Please give feedback on BoB TOD!

[Nifty]

Please let us know what you liked, what you didn't like, what you thought should have been done differently, and any other suggestions or constructive criticism you might have.

The one thing that sticks out in my mind is that in Frame 2 I should have worded the orders to the Allied to be "Hold 5 minutes after the Axis OR until the first sign of radar contact."  I forgot the 1st rule of making events...  Players are rats and they'll chew holes right through your events!

[Nifty]

come on guys, if ya don't say anything we'll assume we're perfect and keep doing what we're doing!  

[Dawggus]

It's pretty close to perfect .  We stumbled a bit a few TODs back, but I feel like the last couple have been smooth as silk.  In the last TOD, the side balancing was fantastic!

Cya Up!

[Joker312]

Originally posted by Nifty


come on guys, if ya don't say anything we'll assume we're perfect and keep doing what we're doing!  

BOB was my 1st TOD here on AH. I just started playing 2 months ago so I am pretty new to this sim. The only thing I can compare it with is the dozen or more scenerios I participated in while playing AW. That being said I have a few obserations I would like to share given my limited exposure.

First, instead of all aircraft being considered lost at endlog that are still airborne, maybe we can do this. Endlog at Start-time +2 hours, no scoring will count at this time but A/C have an additional 15 mins to RTB before being counted as lost. This will have the effect of allowing the full 2 hours to combat. Our flight for instance didnt up the last 20 mins of the 2nd frame because we didnt want to lose any A/C because they were overdue at endlog.

Second, I dont mind people that die joining others as gunners on bomber A/C but there should be no riding in fighter types, it seems like an unfair advantage to get a second pair of eyes in a single place A/C.

I really see nothing else wrong with the way this was setup and run. I love the 1 life to live aspect and the historical nature of the battle. It really gives you a taste of things that you would experience in real combat even though its just a game. The play balance was excellent altough I dont really care if its balanced I lean more to the historical side where numbers and objectives are the same as in the real battle. You can balance a lopsided battle by giving more weight to points scored to the outnumbered side to determine the victor. It seems that the CM's do infact take this into account already when they declare the results to a given frame.

The map was excellent even if only 1/2 scale. The planeset for this was very close except the JU88 is way to high performance to simulate DO-17's and He-111's. The Co's for each side did a great job and the comms gave a real "fog of war" touch.

The host was rock solid ( results from my end, others may vary ). The CM's did a fine job setting the whole thing up and getting us started ontime. (you can not overestimate the value of an ontime start )

Overall this gets an A+ as a gaming experience IMHO. Well Done!

TY
Damned Joker

BTW, Exile PLEASE put up the frame 3 stats, I really enjoy cross checking the real results with the claims. I also want to find out who killed me with such wonderful skill.

[Dux]

Undoubtedly the most fun I've had in a TOD so far. Even sides, survivable (not hopeless, at least) missions and aircraft.

Some of the more frustrating TODs in the past had us (for example) in TBMs striking an inland target with no fighter cover. Needless to say, the N1K2s easily picked us off miles before we went feet dry... about 5 minutes after frame start.

Another TOD had our fuel and bombload requirements so high that 75% of us crashed on takeoff.

Wait eagerly in anticipation the whole week for the frame, only to spend 5 minutes of futility. No fun.

I felt that everything in the BoB TOD was just right.

Here's a thought: How about a TOD with no real objectives, just squad-oriented dogfights? Okay, maybe a little strat. Some of the past TODs seemed much too strat-oriented... especially when getting creamed, like I mentioned above, really affects the next frame. Just a thought.

[Wotan]

first frame the balance was way off.

2nd frame was great

3rd frame was great.

I dont really know what your asking.........

Overall it was one of the best yet.

 I would like to see a better score system based on percentages of aircraft loss. ie lw losses 20% single eng fighters then the allies score xx points.

Bombers and twin eng ac are more costly and time consuming to produce so the point multi would reflect this.

Ground targets should have an assigned point per structure type
radar being the highest. Or in the case of BoB as we werked through the phases the points should reflect the historical target type of that phase. phase 1 shipping 2 radar stations, airfields, then cities etc.

Hurris would have a lower point multi then the spits. Most folks take more pride and get more fun out of the combat that scoring really means little.

In tod like bob there should each side co should be restricted to having each ac represented as a percentage based on rl. This would have limited 110s and spitfires. But the by limiting these ac to certain fields this was accomplished. However in the last frame with the exception of you ordering me to send 1 flight of ju88s with 109 escorts I could have had the rest up in 110s all  head str8 fer london. Theres no way I would have done that because I dont think it would have been in the spirit of tod or BoB. Most of the side cos stuck with the spirit of tod so theres really no complaint.

