And how is flying 20 kilometres not justified at prop tiers?
It’s equivalent to ARB more or less before first contact.
You underestimte how fast propeller planes are. A 300 km/h IAS climb very quickly reaches the battlefield following take off - no more than 4 minutes! And in reality, it will be less due to how increasing altitude leads to higher TAS compared to IAS. Usually reaching around 300 km/h IAS for 400 km/h TAS at altitudes I find comfortable in my typical prop plane.
Why so low?
None of the contested airspace dive bombing techniques recommend releasing at such a low altitude. Not even because of bomb impact, just the sheer risk of slamming into the ground from control stiffening and compression.
Even the super early war Stuka would go for bomb release altitudes around easily twice that which is described - 500-600 meters.
Helldiver release altitude would go as high as 900 meters (granted, it’s easier to hit a battleship than a tank).
~850 meter bomb release altitude following a steep vertical dive (45 to 60 degrees) into a unloaded extension after initiating at a whooping 2.5km high cruise altitude.
2.5 km.
What ostwind or skink or btr-zd is gonna hit you prowling at 2.5km altitude until you decide someone is dying, and how will they catch you before you’re in the unloaded extension phase unless you went straight at one of them (well after someone got bombed into oblivion)?
Looking at footage of people who actually have good rudder control from IL2:GB, this kind of dive bombing is incredibly precise and will hit your target if you know what you’re doing (in my case, I’m only decent enough at hitting ships consistently.)
You do realise that bombs also create fragmentation right?
If you keep getting damaged by your own bombs you just don’t know how to use them then, simple as. Plus pretty sure your distance from the bomb perception is skewed in a fast plane.
To have a (further) 20 km range between the battlefield and airfield for props is to put every aircraft over the battlefield 20km away from repairs and 40km from its next sortie (over the battlefield, RTB and back).
As almost all aircraft have less ordnance than ground units and face far harsher realities when comes to damage (aircraft don’t have the option to repair anywhere nor an ability to play ‘musical chairs’ with the crew members to keep going (a pilot snipe = immediate death)), this ideal would have a very stark effect on balancing. In addition, aircraft already cost more than ground units (even though GFs cost less and accrue more kills) and lack direct influence over capture points (which are what really steer matches’ outcomes). Unless you are suggesting a compromise of some sort (reduced SP costs for aircraft, first spawn ability with ordnance, etc.), I don’t see the idea of a 20km move being viable.
As a matter of game balancing, I don’t think this would be accepted…aircraft already deal with all of what I mentioned and this being added on would simply be unreasonable.
In the most respectful way I can say this…this is WT. The real manuals you present and IL-2 bits you cite are undoubtedly valid techniques (these probably do work too!)–but WT is a far more casual game than either of these things really allow for in practice (because damage for GFs is not serious unless it’s fatal, that also limits the viability of realistic tactics such as these).
When you look at what you propose there versus the goofball lawndarting because he didn’t plan his approach out…I’d have to say the latter is closer to the norm for WT. Thus, that is the reality we have to deal with when it comes to how the game functions.
I am fully aware of bombs’ fragmentation and acknowledged this; I have no problem with handling bombs with the timers set adequately, as is expected and typical.
The problem here is not aircraft getting damaged at a given distance…the problem is ground units far closer (often mere yards) than the aircraft and within the bombs’ given ranges of damaging effect are not getting damaged.
I’ve called top tier a mess on balancing at large for the bigger part of a decade now…so I’m not sure where any doubts about my stance on it come from.
As top tier goes, I agree that it has many flaws…that’s practically a given.
Yes it does sometimes happen that bombs do fuck all to tanks. I had the exact thing happen with the swedish 600kg bomb which has 480kg of TNT. Dropped it on a tiger, saw it bounce of the tank and it only destroyed his barrel and tracks.
THe thing is that does not happen that often. Usually the bombs just work (unless you bomb soviet heavies)
Yes, and no.
