An unfortunate side effect disables approximately half of the allied fighters flying cap and made the zero almost impossible to shoot down until 43. As a result, a good jap player can virtually ignore allied LBA for the first year.
I would have to strongly disagree. The increased durability does decrease combat losses but the flip side is that ops losses are still considerably higher for the Japanese than for the Allies due to their less durability. Plus Japanese fighters are far more likely to be destroyed. I would say the results your are seeing are more likely the result of differences in experience than in durability. The following table shows the changes in durability between stock and CHS 159.
Aircraft...Stock....CHS
Ki-43......23........41
A6M2......22.......40
P-40B.....29.......52
P-40E.....29.......54
F4F-3......29.......49
Below is a screen shot from my game with BradfordKay. The timeframe is mid-Jun 42. Brad has become pretty aggressive with his LBA and only recently have I been able to inflict serious losses on his bombers but it has come at a high cost to my crews. As you can see losses on both sides are nowhere near as bad as they would have been in stock.
Chez






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