Air bombing unit blues

[squatter]

In road to Leningrad I have all my air units close to the front, and in supply.

If I choose bomb unit, and right click on the target I unleash 100 or so JU88s on the target.

But after that first attack, all other attempts are listed "no bombers available"

Question 1: do only level bombers take part in bomb unit attacks?


2: If you dont hold shift, are you effectively sending your entire bombing force on a mass attack, expending all your strength in one shot?

3. In the space of a two week turn, surely your aircraft are capable of attacking more than one target?

As an ancillary point: would it be so difficult to have a little more info on the air doctrine screen? Instead of "Minimum percentage to fly - 40" could through tool tips or whatever it at least say "minimum percentage of readiness/fuel/fatigue (or whatever the number refers to) to fly - 40"?

Regarding air support: all it needs is a "emply air support?" question before each battle to stop 200 bombers appearing out of the sky over an isolated, surrendering border regiment, and then nothing showing for the seige of Leningrad!

I'm basically feeling locked out of how the air war works in the game at the moment, and am just relying upon its most basic functions.

[ComradeP]

Question 1: do only level bombers take part in bomb unit attacks?

As in: are they the only bomber type that will normally be attracted? No, but you don't have any tactical bomber squadrons in RtL.

2: If you dont hold shift, are you effectively sending your entire bombing force on a mass attack, expending all your strength in one shot?

No, you're sending what the AI would send.

3. In the space of a two week turn, surely your aircraft are capable of attacking more than one target?

A one week turn, and I've also debated (like other testers before me probably) whether bomb unit attacks should be possible later on too, with mileage flown, but thus far it remains impossible. No argument that more control over the ground support part of the air war would be preferable in the future.

[squatter]

Thanks ComP. To clarify...

1 So the JU87s dont fly because they are only used in CAS? Is that why I only see JU88s?

2 So the AI always automatically sends all available bombers in range to your first target choice, meaning that if all your air power is concentrated in one zone that you only get one air attack per turn? Because that is what I am experiencing.

3. To be clear: each squadron can fly just one mission per week turn, be it recon, intercept, CAS or bomb unit? What is the point of the mileage then?

[ComradeP]

1 So the JU87s dont fly because they are only used in CAS? Is that why I only see JU88s?

No Ju 87's fly because there are none in RtL, as it doesn't include tactical bomber units/Stukageschwader. Normally anything that can bomb can participate as a bomber.

2 So the AI always automatically sends all available bombers in range to your first target choice, meaning that if all your air power is concentrated in one zone that you only get one air attack per turn? Because that is what I am experiencing.

The AI sends planes over based on a notional number, which is as much of a mystery to you as it is to me, so I always manually select the squadrons I want to use through shift right clicking. You can only launch one bomb unit mission with a bomber squadron each turn, as in order to be able to fly such a mission, they need to have 0% mileage flown. Aside from some transport missions, the other kinds of air missions can still be flown after that.

[squatter]

A quick test reveals:

Road To Leningrad turn 1.

Air docrine settings left on default.

Select bomb unit.

Right click closest target. 120 JU88s and 34 JU87s fly.

Right click another front line target. 80 JU88s fly.

Right click any other front line target - no bombers available. Repeat several times, same result.

Check mileage on all bomber units. Maximum reading is 3%. Some 2%. Yet no more will fly.

Is this how the game is supposed to function?

[ComradeP]

Maybe my version of RtL is outdated somehow, I don't have any Stukageschwader on turn 1.

As said: you can only launch one bomb unit missions per squadron each turn, so as soon as a squadron has anything else than 0% mileage flown, it can't fly any more bomb unit missions, but can fly most other air mission types.

[DBeves]

ORIGINAL: squatter

A quick test reveals:

Road To Leningrad turn 1.

Air docrine settings left on default.

Select bomb unit.

Right click closest target. 120 JU88s and 34 JU87s fly.

Right click another front line target. 80 JU88s fly.

Right click any other front line target - no bombers available. Repeat several times, same result.

Check mileage on all bomber units. Maximum reading is 3%. Some 2%. Yet no more will fly.

Is this how the game is supposed to function?

Dont let the AI make the choice - shift right click on the target hexes and you can choose the units yourself.

You cant for some obscure reason do this for ground support so the AI does that based on god only knows what "Notional" value it chooses.

