Thoughts About Bomber Wars Frame 2

[Seagoon]

Hi All,

Well now that the unmitigated slaughter of Bomber Command is finished, here are a few quick thoughts about night scenarios in particular. I should start by saying that I had fun tonight and my hat is off (along with the tail of my Mossie) to the Luftwaffe lads.

AH1 is just not the best vehicle to accurately depict night combat, that was abundantly clear in tonight's frame. I guessed ahead of time - given the aircraft, the environment, and the settings that it was going to be a massacre and I was correct. In reality, night combat in WW2 was a highly complex cat and mouse game; you searched for the raiders using searchlights and primitive radar and then once you actually had a contact, began the difficult process of both maintaining it and closing in close enough to get off a shot. The stalked rarely saw the stalker. [Pick up a contemporary memoir such as "Night Fighter" by C.F. Rawnsley & Robin Wright for more details on just how difficult this all was]

By contrast with icons on, the ability to maintain squadron cohesion, and the greatly enhanced AH night visibilty, what we had tonight was day combat with slightly lowered vis, complete with all the twisting turning dogfighting you'd expect. As such, Lancs and Mossies were bound to get chewed up by 109s and 110s.

So until we have the ability to really simulate night, can I make the following suggestions for any future night scenario?

1) Turn ICONS OFF, or at the very least reduce icon range to at most 1K
2) Turn RADAR ON for both sides - slow down the updates somewhat but not so much that it makes real time intercepts impossible
3) Reduce single seat fighter participation to 10%
4) Extend Ack Range to 30K - lower lethality

This will still be wildly inaccurate, but will at least get some of the tense and frustrating cat and mouse element back.


- SEAGOON

[Flossy]

Originally posted by Seagoon
1) Turn ICONS OFF, or at the very least reduce icon range to at most 1K

Unfortunately we just don't have the capability of turning icons off altogether or even reduce the icon range - it is either 3K or 6K.  The nearest we can get is to ask players to voluntarily turn off icons..... something which cannot be enforced, but has been done with some success in some of the Euro snapshots.  

[Skyfoxx]

While I agree that AH is not "up to snuff" on night time events, I have to disagree about it being just slightly lower visibility.
I couldn't see squat. Just by chance I stumbled onto a couple of lancasters, otherwise it would have remained an evening of just viewing the stars over Germany.
It was nothing but "cat and mouse" play for our squadron. Trust me, it was not easy for us finding lancs or mossies.
In fact I was forced to ditch because I couldn't see the bloody runway.  I guess you can game it some by adjusting your monitor's gamma, but I refuse to go there.

[CUTT]

I'll never try to fly a bomber at night again without adjusting my gamma. I could not see my crosshairs to calibrate! While locating the enemy may have been easier, seeing the target from 25 k with clouds over our target was not! There was much confusion and frustration for the bomber pilots.

[Seagoon]

Hi Skyfoxx, Flossy,

Just on a personal note - my monitor does not have Gamma correction, but I found that the full moon and more importantly the Icons made finding friends and keeping the enemy in contact, easier than it should have been - course thanks to your buds I didn't have to worry about finding the runway.  

Flossy, thanks for telling me about the icon thing - I didn't know it couldn't be turned off by the CM. I guess then my suggestion would be that the next night mission be 3k only and that the launches be staggered so that everyone is separated. That way we can try to get back the bomber stream and the individual "nacht jager" feel. The fact that we had cohesive squadrons on both sides going into combat (I know many got separated once the furballing started) was just all wrong for a sim of RAF night bombing.

,

Seagoon

[Skyfoxx]

Originally posted by Seagoon
course thanks to your buds I didn't have to worry about finding the runway.  
 

Aye, a valid point indeed. I'll quit sniffling about my ditch now.

[68falcon]

Just a note: First off I want to thank everyone for there participation and do hope they had an enjoyable time.
As far as the frame itself,I thought it went well. Getting to the targets alone was an accomplishment. It only takes one enemy fighter to call in a whole wing on the bombers. The allies made it to there targets and inflicted damage, well done all. The night scenario seemed effective,there where a lot of bomber pilots complaining that they couldn't see and yes the cloud cover over the target did add to the confusion. But isn't that more realistic, adapt and overcome !
The Mossies did as expected and they where a valuable asset. There support gave the Lanc's the opportunity to reach the target.
I didn't hear one pilot complain that it was boring or lopsided in any direction as a matter of fact it sounded like they where all excited and engrossed in there flights and engagements.

                                                        Thank You
                                                        68Falcon

[Flossy]

Originally posted by Seagoon
I guess then my suggestion would be that the next night mission be 3k only

Short icons (3K) are standard for all our events except the CAP - the CAP Team insist on being different!    Generally, though, we always use short icons.  

[Drano]

Originally posted by Seagoon
Hi Skyfoxx, Flossy,

Just on a personal note - my monitor does not have Gamma correction,

Chances are your gamma setting isn't found on the monitor itself but more likely in your video card controls. Check out start/settings/display and look for a tab in there somewhere. Prolly under color controls.

Personally I never mess with mine. I figure if its supposed to be night I shouldn't be able to see much---its dark out right? That's part of the challenge. So I just deal with it.

