Expanding Soviet Aviation Regiments

[falle96]

I've been doing some research - as best as someone can without access to scholarly sources or a mastery of the Russian language, I must admit - and I've found that Soviet aviation regiments, be they fighter, ground attack, or bomber regiments are considerably smaller than their real-life equivalents.

 

I've found, in my experience, Soviet fighter regiments in the career mode tend to be approximately 9-14 pilots in size, which while a respectable amount, would be historically an over-sized squadron at best. At the start of WW2, Soviet IAPs were in the range of 63 aircrews, and even following the first grueling months of combat still operated in the size of two squadrons of 10 each for a total of 21 aircrews. This size would grow to a larger number as the war progressed, but in any case the historical number is considerably larger than the one represented in game.

 

I understand that having a list of 21 pilots to sort through and, if acting as a regiment leader, manage might be unwieldy. However, I do think that it would add some degree of realism and also impress upon the player better the scale of aerial combat during the Second World War over Russia.

[LukeFF]

The basic idea of the current Soviet regiment size is you are flying from one squadron of 9 planes, plus the 3-plane HQ section, so that of course makes the default squadron size 12 planes. I've set up the files like this to keep it consistent with the other nations, which also are all set up on the squadron level:

 

RAF: squadron size of 20 planes

USAAF: squadron size of 20 planes

Luftwaffe: one staffel within the Gruppe of 12 planes, plus the 4-plane HQ schwarm for 16 planes total (the exception being independent staffeln, which are 12 planes by default).

 

So, it would be easy enough to bump up the Soviets to have 20-plane regiments, but then realize you are in essence now simulating two squadrons instead of one.

 

I'd be curious to see what people think of this.

[falle96]

Sorry for the heavily belated reply!

 

Personally, I would be all for bumping the squadron/regiment cap up to 20, but I suppose part of me wonders if it might be more elegant to split the regiments into component squadrons, similar to how each of the German JG have selectable Staffels.

 

How difficult is it to make new units in the Career? And if it’s not horrifically difficult, would it be worth the effort to retroactively introduce them to the game?

[LukeFF]

24 minutes ago, FarflungWanderer said:

Personally, I would be all for bumping the squadron/regiment cap up to 20, but I suppose part of me wonders if it might be more elegant to split the regiments into component squadrons, similar to how each of the German JG have selectable Staffels.

 

How difficult is it to make new units in the Career? And if it’s not horrifically difficult, would it be worth the effort to retroactively introduce them to the game?

 

That sort of thing would require the development team to create new units. It would take a whole lot of work for users to create new units on their own.

 

What the career mode interface really needs is more detailed unit management. Ideally, for instance, if a player chooses a Soviet regiment, then the pilot roster screen would show all the pilots assigned to a component squadron, while a German Gruppe would have the pilots assigned to individual staffeln, etc. In my tests, I've come across no practical limits to the number of pilots one can assign to a unit (I even ran a test where I successfully outfitted a full-strength German late-war Gruppe with 52 aircraft ?). The problem of course, is that it's just one huge mass of pilots, with the unit CO and XO being tagged as the only unit leaders - no staffel captains, etc.

 

Going back to the original question: if I bumped up the Soviet regiment size to 20 planes, I would probably then increase the default number of planes assigned to a mission to 9 and set each regiment to fly two missions per day, to simulate both squadrons within the regiment flying one mission per day. Like I've said, it wouldn't be perfect, but if people like that idea I'm willing to put in the work to make the necessary changes.

Edited August 15, 2020 by LukeFF

[falle96]

2 minutes ago, LukeFF said:

 

What the career mode interface really needs is more detailed unit management. Ideally, for instance, if a player chooses a Soviet regiment, then the pilot roster screen would show all the pilots assigned to a component squadron, while a German Gruppe would have the pilots assigned to individual staffeln, etc. In my tests, I've come across no practical limits to the number of pilots one can assign to a unit (I even ran a test where I successfully outfitted a full-strength German late-war Gruppe with 52 aircraft ?). The problem of course, is that it's just one huge mass of pilots, with the unit CO and XO being tagged as the only unit leaders - no staffel captains, etc.

 

This seems like something the career mode sorely needs, and hopefully it’s something we’ll see implemented in the future in some way, shape, or form.

 

4 minutes ago, LukeFF said:

Going back to the original question: if I bumped up the Soviet regiment size to 20 planes, I would probably then increase the default number of planes assigned to a mission to 9 and set each regiment to fly two missions per day, to simulate both squadrons within the regiment flying one mission per day. Like I've said, it wouldn't be perfect, but if people like that idea I'm willing to put in the work to make the necessary changes.

 

All of those changes sound fine by me, though from my experience Soviet regiments already fly at least twice a day. I’m not necessarily assigned to both of them, but they seem common as it stands.