Slitherine

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS
No, it wasn't a fat finger. I only did two because I didn't have enough railcap left. I'll send you the rest later.

Moscow is a good choice to evacuate them to!

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS
No, it wasn't a fat finger. I only did two because I didn't have enough railcap left. I'll send you the rest later.

Moscow is a good choice to evacuate them to!

That U-2VS airbase didn't get much in the way of Luftwaffe love this turn, so like an obstinate child, it will kick and scream (by bombing you) you until you do. You're going to do my job for me whether you want to or not.

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS
No, it wasn't a fat finger. I only did two because I didn't have enough railcap left. I'll send you the rest later.

Moscow is a good choice to evacuate them to!

That U-2VS airbase didn't get much in the way of Luftwaffe love this turn, so like an obstinate child, it will kick and scream (by bombing you) you until you do. You're going to do my job for me whether you want to or not.

I want to - we have lots of arriving bomber boys who want the practice! Just ran out of airfield bombing miles this time. Ask the coders to extend the 33%! But I think this confirms you are in the U2-VS club!

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ORIGINAL: HardLuckYetAgain
Next time I play I think I'm going to hold onto some U2's. I seem to kill a lot of AA guns (like the 88's) So I'm rethinking some things on these WWI era planes. They may be useful after all. But have to test things more :)

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: HardLuckYetAgain
Next time I play I think I'm going to hold onto some U2's. I seem to kill a lot of AA guns (like the 88's) So I'm rethinking some things on these WWI era planes. They may be useful after all. But have to test things more :)

Oh no - the body snatchers got you too! What else have they done to your mind - spreadsheets?

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS
No, it wasn't a fat finger. I only did two because I didn't have enough railcap left. I'll send you the rest later.

Moscow is a good choice to evacuate them to!

That U-2VS airbase didn't get much in the way of Luftwaffe love this turn, so like an obstinate child, it will kick and scream (by bombing you) you until you do. You're going to do my job for me whether you want to or not.

I want to - we have lots of arriving bomber boys who want the practice! Just ran out of airfield bombing miles this time. Ask the coders to extend the 33%! But I think this confirms you are in the U2-VS club!

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

quote:

ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS
No, it wasn't a fat finger. I only did two because I didn't have enough railcap left. I'll send you the rest later.

Moscow is a good choice to evacuate them to!

That U-2VS airbase didn't get much in the way of Luftwaffe love this turn, so like an obstinate child, it will kick and scream (by bombing you) you until you do. You're going to do my job for me whether you want to or not.

I want to - we have lots of arriving bomber boys who want the practice! Just ran out of airfield bombing miles this time. Ask the coders to extend the 33%! But I think this confirms you are in the U2-VS club!

I would never join a club that would have me as a member.

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

15 September 1941

From AP Wire Services

Radio Moscow reports that the trial of Defendant Hortlundski ended with the accused found guilty of the crimes specified under Articles 58-1b, 58-11 RSFSR Criminal Code.

First Secretary of the USSR Josef Stalin reviewed and approved the courts findings. The defendant was executed at an unnamed location.

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS
I would make a suggestion of adding a house rule in your games. Specifically, both sides should be prohibited from conducting what amounts to precision bombing of industrial targets within cities by night.

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ORIGINAL: charlie0311
Operational guided (ballistic) ordinance did not appear for decades.

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS
I would make a suggestion of adding a house rule in your games. Specifically, both sides should be prohibited from conducting what amounts to precision bombing of industrial targets within cities by night.

I have some sympathy with this as it does seem strange you can fly across the Soviet Union to hit one precise kind of factory. My own thoughts were more that you could not bomb "named" factories trying to get at choke points. However I do think bombing general industry should be OK.

However I do feel that such a house rule or change by the developers needs to be accompanied by restricting some of the Soviet air forces to the rear areas for their industrial defence. Historically Soviet air forces did not just bunch up together close to the front. They had many aircraft because they were a big country with a lot to defend. There was never a time when virtually the whole Soviet Union was left without air cover and defenceless. Nor a time when all the air forces could just concentrate on the front lines.

Clearly it is not an exploit but an intended facet of the game. To be fair to the developers the Soviet factories were not comparable to the ones in the west or in the Reich. They were vast complexes integrating the whole supply chain. Eddie Chapman, the double agent for the British, could credibly fake a sabotage attack on a British aircraft factory because it was so small. It had hundreds of suppliers scattered over Britain which in turn had their own suppliers. If they were all co-located this would be the size of a town or small city in itself. So a Soviet factory was a more credible target even if you were only likely to hit the upstream supply line rather than the final assembly. So it was possible to find out where they were and that daylight bombing of these is not too incredible. Just maybe exaggerated and not what the Eastern front happened to be about (it was in the Barbarossa directive for the end of the campaign though).

