Air support - help me

[PEB14]

Hello folks,

I used air support for the first time this week: a Typhoon with bombs in the Grainville Chateau mission of The Scottish Corridor campaign.

It was a big success: even though I watched Usually Hapless' excellent tutorial just before, it didn't not a single causualty. None. Nada. Niente. Rien du tout. In fact I didn't even hear MG fire during the sweeps. Maybe the cannons were jammed?

 

Can some vets please clarify some points?

- I understand that the aircraft will attack anything they can see in their target area. Only what they can see (no area fire)? Strictly in their target area (no fire outside)?

- The forward observer needs to have a LOS to the target area for calling aircraft support, like for artillery. But what thereafter? Does it help if the FO has a LOS to units inside the area?

- I see in some AAR that people redirect their aircraft to alternate target areas. Therewas no possibility to "adjust fire" like one does for artillery. Did I miss something? How can you change the aircraft target?

- It is not clear for how long an aircraft remains available for support. In my case it stayed for about 10 minutes, then disappeard but seemed to be available for another call with a 10 minutes delay... Can you call the same aircraft several times in the same mission, as long as it has got ammos?

- My Typhoon had bombs and 20 m cannons. I had the choice bewteen light, medium and heavy missions. Unsure of what this meant, I asked for medium... Should I have done otherwise?

 

Thanks for your help!

[A Canadian Cat]

8 hours ago, PEB14 said:

- I understand that the aircraft will attack anything they can see in their target area. Only what they can see (no area fire)? Strictly in their target area (no fire outside)?

Correct it picks its own targets inside the area specified by the FO. I have seen them go just outside the area in the past.

 

8 hours ago, PEB14 said:

- The forward observer needs to have a LOS to the target area for calling aircraft support, like for artillery. But what thereafter? Does it help if the FO has a LOS to units inside the area?

No, once the call has been made your FO does not make any difference that I have seen.

 

8 hours ago, PEB14 said:

- I see in some AAR that people redirect their aircraft to alternate target areas. Therewas no possibility to "adjust fire" like one does for artillery. Did I miss something? How can you change the aircraft target?

Those people either made a second call after the CAS finished the mission or they cancelled the mission and made a new call.

 

8 hours ago, PEB14 said:

- It is not clear for how long an aircraft remains available for support. In my case it stayed for about 10 minutes, then disappeard but seemed to be available for another call with a 10 minutes delay... Can you call the same aircraft several times in the same mission, as long as it has got ammos?

I'm not sure what the time limit is either. Once they are out of ammo they leave for good. I usually assume they are going to run out of ammo on the mission I called so if I really really want a subsequent call I'll cancel the first one while they still have ammo. Just to be sure.

 

8 hours ago, PEB14 said:

- My Typhoon had bombs and 20 m cannons. I had the choice bewteen light, medium and heavy missions. Unsure of what this meant, I asked for medium... Should I have done otherwise?

It's more guidance light means favour strafing and heavy means favour bombs. I have not really tried experimenting with how strong the effect is. For example I don't know if Light would prevent a plane armed like yours from dropping bombs at all. Hopefully someone else can chime in on that topic.

[Brille]

On 9/15/2023 at 8:12 AM, PEB14 said:

- I understand that the aircraft will attack anything they can see in their target area. Only what they can see (no area fire)? Strictly in their target area (no fire outside)?

I think they can deviate slightly from an area of attack but that´s only reading in the forum not my own experience.

If you give your plane an operation area (circle) then they will engage any enemy (and sometimes even friendly) unit they can see.

It helps a lot in spotting if these units move or shoot at something. Area fire is for point targets.

On 9/15/2023 at 8:12 AM, PEB14 said:

- I see in some AAR that people redirect their aircraft to alternate target areas. Therewas no possibility to "adjust fire" like one does for artillery. Did I miss something? How can you change the aircraft target?

I can´t think of a way to redirect a plane. You can abort the mission and set a new one.

 

On 9/15/2023 at 8:12 AM, PEB14 said:

- It is not clear for how long an aircraft remains available for support. In my case it stayed for about 10 minutes, then disappeard but seemed to be available for another call with a 10 minutes delay... Can you call the same aircraft several times in the same mission, as long as it has got ammos?

I would assume so yes. If the plane has still ammo left you can use it until it doesn´t. Sometimes though they are easily scared of by enemy AA fire so if they stay for long is uncertain.

 

On 9/15/2023 at 8:12 AM, PEB14 said:

- My Typhoon had bombs and 20 m cannons. I had the choice bewteen light, medium and heavy missions. Unsure of what this meant, I asked for medium... Should I have done otherwise?

In general I believe with a light, medium and heavy mission you are telling the pilot what weapons he should use or how intense the engagement should be. But never the less it is up for the pilot to decide and it can vary.

