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Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 12:51:00 AM   
joliverlay

 

Posts: 635
Joined: 1/28/2003
Status: offline 		I'm on turn 6 of a 1943 campaign as Axis. My opponent just leveled three large factories (aluminum and rubber) using bomber command in a night raid. I think it is an exploit because it was not possible in real life. I have a few questions for the group.

1. Is it an exploit or am I wrong?

2. I have suggested I would retaliate with my own exploits (which I can easily do) to level the playing field. Is that unfair? For example, I let 150 B17s fly (the wrong way) from the channel back over my territory (deeper than the original raid [yes I saved in mid game HS/Harley)] and could easily have killed probably 50 or more, but did not molest them.

What would you do.

Also, no offense intended to my opponent (whom I will not name). This is a "game" issue not a personal one. Even if this had not come up in the game, it is something I would like to hear opinions on.


Post #: 1
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 2:27:45 AM   
kaybayray

 

Posts: 424
Joined: 6/1/2007
Status: offline 		Just my opinion..... but...

Unless you've been tinkering with the attributes of the game mechanics I dont think it's an Exploit. I hesitate to jump in the Hack Bunker on first sight. Maybe he read my post in the War Room and is following my BC Strategy. However I have never severely damaged 3 Fabs in one Strike. But then my goal with BC is not hitting factories. My goal is burning down cities and that usually includes Rail targets if I do particulary well.

I am kind of at a loss for what you could do to retaliate short of sending a Thank You for Playing and dump him for being a Hack if it actually was a Hack. However, correct me if I am wrong in a PBEM game unless you have modified game files exactly as your opponent has then they can plot anything they want but when you run it using your game files I dont think it will be successful.

So at my age I can site you all manner of trips to Bizzaro Land of Freak things I have seen happen that are far more unlikely than swarms of bombers actually destroying 3 factories in a Night Bomber Strike in this game.

I think if you followed very exactingly to my method of building a Night Bomber Strike and taking great care with your final leg of your approach route from the IP to the Target and taking great care with aligning the aiming points of each Strike Element you could probably do some serious damage to a factory if your crews were well experience, had high morale and the lighting conditions were good for targeting.

So if it were me.... I would think not a Hack but just either great attention to detail or just flat out fantastic luck. But a word of advice to anybody who attempts to play this game. If you cant take gatting spanked.... dont play. Cause in all my years and all the games I have played this game is one of if not the most complex game I have ever encounterd. It is hard not to get spanked by a Human Opponent, because Humans are SMART and they learn very quickly and they put together very shrewed and clever plans with the intention of giving you a sever spanking.

So if it were me in your shoes... I would just chalk it up to luck and great leadership and try to learn something from it and see if you can Learn something that will allow you to Spank your opponent... after all ... your are Human

Later,
KayBay

_____________________________

It's all Mind Over Matter....
If you dont mind... It dont matter

(in reply to joliverlay)
Post #: 2
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 2:54:03 AM   
joliverlay

 

Posts: 635
Joined: 1/28/2003
Status: offline 		Thanks for you comments. To bad the forums from the original game and JC's mods are lost. I wounder if there was some discussion about this subject in them that has been lost over the 10 years we have been playing BTR.

How do you discern smart from exploit? The game mechanics will allow me to attack the 5% or so of bomber raids that fly almost back to England then recross the channel unescorted because of a bug in the return/landing program? (explanation below for those that dont know what I'm talking about) Obviously that is smart if you want to win, but an exploit if you want to model the "real world" because the bomber groups would never fly back to Germany unescorted with empty bomb bays, as they will do in the game.

(For those who don't know what I'm talking about, I had 150 enemy bombers fly back from England (empty) at the end of their raid all the way back into Germany proper rather than landing. No other allied aircraft over Germany. This will happen regularly throughout the game. A good axis player can sometimes kill almost 100% of this force.)

Other comments welcome.


(in reply to kaybayray)
Post #: 3
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 3:05:00 AM   
joliverlay

 

Posts: 635
Joined: 1/28/2003
Status: offline 		kaybaray Your guide for night bombing was about area bombing, not pinpoint bombing of factories. Right? I'm not talking about that.

