Mid war jap aircraft production

[panzer cat]

It's july of 43, I have a much reduced carrier force and fighting very hard in the DEI. As the George comes on line I can reduce the the number of zero's. Should I streamline production? What are the better midwar aircraft? I've had no luck with Betties, Nell,s and Helens.

[ny59giants]

I'm in early '44 as Japan and the name of the game comes down to two issues, speed and armament. The American Corsairs and P-47s are killers due to their speed (over 400). As Japan, the George is my best 4e bomber killer. You want to get away from the Betty/Nell due to their speed as they will not be able to use range anymore. You want the Oscars and Zeros more for long range escorts than for CAP. I focus on the Frances and Peggy (torpedo carrying) as their speed is around 340 vs 270 for newest Betty.

[CV 2]

Personally I prefer the George on non-carrier air units. They are the only mid-war IJN aircraft that can bring down 4E aircraft.

In a game I have going in Nov 43, my IJN fighter production is:
A6M3a: 30
A6M5: 60
N1K1: 320

As for attack aircraft, you can use pretty much anything you want. You just need beau coup experience, because your best attack mode when the F6F comes out is at night. And anything less than 80 experience at night is unreliable.

[panzer cat]

I've been using the Oscars and Zeros mainly for escort, and tojos and tonys for base def. With the arrival of the hellcat his carriers have been almost impossible to hit. What about the jack? It seems to have decent stat's, but like the tony it has no legs.

current fighter production.
210 A6M3A
220 Oscars
110 Tonys
120 Tojos

[obvert]

The Jack is very good, and has amazing climb rate. Look at the 2nd generation of the George and the Jack. Look similar?

I've used the Jack a lot, and it is my escort as well as interceptor, getting about as far out as you'll need to strike at this time anyway, to 11 hexes. Keep some A6M3a around if you need to go farther. The Jack also uses a plentiful engine, which helps.

[panzer cat]

Obvert, your right. The engine is the key, I'm producing a lot of Ha 32's for use with planes that are becoming obsolete. looks like I have some re-tooling to do.

[GreyJoy]

Well, it depends if you play with PDU ON or OFF.
 
With PDU ON, i'd go with what Obvert says but with one exception:
 
I'd heavily R&D the N1K1, in order to be able to get it by mid-43. I'd skip the J2M2 (you don't need another SR3 Navy fighter by this stage imho) and concentrate not less than 3x30 R&D factory (with engine bonus) on the J2M3.
The idea is to have the N1K1 available as early as possible, followed by the J2M3 few months later and then the N1K2 by early 1944.
 
The J2M3 can be very usefull imho. The N1K1 is a great plane but it's a "one shot weapon" due to its horrible SR.
 
The J2M3, backed by some good KI-44c, can operate even from smaller AFs and can be a good weapon to deal with the 4Es.
 
These are my plans for late 1943 production:
 
A6M3a: 60
A6M5: 80
J2M3: 90
N1K1: 160
 
KI-44a (then c): 140
KI-84a: 100
Nick-a: 60 (later this factory will be changed to the KI-102a)
KI-43 IIIa: 120
 
 
 
The KI-84a is a wonderfull plane but it has the same problem of the N1K1 or the J2M2... the SR3 really limits its use in frontline bases. After a fight you'll have half of its components grounded for a week or so...not exactly what you want when you have a base threatened by 4Es....
 
The climb rate is also very important imho...that's why i love the KI-44 and the J2M3... the better the climb rate, the more planes you're gonna have in the air in time to fight the enemy bukas

[obvert]

Great comments GJ. Exactly.

The only thing I'd consider for you is upping your Frank production slowly over time to around 200, and getting maybe a few more Georges/Jacks while dropping off the A6M3a altogether. I at least have enough in the pools to keep 2-3 groups going for escort into mid-44 and I haven't made any since mid-43. You'll need long-distance escort less as time goes on anyway. I've even used Georges on escort lately and they performed very well, getting to 12 hexes and actually holding their own in the escort role.

Tough when all supply is crucial, as in your game. I had extra from bumped up Chinese and DEI production and could afford a few 'mistakes' and experiments. If you plan any offensive ops the extra Franks will be crucial as they and the George are your only real sweepers in late 43-44, and they still suffer against the better Allied planes.

