Level bombers

[loktarr]

Would be interresting for sure, but depends a lot (in the "real" situation of a battle), of the number of flight allowed.
Once I got 11 !!! support missions, I was able to bought 3 SEAD flights more, but when you only got 3 flight, this sort of attack becomes useless...

[ueauvan]

as for spotters, i tend to play 1980-1983 Nato V Warsaw Pact. the big difference is vision. with a couple of Hueys and vision 40 everywhere gets hits with smoke, tow missiles and ammo = massacre

[Bernard]

I've been running lots of experimental scenarios like the one you set up lotkarr. I've found that for all the gripes expressed about airpower and cluster bombs especially in these forums are a bit odd..... air power is amazingly effective if:
A) the enemy is on the move
2) you airstrike actually hits them/there are enough of them for your cluster bombs to make a nice wide coverage over them.

I've always found (I mainly play USA/USMC vs VC or Korea) that I can purchase air support that in a test scenario is utterly devestating, but in an actual battle the enemy just don't stick together close enough for me to get a good coverage from cluster weapons. Napalm is excellent, but not when some COIN fighter drops it on an open hex of jungle with no one in it....

Hopefully some of the changes in the v2.0 patch should improve things.

I've had some experiences where airstrikes have been highly effective, but it nearly always happens when they kill my forces, which as you can imagine, are advancing towards the enemy and therefore moving and more vulnerable.

[Mustang]

Level bombers are great in theory but worthless in reality. It takes them four turns to reach their target, and it's very rare to find an enemy soo bunched up and traveling in a long, straight line. That's the problem with air power- the aircraft always dump their ordnance in empty hexes. This needs to be fixed.

[Mobhack]

They attack on the intended turn IF you plot them as pre-game bombardment (with perhaps a delay). They were not intended as "on call" assets, so the delay is artificially short for these, as with air landing troops you do not plan as pre-game bomabardment.

They were only ever intended for WW2 Normandy type scenarios, e.g the opening stages of COBRA.

Level bombers go to the targeted area, offload HE iron bombs and return to base. The accuracy goes up as the decades pass.

Cheers
Andy

[Shadowcougar]

I tend to use them just before an asswult on a ridge line or town. nothing says I hate you like a Buff strike on that nasty and dug in company inside a town.

[lopezonline]

Air power can be deadly, but AAA and SAM's can also be very "efective". Try for example conduct such air raid against force protected by section of "Tunguska" AAA and some Area SAM's... it's one way to grave for those pilots. Remember that you knew where op4 is, and enemy was totaly unprotected, in normal game such raid would be unefective...

[Shan]

Mobhack said:
They attack on the intended turn IF you plot them as pre-game bombardment (with perhaps a delay). They were not intended as "on call" assets, so the delay is artificially short for these, as with air landing troops you do not plan as pre-game bomabardment.

They were only ever intended for WW2 Normandy type scenarios, e.g the opening stages of COBRA.

Level bombers go to the targeted area, offload HE iron bombs and return to base. The accuracy goes up as the decades pass.

Cheers
Andy

I tried this a few times (pre-planned level bomber strikes), but it turned out they never hit the market hex, just somewhere nearby- unlike the pre-planned artillery, which is very accurate... I only tried with one coultry though (Libya) - could this have something to do with the experience of the crew or something?

[lopezonline]

I supose it has a lot to do with quality of equipment, for example bomber flights of Tornado's are quite deadly, but same flights conducted by Su-22 where... hmmm... well they hit ground quite randomly