Mission advice.

[Condor11]

So I recently began running a lot of missions on the bish side of things with a moderate amount of success, and I was wondering if anyone had some tips.

I follow standard bish motto and use mass hordes on most occaisons but do mix it up. I mostly just want some tips on planning, planes, strategy, and tactics for running things.

Any positive feedback / critiques are greatly appreciated.
 

Condor

[Rich52]

On the Rook side we used to have about 1/2 dozen guys/squads who would run missions and get mass turn outs. I used to run missions back then and get oretty good turnouts, tho eventually I quit cause I'd end up with 6 guys wanting to be the general.

Now we pretty much only have one bunch and its ALWAYS P-51s, P-38s, B-17s, and P-47s. A hangar full of planes and plane sets and we never have missions with them. And we used to, all the time. B-25Hs, A-20s, Mossies, Brit sets, Jap sets, Russian sets, GV sets, back when Dredger was around I can remember 50+ planes taking off a CV. Or 50+ Jeeps heading toward a town "cockroach missions". So thats my advice. Mix it up and make it interesting. Theres nothing more boring then the same kind of mission EVERY time.

[The Fugitive]

First you need to find out was is needed, how much to take out hanger, drop it's a at a field, how many pounds of bombs to get a town to white flag, and so on. With this info you can build your missions.

If your leading a squad you'll know how well they will bomb and can then gauge how many people you need. With just pulling from your country, you'll have to guess. I always liked 50% more than necessary from country, but only need 10% more if it was the squad. Any extra players in the mission I would then use to pork radar or its at other bases, or use them as a distraction by having them take down sci at another base drawing defenders there.

Once you know WHAT you need to take a base then you can pick the planes/ gvs to use to do it. Line mentioned, mix it up. Avoid building a horde at all cost. Make the missions fun and challenging.

[A8TOOL]

Even though I think your trolling........

I come from an old squad that exists no more but was the best squad I have ever flown with. A small group of maybe 16 guys in squad used to take nearly 200 bases a month and one month even racked up 10,000+ kills. (Aces&8's Tour 100 A8Balls CO)

We would go NOE maybe 10% of the time..usually for Vbases and the rest were the hard way. My advise to you would be,

Keep the plane set small but affective
Look on the map for who needs help and then just get done what they can't.
Instead of trying to get 40 people to join your mission.... use the players that are already in flight either furballing or taking a base. As you approach use range to unwittingly get a few of them involved in your mission objective and send a few people ahead for a near base cap.  Before you know it, ... and sometimes after an attempt or two, the base is yours. Just make sure your the 10th man in the map room.

 Worked for us  

[Condor11]

Thanks a lot so far,
sorrry to disappoint a8, im just looking for advice on making fun effective missions, no trolling here . 

I like the variety so far, in terms of the answers I'm getting.

Where would I find the numbers on required ords for differemt size fields? I have a rough idea myself of what is needed but precision is never a bad thing.

In advance, thanks 
 

[Soulyss]

Before I get into my thoughts, let me preface it by saying that I don't join many missions and if I don't actively participate in base capture very often.  With that in mind I hope I don't come off as a grump, as it's not my intent to disparage anyone.

One thing that get's me about missions seems to be the sheer lack of variety, as some who defends against a lot more missions than joins it seems like it's the same handful of planes.  I think this comes out of the desire for RESULTS, I try to find my Aces High fun in the DOING, the attempt.  I'm a bit of a history junkie so I look for missions that create a bit of immersion, AH is at it's best if I'm in a P-38 or P-51 zig zagging my way along above a group of B-17's or B-24's and I see a 109 making a run on the big friends and I roll over and dive.  In that moment I'm not sitting at a computer, staring at a screen I'm in the cockpit and it's 1944, it doesn't get better than that.

I've been flying Bishops lately because they've had fewer people with the migration of one of the bigger squads and I got into a bit of a funny disagreement with a few people one night when they argued that without a lot of people you can't succeed, and now I see the same word pop up here.  I argue that "success" comes in many different guises and goals, one of the most successful missions I ever participated in was a fighter sweep we did in D3A's.  We stumbled across a bunch of unescorted Lancasters and over the course of the intercept many of us almost hit the ground trying to see through the tears of laughter as we peppered them with or little twin .30 cal machine guns.  I don't even remember if we stopped them from bombing our base, I just remember sitting under one of those monsters where he couldn't shoot me and firing up with my rear gun when all of a sudden I'm staring up at all his bombs as the doors open and he tries to drop his bombs on me!