Last night I had a helluva time seeing the bad guys other than when I could see them against cloud. But this was actually one of the Luftwaffe tactics used to locate the bombers when in single seat fighters or more accurately fighters that had no airborne radar. Be above and look for the bomber stream sillouhetted on the lower clouds backlit from either searchlights or fires from below. In the case of 2 of my kills the first was a bomber group that exited the clouds, co alt to my east, under the moon. Saw them OK. The second was tooling along under the clouds over the base I'd just upped at. The ack puffs were the dead giveaway. I WEP climbed under his belly. Knock knock!

Add to that I forgot to change my gunsight from a red dot to a white dot. No matter, I just closed to collision range. Can't believe I didn't actually collide with anyone. I'm pretty good for that in broad daylight anyway .

      Drano

[daddog]

Forgive the large pictures, but if I can load em with my dial up you can view em.

68Falcon for being the Frame C.O. Never an easy task for the first time and can be quite stressful.

I am not sure what happed to the 56th, 325th, 339th, and the 412th. Airstarts are difficult for some and at night it can be hard to find your flight leader after one. I am not a fan of night events, but this one was ok. I just wish we would be able to fly a mission and land it. It has been over 4 or 5 frames since any Mongrels survived a frame and that is frustrating in itself.

Nevertheless.. here is an AAR in pictures!

As you can see even trying to view your instruments is difficult at night.


It took a while but our squad finally began to form up over the North Sea.


Even then some pilots became lost or seperated, but with the help of the full moon we spotted them and they began to climb up and join our formation.


Over France we first were attacked by a few 109’s. Nothing serious with all the Mossie escorts about. I think only one or two Lancasters were damaged. Then after the first small wave of 109’s suddenly 110’s were spotted diving in.


Enemy fire took its toll, yet the Mossies were also taking out enemy fighters along with our gunners. Some Lancasters in the back of our bommer stream could be seen exploding in the distance.

[daddog]

Despite our tight formations Lancaster's were going down. Some of us were less than 200 yards apart. At the bottom of the picture one Lancaster in Swager's formation snapped a wing off and went spiraling down barely missing other aircraft.



Suddenly one Lancaster blew up only yards away! Poor Teedog can be seen illuminated by the fire of the explosion as he was blown out of his aircraft! Over the roar of the engines I could hear his screams. He fell to his death!!!


In a few moments the sky was clear except for the clouds that were covering our target.


We were forced to dive through the clouds and leveled out just below the cloud layer. A couple more Lancaster's were lost in the clouds and it was difficult to see even those near you.



With out even moon light to light our target it was very difficult to make an accurate drop. You can see how difficult it was to spot ground targets by this picture, let alone try to calibrate at a distance for an accurate drop. We lost one or two bombers from the ack over the target.

Despite the night, clouds, and enemy we managed to damage the target. Looking closely you can see several fires from our drop in the distance. This was a very difficult mission to be sure. Damage to the target was lite to moderate.


After our drop we rallied one sector away. About ½ our squad manged to form up again  and head north for home. Unfortunitally there were 109’s and 110’s waiting for us. Once they found us it was not long for them to slaughter the wounded and damaged Lancasters.

[Holder3]

Well for all of the inaccuracies in AH it sounds like it was pretty successful. I flew a 110 and have to echo the frustrations of not being able to see even your instruments. I attacked two lancs, on the first I was driven off into the clouds by a Mossie (a successful defensive attack) and I didn't find the Decoy Force again. The second was an attack on a Lanc that still had a drone. Unfortunately, the drones don't show up with an icon and I had no idea it was there until I had massed fire from two directions. They removed my left wing so I had to bail.

I'm glad that most people had a good time. Night missions are difficult to model. If we did it properly, it is likely that more people would complain about the sheer difficulty.

Next week the mighty 8th Air Force takes on the Luftwaffe Defence of the Reich force. In daylight. Does anyone think this will be easier?

[magic2n]

Let me add my perspective as a -110 pilot.  It was DARK!.  Flying east, toward the moon, it was almost impossible to read the cockpit instruments (even with monitor brightness and contrast turned up to maximum).  Flying with the moon behind you it was much easier to see them.

The short icon range made it very hard to spot enemy planes. By flying high (about 27K), I was alble to spot bomber shadows against clouds below me long before I could see icons.  On one occasion I dove toward a group of shadows but they passed into clear air beyond the cloud bank before I could reach them and "disappeared".  I never was able to regain contact to close into icon range.

By accident, or design, we never knew what the British target was.   Consequently our night fighters were spread over a wide area.  Only by following the movement of the DAR bars were we able to deduce the direction of the British attack (that seemed pretty realistic to me).   When a large DAR bar and many icons appeared and remained in the area around A4, many of us concluded that that was a target and converged on it.

For myself, fuel shortage by the time I reached A4 caused me to land.  It was hard finding the runway and then the refueling pad in the dark (A4 was under cloud cover).  Then I crashed into an unseen hanger while trying to takeoff.

I thought this event was well planned.  The darkness gave it a different feel.  I would like to see more like this.

- MAG1C

[Strange]

56th had a pretty good time... till the end. We got to our target and it was clouded over. We had to extend out a gird & half turn about and come in under the cloud level @ 14K.  We found one of our tartget's taken out so we went to our other target hit it & dropped the remained egg's over a non-target base.

Egressing we ran into a few 110's and 109's.  Most of us fell to the fait of the gunns of the 110's.  My gunner had disco's and thus I lost all my ammo. My bomber left gunless & helpless.

Only pilot that made it back was Scooter a big to him and Nomde who was gunning after he got shot down as well.

For us not being buff guy's we did a bang up job.

[68falcon]

I will vouch for that Strange thanks

                                                    68Falcon