What do the colored circles mean?

[kaleun]

What do the white circles and red circles around the radar stations mean? I remember from the Talonsoft game that one of them had something to do with electronic warfare but I don't remember the details.
What is the white circle and what is the red one?

[khalfani]

They normally indicate the range of radar. As to why they're so small on your screenshot, it could indicate the effects of being jammed like you were suggesting.

[PizzaDeOveja]

I don't think radars do much in daylight. In a past glorious oil campaign I made a corridor hitting all radars between Italy and Ploetsi and the germans just kept intercepting my raids anytime. Perhaps hitting radars and/or jamming is more useful for night bombing, as it was historically...and/or interceptors get penalties when resolving combat. Also I hear they play a bigger part in Eagle day but I haven't played that so far so...

[kaleun]

This is from the night phase.
Red jammed
White ?
or reversed.
Does anyone know?

[Cripes A Mighty]

IIRC, the small red circle indicates a jammed radar site. The white circle means that Jerry is taking your picture.

The ranges of the radar stations can be seen during the planning and briefing phases but aren't visible during the combat resolution phase.

[PizzaDeOveja]

Yep I just came back from a glorious night bombing of dortmund and I got a lot of circles thx to my ECM buddies. Sadly while there are some white Im guessing Im being detected (in fact those krauts didnt seem to have any problem in directing their planes towards me) so there is really not much of point in using them. Anyways I'm guessing having some ECM doesnt hurt so I'll keep using them.
What I really suck at is using my Night fighters. They never intercept anyone. How do you guys use them? I even had just one gruppen hovering an enemy airport while the germans were landing on it and they didnt do anything, nor they get any bad guys that infiltrate in my bomber stream...snif snif...

[john_txic]

Pizza,

Mine are quite effective: some pilots can score 3 kills+ per night if the Force is with them.

I progamme a NI sortie to the airfield of interest about 90/120mins after bomber T/o time (dependent upon range). Altitude approx 17,500ft. "Follow" at about 30 min. intervals for approx 2 hrs. I usually alternate Mossie/Beau.

Rarely, if ever, do I integrate them with the Bomber stream.

109s I find hard to kill, however, so I concentrate on the twin-engined NJG bases.

[PizzaDeOveja]

Yep I think that integrating your NF on the bomber stream is a waste of time. I will try your approach and see what happens. Anyways I can always daylight bomb those airfields to dust and hope I destroy some of them on the ground.

********
Woh! the wellington RCM (1/192) squadron in the 44' Campaign is the only one RCM plane equipped with WINDOW and Elint Receivers(which has the top rate of all jammers(25)). I will use it in my next raid and report the effects. Strangely enough despite being the same plane, the 16th spec fortress RCM squadron has different equipment from the other fortress RCM. I will probably send them both anyways on raids deep in Germany so...

[Ralzakark]

The window dropping Wellingtons are useful for diversions to pull up night fighters and exhaust their fuel before your main raids go in. Those ELINT receivers won't jam anything of course, high rating or not.

I also use Mosquitos to patrol airbases individually at half hour intervals. I usually catch a small handful of night fighters, sometimes none, but I have had almost no success patrolling the bomber lanes. The main difficulty is the nausea of plotting endless individual sorties to cover multiple bases.

Even with supressed radar you will still be tracked. Historically the Germans used passive devices to find the bomber stream as well as radar, and of course any troops on the ground you fly hundreds of bombers over are going to call them in. The very presence of heavy jamming gives away the position of the jammers as well of course. What you will find is that fewer night fighters make contact even if their unit is shown as flying with abomber stream.

[PizzaDeOveja]

Excellent tips Razakark thx a lot...[&o]
Im reading the EXCELENT book by R.V. Jones,Most Secret War, and it states there that jamming was pretty effective, the more so towards the end of the war. Of course that was what this guy did so he wouldnt report otherwise anyways, buy he is pretty convincing.

Just as you say it is pretty frustrating to have to plot individualy every bombing night those NF. Perhaps in an upcoming patch they allow mission to be loaded from the previous day so you just had them all and just need to change whatever needs changing. That would be cool. Most times in these games, they suffer a lot from needless mandatory anal-retentive micromanagment, but of course this can have a lot of appeal for some people so...

I would hope that there was some way for your fighters to be directed during the action part of the game just as the axis player is able to direct his force. Of course that would make it even harder for the AI or the player that controls the Axis, which is already playing against impossible odds but...

EDIT: just added to my wishlist at amazon! thx John!

[john_txic]

Pizza: get hold of a copy of "Instruments of Darkness" by Alfred Price. You'll enjoy it: it deals with the electronic war over germany from 1940 - 45.

[Ralzakark]

ORIGINAL: PizzaDeOveja
Perhaps in an upcoming patch they allow mission to be loaded from the previous day so you just had them all and just need to change whatever needs changing. That would be cool.

ORIGINAL: PizzaDeOveja
I would hope that there was some way for your fighters to be directed during the action part of the game just as the axis player is able to direct his force.

The RAF didn't have radar coverage over Germany or anything but the costal fringes of France and the occupied low countries, so having to plot missions in advance and not being able to alter them in real time matches the RAF's historical experience. Just wish it was easier to do in the game!

Another good book is Gebhard Aders' History of the German Night Fighter Force, 1917-45 which you can still get second hand via Amazon.

[npsergio]

White circles: range from the Mamut radars.
Red circles: range from Freya radars.
They're so small because their are shut down by allied planes.

[warshipbuilder]

Is there any way to isolate a radar site so that you only see its range circle? With so many overlapping circles it is hard to figure out just what radar is covering what area. Thanks.

[jjjanos]

Plot a mission to the radar site.

Click hid targets.

Ranges for targeted radar sites go bye-bye.

[warshipbuilder]

Where do you find "hid targets"? Thanks.

[jjjanos]

Hide targeted is one of the buttons on the right side of the screen.

[warshipbuilder]

Ok I got it. Thanks.