I've prioritized fighter over bomber production and have really tried to pick spots to use bombing, which is expensive (2E planes, escort losses, pilots KIA/MIA, etc). My bomber pools are nearly always under 100, and just barely keeping up with losses. As I get into 44 and add some factories from R n D of new planes (like the Peggy recently) I will add offensive capability without using any more supply (as the factories transfer fully repaired) and build my pools for kamis. I have a good Oscar and Nick pool now and some older Judys but could use more DB/TB types and 2E bombers for kamis. As the Grace and final Judy versions show up as well as the next Frances these will give those extra factories to pump up production.

[Dora09]

IMO N1K1-J is the most important fighter Mid war along with the Ki44 of course.

I replace all land based IJNAF fighter groups with N1K1 (and J2M) ASAP.

I am at the end of Dec 43 in my PBEM

I have noticed in this game if you use these aircraft acording to their strengths you can have success even with planes that have unspectacular stats. For example I have three very well trained Ki45 Ia groups and I have had them kill p38s and even p47s with mild losses.

Also as the war goes on I care less and less about range. I try to never have any air operation go in half assed and allied CAP is so strong as time goes on better to have shorter distance raids with max sweep, max escort and choose offensive strikes carefully and deliberately


My fighter and bomber producrtion is as follows:

(I might b producing too few Ki44 late war according to others so take that into account)
A6M5 (only enough to cover CVs)

J2M2 50

N1K1-J 180

G4M1 25

P1Y1 36

Ki43 31

Ki45 15

Ki44 55

Ki61 Ic 32

Ki84 200

Ki49 IIb 55

Ki67 Ia 33

[leehunt27@bloomberg.net]

Any ideas how to stop B-17E's as of mid 1942? I had a CAP of 30 Oscars and 30 Zeroes fail to significantly disrupt a wave of unescorted 36 B-17's recently. Was very frustrating!

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: leehunt27@bloomberg.net

Any ideas how to stop B-17E's as of mid 1942? I had a CAP of 30 Oscars and 30 Zeroes fail to significantly disrupt a wave of unescorted 36 B-17's recently. Was very frustrating!

It's a tough job in mid-1942. In general, think distance, numbers and cannons. You want >2:1 advantage in numbers, aircraft with a 20mm cannon (think Nicks or Zeroes in mid-1942). Also, you want to try to get the B-17s to strike unescorted at a distance from their home base. Damage them and get them as OPS kills-more likely at longer distance from their home field.

When you have mid-war fighters (George comes to mind for IJN), it's a more straightforward task, but then you'll probably have to deal with some form of escort.

[FatR]

ORIGINAL: panzer cat

It's july of 43, I have a much reduced carrier force and fighting very hard in the DEI. As the George comes on line I can reduce the the number of zero's. Should I streamline production?

Streamlining is pretty meaningless, since converting instead of adding new factories will save you only 1/11th of the supply cost.

As about fighters, the best midwar IJN fighter by far is N1K-J, and the best IJA fighter is Ki-84, but the latter has a horrible service rating, so you should produce some Ki-44-IIc as well. Oscars/Zeros are for escort only.

Regarding bombers, unless you're playing Scen 2 or not doing your best in the air war, you should plan forward to shift the main burden of naval attacks to IJA. IJN gets too little pilots in 1944 to sacrifice them easily, assuming the air war is properly intense. You can literally drain the IJN training program dry even before kamikazes. Produce the torpedo-carrying version of Ki-67, and hopefully you've been using Helens as skipbombers even before that. I prefer P1Y1 as IJN's naval attack bomber, but if you have nothing to do with Ha-32 engines, you can plan to switch some factories to P1Y2. Betties and Nells can still do some damage, but are primarily useful as naval search planes at this stage.

[Dora09]

The best way to deal with the 4es is to make it as painful as possible. I pack as much AAA guns in bases I know will be targets and where I plan to base most of my aircraft.

As far as interceptors, Ki45s (Nicks) are great. They have been great for me. Ki44s are good too, even though they have week armament they have great climb. Pilot exp is key here too. It really makes all the difference in the world. Also, found that alt setting matters, if you set your CAP too high, I have noticed this seems to result in more fighers lost to defensive fire (not sure why this occurs).

Finally you want to make sure you have good numbers. I don't know about others, but I manually set my CAP every turn and I always use point CAP meaning that I always set range to 0 so they don't stray and CAP other bases (this also keeps fatigue very low so you can set 80-90% CAP. I use this system and then have dedicated escort groups rather than have groups set to 50% CAP and 50% escort or whatever. You can then bring in LR CAP from other bases to pump up the CAP further.

