For years, Luftwaffe Commanders in the campaign game in BOBII had to live with 'hit or miss' escort behaviour. The game AI would set both bombers and fighters to take off at the same time and head to the rendezvous point, no matter where they based relative to each other. If they were equally distant from the rendezvous, you got a perfectly escorted raid. But if bombers and fighters were different distances, the rendezvous would go haywire and bombers risked getting slaughtered.
Some said this reflected real life in WWII, where such escorts often went wrong, but it was decided to fix it anyway.
Now thanks to the work of Two27 and tester Stickman, the code has been optimised so that distance to rendezvous is calculated and takeoff times adjusted:
Fighters in this raid take off 17 minutes later than bombers, and make a perfect rendezvous.
1. In each Raid, the fighters should join up with the bombers at the Fighter Rendezvous Way Point.
2. You can check and see if the fighters and bombers will rendezvous OK, by opening the Mission menu, choose the Raid, then the Route Menu. Then the Take Off menu in there.
If the fighters have the same take off times as the bombers do, which are far away into the rear area behind the fighters, then successful rendezvous will fail, as in old Rowan code.
If the fighters have different take off times than the bombers do (almost always later take off times) then you can be sure that fighters and bombers will join up correctly.
Note! That if you do see a potential Rendezvous failure, with the same take off times for both fighters and bombers, you can delete that Raid and Authorize a new Raid to same Target.
Roll the dice again for that "new-again" Raid, and you will probably get a successful rendezvous. (some serious war gamers may consider this as cheating!)
3. I am a war gaming Commander type of man that tries to take care of all my men, not just my vain glorious self as an individual pilot.
Also I have a healthy disrespect for commanders above me, as many are, and have been.. quite stupid! LW Campaign AI Directives are really stupid!
As a war gamer, I prefer to issue all orders.. where to attack, when to attack, how many aircraft to send forth each Raid, what altitude each Raid should use,
and what each Initial Way Point compass direction of a level bombing Raid to attack a Target is, that can maximize best force destruction upon the Target!
Doing this "micro-managing" style of war game play takes a lot of time and careful thought.
Also, as to getting good fighter-bomber rendezvous, and as I am switching different fighter Gruppen around to be my preferred men to escort a detailed Raid,
I sometimes see that my new fighter escort has bad take off times in relation to the bombers! GGggrrrrhhhh!
OK, I pick another fighter Gruppe to fly with that Raid, and it usually will have good take off time s for successful rendezvous. (I do not consider this evil cheating, but I am no Saint!)
4. If you send an unescorted bombing Raid out (which I do not advise doing so, unless you have the RAF on it's knees and bloodied badly!)
and then make another Raid somewhere that is escorted, you will see that the escorts for this 2nd Raid have no Patrol Way Points!!! Game flaw!
If you have a fighter escorted bomber Raid on a Target, and that Target does NOT have Patrol Way Points around it,
then the fighters will NOT rendezvous OK with the bombers. Game flaw!
Just delete that Raid and set it up again exactly the same. Then you should have the escorts Patrol Way Points show up OK. Rendezvous will now be OK.
Always check and make sure that an escorted Raid has those Patrol Way Points around the Target.
If not.. then it is like leaving your house to go to work without wearing any pants or shoes or boots... and it is raining.. and you forgot your umbrella!
No comments:
Post a Comment