Why is my strategic bomber getting shot down by an Italian recon jeep with a 50 cal?

[prestidigitation]

https://i.imgur.com/PbFe3bi.jpeg

There are many choices in this game that make little sense to me but this one takes the cake. I have no idea why this thing even has an AA value but it is utter nonsense that it is high enough to damage a strategic bomber. Unless this thing is secretly packing manpads from the 80s I don't see how this is remotely plausible or good balance.

[adiekmann]

https://i.imgur.com/PbFe3bi.jpeg

There are many choices in this game that make little sense to me but this one takes the cake. I have no idea why this thing even has an AA value but it is utter nonsense that it is high enough to damage a strategic bomber. Unless this thing is secretly packing manpads from the 80s I don't see how this is remotely plausible or good balance.

Because the main armament of the SPA-Viberti AS.42 Sahariana https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPA-Viber ... nt_&_Armor was a 20 mm auto cannon. I think you'd agree that a 20mm cannon has what it takes to shoot down an aircraft. I'm surprised, however, that it took down a strat bomber, unless it had only 1 strength point left. They are usually are pretty safe from low caliber AA guns.

[prestidigitation]

The actual reason is that this recon car doesn't have the trait that makes most of its damage go to suppression so even though its a terrible gun with terrible AA value it kills planes on the top difficulty. Often it will put 0-2 on the board against planes.

The performance is nonsense.

[adiekmann]

The actual reason is that this recon car doesn't have the trait that makes most of its damage go to suppression so even though its a terrible gun with terrible AA value it kills planes on the top difficulty. Often it will put 0-2 on the board against planes.

The performance is nonsense.

I've not noticed that, but I wonder if it's a one-off freak occurrence, or if it's happened numerous times to you. Or if there is an error in its stats or settings. A 20mm gun is NOT supposed to able to deal regular damage to a high altitude strategic bomber.

[VirgilInTheSKY]

The actual reason is that this recon car doesn't have the trait that makes most of its damage go to suppression so even though its a terrible gun with terrible AA value it kills planes on the top difficulty. Often it will put 0-2 on the board against planes.

The performance is nonsense.

I've not noticed that, but I wonder if it's a one-off freak occurrence, or if it's happened numerous times to you. Or if there is an error in its stats or settings. A 20mm gun is NOT supposed to able to deal regular damage to a high altitude strategic bomber.

A status thing, normal 20mm AA guns have 6 AA value, even that 4 AA value on the sahariana is more than enough to damage an aircraft with 11 ground defense in terms of how attack and defence works in this game. There is no "high altitude" thing that prevents small caliber guns from shooting at an aircraft, and game does not list all strategic bombers as "strategic bombers", or tactical bombers as "tactical bombers". The Whitley is a heavy bomber by British naming, but that does not neccessarily mean it is heavily armoured or protected, being long ranged or can be heavily loaded also counts.

[adiekmann]

The actual reason is that this recon car doesn't have the trait that makes most of its damage go to suppression so even though its a terrible gun with terrible AA value it kills planes on the top difficulty. Often it will put 0-2 on the board against planes.

The performance is nonsense.

I've not noticed that, but I wonder if it's a one-off freak occurrence, or if it's happened numerous times to you. Or if there is an error in its stats or settings. A 20mm gun is NOT supposed to able to deal regular damage to a high altitude strategic bomber.

A status thing, normal 20mm AA guns have 6 AA value, even that 4 AA value on the sahariana is more than enough to damage an aircraft with 11 ground defense in terms of how attack and defence works in this game. There is no "high altitude" thing that prevents small caliber guns from shooting at an aircraft, and game does not list all strategic bombers as "strategic bombers", or tactical bombers as "tactical bombers". The Whitley is a heavy bomber by British naming, but that does not neccessarily mean it is heavily armoured or protected, being long ranged or can be heavily loaded also counts.

