Carpet Bombing

[Marquo]

I am playing Prelude from B'45 - it is a great scenario for those who have not tried it. One thing is somewhat worrisome to me in the scenario, also in the Kursk game, are the carpet bombing missions.


Carpet bombing (US MIlitary Dictionary)= The intensive bombing of a designated area in a close pattern by many aircraft, usually B-52s, as though laying a wall-to-wall carpet. In World War II the term denoted bombing campaigns designed to clear wide areas for advancing troops.Also called saturation bombing

Carpet bombing ususally takes much time to plan, coordinate and amass payloads; yet in these scenarios these missions can happen several times or more per day. As above, these were usually "campaigns" (like to kick off Cobra), not missions organized on the fly as lower grade tactical responses. My Axis opponent is using his carpet bombers to great effect as a defensive reaction whenever he sees a stack of units approaching his line - within the context of the rules this a great use of the game engine, but it is not carpet bombing.

Marquo :chin:[/b]

[Mr Grumpy]

The air rules in PzC do seem to have been a bit of an afterthought and i think Glenn said a while back that JT had no plans to update them, so we have to live with what we have got. :chin:

[Ricky B]

And you must be playing the VM version of the games, Marquo - the carpet bombing rule was added to represent specifically the planned extremely heavy bombing attacks by the allies at Normandy, I believe. But VM took the rule and added it to most level bombers to show their inherent innacuracy, since they should at least sometimes miss their primary target and wander up to 2 hexes away. As with most uses of rules in a way they weren't designed for specifically, the result is what you see - and my big concern is they can be deadly against a big stack, but then always a pleasure to see an enemy CB attack wander into the dropper's own troops.

So if it bothers you enough, you can play the standard versions of the scenario, or make your own alternate version of the alternate versions of VMs and switch the bombers back to regular. You are correct that these are not technically carpet bombing missions, just a use of the rule for other purposes.

Rick

[Mr Grumpy]

but then always a pleasure to see an enemy CB attack wander into the dropper's own troops.

Happened to me in a F40 CG _alt turn a while ago when i took out 55 of my own troops......:hissy:

[alaric99x]

...and that unit spent the next 3 months sticking pins into their little Foul voodoo dolls.

In most of the VM Alt scenarios it's not really what you would call "carpet bombing," rather regular bombing missions that that don't always hit the intended target.

[Mr Grumpy]

...and that unit spent the next 3 months sticking pins into their little Foul voodoo dolls.

Thanks for the tip! I thought that was just my hemorrhoids playing up again! :eek1: :smoke:

[Volcano Man]

...As with most uses of rules in a way they weren't designed for specifically, the result is what you see - and my big concern is they can be deadly against a big stack, but then always a pleasure to see an enemy CB attack wander into the dropper's own troops.

Well, actually "carpet bombers" have appeared "normally" in PzC long before I put them in the _Alt scenarios (and it wasn't just for the planned level bombers in N44). As a random example, the Blenheims in the stock F40 game are "carpet bombers" and there are many other examples from the stock games where carpet bombers are used outside of N44. So needless to say, I don't feel like I am using them in some unintended way. All I merely did was made some logical standardization out of the chaos so that instead of having some bombers in some PzCs as "carpet bombers" and the same such bomber in another PzC as a "bomber", I simply decided that all real world bombers of the period who were classified as "level bombers" should be "carpet bombers", and this works logically IMO.

In regards to medium level bombers, which I have given the carpet bomber type to, these things were not surgically accurate, and when they did hit a target you are talking about lines of bombs spread out over some distance so it makes perfect sense to have the attack across the whole stack in a measly 1km hex (and it is the only way to discourage the mega stack without all the other Alt rules). The medium level bombers did fly and bomb across the battlefield without some sort of heavy planned strategy because they were used tactically, unlike the events of Operation Cobra with the use of the B-17s.

I agree though, if someone does like my use of carpet bombers then by all means change it in their OOB. I always like the unplanned element in regards to these bombers, but I recognize too that some people want a level of total (and unrealistic) control over everything in PzC.

