• There seems to be an uptick in Political comments in recent months. Those of us who are long time members of the site know that Political and Religious content has been banned for years. Nothing has changed. Please leave all political and religious comments out of the forums.

    If you recently joined the forums you were not presented with this restriction in the terms of service. This was due to a conversion error when we went from vBulletin to Xenforo. We have updated our terms of service to reflect these corrections.

    Please note any post refering to a politician will be considered political even if it is intended to be humor. Our experience is these topics have a way of dividing the forums and causing deep resentment among members. It is a poison to the community. We appreciate compliance with the rules.

    The Staff of SOH

  • Server side Maintenance is done. We still have an update to the forum software to run but that one will have to wait for a better time.

Low Level bombing accuracy

_486_Col_Wolf

Charter Member
Having a real hard time getting my DO-17's to hit moving ships in the Channel. Anyone know the secret to positioning them and thier waypoints for better accuracy?
 
Here is something to check
Open the plane's DP in note pad. In it you will find something like this line.

[MISC_DATA]
unit_family=1
category=10
allegiance=3
max_group_size=8
min_speed=240
cruise_speed=309
max_speed=463
min_alt=50
cruise_alt=5487
max_alt=8230
entered_service=6/1/40
crew=2

***This is from the stock SBD2_DAUNTLESS***

Make sure yours plane's DP says the samething.

Here is what the unit family and category mean.


unit_family=
1 - Fighter (default)
2 - Bomber3 - Ground Vehicle
4 - Static Object
5 - Ship or Boat
7 - Aircraft Carrier

Category=
1 - aircraft fighter
2 - aircraft level bomber (B-24, He-111)
3 - aircraft dive bomber (Stuka, Dauntless, Val)
4 - aircraft torpedo bomber (Avenger, TBF)
5 - aircraft tactical bomber (A-20, Ju-88)
6 - aircraft strike (Fw-190F2, A-4; 2-engine nightfighters?)
7 - aircraft civil
8 - aircraft recon (Storch)
9 - aircraft transport (C-47)
10 - aircraft fighter-bomber (any fighter equipped with bombs) or Dive Bombers
13 - ship Cruiser/Aircraft Carrier
14 - ship Cruiser
15 - ship Destroyer
16 - ship Submarine
17 - ship Battleship
18 - ship Gunboat/Torp Boat/Auxiliary
19 - ship Transport/Tanker/Cargo
24 - ship Landing Craft
21 - tracked vehicle
22 - wheeled vehicle
23 - train car
24 - amphibious vehicle
29 - artillery static
30 - mechanical equipment
31 - structure static
32 - factory
33 - non-target object
34 – runway

If the category is set too 2 then it will be a level bomber. Level bombers will only drop at a specific point. Thats only useful for bombing buildings and ships in port. For moving ships you want either the ones in red or blue.

a little note here: if you set the unit family to 1, then they may get stuck in dog fights...

If you set them to unit family 2 they won't dog fight as much.

I'm not sure how they will behave if you use category 3 or 5. I can't remember what a tactical bomber will and won't do.

another thing to look at is the aircrafts MOI. this is found in the .air file. most of the time this is set high

something along this line...

[WEIGHT_AND_BALANCE]
empty_weight = 10069
empty_weight_pitch_MOI = 42541
empty_weight_roll_MOI = 28357
empty_weight_yaw_MOI = 45678

if you drop by half or more you can get them to attack targets alot easier. Kind of like this...

Roll 42541……..Changed to 8146
Pitch 28357……..Changed to 13244
Yaw 45678……..Changed to 18059

I have a bunch of Docs on this. I can send it to you. There are numerous posts for all of it as well. I also think the newest version of CC_Handbook has all of this in it.

If you are afraid to mess with any of this then PM me and I would be willing to help. Just remember to make backups if you do try it yourself. I know Rami and Talon can help if you get stuck. As cn Captain Kurt and a few others that make missions and Campaigns.

So there is a starting point.

Till Later,
John
 
I'm pretty sure the AI JU-88's that I'm using are set as a Cat 5(Tactical bomber). I'll double check that and use your other suggestion. Thanks!
 
OK, I've switched the DO-17's and JU-88's to a cat 10 and they hit the targets (moving ships) perfectly. However, in Cat 10 (and I also tried it in Cat 3) they behave like dive bombers. Both the DO-17 and the JU-88 were tactical low lovel bombers. I need a way to get them to hit the moving ships at low level "swooping" bombruns instead of behaving like dive bombers. Any suggestions?
 
Reply...

_486_Col_Wolf,

Two points...

1) The Ju-88 was a dive bomber and can perform in the role very well, and the Do-17 could and often did attack targets in a shallow dive.

2) What you're referring to is glide bombing, or even skip bombing. The Germans called this the "Swedish Turnip" technique. I'd suggest sending a PM to Talon, or sending him an e-mail.
 
