How to make AA less lethal?

[Heckpupper]

Hey, how can I make AA in my missions less effective? I'm trying to build an online campaign, in which strafing ground targets will play a decent part, but I don't want people to feel like commiting to a few gun runs is almost suicidal. I'd still like to have some visual AA effects in the air though. 

 

Is there a way to get a decent amount of smoke-puffs in the air, without making every squadron in the area lose half it's aircraft? What types of AA are least lethal? What's a good amount that would give me the visual effects but least lethality?

 

Cheers

[Gambit21]

Set AI to “low” - it’s that easy.

 

[Jaegermeister]

The black smoke puffs come from Flak 88s. The further away they are the less likely they are to take your wing off with 1 shot. They were supposed to have 4 shot clips, but I have not verified that they are limited to that.

 

what Gambit said regarding not suicidal

[unreasonable]

Light AA is less dangerous than it used to be after the changes in a recent update 4.001:

 

73. Simple ground vehicles have realistic gun aiming speeds;
75. Simple AI tanks and guns have a delay between initial aiming and opening fire and between destroying a target and engaging another;

 

I have tested it quite a bit and even on normal AI the results are now plausible. You should have no problems on low.

 

20mm LAA is the most survivable: it gets the most hits but it is usually possible to RTB after one hit. The 37mm LAA get fewer hits, but more kills.  They also produce airbursts, which the 20mm does not do.

 

We do not have a 40mm Bofors or an allied 20mm AA gun yet, so if you are doing a campaign for the Germans you could use the 61-K for the Allies: it is the closest in performance to the Bofors, though not quite as good, but I doubt it makes much difference, as being hit in a fighter by the 61-K is fairly hard to survive.  Alternately or in addition you could use the German 20mm Flak 38: the Allies still had 20mm LAA in their inventory, but by the period of the BoBP map the Bofors was the primary weapon for both UK and US LAA units. 

 

Since the UK and US  both used bofors variants as their main LAA gun in defence of airfields it is a bit strange that this was not included in the BoBP release, but I assume that it will make it's way into BoN. Better late than never.

 

 

 

 

[jollyjack]

On 1/15/2020 at 8:48 AM, Gambit21 said:

Set AI to “low” - it’s that easy.

 

 

Just followed Icky's advice to set Flak on train wagons to low instead of high. Now they shoot at bombers, but when set to high they don't ... An FMB programming fault then?

[Stoopy]

Love this tip about waypoint priority mixed with AI level.  I have 3 riverboats cruising up the river with waypoints set to Low, so all 3 light right up like Nervous Nellies when you get close, but AI is also set to Low so they can't hit diddly squat.  It's like the 3 Stooges are down there manning the gun stations.  

 

 

[IckyATLAS]

On 1/21/2020 at 2:59 PM, jollyjack said:

 

Just followed Icky's advice to set Flak on train wagons to low instead of high. Now they shoot at bombers, but when set to high they don't ... An FMB programming fault then?

Difficult to say if it is a programming fault. If only we could know why Force Complete has such many behaviors. It seems more a kind of programming where you just cram functions by opportunity or to avoid to create three different functions. As for low and high, they may make sense for a certain use (like interrupting the last order given to a plane) but become nonsense for others. Even the name Force Complete is not adapted for the other functionalities. Anyway once you have discovered how it works it is fine. In the ME just change the name of the MCU to whatever function it will carry. The parameter name cannot be changed so you are stuck with high/low. The ME was not intended for public use at least at the beginning. So when finally it was given I suppose it was as is, and has never been much polished since. Some additions have just been made on the objects, but still it is incomplete and all is still not available in the ME.  The Documentation, Manuals, and the ME share the same problem. These are things that do not bring any profit but cost a lot to make and maintain. So it is up to us that want them to do the job ? 

[jollyjack]

For sure i'd love to see examples of the various ways you can use Force Complete; for now i think the only common ground is target linking to the plane,

and then experimenting with bingo, timers etc.

[JimTM]

6 hours ago, IckyATLAS said:

Difficult to say if it is a programming fault. If only we could know why Force Complete has such many behaviors. It seems more a kind of programming where you just cram functions by opportunity or to avoid to create three different functions. As for low and high, they may make sense for a certain use (like interrupting the last order given to a plane) but become nonsense for others. Even the name Force Complete is not adapted for the other functionalities. ...

 

Coconut had an interesting take on force complete.

[Gambit21]

I concur.

”high” works as a “clear all logic” command, whereupon you can assign a new command or trigger.

 

Most of the time an entity will obey a new command/trigger in any case. The Force Complete “high” is just best practice/insurance”

 

Force Complete “low” is “fire at your discretion” more or less.

 

I don’t use or see a need for “low” where aircraft are concerned.

[IckyATLAS]

5 hours ago, JimTM said:

 

Coconut had an interesting take on force complete.

True, I forgot this post, I read some time ago. ? You can find indeed logic explanations.

Personally I would not have programmed it that way as it opens the door to misinterpretations and for normal users makes things a little fuzzy.

But as it was a tool for internal use anyway, why bother.

[Heckpupper]

Thanks for all the answers guys. It's going to be a multiplayer campaign set during the closing stages of the Battle of Stalingrad by the way.

A year ago, when we were running the Moscow campaign, AA proved to be very lethal even when in small numbers and set to low. I just had a chance to try out the first build of the template mission, and it turns out that nowadays they're nowhere as accurate. In fact, I feel like in some places they need to be beefed up. 

 

I think the traverse/aiming speed change was very helpful here.

 

[Gambit21]

AA set to “low”’was very usable a year ago as well, and as long as I can remember - so not sure what you were experiencing or why.

[IckyATLAS]

I experimented lately with a heavy artillery train, that is overflown at low altitude and found that there are now marked differences between Low Normal High. At low you can go through a hail of bullets with little damage. Normal can kill you, and High no chance to escape. These tests where made with the priority for the train set to low which means all guns firing at maximum rate. On the train there were multiple flak pieces of all sizes firing in combination. It is by having extreme conditions that you can see the differences.