Carpet bombing (US MIlitary Dictionary)= The intensive bombing of a designated area in a close pattern by many aircraft, usually B-52s, as though laying a wall-to-wall carpet. In World War II the term denoted bombing campaigns designed to clear wide areas for advancing troops.Also called saturation bombing

Well, OK, that is the literal definition of carpet bombing but it has no bearing on PzC. All the name "carpet bombers" do in PzC in the unit type is determine a method of how they are resolved so that they are scattered and the attack is applied across the entire stack. It has nothing to do with wall to wall B-52s on preplanned missions or whatever some such literal definition. What I mean is, the Carpet Bomber unit type does not magnify the power of the bomber unit in any way, it only effects its accuracy. Sure it applies it across the entire stack in a hex, but I would think that this is offset evenly by the fact that it rarely if ever hits the intended target. Now if you have large dense stacks in a large concentrated area of many hexes to where your enemy "can't miss" then I don't see why 10+ level bombers wouldn't indeed cause destruction. The funny thing about these bombers is that their effectiveness has less to do with with their ability than it has to do with whether or not massive dense targets are presented to the enemy.

If (in B45_Alt) the bombers are coming in twice per day (not sure how you know that?), then it sounds like air availability *might* be set too high, but I doubt it (it seems to be 20% for Germans which is pretty standard), although I would consider lowering it in the B45_Alt scenario if someone made a convincing argument about it on the vmods.com forum. All the Germans have at their disposal for air power are their 10 or so He-111 air units of 13 planes, so I don't see why you think they are showing up twice a day when he might just be spacing them out. It just sounds to me like you might be a little frustrated? Can you not just avoid making large stacks so that it marginalizes the effectiveness of the bombers completely?

Still, there is a known problem of someone using level bombers in such a way that they save / replay the turn until they strike the intended large stack hexes every time. These strikes miss quite a bit so if you are seeing multiple bombers hitting the same stacks repeatedly are bombarding the front line hexes near enemy units without ever hitting their own troops then you have to wonder why they are so accurate. I used my Italian level bombers in Compass '40 and all I manage to hit is fish in the Mediterranean!

[Nitram Draw]

I don't care what you call them, I like the way they work. I'd like to see it become standard.

[Glenn Saunders]

Where you see Carpet Bombing - read "inaccurate level bombing with target scatter" and it should resolve everything for you Marquo

[Ricky B]

...As with most uses of rules in a way they weren't designed for specifically, the result is what you see - and my big concern is they can be deadly against a big stack, but then always a pleasure to see an enemy CB attack wander into the dropper's own troops.

Well, actually "carpet bombers" have appeared "normally" in PzC long before I put them in the _Alt scenarios (and it wasn't just for the planned level bombers in N44). As a random example, the Blenheims in the stock F40 game are "carpet bombers" and there are many other examples from the stock games where carpet bombers are used outside of N44. So needless to say, I don't feel like I am using them in some unintended way. All I merely did was made some logical standardization out of the chaos so that instead of having some bombers in some PzCs as "carpet bombers" and the same such bomber in another PzC as a "bomber", I simply decided that all real world bombers of the period who were classified as "level bombers" should be "carpet bombers", and this works logically IMO.

Hey Ed,

Sorry I maybe didn't phrase it better, but I wasn't trying to say you were the first to do it outside of Normandy, or that it was a bad use, or anything, just that when the setting/rule was developed it was to represent true carpet bombing and the impact of that. The standard games have used them for a few specific models, your assignment to all level bombers works too.

As I mentioned, my only concern has been the huge difference in effectiveness against a big stack vs a small one - I have killed 150 men, deployed, in a Minsk game on occasion and that seems a bit high for the number of bombers involved (12 I think? but maybe more), but not unreasonable either considering everything. I guess my thought is that it was intended for the heavy bombers originally, I believe, and that causes the rule in other usage to be VERY effective, when the bombs hit the target.

Rick