Air Strikes

[Apocal]

Forgot to mention some things yesterday.

First off:

1 Did any of he KO tanks actually burn. Any that did we can assume were total wrte offsor, at the very least, would have required extensive refurbishments.

None of the tanks burned. Not even the ones hit directly with bombs so big the destroyed vehicle was left turret down in the resulting crater. It would be a nice-to-have to improve the burn-up modeling a bit to cover extreme overmatch cases like this, but I don't consider it anything but eye candy.

This allows me to segue into something I meant to mention: the numbers (inconsequential air defenses aside) might be somewhat accurate if one converts KOs into "abandoned, but operable" vehicles that routinely happen with inexperienced tankers under air attack IRL. The bombs do regularly max out the suppression bar of tankers with near-misses, but do no damage and it never pushes over into abandoning the tank. Perhaps this issue would best be solved this way? I don't know, perhaps people with more East Front specific knowledge can chime in here.

Moving to the second, the observant might've noticed two sets of numbers for the undefended portion of the test. I decided to re-run the undefended test portion owing to the possibility that aircraft skill not being leveled (it was the first test scen made in the set and I forgot about it) had thrown off the results. I don't think it changed anything substantial though.

Thirdly, comparing the cost of aircraft used (four Ju87D [heavy], 1940 points) against what they knock out on average (2.8 T-34/85, 708 points), it appears buying aircraft is money at first glance, but tanks are the most survivable asset against air attack, shrugging off large bomb near-misses (within 20m) with minimal damage and being mostly immune to the most accurate and persistent method of attack - strafing with cannons and MGs typically takes two runs to destroy radios and optics. Meanwhile, even tank crews and AA weapons positioned in cover would occasionally be spotted during my tests, mercilessly strafed and annihilated in one pass. I wouldn't go as far as to say Ju87D's would break even or (god forbid) come out ahead on points, but I will say they are worthy of consideration, especially if you suspect your opponent plans on taking a lot of ATGs and you can get the (much cheaper) Ju87D [strafe]. Don't use the Ju87G, limited ammo and much higher cost makes it a worse option since you get less steel in the box, which is useful when shooting up infantry and crews.

Now for the portion I address to BFC itself: with 25 (or 30, if the first undefended test run counts) runs, is this considered a strong case for adjusting aircraft accuracy on moving vehicles down a few notches? If not, are more data points necessary? Or is there another aspect you'd like to see included in tests?

If you want me to put a target number on how I feel this setup should go typically, I'd say the aircraft should be causing three "abandoned" tanks (panic states resulting from near misses) in the undefended scenario, with one actual knockout for every nine abandoned tanks. This number should be scaling down as defenses increase, capping out at eight 37mm AA guns (two batteries' worth, 690 points total). Two batteries' worth of 37mm guns should be downing one aircraft and forcing the other three off with battle damage after a single pass, with complete regularity. Just my opinion.

Finally, I know the case for adjusting the influence of AA is weaker, but I'd say its actually a bit more serious of a problem because highly effective aircraft being countered by AA introduces a bit of interesting play/counter-play (realism aside, of course) whereas highly effective aircraft that are not countered by AA are less a gamble.

[Michael Emrys]

Has anybody tested aircraft against quad-20mm guns? Seems like they would be very effective at least at scaring off/messing with the aim of attacking aircraft. The impression I have formed from my readings is that was the weapon that pilots feared the most when making low level attacks. A hit from a 37mm would be more destructive, but the 20mm and especially the quad are threatening more hits.

Michael

[YankeeDog]

Has anybody tested aircraft against quad-20mm guns? Seems like they would be very effective at least at scaring off/messing with the aim of attacking aircraft. The impression I have formed from my readings is that was the weapon that pilots feared the most when making low level attacks. A hit from a 37mm would be more destructive, but the 20mm and especially the quad are threatening more hits.

Michael

Most combatants concluded by mid-war that 20mm AA was less effective per unit system weight than 37mm-40mm. IOW, if you could fit one or two tubes of 37-40mm AA in the same place you could fit four tubes of 20mm system, it was generally better to go with the 37-40mm.

For example, by 1943, the U.S. Navy was replacing 20mm Oerlikons with any of the various 40mm Bofors mounts wherever they could; the 20mm mounts stayed where a 40mm mount simply wouldn't fit (they still used substantial numbers of 20mm; something is always than nothing). Note this transition starts to happen before the Japanese begin using Kamikaze tactics in 1944, so cannot be attributed to this.

