Shooting down aircraft.

[Mark_McLeod]

I am currently playing a quick battle where i am the luftwaffe and i knew the enemy had planes so i brought 3 flak 20mm and 3 flakverlings. i hear the enemy plane come in and then all my guns go berserk and shoot in the sky at the direction of the aircraft. but after shooting alot of rounds the plane still came around and did 3 strafe runs on my soldiers like the AA guns had no or little effect on it. So my question is how do i shoot down enemy planes and is there a way to tell thats they've been shot down because i cannot see them so i do not know exactly whats going on. Any help would be awesome Thanks! -Mark McLeod

 

[Mark_McLeod]

to update all 6 of my guns have depleted all there ammo and the one spitfire had gotten in 6 strafe runs without being touched and is continuing to harass my infantry 

[Michael Emrys]

Question: Have any of your men suffered casualties?

Michael

[Mark_McLeod]

 

12 minutes ago, Michael Emrys said:

Question: Have any of your men suffered casualties?

Michael

the strafing alone took out a squad then the bomb he dropped took out a 222 with a small scout team attached 

 

[Cobetco]

Sooo AA guns in CM can shoot down planes, but don't hold your breath as the chance is very very low. when one does get shot down you'll hear an audio response and see an explosion of board. However as Micheal was trying to hint at they do a very very good at making incoming aircraft suck at their job, and that can be very very important even if you can't tell it is.

[MOS:96B2P]

9 hours ago, Mark_McLeod said:

to update all 6 of my guns have depleted all there ammo and the one spitfire had gotten in 6 strafe runs without being touched and is continuing to harass my infantry 

That is frustrating and has made me cuss at the monitor.  AAA will shoot down OpFor aircraft.  When they are successful red text will briefly appear next to the AAA vehicle that hit the aircraft that reads:  Aircraft Destroyed.  There is normally a large explosion of the aircraft crashing to the ground along a map edge.  AAA units shoot at aircraft on their own.  Even a Target Arc will not stop them from shooting at aircraft.  

The better the experience and leadership level of your AAA unit the better the chance of destroying OpFor aircraft.  

What is the experience and leadership of your AAA units?  Just curious, how do you know what kind of aircraft the OpFor has?   

[Mark_McLeod]

1 hour ago, MOS:96B2P said:

That is frustrating and has made me cuss at the monitor.  AAA will shoot down OpFor aircraft.  When they are successful red text will briefly appear next to the AAA vehicle that hit the aircraft that reads:  Aircraft Destroyed.  There is normally a large explosion of the aircraft crashing to the ground along a map edge.  AAA units shoot at aircraft on their own.  Even a Target Arc will not stop them from shooting at aircraft.  

The better the experience and leadership level of your AAA unit the better the chance of destroying OpFor aircraft.  

What is the experience and leadership of your AAA units?  Just curious, how do you know what kind of aircraft the OpFor has?   

For my AA the leadership ranged from 0 to +2 I made sure hey were. They also regulars and 1 veteran. The reason I knew it was a spitfire was because it was a quick battle and I always make sure I can see what the AI uses that ways they don't just use only tanks and artillery and I saw that they had a spitfire.

[Michael Emrys]

1 hour ago, MOS:96B2P said:

What is the experience and leadership of your AAA units?

That was going to be my next question, but I see that it has already been answered. Finally, were they under command?

Michael

Edited February 28, 2017 by Michael Emrys

[MOS:96B2P]

1 hour ago, Mark_McLeod said:

For my AA the leadership ranged from 0 to +2 I made sure hey were. They also regulars and 1 veteran. The reason I knew it was a spitfire was because it was a quick battle and I always make sure I can see what the AI uses that ways they don't just use only tanks and artillery and I saw that they had a spitfire.

Good idea reference keeping an eye on the AI QB picks.  

With six AAA units all shooting with the leadership and experience they had I would have expected you to do much better against the aircraft.  For a moment it crossed my mind that maybe something was changed in engine 4.0 but I see we are in CMFI in this thread which is still (to my great impatience) at engine 3.  In CMFI when playing as the Germans I normally take one, sometimes two, 20mm Flak and do fairly well against aircraft.   I can't explain it at this point except to say very bad luck and very frustrating.....................  

[Rinaldi]

Soft factors don't affect off-map assets except for veterancy. The question not asked yet was; what was the plane's veterancy? Could explain the nerves of steel and the uncanny accuracy despite the curtain of fire.

[MOS:96B2P]

2 minutes ago, Rinaldi said:

Soft factors don't affect off-map assets except for veterancy. The question not asked yet was; what was the plane's veterancy? Could explain the nerves of steel and the uncanny accuracy despite the curtain of fire.

That's a good point.  It would be interesting to know the experience level of the aircraft.  

[Mark_McLeod]

31 minutes ago, Rinaldi said:

Soft factors don't affect off-map assets except for veterancy. The question not asked yet was; what was the plane's veterancy? Could explain the nerves of steel and the uncanny accuracy despite the curtain of fire.

I didn't look at the planes veterancy. I just checked to make sure the AI didn't do there classic move of not bringing any infantry. 

[Mark_McLeod]

1 hour ago, Michael Emrys said:

That was going to be my next question, but I see that it has already been answered. Finally, were they under command?

Michael

When you say under command do you mean having there squad leader/commander nearby? If so yea I had them near the FLAK 

[mjkerner]

Mark, remember, sometimes you eat the bear, sometimes the bear eats you. 

 

Oh, and what was the weather like?  Obviously flying weather, but fog/mist whatever could affect it, I suppose.  Then too, your groundpounders would have benefitted from the same bad weather.  So, again, sometimes you eat the bear....

