The fundamental tactical philosophy on Ground strike and Assault maps

The match is usually a race in deleting the other team's tickets. Victory by annihilation ("The other team has lost all vehicles") is rather rare, particularly in Era III-IV.

(I)

The planes with a quick bomb reload, a very large bomb (bombers, most attackers) and rocket load (P-47D) and the few well-known planes with good enough armour-piercing shells or bullets to kill tanks are the ones who cause almost all of this ticket destruction. The exception to this are the Era I-II maps with armoured cars and other rather soft targets as objectives.

(II)  

The fighters' job is to buy time, to enable the offensive part of the team to do its job at whatever is its (usually embarrassingly slow) speed. They need to defend against the other team's offensive players first and foremost.

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Many bomber players - especially those who fly crap bombers like the mostly worthless Wellingtons or PBYs - believe that it's the fighter players' job to defend them. But to defend them usually is impossible, at least without neglecting the defence. Bomber players should thus focus on using capable bombers, since the success of their offensive actions depends on themselves more than on anything else. Offensive success isn't about luck, and not the responsibility of fighters. It's the responsibility of bomber players, and they fail by default if they make a crappy choice on the aircraft selection screen.

There are also a few bomber players who don't think that offensive is their job, and then proceed to seek air kills. B-25J, Pe-2, Ju 87D-5, B7A2 and since the last patch also SB2C players are especially prone to this (there are also a few Blenheim and SB2M pilots with a weird interest in turnfighting).

I have sympathy for the B7A2s in this regard, since their bomb load (800 kg) is less important than their BnZ capability. B7A2s are excellent escort fighters with a secondary capability to knock out a couple pillboxes from high altitude.

Nevertheless, almost every bomber player who's chasing red bombers over the blue half of the map wastes his bombing capability and should have played a fighter instead.

There's one tiny exception; red bombers may fly high above blue territory and be able to win the battle soon by an airfield kill. A respawning player will then want to intercept them ASAP, but the only way to do this in time might be some plane starting at the bomber spawn point. That's when Pe-2s loaded with rockets, B-25Js or B7A2s may be a fine, match saving choice.