Similarly, the Germans viewed the single 37mm Ostwind as an *upgrade* to the quad 20mm Wirblewind, not a complement -- the plan was to end production of the Wirblewind entirely, and switch over to Ostwind.

The big issue with the 20mm systems wasn't so much hitting power as it was range -- the smaller, lighter 20mm shell loses velocity much more quickly with range, which means longer time of flight, and time of flight is a critical factor in hitting a fast-moving target at distance. Most combatants concluded that 20mm AA had an effective range of only about 1000mm, maybe 1500m at the uppermost. Against an attacking plane moving at least 100m/s, and usually closer to 150 m/s, this meant that a plane was only in the target envelope of 20mm AA for a very brief time. Bear in mind that a plane on a strafing run usually starts to break off at a slant range of about 400m, and dive or shallow glide bombers usually start pullout at a slant range of no less than 800m. So a dive bomber spends a very brief time indeed in the range envelope of 20mm and in fact the bomb is often already released before a dive bomber enters 20mm AA's threat envelope.

In contrast, the 37-40mm shells carried much further, and were considered effective out to at least 2,000m, and in many cases as far as 4,000m, depending on the details of the weapons system and the target profile. This compensates for their lower rate of fire -- they spend more time shooting at the target. It also means that more 37-40mm guns can be brought to bear on a given target if the guns are dispersed over a wide area (which they generally are, to defend multiple targets and attack vectors).

[Apocal]

Has anybody tested aircraft against quad-20mm guns? Seems like they would be very effective at least at scaring off/messing with the aim of attacking aircraft. The impression I have formed from my readings is that was the weapon that pilots feared the most when making low level attacks. A hit from a 37mm would be more destructive, but the 20mm and especially the quad are threatening more hits.

Michael

Four quick tests with a full battery (twelve guns) of 20mm Flakv, got "HIT" notices on several times on IL-2s strafing which led to a long "PREPARING" delay, but none were ever downed and "ATTACKING" resumed after approximately two or three minutes.

I think something might be wrong here. Has anyone seen an aircraft actually downed or even had its attack broken off entirely by AA?

[JasonC]

Well YankeeDog is mostly right - the evidence is that the 37mm / 40mm AA was the best light AA, but going up to 4 tubes covers the performance difference.

In USN experience, the 20mm needed 9000 rounds per kill, the 40mm only 2300. Heavy AA (5 inch) needed over 1000 rounds per kill, even after they got VT fuzes, and was much less effective for the thrown weight than the light AA.

Heavy MGs were not very effective - the 50 cal average was 28000 rounds per kill, making a quad 50 mount only about as effective as a single 20mm and less effective than a single 40mm.

The practical ROF of the 20mm Oerlikon was about 300 rounds per minute, vs 120 rounds per minute for the 40mm Bofors, which puts the required aimed firing time at 30 seconds per kill for a 20mm and 19 seconds per kill for the 40mm. (Water cooled 50s firing at full cyclic are more like 1 minute per kill).

You won't get 4 times effectiveness with a quad mount over a single, but you might get double especially if the individual hits are too light to take out the target plane. YD is still right that the 40mm gets more total engagement time from its superior range - but within range a *quad* 20mm is comparable in kill per unit time chances to a 37mm or 40mm.

Note also that you can't remotely just keep pulling the trigger that long to get those kill rates - those are the averages achieved firing short aimed bursts for much shorter periods at a time, mostly missing but hitting and killing once every several attempts, etc.

[YankeeDog]

but within range a *quad* 20mm is comparable in kill per unit time chances to a 37mm or 40mm.

[emphasis added]

This is true, but is also the critical qualifier; many attack profiles like dive bomb and torpedo run only skim the edge of the 20mm range, so it barely gets to fire at all. And of course, against the kamikazes the problem with the 20mm AA was that hits which might have been "kills" of ordinary attacks often didn't break up the airframe enough to stop it from hitting the ship. But this is rather a special case and in any event not relevant to CMRT.

The longer range of the 37-40mm also means there's greater chance that installations or ships in proximity can offer mutual support. For the most part, 20mm AA defends whatever is right next to it and that's it.

