Hellcat x 20
F6F-5 Hellcat x 90




Japanese aircraft losses
A6M5b Zero: 1 destroyed
J2M3 Jack: 1 destroyed
N1K1-J George: 6 destroyed
Ki-43-IIIa Oscar: 2 destroyed
Ki-44-IIc Tojo: 1 destroyed
Ki-61-II KAI Tony: 1 destroyed
Ki-84a Frank: 1 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
F6F-5 Hellcat: 1 destroyed

why these smileys? Because this is not a combined sweep but nothing else than the usual failed attempt of carrier based ac to escort a LBA strike... what a numerical superiority does in this numbers´ game is obvious too, with enough fighters you don´t even have to set them to attack in the stratosphere because the enemy runs out of the dive at some point if you heavily outnumber him as this is what happened here... don´t have to comment the losses I guess...


Aircraft Attacking:
16 x F6F-3 Hellcat sweeping at 20000 feet
18 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 20000 feet
17 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 20000 feet
19 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 20000 feet
20 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 20000 feet
19 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 30000 feet
16 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 25000 feet
18 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 30000 feet
14 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 25000 feet
15 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 25000 feet
10 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 30000 feet



CAP engaged:
S-302 Kokutai with N1K1-J George (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 2 scrambling)
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 41010 , scrambling fighters to 18000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 24 minutes
S-316 Hikotai with A6M5b Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 2 scrambling)
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 6000 , scrambling fighters to 17000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 27 minutes
S-309 Hikotai with A6M5 Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 1 scrambling)
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 38500 , scrambling fighters to 22000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 13 minutes
S-401 Hikotai with N1K1-J George (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 4 scrambling)
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 41010 , scrambling fighters between 17000 and 41000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 37 minutes
S-407 Hikotai with J2M3 Jack (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 2 scrambling)
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 38380 , scrambling fighters to 25000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 13 minutes
18th Sentai with Ki-61-II KAI Tony (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 2 scrambling)
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 35090 , scrambling fighters to 23000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 34 minutes
33rd Sentai with Ki-43-IIIa Oscar (0 airborne, 2 on standby, 3 scrambling)
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 37400 , scrambling fighters between 23000 and 37000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 30 minutes
59th Sentai with Ki-44-IIc Tojo (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 2 scrambling)
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 6000 , scrambling fighters to 6000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 25 minutes
73rd Sentai with Ki-84a Frank (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 1 scrambling)
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 34440 , scrambling fighters to 34000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 15 minutes



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Afternoon Air attack on Manila , at 79,77

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid detected at 20 NM, estimated altitude 34,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 6 minutes

Japanese aircraft
Ki-43-IIIa Oscar x 1



Allied aircraft
F6F-5 Hellcat x 27


Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-43-IIIa Oscar: 1 destroyed




Aircraft Attacking:
20 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 30000 feet
7 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 25000 feet

CAP engaged:
33rd Sentai with Ki-43-IIIa Oscar (1 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
1 plane(s) intercepting now.
Group patrol altitude is 37400
Raid is overhead



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Afternoon Air attack on Manila , at 79,77

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid detected at 43 NM, estimated altitude 31,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 18 minutes


Allied aircraft
F6F-3 Hellcat x 20


No Allied losses



Aircraft Attacking:
20 x F6F-3 Hellcat sweeping at 30000 feet

lots more failed escorts...

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Afternoon Air attack on Manila , at 79,77

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid detected at 160 NM, estimated altitude 10,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 55 minutes

Japanese aircraft
no flights


Allied aircraft
B-24J Liberator x 67
B-25H Mitchell x 44
F4U-1A Corsair x 31
F4U-1D Corsair x 56


Japanese aircraft losses
J2M3 Jack: 2 destroyed on ground
N1K1-J George: 6 destroyed on ground
Ki-61-II KAI Tony: 3 destroyed on ground
Ki-43-IIIa Oscar: 3 destroyed on ground
Ki-44-IIc Tojo: 1 destroyed on ground
Ki-84a Frank: 2 destroyed on ground
A6M5b Zero: 1 destroyed on ground
A6M5 Zero: 2 destroyed on ground

Allied aircraft losses
B-24J Liberator: 9 damaged
B-25H Mitchell: 2 damaged



Airbase hits 14
Airbase supply hits 1
Runway hits 235

and then the bombers show up with land based escorts, all bombers set to nav attack/airfield attack and it worked quite well today... it seems lots of what has been damaged yesterday or in the morning is now destroyed on the ground...