[Michael Emrys]

2 hours ago, Mark_McLeod said:

When you say under command do you mean having there squad leader/commander nearby? If so yea I had them near the FLAK 

It isn't enough just to have an HQ nearby. It must be an HQ that is in the same chain of command as the unit, preferably its immediate superior. The manual explains all this fairly clearly.

Michael

[Mark_McLeod]

8 hours ago, Michael Emrys said:

It isn't enough just to have an HQ nearby. It must be an HQ that is in the same chain of command as the unit, preferably its immediate superior. The manual explains all this fairly clearly.

Michael

it was the chain of command because i bought the FLAK squad, im just going to assume i got really unlucky!!

[Michael Emrys]

13 minutes ago, Mark_McLeod said:

...im just going to assume i got really unlucky!!

It happens.

Michael

[DougPhresh]

I don't have the numbers in front of me right now, but I would venture to guess that AAA was not particularly effective in WW2. Forcing the enemy to break off attacks, or not linger over the battlespace, or fly at higher altitudes in more erratic patterns was much more common than outright kills.

I don't know if those "soft" factors are modeled in CM.

[JonS]

2 hours ago, DougPhresh said:

I don't have the numbers in front of me right now, but I would venture to guess that AAA was not particularly effective in WW2. Forcing the enemy to break off attacks, or not linger over the battlespace, or fly at higher altitudes in more erratic patterns was much more common than outright kills.

It depends on how you measure "effective", but I'd consider all those outcomes you list as being examples of AAA being particularly effective.

Also, bear in mind that over the course of the Normandy campaign the British lost over 100% of their Typhoons, although not all of them were shot down by FlaK.

Edited March 4, 2017 by JonS

[Erwin]

"...lost over 100% of their Typhoons..."  That sounds terrible.  Was that worse than BoB losses??

[JonS]

That's kind of a complex question, and really isn't apples to apples. Fighter Command was still growing in 1940, so it depends when you consider to be the baseline - July, before the start of the battle, or October, after the end of it ... or sometime in between. Also, famously, Fighter Command was never committed in its entirety to the air battles over south east England. Dowding always maintained a reserve, and was also forced to cover the entire country at all times. Finally, shot down Fighter Command pilots invariably came down over England, and were readily sent back to their squadrons ... sometimes taking off and fighting again later the same day.

Meanwhile, in 1944, 2TAF was essentially at full strength already in May and the composition changed little thereafter, aside from the rolling introduction of newer aircraft. And throughout then battle, essentially all those squadrons were allocated in support of the battle. Pilots shot down often came down on the wrong side of the frontlines, so even if they managed to evade it would be a long time before they got back to their units. Too, the generally low-level nature of the flying was less forgiving of problems and mistakes. FWIW, 2TAF had 18 squadrons of Typhoons at the beginning of June '44.

So, taking all that into account ...

In 1940 Fighter Command lost ~540 pilots out of 2,946 who flew at least one mission during the battle. But that definitely isn't apples with apples. Overall, by 2 November, the RAF fielded 1,796 pilots, an increase of over 40% from July 1940's count of 1,259 pilots. On 15 Sept 1940, 11 Group included 27 squadrons, or about 324 fighters. Over the course of the Battle the RAF lost 426 fighters destroyed in August, amounting to 40 per cent of 1,061 fighters available on 3 August.

Overall I don't find it hard to believe that the RAF lost (for some definition of 'lost') the equivalent of 100% of the fighters they had available at the start of the battle. All air superiority campaigns in WWII were drawn out attritional struggles, which was something the RAF and USAAF understood but the GAF did not. In both 1940 and 1944 the RAF had sufficient 'flow' of a/c and pilots to replace losses almost immediately.

Edited March 5, 2017 by JonS

[MikeyD]

I did tests of defending against air attacks with Bofors recently and the results weren't encouraging. Planes will get shot down but is very very much more likely the AA unit will get destroyed or the aircraft will complete its primary mission... or both. I think this might be the result of the BFC guys wanting to deemphasize close support aircraft along the active front line in WWII, something that was both rare and dangerous, at least into late 44. I recall (vaguely) in CMBN they had explicit orders not to include aircraft in scenarios. Then they stripped out forward air control targeting from CMRT. They even did a bit of this in modern war CMBS, leaving out 'heavy hitters' like F22 and F35 under the assumption they'd be involved in deep interdiction and air defense, not tank busting along the line of contact.

[Bulletpoint]

On 3/6/2017 at 0:01 AM, MikeyD said:

Planes will get shot down but is very very much more likely the AA unit will get destroyed or the aircraft will complete its primary mission... or both. I think this might be the result of the BFC guys wanting to deemphasize close support aircraft along the active front line in WWII

If they wanted to deemphasise aircraft, wouldn't it be more logical to make AA guns stronger rather than weaker?

[MikeyD]

An update to this topic. In the CMFI v4 upgrade AA effectiveness was looked at by Charles and significantly tweaked. It was one of his last game changes before releasing. My last AA test I got me a shoot-down(woo hoo!) and considerably fewer units on the ground died from attacking aircraft. Aircraft are still a pain but they aren't omnipotent anymore.

[Mark_McLeod]

7 hours ago, MikeyD said:

An update to this topic. In the CMFI v4 upgrade AA effectiveness was looked at by Charles and significantly tweaked. It was one of his last game changes before releasing. My last AA test I got me a shoot-down(woo hoo!) and considerably fewer units on the ground died from attacking aircraft. Aircraft are still a pain but they aren't omnipotent anymore.

That's great to hear man thanks for the update!