5.0 CHAPTER 5
by Brooke
This chapter explains bombing and dropping troops. The most difficult part of bombing is getting to and from the target without getting shot down. Techniques for doing that are discussed in the "Bombing Tactics" section. The other sections explain level bombing, dive bombing, dropping troops, tactics for bomber escort, and bombing strategy.
5.1 LEVEL BOMBING
Level bombing is just what it sounds like: flying along level in your bomber and then dropping bombs. The most difficult part of this is lining up correctly on the target. Because your bombs, in addition to falling, have a substantial horizontal speed, you have to anticipate where the bombs will hit, a task with which your bombsight helps immensely. If you are flying at high altitude and at high speed, you will have to line up on your target well in advance, perhaps by as much as 5 miles (1/2 a sector width).
Use your radar to line up on target ahead of time. Your bombs will lay down a line of craters, and you want that line to do as much damage as possible. If you are targeting a runway or a carrier, you want your string of craters to run down the middle of it. If you are targeting a cluster of buildings, you'd like to plan your approach so that the line falls across as much of the buildings as possible. Plan your flight path far enough in advance of the target so that you don't blow your approach. About half a sector from the target (or a bit less, if you are at lower altitudes), turn toward your target and line up your flight path.
Once you are lined up on radar, go into the bombardier's position and use the bombsight to fine tune your line up. You can zoom the view in and out to get as much detail as possible and still see the target. I like to use my rudder to line up as opposed to the stick -- it skids me left or right until I'm lined up. Keep in mind that, if you are approaching at an angle instead of down the center of your target, you will have to swing the nose of the plane past the target, fly for a little while, then swing it back on target in order to correct your flight path. You also need to open the bay doors -- don't forget to open the bay doors.
If you are having trouble lining up, give yourself more than 1/2 a sector to line up. Giving yourself enough room to line up is essential in level bombing. The better you are at it, the closer to the target you can go before starting your line up. The point at which you turn toward the target is called the "initial point" or "IP."
As you get closer to the target, zoom in the bombsight view. For runways and large ships, you want to drop your bombs just after the bombsight crosshairs cross the threshold of the runway or the deck of the ship. For small objects, drop your bombs just before the crosshairs cross onto the object. Remember that you have two batches of bombs (called "sticks" of bombs). You can drop one and save one for another target (which is useful when you are bombing small objects -- only one stick would hit it anyway), or you can drop both (which is useful for runways, carriers, and other large ships -- you drop one stick, wait a second, then drop the other stick).
After your bombs are away, it's time to close the bay doors and to jump back to the pilot's position. Now it's time either to head for the second target (if you only dropped one stick), head back to base, go shoot up some enemies (if you have a gunner), do a bomb-damage assessment (BDA), or a combination of these. BDA consists of verifying what your bombs did to the target -- for example, seeing if all of your bombs hit a runway or not by looking at the craters.
You get to the bombardier's station by typing "<Esc>z<Enter>"; and getting back to the pilot's position is "<Esc>jp<Enter>". Opening bay doors is "<Esc>a<Enter>". Sometimes, you might want to slow down before dropping your bombs so that your line of craters will be closer together. I don't find that this is usually necessary in order to get all bombs on a target. If you do, though, make sure that you don't get so slow that you stall while you're at the bombardier's station.
Top
5.2 DIVE-BOMBING
There are two approaches to dive-bombing: high and low. High dive-bombing is like what you see in WWII footage: you fly directly over the target and dive on it vertically. In order to know whether or not you are over the target, you can use radar to line up approximately. Arm your bombs and enable your dive-bomb sight when before you are too close to the target -- I like to do this about 1/2 a sector from target. As you get close, you can fly to one side of the target and occasionally dip your wing and look out the side of your plane to see the target. When you are over the target, roll inverted, chop throttle, and pull down so that your sights are on the target. Adjust your flight path so that your dive-bomb sight is right on the target, and then trigger off one or both of your bombs. You don't want to be pulling many g's at all when you drop your bombs -- the key is in lining up well during the vertical (or very steep) dive. After you drop your bombs, commence a pullout and go back to full throttle. After you have pulled out, switch to your normal gunsight.
You arm the bombs with "<Esc>a<Enter>"; switching to the dive-bomb sight is "<Esc>sd<Enter>"; and switching back to the gunsight is "<Esc>sg<Enter>".
Once you are more proficient at dive-bombing, you might want to keep full throttle during the dive-bomb run -- especially if an enemy is chasing you. At full throttle, you don't have much time to line up before you hit compressibility or the ground, but it can be done with practice.