Also for some obscure reason bomb unit can only be done once for each air unit per turn - as opposed to ground support - which I would have thought was much the same thing - which is based on mileage flown.

Leaving aside the fact that one ground attack mission per week is baffling - it seems to me the whole bomb unit is the only mission that doesnt abide by the mileage flown rule (which is good I think) is just another indicator to me that the more I experience of the air system in this game the more flawed I think it is.

Really - if you can explain any of the logic of this to prove me wrong I am only too willing to listen.

Seriously - this whole air thing is leading me to the conclusion I must put my very expensive purchase on the shelf for a while till something changes - as it is simply an excersise in frustration at the moment

[ComradeP]

Bomb unit missions are not really effective for damaging units, they mostly increase disruption. Unless you're the Soviets and attack with hundreds of planes, but the Luftwaffe does far more damage with interdiction attacks and ground support during attacks than with bomb unit attacks. At this point, there isn't much reason to fly more than one bomb unit mission as the Axis and the limitation on bomb unit missions slightly limits the awesomeness of the VVS from 1943 onwards.

[squatter]

I see, thanks.

So mileage only counts for CAS, recon, escort and I guess airbase moves? How about airbase attack?

Anyone have any notion why a squadron should be allowed only one air strike per turn, but multiple CAS missions?

What you mean by interdiction btw ComP? And disruption? Is that reduced readiness?

[DBeves]

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

Bomb unit missions are not really effective for damaging units, they mostly increase disruption. Unless you're the Soviets and attack with hundreds of planes, but the Luftwaffe does far more damage with interdiction attacks and ground support during attacks than with bomb unit attacks. At this point, there isn't much reason to fly more than one bomb unit mission as the Axis and the limitation on bomb unit missions slightly limits the awesomeness of the VVS from 1943 onwards.

Well that really doesnt explain the logic of why this one particular mission is coded to ignore the miles flown rule. I have noticed they are not really effective at all actually which makes it even more of a mystery to me - at least if the one fly rule was there as they were more effective then maybe I could understand.

Seriously - this all smacks of something that was coded but too difficult to change for some reason so it wasnt. I was looking forward to this game but I have opened it twenty times now and not got past the first few air attacks cause I simply think the system stinks.

Seriously - what the hell was wrong with allowing the player to choose what his air units do as in WiTP ?

[ComradeP]

I wish I could give you a logical reason for why this is the case, but the bomb unit thing is one thing I'm not particularly fond of myself (both because it's mostly useless and can only be done once per turn, which kind of evens eachother out, but I'd rather see more effective air missions and more control in general). I don't let the somewhat whacky air war ruin the game, though, and I just stick to managing the parts I can manage. The air war is only a small part of the game, and not a critical part most of the time as you win or lose the game based on your use of your ground units, not on the use of your air units.

[DBeves]

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

I wish I could give you a logical reason for why this is the case, but the bomb unit thing is one thing I'm not particularly fond of myself (both because it's mostly useless and can only be done once per turn, which kind of evens eachother out, but I'd rather see more effective air missions and more control in general). I don't let the somewhat whacky air war ruin the game, though, and I just stick to managing the parts I can manage. The air war is only a small part of the game, and not a critical part most of the time as you win or lose the game based on your use of your ground units, not on the use of your air units.

Mmmm - OK comrade - I wish I had your blinkers to some extent - if the air war is not important in the game - that makes me even more disappointed - as it sure as hell was in real life. I am truly fairly despondant about my purchase now ...

[ComradeP]

The effect the air war has is being somewhat inflated. If you have so many problems with not being able to micromanage parts of it, then I can see why you may find that part of the game disappointing. I just manage my air bases, the air doctrine screen and the missions I can manage manually and hope for the best for the parts that I can't.

From time to time the mysterious notional number will then create battles where hundreds of planes provide completely unnecessary support, and from time to time everything will work more or less as inteded. It's something I can live with, and about what I had expected, but the air war can certainly be improved, everybody is 1000% convinced of that on the tester forum too, it just had a much lower priority than finishing the game and getting the ground combat system to work as intended.

As said at release, I'm not going to give dishonest answers. There's stuff in the game I don't like either, and I can suggest changes, but in the end I can't really influence what's actually going to be changed, so I learn to live with my pet peeves, just like the other testers have learned to live with their pet peeves. It will probably all improve over time, but so soon after release there are still a number of imperfections in the game. The game is certainly playable and enjoyable, at least to me, but the imperfections can be annoying.