Aircraft Attacking:
16 x B-24J Liberator bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 10 x 500 lb GP Bomb
12 x B-25H Mitchell bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 6 x 500 lb GP Bomb
12 x B-24J Liberator bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 10 x 500 lb GP Bomb
16 x B-25H Mitchell bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 6 x 500 lb GP Bomb
12 x B-24J Liberator bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 10 x 500 lb GP Bomb
9 x B-24J Liberator bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 10 x 500 lb GP Bomb
9 x B-24J Liberator bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 10 x 500 lb GP Bomb
16 x B-25H Mitchell bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 6 x 500 lb GP Bomb
9 x B-24J Liberator bombing from 10000 feet
Airfield Attack: 10 x 500 lb GP Bomb
3 x F4U-1D Corsair sweeping at 25000 feet



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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LoBaron
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by LoBaron »

Maybe. Maybe not. This is getting boring fast.

You sell another tidbit of combat report on exactly the same day as fighter sweep.
ORIGINAL: castor troy

AFTER ACTION REPORTS FOR Oct 03, 44
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on Manila , at 79,77

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid detected at 14 NM, estimated altitude 27,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 5 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M5 Zero x 13
A6M5b Zero x 13
J2M3 Jack x 15
N1K1-J George x 24
Ki-43-IIIa Oscar x 8
Ki-44-IIc Tojo x 25
Ki-61-II KAI Tony x 7
Ki-84a Frank x 13



Allied aircraft
F4U-1A Corsair x 20


Japanese aircraft losses
J2M3 Jack: 2 destroyed
N1K1-J George: 1 destroyed
Ki-44-IIc Tojo: 4 destroyed
Ki-84a Frank: 1 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
F4U-1A Corsair: 3 destroyed

I wasn´t quite sure how the situation will be over Manila after yesterday´s bombings, thought the chances would be 50:50 to see enemy aircraft and while there weren´t as many as yesterday there was still formidable resistance... hard to tell how many leaked in from Clark and how many were still coming from Manila... ordered a lot of squadrons to sweep again of course, doing it in the same way as usual but at least the Corsairs are the ones to show up first as these are my second best fighters right after the Thuds...

After that 10 combat reports you dub as sweeps, then something that looks nearly the same you say its failed escorts. Whatever...

Personally I think that you had no idea anymore what was sweep, escort or leaky CAP, and whom escorted what - with a couple of hundreds of planes in the
air from different origin, and it just might be that the game engine didn´t know either. Not that I care... [;)]

Since its a sweep against a land base, probably with dozens of squads having targets set, it has nothing to do with the original topic anyway.
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castor troy
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by castor troy »

lol, that post clearly showed me that you must be either totally ignorant or fail to read what I write, guess it's the first one because otherwhise you would get it by now.

I didn't know what was going on? Really? I didn't know what was going on in my PBEM? Yes, but you probably do?

I can surely tell you that this strike

Aircraft Attacking:
16 x F6F-3 Hellcat sweeping at 20000 feet
18 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 20000 feet
17 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 20000 feet
19 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 20000 feet
20 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 20000 feet
19 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 30000 feet
16 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 25000 feet
18 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 30000 feet
14 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 25000 feet
15 x F4U-1A Corsair sweeping at 25000 feet
10 x F6F-5 Hellcat sweeping at 30000 feet



was coming from my CV TF because I know where my strikes are coming from. If someone doesn't know what is going on in the game then it's you because you don't even believe ppl when they actually support their claims with an ingame example (something I have never seen in your game, other than you using strato sweeps - after years of debating them, lol). Wonder if we really have to go through all the different times again when and who was wrong in the past years.

And to disregard the whole thing, heck, sure, it is a sweep against a land based target. Lol, this means it can't happen against a nav target and me saying I had it happen often enough of course doesn't mean anything for you, while you can't show anything at all, other than false assumptions of what is going on in the game, for a repeated time.

But hey, Mr. I know it better without showing anything even once can surely tell everyone here how Mr. dumbass showing an example was able to order a sweep from whereever it came from, that consisted of 194 fighters in one strike. And funnily, those are all CV type fighters? Can't be that those were all on escort, trying to escort an LBA strike which they 100% of the time miss, ending up sweeping the target (no matter if land or naval), doing this at the altitude they were set to escort/Cap and NOT at 2k above the bombers as Mr. I know it better seems to think (wrongly once more).

