Turnaround? Lowpe (J) vs Tiemanj (A) Stock

[Lowpe]

I tried Helens early on, and couldn't get them to hit those agile destroyers although I didn't fly at 2000. I flew at 1000, 5K-8K.

I will try again.[&o]

A nice bonus on the Lilly divebomber is that they can sortie from size 2 runways.

[Lowpe]

Japanese ship builders are still cranking out the ships. [:)] Generally they make a high speed run to Daito, like the Kiri here. Shakedown cruise? Not bleeding likely, full speed ahead and hope we dodge the enemy destroyers.

Some Es' have managed to speed out to sea for a full day and then turn west to the Bonins. Unfortunately, an E was caught making that run yesterday.

[Lowpe]

25mm AA will be arriving shortly in my Army aviation units. We can use them, especially since the Allies like using SBDs to hit my troops. A big boost in low altitude protection.

[Lowpe]

Lots of great terrain to hold here, just lack the fresh troops to do it.[:(]

Another concern will become ship bombardments.

Always a concern is the path of retreat.

[Lowpe]

You can see how battered the IJA is here. The defenders of Saigon got out while they could, but they are in serious need of some rest which they won't get.

[Lokasenna]

Hurray, more pictures!

[ny59giants]

Too bad the name "Bofor" is not in the Japanese language. [:D]

[Lowpe]

There is a really good 40 mm AA gun that becomes operational 9/45[X(]

There is some 40mm at the start of the war...mostly upgrades to 25mm, but I still have 56 active mostly in CD units I won't allow to upgrade.

[Lowpe]

I tried an experiment today.

I have run out of Naval pilots in the replacement pool. Have for pretty much most of the game. So, I emptied a fighter squadron of pilots and drew in kids from the training school.

However, my squadron leader had a very high leadership rating. 74 Leadership to be exact.

I got a great bunch of kids from the flight school....average air to air skill 35. Sometimes I can get very low trained kids, down in the teens.

So,then, to test my hypothesis I saved the game, replaced the leader with a 35 Leadership skill flunkie and restaffed the squadron with flight school students.

The results were identical.

Oh well, I was thinking that the better leader might cherry pick the kids from the flight school. Not to be.

[GetAssista]

Tapping the school pulls top students from top class first, and if you had this class filled and studying they are good, with best being in 40s skills/xp. But when all cream is pulled you won't get 30-40s until 1st next month AFAIK when school training happens. It is good practice to first pull from school into those pilot roles that need multiple skills, so that you can have lots of secondaries already in 30-40 range. I pull for fighters last )

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

Tapping the school pulls top students from top class first, and if you had this class filled and studying they are good, with best being in 40s skills/xp. But when all cream is pulled you won't get 30-40s until 1st next month AFAIK when school training happens. It is good practice to first pull from school into those pilot roles that need multiple skills, so that you can have lots of secondaries already in 30-40 range. I pull for fighters last )

Helpful, never studied it at all.[&o]

[Lokasenna]

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

Tapping the school pulls top students from top class first, and if you had this class filled and studying they are good, with best being in 40s skills/xp. But when all cream is pulled you won't get 30-40s until 1st next month AFAIK when school training happens. It is good practice to first pull from school into those pilot roles that need multiple skills, so that you can have lots of secondaries already in 30-40 range. I pull for fighters last )

Helpful, never studied it at all.[&o]

Actually... I don't think this is the case. It pulls from the top class first, yes - but the experience/skill levels are still random. I don't think the game tracks the individual pilots until they are pulled into units for the first time, at which point they are "created". I think. That's my observation, so take it with a grain of salt. But the number of pilots in each class of school, and in the replacements pool, are just that - a number of available pilots. The pilot doesn't seem to have skill levels assigned until pulled into a unit.

It's circumstantial, but I believe the following behavior supports this assumption. When you pull a pilot from the replacement pool, or from training school, what his top skill is will depend on what type of unit you are pulling him into. If you pull him into a fighter unit, it seems to me that his Air skill is slightly higher than the other skills. For an Army bomber unit, it will be Ground Bombing. For a float plane or patrol unit, it will be Naval Search. A recon unit, Recon. And so on...

Also, the experience level for each of the pilot school classes and the replacement pool is listed as a single number, when in fact it is an average. If it's 37, for example, when you draw replacements in big batches you'll get a range of pilot XP from around 31 to around 43 (I don't know the exact numbers, but that's about what I observe). You can notice this as you fill up entire units from the Replacement pool - their Experience (and skill levels) will be all over the board, but will average about what the Replacement or Pilot School class level average XP is listed as.

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna

ORIGINAL: GetAssista
Tapping the school pulls top students from top class first...

Actually... I don't think this is the case. It pulls from the top class first, yes - but the experience/skill levels are still random...

Did a quick test with 2x108 pilots pulled from 2nd class. Yes, you are right. Pulling from the particular class gives random skill in the range of the class. Thanks for clearing my misconception too [&o]

I mixed it with pulling from higher classes vs lower ones. Like, pulling multiskill recruits from replacement pool first, only then fill fighters, even if school is all what's left.

While I was at it, I put great overall commander in one squadron and totally rubbish one in another - quality of pulled recruits is the same. So commander skills seem to not matter at all for recruit quality.

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

While I was at it, I put great overall commander in one squadron and totally rubbish one in another - quality of pulled recruits is the same. So commander skills seem to not matter at all for recruit quality.

That is what I was crudely testing.

Now will the high experience skill be related to the mission the squadron is on? Torpedo skill vs Naval bombing skill etc.

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: Lowpe
Now will the high experience skill be related to the mission the squadron is on? Torpedo skill vs Naval bombing skill etc.

You mean what skills recruits get higher? Them depend only on the plane type I believe. E.g. some FP sentai can upgrade to A6M5 and then they will pull fighter recruits with Air/Staf not patrol recruits with NavS. Torpedo bomber sentai will pull recruits with NavT/NavB/GrdB/LowN no matter the mission it is on.

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

ORIGINAL: Lowpe
Torpedo bomber sentai will pull recruits with NavT/NavB/GrdB/LowN no matter the mission it is on.

Exactly my question.

[Lokasenna]

Yep, now you guys have got it [;)]. Commander skill does affect the rate of skill/experience gain, though... I believe Leadership is the only attribute that affects it.

[Lowpe]

May 29, 1944

Catch a Yank sub in the shallows....catch another in the the deep water and only put one hit on her. Big difference between shallows and deep water.

[Lowpe]

Relatively quiet here...

A mixed brigade is the equivalent of a division in this x3 terrain. Hopefully they can buy time to allow my shattered divisions time to replenish and re-organize.

[Lowpe]

Ship losses for the day...not bad at all.

I lost the AMc clearing mines, they got 25 mines before blowing up on one.[:(]

The two ships got caught by Fletchers...

We scored the sub....need to spend more time sinking his submarines.

Quiet day in the air 9 Japanese losses to 6 Allied. 7 of my losses were Betties torched on the ground...