Earliest historical start for Fw 190 campaign?

[istari6]

I've been working my way through the war starting with an I-16 in Oct 1941.  Having recently finished a short career in a Yak-1 ser 69, I'm now in a 109 G-2 over Stalingrad.  Looking ahead, I'm eagerly awaiting the first chance to fly the Fw 190.

 

The goal is to be historical.  Only fly an aircraft when and where it actually served.  Based on research in the forum, I found these threads:

 

https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/topic/42437-a-question-on-jg51-mölders-and-stalingrad/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Focke-Wulf_Fw_190_operational_history#Eastern_Front 

 

So it seems that this scripted campaign (I./JG 51) is the earliest historical moment I could fly the Fw 190A, correct?  And the first dynamic Career that would be historically accurate would need to wait for Battle of Kuban with the A-5?

 

Thanks!

[PatrickAWlson]

Depends on "when" vs "where".  PWCG has the FW190 A3 at Stalingrad.  I believe the in game career also offers this.  The "when" is historical but the "where" (no FW190s at Stalingrad) is not.

 

If that is off-putting then the FW190 A5 is at Kuban.  In the in game career I believe that all Kuban FW 190 units are ground attack.  In PWCG I./JG 51 moves to Kuban and you can fly A5s as fighters.

[istari6]

Patrick - PWCG is your baby, right?  I've heard great things about it.  

 

Yes, I'm avoiding flying 190s directly over Stalingrad since that never happened historically.  Nice to have the option, but I'm enjoying learning and experiencing the history along the way, so for my own personal taste I'll probably focus on Kuban.

 

I'm surprised the only option for 190 in Kuban is as ground attack.  I would have thought the Germans would need the 190s help in battling for air superiority, but I guess the various 109 models were still sufficiently effective they could rely on them?  Or is it more that the Germans had lost air superiority and now required "strike fighters" (to use a more modern term) that could basically rely on speed to strike the target unescorted?

 

Too bad, as I was looking forward to learning how the 190 handled as an air-to-air weapon.  I know it's a legend, but I've never flown the Anton in a sim before. 

 

[LukeFF]

2 hours ago, istari6 said:

I'm surprised the only option for 190 in Kuban is as ground attack.  I would have thought the Germans would need the 190s help in battling for air superiority, but I guess the various 109 models were still sufficiently effective they could rely on them?  Or is it more that the Germans had lost air superiority and now required "strike fighters" (to use a more modern term) that could basically rely on speed to strike the target unescorted?

 

It's a combination of things - the Ju 87 was very outdated by this point in the war, the 109s were still very effective, and the 190 fighter units in the East were farther north. All that and yes, the 190s could self-escort themselves when flying as fighter-bombers. 

 

All that said, you'll see plenty of air-to-air action in the game's Fw 190 Kuban career, as enemy fighters show up quite often. 

[PatrickAWlson]

2 hours ago, istari6 said:

Patrick - PWCG is your baby, right?  I've heard great things about it.  

 

Yes, I'm avoiding flying 190s directly over Stalingrad since that never happened historically.  Nice to have the option, but I'm enjoying learning and experiencing the history along the way, so for my own personal taste I'll probably focus on Kuban.

 

I'm surprised the only option for 190 in Kuban is as ground attack.  I would have thought the Germans would need the 190s help in battling for air superiority, but I guess the various 109 models were still sufficiently effective they could rely on them?  Or is it more that the Germans had lost air superiority and now required "strike fighters" (to use a more modern term) that could basically rely on speed to strike the target unescorted?

 

Too bad, as I was looking forward to learning how the 190 handled as an air-to-air weapon.  I know it's a legend, but I've never flown the Anton in a sim before. 

 

 

Yeah, PWCG is mine.  I try to promote it without sounding like I am trying to compete with the in game career.  They are both there.  Quite similar but also different.  Preference is a matter of taste.

 

On the 190 - the Anton has always been my favorite WWII plane.  Flying it is certainly different.  It has a nasty stall that (to me) is very sudden. It is pretty easy to recover though.  The best 190 pilots (I am not one of them  ) stay smooth and keep speed high. 

 

There is a lot of armament and a lot of ammo for those guns, so putting up a wall of lead in front of a maneuvering fighter is an option.  IMHO this works well with keeping the plane fast as you are not obliged to make violent, speed bleeding maneuvers when setting up a shot this way.  I am not a good shot so I tend to hold fire until I get to point blank range.  A long burst from those six guns is devastating up close.  

 

Historically, JG54 is the best known 190 unit in the east and they were way up north.  I was unaware of 1/JG51 until recently.  Most of the 190 units were in the west.  Lots of them in Bodenplatte.  

[InProgress]

7 hours ago, istari6 said:

Yes, I'm avoiding flying 190s directly over Stalingrad since that never happened historically.  Nice to have the option, but I'm enjoying learning and experiencing the history along the way, so for my own personal taste I'll probably focus on Kuban.

Normally you would start on velikie luki but that map has no career mode, unfortunately. Maybe one day.

[6FG_Big_Al]

But what you can look forward to is the BobP career or Pat´s counterpart Hopefully there will be some groups with Fw-190 A8 and later D9 ?

[istari6]

18 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

It's a combination of things - the Ju 87 was very outdated by this point in the war, the 109s were still very effective, and the 190 fighter units in the East were farther north. All that and yes, the 190s could self-escort themselves when flying as fighter-bombers. 

