Combat Alts in WW2

[Squire]

Just thought I would counter some of the comments made on alt in WW2 air combat. Seems to be a fav of some, fill your boots:

"Aircraft vs Aircraft" page 105: "Patrolling over the invasion fleet at 22,000 ft. Sakai and Uehara..." describes an action where Sakai attacked a B-17E in his A6M2.

Same book page 120: "the first to see the enemy, at 27,000 ft. was 54 Sqn." Describing RAAF Spits vs IJN Zeros and bombers, Darwin 1943. It goes on to describe the RAAF SpitVs climbing to 32,000 ft. before attacking.

"Osprey Aces 22" page 52: "Diving out of the sun from 24,000 ft..." describing A6Ms bouncing a flight of F4Us.

"Osprey Aces 12" page 40: "(27 Hurricanes) patrol Hornchurch at 25,000 ft." Those are Mark Is too, in the BoB, 1940.

"RAF Fighter Sqns in the Battle of Britain" page 208: "No.66 Sqn in a patrol at 30,000ft." Describing Spitfire Is in September 1940.

"Osprey Aces 16" page 60: "a high cover escort that may be anywhere up to 30,000 ft." describing RAF fighters vs the LW over Malta, 1942.

"Osprey Aces 55" page 59: "Reports coming back from the early air combats over Guadalcanal indicated that many encounters were taking place at altitudes of 20,000 ft. and above."  Describing P-40s vs the IJN in late 1942-43.

"Fleet Air Arm at War" page 41: "Black section patrolled from 25,000 ft." describing Sea Hurricanes operating in the Med, 1942.

Those are just a few, and I picked 1940-1942 examples deliberately. 1944+ combats could routinely get to 30k and above.

My last example, this one is my favorite...

"Aces Twilight" page 41: "we climbed back up to 16,000 ft. and were attacked by Richtofens pilots" describing a fight between Sopwith Camels and German scouts, March 1918, WW1

The examples are also clear indications that securing an alt advantage was a routine tactic of all air forces.

Regards.

[rshubert]

that the "typical" bombing alt for b17s was 20-25000 feet.  Those that complain about their opponents climbing "too high" are basically complaining about the TIME required to do so.  Some of it may be the "quake" syndrome.  AH can be excellent thumb-candy.

You gotta admit, you get a lot more fighting done over the field at 1000 feet than at 20000 feet.  The majority seem to think that is the "right" way to do it.  In our little artificial world, the closeness of the bases causes that--nobody can climb much higher than 10-15 k in 25 miles.  In the real world, opposing bases were MUCH further away from each other, and from their targets.

For me, it is a situational thing.  If I can get a lot of alt, I do.  If not, I don't.  But I don't get exercised when I go low and get jumped by somebody willing to put in the time to climb to altitude.

In my opinion, we should put a hard ceiling on climbout during things like snapshots, but only if there is a significant difference in the climb capabilities of the opposing aircraft.  For example, a few weeks ago we were doing the Burma thing, and one event pitted P40Bs against A6M2s in a fighter-vs-fighter sweep.  With no ceiling, the A6M2s were much higher, due to their superior climb rate.  

The fight was no contest.  In the real world, the P40s would climb out away from the zekes, or use another tactic to get high.  We can't do that with simultaneous launches and time-limited events, not to mention players eager to get into the furball.

[MRPLUTO]

I had the pleasure to meet Elwyn J. Warfle, Col. USAF (Ret.) at the Frederick, Maryland airshow recently.  He survived two combat tours as a B-17 bombardier in Europe and has written a very interesting book about it, "One Lucky Bastard".

I asked him about operational alts, and this is what he told me:

As you said, Squire, the B-17s usually dropped from 20-25k.  I asked him if they ever went higher and he explained that there was no reason to.  The Germans had such advance warning of the buffs' approach that they'd get up to 35k (109G-6 ceiling was almost 38k) and come diving down on them.  Also, at 29k he said that the air was so thin you couldn't hold the bombers in formation, but in AH the drones can keep formation easily.

I read that in the Aleutian campaign some B-17s flew at 30k to avoid the Zeroes which at that alt didn't have the ability to make an intercept. I'm not sure the B-17s had the ability to hit anything from that altitude either.

MRPLUTO VMF-323 ~Death Rattlers~ MAG-33

[Squire]

38k, those Luftwaffe alt monkeys!

I do think 25k was the max alt to take bombers and have any hope of getting decent hits, higher than that and the accuracy rate is just too poor, and like you said, in RL, past 25k it was very hard to keep formation.

[Holder3]

In the early years of the British night bombing raids the Lancaster and Halifax crews were often happy to see Stirling bombers climbing with them, because they knew that the Stirlings topped out at 24,000 ft, while the Lancs and Hallibags could get to 28,000. The German FLAK tended to hit the lowest aircraft and so the Stirlings would catch the brunt of it.

[rshubert]

Originally posted by Holder3
In the early years of the British night bombing raids the Lancaster and Halifax crews were often happy to see Stirling bombers climbing with them, because they knew that the Stirlings topped out at 24,000 ft, while the Lancs and Hallibags could get to 28,000. The German FLAK tended to hit the lowest aircraft and so the Stirlings would catch the brunt of it.