Now ppl can either believe me, take that example here (if necessary they can look at the last 15 pages of my AAR against Rainer79 that shows dozens of those examples with SCREENS!) or they can believe Mr. I think I know what is going on.

I can sure tell you, you may think you know what is going on, but you sure got no clue and that's the real pity, you don't get it, not even if one presents it right in front of you.

Fighters that are set to escort and miss the bombers are on sweep as a result and they sweep both land AND naval targets and that's the only way to sweep a CV TF or any other naval target. Get it, fine with me, don't get it, stay uninformed.
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by BBfanboy »

Okay folks - enough of the gibes at each other. It's ok to have differing opinions of what is causing strange results - the game doesn't make it clear so we give our best guess, which sometimes fits what we see subsequently and occasionally does not. Keep doing whatever works for you!

Spruance - I am not greatly experienced in the air combat model but my observations say that having too great a radius for your CAP can have them off many hexes away when the enemy arrives. E.g. if the range set is 3 hexes [the 111 mile detection range was about 2.5 hexes], and the CAP spreads itself around, some of them will be 3 hexes the WRONG DIRECTION from the enemy approach, or about 5.5 hexes from point of detection. They are not going to get back in time to intercept. I usually restrict my CAP to 1 hex radius to give time to intercept before the enemy arrives in my TF/base hex. What range setting were you using?
No matter how bad a situation is, you can always make it worse. - Chris Hadfield : An Astronaut's Guide To Life On Earth
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LoBaron
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by LoBaron »

Good point BBfanboy. For the same reason - when I want point defense CAP over a TF in the same hex as the flight deck - I reduce the range to 0-1 (more often 1) as well.
With a higher range setting you often see CV born CAP defending against an attacks 2-3 hexes away or doing other strange things.

This is often the problem for carrier born fighter settings, if you want to cover both defensive and offensive tasks. You need to set the range to match the strike
a/c setting, but by doing so you spread the CAP umbrella unneccesarily.

In confined waters with many bases and lots of air action this often leads to a thinned out CAP over the primary target, and lots of fighters in many places.
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RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by JocMeister »

I´m not trying to get into the argument here but rather let AdmSpruance know I also have had some very "unlikely" outcomes with CAP lately. CAP seems almost useless right now and I have had very small strikes penetrate huge CAP on several occasions now.

I do think something is not working as it should be. I have no clue what is wrong at all but a hunch says it has to do with intercept times and/or detection ranges.
Morning Air attack on TF, near Portland Roads at 91,132

Weather in hex: Severe storms

Raid detected at 107 NM, estimated altitude 16,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 27 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M5 Zero x 6
D4Y1 Judy x 43



Allied aircraft
Spitfire Vc Trop x 19
P-38G Lightning x 64
P-38H Lightning x 53
P-39D Airacobra x 13
P-39N1 Airacobra x 26
P-40K Warhawk x 33
P-47D2 Thunderbolt x 18


Japanese aircraft losses
A6M5 Zero: 1 destroyed
D4Y1 Judy: 8 destroyed, 7 damaged
D4Y1 Judy: 1 destroyed by flak

No Allied losses

Allied Ships
LCT-364
AM Junee, Bomb hits 1, heavy fires, heavy damage
LST-22, Bomb hits 1, heavy fires
LST-19
AM Jan van Amstel, Bomb hits 1, heavy fires, heavy damage
LST-20
AM Stawell, Bomb hits 1, heavy fires, heavy damage
LST-17, Bomb hits 1, heavy fires



Aircraft Attacking:
5 x D4Y1 Judy releasing from 3000' *
Naval Attack: 1 x 250 kg SAP Bomb
6 x D4Y1 Judy releasing from 1000' *
Naval Attack: 1 x 250 kg SAP Bomb
8 x D4Y1 Judy releasing from 2000' *
Naval Attack: 1 x 250 kg SAP Bomb
6 x D4Y1 Judy releasing from 2000' *
Naval Attack: 1 x 250 kg SAP Bomb
4 x D4Y1 Judy releasing from 3000' *
Naval Attack: 1 x 250 kg SAP Bomb

