I think it is just fair that AA alone is not enough to stop the Allied air offensive in 1944. German AA guns were just not effective enough, in my opinion mainly because only using timed fuzes until the last few months (weeks?) of the war: these only exploded when the shell reached a certain pre-set altitude and thus often just went through the frame or wing of a heavy bomber without exploding. Even adding a relatively simple impact fuze would have increased their effectiveness in those cases, but for some reason they did not do so, despite having the technology. The US and the British even used proximity fuzes from 1944 (the shell exploded if it was close to an aircraft), which vastly increased their effectiveness against the Japanese kamikaze bombers.In my last playthrough of v2.4 which i am now in turn 95, I went a very heavy AA defence of the Reich (particularly for the D-Day landings). But even with multiple layers of AA, the allied air still causes much grief to my troops as they just suppress the AA and then bomb everything around it. The enemy air is often overstrength too, so i wonder that by nerfing the AA it will make it mostly useless? Even my 2 star 11 strength 3.7cm flak usually takes just 1 strength off enemy strat bombers in clear weather in current v2.4. So v2.5 will make defending France a nightmare (maybe this is true to history).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proximity_fuze
We know that historically the Germans produced and fielded large amounts of AA guns with plenty of ammunition but it was not enough on its own and the fighters of the Luftwaffe were largely defeated in the first half of that year. The Mustangs and Thunderbolts outclassed the then best German fighters in much of 1944. Only the later versions of the Bf 109 and Fw 190 could fight these on more or less equal terms, but these appeared too late. So yes, there is (was) indeed a crisis in the first half of 1944. However, if the Soviets are largely or completely defeated by that time than all the AA and fighter units can be transferred to the west to deal with it. Or, if not, some land has to be traded in to gain time, until the better German fighter planes become available.
It may be more punishing now, but on the other hand there will be some compensation as well: an extra German bomber destroyer appears in turn 17, Italian fighters are now somewhat better than before, the Bf 109G-6 now has a slightly better late version, etc.JimmyC wrote: ↑Fri Apr 17, 2026 5:33 am I have always gone with option 1 as you are given 3 tanks in the earlier scenarios, so it feels a waste to disband 1 of them. Note that i always disband the Junker and get an extra fighter after Poland.
But thinking about how punishing the air war will be in this upcoming version i would probably go with 3 fighters, 2 tanks.
I did not really pay a lot of attention to the actual layout of the railway lines: in most cases I just connected the cities with railways, wherever it seemed rational. But in reality, planners are not always rational. So for every new release of the mod I made corrections by using WW2-era railway maps as reference, and over time it has become more and more precise.