Aces High Bulletin Board
Special Events Forums => Friday Squad Operations => Topic started by: Kurt on November 19, 2005, 12:44:33 AM
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Man, Am I ever glad that '190's in low earth orbit' is over!
That whole FSO was ridiculous.
I mean come on, why base a whole series on a point in the war where only one side EVER had a chance.
p38's vs 190A's at 27k feet... Thats about as fun as shaving your crotch with a rotary saw.
Sorry, I don't mean to get in anyones face here but this was a damn hard set of FSO's for the axis... I would like to believe that we are here to have fun on BOTH sides of the channel.
just a few ta152's would have made a difference, or a 262 squad... But if the Allies were pushing hard into france and belgium then it must have been late in the war... why were the Axis in 1942 and '43 birds?
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Kurt,
The write-up clearly states "Late 43" as the time frame that this FSO is based on. If you have a problem with being out-numbered, out-gunned, out-performed, ect..... chose your side more carefully or at a minimum read the write-up. I personally like the historical aspect of FSO and the chance to escape the mindless re-up, rush to the closest fight, get jumped by x number of alt monkeys, re-up again BS of the MA but hey thats me:)
BTW I flew for the allies and found the Luftwaffe for the most part to be very skilled at the art of the kill, even without a clear advantage in aircraft.
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I'm not saying I have a problem with FSO... I enjoy getting out of the MA and working in a more realistic environment too.. Can't a guy have an opinion without someone thinking he's just an MA kill-monkey?
I do read the write-ups, but I'll be honest that I don't read them in great detail. I'm mostly skimming to see what we're in, where we are going and what we are supposed to kill.
Its not that I dislike being on the underdog team. Don't get me wrong. But for 3 weeks straight we had the same assignment... Go to low earth orbit and shoot B17s, you must shoot them down using...... A HERRING!
Yes, we managed to get a lot of the buffs banged up, and thank you for the compliments to the Axis, we were all trying very hard in aircraft that weren't quite up to the task. But it was tiresome to the extreme.
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Man, you guys were just enough faster than me to make it almost impossible to turn, fire or even know where I was. I know we had you outnumbered, but it felt the other way around a lot of times out there.
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I thought the event was one of the most historical events to date. I really felt the weight of being outnumberd and outgunned just as the Luftwaffe experten were so many years ago. I also enjoyed tryin to develop tactics that would counter the said disadvantages.
~S~
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Kurt.
I appreciate your comments. It is a no brainer that all the Squad Ops are not for everyone. I guess this one was not for you. For what is it worth your not alone. On our squad BB the first post of AAR’s by one of my squadies was “man I am glad this Squad Ops is over!”. It was not his favorite either. ;)
I just want to say that when these are designed CM’s don’t ever plan a “no win” situation, or an underdog side. It may seem that way, but we really don’t. Ideally we come up with a theatre/time period/plane set that is balanced and offer opportunities for both sides to score the points needed to win. Sometimes that might be by simply defending a target so the defenders get the points when it is undamaged.
Hope the next one is more to your enjoyment. :)
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One thing that I believe should have been placed was a alt cap on b17's. B17's did not fly over 33K+ as the bomber groups that came in from the north side of the map (a60 area I believe). The AK's were patroling between 31-32k as the 190 A5 wouldn't go much higher. The 17's flew over us. That was the only thing I disagreed on in this FSO. If they were allowed to go that high we should have had at least a few ta152's or 262's.
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Originally posted by daddog
Kurt.
I appreciate your comments. It is a no brainer that all the Squad Ops are not for everyone. I guess this one was not for you. For what is it worth your not alone. On our squad BB the first post of AAR�s by one of my squadies was �man I am glad this Squad Ops is over!�. It was not his favorite either. ;)
I just want to say that when these are designed CM�s don�t ever plan a �no win� situation, or an underdog side. It may seem that way, but we really don�t. Ideally we come up with a theatre/time period/plane set that is balanced and offer opportunities for both sides to score the points needed to win. Sometimes that might be by simply defending a target so the defenders get the points when it is undamaged.
Hope the next one is more to your enjoyment. :)
Thanks Daddog...
It wasn't the planeset really, it was just the altitudes were beyond the capabilities of the Lw fighters... I really enjoy the 190A's in most scenarios, and I'm pretty effective with them... But they simply can't fly at 30k feet.