But it is true it 20mm AA wasn't worthless; it still had enough value that they kept using it where 37-40mm wouldn't fit. It also had value in making very low, nap-of-the-earth radar avoidance flight paths dangerous to the enemy; once targets get extremely low and fast, even 37-40mm AA can have difficulty tracking them. But since these approach profiles aren't detected much in advance by radar, it required a very good fast-response system and good gun placement (or simply lots and lots of light guns, dispersed to cover all possible approaches) to execute an effective low-level AAA defense. If there wasn't at least a few minutes' warning, the planes would often simply be gone before the gunners could man their guns and get a bead on them. Mosquito pilots, for example, got remarkably good at avoiding German light AAA on their flight paths, much to Goering's consternation.

For these reasons, the USN did conclude that is was useful to keep at least some 20mm tubes on the ships; while weight of 40mm fire was given higher priority, 20mm had value as the "final defense" component of the AAA plan.

[sburke]

Four quick tests with a full battery (twelve guns) of 20mm Flakv, got "HIT" notices on several times on IL-2s strafing which led to a long "PREPARING" delay, but none were ever downed and "ATTACKING" resumed after approximately two or three minutes.

I think something might be wrong here. Has anyone seen an aircraft actually downed or even had its attack broken off entirely by AA?

See my post above (#149). You have to test in hot seat mode to verify, but yes I had 1 of 3 flights show KO. Unfortunately there was no flaming wreckage to show the results so our Battalion commander thinks perhaps the gunners are giving themselves too much credit.

As to the debate about 37mm vs 20 mm. As far as the game is concerned (and that is really all that counts here) the advantage for the quad 20 mm is they had more ammo and after a few runs all the single mount 37mms were dry and simply bait now for Russian aircraft. As to what accounted for the KO, no idea. I didn't even realize it had occurred till I checked the Russian FO to see status on the flights.

[JasonC]

Correction to my post above - minutes of fire above, not seconds - duh, I am so numerically challenged some times... And nearly an hour of fire for the 50 cal (53 minutes for a single mount). Rounds per kill correct, rates of fire correct but rounds per minute, of course...

[Apocal]

See my post above (#149). You have to test in hot seat mode to verify, but yes I had 1 of 3 flights show KO.

I played the aircraft side in scenario author test mode to see how the aircraft were doing. It isn't like the AA needs any player intervention to engage.

As to the debate about 37mm vs 20 mm. As far as the game is concerned (and that is really all that counts here) the advantage for the quad 20 mm is they had more ammo and after a few runs all the single mount 37mms were dry and simply bait now for Russian aircraft. As to what accounted for the KO, no idea.

The quad 20s in my tests ran out long before the single mount 37s.

[sburke]

I played the aircraft side in scenario author test mode to see how the aircraft were doing. It isn't like the AA needs any player intervention to engage.

In scen auth test mode you can't see the status of the air missions so you don't actually know if you shot down any aircraft. That doesn't invalidate your test from the perspective that perhaps the CAS is too effective, but it does invalidate it as to how effective the AAA is in terms of shooting aircraft down.

The quad 20s in my tests ran out long before the single mount 37s.

Odd, I ran a couple turns just to watch the ammo expenditure. The quads start out with a helluva lot more but expend at a faster rate. Still what I was seeing (assuming both were firing the same amount of time) the 37 mm runs out sooner. There do appear to be some variables here one of which I don't understand.

First is when they actually spot and fire. Not all units were firing during all CAS runs.

the second and odder one is the pause. I am not sure what the pause is supposed to represent, but the units will all get a long pause say up to 30 seconds, but they can start firing before the pause runs down to zero. Crap I may have to read the manual assuming it is in there.

[sburke]

Are you using vehicles or towed units? I tried a run with towed and yeah I am seeing the 20 mm run out faster as well. The vehicle mounts hold out longer on the ammo but become CAS bait which the towed units don't seem to.

[Apocal]

I used towed in my tests.

[JasonC]

Here is my old board wargamers take on what should happen when a Stuka dive bombs a column of tanks protected by a couple of 37mm AA guns. I am basing it on rounds per kill data, rates of fire and ranges, speeds and engagement times, target sizes and historical dive bombing success and failure rates, etc. I think these are realistic probabilities.

