Aircraft question

[shotgun-toting chipmunk]

Something doesn't seem right about the A/C rules. The way they are written, it seems you can use any a/c to initiate dogfighting. That means that I could use, say, a Betty bomer to intercept an incoming flight of torpedo planes and keep them away from my fleet, if only for a bit.

Somehow, this just doesn't seem right. For one thing, the bombers shouldn't be used for fleet defense. For another, I don't imagine in most cases the torpedo bombers are going to break off to engage some Bettys before they've dropped their payload.

Am I missing something here? Is this going to be addressed in the upcoming release?

 

[DM]

Yes, it isn't right

Yes, it is being addressed

 

[Alexb83]

Fighters and bombers have to be the biggest bugbear (that I have at least) with the game atm. From their limited damage output, to their limited ability to even attack ships before getting shot down... blargh.
First time I played, I mis-read the rules and sent in 6 flights (rather than the 3 allowed?) against a KGV from an Essex - of those 6, one survived, and of his torpedoes, one hit, and was rerolled for nothing.
Following turn the remaining 3 flights (what was left of the entire ships complement of attack planes) flew in and met the same suicidal fate.
In real life, would the battleship have been up to much against a carrier with a large cruiser escort? (except for running away and spending a few hours jinking to avoid torpedoes)?

It has to be said atm the game is far too gunnery heavy - perhaps we should just reach the point where we see that carriers don't belong on the same tabletop with battleships or play over 6x8 rather than 6x4 tables.

Thankfully yeah, aircraft seem to be being tempered with some hopefully good revisions. ATM when I play (not that I've had much chance to play VaS recently) they're heavily house-ruled with some of DMs more inventive ideas.

 

[DSV1]

well carriers shouldnt be really but the game sacrifices some elements for a playable fun game.

Hopefully Aircraft and some other issues will be resolved, in the meantime why not use DMs rule addons- they work well.

 

[Wishbone]

i've read through a lot of stuff about aircraft, and i've had a few small 'tester' battles (skirmish, one illustrius, two j/k class, two tribals against 2 trentos, 2 navigatorys). i've found the best that works for me so far is neither the rules, nor DMs version.... I doubled the amount of flights, and halved (rounding up) all ships anti aircraft AD. i still didn't score effective torpedo hits from the planes (2 hits on the trieste, 1 on a navigatory - not one critical!) but it certainly balenced it out best for me...

I mean, how many aircraft were actually ever shot down by surface to air fire? very few. effectiveness of AA fire certainly wasn't as high as the rules seem to allow for.
I guess at the end of the day (or at least until the suplement comes out), if you need to change the aircraft rules for non-tournament play, you've got to adjust the rules to whatever suits your opinion of realism and what the club agrees on.

 

[DM]

Don't forget that removing a flight from play just menas that it is no longer combat efective - it is more likely to have been scattered than suffered heavy losses. You are right, in bald numbers of aircraft shot down AA doesn't necessarily seem that effective. However, when combat efefctiveness is taken into consideration its efefctiveness improves.

 

[juggler69uk]

First time I played, I mis-read the rules and sent in 6 flights (rather than the 3 allowed?) ..............

It was ruled you could place as many a/c as you want against a ship but after AA only 3 could "Attack"