CAP engaged:
No.75 Sqn RAAF with Spitfire Vc Trop (0 airborne, 8 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 10000 and 15000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 29 minutes
8 planes vectored on to bombers
No.54 Sqn RAF with Spitfire Vc Trop (0 airborne, 6 on standby, 0 scrambling)
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 13000 and 15000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 11 minutes
8 planes vectored on to bombers
318th FG/19th FS with P-40K Warhawk (4 airborne, 11 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 13000 and 15000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 27 minutes
12 planes vectored on to bombers
8th FG/36th FS with P-39N1 Airacobra (0 airborne, 10 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 4000 and 13000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 26 minutes
6 planes vectored on to bombers
35th FG/39th FS with P-38H Lightning (4 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 31000 , scrambling fighters between 13000 and 31000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 30 minutes
17 planes vectored on to bombers
35th FG/40th FS with P-38G Lightning (4 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 31000 , scrambling fighters between 10000 and 31000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 29 minutes
17 planes vectored on to bombers
35th FG/41st FS with P-38G Lightning (0 airborne, 10 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 31000 , scrambling fighters between 8000 and 31000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 22 minutes
14 planes vectored on to bombers
18th FG/44th FS with P-38H Lightning (4 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 31000 , scrambling fighters between 10000 and 31000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 28 minutes
18 planes vectored on to bombers
347th FG/67th FS with P-38H Lightning (4 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 31000 , scrambling fighters between 3000 and 31000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 24 minutes
14 planes vectored on to bombers
347th FG/68th FS with P-39N1 Airacobra (0 airborne, 8 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 16000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 18 minutes
12 planes vectored on to bombers
318th FG/73rd FS with P-47D2 Thunderbolt (4 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 33000 , scrambling fighters between 7000 and 33000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 21 minutes
18 planes vectored on to bombers
18th FG/78th FS with P-38G Lightning (4 airborne, 10 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 31000 , scrambling fighters between 9000 and 31000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 36 minutes
15 planes vectored on to bombers
8th FG/80th FS with P-38G Lightning (4 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 31000 , scrambling fighters between 11000 and 31000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 22 minutes
14 planes vectored on to bombers
347th FG/339th FS with P-40K Warhawk (4 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 6000 and 15000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 26 minutes
1 planes vectored on to bombers
475th FG/432nd FS with P-39D Airacobra (0 airborne, 9 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 10000 , scrambling fighters between 10000 and 14000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 21 minutes
12 planes vectored on to bombers

You guys can probably look at the report and tell me why his unescorted bomber slipped through for the millionth time. I don´t really find that discussion relevant. This is my reasoning:
This strike took place over the biggest airfield in the world. Its a size 9 AF with two AirHQs and some 500 AS. I have 500 fighters there. There must be some 30-60 radars in the base. This is September 1943. You can argue on the technical aspects this but I don´t think ANYONE thinks this even remotely plausible given the place and time?

Why does it take 30 minutes for a big chunk of my planes to reach intercept? I have told my planes by setting CAP to 50%: "Half of you protect my base from enemy airplanes". That is all I can do? I think I should then be able to actually have that happen? As it is now it looks like 5% of the 50% are protecting the base while the rest of the 50% are sitting on "standby" with no realistic possibility whatsoever to intercept something.

Why does some groups with a 50% CAP setting have 0 planes in the air?

I can see it takes quiet some time to get from the ground up to 31K. And why are they trying to get to 31K in the first place? The raid is at 16K. Do they have to go to 31K first and then dive to 16K?

Why doesn´t my overhead CAP already at 31K just dive down to 16K?

And again, my biggest issue: If I tell 50% of my planes to protect my base they should. If setting a CAP of 50% means that only 5% of the planes are airborne and the rest have absolutely NO chance to intercept any incoming strike something is wrong. If I want 5% of my planes to be able to intercept a strike I will set it to 5%. If I want 50% to be able to intercept a incoming strike I will set 50%...

When I look at the combat reports I constantly see detection times very, very close to the intercept times and that kind of explains why the IJ strikes continue to slip through any kind of CAP time and time again. Why is that? Arn´t the allies equipped with the best radars in the world? And the IJ really crappy ones or none at all?

