How are Strategic Bombing Points calculated?

[RedBunny]

I'm not sure how strategic bombing points are scored (the score in the "Points for Strategic Bombing" section in the Campaign Summary). I am sure it has something to do with reducing factory capacity but I'm interested in details.

Let say I inflict 2 capacity damage in each of these three cases, would I earn the same number of Strategic Bombing points in each?

• Case #1: Inflict 2 capacity damage on a 10 capacity factory that had no previous damage

• Case #2: Inflict 2 capacity damage on a 10 capacity factory that previously had a damage of 80 and only 2 undamaged capacity left so presumably I've completely destroyed the factory

• Case #3: Inflict 2 capacity damage on a 2 capacity factory that had no previous damage, so I've completely destroyed it

I guess what I'm getting at is do you get more points per capacity destroyed on a higher capacity factory and do you get progressively more points per capacity destroyed by to continuing to damage a factory.

I'm asking because I've played the one week "Oil Campaign I" scenario several times and can't seem to score an Industrial Damage score above 5 leading to scenario losses (Industrial Damage score is of course derived from the Strategic Bombing points). I believe my targetting strategy is good, I'm going after the high-capacity oil facilities in the Ploesti area and while I don't generally completely destroy any factory I do move onto nearby factories with the highest undamaged capacity values. Hope I'm making myself clear here.


Of course it's also possible the "Oil Campaign I" scenario is unbalanced and the victory level is set too high.

Thanks for any insights!

[simovitch]

Of course it's also possible the "Oil Campaign I" scenario is unbalanced and the victory level is set too high.

This. I tried playing this scenario a few weeks ago and it seemed unbalanced to me however it may not be impossible. You definitely need to cluster your raids together so that you all share a well-timed escort screen and fan out once the (also well-placed) IP is reached. Leipzig area is rich with high capacity POL targets and also the 60 cap Schkopau rubber factory. With good weather raiding this area for 7 days straight might get your industry to 8. Your B24 cluster needs to be separate from your B17 cluster because the B24 groups will reach the target sooner.

There is no sliding scale of damage/current damage with the exception of the diminishing returns during the actual raid itself. As smoke covers the target the following bombers will cause less and less effect on damage. That's why anything over 100+/- bombers on target might be a waste.

[RedBunny]

I finally managed a win in this scenario.  I was happy to see that my basic strategy approached your suggestions, namely having clustered raids all following the same path in and then fanning out once they reached the targets which themselves were close to each other.  I time my B-24 and B-17 clusters to reach their targets at about the same time which means the B-17s take off earlier and are in the lead all the way to the targets.  I've observed that lead groups attract most of the interceptors so I loaded up my B-17s with most of the escorts and the B-24s are more or less left alone, on the way in at least.  Perhaps a gamey tactic but I'm not proud.  I followed your suggestion on running raids all seven days and that helped my score but still no wins.  This seemed to wear down the LW and I was pleasantly surprised that the fatigue on my escorts was manageable.  

I evolved these strategies over a dozen playings of the 'Oil Offensive I' scenario.  I was attacking the Ploesti area only (and the two capacity factory in Albania) but could not get more than 7 industry damage score.  Need 8 to win (usually).  I broadened my attacks to the Giurgiu factory (conducted simultaneously with the Ploesti raids as a distraction) but still couldn't get the 8 industry score.

But I finally won following your suggestion on attacking the high capacity targets in Central Europe.  On my latest playthrough I attacked the Blechhammer "FUEL" factories in Poland on the first two days.  My first day's raids were with almost all my B-24s in two heavily escorted clusters.  Each cluster targeted one 20 capacity FUEL factory and caused nearly 100% damage on each.  The next day I attacked the two 17 capacity factories nearby and in addition I sent my B-17s to attack the Ostmarkische OILR factory near Vienna.  In my previous games I was reluctant to go so deep into Central Europe because I figured the LW was really strong there and they are but my escorts did a good job defending my concentrated groups.  I sent my B-17s after the B-24s and the B-24s attracted most of the interceptors even though the B-17s later deviated from the B-24s path to their targets.

After these first two days I switched over to the high value Ploesti targets.  My strategic bombing score was much higher at this point in my previous playings but I found my bombers and escorts had much higher fatigue, no doubt from the longer flight times into Central Europe.  I followed my standard strategy in attacking the Ploesti area but I could not do so at the pace in my previous playings because of the fatigue levels.  I had to take an entire day off and on one other day I only mounted one raid.  On the second to last day of the scenario I mounted what I thought were effective raids but I earned a disappointingly low number of strategic damage points.  On the last day of the scenario I needed to earn 301 more strategic bombing points for the needed 8 industry damage points to win.  I didn't think I'd be able to do this considering how poorly the previous day went so I decided to attack three 6-8 capacity targets in the Ploesti area that had lower HAA levels and at a 20k height compared to my usual 24k or 25k heights I was doing.  Even though some really low morale and depleted units participated I earned over 500 strategic bombing points putting me well over the needed points for the 8 industry damage points.  
Scenario tip:  switch out the P-47s and Airacobras for P-51s and P-47s.  The additional long range escorts are critical.

Anyway, fun scenario.  Next up:  Big Week

[simovitch]

Glad you could beat it, and nice AAR. Looking forward to how you did in Big Week. That one isn't easy either.