IMO Bomber command should be able to target areas (cities) at will, but not individual factories. If an area attack hits a factory as collateral damage that should occur, however, pinpoint bombing of factories at night with any significant (let alone very high) probability of success should not be possible. As I understand it, this was the actual situation during the war. If I am wrong (about the real world I mean) please elaborate.




(in reply to joliverlay)
Post #: 4
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 3:17:03 AM   
kaybayray

 

Posts: 424
Joined: 6/1/2007
Status: offline 		Bomber Groups returning to way points is a new bug associated with the Matrix bebuild. Harley is working on a fix but I am unaware of the status. I would not attack a formation that is suffering from this bug especially if I had a Human opponent. Bad Form IMHO.

Smart from exploit....

What exploit are you aware of that allows a BC Night Bomber Strike to decimate an industrial target? On Command any given Mission??? No.. no exploit.

Smart...

Many will tell you how to build a Night Strike. They will tell you use the "Follow" command to easily plot repetitive strike elements to the same target region... yeah let the mindless AI fight your war and suffer the the consequences of poor Leadership. Follow My doctrine of plotting each individual Strike Element with it's own independant Aiming Point and march a line of aiming points across an industrial target under good targeting lighting using only elements with very high Experience, Morale and very low Fatigue and you have Smart with a much better potential of actually hitting an industrial target or including it being damaged by the Fires you create with a focused and purposful aiming regemine.

Read my post in The War Room, talk to Hard Sarge, TechSgt, Swift, Harley and Nick Bell. Read their posts. Lots of fantastic insight and pearls of wisdom to be had by these guys. They are light years ahead of me. I am a relative Slime Mold in the EDBTR Sea of Life compared to these guys. Talk to them.. they will Smart yas If you have the Mind to Listen.

Later,
KayBay

_____________________________

It's all Mind Over Matter....
If you dont mind... It dont matter

(in reply to joliverlay)
Post #: 5
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 4:08:35 AM   
joliverlay

 

Posts: 635
Joined: 1/28/2003
Status: offline 		I'm sorry I am not being very clear.

I was under the impression it was essentially not possible in real life to successfully attack individual factory's at night. Bomber command did area raids because it was not possible for them to target individual complexes. They tried and simply could not do it. Likewise the US flew in the day time for the same reason. They understood they could not hit specific targets (factories) at night with any real chance of success. My point is the game should model this reality. This is not my experience in my current PBM game.

As I said, my surprising experience in my current PBM game is that night raids have a higher success rate attacking factories than do the day raids. I think this is a bug in the game. I think night bombing should be limited to area targets, not factories. Deliberate attacks on factories should miss almost all of the time. Smarts or planning should have nothing to do with it.

If you have posted something on the forum in a strategy guide that now makes night raids more dangerous (or as dangerous) to factory targets than day raids, I'd say you have shown the game is broken.

Yes, I know who Hard Sarge is. I hope he and Harley will post on this. I'd like to here as many opinions as possible.

Fixing this (if it is broken) should be as important as the fixes that reduced German production to make it more realistic.

(in reply to kaybayray)
Post #: 6
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 4:28:49 PM   
Dobey455

 

Posts: 445
Joined: 12/28/2007
Status: offline
Early in the war bomber command was certainly not capable of much accuracy, however the development of the pathfinder squadrons and introduction of H2S and other radar greatly changed things.
To a great extent Arthur Harris purposely down played the capabilities of Bomber command because he was a VERY passionate believer in Area bombing and didn't want his assets re-tasked to precision bombing.

I believe that the RAF coordinated with the USAAF in the 1944 oil raids and was able to achieve decent accuracy at night. I know they were trusted enough to bomb German positions within close proximity of allied troops (something the 8th AF had trouble doing even by day.)

To say that BC could only hit big cities by the later half of the war would be as much a myth as the idea that the US B-17's dropped all their bombs into a pickel barrel.