I am not someone who has a deep knowledge of the stats compared to you, but you do have the "low altitude attack" trait that tac bombers usually have, and strat bombers usually don't. Same for rapid firing lower caliber AA guns. But of course there are differences between aircraft that can give different results. That is what I was referring to in the previous post. So in theory, you could give a Stuka, for example, a Vigilant Hero and that would negate a lot of that bonus effect.

[VirgilInTheSKY]

I've not noticed that, but I wonder if it's a one-off freak occurrence, or if it's happened numerous times to you. Or if there is an error in its stats or settings. A 20mm gun is NOT supposed to able to deal regular damage to a high altitude strategic bomber.

A status thing, normal 20mm AA guns have 6 AA value, even that 4 AA value on the sahariana is more than enough to damage an aircraft with 11 ground defense in terms of how attack and defence works in this game. There is no "high altitude" thing that prevents small caliber guns from shooting at an aircraft, and game does not list all strategic bombers as "strategic bombers", or tactical bombers as "tactical bombers". The Whitley is a heavy bomber by British naming, but that does not neccessarily mean it is heavily armoured or protected, being long ranged or can be heavily loaded also counts.

I am not someone who has a deep knowledge of the stats compared to you, but you do have the "low altitude attack" trait that tac bombers usually have, and strat bombers usually don't. Same for rapid firing lower caliber AA guns. But of course there are differences between aircraft that can give different results. That is what I was referring to in the previous post. So in theory, you could give a Stuka, for example, a Vigilant Hero and that would negate a lot of that bonus effect.

LAA trait on aircraft makes AA units with the same trait attack their Close Defense instead of the normal Ground Defence, for most of them this means 0 defence value, so even machineguns can kill such ground attackers.

[prestidigitation]

The actual reason is that this recon car doesn't have the trait that makes most of its damage go to suppression so even though its a terrible gun with terrible AA value it kills planes on the top difficulty. Often it will put 0-2 on the board against planes.

The performance is nonsense.

I've not noticed that, but I wonder if it's a one-off freak occurrence, or if it's happened numerous times to you. Or if there is an error in its stats or settings. A 20mm gun is NOT supposed to able to deal regular damage to a high altitude strategic bomber.

Start the Cyrenacia campaign on max difficulty, buy a strat bomber and try to bomb a Saharina with it. You'll see it happening immediately. It's not a freak thing, it's the inevitable consequence of the design of the unit mixed with the accuracy bonuses of the top difficulty level.

[prestidigitation]

The actual reason is that this recon car doesn't have the trait that makes most of its damage go to suppression so even though its a terrible gun with terrible AA value it kills planes on the top difficulty. Often it will put 0-2 on the board against planes.

The performance is nonsense.

I've not noticed that, but I wonder if it's a one-off freak occurrence, or if it's happened numerous times to you. Or if there is an error in its stats or settings. A 20mm gun is NOT supposed to able to deal regular damage to a high altitude strategic bomber.

A status thing, normal 20mm AA guns have 6 AA value, even that 4 AA value on the sahariana is more than enough to damage an aircraft with 11 ground defense in terms of how attack and defence works in this game. There is no "high altitude" thing that prevents small caliber guns from shooting at an aircraft, and game does not list all strategic bombers as "strategic bombers", or tactical bombers as "tactical bombers". The Whitley is a heavy bomber by British naming, but that does not neccessarily mean it is heavily armoured or protected, being long ranged or can be heavily loaded also counts.

I genuinely don't know why you reply if you intend keep saying nonsense. Tactical bombers have a low altitude trait. Strategic bombers do not. Therefore they operate at high altitude. AA guns ALSO have a low altitude trait on the low caliber ones. If the plane is a low altitude plane and the gun has low altitude attack, the gun attacks the close defense of the plane. If you need it I will start posting pictures of units and explaining what the traits mean but I feel as a player of this game you really ought to know this one already.