These 2 issues I have only brought up for discussion. Overall this tour was great.

As for the orders with specific flight details. As I side co I like to have more freedom in planning my missions. However as a player I think it keeps everything "honest" and makes for better gameplay overall.

Again I have no complaints and my comments are more for discussion then the desire to change anything.

[skernsk]

Point system

A/C based on real life percentages

As for the orders with specific flight details. As I side co I like to have more freedom in planning my missions.

How about a TOD with no real objectives, just squad-oriented dogfights?


Keep the feedback coming.....

[Sancho]

We need He-111 to do BoB right.  That and AH version 1.1s multi-buff thing.  The Ju-88 model we have is too fast in level flight.  And when you catch them, the Ju-88 can make an un-realistic high speed dive and leave the Brit fighter in the dust.  Not saying that the Ju-88 couldn't dive like that, but in real life the Heinkels that were used wouldn't have been able to do that.  They would have had to defend themselves rather than run.

[daddog]

Good comments.

Joker glad you enjoyed it! FYI exile is out of town till Tuesday. He usually posts results with in 2 days of our events.

FYI soon we hope to move it all over to the HTC site (scoring system) and they will take over the scoring of the events. Not sure how that will all work out but we can't keep expecting exile to the excellent job he has been. He is ready to hand it over.

lol dawg, that is because I ran the first few! We finally got some CM's who know what they are doing.  

[Nifty]

Sancho, I agree, but there's nothing we can do about the planeset.  We gotta work with what we have, and I'd rather have a BoB with Ju88s only than no BoB at all.  

Of course, we when run this one again after 1.10 comes out, we can force the Ju88s to fly in multi bomber formations with the drones.  Why you ask?  because they have to go slower to keep the drones with them.  Each drone lost will count against the LW side, so maybe they won't be as apt to dive away so drastically as they did in the past TOD.  I dunno, I think Sundog had that idea on the CM forum.   We'll have to see how 1.10 works in practice in the MA first.

However...  Ju88s diving away in the Battle of Britain after releasing ordnance was historical.  (banana found and posted this in the CM forum)

http://www.battleofbritain.net/section-4/page-19a.html

thanks for feedback guys.  Keep it coming!

Wotan, your post was exactly what I was looking for.  The reason I gave the orders like I did was so you could be historical if you wanted, or not historical if you wanted to do a "what if" for one of your objectives.  I thought the London objective was definitely no 110s in JABO roles tho, just 109s and Ju88s.  I hope I didn't get the planes mixed up with the other objective!    I'll start triple checking my plane assignments next time.  edit:  As to the RAF plane breakdown.  There were always 3 Hurricane flights and 2 Spitfire flights.  I thought 3-2 would be better than 4-1.  I'd have liked 4-2, but we don't have that many players.  

Dux, your TBM flight got nailed because I think a whole squad didn't show up that frame.    Usually it's the IJN that get undermanned in the late war Pac stuff we've done.  Believe me, your TBMs were supposed to have escort, unless the Frame CO thought they could sneak you in...  I dunno for sure.  However, I think a big reason the TODs weren't "successful" in the beginning was we didn't have as many squads and we had 3 targets per side.  That meant hitting 3 targets and defending 3 targets.  Plus we didn't group the smaller squads together and we'd have a small squad run into a large squad.  So what I did in the BoB is try to make it so every Flight had a minimum commitment of 11-12 pilots.  Hopefully, we're on the right track with that and we'll have good fights in terms of numbers.

Hopefully, 1.10 will be out before July and we can get you guys an Early Pac TOD after Skernsk's Germany TOD.  

[Wotan]

no your orders were clear i sent 2 groups of 88s to london 1 had 110s escorts the other had 109s meet over london. With the bomber bases in rear there was no way to have a close 109 escort all the way to london. With the fuel limit it would have been impossible.

I made up for this fact by sending D flight (109s) as a sweep near a14, the same place i had the 88s making land fall.

fyi germany was not with out radar (even though it made no difference in this tod)

FuGM 80 Freya

This was a long-range ground radar. It is little known that the Germans had operational radar in the beginning of the war, and used it effectively against British bomber raids he's talking about early war(39-40) British daylight raids. Freya had a range of 120km . It operated on a frequency of 125MHtz. Range precision was 125m, angle precision was 0.5 degrees.

FuGM 39/62 Wurzburg

Short range ground radar. range 170km(? - possibly one too many zeros), frequency 560Mhtz, range precision 100m, angle precision 0.2 degrees. This type of radar was used to guide night fighters to the bommbers and for AA gun laying. There first operational success was Sept 4th 1939 vs a Bristol Blenheim raid on Wilhelmshaven.

