Battle of Britain

[gap]

Originally Posted by kapuhy

That said, it would be a nice touch for immersion to implement bomber formations following semi-historical routes, for example German bombers crossing English Channel during Battle of Britain or Allied bombers over North Sea in later years. Those would have to be set to non-aggresive and high altitude, so they don't abandon their mission to chase a lonely U-Boat.

Strategic bombing raids over UK could be simulated by means of dummy "environmental" aircraft scripted in campaign with their waypoints set opportunely. I think a similar approach was used in an old SHIII mod by Kendras, where entire B-17 formations are made into a single air unit.
If the priority is having realistic aircraft formations crossing the English channel with a low GPU impacts this one would probably be the best approach. It would nonetheless disappoint U-190's idea of AI-AI dogfights, since these dummy aircraft formations couldn't/shouldn't dogfight.

If the priority is having German intruders and their escorts to dogfight with British interceptors over the English channel (with the AI limitations that you have already mentioned), then a more traditional approach should be adopted. Setting those aircraft to non-aggressive might prevent them from attacking surface targets such as ships and surfaced submarines on their way but, again, it might also affect negatively their attitude to attack other air units and/or to defend themselves against attacking aircraft. All in all, I think that equipping those aircraft with only machine guns would be enough to prevent them from attacking ships and submarines. Bomb-less aircraft ignoring surface targets even though they have gun bullets available, is an old SH5 bug that we could exploit for our own purposes.

Originally Posted by kapuhy

Better still for immersion would be to implement realistic air raids on sub pens - high altitude formations dropping a lot of bombs all over the port from time to time - if you happen to be unlucky enough to be caught in the middle of it, it would make for unforgettable (and possibly career-ending) experience.

I definitely agree and I have have been slowly gathering information on this sort of attacks, but my database is still far from complete. As I noted elsewhere I think that those air raids should be similarly scripted but of course, unlike bomber formations bound for inland targets, they should be composed of bombers equipped with actual bombs.

Conversely, airbase-spawned aircraft should simulate ASW/antiship patrols, coastal traffic escort missions, home defense, etc. and their max radius should be limited so to reflect their mission and to prevent them as much as possible from flying over enemy-controlled territories.