I had set up a test scenario on which I tasked a Typhon (with bombs) to attack a Panther with a light firemission. He depleted his entire 20mm canon ammo with just one partial penetraiton but didn´t use one bomb.

On the other side I did a similar thing with a Focke Wulf 190: Light firemission on a point target. Firstly it used mg and canons but after 2 strafes it suddenly threw a bomb. (and it had still plenty of mg and canon rounds left)

So what weapon the plane uses is somewhat determined due to the fire mission setting, it is however not set in stone or something.

[StieliAlpha]

To summarise: I find air support mostly pretty useless and can remember only one game against Bulletpoint, where he used it quite effectively against me. But even there: The result was more of a morale drop for me and a few friendly „KIA pixeltruppen“ on the map.

Not to forget: The risk of „blue on blue“ is quite high…

Edited November 5, 2023 by StieliAlpha

[PEB14]

7 hours ago, StieliAlpha said:

To summarise: I find air support mostly pretty useless and can remember only one game against Bulletpoint, where he used it quite effectively against me. But even there: The result was more of a morale drop for me and a few friendly „KIA pixeltruppen“ on the map.

Not to forget: The risk of „blue on blue“ is quite high…

Hmmm… After my disastrous first employment of air support, last weekend I had a Typhoon destroying an immobilized Tiger II with its rockets in the Scottish Corridor campaign ! In the same mission another Typhoon damaged a Panzer IV enough to turn it impotent (I knocked it down easily with a Churchill afterwards).

In a previous mission of the same campaign another Typhoon wrought havoc amongst a German infantry assault.

Accordingly this was against the AI. But I wouldn't say Air Support is useless!

BTW, thanks to @IanL and @Brille whose advices above make it possible!

[StieliAlpha]

1 hour ago, PEB14 said:

Hmmm… After my disastrous first employment of air support, last weekend I had a Typhoon destroying an immobilized Tiger II with its rockets in the Scottish Corridor campaign ! In the same mission another Typhoon damaged a Panzer IV enough to turn it impotent (I knocked it down easily with a Churchill afterwards).

In a previous mission of the same campaign another Typhoon wrought havoc amongst a German infantry assault.

Accordingly this was against the AI. But I wouldn't say Air Support is useless!

BTW, thanks to @IanL and @Brille whose advices above make it possible!

Congrats! Sounds more effective than any of my encounters.

[Vacillator]

45 minutes ago, StieliAlpha said:

Congrats! Sounds more effective than any of my encounters.

My experiences are more in line with yours my friend.  Perhaps luck will favour us more in future.

[Redwolf]

Another problem with air support is pricing in quickbattles. It is all over the place, including some CMCW items that are too cheap by a factor of 10.

[Brille]

17 hours ago, StieliAlpha said:

To summarise: I find air support mostly pretty useless and can remember only one game against Bulletpoint, where he used it quite effectively against me. But even there: The result was more of a morale drop for me and a few friendly „KIA pixeltruppen“ on the map.

Not to forget: The risk of „blue on blue“ is quite high…

 

Yeah I find them a bit of hit and miss too. 

Atgm capable aircrafts or helicopters in the modern era may have an impact on the battlefield but anything else can be achieved by artillery more effectively and with a cheaper price. Not to mention that aircrafts are under the constant threat of being shot down. 

The ww2 stuff, in addition, is most of the time pretty inaccurate (as it should be). 

And if the plane drops it's heavy payload on some questionable targets it doesn't even pay back. 

I had a Stuka once in CMRT that had the bright idea of hammering it's 1000lb bomb on a lone soviet truck. 

Well yeah.... Why not?

 

In one CMBS US vs US game the airpower was well used. 2 Apache shot up some of my Bradley's and Humvees while seemingly impervious to my Stinger counterfire. In the end though it just was a bigger nuisance, as I had still more forces than needed. For the price my opponent probably would have been better of with some extra Javelins. 

 

[PEB14]

From an historical point of view, the Allied Tactical air support in WW2 was more directed against line of supplies and enemy units in movement than against tactical defending positions on the battlefield. So it's not surprising that its effectiveness is not wonderful in the frame of CM WW2 games!

[thilio]

11 hours ago, PEB14 said:

From an historical point of view, the Allied Tactical air support in WW2 was more directed against line of supplies and enemy units in movement than against tactical defending positions on the battlefield. So it's not surprising that its effectiveness is not wonderful in the frame of CM WW2 games!

Yes, with exceptions like Dompaire where Thunderbolt were effective during the battle

[PEB14]

11 hours ago, thilio said:

Yes, with exceptions like Dompaire where Thunderbolt were effective during the battle

Absolutely! Excellent counter-example! In the Dompaire case, they were even more than effective, they were decisive!

Edited November 7, 2023 by PEB14