kaybayray
Posts: 424
Joined: 6/1/2007
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Hey Ter <S> 
Yeah this is a very challenging and detailed game. However once you master a few things and learn a few things it becomes much easier to do well or at least OK.
Not to belabor some things about Bomber Command and the Night Bombing aspects in this reply, check out my post in the War Room, KayBays Strategic and Tactical Doctrine for the Allied 1943 Long Campaign. I show "My" way of operating Bomber Command. I have been IMO successful overall but yes I have had my disasters. But in that post I detail some things you might find at least interesting and perhaps might try out some.
In that same post I also discuss the various types of Industrial Targets and some ways in which you might go about putting together an overall Strategic Bombing Campaign plan for your Daylight forces.
I am currently working on what I want to add to that regarding what you are asking about. Namely building Daylight Strategic Bombing Missions were you dont get your head handed to you and you can overcome the Luftwaffe and destroy German Industry. Being a long way from posting it I will just tell you of some things that might help you at least do a bit better. At least I hope I can.
We can debate the numbers of AC you have in a Strike, IE how many Bombers, how many Fighters, the main Strike altitude and your flight path in and out, etc... Because there is more than one way to choke a dog... there is also many ways to do each of these.
Here are some things that I would ask you about your missions.
What Fighters are you using for your escorts?
I dont know how familiar you are with the various airframes available to you. The best group of AC to be using in this role very early on would be those like the P-47's, P-38's, the Spit 8's or Spit 9's. These are the for the most part, the most maneuverable, have the best weapons package and for some of them the longest legs to escort with. I dont want to get into a "this bird is better than that bird" thing with others on this board. I am speaking in generalities so I can help you get something going that does better generally.
Aircraft like the Spit 5's (Spit V or Spit VII) or the Hurricane (Cains as some call them) are pretty much useless in an escort role unless you have like 500 of them and even then I would not recommend it.
Are your targets within Escort range of the 47's or 38's and are you building missions where your Strike force is being escorted to the target and back by your aircraft?
Not meaning to be silly but this is important.. at least to me it is. No matter what you do your Strikes are going to be escorted to and from the target. If you do it right they will be escorted by your aircraft, if you dont.. well then you can expect extreme losses.
That is easy for me to say now that I have been playing this for many years. However this very situation you find yourself in right now is one of the tremendous things about this game. It puts you in the real hotseat of the actual commanders of the Allied Air Forces in Europe at the time. You dont have a lot of equipment, most of it is not very good, doesnt fly very far and doesnt carry very much. That is the challenge. Figuring out how to stay in business and damage German Industry until better and more equipment becomes available to you.
Flying deep into Germany in later 44 through early 45 is pretty easy when you can throw together 1000+ Bombers with 1000+ Fighter Escorts that can hit a target on the East side of Europe daily. Not so easy when you really have to work at it to scrape together 100+ Bombers with 50+ fighters to hit a target across the street.
But you do have some... and very little but some.. decent equipment to work with as I described earlier. Starting with that core of equipment you can succeed. But you have to take your time and you have to work hard at it. I believe you are off to a good start, you are dispersing your Fighter Escorts vertically which is just about as effective as you can make it. You must only strike targets that you have good solid escort to and from. You get outside of overlapping escort and man your are Indian Country and it is gona hurt.
Just as those that this game models you are constrained to a very short radius of operations in Western Europe. Mostly parts of France, Belgium and the Netherlands. As much as you may want to hit Germany... RESIST IT. You need to Build good solid experienced Units to work with. So you have to manage many things other than Targets, Altitudes, flight paths and escort ratio's.
Using inexperienced, low morale or fatigued Air Crews is a recipe for disaster. Working your Air Crews daily will create all of these. You have to take your time, rotate in and out of action, stand down, etc... Early on the single largest threat to Germany you have is Bomber Command. Hence why I posted about it first in my thread in The War Room. You are gona have to limp by with BC until you can build some sizable daylight forces with legs. Legs = Combat Range. Something you dont have yet.