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Kurt,
I too appreciate your comments, But I also note that the Axis won this Event.
I guess they made do.:)
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I hear you Kurt. I did not make it Friday night, but several of my squadies have posted that the 110's were at their limit at 30k and the buffs were above them. Several spun out of control and lost several thousand feet befoe they could recover.
I am kinda in a fog today. Nasty flu. Swoop had an idea that we might use in some future Squad Operations that I think is a pretty good one. We would set the dot dar to turn on at a certain alt. So say anything above 20k will be on dot dar (specific location). Lots of ways for CM’s to fiddle with this idea, but it would be a sacrifice then for buffs to climb high because their exact location would show up. Again this is just an idea, but one worth mulling over.
I do know the next Squad Ops will not have much in the way of high alt flying. Skernsk has come up with a nice Dunkirk setup. :)
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Actually, B-17's did in fact fly above 30K. As a general rule, they did not always fly that high, and in fact not even the majority of missions were flown that high. But to say they didn't fly that high is absolutely false.
To expect to have 262's and 152's in a late 1943 time frame isn't really reasonable. There were some P-51B groups in late 1943, but the Allies didn't get those either.
As I understand the basic premise of scenario type play, the goal is not to force exact replays of history, nor is it to force either side to repeat the mistakes made by that side in reality at the time the war took place.
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Setting dot dar to 20k is a great idea.. as would expanding the range of dot dar out to 30 miles. The 190a5 can barely hold alt at 30k. The only way to climb is to accelerate then zoom climb but you still can't even keep up with b17's under any circumstance at that alt from my experience. Sure, some of the bombing raids came in at that alt in the real world but most did not and I'm not sure if the 190's are modeled right for alt. Were they realy almost that useless?
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Originally posted by rabbidrabbit
Setting dot dar to 20k is a great idea.. as would expanding the range of dot dar out to 30 miles. The 190a5 can barely hold alt at 30k. The only way to climb is to accelerate then zoom climb but you still can't even keep up with b17's under any circumstance at that alt from my experience. Sure, some of the bombing raids came in at that alt in the real world but most did not and I'm not sure if the 190's are modeled right for alt. Were they realy almost that useless?
Yes the A5 was almost useless at that altitude, the 38's could easily extend and the bombers were almost just as fast as the A5. You could not mount a serious attack and extend. The 38's could easily force you down which I don't have a problem with, but you could not reengage the bombers which I do have a problem with.
Originally posted by Captain Virgil Hilts
Actually, B-17's did in fact fly above 30K. As a general rule, they did not always fly that high, and in fact not even the majority of missions were flown that high. But to say they didn't fly that high is absolutely false.
To expect to have 262's and 152's in a late 1943 time frame isn't really reasonable. There were some P-51B groups in late 1943, but the Allies didn't get those either.
Under normal circumstances the aircraft were sufficent for the era. Just because the B-17's can fly that high doesn't mean they have to. What ever happened to fighting your way to target. Having a 25k alt max on buffs in this particular scenario would not significantly diminish your protection since the A5 is terrible at altitude, but it would give those pilots a chance at attacking instead of being cherry picked by unreachable buffs at 32K or better.
Originally posted by Captain Virgil Hilts
As I understand the basic premise of scenario type play, the goal is not to force exact replays of history, nor is it to force either side to repeat the mistakes made by that side in reality at the time the war took place.
No the goal of scenario play as explained previously in other posts for other events is relative fairness and a concern that all who show have a chance at fun. Several concessions to game play have been made. The two that come to mind is having to attack all targets and within the first 60 minutes. Putting an alt restricition for buffs in my mind would fall in that category. This would put a premium on tactics, skill and coordination.... instead of simply being out of range.
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I enjoyed it.
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Originally posted by Captain Virgil Hilts
Actually, B-17's did in fact fly above 30K.
In theory only. Practical limit maxed out at about 25K, majority of raids were at this or lower altitudes.
B-29 raids in PTO were about the only ones to flew above 30K and even they switched later to more reasonable alts.
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I have not heard from all of my flights, but I do know the ALT's for three of them.
Black Flight: ordered to attack A50 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT Unknown.
Green Flight: ordered to attack A63 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT ~18K.