You dont have hard data from devs. But you can count how many time plane kill GF, and how many times SPAA kill air. Still, no hard data - but the problem is visible
It’s absurd that a F4U-4B can take off, climb to ~1.5-2 km within moments at WEP, push nose down, drop bombs and after going dry, is able to rearm and return to terroize the battlefield in ~180 seconds between bomb drops.
Maybe if CAS had to choose between loiter time (through frontline bombers and heavy attackers equipped with multiple bombs at cost of being large, fat and slow targets) and safety (fighter-bombers capable of using dive bombing tactics to become effectively immune to SPAA and only be vulnerable to enemy CAP), CAS wouldn’t be as absurd as it is currently.
That is if you get hit, and you can fly/limp back to the airfield just fine even if it is at a longer distance. Now, I’ll grant you that you do become very vulnerable to interception by enemy CAP if you’re fighting your own hellcat to keep her in the air despite missing your wingtip.
Other than outright engine failure or total loss of stability, most prop planes should be able to nurse their way home over a 20 kilometer stretch. I say this with confidence based on my own experience getting torn to shreds by bomber gunners in SB EC and landing increasingly zombified aircraft.
In exchange, you gain total immunity to enemy outside of fellow aircraft flying to intercept you. The window of opportunity for ground vehicles to threaten you is something you alone dictate and decide during your attack run.
Your first fly out is taking off, climbing at 300 KPH IAS and dropping your bombs over 4 minutes.
Your flight back will likely be no more than half that due to lack of bombs and ability to dive down to the deck. Other than big fat bombers and stuff like zeros and Re2001Cn and early spitfires, you should be able to hit and sustain ~500-550 km/h in straight line. Make that 630 km/h for americans or even 700.
P-38G, known for its very draggy airframe, could sustain me ~500 kph TAS at 830 meters over approximately 28 kilometers of desperate WEPing with multiple instances of skin damage yesterday following a dive down to 300 meters to pick up some 650 km/h to escape a very nasty Bf109 trying to eat me alive.
Even the A6M5, after turning into a literal zombie, could sustain 290 kph TAS
Look at that enormous damage. She flew just fine across EC Tunisia
J2M2 flew at ~580 kph with its whole wing missing across Ruhr as well:
Spoiler
Ki-43 managed to maintain 400 km/h - japanese planes are known for being awfully slow - with its tailplane turned into swiss cheese and its entire rudder being chewed off (which led to massive sideslip slowing down the plane).
You will be just fine with a 20 km flight to RTB after getting damaged in props. If Japanese aircraft made of bamboo and rice paper can do it, everyone else can do it too.
Nothing stops you from NOT doing goofball lawndarting or loitering in gunrange of SPAA.
Also, “damage is not serious” is a point in favour of CAS, not SPAA.
Most “Anti-air” rooftop MGs and SPAA worked less by actually scoring air kills and more by just…
Saturating the airspace above the convoy with so many tracers that it scared off or at lest psyched out attackers and dive bombers forcing them to miss out of self-preservation.
In case of US vs Yamato -
Look at how effective naval anti-air fire was:
Operation Ten-go.
Of 386 aircraft fielded by the U.S, only 10-13 were destroyed.
Per accounts, U.S dive bombers just sat and circled above and outside the anti-air armament’s range and took their sweet time making methodical passes.
In Warthunder, CAS players lack this sense of life-preservation so they’ll dive in and kill your tank even if you’re spraying .50 cal or 20 mm in their general direction without any fear of death.
For counting the effectiveness of aircraft usage to kill tanks, you count the number of aircraft lost (to all enemy fire) versus tanks killed. Defending aircraft are half of the enemy team’s means to prevent the destruction of their ground units by aircraft.
A person can assemble the data manually via observation and/or replays…but it’s extremely laborious to do it that way.
I still don’t see that idea selling as-is in the current day, particularly as CAS isn’t doing all that much (below the mess of 9.X+ anyway).
Aircraft are already markedly less cost effective and less influential than ground units; I don’t see any real justification for hobbling them further–and certainly not without some compensation (BR reductions, SP costs reductions, first spawn ability, etc.). It just does not make sense given the realities at hand.