First the AA guns roll 2d6. On a 12 the dive bomber is shot down and destroyed. On an 11 the dive bomber is damaged and aborts. Otherwise it attacks normally.

Then the dive bomber rolls 4d6. If all 4 dice are a 6, it got a direct hit and the tank is destroyed. If 3 of the dice are a 6 and 1 is a 5, it got a near miss and the tank is immobolized and the crew concussed. Otherwise, the bomb missed by enough that the tank's armor fully protects it - nearby infantry would still be suppressed and a few percent wounded by bomb fragments etc.

I think the game today has these relationships quite wrong, especially on the last part, bombing accuracy.

The OR evidence tells us that this match up is one that light flak wins in the long run, but also that loss chances in single engagements are very low. Normally, both sides just flat out miss.

[Apocal]

In scen auth test mode you can't see the status of the air missions so you don't actually know if you shot down any aircraft. That doesn't invalidate your test from the perspective that perhaps the CAS is too effective, but it does invalidate it as to how effective the AAA is in terms of shooting aircraft down.

Yes, you can see the status of air missions from scen auth test mode: place a ground HQ somewhere it can be seen, click on unit, click on air support panel.

[sburke]

Yes, you can see the status of air missions from scen auth test mode: place a ground HQ somewhere it can be seen, click on unit, click on air support panel.

huh. thought I tried that, chalk it up to old age. or just plain stupid.

[bobo]

Late to the party. Was just discussing this earlier in the week on another board. I tend to agree. Rudel was definitely very good at his job, no argument. But at the same time Goebbels needed heroes and it wouldn't surprise me if kill claims were rushed through the system somewhat to help provide them. In addition it's pretty well known that everyone over claimed, even in good faith. IMO WW2 CAS was great for soft targets, armoured ones not so much.

BTW you guys do know that before CM, Chris produced two WW2 tactical air combat games. I've still got them both...

Achtung Spitfire - http://www.hotud.org/component/content/article?id=19708

Over the Reich - http://www.hotud.org/component/content/article/46-content/games/simulation/20489-sp-853066880

-F

Don't know about Chris, but Charles programmed both of those games...

[John Kettler]

Quick note to US fans of warbirds. Places to check out for such flying exhibitions are, to name but some: Cavanaugh Flying Museum (Warbirds Over Addision (TX), July 4th, etc.), Planes of Fame, Chino, CA; Flying Heritage Collection, Everett WA. Among these, you'll find all of the following: C-47, F4F, F6F, F4U, P-51, P-47, Me-109, Il-2, Po-2, FW-190, Spitfire, A-26, B-24, B-17, P-40, Zero, Yaks. Consider this list partial. Many vids available on YT. Not responsible for sanity loss!

Regards,

John Kettler

[agusto]

I havent read most of the thread (except the first 4 and this page), but i have to agree with all those saying that Lucs' initial test results are with the range of possibility. I have always loved combat flight simulations like the WW2 sim IL-2 Shturmovik (of wich i of course know that it is not the real thing but just another simulation), and attacking a stationary colum of 4 tanks with iron bombs would be easy after some training. It is a whole different story if they are moving or even taking evasive maneuvers, but if they are stationary, they are easy to hit. Another story is spotting them: visually spotting tank-sized targets from the air is very difficult, if they are well conceald, almost impossible.

[JonS]

... I have always loved combat flight simulations like the WW2 sim IL-2 Shturmovik ..., and attacking a stationary column of 4 tanks with iron bombs would be easy after some training.

Lucas' results are within the realm of the plausible, but otherwise no. That is not even remotely close to true, unless you have a very personal definition for 'easy'. What you've basically said here is "I've played ArmA a couple of times, and getting 1km+ kills as a sniper with a scoped M4 is easy!" or "I've played CM a couple of times, and I can't understand why they took so long to win the war. Leading a company in combat is easy!"

There is plenty of info readily available on how hard air-to-ground is. This is a good place to start:

http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?did=2&uin=uk.bl.ethos.338168 (free PDF download)

[Skwabie]

In the 1st gulf war the Mk82 500 pounders were initially used against Iraqi armored columns. Pilots found them largely ineffective due to the high speed the jets travel and winds aloft, even with CCIP it's nigh impossible to achieve direct hits. They later petitioned for cluster bombs/mavericks, and were used with good effect. How that translates to the ww2 setting I've no idea, one hand you don't get the magical pipper to "put the thing on the thing", on the other the ww2 prop jobs are like floating kites. I've got some time in IL-2 as well but it's more arcade "shoot 'em up" than it appears tbh, and the bombs explosive power is quite overrated until iirc recent patches. We need a real expert here, if Rudel is still alive maybe we can ask him like the Fairchild A-10 engineers.