 

All that said, you'll see plenty of air-to-air action in the game's Fw 190 Kuban career, as enemy fighters show up quite often. 

 

I was wondering when the Ju-87 was finally phased out.  I remember reading that they were withdrawn from service after being savaged in the Battle of Britain, so I was a little surprised to see them still arcing down over Stalingrad in August 1942 during my Yak-1 career.   Makes sense that the Germans wanted to use them in an environment where they could still establish air superiority.  

 

Do we know why the 190s were first deployed in the north?  I was surprised that given the centrality of the Stalingrad battle to the German's plan for 1942, that their best new fighter wasn't deployed at the tip of the spear.  

18 hours ago, PatrickAWlson said:

 

Yeah, PWCG is mine.  I try to promote it without sounding like I am trying to compete with the in game career.  They are both there.  Quite similar but also different.  Preference is a matter of taste.

 

On the 190 - the Anton has always been my favorite WWII plane.  Flying it is certainly different.  It has a nasty stall that (to me) is very sudden. It is pretty easy to recover though.  The best 190 pilots (I am not one of them  ) stay smooth and keep speed high. 

 

There is a lot of armament and a lot of ammo for those guns, so putting up a wall of lead in front of a maneuvering fighter is an option.  IMHO this works well with keeping the plane fast as you are not obliged to make violent, speed bleeding maneuvers when setting up a shot this way.  I am not a good shot so I tend to hold fire until I get to point blank range.  A long burst from those six guns is devastating up close.  

 

Historically, JG54 is the best known 190 unit in the east and they were way up north.  I was unaware of 1/JG51 until recently.  Most of the 190 units were in the west.  Lots of them in Bodenplatte.  

 

Appreciate the "low-key" approach in sharing PWCG.  I've only recently gotten into BoX after years of flying DCS.  I'm still enjoying the built-in Careers, but would welcome the chance to understand the differences in PWCG and see if it's an even better fit.  What's the best way to learn about the differences between PWCG and the baseline Careers?  A quick pointer to a link is all I need, I'm sure you're tired of being asked that question more generally :).  

 

Good tips on the 190 - looking forward to flying it up in Velikie Luki (via the scripted campaign) after I finish my current G-2 Career at Pitomnik.  

[LukeFF]

15 hours ago, Big_Al_the_Allo said:

But what you can look forward to is the BobP career or Pat´s counterpart Hopefully there will be some groups with Fw-190 A8 and later D9 ?

 

Lots and lots of Fw 190 groups were present on the map during the career's timeframe, yes.  

[InProgress]

17 hours ago, istari6 said:

I was wondering when the Ju-87 was finally phased out.  I remember reading that they were withdrawn from service after being savaged in the Battle of Britain, so I was a little surprised to see them still arcing down over Stalingrad in August 1942 during my Yak-1 career.   Makes sense that the Germans wanted to use them in an environment where they could still establish air superiority.  

1945. They stop making them in 1944 but since there was still some left they were using everything they could. Rudel was shot down in February 1945 in his ju87.  Battle of Britain was small, in that small area you had thousands of planes located, bunch of AAA and radars tracking everything. It was simply hard to send ju87 far away across channel with fighter cover at best. Enemy will know you are coming and send fighters to intercept. In Soviet Union you had 1600km long frontline (from Leningrad to Stalingrad) so you could fly in, bomb enemy and fly back and they would never know. Its job was to drop bombs (and later shoot at tanks) with high accuracity and it was doing great job at it. No reason to get rid off it.

 

17 hours ago, istari6 said:

Do we know why the 190s were first deployed in the north?  I was surprised that given the centrality of the Stalingrad battle to the German's plan for 1942, that their best new fighter wasn't deployed at the tip of the spear.

It was deployed in the france first and there it shot down spitfire. Don't know why they did not send them to Stalingrad but there was "little stalingrad" in Velikiye Luki. It badly needed reinforcments and air support. Ju52 were dropping supplies there as well. So maybe Fw190 was needed there most or it was simply close so they send it there.

[istari6]

Interesting!  Didn't know that the Ju-87 lasted until the end of the war.  Thanks for the information, learned something today.  

[Sybreed]

I was kind of hoping for a more exciting career for the A5 during the Kuban campaign. Shooting ground targets and getting ambushed by russians at low altitude and speed isn't always fun... hope the BP campaign will be a bit more interesting.

[Yogiflight]

5 hours ago, Sybreed said:

Shooting ground targets and getting ambushed by russians at low altitude and speed isn't always fun... hope the BP campaign will be a bit more interesting.

Definitely. You will be shooting ground targets and get ambushed by american and british at low altitude

Edited August 23, 2019 by Yogiflight

[PatrickAWlson]

15 hours ago, Sybreed said:

I was kind of hoping for a more exciting career for the A5 during the Kuban campaign. Shooting ground targets and getting ambushed by russians at low altitude and speed isn't always fun... hope the BP campaign will be a bit more interesting.

 

Quick PWCG plug - PWCG tries to make ground attack missions and careers more focused on the attack aspect by limiting fighter opposition.  You will also get an escort.  The presumption is that if you are flying a ground attack mission you want to be able to focus on that - usually.  You will not always get a milk run but you will also not get overwhelmed by enemy fighters every mission.  The level of fighter involvement is configurable.