After some of that he will go to night bombing... and then there is not much you can do. But as long as he goes daylight you can put a hurt on him even without the big guns like the N1K1

[GreyJoy]

ORIGINAL: obvert

Great comments GJ. Exactly.

The only thing I'd consider for you is upping your Frank production slowly over time to around 200, and getting maybe a few more Georges/Jacks while dropping off the A6M3a altogether. I at least have enough in the pools to keep 2-3 groups going for escort into mid-44 and I haven't made any since mid-43. You'll need long-distance escort less as time goes on anyway. I've even used Georges on escort lately and they performed very well, getting to 12 hexes and actually holding their own in the escort role.

Tough when all supply is crucial, as in your game. I had extra from bumped up Chinese and DEI production and could afford a few 'mistakes' and experiments. If you plan any offensive ops the extra Franks will be crucial as they and the George are your only real sweepers in late 43-44, and they still suffer against the better Allied planes.

I've prioritized fighter over bomber production and have really tried to pick spots to use bombing, which is expensive (2E planes, escort losses, pilots KIA/MIA, etc). My bomber pools are nearly always under 100, and just barely keeping up with losses. As I get into 44 and add some factories from R n D of new planes (like the Peggy recently) I will add offensive capability without using any more supply (as the factories transfer fully repaired) and build my pools for kamis. I have a good Oscar and Nick pool now and some older Judys but could use more DB/TB types and 2E bombers for kamis. As the Grace and final Judy versions show up as well as the next Frances these will give those extra factories to pump up production.

I agree Erik. Franks are necessary, but i don't wanna end up like i did with the Ki-44a...i overproduced them and, given the good results i obtained early in mid 1942 against enemy's attempts to break through my CAP, the air war has been very less bloody than predicted. This led to the fact that now, in july 1943, when the Tojo-c entered into production, i have more than 600 useless KI-44a in the pools....
Same may happen to the Frank-a. I'm heavily researching the "r" version, so i think i should get it by 5/1944 or something like that... that means that i run the risk of having too many KI-84as in the pool...and i hate wasting precious HI points.

I halted the A6M line for many months but, to be honest, i find that i badly need at least 150 zeros every months. Their role of escort means that, every time i launch an offensive, the losses of the A6M are HUGE. My N1K1s, at the moment, are used only for local CAP duties and are performing fine.
I'll use for sweeper duties only the KI-44c from now on, cause even after a succesfull sweep, the groups equipped with N1K1, with its terrible SR=3, gets grounded for a week and i cannot sustain that.

For what concerns bombers, i've been changing my mind lately. I had lots of hopes in the P1Y1s and generally in the second generation 2Es naval bombers but found that the single engine naval bombers are much more usefull.
With their terrible SR (4) and with the use of 2 precious engines, the P1Y1 hasn't prooved anywhere much usefull.
especially in DBB mod, where the aviation support for Japan is greatly reduced, having too many 2E bombers in front line bases becomes a problem. I never overstack so for every Frances i can have 2 Jills...and the second version can fly up to 12 hexes carrying a torp...which is more than enough for mid-late 1943.

The second Jill, in fact, has proven to be the best torpedo-bomber so far. It performs well both as a LBA and as a CV plane and uses only 1 engine. It has a great SR of 1 and can be used even from smaller fields. It goes up to 300mhp and it's flexible. Also it uses the Ha-32 engine, so the Ha-45 production doesn't get that stressed. Really a good plane imho.

Same goes for the Judy. especially the D4Y3. Great SR, only one engine (Ha-33) and can operate even from smaller fields.

But, above all, the engine number restrictions in smaller fields really make the 1E planes much more valuable than their 2Es counterparts.

I've also found that the non-overstacking philosophy pays back a lot in terms of coordination...so it's way better to have 72 Jills than 36 Frances in a single air base

[obvert]

Definitely feeling the same on the 2E naval strike capability. Limited use until maybe later when there is a lot of support around several big fields. Maybe in the PI, areas of the DEI, around Formosa and of course the HI. Once I get the Grace that will be my go-to for any naval strike with its speed, versatility and it's one engine.

The 2Es are still useful periodically in an airfield suppression role. If he has big built up fields that come within range as he moves closer it can be worth it to hit them, and the speed of the Frances and Peggy can get through to hit even with CAP up. That's where I see their use now, especially since the Frances does 19 hexes with tanks and the Peggy goes to 17.

The good thing about the Frank is that you'll never feel that the pool of Ki-84a are useless. They carry 2x250kg, so later, with their speed to target, you know what that means.

