Derailing the New Swiss, or : Is it plain how explain the many planes?

[Kaiser Kirk]

I was going to post in the New Swiss aircraft thread, but noted we've already managed to steer it off-topic

Besides airplanes cost a good deal less and less to maintain than say one corp of 5/3 infantry.

That is not a valid reason to build planes like crazy.

Hmm... 1 Corp = 6,000 airplanes + 1.5 BPs, 9 soldiers ~ 1 Pilot. Also 700 planes = 1 Zeppelin.

Bavaria has 900 aircraft dispersed 150 to an airfield, and 50 multi-engine seaplanes at one seaplane base.

Never considered how many were trainers and how many Fighter/scouts, likely 100 fighter/scouts and 50 trainers per land base.

The number of squadrons has been fixed for some time, I just replace the aircraft every 3 years, buying 100+ new/HY.

This also means my various manufacturers are producing a constant, if slow, stream of planes and have a skilled workforce.

Due to the mobilization and the photomapping flights in 1917, I rebuilt the entire force HYI-II/1917. Now I'm slightly expanding as I want better coverage of my frontiers.

As for numbers.
The 1 corps = 6,000 aircraft is interesting.

It's not just 1 pilot = 9 soldiers.  It's one pilot, possibly an observer, and ground crew, and mess hall, fueling depot, runway maintenance. etc.

Wiki says : After starting in 1914 with some 2,073 personnel, by the start of 1919 the RAF had 4,000 combat aircraft and 114,000 personnel.
At the end of the war there were 5,182 pilots in service (just 2% of the RAF). .

Also if 6,000 Aircraft = 1 corps, that is 6,000 x engines. A Mercedes D.III weighed 700lbs or .35 tons. So just the engine weight of 6,000 planes could run 2 BP if we were accounting for them.

[maddox]

It seems France neglected the Bavarian border concerning air-defence.

[Kaiser Kirk]

Not terribly. Only airfield directly on the border is Frieburg, with Stuttgart behind it.
Though my general intention is to build more throughout the Kingdom, so there will likely be others built in Swiss/Baden/Palantine over the next several years.

Still the force is smallish compared to some of the ones discussed in the New Swiss thread. I really don't have a feel for what is "reasonable" number wise.

[TexanCowboy]

What? I only have 750, thats not bad, is it?

[Kaiser Kirk]

Well, 750 seems reasonable compared to Italy's 850, Bavaria's 950, ... but I'm not sure if any of those should be higher or lower. We seemed to be drifting into the subject of appropriate air force sizes in Foxy's thread, and China and Japan were both discussing numbers in the thousands, so I started this instead.

[TexanCowboy]

Well, look at it this way... the CSA views aircraft as more cost effective to scout then a divison of calvary.

[Desertfox]

Aircraft ARE more cost-effective, the question is, should they?

As far as numbers go, I consider anything over 2,000 to be way too much, especially without a major war being fought. We should not (at this time) know how effective planes are. There should not be any reason for thousand plane strong air forces. When I was putting together the Swiss Air Force (which has the most experience in aircraft use in combat) I considered 500 planes to be on the high side. I was actually concerned about having too many planes, untill I saw the size of other air forces around.

[TexanCowboy]

Well, if you want to look at it like that, 30 of my planes are long range bombers, 150 are AEG G.IV clones, and 350 are traniers. That makes 430 or so combat effective.

[Tanthalas]

while I tend to agree with you DF there are other considerations to make as well.  Like a Airplane Crazed King of Rohan having Billy Mitchal turned loose on him (seriously that kind of scares me)

[TexanCowboy]

BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!

[Desertfox]

Billy Mitchel is just another officer in either the French or UNK Armies. Without WWI he is a nobody.

[TexanCowboy]

No, he's in a evil storyline of mine. And he was born in Missouri... and he is one of the top pilots in the CSA.

BWHAHAHAHAHA!!!

[Desertfox]

Actually he was born in France and lived in Wisconsin. But my point stands, without WWI we should not have big air forces, nor would alot of famous aviators come to be well known, Billy Mitchell being an excellent example. Another example would be all the fighters around with twin MGs. You can count all the air-to-air engagements in one hand, so we should not have any fighters at all, much less well armed, advanced WWI ones.

[Tanthalas]

I view it kind of as an alternate Naval Arms Race.  That said Rohans first "Fighter" (I view it more like an armed scout) will be a knock off of the Eindecker.

[TexanCowboy]

No, your first fighter will be the 200+ Cessna-Martin's with two handheld revovlers.  ;D