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hellfish6 -> RE: Operation Brass Drum Scenario - Help (11/18/2013 9:44:33 AM)
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I'm about three hours into it.
Spoilers follow:
Very tricky mission, but I've managed a 20-to-1 kill ratio in air-to-air combat so far. I've shot down 40 enemy aircraft (mostly MiG-29s with a scattering of J-10s, J-7s and F-14s) for a recon F/A-18 (the damn MiG survived 8 AMRAAMs before I was finally able to zap him) and another F/A-18 to an undetected SAM site. I just finished squashing Cha Bahar with a long-range F-35 JDAM strike that took out the tin shield and damaged a runway. A SEAD strike, not finding any targets to hit with HARMs, was accidentally sent over Chah Bahar at 2000 feet. Somehow the two ships survived discovering all the AA (and the 12+ SA-10s thrown at them) and a follow-up Tomahawk strike took out the rest of the airfield, the jammer, and SA-10 site. I had a couple of follow-up sorties, including the doomed recon bird, to hit the ammo bunkers, fuel and another radar station I stumbled across NE of the airbase in the mountains. I suppose I didn't need to, but I wanted to play with some ordnance.
I jumped a Russian SSGN that popped up in the Zumwalt SAG. Sorry - in wartime anyone would have done the same thing to an unidentified sub in the middle of a battlegroup under fire. Yeah, I probably should have IDed it, but I had four Mk54s in the water before it went from Goblin to SSN. For some reason, the Russian DDG didn't want to fight me even after sinking the sub, but I'm 99% sure it's providing radar and jamming support to the Iranians. I'm sorely tempted to throw some HARMs at it.
I kept one E-2D and two EA-18Gs on a support line at all times. The Growlers were all offensive jamming and the E-2D let me pick up everything in the air. Not sure how much the Growlers have been helping, but their AMRAAMs have accounted for a couple of leakers that made it through my CAP.
My advice for air-to-air combat (and this is from some experience with Command, and possibly exploiting the AI) fly your aircraft at 1000 feet. Have AWACS. With AWACS and AMRAAMs you don't need to turn on your aircraft radars to engage. Manually fire AMRAAMs at targets in pairs (I always fire one from each aircraft in a 2-plane group, just in case one gets killed and the survivor was the one who fired all his missiles first). DO NOT CLOSE WITH THE ENEMY. You're so low they'll probably never see you. If I've got F/A-18Es with heavy AMRAAM loads (6 each) and four targets in range, I'll volley fire two AMRAAMs at each inbound, turn tail at minimum altitude and then use the remaining four AMRAAMs to pick off any survivors (and, given the relatively poor performance of modern missiles against modern aircraft/ECM you'll have a couple leakers). Never use your AIM-9s unless you're saving a high value asset and are willing to sacrifice your fighter.
Also, don't let the AI run your battles. I think the scenario is manageable by you manually allocating weapons - and you'll do a much better job limiting your expenditures than the AI. All too often I've had the AI fire 2-4 SAMs at a target, destroy the target with the last SAM, but not before firing 3-4 more SAMs at the target that you just blew up. Eight SAMs for one J-7 is not going to help you.
I'm gonna try running the Zumwalt group along the Omani coast at high speed. Hopefully they're moving too fast for Iran's dinky subs to intercept (at least too fast for them to move quietly to intercept) and maybe by hugging the shore the radar picture for the bad guys will be hazy. The America group is following them, for mine-clearing and gunship support when the fast attack boats inevitably show up.
My next objective is Jask. I'm pretty comfortable that I've got air superiority now, though the IRIAF still tried to send onesies and twosies against me. No Su-24s or F-4Es yet, which leads me to believe I my ships haven't been detected yet.
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