Regarding escorts, historically it was always either very hard or impossible to
stop a bomber being attacked by fighters, several general examples, you all
know well, the BofB, small numbers of fighters get through overwhelming numbers
of escorts to attack some bombers, go forward a year and now the blue players
do the same to hundreds of spitfires escorting some bombers, enemy get through
most of the time, 2 years later and now there are even more bombers and escorts
though enemy fighters get through on the odd occasion. In these scenarios there
were proper “bombers”, they should have the attitude to bomb regardless.
Fighter bombers, imho, had a more flexible brief regarding enemy bridges in
that enemy fighters are a higher priority target. In this scenario it was
acceptable to ditch the eggs and Tally Ho the enemy.
Of course in IL-2 we have a falsely limited war scenario, mostly it involves
ground targets being attacked by “tactical low level” bombers or fighter
bombers, very much on an Eastern Front setting obviously, where the ground
targets are more of a priority, as you can win the map doing that.
It’s a bit unrealistic as small scale ground attacks don’t usually cause the
whole front to collapse.
For the blaggards, and it’s documented on the 56 website, our priority is
always to survive every sortie, if we can safely engage the enemy then we will
do so, sometimes we don’t engage an enemy because it doesn’t feel safe.
We make that decision easier by getting as many things in our favour as
possible, the most important one being altitude, then angle of the sun,
numbers, do the enemy have AI rear gunners, “where” are we engaging them, as
in, where and when are the next enemy going to come from.
We know we don’t win maps but on some servers, with limited plane sets, we do
affect the enemies ability to choose planes, but not very often. More often we
get mission kills, we shoot down fighter bombers before they get to target, a
double whammy to the enemy as they will often change bases.
We prefer to hunt like peregrine falcons, taking our prey “on the wing” using
our energy to get the kill and keep us safe.
So, should fighter bombers always strive to get to target in IL-2? As I said
before, I think you should poll the pilots of 56 and see.
In our last meeting, you didn’t engage us but still lost half your escorts and
half the fighter bombers, and their bombs, there surely must be a morale effect
as well, because at the end of that mission you only had 1 or 2 aircraft make
it home for some mud moving, imagine if you’d engaged us and shot some, or all
3 of us down, and most of you returned home, surely that’s more fun?
I know which is choose 😁
Witch
On 30 Apr 2021, at 11:36, dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
Working out the best way to fly with Java is a challenge at present.
For a fast, fighter-bomber mission like on Sunday, there is a danger at
present that all they will do is end up being sacrificial decoys if attacked
by higher enemies. And also add some confusion for the rest of us as to
what's going on.
Perhaps - for that mission profile - asking Java to fly ahead and light up
the radar at a different, but nearby target might be a useful alternative
approach?
As for the 'attacked by higher enemies' bit, we all know the Tempest at 25k+
with 2000lbs of bombs is a dog. But if we had been that high when the
Blaggards first spotted us, things would have gone differently. At the least,
we would have had more options - and no real need of direct escort anyway.
There's no implied criticism there BTW, had I been leading on Sunday I
probably wouldn't have gone that high either.
When flying bombers, or for a low level attack, having Java fly closer escort
on the other hand could still be the right way to go. I'm all for flying
together, but if the limitations we've seen recently aren't likely to change
we just have to take that into account.
Roke
On Friday, 30 April 2021, 10:05:18 BST, 56RAF_phoenix
<phoenix@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
You're mostly right there Colin, but to labour the points:
I'm not sure language is really a problem... their English is rather
better than my Dutch!
Close escort is really, really hard, as Bo and I found when we trivially
massacred an escorted Ju52 a couple of weeks ago.
But they have a real formation discipline problem, for example one of
them got lost or something and was coming in late, so when I called my
warning I wasn't sure and nor were they. I don't think our relationship
as squads is close enough for joint training yet.
As to the Reverb G2 spotting, I haven't got good settings yet (another
email to follow in due course), for example the murky conditions on
CombatBox last night were dreadful for me. They also had the "moving
cockpit" problem and I talked them through that later, though one of
them seemed to know the answer anyway.
Having taken over when Cina had to leave, I was kind of in "bomber
survival" mode because we don't often do bombed-up Tempests. It's very
different because with rear gunners, I set mine to long-distance and get
plenty of warning. So I wasn't playing to our strength, which would have
been to ditch the bombs. But that would still have left us with an
energy disadvantage. So I think turning South was right, but I should
have taken the time to make it a tac-turn so that Roke & Stickz were
abreast. Then ditched the bombs and extended to equalise energy.
Either way, most of Java would have been dead by then. So you could
argue that it would have been just as good to continue to target and get
at least some military objective.
I know this will sound brutal, but the escort really have to be able to
look after themselves because bombers/bombed-up fighters will never have
enough energy to come to their immediate help.
You may remember you killed a few of us at low level a few months ago on
the deck in a similar way and I proposed an unconventional flight layout
to provide better outward coverage. That's pretty much all bombers can
offer to the escort.
56RAF_phoneix
On 28/04/2021 12:05, Colin (Redacted sender bart_56 for DMARC) wrote:
Hi Phoenix,
Did they get the warning correct language issue or transmit issue? If
language maybe get Pod/Boot/Dutch to relay the messages in the future?
Do they need help/training in keeping formation, etc, as JaVa are flying
with 56 on a regular basis, joint training might help? I do think JaVa
doing joint missions etc is great btw:). How do you communicate with them
outside of squad nights, maybe bring them into the existing comms settings,
if this is a permanent fixture?
They have all got G2’s wow, I presume that you have now got good settings
for spotting with the G2, have they tried them ?
Hmm real life I think there could be a whole discussion on that;).
The decision was made and I respect that, as you are in charge and leading
the mission.
Comms do not seem run smoothly as a rule, between the different flights. As
you have mentioned about the comms to JaVa and not knowing Roke/Stickz
situation. Any way do you think there is a way to improve this?
As Roke says it’s good to hear the opposing forces PoV, most online
engagements don’t have the opportunity to do this, to see where things went
right and wrong. Plus it makes the debriefs more complete and interesting.
Just some small stuff that’s needs some work on :).
Colin
On 27 Apr 2021, at 22:55, 56RAF_phoenix <phoenix@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
I actually called a warning to Java. They're not great at keeping
consistent formations so we can spot attackers. Also, I think they're
having real problem spotting with their Reverb G2s. I sorted out a
cockpit-moving problem for them at the end of the evening.
So, in real life, as long as they weren't directly attacked I think the
Tempests with bombs would have continued to target as we did, because
that's their mission. Shooting down enemy fighters is a secondary
objective. Us bombers assume the escort can look after themselves unless
outnumbered.
There's a case to be made that we should have turned back when Roke &
Stickz got attacked. But by then I wouldn't have known how many were down.
56RAF_phoenix