However so far in all AARs and guides the point has always been made that strategic bombing is a waste of Axis air force resources. One thing I hoped to show is that it is not. Does this mean I have succeeded? I believe it is worthwhile for "named" factories although is more debatable for general industry. There are two critical weaknesses. One is that 1% damage on an expanding factory which has a long way to go in its expansion creates disproportionate losses. The other is that while damage is cumulative, repair is only sequential. So the first 1% damage matters very little. But an extra 1% damage on top of a lot of existing damage is catastrophic if it lasts for so many turns.

So perhaps a first lesson for all games is do not leave the Soviet Union without fighter cover. We had so many turns of uncontested, unopposed, unescorted, free daylight bombing that large damage levels were built up. Now there are significant probabilities that factories will shut down. And so it does make sense to fly opposed bombing missions even if they only got a few percentage points of damage because they will last for so long.

Bottom line for Soviet players - on turn 1 get some fighter cover for your factories. Do not let the genie out of the bottle. Do not react when it is too late. The norm should be little strategic bombing as it is ineffective, but significant air forces committed across the rear as a deterrent to make sure it is ineffective.

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ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

I really feel obligated to bring this up, given the nature of the discussion over this Axis air strategy that is being highlighted.

This is intended to explain in large part why it has been successful, and is not intended to dump on someone who is not likely dropping by this forum again, at least it doesn't seem so.

From the STAVKA multiplayer thread, Post #13. From Panzerjager Hortlund:

As Commander Im responsible for all airforce- things. I will do all airforce things before I send the turn to the front-commanders. But I will of cource use the airforce to support you guys as best I can.

We will not send the airforce to the national reserve. I understand the logic behind the reasoning from a game-perspective, but I refuse to play like that. The Motherland is under attack and is fighting for its life. The idea to send all airunits to reserve airfields behind the Urals in such a situation is just gamey and completely unrealistic.

It is for individual players to decide what is gamey and what is not, what is realistic and what is not. Having said that, newer players need to understand this:

If you play this game like the Soviets played historically, against a similarly experienced player, you will lose, and often lose badly.

It has been tried, and not by someone who has played a couple games. Read this AAR from a couple years ago from a player who was experienced, quite good, and tried the "historical" route.

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3539999&mpage=1&key=

This game over the years has seen the Axis side buffed in order to create an element of play balance. As the Soviet, you can't afford the luxury of trying to play certain aspects of the game as it was historically done without paying a penalty.

Back to this game, I do no not see any evidence that any Soviet air unit ever went back to the reserves in order to recover morale. We aren't even talking about wholesale removal, nothing ever went back.

By turn 9, the morale of the VVS was well below the point where it could be effective.



I did try to do some work after taking over the air war on T10 to recover from the situation, but by this time most of the reserves of fighter bombers had been used up and at this time there simply aren't enough new aircraft coming on line. So what happens next is a downward spiral that cannot be recovered from without a certain amount of time.

The point is, had a more experienced player been managing the air war from Turn 1, this Axis strategy would not have been the success it appears. The only new thing that has been added to this equation, and Dinglir should get due credit for this, was experimenting with the whole day-night bombing thing. Unfortunately, as I have pointed out, it contains elements that are also totally unrealistic. Night bombing on the eastern front was primarily a U-2VS thing. If someone wants to come forward with examples of large scale night bombing, and we're talking night not flying in at first daylight, to take out an airfield or industrial area, please do. Also, please don't, as Charlie points out, assume what the developers came up with was intended. Very creative people have always looking for that opportunity to stretch the envelope, it doesn't change the fact that nighttime industrial bombing is largely impractical. The closest the Luftwaffe got to was bombing the commercial docks in England. The whole Urals bomber concept never was more than that. The whole Barbarossa strategy was laid out at the very beginning in the Fuhrerdirective 21:

The German Wehrmacht must be prepared to crush Soviet Russia in a quick campaign even before the conclusion of the war against England.

Finally, as to the question is this strategy effective at least in reigning in the VVS. My answer is you really can't say when the first 17 turns aren't even done. All four IL-2 factories were evacuated to the Urals. That will provide 216 aircraft per turn in time, and I have yet to see a game where I've even come remotely close to being short of them. As to fighter bombers, I have thousands of lend lease aircraft gathering dust every game I play. If this game continues for time, they will simply be employed to make up for any shortfalls in domestic production. So my prediction for the long term would be for the fighter bombers, marginal impact, for tactical bombers negligible impact. Level bombers aren't employed in significant numbers by summer 1942, so marginal impact. Transports and recon, tbd.