OK, I've switched the DO-17's and JU-88's to a cat 10 and they hit the targets (moving ships) perfectly. However, in Cat 10 (and I also tried it in Cat 3) they behave like dive bombers. Both the DO-17 and the JU-88 were tactical low lovel bombers. I need a way to get them to hit the moving ships at low level "swooping" bombruns instead of behaving like dive bombers. Any suggestions?


did you try

5 - aircraft tactical bomber (A-20, Ju-88)

unit_family=2
category=5

I'm not sure how they will behave like this. they might not attack. or they will miss. this might be a case of going with what works then what is correct.

the good part is they worked just by changing the catagory. that means the aircraft shouldn't need any modification.
 
Tried them both in Cat 5 and they can't hit the target.

Rami, I might just have to take your suggestion and use JU-88's a dive bombers instead of DO-17's. I will however, first message Talon and ask him about glide bombing moving ships.
 
are you trying to setup a fleet defence mission? where you have to protect the fleet from bombers. or are you trying to setup a mission where you are attacking the fleet.

basicly are you trying to get your wingmen to attack the ships or the AI?
 
BH23 has it right, you need to have them set as

5 - aircraft tactical bomber (A-20, Ju-88)

unit_family=2
category=5

to get them to attack moving ships.

Also, the AI attack pattern for underway vessels is to manouevre to attack from the stern, from c.6500ft. This means any flightpaths & attack points need careful consideration. Make sure they're high enough to "see" the targets on approach (2500 to 3500ft).

If the AI just fly right past instead of circling to the targets stern aspect & climbing to 6000ft (this might take some time in a Do-17) the Do-17 MOI in the airfile might need to be reduced, so the AI pilot can throw the a/c into a glide bomb dive & still pull-out. The level of MOI reduction involves some trial & error.
 
Is this what you are trying to do?

Do-17 Glidebombing a ship.It also drops its full bombload
 
Last edited:
Ju-88s glidebombing.It also drops its full bombload.

I have done threads on how to do this.
 
Last edited:
I'm writing fleet (convoy) defense missions for the RAF 133rd Eagle Squadron 1941-1942. I've tried the DO-17's and JU-88's in Cat 5 spawning at 7000ft then dropping to 2000 or remaining at 7000ft and either choice ends with the bombs falling way off target. If I change either plane to Cat 10 they hit every time but fly up then drop in like dive bombers. This is OK for the JU-88's since as Rami pointed out the JU-88's were used as dive bombers but I need to make either plane, particularly the DO-17's drop in a glide bombing run.
 
To Glidebomb ships

Set planes to category 4 but ships have to do 5 knots or less. Alt. 4000 to 4500ft.If ships are over 5 knots they will divebomb.Sorry but there are limits to CFS2 and you have to work within them.They will also drop all bombs.

This will not work with all planes,sometimes you have to do work on the airfile and config file.

Also some of the Do-17s had divebrakes so they could divebomb.Most German bombers did multiple tasks.
 
_486_Col_Wolf,

the DO-17 your using, is it here? if so i'll take a look at the airfile and such. That way we can write off that portion and you can get your mission finished.
 
_486_Col_Wolf,

the DO-17 your using, is it here? if so i'll take a look at the airfile and such. That way we can write off that portion and you can get your mission finished.

The ones by Thicko will glidebomb,that's what I used for testing.
 
The ones by Thicko will glidebomb,that's what I used for testing.


Well if your getting them to work Talon, I won't mess with them.

Here are the MOI values for Thicko's DO-17 by model. They look high to me but I've been working with WWI planes for the last 2 years. Like I said though... If they're working I won't mess with them.


Do-17z, Do-17z2

Roll Inertia=27541
Pitch Inertia=29299
Yaw Inertia=52602


Do-17e

Roll Inertia=25085
Pitch Inertia=22955
Yaw Inertia=44659


Do-17m, Do-17z7 Kaus I, Do-17z10 Kaus II, Do-17z7 Kaus II FuG 202

Roll Inertia=25424
Pitch Inertia=23817
Yaw Inertia=45741


Do-17p

Roll Inertia=25424
Pitch Inertia=23856
Yaw Inertia=45780
 
OK, if I change the DO-17's to Cat 4I can get them to divebomb with great accuracy but still no glide bombing with ships to 5 knots or less. I can live with that. As for the convoy traveling that slow not bein realistic as Talon eluded to.... I can just put in the overview that the convoy has had to slow to 5 kts in rough seas and is a sitting duck LOL Thanks to all who replied!!
 
OK, if I change the DO-17's to Cat 4I can get them to divebomb with great accuracy but still no glide bombing with ships to 5 knots or less. I can live with that. As for the convoy traveling that slow not bein realistic as Talon eluded to.... I can just put in the overview that the convoy has had to slow to 5 kts in rough seas and is a sitting duck LOL Thanks to all who replied!!

you could put a timed event that once a zone is entered if x unit isn't destroyed then the convey will speed up. that way if the player can hold them off lets say for 5 or 10 mins then the convoy escapes. something along that line. maybe you could have it set that some of the ship had to take on fuel or supplies. not something that could be done by even navy or even convoy in those days.

Just thinking out load.
 
Back
Top