P-38E/F - Super plane?!?

[ny59giants]

I am playing my version of Big B's mod with only map changes and an added shipping channel. I did not do anything to the performance of any aircraft. Below is the result of 5 days worth of A2A. Is it common for highly experienced Zeros (around 80) to have these kind of losses?? I lost 24 Zero vs 5 Lightnings!?!

16 Feb 42

Day Air attack on Milne Bay , at 57,96

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 25
Ki-43-Ic Oscar x 15

Allied aircraft
P-38E/F Lightning x 37

Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 7 destroyed, 1 damaged
Ki-43-Ic Oscar: 9 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
P-38E/F Lightning: 2 destroyed, 4 damaged

19 Feb 42

Day Air attack on Milne Bay , at 57,96

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 24
Ki-43-Ic Oscar x 14

Allied aircraft
P-38E/F Lightning x 30

Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 6 destroyed
Ki-43-Ic Oscar: 5 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
P-38E/F Lightning: 7 damaged

21 Feb 42

Day Air attack on Milne Bay , at 57,96

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 18

Allied aircraft
B-26B Marauder x 8
P-38E/F Lightning x 25

Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 1 destroyed, 1 damaged

Allied aircraft losses
B-26B Marauder: 4 damaged
P-38E/F Lightning: 2 damaged

Japanese ground losses:
10 casualties reported

Runway hits 2

23 Feb 42

Day Air attack on Milne Bay , at 57,96

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 20

Allied aircraft
B-26B Marauder x 10
P-38E/F Lightning x 24

Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 4 destroyed, 3 damaged

Allied aircraft losses
B-26B Marauder: 1 destroyed, 4 damaged
P-38E/F Lightning: 3 destroyed, 2 damaged

Japanese ground losses:
8 casualties reported

Airbase hits 1
Runway hits 2

24 Feb 42

Day Air attack on Milne Bay , at 57,96

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 15

Allied aircraft
B-26B Marauder x 8
P-38E/F Lightning x 23

Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 6 destroyed, 1 damaged
Ki-46-II Dinah: 1 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
B-26B Marauder: 2 damaged
P-38E/F Lightning: 4 damaged

Japanese ground losses:
38 casualties reported

Runway hits 4

[rtrapasso]

Historically, the P-38 suffered its heaviest losses in the Med when fighting against the Luftwaffe usually against odds, and reportedly had a 3-1 kill ratio even then... 5 to 1 doesn't sound too out of line historically as the Japanese fighters were usually much more lightly built and consequently easier to shoot down... i haven't seen any firm air to air statistics in P38 vs. Zero, but the P38 did shoot down more aircraft than any other USAAF plane.

EDIT: in most (not all) of these encounters you listed, the P38 outnumbered the Japanese fighters (unlike the real-life Med encounters).

[USSAmerica]

I have to agree with Bob.  Since the P-38's were usually not outnumbered, these results seem very reasonable to me.  If a handful of planes more were lost on either side, I really wouldn't have a problem with it.  Not a single one of these individual battles were a slaughter on either side. 

[rtrapasso]

Dug through some references - only stats i've found for Pacific was 11 to 1 kill to TOTAL losses (which apparently includes all causes of losses - i.e flak, operational, a-to-a) over New Guinea in 1944.

Reading through accounts, it seems the times the P38s suffered most heavily in the Pacific was when it was conducting bombing missions and was intercepted before bombs were dropped.

[niceguy2005]

The P-38 was much loved by its army pilots.  It could easily best the zero, which was outdated by the time P-38s were widely used.  The 5th AF had a tough time convincing its pilots to switch to the P-47 even though it was a superior plane.

The question is, why are you facing so many P-38s in Feb 1942???  The standard pacific army fighter was the P-40, with P-39s used as a stop gap.  I'm not sure that there were any active P-38 E/F squadrons in the Pacific at that time.


Edit: I don't know the basis of the Big B mod. That said, according to wiki[8|] the first non-recon version of the P-38E didn't see combat until May 1942 in the Aelutians.

[castor troy]

It´s been some time since I´ve last had a BigB game going but from my memory I didn´t have that much problem to take on the Lightnings if I had high exp pilots.

The reason there are so many Ligthtnings is the fact that Brian has put two squadrons of them onto the West coast and the read me stated that those should be left there... [;)]

[rominet]

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

I am playing my version of Big B's mod with only map changes and an added shipping channel. I did not do anything to the performance of any aircraft. Below is the result of 5 days worth of A2A. Is it common for highly experienced Zeros (around 80) to have these kind of losses?? I lost 24 Zero vs 5 Lightnings!?!

Can you give the stats of the 2 planes? (with witptracker for example)

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

I am playing my version of Big B's mod with only map changes and an added shipping channel. I did not do anything to the performance of any aircraft. Below is the result of 5 days worth of A2A. Is it common for highly experienced Zeros (around 80) to have these kind of losses?? I lost 24 Zero vs 5 Lightnings!?!

GAME

Yes. You'll have to live with it.