Ofcourse if EVERY raid your opponent sends is wiping out a little factory on the open country side, THEN i would start to worry.

(in reply to joliverlay)
Post #: 7
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 4:30:41 PM   
Dobey455

 

Posts: 445
Joined: 12/28/2007
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: kaybayray

Bomber Groups returning to way points is a new bug associated with the Matrix bebuild....



Just for the record I'm pretty certain this used to happen in the original as well. Not as often, but I did see it happen.

(in reply to kaybayray)
Post #: 8
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/10/2010 7:09:22 PM   
joliverlay

 

Posts: 635
Joined: 1/28/2003
Status: offline 		Dobey, That is my recollection as well....but its been a long time.

(in reply to Dobey455)
Post #: 9
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/11/2010 2:40:46 AM   
Rusty1961

 

Posts: 1219
Joined: 2/4/2010
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: kaybayray

Bomber Groups returning to way points is a new bug associated with the Matrix bebuild. Harley is working on a fix but I am unaware of the status. I would not attack a formation that is suffering from this bug especially if I had a Human opponent. Bad Form IMHO.

Smart from exploit....

What exploit are you aware of that allows a BC Night Bomber Strike to decimate an industrial target? On Command any given Mission??? No.. no exploit.

Smart...

Many will tell you how to build a Night Strike. They will tell you use the "Follow" command to easily plot repetitive strike elements to the same target region... yeah let the mindless AI fight your war and suffer the the consequences of poor Leadership. Follow My doctrine of plotting each individual Strike Element with it's own independant Aiming Point and march a line of aiming points across an industrial target under good targeting lighting using only elements with very high Experience, Morale and very low Fatigue and you have Smart with a much better potential of actually hitting an industrial target or including it being damaged by the Fires you create with a focused and purposful aiming regemine.

Read my post in The War Room, talk to Hard Sarge, TechSgt, Swift, Harley and Nick Bell. Read their posts. Lots of fantastic insight and pearls of wisdom to be had by these guys. They are light years ahead of me. I am a relative Slime Mold in the EDBTR Sea of Life compared to these guys. Talk to them.. they will Smart yas If you have the Mind to Listen.

Later,
KayBay


Kaybay,

I did use your insights and the comments of others, from the war room to build that attack on Jack's factories.

I have to admit, I'm 50/50 on this one. I had no idea that my attacks were that successful, I had reports of 0% damage, until Jack told me it was about 80%.

Granted, I lost about 58 bombers in one strike of 271 planes so I did pay big-time for that attack.

If BC did have the capability to carry out such devastation than it's not an exploit, if they didn't have it, than I fear it should be fixed.

(in reply to kaybayray)
Post #: 10
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/11/2010 3:04:30 AM   
joliverlay

 

Posts: 635
Joined: 1/28/2003
Status: offline 		Yes the turn 8 night raid did 80-100% damage to 3 of my largest factories. Hardly damaged the urban areas around them at all.


(in reply to Rusty1961)
Post #: 11
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/11/2010 6:04:55 AM   
Rusty1961

 

Posts: 1219
Joined: 2/4/2010
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: joliverlay

Yes the turn 8 night raid did 80-100% damage to 3 of my largest factories. Hardly damaged the urban areas around them at all.




In the replay, I did see some of my big-boys miss the target and hit the open fields.

I think it was like 3 or 4 sqaudrons so I didn't even hit you at the 60 level rubber plant at full strength.

I think they need to tone the bombing down both at night (a lot) and from high-altitudes.

I think it is way too easy to destroy German industry from night bombing and high-altitudes. But, if it is legitimate, and the British could have bombed that well than Harris was a fool for not doing so.



(in reply to joliverlay)
Post #: 12
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/11/2010 12:42:33 PM   
wernerpruckner


Posts: 4148
Joined: 5/5/2005
Status: offline 		joliverlay:

let him do the damage, this will not bring him any good in the long run....he has not yet the forces to keep the pressure up.
If he damages some industries to the critical damage level or below it....this is good for you at the moment....you have enough time.
Each day the damage to a certain industrie is below the critical damage, the critical damage is lowered ( reflects the adaption of the German industry to shortages).
If he hits industry that triggers dispersal - this is also only good for you in the long run.