That's the fun and beauty of missions, I've shot down and been shot down a lot of the years but most of my memories of this game are a small to mid sized group of people doing something silly and/or historically themed, I rarely remember the results.

There I've managed to write another book, I need to learn to stop rambling.

[PFactorDave]

My advice echos Soulyss to some degree...

Success in a mission should be measured in how much fun was had by all.

Is it necessary to drop the fighter hangars?  Or would it be more fun to have enemy fighters to shoot at? 

Is it necessary to drop the vehicle hangar?  Or would a big GV battle develop if you leave it up?

Is it really fun to take 40 planes?  Is it really fun to be 8th or 9th guy in on an enemy plane?  Don't you get tired of scoring assist after assist after assist simply because there are waaaay too many green guys competing for the same kills?

The mistake, in my opinion, is to equate taking every base you attack in as little time as possible to succeeding.  From my point of view, quite the opposite.  Perpetuating the horde causes you to miss out on some of the most fun aspects of Aces High.

So...  Rather then success, horde equals failure.

Just my $0.02

[Traveler]

Our Squad is an old Squad 10 years in AH.  We have always been a mission oriented Squad.  Our numbers have ranged from a high of 16 to a low of 3 and we are presently sitting at 6.  The 113th Lucky Strikes, we never turn down anyone that wants to wing up for just one flight or a year.  We are Knights, as far as I know, as a squad, we always have been Knights and don’t plan to change and we only fly in the late war arena.  The Squad aircraft is the P38.  We do fly other aircraft when operating off a CV or flying in troops.

We also run missions, some just to resupply a base others to capture a field.  We also perform fighter sweeps, CAPS. BARCAPS and so on.   We are always willing to fly bomber escort when needed. 

One think that we attempt to do is plan and fly missions cooperatively with other squads or just other Knights attaching against a common front or field. 

We discovered that with a P38L loaded with 2, 1000lb bombs and 10 rockets you can take down any hanger with 2000lbs and 5 rockets.  We have also taken down hangers with 15 rockets and some cannon fire. 

Three members from the 113th can attack a small airfield, take down the three fighter hangers in one pass, return and hit the VH with their remaining rockets and some cannon fire to finish off the VH, Ammo and radar.

We have also attacked the mid size fields and GV bases with three members and are able to shut down four fighter hangers at the airfield or the four GV hangers at a VBase with just three P38L’s.


The Mission tool was changed a few years ago.  The original mission tool allowed the planner to lay out different routs for each flight and could also stagger the departure times of each flight.  You could plan a set of different routs using different airfields,  assigned alt to each flight.    The tool we have today is less useful as a mission planner, and just serves the purpose of allowing members to post a mission and have some place for people to join.  Some don’t even use the tool they just announce on country that a mission is forming and meet at airfield x in two minutes.   No real planning. 

I think the original tool was more strategic and actually allowed larger missions that were not just a mass of players (horde) but a large group of players taking off from different airfields at staggered times following different routs and alts  with different load outs to assigned targets.  The missions were more interesting.  Would love to see our mission planning tool improved.

It would be nice to be able to assign waypoints ,  egress routs, Identify areas on a map where CAP and BARCAP stations were expected to be established and be able to communicate that information in a mission briefing.

[Condor11]

Thanks for everything thus far.

My primary goal is base takes, every now n then I do cv kills, fighter sweeps, or gv raids.

I know people get sick of the same old birds, so I try and have variety or themes to my missions.one example is an noe german theme. hvy 110, a8, ju88 and goons ( I know goons aren't axis). Usually I run noe, simply because with as many 2 weekers are bish its hard to leave any room for error.

I have other theme runs for british, jap, american, and if they had a decent russian buff id work sometHing there.

I usually set up a flight of heavy fighters (usually cannon), 2 engine fighters, buffs, and a goon.

Im finding though since I'm averaging 25 joiners I have more room for leeway, and thus can add variety of aircraft, but I'm still having issues taking much with amything other than smash n grab, or ifwe encounter heavy opposition.