HISTORY

The developers of the game came up with ahistorical weightings for the factors in WWII air combat. They underrated pilot skill and overrated firepower and top airspeed. They also had a fixation on numbers over quality and generally ignored diminishing returns. If you want to play something more realistic, try a good two-person flight simulator.

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: herwin

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

I am playing my version of Big B's mod with only map changes and an added shipping channel. I did not do anything to the performance of any aircraft. Below is the result of 5 days worth of A2A. Is it common for highly experienced Zeros (around 80) to have these kind of losses?? I lost 24 Zero vs 5 Lightnings!?!

GAME

Yes. You'll have to live with it.

HISTORY

The developers of the game came up with ahistorical weightings for the factors in WWII air combat. They underrated pilot skill and overrated firepower and top airspeed. They also had a fixation on numbers over quality and generally ignored diminishing returns. If you want to play something more realistic, try a good two-person flight simulator.

The results are NOT ahistorical as noted above: 3 to 1 kill to loss vs. Luftwaffe up to 11 to 1 vs. Japan over NG... 5 to 1 A-to-A is not out of line especially since:
- there were only three handpicked battles (that the Japanese player was particularly upset about), and
- the TOTAL losses for P-38s were not given, just those in direct A-to-A.

The game does NOT factor in things you fail to mention: i.e. - almost no radios so lack of in-flight communications for the Japanese fighters... Bergerud describes Japanese fighter formations as resembling "a swarm of flies"... this allowed coordinated attacks by Allied planes to be rather devastating in many cases.

[castor troy]

38:5 Zero/Lightning losses are still a bit high I would say as the Japanese pilots surely had a higher exp at this date than the Lightning pilots and in three of the original poster´s attacks the Lightnings even were on escort which should give them a disadvantage.

[ny59giants]

Big B's mod starts with 2 fighter groups (72 max). The 1st FG & 14FG at Los Angeles with 60 planes and experience for both at 58. They get 5 planes per month for replacements. His designer notes do recommend that both be restricted to the West Coast.

From his "Designer's Notes."

There are Two P-38F units at start in Los Angeles, these should be left
on the USA West Coast until Oct 1942.

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: castor troy

38:5 Zero/Lightning losses are still a bit high I would say as the Japanese pilots surely had a higher exp at this date than the Lightning pilots and in three of the original poster´s attacks the Lightnings even were on escort which should give them a disadvantage.

i count 24 Zeros lost not 38 - and the original poster (ny59giants) stated 24 as well. 5 to 1 does not seem all that much "out of whack" from historical data, esp. considering a few select engagements are used... i doubt someone playing the Japanese would post that P-38s are underpowered if the ratio was the other way... an ALLIED player might, but then it would be subject to the same kind of bias.

Heck, you could even argue that the P-38s should have gotten MORE kills given historical 11-1 kill to ALL CAUSE losses, but i won't go there. [;)]

He didn't state what the exp. of the Oscar pilots was, and didn't bring those into the argument - just the Zeros.

Again: for a player to pick a few battles he is upset about and bring them to the table as "this is (maybe) broken" is not much of an argument at all... i could just as easily take some consecutive battles out of my PBEM to "show" that the Japanese fighters are overpowered...

In order to really make an argument, you'd have to get all encounters for aircraft A vs. aircraft B and get data from BOTH sides (not just one), and then compare it to historical data (which is hard to sort out itself, and is woefully incomplete to researchers from what i can discover).

Maybe you could do it, but it would take MANY, MANY hours (or years, maybe).

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

Big B's mod starts with 2 fighter groups (72 max). The 1st FG & 14FG at Los Angeles with 60 planes and experience for both at 58. They get 5 planes per month for replacements. His designer notes do recommend that both be restricted to the West Coast.

From his "Designer's Notes."

There are Two P-38F units at start in Los Angeles, these should be left
on the USA West Coast until Oct 1942.

Historically, the USAAF rushed every P-38 they had in the Americas(except 1 training unit) to the West Coast after 7 December... i had done a long study trying to figure out what the replacement rate for P-38s should be that i think was incorporated into CHS (and by extension, Big B, i think) and traced movements of the P-38s throughout the war... there were actually a lot more than 2 units on the West Coast, but most of them were eventually returned to ETO and the Med after the initial "invasion" scare subsided.

i tried to trace every P-38 unit there was and allocated replacements base on production numbers, etc. ... this is all complicated by various factors (i.e. - P-38s were quite often converted to F-4 and F-5 recon planes, etc.)

[rominet]

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

These stats seems to me quite good although the difference between manuever is a little bit big (6pts) so in Zero favor.[X(]
That's perhaps what Herwin was talking about when he said that in this mod, top airspeed is overrated.
Do you remenber if P-38 had bounce advantage?

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: rominet

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

These stats seems to me quite good although the difference between manuever is a little bit big (6pts) so in Zero favor.[X(]
That's perhaps what Herwin was talking about when he said that in this mod, top airspeed is overrated.