Low dive-bombing is much different than high dive-bombing. Low dive-bombing involves flying at the target at very high speed and at very low altitude (200 ft.). You need to fly fast enough so that the dive-bomb sight is visible out in front of your plane -- you generally have to be going about 300 knots or more. Once the dive-bomb sight just touches the outer edge of whatever your target is, drop a bomb, and immediately pull up into a 6 g (or even higher, as you can stand even 8 g's for a brief time) steeply climbing turn. You have to get your plane 500 ft. away from the blast or the explosion will destroy your plane.
Low dive-bombing is easier to set up than high dive-bombing. Lining up is easier, and you don't need to get to altitude. However, split-second timing is required: you have to trigger off your bomb right as the crosshairs touch the target, and you have to pull up and away at 6 g's as soon as the bomb is away.
Top
5.3 DROPPING TROOPS
The C-47 Skytrain drops troops instead of bombs, which is one necessary element to capturing airfields. To drop troops, you don't need to line up, but you do have to lay the troops down within about 1500 yards of the airfield. You have to open the doors (the same command as arming bombs and opening bay doors in bombers), and type "'*go<Enter>" for each paratrooper that you want to jump out of the plane -- that's a big load of "go"'s. I keep typing it until the messages stop saying that a paratrooper jumped -- just to make sure all of the paratroopers are out. Some people set keyboard macros so that they have only to hit one key to do it.
One thing to keep in mind is that the paratroopers won't jump out unless your C-47 is at 500 ft. altitude or higher. So, even if you approach the airfield down low, say at less than 200 ft., you have to pull up to above 500 ft. before you start kicking the paratroopers out of the plane.
Top
5.4 BOMBING TACTICS
Dive-bombers are (so far in Air Warrior) fighter planes. You don't need much extra in the way of tactics to get to your target. For bombers, it's different. Bombers are easier to hit. You generally don't want to tangle with fighters -- at least until after you have destroyed the target. You want to get to the target unmolested.
There are several ways work toward this.
(1) You can fly at extremely high altitude, past where people normally fly because it takes to long to climb up there. That used to be about 25k ft., but might be 30k ft. these days now that Air Warrior is less expensive to play. It works well, but is very time consuming.
(2) You can fly an out-of-the-way path to the target, staying away from the hot spots. You can tell by looking at the counters in the various sectors or by getting reports from other players on which sectors are clear.
(3) You can pick a target that is out of the way.
(4) You can fly under radar. This one is most popular, as it's quick. Keep in mind, though, that you have to pop up to over 500 ft. before the target, or you will get caught in your bomb blast.
(5) You can have an escort that will attack any enemies that come for you.
(6) You can have your fellow countrymen clear out a path for you (sort of like an escort but on a much larger scale). This works well but requires a lot of coordination and manpower. Sometimes you can get the same effect naturally by waiting for an area to clear and getting an "all clear" message from fellow countrymen. Then you can head toward the target and, on channel 2, keep every appraised of your situation so that they can help clear a path if there's trouble.
(7) You can employ a combination of these approaches.
However, what if, despite everyone's best efforts, enemies do find you? Bombers can't out-dogfight fighters (with the possible exception of the A-26). It's nice to have gunners, of course, and with gunners you can give fighters a very hard time, but regardless it's best to call for help on the radio early on. Say what you're flying, where you are (both location and altitude), what's about to attack you, and ask for escort help.
As for evasive maneuvers, by far the best -- the most tried and true -- is the hard nose-low turn into the attacking enemy. If you are going fast, chop your throttle and do the hard nose-low turn. Hold about 5 g's -- keep in mind that all bombers suffer wing failure at more than 6 g's. Don't rip your wings off -- be careful of your g's. If you aren't going more than about 200-225 knots, keep full throttle in the turn. You want to start turning when the enemy is 2000-2500 yards from you, and you want to keep the nose of your bomber well below the horizon during the turn (unless you are at low altitude and would thereby crash). Doing this for each pass an enemy makes on you will usually buy you some time. Hopefully some help will arrive or your gunner will get the enemy.
Another useful tactic is to get very close to the ground -- 100 ft. or less. As the enemy comes in for a shot, do a hard turn. The enemy might crash while trying for the shot, not noticing just how low you are. Or you might try turning toward the enemy so that he has to do a front-quarter gunning pass and then get down to about 10 ft. of altitude, again in an attempt to get the enemy to crash while trying for a difficult off-angle shot. Being evasive at a very low altitude has saved me more times than I remember.
Top
5.5 BOMBER ESCORT
Although it is very difficult to protect bombers from determined fighters, there are several techniques that seem to work best for escorting bombers. The best is to clear a path for the bomber. You need to know the target and the bomber's flight path. Then you fly along it (with as many allies as you can muster) and clear the area out of enemy planes. If that isn't possible, then you should either fly above the bomber (going after any plane that seems to be heading in for an attack on it) or fly above and behind the bomber (going after any plane that closes on the rear of the bomber -- you dive down onto his tail).