CAP engaged:
Sasebo Ku S-1 with N1K1-J George (7 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(9 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
7 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 2 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 20000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 10 minutes
7 planes vectored on to bombers
Soryu-1 with A6M5 Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(3 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 3 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 6 minutes
3 planes vectored on to bombers
Junyo-1 with A6M5 Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(7 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 7 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 12 minutes
10 planes vectored on to bombers
Shoho-1 with A6M5 Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(7 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 7 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 10000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 10 minutes
6 planes vectored on to bombers
Hosho-1 with A6M5 Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(11 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 11 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 10 minutes
11 planes vectored on to bombers
958 Ku T-2 with A6M5 Zero (9 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(15 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
9 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 6 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 3 minutes
9 planes vectored on to bombers
Kaga-1 with A6M5 Zero (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
(6 plane(s) diverted to support CAP in hex.)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 6 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 9 minutes
8 planes vectored on to bombers
Zuiho-1 with A6M5 Zero (0 airborne, 18 on standby, 3 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 9 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 12000 and 18000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 24 minutes
25 planes vectored on to bombers
958 Ku T-1 with A6M5 Zero (0 airborne, 12 on standby, 2 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 1 being recalled, 4 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 6000 and 19000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 31 minutes
16 planes vectored on to bombers

Intercept time of 3-10 minutes? I don´t think I have EVER had that as the allies...

As I said I´m not sure that any discussion about the mechanics of it is relevant. By looking at the end results its obvious something is wrong because the results are clearly not connected to any kind of historical results. Hence I think one can draw the conclusion that somewhere in the mechanics something should be changed?

Sorry if I´m sounding grumpy. I am. "Someone" in the household decided she didn´t need to sleep tonight...[>:]








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LoBaron
Posts: 4775
Joined: Sun Jan 26, 2003 8:23 pm
Location: Vienna, Austria

RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by LoBaron »

Hi JocMeister, even when taking the Lightnings at 31k from the equatation you still should have a nice ammount of Warhawks and Airacobras at reasonable
available for intercept.

It is difficult to analyse as a separate event without knowing the context of the attack. Just a few questions:

- are you playing with the latest beta, another beta version or the last official patch?
- was this the only attack, or is it a snippet from a larger one?
- what was the setting of your other 50%? Were they set to rest or assigned to escort
- what was the range setting of your fighters?
- did you, besides defending fly strikes which were escorted by the same squads also assigned to defense?
- where there any other targets in vincinity also under attack, maybe in a different hex?
- do you have an estimate of plane availability and airframe fatigue at the time of the attack?


On first observation there are a couple of things to note:

Again, one can discuss the realism of this, but CAP set at high alt has significant problems to reach bombers arriving 10k or more below the CAP
altitude. This is not only for planes already airborne, but also for scramblimg fighters, as they get vectored to a spread alt up to the maximum you assigned.
They only react in adapmtin their altitude when making contact (I am not referring to initial radar detection but visual contact) with the incoming strike.
By setting CAP so high you often prevent visual contact, and your fighters are not even in position to engage. So much for the Lightnings and TBolts.

Players can l ike it or not, I like it because it enriches the tactical variety, but like it or not, it is how the game engine treats these engagements.
This is extremely easy to replicate and has been proven over and over again. Also, it is this way since intitial release and has nothing to do with any recent
patches.

The second thing is, you got other fighter which are in a much better position to attack. Severe Storms has an impact on the ability of those to make
contact with the raid.

Adding to that the remaining fighters, except for the Spitfires, are 1st generation types who have 2 drawbacks in the situation: they are much worse fighters
than the 2nd generation Zero escorts, but more important, the Judy is a very fast plane. I think that the Judys speed was another factor which resulted
in a low intercept.

The CR does not tell more than that, but my prediction would be that simply setting the high alt CAP down to staggered altitudes slightly above the strikers,
you would achive a much better result.

I note that the hit percentage is very high for severe storms, but that is a known problem.


Understanding the game engine is not very hard, but often there are many components playing together to produce the results you see.
The denser the enviroment, and the more complex the setup, the harder it is to separate the root causes of events often displayed together
in single combat animatons.
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JocMeister
Posts: 8258
Joined: Wed Jul 29, 2009 10:03 am
Location: Sweden

RE: WHAT HAPPENED TO CAP IN v1.06.1108r9

Post by JocMeister »

Morning Lo Baron. Thank you for taking the time to respond! I´ll try to respond in turn as good as I can!
ORIGINAL: LoBaron
It is difficult to analyse as a separate event without knowing the context of the attack. Just a few questions:
- are you playing with the latest beta, another beta version or the last official patch?

