(Tactical) IL-2 Strumovik Attacks ability. Whats the catch?

Hey guys!

I tried using the ability IL-2 Sturmovik Attacks (12CP) which comes with the Advanced Warfare Commander a few times while floating munitions.

The ability feels quite weird as it drops smoke, hits a linear area with 23mm cannons and is supposed to deal damage to soft targets. Still, if you try to hit infantry your opponent can easily react to it and it you try to hit a light vehicle it deal more damage if you hit the sides and less if you hit the rear. Didn't try it on a weapon team this far...

Anyone found a good use for it? Do I do something wrong? For 90MUN and a late game ability its rather ... unreliable!

It's really not good. I suggest that you place mines rather than use the Sturmovik.

Its a failure. Could and should be anti-blob. But in its state it has only contributed to coh2s poor gameplay.

So, its not only me that can't find some good use.

Its really bad that a 12CP 10CP ability is such a failure, especially when similar ones, like the Stuka Anti-Tank Strafe (Ostheer Close Air Support Doctrine) is so powerful and costs 20MUN more...

So, its not only me that can't find some good use.

Its really bad that a 12CP ability is such a failure, especially when similar ones, like the Stuka Anti-Tank Strafe (Ostheer Close Air Support Doctrine) is so powerful and costs 20MUN more...

Y, its sad as it comes in 3 or 4 commanders which then becomes a no no -pick.

Y, its sad as it comes in 3 or 4 commanders which then becomes a no no -pick.

The Sturmovik strafe in Advanced Warfare is unique to that commander. It's a single-pass ability and costs less than the other Sturmovik strafes. It used to be much more useful (ie borderline overpowered) when it automatically targeted a unit, like the other Sturmovik strafes. Now it works like the CAS Stuka strafing run.
I don't think it's worth the munitions at the moment. If there was less time between the smoke and the actual strafe, it could be OK. As it is, it takes quite a long time for the strafe to arrive and that makes it easy to dodge. Or it could be no smoke with low damage and high suppression or something.

The Sturmovik strafe in Advanced Warfare is unique to that commander. It's a single-pass ability and costs less than the other Sturmovik strafes. It used to be much more useful (ie borderline overpowered) when it automatically targeted a unit, like the other Sturmovik strafes. Now it works like the CAS Stuka strafing run.
I don't think it's worth the munitions at the moment. If there was less time between the smoke and the actual strafe, it could be OK. As it is, it takes quite a long time for the strafe to arrive and that makes it easy to dodge. Or it could be no smoke with low damage and high suppression or something.

Spot ON!

Take into consideration that on light armor it works a bit awkward... Hitting the sides of a target deal more damage than hitting the rear. This besides unrealistic, its stupid as well!

Its probably bad RNG that gave you that result.

Maybe atm its best used against stationary targets like weapons teams or crippled vehicles.

Its probably bad RNG that gave you that result.

Maybe atm its best used against stationary targets like weapons teams or crippled vehicles.

No, no, no!

According to what tests I 've done, and I did enough, on my (soviet) vehicles and AI-controlled WM infantry units (and weapon teams) I 've seen that :

1) On light vehicles the damage is lot greater when the attack comes from the sides (for some reason). Hits on the front deal deal to little damage (somewhat reasonable since its frontal armor) and hits on the rear always deal less damage that side hits.

Afaik, armor values are divided to front and rear and there is no different value for side armor (side hits are calculated based on rear armor value). Isn't that so?

So, its probably how the ability works (maybe how many rounds land on the target) rather than how much damage the ability deals on rear armor.

2) On the AI-controlled(Easy difficulty) infantry the ability fails to deal significant damage on infantry squads. Even if the squad is a Gren squad not in cover with half(2/4) squad members dead already, a direct hit from this ability fails to wipe the half-dead squad and sometimes it fails to to even kill a single soldier. Same goes for weapon teams.

On my own (soviet) squads the ability deal no damage at all. What I thought is that it had friendly fire turned off. On the other hand Stuka Anti-tank Run (WM Close Air Support Doctrine), which is a similar ability, deals significant damage to infantry, even your own. I can't say why this disparity exist.

I 've spend more than an hour testing this ability on various targets and multiple times. It can't be just a matter bad luck on RNG.

...rise from the dead...

I use the Advanced Warfare Commander to some success. The reasoning behind the IL-2 Sturmovik Attack escapes me though. From my experience it does almost nothing. Against infantry it doesn't even pin them most of the time and usually does not kill a single individual. Even the lightest of vehicles take practically no damage. The only use I see is that maybe you can scare your opponent into retreating his units with the red smoke a few times if you're lucky. I'm not realy complaining. In my opinion the commander offers enough without the strafing run. But in it's current version it seems a bit pointless to even make it an ability. Am I doing something wrong? Is there any use to it? It just looks like it does no damage at all right now. And the ability does cost 90 munitions if I remember correctly. Stuka JU-87 D Anti-Infantry Strafe costs 60.

The only thing that ability is useful for is destroying OKW trucks while they're building, haven't tried in a long time but at one point that strafe used to one shot the trucks while they were building

Hey guys!

I tried using the ability IL-2 Sturmovik Attacks (12CP) which comes with the Advanced Warfare Commander a few times while floating munitions.

The ability feels quite weird as it drops smoke, hits a linear area with 23mm cannons and is supposed to deal damage to soft targets. Still, if you try to hit infantry your opponent can easily react to it and it you try to hit a light vehicle it deal more damage if you hit the sides and less if you hit the rear. Didn't try it on a weapon team this far...

Anyone found a good use for it? Do I do something wrong? For 90MUN and a late game ability its rather ... unreliable!

There is a thread from a couple weeks ago on this with some screenshots. The trick is to fire the strafe past te target about 30 game meters. A player posted results of firing right on a Stuka and then one firing 30 m past and the first one took half health off and the 2nd one wiped the unit.

Can't find that thread unfortunatly. Post the link if you can.