ORIGINAL: PaxMondo
ORIGINAL: Lowpe
Three for three...cancelled the Nates, and switched to Oscar Ic.
What I have observed is that players now reverting to PDU OFF are overthinking RnD. Most of us stopped playing PDU OFF because it became quite simple: RnD Oscar and A6M. That's about it for sure.
For everything else it hardly matters. Why? so few groups upgrade to anything else. Very hard to justify spending 90K supply to build maybe 200 aircraft the entire game and get them a couple months early. At any rate that was the results of most of us. YMMV.
For the rest of the IJA, maybe you can invest in Helen RnD. You have to keep building Sally for almost the entire game.
For the rest of the IJN, you can likely justify Jill/Judy/Grace. That's about it. Everything else, I just let them appear per schedule.
That means my NF are just Oscar/A6M on night CAP. Recon is Babs for most of the game. Helen/Sally or Nettie the whole game. etc.
Don't over think it. Don't waste 1000's of supply on a couple of hundred planes. They won't matter in the end. The supply will.
The biggest difference between PDU OFF and ON is going to be your pilot losses. Plan on 25% more losses. That means your training pools now have to be much deeper than before.
I will, with much respect, disagree on some points. I think fighter research for Frank is well worth it.
Now Jack and George are fairly restricted in the number of squadrons that upgrade to them - like 1 or 2 thru 43. So they aren't much help. Tony has 3 or 4 that can get to the 61d, but it isn't really good except against bombers.
But Frank A has 7 squadrons available in 1943. Some upgrade straight to it, others thru the early Oscar models (IIa, IIb, IIIa,), and others thru Tojo IIc. Now this is a force worth getting early!
Nick A (and then C): they come early, but there are also 4 squadrons that can be converted in 42 when it can really do some damage. After 42 on rear area anti bomber protection it will be good outside of escort range all the way thru half of 44.
For bombers: I would add the Lilly IIb/IIc line. Quite a few Army squadrons upgrade here, and it is a worthwhile long strike plane thru 43. Getting it a few months early might help against a late Allied push to avoid autovictory, or more likely, just a plane that can hit Fletchers.
Night Fighters: I think it is worthwhile researching the Irving and the Nick. The Allies can really abuse night bombing in PDU off. IMHO.
Of my R&D changes to Olorin's start: I have added Oscar, Frank and Lilly IIb r&d. I have expanded Zero and Oscar production. I have boosted engine production. I probably added some NF research too.
Nothing embraces the suck more than having 200 Allied bombers hitting your runways at night without NF. Perhaps the better AA present in this mod will alleviate that problem to a degree.