[JasonC]

In the first gulf war, the US expended 5800 Mavericks and 4600 laser guided 500 lb bombs, the former largely launched by A-10s (some by F-16s) and the latter largely by F-111s. Detailed OR after the battle by Rand puts the full MBTs killed by air weapons at 1700. Now, certainly some of those weapons were expended at other targets - fixed installations for some of the latter, APCs and artillery positions for some of the former etc. But plane by plane details validate a kill rate per precision guided AT munition around 1 in 4.

This was the largest outlier success of anti armor air attack in world history and it isn't close. Using the best tech ever, in the best conditions and terrain.

(By the way, the same campaign also expended 200,000 unguided bombs, which certainly hurt Iraqi personnel, soft vehicles, etc, but were singularly ineffective vs full tanks, compared to A-10s firing Mavericks and F-111s with forward looking infrared, launching laser guided 500 lb bombs at night).

There is no way in heck a Stuka pilot with an unguided bomb came anywhere near that kill per munition figure.

In fact, when we look at what the allied air forces were expending on German targets in the last year to year and a half of the war, it is clear a single unguided bomb delivered by tac air means didn't on average account for a single *man* on the ground, let alone a single vehicle. There aren't enough German casualties for them to have done so. A fighter bomber over its entire operational service life may have accounted for 1-3 trucks or railroad cars. The inescapable conclusion is that the average unguided bomb or rocket missed everything, with high probability.

[Skwabie]

JasonC I dunno, from my (v)pilot perspective and some reading on the net the way of dive bombing can produce some pretty accurate results. Roll in altitude varies from 6000-15000ft, typical dive angle 80 degrees, min bomb release altitude low as 1500ft. Basically the attack profile has you ride the bombs straight down until the last moment so effects of wind and human error etc is tried to be kept minimum.

Thread here

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=35214

and video here (yep it's Il-2 lol, but I mean just to get a feel for it):

Honestly I'm not sure either way is more accurate, fast jets aided by fire control computers or vertically diving stukas, probably the modern way has the edge but not much. I mean... no self-respecting fast mover pilot drops his bombs at some 1500ft slant range much less vertically:eek: (well except retarded bombs but those are even less accurate...)

[Apocal]

JasonC I dunno, from my (v)pilot perspective and some reading on the net the way of dive bombing can produce some pretty accurate results. Roll in altitude varies from 6000-15000ft, typical dive angle 80 degrees, min bomb release altitude low as 1500ft. Basically the attack profile has you ride the bombs straight down until the last moment so effects of wind and human error etc is tried to be kept minimum.

Honestly I'm not sure either way is more accurate, fast jets aided by fire control computers or vertically diving stukas, probably the modern way has the edge but not much. I mean... no self-respecting fast mover pilot drops his bombs at some 1500ft slant range much less vertically:eek: (well except retarded bombs but those are even less accurate...)

And in Call of Duty I once cleared a room of six bad guys with nothing but a Desert Eagle...

[agusto]

Lucas' results are within the realm of the plausible, but otherwise no. That is not even remotely close to true, unless you have a very personal definition for 'easy'. What you've basically said here is "I've played ArmA a couple of times, and getting 1km+ kills as a sniper with a scoped M4 is easy!" or "I've played CM a couple of times, and I can't understand why they took so long to win the war. Leading a company in combat is easy!"

There is plenty of info readily available on how hard air-to-ground is. This is a good place to start:

(free PDF download)

As i said, Il2 is just another simulation and doesnt represent reality. It tries to recreate it, but how accurate the results match the real thing depends on the quality of the simulation. I think though that as a combat sim it is much more accurate than ArmA.

EDIT:

Here is a video of US dive bombers training vs. a stationary target. They are very accurate. 3:00 - 3:10 shows an alomst perfect hit on the target.

That is my definition of easy, JonS.

[JonS]

Oh, come on. A training film?