Airpower munitions

[Erwin]

What do the 5 columns of munitions represent exactly for aircraft?

In a scenario I am playing I get two "Heavy" armed choppers (Apaches) and two "Medium" choppers (Cobras). Not sure what missions to send em on (anti-armor, anti-pillbox, anti-personnel, anti-building etc.) as I don't know exactly what munitions each column represents.

Thanks...

[Dietrich]

You're certainly not the first one to ask this. I've asked it myself at least once.

Some rules of thumb:

1. Cobras have either cannon plus rockets or cannon plus missiles. Apaches have (usually) cannon plus missiles plus rockets.

2. The A-10 and the USMC Harriers are the only fixed-wing air assets that have on-board cannon plus bombs and/or missiles. British Harriers have bombs and/or missiles but no cannon.

[stoex]

I believe no one really knows for sure except the folks at BFC, and for some reason they decided to leave the player in the dark. Only thing I can tell you is that with choppers, the longest bar is the one for rockets IF they are available. In the case of fixed-wing CAS, the short bars are the bombs. Everything else is pretty much unknown. Also, the different types of ammo are not always in the same order in the GUI, it seems.

Regardless, I strongly suggest using chopperson "medium" for area targets against mostly unknown enemies, since on this setting they tend to engage infantry in the open, light and heavy vehicles as well as infantry in buildings appropriately MOST of the time. On light they will not target tanks, on heavy they will rarely target infantry. Needless to say, this is one of the areas of the game I feel could use some more work .

For point targets use your own best guess. Most things are obvious, infantry in buildings is a difficult decision, against infantry in the open I would use light for small groups of enemies (will normally result in cannon fire), heavy for bunched up formations, as the chopper will be more likely to use rockets to devastate them.

[akd]

We've repeatedly asked for something as simple as a text document listing what the loadouts in the editor actually contain.

One little tip: Apache only carries 3 different weapons: M230 30mm cannon, rockets and Hellfires. When the Apache has 4 ammo columns, one is for M230 AP and the other M230 HE.

[Erwin]

Thanks guys. I thought I was being lazy not reading the manual for the umpteenth time to find things that are not there...