He can cause havoc for around 60 to 90 days....after that your NFs should be able to hit back on the deeper strikes.
He will have accumulated around 20 to 30 points of terror ( if he only attacks industries in cities) and additional 20 to 25 industrial damage).
After that he will struggle to keep the damage levels this high......

_____________________________


(in reply to Rusty1961)
Post #: 13
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/11/2010 1:10:23 PM   
Nicholas Bell

 

Posts: 549
Joined: 4/10/2006
From: Eagle River, Alaska
Status: offline 		It's funny, I've had some success with precision night attacks in both BTR and BOB, but the more I attempt to repeat those successes, the less likely I am to hit anything.  As HS indicates, my experience is there is a lot of luck involved - all the various randomizations have to fall into place perfectly.

Recall the statement "garbage in, garbage out".  To a degree this is true in this game - too many tactical "tricks"  and you will start to see odd results.  The code simply is not robust enough to filter out unexpected player techniques.  Whether you consider these techniques tactics or exploits is your call.  But the program is designed to handle what itself will do (ie what the AI does).  So creating BC raids where you make each squadron it's own raid and own lead unit is outside the parameters of the program and will probably give you odd results. (although I think I might give it a try in a toned down manner to represent remarking by the pathfinders).  In like manner stacking dozens of NF intruders over a German airbase will produce ahistorical results.  Or placing fighter sweeps just far enough away from a German airbase to not attempt to strafe (avoiding those losses) while still close enough to slaughter landing aircraft without being touched. Or flying night heavy bomber raids at low to mid altitude (7-10,000).


< Message edited by Nicholas Bell -- 4/11/2010 1:13:36 PM >

(in reply to wernerpruckner)
Post #: 14
RE: Am I being unfair? - 4/12/2010 1:05:14 AM   
kaybayray

 

Posts: 424
Joined: 6/1/2007
Status: offline 		Hey Guys <S>

My points about the use of BC are oriented at hitting Area targets. Burning down cities, not trying to hit a single Industrial Target.

Read though my posts and you will see that IMHO, I am sending modest amounts of Night Bombers to each area target in a nights strike. Typically around 100 total, 5 groups of around 20 AC. My Strategy and Tactic deviate from the Historical because IMO this game is all about "What If I commanded XYZ forces?".

I am not trying to duplicate how BC, the USAAF or the Luftwaffe carried out air operations in WWII. I am trying to utilize their equipment in a doctrine different from how it was done. I have not sat and ran replay after replay attempting to Game the Game. I have applied Strategic and Tactial thought to how I went about carrying out air ops, observing the effects and making adjustments to theory based on results as the campaign progresses. I then wrote about what I found to have a good and consistent margin of success throughout a campaign.

I do believe you could find a way to target a particular site as I described one possible method in an earlier post on this thread. But my posts about BC in my Doctrine are focused on hitting Area Targets as has earlier been pointed out. I have found that on occasion I do heavy damage to an Industrial target. But mostly I burn surface area of cities. I dont think this is an exploit. As Nick and others have posted BC doing heavy damage to particular sites appears more based on luck than tactics.

Now I must admit it may very well be an exploit. I do not know. My opinion is that it is not.

Later,
KayBay

_____________________________

It's all Mind Over Matter....
If you dont mind... It dont matter

(in reply to Nicholas Bell)
Post #: 15
RE: Am I being unfair? - 5/9/2010 11:37:06 AM   
Deadmeat1471WITP

 

Posts: 22
Joined: 4/10/2010
Status: offline 		Just my input. I love mosquitos, ive had alot of success using them both day and night at low altitudes (5000-1000 feet). They are brilliant! i just love em, use them instead of fighters :D

Best at day tho, as they are soo fast i think they can outrun fighters

Perfect for striking small targets like radar etc

< Message edited by Deadmeat1471WITP -- 5/9/2010 11:41:36 AM >

(in reply to kaybayray)
Post #: 16
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