Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (Full Version)

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CaptCarnage -> Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (1/7/2017 12:27:25 PM)

Greetings my favourite community!

Coming from WitE I bought WitW mainly because I was interested in the air war. That's what I have been doing for the last 2 days.

But quite a few questions here on how to conduct a good bombing campaign.
Are there any general tips for this?
Having played BotR I am always very much inclined to keep raids at around 200 bombers (the WitW AI sometimes sends 600 in a raid...).
And 1 raid a day on a certain target seems realistic but the game allows for 2 or more.

And how to prevent Operational Losses? These are currently preventing a good score in my Intro Campaign. I have very little A2A and Flak losses, but many planes go down operationally...
What can I do about that?



loki100 -> RE: Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (1/7/2017 2:12:34 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Skyhigh

Greetings my favourite community!

Coming from WitE I bought WitW mainly because I was interested in the air war. That's what I have been doing for the last 2 days.

But quite a few questions here on how to conduct a good bombing campaign.
Are there any general tips for this?
Having played BotR I am always very much inclined to keep raids at around 200 bombers (the WitW AI sometimes sends 600 in a raid...).
And 1 raid a day on a certain target seems realistic but the game allows for 2 or more.

And how to prevent Operational Losses? These are currently preventing a good score in my Intro Campaign. I have very little A2A and Flak losses, but many planes go down operationally...
What can I do about that?


Some advice on the latter. from the Allied side - rest bomber squadrons that get low morale (I use around 65 as my threshold) as this feeds into operational losses. Its better to take breaks (either due to operational tempo or weather) than run everything as fast as possible. Some aircraft are safest left on the ground. The Stirlings are a good example. Especially the IIs, I send off to N Scotland and keep in reserve till I can convert to Lancasters or Halifax IIIs. Low experience is another source of operational losses so put those squadrons onto reserve (or training) - again out of the way.

Another source is damaged planes. So watch your tempo - don't bomb every day of the week and try not to have unescorted bomber raids caught (easier said than done).

From testing, there are 2 broad bombing strategies. One is to draw quite a wide air directive, work out how many targets you want to hit and set the number of 'missions' (on the advanced part of the AD tab) to meet this. I try to get 100-150 at least over each so if I have say 600 B-17s available I may tell it to do 4-5 raids per day (remember I'll not fly every day). The other is to micro manage it, set up one/two hex ADs and pick the bombers for the target.

Some are getting good success out of lots of small raids on this basis (remember you can target a city with more than 1 AD). Unless you are bombing in France or the Netherlands I doubt you will get two raids a day per AD and I'd actually try to avoid this (fatigue becomes a problem).

The in-game air war scenarios are really good for trying this out.

Finally look at the routes of your raids and adjust. Obv avoid flying over/next to heavy flak but also look for where the Luftwaffe is. Use some of your recon for airbase detection. There are a number of strategies but a really heavily escorted raid into an area of heavy fighter concentration can pay off. You are using the bombers as bait and the idea is that the Luftwaffe is an irreplaceable resource - at some stage in mid/late 44 it will degrade badly as it runs out of skilled pilots. On the other hand, esp along the Baltic you can try to avoid fighters and this can give you an unchallenged route to some key targets (same can apply in S Germany).

Oh and team up your bombing missions with recon missions - this is a must.




CaptCarnage -> RE: Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (1/7/2017 3:55:28 PM)

Thank you very much!

2 playthroughs of the Intro campaign after your notes and I now scored a Decisive Victory with 1135 VPs :)

I rested the low-morale units, I had 2 ADs in the end for 8th on the Ruhr area, had RAF on the Ruhr for manpower and 15th went to Ploesti and surrounding hexes. Played around a bit with intensity (missions per day) and experimented at the same time with single-hex raids (Magdeburg; no big impact, Schweinfurt, too many losses).
And all this in the last Scenario :)

On to the bigger scenarios I'd say!



Q-Ball -> RE: Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (1/8/2017 5:35:09 PM)

One key to reducing Ops losses is to reduce the operational tempo. You should rarely set an Air Directive to fly every day, otherwise you will increase fatigue, which is a major cause of Ops losses.

Fly RECON missions EARLY in the week, and bombing missions LATER in the week; that way, each get some rest, but the bombers can use the recon data, presumably

Also, at the start of every turn, filter all units with more than 25 or 30 fatigue (pick your level). You'll start to see who is wearing out or having fatigue issues. If you fly highly fatigued units they will suffer OPS losses, even if the morale is very high




RedLancer -> RE: Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (1/8/2017 5:39:03 PM)

Also on any given day ADs fly in the order they are listed for the Air HQs so it can de better to create the recon ADs first.



LiquidSky -> RE: Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (1/9/2017 2:39:34 PM)



You can change the order by setting Priority as well. The AD's will go in order starting with the V. HIGH Priority.....then it will do the AD's in order at HIGH...and so on.

Operational Losses can also come from aircraft that where damaged by Flak...then subsequently lost.



CaptCarnage -> RE: Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (1/11/2017 3:54:19 PM)

I have started Weakest Link and the scenario objectives are Heavy Industry, Oil, etc.

Obviously fighter defence is very strong now, so I have to deal with heavy losses if I attack the Ruhr.

But for every enemy plane shot down, there will be another coming out of the factory I suppose? Is it wise to also attack Aircraft Factories - they get less VP score but it might help the difficulty?
Or should I just limit supply to these factories by bombing surrounding railyards? Or interdicting railway hexes? Is that effective at all, or should I stay focused on HI etc. and go for the big VPs?



Q-Ball -> RE: Some airwar pointers please? + reduce Ops Losses? (1/12/2017 4:47:41 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Skyhigh

I have started Weakest Link and the scenario objectives are Heavy Industry, Oil, etc.

Obviously fighter defence is very strong now, so I have to deal with heavy losses if I attack the Ruhr.

But for every enemy plane shot down, there will be another coming out of the factory I suppose? Is it wise to also attack Aircraft Factories - they get less VP score but it might help the difficulty?
Or should I just limit supply to these factories by bombing surrounding railyards? Or interdicting railway hexes? Is that effective at all, or should I stay focused on HI etc. and go for the big VPs?


Only bomb the scenario objectives.

Bombing railways inside Germany is nearly useless, IMO. There are better targets.

Overall, the collapse of the LW happens because of a lack of trained pilots, not a lack of planes. The only A/C factories worth bombing, IMO, are Me-262, only because that aircraft can rack up big kill ratios. But that's it.

Late-war Germany I typically find I have plenty of planes in the pool, but not enough good pilots to fly them



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