Any more advice, specifically on tactics and commanding/target assignments would b great


Condor

[BaldEagl]

Hi Condor.  As you might know I'm a Bish too.  I don't organize or join many missions but the two most fun in recent memory were a 30 Spit IX fighter sweep and a Stuka Mission to take a v-base supported by 109E-4's and 109F-4's.  I think we had 9-10 Stukas with a similar number of 109's.

The Spit mission was very successful.  The Stuka mission not so much as we were buzzed by 262's but it was still a lot of fun.

The point is there's a lot of different types of missions and even a failed mission can be a lot of fun.  I like going for something a bit historically correct when I'm organizing one.

As to tactics, if you can get everyone on the same page don't use the mission planner.  Meet at a remote field then have various elements take of from different fields at different times.  That way you won't draw as much attention, setting up many smaller dar bars, and can get altitude.  Set up a rendezvous point or time your approaches from different directions.  You'll also gain the benefit that if one element is engaged, the others will likely make target.

[The Fugitive]

Thanks a lot so far,
sorrry to disappoint a8, im just looking for advice on making fun effective missions, no trolling here . 

I like the variety so far, in terms of the answers I'm getting.

Where would I find the numbers on required ords for differemt size fields? I have a rough idea myself of what is needed but precision is never a bad thing.

In advance, thanks 
 

Sorry was using the phone for that last post and there were tooo many mistakes for my taste.  

There is a chart HERE. Some say it's no longer correct, but it will still give you a good idea of what you need to take out what. The rest is math. One fighter hanger takes 3000lbs, so 3 would take 9000. Then you add in your error factor. If using rookies/countrymen add 50%, or 4500 lbs. So 3 fighter hangers need 13,500 lbs of bombs. So if your running a mission with Vals as you bombers you will need 27 of them (each carries a 250 kg bomb which is just a bit over 500 lbs) to be sure to get the job done. Now if you launch 27 Vals your going to need a lot of cover because nothing brings out defense better than a bunch of easy kills  

OK so Vals may NOT be a good plane to use, but you can see how the math adds up.

NOE's vs alt, about the only thrill with an NOE is getting there with out being seen. Seeing as this doesn't happen too often it just leads to frustration for those in the missions as they get shot down over and over again. This frustration will lead them to NOT join your missions after a while. The best NOE missions are small fast planes used to go in an pork a field, or drop ack for a diversion, or in prep for the next mission coming that way.

When using high Alt missions don't group everyone together. Traveler is right, the old planner was much better and worked great for missions with alt. Having 3 wings/groups coming in from 3 different directions and skirting radar circles and grid lines could fool defenders up untill the last minute as to which base you were hitting. Planning and executing that plan is as much fun as getting the base. Like Souls said making missions different, or themed helps with the immersion factor as well as making them fun as they are not the "same old thing".

I knew one guy that use to fly the routes of his mission in the planes that he was going to use and time the climb outs, times to waypoint turns, throttle settings and so on. It was awesome to launch with a few other fighters and follow the the directions and see the buff groups appear off your 10 o'clock at the same alt with a high cover sweeping in 3k over head.

Make them different, make them fun. Don't worry about if they succeed, it's all about the fun!  

[Rich52]

Ya I like historical plane set missions the most. And there are so many variations you can use. All thats really missing in the set is a Soviet level bomber, but even there you can use A-20s or B-26s cause they did too.. Now we have Bettys and I'd love to see a herd of them along with KIs, Niks, ...ect. B-25s with P-40s, P-39s with IL2s, and on and on.

I know there arent a whole lot that want the same things. But to me its more important then just upping 20 110s, or planes from every country, and pounding a base to dust.

[shiv]

I used to enjoy the split missions. Everyone joining one mission, and you send half the planes to one base and half to another. If you have a ton of joiners and it's looks like it's going to be overkill and there's another base in easy reach think about doing that every once in a while.

Cuts down the probability of success while at the same time doubling it And causes some chaos for sure.

[TylerMac]

I must say Condor, you missed some fun semi-missions.   The squad upped in eny 40 and 35 planes one afternoon.  We all flew the same thing on the sortie and seen who A) got shot down first, B) lived the longest, C) bagged the most scalps.   Running these missions, we actually wound up busting up a couple furballs and base takes.   I tie this in with the "variety" aspect these guys have been saying.   Its a fun challenge when pushing negative G's stalls out your Spit or Hurri 1 engine while chasing superior birds.   I'm looking forward to one of your missions 

[Condor11]

 
Ill b back running them soon, just had to take a week or 2 off