If you’re lit afire, which is very common and relatively easy to do, a 20km further commute would likely ensure a death–whereas such a scenario is perhaps a toss-up currently, depending on severity.
Having not tried SB, I cannot say whether it’s congruent with RB…though I suspect certain peculiarities about it (such as viewing limits) may limits its carry over.
Putting aside the time I smoked a Pe-8 with an 88mm cannon shot from a Tiger H1 at about 3km on a complete fluke, it is true aircraft can remain outside the effective range of ground units fire below a certain BR (props particularly)…but given aircrafts’ kill results and the need for aircraft to enter that area to attack enemy ground units, I don’t think it carries the relevance you imply.
Sure aircraft can remain outside the reach of tanks…but if you’re trying to attack them, what point is there staying outside your own reach too? (In WT, the realistic drop ranges you discussed earlier aren’t really reflective of what actually occurs.)
I doubt that this pitch would sell with many players–and Gaijin too for that matter. Putting aside my own dubiousness about the idea and its fairness to aircraft, Gaijin is not known for liking things that block their queue times up (including with extended gameplay such as traversing the map). That’s no doubt one of the reasons they cut down the playtime in RB AFs matches years ago…
True…except that seriousness about the game and talent are two very big filters on what happens in WT. While it is admirable to plan out moves such as bombing and the like, it is seldom practical in WT (standoff bombing to guard the capture points in Battle mode comes to mind).
How so? I had been referring to GFs in general…not SPAAs. As GFs can repair from any non-fatal damage, CAS must outright kill GFs for the attack to have any meaning…whereas a significant hit to an aircraft can force its hand to RTB or die. That’s a stark difference.
This is something that is really not seriously reflected in game at any point. Like it or not, most of what we see in game is banzai charging…either in the air or on the ground. That’s just how WT is.
Most players barge into enemy turf with little concern…“Leroy Jenkins!” is basically standard operating procedure here. I don’t adore that…but that is how it is in large part.
Trying to mesh WT and reality with all of the many differences between them is…‘problematic’ to put it mildly.
For counting the effectiveness of ground units to kill CAS, you count the number of ground unit loss (to all enemy fire) versus CAS killed. Defending ground units are half of the enemy team’s means to prevent the destruction of their AIR units by ground.
Hope now you understand what a bull@@@t you wrote.
There’s no bull in what I said…it’s simply the reality of the matter:
You can do a reasonable but rough analysis of aircraft effectiveness based upon the number of ground units killed as compared with the number of aircraft lost to enemy fire during that pursuit because you know the specific numbers and types involved. This is still imperfect because many of the counted aircraft were not trying to kill tanks…but this accounting is still vastly closer to accurate than the method you suggest because of the context differences (more of the aircraft are regularly involved in attacks on GFs than GFs are upon aircraft).
Counting all ground units’ deaths occurred as they were trying to fight aircraft serves no purpose because most ground units are never trying to fight aircraft, as others here have mentioned. Therefore, only a tiny subset of that tally are relevant to the premise you raise and this hopelessly skews the data into uselessness. Ground units aren’t billed with enough specificity in the data set for your framing to be useful. That is the key difference…and it makes all of the difference.
Though admittedly imperfect (due to data filtration limitations), the method I explained fares far better. It is simply more realistic and that’s why other similar assessments (tallied by others) have validated it…it’s close enough to what is accurate that it’s workable.
This makes no sense. If, in order to calculate an aircraft’s “effectiveness”, you count all kills, regardless of who inflicted them, then why do you claim that doing the same comparison for ground vehicles doesn’t make sense because “most ground units don’t fight aircraft"?
In the same way, half of the aircraft don’t fight other aircraft. And half don’t fight ground vehicles. What you’re saying doesn’t make any sense at all.
You can’t just calculate effectiveness like that, because you don’t have that kind of data available — not even when analyzing StatShark, etc. You can only analyze it for individual players if they track such statistics themselves.
I’m playing 1 spawn… Doesn’t matter CAS kills me or tank (mostly high tiers). Right after my spawn protection disappears I’ll get bombed or spawncamped so what’s point of giving free kills to enemy?? Better join next session.