We are playing with the latest official.
ORIGINAL: LoBaron
- was this the only attack, or is it a snippet from a larger one?

This was the only attack during the turn that effected any of the groups stationed at PR!
ORIGINAL: LoBaron
- what was the setting of your other 50%? Were they set to rest or assigned to escort
- what was the range setting of your fighters?

It might have been different for one or two groups but most of them would have 50-70% CAP, 0-30% Rest and Range: 0
Groups set to escort did not have a CAP setting (ie. CAP 0%). I do this to avoid fatigue.
ORIGINAL: LoBaron
- did you, besides defending fly strikes which were escorted by the same squads also assigned to defense?
- where there any other targets in vincinity also under attack, maybe in a different hex?

Not during that turn.
ORIGINAL: LoBaron
- do you have an estimate of plane availability and airframe fatigue at the time of the attack?

No sorry! I would say that roughly 500 fighters was available and ready to fly missions. That would be consistent with the roughly 220 planes listed in the CR.
ORIGINAL: LoBaron
On first observation there are a couple of things to note:

Again, one can discuss the realism of this, but CAP set at high alt has significant problems to reach bombers arriving 10k or more below the CAP
altitude. This is not only for planes already airborne, but also for scramblimg fighters, as they get vectored to a spread alt up to the maximum you assigned.
They only react in adapmtin their altitude when making contact (I am not referring to initial radar detection but visual contact) with the incoming strike.
By setting CAP so high you often prevent visual contact, and your fighters are not even in position to engage. So much for the Lightnings and TBolts.

Players can l ike it or not, I like it because it enriches the tactical variety, but like it or not, it is how the game engine treats these engagements.
This is extremely easy to replicate and has been proven over and over again.

The second thing is, you got other fighter which are in a much better position to attack. Severe Storms has an impact on the ability of those to make
contact with the raid.

Adding to that the remaining fighters, except for the Spitfires, are 1st generation types who have 2 drawbacks in the situation: they are much worse fighters
than the 2nd generation Zero escorts, but more important, the Judy is a very fast plane. I think that the Judys speed was another factor which resulted
in a low intercept.

The CR does not tell more than that, but my prediction would be that simply setting the high alt CAP down to staggered altitudes slightly above the strikers,
you would achive a much better result.

I note that the hit percentage is very high for severe storms, but that is a known problem.


Understanding the game engine is not very hard, but often there are many components playing together to produce the results you see.
The denser the enviroment, and the more complex the setup, the harder it is to separate the root causes of events often displayed together
in single combat animatons.

I agree that realism in this can certainly be discussed. So I´ll leave it at that! [:)] But this greatly favors the attacker. If you set your CAP up low to protect shipping/ground troops you can get skewered by sweeps and if you set it high bombers always get through virtually unmolested. If you set them up both ways you are toast either way. I think some tweaking in this regard could be in order. This happened to me just a few turns ago when I had lowered all my CAP to 15K in order to protect some shipping at Terapo. Erik then swept Terapo at high altitude (31K) and of course got the insanely powerful dive costing me some 15 Hellcats for 2 Tojos.

Also of note here is that the escort only consists of 6 Zeroes so despite the fact that many of the planes in the "low CAP" are older models they should still have been able to inflict some heavy damage on the strike planes.

But I think my main point remains? I´ll simplify to make my point clearer.

-The best possible detection you can get is roughly 30 minutes.
-The time it takes for fighters on CAP duty but sitting on standby to scramble is also roughly 30 minutes.

Isn´t something very obviously wrong here? Since the majority on CAP duty is sitting on standby that actually means that the majority of the CAP have no chance to intercept the incoming strike?

This would be very consistent with what I have seen in my game so far. I regret now that I just recently lost all my combat reports in a disc crash. Would have been very interesting to go back and look at all the other "odd strikes" I have been on the receiving end of.

I still think there might be a problem concerning intercept time and detection time. My gut feeling says that this does not effect the IJ as much/at all. I base this (very loosely I´ll admit) on the fact that my opponent have had a good amount of both escorted and unescorted strikes go in right through the CAP with none to slight losses. I have not had this happen from my side at any time that I can recall.

EDIT: Just pure speculation. Could it be that something is "odd" with allied intercept times? Is 30 minutes from scramble to airborne and at altitude reasonable?

How does it look from the IJ side?
What does the detection time look like from the IJ side?

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