Top
5.6 BOMBING STRATEGY
Now that you know how to bomb things, how do you decide which targets to hit? That depends entirely on your objectives. Here are some of the things that you can do. (Keep in mind that the settings -- how many bombs it takes to destroy a particular target -- are configurable by Kesmai and might change from time to time. That's why I use the word "usually" a lot in the following information.)
If you want to take away the anti-aircraft cover some enemies are using near an airfield, you obviously just go in and destroy the ack batteries (the little dots that show up on the ground as you get close and that then shoot at you). It usually takes one bomb to destroy an ack. You can also kill them with gunfire, but the acks are sometimes quite difficult to kill that way. They can be tough.
If you want to degrade the quality of an airfield, you can do a few other things. First, you can bomb fuel tanks (the clustered, round structrues). That reduces the quality of fuel at an airfield, which then reduces the performance of planes taking off from the field (except for the Bf 109's, which can run on lower-octane fuel). It usually takes three bombs to destroy a fuel tank, but an exploding fuel tank can damage the tanks next to it, so with practice and skill you can take out more than one fuel tank for every three bombs. Once fuel tanks are damaged, nearby oil refineries (and depots in Air Warrior III) send trucks or planes to resupply the field with high-octane fuel; but the field is hampered until the resupply arrives (and the resupply convoy might get shot up on the way there, eh?). Second, you can bomb the ammo dumps (the small, solitary buildings). That reduces the ammount of ammo (especailly cannon rounds) loaded into each aircraft at the field. It usually takes three bombs to destroy an ammo dump. Like with the fuel, once a field's ammo dumps are damaged, nearby ammo factories (and depots in Air Warrior III) send out trucks or planes to resupply the field. Third, you can destroy the aircraft hangers (the buildings with sloped roofs). That causes the aircaft at a field to be more fragile and less able to withstand damage in combat. It usually takes three bombs to destroy a hangar. Nearby spare-parts factories (and depots in Air Warrior III) send out trucks or planes to resupply the field.
If you want to bomb strategic targets (although strat targets are not enable at the moment), you can go after oil refineries, ammo factories, aircraft factories, spare-parts factories, and (in Air Warrior III) various depots. Oil refineries are recognizable by the tall cracking towers. Aircraft factories have aircraft near them on the ground. Destroying oil refineries, ammo factories, spare parts factories, and the corresponding depots ends their ability to resupply damaged fields. If you are going to destroy a strategic target AND damage an airfield, it is best to destroy the strategic target first. If you do it the other way around, the strategic target can get out a resupply convoy before you get around to destroying it. If you destroy a country's aircraft factory and then destroy the hangars at an airfield, that airfield will lose the availability of a particular type of aircraft (such as Spitfires or FW 190's).
If you want to destroy an aircraft carrier, it usually takes 12 bombs. If you want to destroy an airfield, in Air Warrior for Windows and the Mac, it usually takes 8 bombs dropped on the runway. In Air Warrior III, to destroy an airfield, you need to destroy a certain percentage (usually more than 50%) of each of the following: fuel tanks, ammo dumps, hangars, and control towers. Oddly, bombing the runway apparently isn't the way to close the airfield.
If you want to prepare an airfield (or a factory, refinery, or depot in Air Warrior III) for capture, see chapter 6. So, now that you know what you want to destroy, how do you find it? To get a map of an area, you can use the map available when you click on the "choose an airfield" button before you take off. That brings up a map that you can look around on (using the "east," "west," etc. buttons) and zoom in on to get a level of detail that shows individual structures. In Air Warrior II, there are some facilities (factories, refineries, and depots) that are not shown on the map, giving people some targets that must be found the old-fashioned way.
Air Warrior has a rich environemnt of ground targets.
Top
5.7 CHAPTER 5 EXERCISES
5.7.1 LEVEL BOMBING
Take up an A-26 and do some simulated bombing runs on an airfield. Make sure that you can line up correctly so that you are flying right down the center of the runway on your pass.
Top
5.7.2 DIVE-BOMBING
Take up a Corsair and do some dive bombing runs on an ack battery or, if the version of the software you have has no ack batteries for off-line play, on a small structure such as the corner of a runway. If your software has no off-line bombing capability, do simulated dive bombing runs (i.e, no bombs, but you can still use the dive bombing sight and go through all of the motions). Try both low-level and vertical dive bombing runs -- do them both until you think you have them down. You can also try other approaches, such as steep but not vertical dives, to see which methods you prefer.
Top
5.7.3 BOMBER EVASIVES
Take up an A-26 and get to 4000 ft. altitude. Practice 5 g nose-low turns. When you get to low altitude, go down to 100 ft. and practice hard turns at that altitude. Practice flying at 10-50 ft. altitude. Fly at 10-50 ft., pop up to 100 ft., do a hard 180 degree turn, and go back down to 10-50 ft.
Top