[FatR]

I've used Jills a lot in my first PBEM, and I'm currently using primarily P1Y1 in my Scen 2 PBEM, and I find the latter more useful. 15 hexes of effective torpedo range versus 10 actually makes the difference quite often. And Jills really drop like flies to both flak and CAP, so I'm vary of sticking good pilots in them. As about SR 4... I find that the most common scenario from late 1943 onwards is 1 turn of air attacks, after which my shattered bomber units need to rest and restore morale for several turns anyway. If a battle extends, I prefer to send their remnants to a rear base for this rest, disband disabled planes and fly new airgroups in. Which is easier to do with Francices and their huge radius.

And for that matter, 2E IJNAF bomber group aren't going to upgrade to 1E planes anyway.

[GreyJoy]

ORIGINAL: FatR

I've used Jills a lot in my first PBEM, and I'm currently using primarily P1Y1 in my Scen 2 PBEM, and I find the latter more useful. 15 hexes of effective torpedo range versus 10 actually makes the difference quite often. And Jills really drop like flies to both flak and CAP, so I'm vary of sticking good pilots in them. As about SR 4... I find that the most common scenario from late 1943 onwards is 1 turn of air attacks, after which my shattered bomber units need to rest and restore morale for several turns anyway. If a battle extends, I prefer to send their remnants to a rear base for this rest, disband disabled planes and fly new airgroups in. Which is easier to do with Francices and their huge radius.

And for that matter, 2E IJNAF bomber group aren't going to upgrade to 1E planes anyway.

Very interesting FATR! Thanks for sharing

Don't know to be honest. The Frances seems to be able to operate effectively only from big bases with a lot of AV support... which is limiting a lot my ability to use it. I think much depends on each one's game situation.
However i'll try to keep on using it...let's see what kind of results i get

[panzer cat]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I will keep the jack in production since the engine factory is already ramped up. The George will replace the zero on land. For the army i'll close out he tony as the frank comes on line. I'll keep some Oscars for escort and late war kamikazes, and tojo's foe the 1 SR.
Going with more 1e bombers seems to be the cost effective approach for the IJNAF, the days of long range strikes are over. IJAAF bomber will be the frances since it is torp armed. Jumping into my first PBEM as Japan has been a real eye opener. I've lost a lot of CV's, crashed my econ and have had around 2000 planes shot down- I Fight On.

[GreyJoy]

ORIGINAL: panzer cat

Thanks for the advice everyone. I will keep the jack in production since the engine factory is already ramped up. The George will replace the zero on land. For the army i'll close out he tony as the frank comes on line. I'll keep some Oscars for escort and late war kamikazes, and tojo's foe the 1 SR.
Going with more 1e bombers seems to be the cost effective approach for the IJNAF, the days of long range strikes are over. IJAAF bomber will be the frances since it is torp armed. Jumping into my first PBEM as Japan has been a real eye opener. I've lost a lot of CV's, crashed my econ and have had around 2000 planes shot down- I Fight On.

For IJAAF (Army) you wanna produce Peggy and Peggy-T. Especially the latter. My suggestion is to have at least 3x30 R&D factories researching the torpedo version since the beginning. with the engine bonus, once they are repaired (and they take SO MUCH TIME), you can hope to get it by december 1943.
Once you have the Peggy-T online, you can easily equip enough sentais to have 300 fast, armoured, torpedo bombers piloted by IJAAF crews... and that's the important fact: you are going to have shortage of trained navy pilots in late war and you need them for the KB... while your IJAAF pools will be FULL of pilots....

My plan is to be able to start training IJAAF pilots in navT role by the end of 1943 and to produce 180 Peggy-T each month by mid 1944.

This bomber is fast, armoured, durable (for Japanese standars) and can completely substitute the P1Y series in anti-naval role

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: GreyJoy
My plan is to be able to start training IJAAF pilots in navT role by the end of 1943 and to produce 180 Peggy-T each month by mid 1944.

This bomber is fast, armoured, durable (for Japanese standars) and can completely substitute the P1Y series in anti-naval role

But GreyJoy, if you only get the Peggy (T) on or around 1/44, why is that any better than using your (trained) IJAAF pilots as kamikazes? That's how I intend to use my supernumerary IJAAF pilot pools moving forward. Plus, then you don't have to worry about an air HQ with sufficient torps and you can use any number of different superfluous airframes.

I'm training up kamikaze pilots in number from day 1 of the war. Then I'll be able to use my old Sallys, Helen, and other (by then) antiquated airframes.