Beaufighters vs. Boats

[palker4]

Four and then eight flights of Beaufighters armed with 500 pound bombs attack 2 axis cruisers escorted by 4 destroyers in Cliffs of Dover.

Created this mission to see how many airplanes do I need to sacrifice in order to get through that crack shot AAA on those nasty warships.

My efforts were a bit hampered by stupid AI pilots crashing into each other so the losses were 100% with not that great results.

Attacking anything bigger than a torpedo boat seems like a suicide mission.

 

 

 

[343KKT_Kintaro]

9 hours ago, palker4 said:

Attacking anything bigger than a torpedo boat seems like a suicide mission.

 

 

Seems to me this is a 20 years old problem... indeed, attacking ships wasn't much different in the first IL-2 game...

 

 

[Peachy9]

I get it but are you using delayed action bombs - if not some of the damage will be from the blast of your bombs - IN RL they used up to 11 second delay below 1500 feet - and to avoid flak they went in at mast top height with DA bombs. But i dont think they would have gone in against a cruiser with a destroyer escort at all without bad weather cover - which i think some beauforts did in 1942 but with torpedoes and in bad weather at dawn!

 

In FMB put the pre attack, attack and post attack waypoints ridiculously low like 10-15metres and use delayed action bombs - also spread out the attack from 3 different directions. You will still lose a lot but not as many - I have tried it in FMB against escorted armed merchants and it feels relatively realistic with about 40% damaged and 25% lost out of 9 aircraft but 2 or 3 ships sunk

Edited April 18, 2021 by Peachy9

[jollyjack]

well, i am sure i hit an AA gun spot-on several times in Tobruk, but it kept firing .... i give up.

[Peachy9]

 

 

Just how low they would go (ok this is against merchant shipping) - from Combat Over the Mediterranean by Chris Goss

[palker4]

2 hours ago, Peachy9 said:

 

In FMB put the pre attack, attack and post attack waypoints ridiculously low like 10-15metres and use delayed action bombs - also spread out the attack from 3 different directions. You will still lose a lot but not as many - I have tried it in FMB against escorted armed merchants and it feels relatively realistic with about 40%

There are 7 flights of 3 attacking from different directions in the second part. Results would be better if the AI could avoid crashing into each other. I used 1 second fuses cause of the way AI drops. If you look where the bombs land all of them missed with 11s delay the bombs would explode after the ships sailed way past them.

Mainly they served as decoys so I could practice my bomb runs without getting blasted each time. 

I will try to edit the mission to mitigate the crashing and try to set the attack way points to 25 m to see if they can hit something.

 

Edit: I attached the improved mission here. Left the 1s fuses for the AI as they have better results with those. Set speeds to the max.

Player plane flight has 11s fuse. Also changed positions of the destroyers cause the two in front start colliding after I changed attackers paths and speeds.

When I tried it last time both cruisers were sunk 10 aircraft were lost. Costly victory but two cruisers are way more expensive than 10 Beaufighters with crew.

AntiShip.zip

Edited April 18, 2021 by palker4

[Peachy9]

AntiShip.zip

 

 

Try this - I have changed flight paths - moved Ground attack to further from ships, lowered altitude, changed AI ships to rookie and delay action of 1 second for bombs with a Top mast and all in one pass attack. Its still pretty heavy in terms of losses and AI still fly too close but i think survival rate is a little more realistic now

[Buzzsaw]

Against warships larger than patrol boats, attacking with bombs at low level and close to the target, (i.e. skip bombing or glide bombing) was a near suicidal effort in WWII.

 

That was why so much effort was put into developing rocket projectiles and weapons like the Molins gun.

 

Torpedoes launched from a good distance away were the best bet at this stage of the war.

 

Dive bombing was also fairly successful, but of course, these attacks started at 4000 meters and speeds were in the area of 500 kmh.

 

This size of force, i.e. two Cruisers supported by four Destroyers is a large Naval Task Force... nothing to be trifled with.

 

Beaufighters at this stage of the war and with their ordnance capability were not tasked with attacking large Naval Task Forces... this was left to Swordfish or Wellington Torpedo bombers and they preferred to attack at night.

 

Against Merchant ship convoys, with relatively light escort, (usually no more than a couple of the Spica Class DE's) which the Beaufighters were tasked with attacking, the odds are much better.  (although they still generally attacked at night)

 

There has been a tendency in most WWII Simulations to underrate the effectiveness of Naval AAA.  It was not an easy task to sink large Naval vessels... it required large formations of specialized Naval attack aircraft with highly trained crews.

 

If you read the accounts of the sinking of the Repulse and Prince of Wales, you will see they were attacked by 88 aircraft, half of which were highly trained torpedo bombers... the IJN had the most highly trained torpedo bomber crews in the world at the time... they practiced attacks on large Naval Vessels rigorously.

[palker4]

Thanks for the insight Buzzsaw, but I am less historical accuracy and more stuff blowing up in interesting ways kind of guy.

And 90 planes in the air sure sounds like a great explosion opportunity.

[Buzzsaw]

5 hours ago, palker4 said:

Thanks for the insight Buzzsaw, but I am less historical accuracy and more stuff blowing up in interesting ways kind of guy.

And 90 planes in the air sure sounds like a great explosion opportunity.

Hello Palker

 

Didn't mean my comments as criticism, just as an explanation of why sometimes it might seem attacking ships can be a very difficult task.

 

In this simulation, we try to focus on re-creating as historically accurate a situation for the players as possible.

 

Appreciate all your testing and interest in the game.  ?

[Angry_Kitten]

historical accuracy can mean many things..   

 

in some aspects of historical accuracy they have something called "stitch counters" that will through you out of events if you dont have a copy of an historical document to verify you used the right thickness of thread, the right number of strands in the thread, etc.

[Sokol1]

On 4/17/2021 at 8:06 PM, palker4 said:

Attacking anything bigger than a torpedo boat seems like a suicide mission.

 

Can sunk a Minensuchboot with Beaufighter cannons.

[Avimimus]

On 4/22/2021 at 7:18 PM, Sokol1 said:

Can sunk a Minensuchboot with Beaufighter cannons.

 

Oh? I've tried lighting ships on fire or damaging superstructures with the Beaufighter and the Ju-88C - and come away without really feeling like I'm even causing superficial damage.

 

I have read accounts of aircraft with cannons (e.g. 37mm) causing fires on merchant ships which caused the crews to run the ship aground. I'm not sure about sinking large ships, but it would be nice to have more evidence of damaging them/suppressing them (e.g. ability to damage the bridge, cranes, things that would impact morale).

[palker4]

That is how I started I was trying to damage the ships with guns. I managed to sink the submarine and torpedo boats, no luck with the cargo ships even the 40mm on the Hurri IId failed to do any observable damage.

 

When the bombs explode they can knock out the guns on the ships, but I never managed to destroy the AAA guns by strafing them. Although it is very difficult to test it as the ships defences will usually destroy your plane before you get in range.

[Buzzsaw]

13 hours ago, palker4 said:

That is how I started I was trying to damage the ships with guns. I managed to sink the submarine and torpedo boats, no luck with the cargo ships even the 40mm on the Hurri IId failed to do any observable damage.

 

When the bombs explode they can knock out the guns on the ships, but I never managed to destroy the AAA guns by strafing them. Although it is very difficult to test it as the ships defences will usually destroy your plane before you get in range.

You can make yourself invulnerable in the single player settings.