The Allies based their tactics, esp. their P-38 tactics on this: they could pick when and where to fight, and they did NOT try to maneuver with a Zero. They would generally dive down from altitude advantage and outdive Zeros (or Oscars)... they did not fight if they didn't want to. The Zeros/Oscars did not have that luxury: they couldn't run away effectively if they were in trouble. So, in this case: Speed Kills, and the model more or less reflects this.

Some people will moan that faster planes get an unfair advantage, but i think the game model accurately (more or less) is designed around this. Allied fighters avoided dogfights/turning engagements with Zeros. To insist that high maneuver fighters be granted an advantage in combat where maneuverability wasn't a factor is ahistorical.

Yes, Allied pilots at the beginning of the war tended not realize the maneuverability of the Zero (the dread "Zero bonus").

[USSAmerica]

ORIGINAL: rominet

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

These stats seems to me quite good although the difference between manuever is a little bit big (6pts) so in Zero favor.[X(]
That's perhaps what Herwin was talking about when he said that in this mod, top airspeed is overrated.
Do you remenber if P-38 had bounce advantage?

I honestly think the difference is in the old cliche of Durability ratings. It's almost a 2:1 advantage for the P-38. That means that most P-38's that get hit in A2A combat can hit back, while most Zeros that get hit spend the rest of the battle burning and falling out of the sky, or at best, attempting to limp home. I know this discussion has been held dozens if not hundereds of times already, [:D] but, I'll bet if the Zeros outnumbered the P-38's by 2:1, the losses would be much more even.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: rtrapasso

ORIGINAL: herwin

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

I am playing my version of Big B's mod with only map changes and an added shipping channel. I did not do anything to the performance of any aircraft. Below is the result of 5 days worth of A2A. Is it common for highly experienced Zeros (around 80) to have these kind of losses?? I lost 24 Zero vs 5 Lightnings!?!

GAME

Yes. You'll have to live with it.

HISTORY

The developers of the game came up with ahistorical weightings for the factors in WWII air combat. They underrated pilot skill and overrated firepower and top airspeed. They also had a fixation on numbers over quality and generally ignored diminishing returns. If you want to play something more realistic, try a good two-person flight simulator.

The results are NOT ahistorical as noted above: 3 to 1 kill to loss vs. Luftwaffe up to 11 to 1 vs. Japan over NG... 5 to 1 A-to-A is not out of line especially since:
- there were only three handpicked battles (that the Japanese player was particularly upset about), and
- the TOTAL losses for P-38s were not given, just those in direct A-to-A.

The game does NOT factor in things you fail to mention: i.e. - almost no radios so lack of in-flight communications for the Japanese fighters... Bergerud describes Japanese fighter formations as resembling "a swarm of flies"... this allowed coordinated attacks by Allied planes to be rather devastating in many cases.

OPERATIONS RESEARCH

COL Charles MacDonald: "The main reason we beat the [enemy] is because we work as a team, using the good qualities of our planes and keeping him from using the good qualities of his own. I think if the Nip had P-38s and we had Zeros, we could still beat him because the average American pilot is a good team worker and is always aggressive." (Bergerud, p. 453)

The ground combat model I came up with based on WWII statistics had three battle-related factors for each LCU: combat power, type, and quality. Combat power was how much raw damage the unit could do; type was mostly tempo; and quality translated into cohesion, co-ordination, and skill. The least important of these factors was combat power; the most important was quality. In air combat, the same three factors mattered in about the same order of importance.

[rominet]

To my knowlegde (but it is only my knowlegde[8|]), the ratio in Salomons-New Guinea in 42-43 is about 1 allied fighter against 3 jap fighters.
P-38 or F4U-1 making "hit and run" tactics had nearly always success against very manuvrable jap fighters A6M or Ki-43 but this tactics was requiring good experience.
Some allied pilots tryied to engage ennemy fighter in dogfight; they generally lost the fight
and even some crashed on sea or on ground trying to follow jap plane diving (P-38 and especially Corsair were very heavy fighters).

I think in WitP, with same number and same experience (and without any special advantage), P-38 or Corsair should kill 3 A6M or Ki-43 for 1 losse.

[rtrapasso]

The WITP air model completely leaves out coordination/"quality" issues as far as i can tell and from what i have read... i think they tried to make up for it in other ways but the model is just an approximation good (enough) for gaming purposes.

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: rominet

To my knowlegde (but it is only my knowlegde[8|]), the ratio in Salomons-New Guinea in 42-43 is about 1 allied fighter against 3 jap fighters.

Perhaps, but this counts the P-39, P-40, and even the Wirraway... [8|]

The P-38 was also extensively used as a fighter bomber or even pure bomber (it was sometimes fitted with a Norden bombsight)... the times the "kill ratio" of the P38s in the Pacific/CBI fell to around 3 to 1 was when it got jumped during these types of missions... normally it was much greater. As i have mentioned, even against the Luftwaffe when it was fighting on the wrong side of the odds, its A-to-A ratio was around 3 to 1.

EDIT: Personally in my PBEM, the P-38 might get a 1-1 ratio against Zeros, but i doubt it even does that well... but the war is yet young. [:D]