Red Flight: ordered to attack A62 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT Unknown.
White Flight: ordered to attack A64 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT 28K.
Blue Flight: ordered to attack A65 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT 23K.
If I were to do the mission again, I would order the same ALT.
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"
B-29 raids in PTO were about the only ones to flew above 30K and even they switched later to more reasonable alts.
"Gen. Thomas Power, Commander of the 314th Bombardment Wing, carried out a fire raid test over Tokyo. Bombs were dropped from 25,000 ft. and burned out a full square mile. He reported to LeMay that he thought by going in at lower altitude with a larger bomb load there would have been much greater destruction.Then came the radical decision by LeMay. The planes would go in at 10,000 ft. He ordered the removal of bomb bay fuel tanks claiming by not going to altitude they would not need the gas. All .50 cal. Guns would be removed, and all ammo. With no guns the gunners did not need to go."
"On March 9, 334 B-29s took off from Guam, arriving in Japan under good weather conditions. The planes were stacked up from 4,900 ft. to 9,200 ft. "
"For three hour the B-29s kept coming. Only a few fighters appeared causing little damage. We lost 14 planes with damage to 42. An official Japanese count reported nearly 84,000 killed, 41,000 injured, and over 250,000 buildings destroyed in this one raid. 16 square miles burned out."
Source of these quotes (http://b-29s-over-korea.com/firebombing/firebombing3.html) Plenty more sources available but my interest was raised in this when the same information was given on the History Channel. Note: All these low raids were at night.
If you worry about B17 firepower at high alts then:
"On January 27, 1945, the B-29 identified as "B-29 A Square 52" scored 14 kills over Tokyo, Japan, as follows: rammed by two fighters, gunners then shot down 12 more fighters, the damaged bomber flew 1,500 miles back to Saipan on three engines, crash landed, all crewmen survived, but the aircraft was written off. This is probably the highest number of air-to-air kills by a single airplane during one mission."
Source (http://www.historylink.org/essays/output.cfm?file_id=3828)
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Originally posted by daddog
Swoop had an idea that we might use in some future Squad Operations that I think is a pretty good one. We would set the dot dar to turn on at a certain alt. So say anything above 20k will be on dot dar (specific location). Lots of ways for CM�s to fiddle with this idea, but it would be a sacrifice then for buffs to climb high because their exact location would show up. Again this is just an idea, but one worth mulling over.
I do know the next Squad Ops will not have much in the way of high alt flying. Skernsk has come up with a nice Dunkirk setup. :)
Dunkirk would be fun.
You know, by 1940, the brits had radar coverage out to 75 and 100 miles and 30k feet, the Germans we're boasting that they could see 25 miles to 15k feet (although they had no idea that the brits could see 100ish and thought they were bragging at 25 miles... Thus, even that might have been and exageration...). Granted they weren't exactly modern scopes with little dots for bad guys... But they were able to roughly identify numbers altitudes directions and speeds. Similar accuracy to our 'dar bar'...
With that in mind I don't think that it would be unreasonable AT ALL to have some kind of simple radar in effect as you described.
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I have not heard from all of my flights, but I do know the ALT's for three of them.
Black Flight: ordered to attack A50 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT Unknown.
Green Flight: ordered to attack A63 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT ~18K.
Red Flight: ordered to attack A62 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT Unknown.
White Flight: ordered to attack A64 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT 28K.
Blue Flight: ordered to attack A65 at 25-30K, actual bombing ALT 23K.
If I were to do the mission again, I would order the same ALT.
And I would do things differently so that we formed up while not losing the time necessary to climb to the ordered altitude. Only went lower once I compare thet time passed, distance travelled and figured out we were not going to make the target in time.
Have to go back through my full film (almost 2 hours) to see what I did that lost us so much time in forming up and if anything else I did contribute to the our slow forward progress.
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Does anyone know if the B17 we have in Aces High is a late war (1945) version or did the same model fly in 1942/3/4?
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We have a 'G-model'. I think it was introduced in June of 1943.
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Originally posted by daddog
Does anyone know if the B17 we have in Aces High is a late war (1945) version or did the same model fly in 1942/3/4?
Dog,
Based on the layout (Chin Turret etc) I'd say its a B-17G, I believe that was the most produced model, and it was a late war varient but I don't know exactly what year it came on the scene.