Informal POLL Re: Oscar

[Big B]

Nik, as usual - first class effort on your part.

But this opens another question - I was always under the impression that Chang's Chinese Nationalist Gov investigated AVG claims of downed Japanese aircraft, and if varified payed $500 gold to the US pilot - therefore ALL of the AVG claims were pretty well checked out and varified.

Does your research mean that they (the AVG) were getting paid for phantom victories?

B

[ChezDaJez]

Does your research mean that they (the AVG) were getting paid for phantom victories?

They were getting paid for victories verified by Chennault and his intel staff. However, there was no reliable means to verify those aircraft shot down over Japanese territory. Those claims were normally accepted if another pilot confirmed the crash.

Chez

[Sneer]

Oscar is not useless in WITP
in one of my PBEM one of Oscar sqns crosses 100 kills in malaya/burma/india campaign in early March42

[Honda]

Just give both Oscars mvr value of 36 to make them equal to zero and increase the accuracy of thier guns. They should probably have 37, but that would outrage some people around here. Even if they had 45 it wouldn't matter with their low speed and puny guns. So, at least, don't rob them of the only thing they have. Speed is of importance in WitP and that's it. AT least this way they won't underperform anymore and people will go back to playing nonPDU games.
Signed,
hopelessly outclassed airplanes fanboy

[m10bob]

More Oscar info. (Forgive the pop-ups on this 1st one guys.)

http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Museum/4826/Oscar.htm
(Please note the range info on the last).

http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/IJARG/ki43.html

Info from allied pilots perspective:

http://yarchive.net/mil/ki-43.html

[Gen.Hoepner]

I've just started my first Pbem with the Nik's Mod.
For what i've seen so far it really works well.
The oscars needed badly to be tweakened. I still think theere are many things that unbalances the game ( like the corsair), but surely the oscar uselessness was one of these of with this Mod things seem pretty better than before

[Nikademus]

You are correct Big B'er....but as Chez related, the verificaiton process for claims was sadly lacking, particularily in the China/Burma theater where rampent overclaiming was the norm, so much so there were official memos written about the accuracy of such claims. (i can print the quote from the local air commander stressing that future claims be investigated more thoroughly) The AVG was particularily suseptible to this because of Chenault's stressing of hit and run tactics. If your in an airplane ambushing a Japanese formation and you blitz through it at speed and catch glimpses of aircraft diving and spinning out, some with smoke pouring out of engines (which may only be exhaust from having gunned it) your apt to consider it an aircraft in distress. There were multiple incidents were a dozen+ aircraft were reported destroyed and not a single enemy plane actually went down.

There was also a nasty rumor cirulating of AVG pilots "buying" claims from their RAF counter-parts. As you can no doubt imagine this assertation/rumor has in the recent past generated a stormy set of counter-claims and denials. Myself, I don't see it as out of the realm of possibility. Look at the situation. The AVG was made up of young volunteers seeking adventure and some dough. Your getting "paid" per kill, the temptation would be great to find a way to er.....:game: the system. It's human nature. Did the AVG "buy" claims? Noone can say for certain. What "can" be said for certain was that overclaiming was rampant and continued to be so well after the AVG left the area and disbanded into the 23rd FG. The "Xmas masacre" over Rangoon was a perfect example.

[Nikademus]

No more uber-Corsair. [;)]

[jwilkerson]

Well I went and read through the Nik/SPeedy AAR looking at the A2A in general Oscars/Nates specifically and certainly don't see anything out of line - and so far looks like an improvement - would like to see a little more over Burma - and maybe another Uber Battle( there was one "test" USN vs Kwaj in there - but what about some B17s versus some Oscars !). But don't see anything wacky so far. As to getting this stuff into CHS I don't know how difficult that would be - but would suggest Elf maybe try to drive discussion with Andrew about how to proceed.

[m10bob]

Hoof's analysis of firepower differances.

http://www.rdrop.com/users/hoofj/WBFirepower.htm

(Check out the firepower of the Ki 84 "Frank" !!!!)

With his formula, these figures could be applied to every plane in WITP..??

[TheElf]

m10bob,
That was a great article at yarchive.net. You don't hear people around here talking about japanese aircraft like that.

