Night Fighter vs. Night Fighter

[DTomato]

LiquidSky escorted his RAF night bombers with massed night fighters, and shot down quite a few of my night fighters.

Perhaps this represents intruder missions against German airfields -- which really should be ground attack. Either way, night fighter escorts should be of marginal effectiveness. The RAF should not shooting German night fighters wholesale in 1943.

[decourcy2]

It is over effective but, the German night fighters will slaughter Mosquito's left and right which is also unrealistic. And the Mosquito NF replacement rate is pathetic.

[DTomato]

Mosquitoes do die like flies.

[LiquidSky]

ORIGINAL: DicedT

Mosquitoes do die like flies.

I can't help it..I really thought this was funny [:D]

[LiquidSky]

Hmm..was I actually flying at night? Sometimes I send the BC out during the day. Maybe a quarter of the time. I already 'x'-ed my air doctrines, so I can't look back at the last mission.

[marion61]

I don't totally agree with WA shouldn't be shooting up your planes in 43. If you get close enough to England I would use AS and heavy escorts too. I will do that to keep the german fighters closer to Germany and not out intercepting me in the channel. The math may be off for the planes, but I'm not a mathematician, but that's a perfectly valid tactic to protect your bomber fleet.

[JocMeister]

People fly at night? [X(]


[;)]

[HMSWarspite]

Yes. Much much cheaper for deep raiding...

[wokelly]

Its hard to know, the British didn't really put much effort into night escorts until later in the war, which I feel was a mistake. The British night fighters were pretty much superior to the German designs (Mosquito vs BF110s), and the Serrate detection devices will give even slower designs an advantage over German NFs. Also British NFs have superior radar devices then the German NFs. So it makes sense British NFs should be killing more German NFs then they lose.

When the British NFs were really active in the last months of the war, they definitely put fear into the ranks of the German NF force. A term was coined by German crews in the last months of the war called "Mosquito terror" to denote the inferiority they felt against British NFs.

The British are handicapped by the low NF production numbers, even moderate losses will eat away at their available strength until only the US squadrons can operate.

[marion61]

Prune your airgroups and it's not a big deal. Sometimes you have to disband some air groups to get pilots and planes for the lesser allies, and I prune most every air force to make them more efficient and keep enough planes in the group to fly missions. I also pull every NF from everywhere back to England turn one and put them into Bomber Command to escort. In one game it's April 44, and I have over 250 NF's flying escort. Get the low experienced first.

[DTomato]

This happened on the first turn. 180 British night fighters versus 330 German NFs, and the Germans lose 101 to 9 British!

As the game stands now, the RAF can establish night air superiority over Germany. This is an alternate universe where the British have UFO technology. Because with mid-1943 radar, and operating over Germany without the benefit of ground control radar, there is no way the RAF night fighters rule the night skies.

If you want to play a game where the British have AWACS radar planes, I'm happy to join. I'll use my D&D 67th level Magic User against your bombers.

DT

[Smirfy]

Unfortunately most of those NF would be tied to UK air defence you would probably have to have a UK air box something like the EF one

[Helpless]

This happened on the first turn. 180 British night fighters versus 330 German NFs, and the Germans lose 101 to 9 British!

This one looks as a bug. Providing a save could be more constructive way to deal with it.

[decourcy2]

Yeah, i have done a lot of testing of the air war for my mod and i have never seen results like that. If anything the Mossies probably take a few too many losses, but that is largely because we Axis players cannot set priorities to fighters or bombers.

With the low Mossie production without that bug the British will be out of night fighters quickly.

Also, to many German players are passive and have already concluded Germany lost. You have a huge airforce in '43, use it. If an Allied player pulls all NF's out of the Med to escort night bombers, then use your aircraft in the Med. Do217 NFs can kill night flying Allied naval interdiction.
Launch night raids on Allied ports. See how well the Allies do with Bizerte and Tunis at 100% damage.
Use your Ju88's for night naval interdiction.

There are thousands of options but instead i see complaints that the game is exploitable. But the exploits listed are not exploits.

In '44 preparing for a cross channel invasion, suicide your horded bombers against the invasion ports that you have been reconning.. the invasion will not get far without a functioning port.

Even the constant complaints about the Allies launching a cross channel invasion in '43 are silly, as long as you don't use the exploit it is not like it could not have been done.

People say 'but the Allies learned so much in Husky and Salerno, that is why Overlord succeeded!' That's fine, but a non-exploit '43 cross channel is going to be in the range on 30-40 prep points... overlord handled competently is going to be 90. There is your learning from earlier invasions. Thus, not an exploit.

[AWGreif]

ORIGINAL: Helpless

This happened on the first turn. 180 British night fighters versus 330 German NFs, and the Germans lose 101 to 9 British!

This one looks as a bug. Providing a save could be more constructive way to deal with it.

It's a server game, AWGreif (WA) vs. DicedT (Axis).
I was most surprised by the outcome of this first turn mission.

[HMSWarspite]

You don't need a UK air box, you just need to play a human GE. The turn after I saw that number of NFs with the bombers I would be nuisance night raiding a load of bomber bases, and the odd factory as well... keep the WA honest, its the only way...

[Peltonx]

ORIGINAL: DicedT

This happened on the first turn. 180 British night fighters versus 330 German NFs, and the Germans lose 101 to 9 British!

As the game stands now, the RAF can establish night air superiority over Germany. This is an alternate universe where the British have UFO technology. Because with mid-1943 radar, and operating over Germany without the benefit of ground control radar, there is no way the RAF night fighters rule the night skies.

If you want to play a game where the British have AWACS radar planes, I'm happy to join. I'll use my D&D 67th level Magic User against your bombers.

DT

I will have to agree, if it is true = complete Middle Earth stuff going on.

Saves bro saves, sometimes I get a little pissed off myself and forget to save - ok most of the time.

good stuff man, but 2by3 needs data.

[JeffroK]

My first thought was how RAF NF could "escort" a bombing raid??

As a long term BTR player I hate the time I spend setting up RF NF "sweeps" to co-ordinate with a BC Raid, makes it a lot harder to shoot down the Luftwaffe,

IMVHO, the game is using the same calculations/procedure for day & night escorts, and that Mossies are so much better than bf110 they can make a killing.

[Helpless]

the game is using the same calculations/procedure for day & night escorts

No

[HMSWarspite]

Not all the German losses will be due to NF. And I do agree this looks unlikely, but you have to remember that this has o simulate night intruder missions over a/f as well, so they may be aiming a little high.

Also, as we have no concerns about technology capture, we will send the best NF/AI radar planes over whereas for a long time the RAF wouldnt use radar equipped aircraft over foreign territory (I forget when that stopped)