FuGM 86 Giant Wurzburg

This radar worked on a wavelength of 53cm. It's aerial was 3m across and weighed 1500kg. The 'Giant-Wurzburg' with a range of 45miles began to be introduced in 1942. By D-Day, there were 4000 Wurzburgs in France alone controlling 20,000 AA guns.
FuGM 402 Wasserman

AGW Radar thread

Also the ju88s did drop there load and dive away to escape the raf. But they didnt run full throttle to target. Also they didnt carry a full bomb load. Mostly they carried 2 x 500kg and 2 x 250kg.

The he111 was much tougher then the ju88 and the do17. It could take considerable damage. Without the ju87, do17z and he 111 the raf was at a slight disadvantage but if you look at tod as more a series of "snapshots" and not the overall campaign then ju88s hitting london and hurris coming to stop them its historic enough in this context.

Also Erprobungsgruppe 210 flew 110s and 109s as jabo in BoB.

The activities of Erprobungsgruppe 210 over southern England during the bitter fighting of summer 1940 are recorded here in depth. Formed on July 1, 1940 Erprobungsgruppe 210 was given the task of operationally testing the standard fighters on charge with the Luftwaffe in new and different roles. Their main role was the use of the Messerschmitt 109 and 110 as fighter-bombers, lacking both the level flight of the conventional bomber and the steep dive of the Stuka. The mode of attack was the shallow dive, using only the standard Revi gunsight as a bombsight to line-up the target. They were also the only unit in 1940 to operate the Messerschmitt Bf 110C-6, the version that carried a 30 mm. MG 101 Kanone in place of the standard 2x20 mm. Kanone. Information is provided here on Seilbomben, a weapon which the unit would have used to black-out the electricity network in the south-east of England had an invasion taken place in 1940. In filling a significant gap concerning Luftwaffe fighter-bomber raids over England during the Battle of Britain.

They targeted airfields and radar stations.

As I said this tod was great as is and I would hesitate before making any drastic changes.

[Vulcan]

Loved it... definite thumbs up!

Would like to throw one idea into the ring - allowing 'dead' pilots a reup at takeoff+1hr. IE give them a second run within the frame. I'd like to see that 2 hours used to its fullest. A lot of people make a lot of effort to turn up, being shot down after 20 mins must be a bit disappointing. After all, I shot down half the RAF in frame 3, and the rest ran away to Scotland!

[Nifty]

The problem with a 1hr re-up is that what happens to everyone who lived through the first hour that gets shot down AFTER the re-up window?  Now we've got guys flying around on their "second life", but those who didn't need the re-up initially only get "one life" because they missed the window.  (this happened to me in a check 6 before.  I got killed a couple of minutes after the window closed, so I only got 1 life, while others got 2 lives.)

However, we've asked for multiple lives to be a new option for the SEA.  We may or may not get that.  If we do, then possibly we'll use that in the TODs.

I agree that we should do something, but there's nothing right now that we can do that's fair, and also that's easily implemented.

[Joker312]

Originally posted by Vulcan
Loved it... definite thumbs up!

Would like to throw one idea into the ring - allowing 'dead' pilots a reup at takeoff+1hr. IE give them a second run within the frame. I'd like to see that 2 hours used to its fullest. A lot of people make a lot of effort to turn up, being shot down after 20 mins must be a bit disappointing. After all, I shot down half the RAF in frame 3, and the rest ran away to Scotland!

Sorry guys but I dissagree. No way we should adopt anything other than a 1 life to live format. You want more than 1 life fly the MA. 1 life means you must adjust your flying style and actually use some SA. Because of 1 life we fly more like the pilots actually did during the war. They flew agressively but not with recklessness as we do in the MA. In short they flew within the limits of their ability. To know ones limitations is a crucial aspect of this setup and its what makes this so appealing.

And Vulcan what does your last comment mean? You feel sorry that you shot down 30+ RAF in 1 frame? Thats a fantastic accomplishment if it is infact true. I guess because you are a flyer of unparelled skill that would lend weight to your request for a change in the rules?

Regards,
DmdJoker

[Ghosth]

JU-88's are very hard for early fighters to attack. Teamwork can do it but we really need the stuka IMO.

Loved the way it played out, but its hard for the defenders. There is no way you can keep them from hitting targets someplace, there is just too much coastline and so many targets.

to the LW they had their hands full also.
I guess I'd like to do it again, only reverse the squads. Otherwise make no changes.

Let us SEE what its like on the other side.