I noticed that the author made the same point that I made a while back regarding Oscars in numbers. A point that seems to have been forgotten. That is, especially early in the war, they typically were encountered with a numerical superiority. The result being that a flight of 3 Ki-43s with a combined fire power of 3 rifle cal and 3 machine gun cal weapons could be chopping away at a single target.

Just imagine wht a dogfight would look like with 6 Hurricanes, P-40s, Buffalos, or P-39s facing 18+ Oscars might look like. Oscars in superior numbers should be more dangerous in WitP as it is modelled right now. Any a/c in superior numbers should be more dangerous. Unfortunately Oscars aren't.

[Kereguelen]

ORIGINAL: TheElf
Just imagine wht a dogfight would look like with 6 Hurricanes, P-40s, Buffalos, or P-39s facing 18+ Oscars might look like. Oscars in superior numbers should be more dangerous in WitP as it is modelled right now. Any a/c in superior numbers should be more dangerous. Unfortunately Oscars aren't.

Oscars in superior numbers are quite dangerous in WITP! Actually it seems that all planes in WITP are quite dangerous when having superior numbers!

My PBEM opponents have put the Oscar to good use. I don't understand why so many people seem to think that it's useless. As with many things in WITP the usefulness of planes, ships, subs or whatever depends to a large degree on player's actions.

[m10bob]

WHUTT we have HERE...Is FAILURE....to COMMUNICATE.......................
SUM pipples...yuh JUST KINT REACH...........
(from "Cool Hand Luke")

[Sneer]

Oscars ARE useful - I have almost 250 kills from oscar sqns by march42
BTW - site with gun values is great however to be more specific kinetic energy shoud be modelled- diffrent guns had diffrent parameters
BUt.... it would be REVOLUTION in WITP to have such values implemented

[Big B]

I know I missed something here in this thread[&:]...but if we assume the Ki43 series actually are miss-represented -

What was supposed to be the proposed change? Was this a plea for sharing the Zero Bonus, or a stat change...?[8|]

B

[TheElf]

No this was supposed to be a poll on players opinion of the Oscar in the Stock game. The purpose was to find support for the inclusion of Nik's Mod in the CHS. At least the A2A model and his specific individual aircraft tweaks

[Big B]

ORIGINAL: TheElf

No this was supposed to be a poll on players opinion of the Oscar in the Stock game. The purpose was to find support for the inclusion of Nik's Mod in the CHS. At least the A2A model and his specific individual aircraft tweaks

Check![;)]

[GaryChildress]

Back off topic on the usefullness of the Oscar compared to the Nate; I just got through watching a combat replay in a stock game where 23 of my Oscars destroyed all 3 Buffalos and 2 Demons of an enemy CAP without taking a single casualty of their own. Had they been Nates I'd probably have taken a few losses without shooting down a single enemy plane. Either that or it probably would have been a draw with no one scoring any kills.

Gary

[esteban]

Actually, in the PBEM game I am in, my Oscars have generally done fairly well, even against the AVG. However, I don't put the Oscars in a position where they have to "fight fair". Instead, I try to get 3-1 plus odds with them. But if the Allied player is predictable on where he places his CAP, you can do things like that.

Regardless of what happens, Oscars are better than the Nate. With PDU on, I just shut down the Nate production facilities, and expand the Oscar I factory in Gumma.

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: mc3744

I'm no expert on WWII fighters.

What I can say is that from the couple of books I read on the topic in the game the Oscar seem to under-perform with regard to history. But again I've little knowledge.

In my game as Allies they bother me only as CAP vs. unescorted bombers ar Irrelevant already pointed out.

As Jap I try to use them against unescorted bombers [:D]

They suck for everything else. I had 80+ exp Oscars shot down by Brewsters.
I was watching the BBC box set on WWII (great btw). there was an interview of British pilots fighitn in Burma.
One of them said, with the Buffalo's you were lucky to come back alive if you encoutered bad weather, let alone enemy fighters! [;)]

Their biggest strength was manueverability (they could out turn a Zero); their biggest weaknesses were pitiful armament and light construction. As long as the early war Allied pilots tried to "dogfight" with them they were very tough opponants as it played to their strength. But once even a Buffalo pilot learned not to play their game they were much less effective. I could easily see giving them a 3 month "bonus" at the start of the war asgainst anything but the AFV (who had already learned "dogfighting" was a bad idea against the extrodinarily nimble Jap fighters from Chanault).