Some other things you can do to help your daylight strikes is dont send them in there all by themselves. Just as those that were in command did you must put your strike into the target area in such a way that Flak and Fighters can not concentrate on any one group. IMO the key to this is Saturation. You must have other Strikes, Fighter Patrols, etc... in the area to soak off Luftwaffe concentrations with their intercept.
Ok now you can get real "Meta Game" here which I dont recommend and I dont care for. But the idea is dont send a Strike to a target where you dont have anything else going on at the same time or near or you give the Luftwaffe no other choice but to swarm. You have Tactical Strike Groups, (B-25's, B-26's.. and if you really want to scrape the bottom you could be using Bostons and the like) you have Fighter / Bomber units or capabilities, you also have Fighter Sweep capabilities. The point being get organized, learn some choreography and apply it to your strikes. Spread the response of the Luftwaffe out so that it doesn't concentrate on any one group.
OK, so how you do that? TIMING... the KEY. I set multiple missions to be over the target at the same time or close to it depending on their path to and from the target with respect to each other. The idea being that I want to present a large front and disperse the interception as much as I can. Some days this will work better than others. This is war and you are going to get a bloody nose. Hopefully you wont get Whacked.
Sounds easy right? Well it is harder than I make it sound. It takes great effort to make sure you got all the timing setup right. Then when you launch you learn about all the stuff under the hood of this awesome game that you werent aware of that effects what happens. Like Weather. Man.. "My Kingdome for a Clear Day"... you will learn about this well enough I wont explain it.
OK, now Altitude. I dont want to argue with people over this cause its a game and I play it my way. Take what ever I share as... KayBay's way.. maybe also a stupid way but its mine. I fly my Heavy Daylight Strikes with the Bombers between 18000 to 27000 feet with the escorts stacked to 5000 above that. I mean they aren’t Astronauts ok. And there are some relevant concepts to consider... like Bomb Train, Bomb Trail, Bomb Dispersion Vs Drop Altitude, etc... just to name a few of the biggest hitters. Yeah I read books, I do math and I even think sometimes. Lots of great info out there.. lots of BS on the internet so beware of the "Expert Morons".
Now the flight path. Here is one thought to keep in mind... ignore this and you will learn. If you fly over it.. it has guns.. and the guns will shoot at you. So choose your course carefully. And dont fly over it twice, IE one path to it.. fly over it and bomb it.. then fly away on a different course than you flew in on. As stupid as they AI may be it is still smart enough to figure out what targets you are hitting and it will load em up with AA. And regardless of what anybody says... dont try to take out AA.. best is to just try to avoid it.
And then there was Radar. I would advise that you only consider destroying Radar facilities which provide early warning of your Strikes initial launch and approach. IE, those facilities whom have a Radar Ring that extends out from the coast and / or over your Airfields. And I would choose from those as well. The idea being, you just dont have enough to destroy the Kamhuber Line so dont try. Because even if you could then there is Visual Detection, Sound Detection, Y-Dienst (Radio Direction Finding) and little kids on bicycles looking for you. I would advise only working on that which provides the most initial detection. Because once you cross the coast.. believe me they know where you are.
So now I have given you I hope some things to think about and maybe tryout. And I dont want to mince words with some that want to slap me around with numbers. Like I really dont want to hear about the Gun Value at 18,742feet Vs at 18,744 feet which has a variable differential of 1.7X10-Green Tomato. This game was originally built by Gary Grigsby. You either hate or love him.. thats a fact. But one thing I can say about GG is... if it happened in History.. it happens in his game some how some way... You may not like it, you may not agree with his method but you better believe that it's in there some how.
This is one Awesome game. I hope that you enjoy it as much as many of us have over the years. Ignore those that want to smak it around and power whine because there are some serious bugs that you will find. IE, Way Point Boogiloo for RTB Allied Bombers, Fighter Sweep Death Star Effect on Luftwaffe RTB Landing to name a couple. But at least the dang Sardinia to Dover and Back Again Dash and Splash is gone.
Later,
KayBay
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