What Am I Missing?

[Brandon Wilson]

I have been comparing points values for some aircraft, and I don’t understand where the balance is. I hope that I have missed some rule that would help explain the discrepancies. Thank you in advance for any clarifications.

The Fairey Albacore has two variants, bomber and torpedo-bomber. Same speed, same dogfighting, same year, same points cost. The torpedo bomber gets one more DD and has Devastating for no extra cost? The same could be said for the Swordfish. What am I missing?

Then there’s the American P-51. For no extra points, you can get the upgraded D-series? I know that it’s restricted by commission date, but that doesn’t seem like a drawback. If you decide to play in 1944, then these planes just get way better for no extra points? It may be historically accurate, but doesn’t seem balanced on a tabletop. What am I missing?

Then there’s the carriers. I can take whatever flights I want for free? So the Essex will give me 22 Corsairs (550 points) at no additional charge? What am I missing?

[Nat]

I have summited a list of questions which are being looked at by the studio team… one of the points is the points imbalance across the board.

 

For what its worth I have worked out that the points are actually calculated individually then rounded to the the closest 5 or 10 points for list purchase price.

[Brandon Wilson]

Great! Thanks for the response. I assume when you get any answers you’ll post them on this forum?

[Nat]

The answer I got was the studio are talking with the author and writting an offical FAQ……I’m not expecting a direct response as I also put in all the outstanding questions the Facebook group (Victory at Sea Wardroom) had from the 2 player set. It was quite an extensive list so I’m not expecting the FAQ quickly.

[Shrokins]

The trade-off between using Swordfish as bombers vs torpedo-bombers is that bombers have less punch, but torpedo-bombers are twice as easy to hit (being hit on fives instead of sixes).

[Nat]

@Shrokins, thats hit on 5+s when touching base with the target ship only,  otherwise they are hit on 6s.

[Shrokins]

Nat, sure, but plain bombers still take a 6 to hit in base contact, unlike torpedo-bombers on 5+, that’s my point; the answer to Brandon’s question about Albacores and Swordfish is that as torpedo bombers they have more firepower, but as plain bombers they are harder to shoot down before making their attack.

[invisible officer]

If you decide to play in 1944, then these planes just get way better for no extra points? It may be historically accurate, but doesn’t seem balanced on a tabletop. What am I missing?

Simple answer:  Nothing.    But how many ballanced carrier fights had been there in 44/45?    As often two worlds collide, the pure wargamer that wants equal chances and the more historical one that can live without.   The Japanese gamer may loose 9 of 10 games but that last makes him feel like a war god.  😉

[Brandon Wilson]

 

So I applied a little game theory to this, and discovered the following:

A bomber with 3DD can expect to deal 0.5 damage per attack against an armor value of 4.

A torpedo-bomber with 4DD and the Devastating trait can expect to deal 4.67 damage per attack against ANY armor value.

Considering the Swordfish variants, the torpedo bomber has approximately 9 times the damage potential, with half the survivability.

When you compare the two against a target armor of 6, then the bomber only expects to deal 0.167 damage per attack, giving the torpedo-bomber 28 times more damage potential!!

Only being twice as easy to destroy is a price I’m more than willing to pay for that amount of damage increase! There’s no way these two should be the same points…

@ invisible officer: that is true. Designers have to decide where the balance between “realism” and “fairness” will exist in their game 😋

• This reply was modified 3 years, 8 months ago by Brandon Wilson. Reason: fixed spelling

[Shrokins]

I suppose the other thing is that bombs can hit targets on land.

[Brandon Wilson]

For the sake of integrity, I should mention that the calculations I made assumed that the defender only had 1 AA die.

Once you have more AA being fired at you, the gap between the two planes closes, but not by much.

For example, if we go from 1AA to 4AA, the survivability of the bomber only goes up another 12% relative to the torpedo bomber.

Still not worth the points, imo.

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