350+ Plane Furballs !!

[Top Cat]

I'm currently playing the Allies in Scenario #19, where the Japs don't lose their carriers at Midway and they get about 50% extra in aircraft reinforcements.

After hanging on by my finger nails for the 1st few months I finally retook Lunga airfield in Jan. 1943, via Taivu. The Japanese had been unusually quiet in it's defense

But, as soon as I moved aircraft into Lunga all hell broke loose!

Day after day the Japs attacked with 90+ Betties, 50+ Nells all escorted by 120-140 Zeroes. I defended with about 70 fighters which were a mix of P-39's, P-38's and Wildcats.

Initially I was losing 2 fighters for each zero. Even when I reinforced my CAP with all the wildcats from 3 CV's and a CVE my fighters were going down like flies. I saw my reserve pool of Wildcats fall from 140+ to 0 in the space of a few days.

But, slowly but surely the kill ratio turned my way and by the 2nd week of this kind of attrition I finally broke the Japanese in a battle where he lost 55 zeroes and 23 bombers for the loss of only 6 of my fighters, plus a heap of damaged ones.

Has anyone else had the Japanese throw the kitchen sink at them like this?

I highly recommend scenario #19 as the Allies for those who want a challenging slugfest!

Cheers
Top Cat

[Crocky]

I just threw the kitchen sink at Kid in our battle 150+ raids against his CV TF off Rabual unfortunately my fighters were on strike = scratch 149 bombers in the course of 4 days I have lost upwards of 400 aircraft