Ouch.  I'll bet the Stirling crews felt really good about it, too.



shubie

[Batz]

The problems is people dont like being bored. Long, uneventfull, flights arent something that will attract alot of folks.

In the Aces High Event "Big Week" bomber pilots flew to 27k and we waited on them at 30k. They were 2 hour frames that were for the most part boring for 1 hour and 45 min.

Then you also need to look engine modeling. Bombers flew at a cruise and in formation in rl. In Aces High, and especially in Big Week, bombers fly at full throttle and and rarely in any recognizable formation that allows for their best defense. You see them fly in a large mass but not in anything resembling  a "formation".

Then there's the "other" aspects such as:

 "lets run the other side out of fuel since we know they have to be in the air to get to 30k and we only have 2 hours frames and they only have 1 hour of fuel, so we will wait till 30 min until end of hostilities before we hit the target. We will just stay out of radar until then".

As fighter pilots we also saw bombers pulling stuff like splitt esses, barrel rolls and immelmanns. All that adds up and folks see that for the most part its a waste of time, boring and unfun.

For the bomber pilots most events dont have "good targets" for bombers. In the Aces High Event "Battle of Britain" we were given the impossible task of bombing individual structures with the new bomb site. Bombers are boring as is. We had many many walkons and very few who could bomb. This forced us to lower altitudes where we had a better chance of putting our bombs on target. Had we been able to area bomb and the results been figured based on the amount of tonnage dropped on the paticular fields we could have followed more historic bombing practices.

In Big Week the "targets" where laid out to allow for area bombing but the we still used the laser bomb site. Even then you had guys fly all the way deep into "germany" at 50ft as if all of Europe was unpopulated. They did this to exploit the fact that the big week map had no small aaa.

So if you want an event that is fought at historical altitudes its important to eliminate boredom (air starts maybe?), we  need targets that are designed with higher alt bombing in mind. You also need the bomber pilots to fly in decent formations so that they can be covered better by their escorts and that are arranged so their guns can be used to defend each other. I am sure its no fun for a bomber guy to spend 45 min grabbing just to be slapped out the sky.

Some fyi

In rl typical Bombing altitudes varied from as low as 19k to about 27k. Mostly between 22 and 25. The luftwaffe had long range radar that could pick up activity over East Anglia. They had numerous tactics and systems in place so there were very few instances where the luftwaffe were unaware of where the bombers were. The luftwaffe attempted to attack sections of the bomber stream that was less protected. Bomber streams were stretched out over 100s of miles.  Even "Window" was defeated by tactics. (BTW the germans had the samething called "Duepple", just like window they were strips of silver paper). On top of that you had ground observers etc.

http://www.stable.demon.co.uk/general/bomb.htm

As the bombing campaign progressed the luftwaffe had fewer and fewer planes to attack better and better escorted bomber streams. Finally the allies could put so many fighters up where by they were able to hunt down and disrupt the gefechtsverband.

Also in an event like this some consideration has to made in the rules for kill/death. In real life the greatest effect the bombing campaign had was the overwhelming defeat of the luftwaffe in the west.

http://www.anesi.com/ussbs02.htm

If you force each side to be weary of their losses then there will be instances where the bombers get through with out being pecked to death by the attckers. If they attckers are aware that they need too live as much as they need  to stop the bombers then you get a more "real" style of play. Same with the bombers, they may decide its more important to turn back, hit an alternate target or what ever.

So if you want more "realism"  in the form of altitude then you need to include more "realism" all the way around. But in the end you should keep in mind that regardless of how real it is it needs to be fun. No one is in the AH military and no one has to "do what they are told". If they dont like it they dont show up. If they dont like your orders they go off on their own.

[Squire]

I cant say I disagree with any of your points, as for Bigweek, the CMs should have had the forethought to CAP the B-17s to 20k, that solves a lot of problems in one stroke. As for the BoB, yes, I think the LW should have had more area bombing as well. A few simple changes to the rules, and it makes a big difference.

Engine management would help a lot too, yes. I hope we see that in AH2.

The part that bugs me is when you use a BZ fighter vs a more manueverable one, and get accused of alt-monkeying when all it is is common sense, then the "they never flew that high" posts start...and one gets the desire to post a few facts.

[MRPLUTO]

One thing in real life that would dramatically influence the altitude you'd fly at was cloud cover.

In AcesHigh, solid cloud cover occaisionally forces fights and bombers lower and eliminates some of the advantages of flying at high altitudes.  But visibility is usually unlimited in AH, so being caught low and unable to run from a diving attacker is much more likely.

Fighting with clouds around makes it possible to bounce people more easily and escape more easily if at a disadvantage.

MRPLUTO

[JB42]

Well then, up comes the question of plane modelling. Both altitude performance and fuel consumption. I ask any of you to take a 109G-6 with DT to 35k, maintain any sort of "flyability" and note your fuel supply. Mind also that sectors are based on 25 miles. I would hazard a guess that plane endurance might be an issue in AH.

Now comes my Luftwabble conspiracy whine. Take an A8, a D9 and a G10 to 35K and try some moves. Then ask yourself, what planes were they flying, cause it sure wasn't these

[rshubert]

It's not a modelling issue, it's reality.

You can't yank and bank at 30K.  No plane can.  The thin air has a very large effect on lift and excess power.  Stall speeds go way, way up.