AA guns also have a trait that makes most of their damage go to suppression called Suppressing Fire. The Saharina does not have either the low altitude attack or the suppressing fire trait so it fires against the standard defense of the strategic bomber with standard chance to kill. The british strategic bomber which unlocks on mission 2 (use runany Victory 0 in the chatbox to get there without playing) has a defense of 11.

(26th AW Whitley Mk.V) attacks (28th Sahariana)

Main Stage

Combat range: 0

Attacker's Initiative:
Base Initiative: 1
Attacker's Effective Initiative: 1

Defender's Initiative:
Base Initiative: 9
Defender's bonus to initiative from entrenchment: +1
Terrain cap on initiative: 5
Defender's Effective Initiative: 5

Initiative Difference: 1 - 5 = -4
Defender shoots first. 80% of damage will be applied before attacker can shoot back.

(26th AW Whitley Mk.V) strikes:

Base Number of Shots (unsuppressed strength): 7
Effective Number of Shots: 7

Base Accuracy: 50
Penalty from enemy unit's experience: -4
Reduction from enemy entrenchment: 0.92x
Effective Accuracy: 42%

Base Attack rating: 5
Effective Attack: 5

Base Defense rating: 7
Effective Defense: 7

Deflect/Suppress/Kill chances: 50% / 45% / 5%

Rolls (first roll determines Hit or Miss, second roll determines Deflect, Suppress or Kill):
75(Hit) -> 9(Deflect)
88(Hit) -> 18(Deflect)
6(Miss)
62(Hit) -> 49(Deflect)
15(Miss)
12(Miss)
96(Hit) -> 67(Suppress)
Real result: 0 killed, 1 suppressed

Prediction: 0.147000 killed, 1.301130 suppressed

Randomness: 50%
Final result will be 50% real result and 50% prediction
Final result: 0 killed, 1 suppressed

(28th Sahariana) strikes:

Base Number of Shots (unsuppressed strength): 10
'Rapid Fire 1.5x' unit trait: 1.50x
Effective Number of Shots: 15

Base Accuracy: 50
Bonus from difficulty level: +20
Bonus from experience: +10
Effective Accuracy: 80%

Base Attack rating: 4
Effective Attack: 4

Base Defense rating: 11
Effective Defense: 11

Deflect/Suppress/Kill chances: 75% / 20% / 5%

Rolls (first roll determines Hit or Miss, second roll determines Deflect, Suppress or Kill):
71(Hit) -> 85(Suppress)
83(Hit) -> 67(Deflect)
33(Hit) -> 23(Deflect)
10(Miss)
16(Miss)
77(Hit) -> 33(Deflect)
69(Hit) -> 75(Suppress)
96(Hit) -> 59(Deflect)
86(Hit) -> 11(Deflect)
75(Hit) -> 98(Kill*)
56(Hit) -> 18(Deflect)
36(Hit) -> 37(Deflect)
8(Miss)
68(Hit) -> 72(Deflect)
15(Miss)
Real result: 1 killed, 1 suppressed
* This hit connected with an already suppressed point.

Prediction: 0.600000 killed, 2.114262 suppressed

Randomness: 50%
Final result will be 50% real result and 50% prediction
Final result: 1 killed, 2 suppressed

You are welcome to try this yourself. It will happen the same way pretty much every time on max difficulty.

[prestidigitation]

This is, as I keep repeating, a comical outcome. I do virtually nothing to the Saharina with a bombing attack which is perfectly reasonable as we're level boming a presumably mobile target. It kills a plane flying at high altitude. Nonsense.

The entire campaign is literally about dealing with this thing and the motoguzzi tricycle or whatever. Please, make it make sense.

[armedevil]

1. the bomber is not killed, it loses 1 strength point of 10.
2. as a strategic bomber it is not very effective against a scouting unit, not too surprising.
3. the bomber has no experience and the target had both some experience and a 20% play-level bonus. The AW Whitley also has fairly weak ground defense for a strategic bomber.
4. the modeling of PC2 is not perfect. Far from perfect. And the Sahariana unit is a bit overpowered.