[DBeves]

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

The effect the air war has is being somewhat inflated. If you have so many problems with not being able to micromanage parts of it, then I can see why you may find that part of the game disappointing. I just manage my air bases, the air doctrine screen and the missions I can manage manually and hope for the best for the parts that I can't.

From time to time the mysterious notional number will then create battles where hundreds of planes provide completely unnecessary support, and from time to time everything will work more or less as inteded. It's something I can live with, and about what I had expected, but the air war can certainly be improved, everybody is 1000% convinced of that on the tester forum too, it just had a much lower priority than finishing the game and getting the ground combat system to work as intended.

As said at release, I'm not going to give dishonest answers. There's stuff in the game I don't like either, and I can suggest changes, but in the end I can't really influence what's actually going to be changed, so I learn to live with my pet peeves, just like the other testers have learned to live with their pet peeves. It will probably all improve over time, but so soon after release there are still a number of imperfections in the game. The game is certainly playable and enjoyable, at least to me, but the imperfections can be annoying.

Fair enough comrade - I will put this on the back burner for six months and come back and see if anything has changed
that makes it more enjoyable for me. Plenty other stuff to play in the meantime.

[ComradeP]

Well, see you in six months then.

[Monsieur Pinke]

Hi squatter,

Something to keep in mind about the bombers not comming out to play after a few missions. I noticed that in that particular scenario (RTL) that some of those bomber units readiness levels are already sitting not far over the doctrine level threshhold which happens to be 50. This is before any missions are flown.

So, after a few airfield strikes, they've dropped below that 50% and so won't be available for AI or manual (shift right-click) missions. Adjust your doctrine level down and you can squeeze some more missions out of them.
Now, I've just figured this out over the last day or two so please any WITE vets or testers out there please let me know if I'm barking up the wrong tree.

Fantastic game by the way!

Monsieur Pinke

[Redmarkus5]

I think the fundamental problem with the air model is that it's not sufficiently abstracted. What I mean is that the tempo of real life operations for air and ground units is different:

- An air unit may attack numerous different targets 100s of mile apart over a 1 week period.
- A ground unit will attack relatively few targets along its line of advance in the same period.

For a game of this scale, air units should contribute to an 'Air State' (Air Supremacy > Air Control > Air Parity, etc.). You should assign you units to 'pools' (Reserve, North, Centre, South, etc.) and adjust the focus of units in each pool (Air Supremacy, Airfield, City, CAS, etc.)

Then, each turn the system should compare the resources assigned to air actions that affect the Air State (Supremacy and Airfield, City etc.) compute losses and adjust the Air State. Next, as each ground battle occurs each side's CV is adjusted to reflect the Air State AND the proportion of air power assigned to CAS. The same would apply to interdiction. Interceptions during these ground attack operations would be tabulated and applied to the Air State when it is next computed.

Just some rough ideas...

[BadRon80]

Sorry my english is not very good so i post it shortly

Bomber Units can make 1!!! Ground Attack OR City Attack in 1 Turn, then the Message display: Bomber unavailible or out of Range [:(]

It seems as would it reach choose one part of a Geschwader (eg Stab/KG1) for Ground Attack to take out the other parts for fly Gound Attacks!

But the same Bomber Units can make a lot of Airfield Attack until 100% of movment are full [&:]

It´s a little bit buggy i mean [X(]


Greets from Germany

[mmarquo]

There are different levels of enjoyable Hell everyone finds for themselves; micromanaging every air strike on the Eastern Front for 4 years is a place I will never visit. Micromanaging one player directed strike on a ground unit/week/air group and letting the rest be abstracted is a fine compromise between playability and insanity. Choose your airstrikes and other one time/week missions wisely and be done with it.
 
Enjoy the game,
 
Marquo [:)]

[karonagames]

There are different levels of enjoyable Hell everyone finds for themselves; micromanaging every air strike on the Eastern Front for 4 years is a place I will never visit. Micromanaging one player directed strike on a ground unit/week/air group and letting the rest be abstracted is a fine compromise between playability and insanity. Choose your airstrikes and other one time/week missions wisely and be done with it.

I'm with Marquo on this, but I've never played WITP, where I understand you can assign blond,left handed pilots over 6ft tall to missions and tell them to fly at 28325.66 ft. So for WITP players coming to WITE and not having that level of control, must be very hard to adjust to.