Most of the ground units you see deployed (howitzers, heavy/medium/light tanks, etc.) are not actively fighting aircraft (even SPAAs are not always in use for anti-air purposes (wannabe TD use is common)). Counting the howitzers/heavies/etc serves no real purpose because they play no substantial role in the number of aircraft killed.
A far larger, relevant fraction of the aircraft played (likely well beyond 50%) are engaged in anti-GFs work, not just combat air patrol work, especially if the oft-repeated claims about CAS are taken as legitimate. That is the basis of the approximate calculations here and, while rough, this review does generate usable data.
Um, no…I just restated what I stated before. Nothing about what I said changed…it was basically the same post twice.
All that really proves is that you never understood what I said…there was never any “double standard”, as I explained the difference at hand was how the data was filtered and the limits that imposes.
Spoiler
This is the mentality that leads to defeats…so it’s not much of a surprise.
Somehow it’s my fault that you don’t understand the situation I explained…twice. Yeah, sure…I’ll just make things simple, accept your concession and let matters go.
The more embarrassing bit here is that is you resorting to petty namecalling rather than anything more substantive…but I suppose that it’s coping.
The only thing my comments show is a fine grasp on how WT works presented in a balanced and fair-minded manner with the calculations explained (I even pointed out the limitations of them!)…that’s about the furthest thing you could get from a troll, lmao
Cling to anti-intellectualism, that works so well!
It is easier to whimper than win and takes less effort to play the victim than be a victor.
You’re free to choose your own route, I don’t care.
The sums involved were tallied because they were relevant to the count. The ‘accident’ sums were left out because they were possibly intentional bailouts or crashes.
Lmao, nope…my understanding of WT is just well beyond your own. You’ve made that painfully apparent, even before you started openly violating forum rules such as here.
Your difficulties at understanding all of this are your own issue, not anything related to me nor “trolling”…do not attempt to blame me.
As I said before, when you look at the results of aircraft and are seeking the exchange rate of aircraft based upon the number of tanks killed versus aircraft lost to all enemy fire, you count all of number of tanks killed by aircraft and compare it to the number of aircraft killed by ground and air units during this time.
While imperfect due to data filtration limits (air to air only fighters are not separated), this will deliver rough figures that are close enough to be usable. Ground versus ground results are not included because they are irrelevant to determining the numbers related to aircraft…almost none of the GFs involved were even targeting aircraft, as only SPAAs are specifically designed to counter aircraft or regularly used for this purpose.
This has been repeated many, many times…hopefully you understand what’s said, how it works now and how/why it’s limited. Hopefully.
Lmao…this demonstrates that you don’t understand what’s written:
What I had said states that [air-to-air-focused] fighters (which may theoretically harm an open tops) are counted (despite doubts of its actual involvement in attacking GFs)…yet here you didn’t understand that.
To determine aircraft yield for a given result (ground units) versus the loss rate (to all enemy fire), you calculate the number of tanks killed versus the number of aircraft lost to all causes…which is all that was done.
The 70k ground units killed by other ground units has no bearing or relevance on this manner because those ground units were not likely to be practically capable of targeting aircraft, nor engaged in such action. For about the third or fourth time…they had no relevance to aircraft.
Once again, the actual premise was number of tanks killed by aircraft versus the number of aircraft lost to all enemy fire (air + ground fire).
The reality is this: you did not understood the framing of what I said originally, nor the calculations of what was involved or how/why those calculations were/are made. Maybe now you’ll get it…or maybe you’ll lash out again. We’ll see I guess!
Okay i said I’m not going to waste time with trolls, but 1 more question: where did i violated forum rules?
I didn’t called you “dumb” i said “if you where dumb” there’s difference between “you are dumb” and “if you where dumb”
About your “skills” of understanding WT and overall statistics, i think who reads this will understand everything without further continuing.
Your statements is wrong and doublestandarted. You said most planes are going for other planes, but half of them are going for tanks and it should be included, but ground units are going for ground and air too and it’s irrelevant. Just vibranium logic man.
