Combined Historical Scenario - Aircraft

[el cid again]

In my opinion (and this is not inviting an argument) the P40 was the 'worst' of the American fighters.

Probably not. The P-40 is probably better than the Buffalo, for example. And the F4F-3. And it seems to do better than the P-39 and cousins in many situations - historically speaking. Also, IF you had to actually fight in something of the period, you probably might prefer it to a P-38, except if you needed range. The P-38 is the best scoring fighter in the Pacific theater, but it is not because it is a better fighter in purely terms of dogfighting. They learned how to use it without dogfighting.

[el cid again]

A few aircraft, P40, P39, Zero, Oscar, Claude, Spitfire, Nate, I gave a plus or minus 1 or 2 to represent the general crapiness/quality of an aircraft.

I think that the Oscar is (quoting) almost as much of a technical surprise as the Zero was. It is a superb fighter plane and it was very hard to stop.

I think the Claude and the Nate are passing fair fighters for the end of the 1930s, and not at all useless. They are hardly crapy - they just are traditional in armament (2 .30 cal being the state of the art for a generation) and unarmored. But they are superbly maneuverable and quite lethal in the hands of a good pilot. Saburo Sakai became an ace in the Claude.

[Gen.Hoepner]

ORIGINAL: el cid again

A few aircraft, P40, P39, Zero, Oscar, Claude, Spitfire, Nate, I gave a plus or minus 1 or 2 to represent the general crapiness/quality of an aircraft.

I think that the Oscar is (quoting) almost as much of a technical surprise as the Zero was. It is a superb fighter plane and it was very hard to stop.

I think the Claude and the Nate are passing fair fighters for the end of the 1930s, and not at all useless. They are hardly crapy - they just are traditional in armament (2 .30 cal being the state of the art for a generation) and unarmored. But they are superbly maneuverable and quite lethal in the hands of a good pilot. Saburo Sakai became an ace in the Claude.

Was the oscar so good? I'm far from being an expert, but i'm like a 14years old adolescent:just love to play simulations[:D]...and in every sim i've played( the last one is Pacific Fighters) the Ki-43 is just a piece of crap. I'm not saying that these sims are a good reference, but i know those guys tend to do a good job in reserches...so...

[el cid again]

Six sqdn's of P-38E's might put a real damper on a Japanesse players plans for invading the West Coast early in the Game.

If we ever get the logistics modeled right, there is no prospect of more than a raid against the US West Coast. I once invaded Hawaii with three divisions - before I knew Japan actually planned to invade Hawaii with three divisions. My invasion "worked" insofar as we took Hawaii in Dec 1941 - but I lost the war because it took way too much shipping. This using a different system in which Japan's shipping is reasonably constrained. Japan MIGHT be up to taking Hawaii and NOT using too much shipping - IF ONE division is enough. But no way it could have mounted enough to invade the West Coast for real. Worrying about discouraging what is not realistic in the first place seems the wrong thing to focus on: lets get the log in balance so Japan never dares think of such a thing in the first place. The IJA was right - invading Australia was not an option (some in the Navy wanted to) - but it is on the margins of possible. The US isn't.