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Several months ago I started grand campaign playing Allies against AI Japan. Currently I am in the second half of 1943. I have a feeling that since last patch I am loosing air war against japanese figthers. Previously I was winning the air war with my P40s, Aircobras and Hurricanes, taking advantage of war of exhaustion, my deeper pilot pool and overagressivness of AI. Now old and unexpected enemy surfaced from ashes - Ki43, and Zero fighter to a lesser degree.

Ki43 in Malaya and Burma started decimating my Hurricane squadrons. I tried to counter it with the latest and greatest American wing of P38H Lightnings (mid to high 60 average experience) but it got beaten so severly that I reverted back to P40K, which seemed to hold the ground a little bit better. I have also replaced one squadron of Hurricanes with Mohawks that have better manueverability ratings. Now, as far as I keep defensive I am able to hold my ground. The new squadron of Thunderbolts also helped a lot and this is the only plane type I am confident to use for offensive missions such as sweeps.

The US navy started receiving Hellcats month ago and since then I ventured on sea offensive. Wildcats turned out to be completely innefective, the hecatomb losses were prevented only by their sturdy construction. I managed to take Eniwetok, Marcus Island and started the invasion of ChiChi Jima. That provoked Japanese to counter strike with a carrier task force. The resulting series of battles ended up with apalling losses. Japanese strike has been destroyed utterly due to my superiority of numbers. The Japanese escort, though inadequate, scored supprisingly good against my Hellcats. Similiarly my air strikes were a complete disaster. Landbased P40K (70+ exp) were decimated. The air strike was welcomed by huge anti aircraft fire prior to even meeting enemy CAP??? The escort of Hellcats acted as shooting targets for 50 Zeros, scoring only few damaged planes and one or two kills in spite of equality in numbers. Then the Japs went for my bombers. Then the rest of the bombers have been welcomed again by strong AA fire. All in all I have lost more than 200 planes against 100+ in 2 days. None of the ships on any side was damaged.

I have to frankly state that I have cheated and went back to one of my previous saves and checked the pilot experience [:o]. In general my fighters are better trained. They fly better aircrafts, still they are inefective in offensive missions, or at least not effective when pitted against similarly trained Japanese. I tried to fly hight (alt 20000) and keep my escort on the same alt as bombers. I tried to fly in leyers on different altitudes. No matter. Hellcats and Corsairs are beaten by Ki43 and Zeros and they can not provide effective escort to my bombers. Nate's are the only usual prey, even though they are tough too, damaging many aircrafts and scoring occasional kill. P38s landed in the dumpster of history as the most useless plane ever built [:(]

So what do you do? Any advice welcomed.

Can you tell us what difficulty level you are playing on? And, has that remained constant throughout the game? To me it sounds like you started on historical or hard and then moved to very hard. On very hard the Japanese aircraft will be extremely difficult to defeat.

I play on historical difficulty setting. I guess my tactic is wrong. Most of the time I set my escort at 15K feet and bombers at 10K. Only recently, after seeing some posts on the forum, I started setting the altitude of the fighters the same as the bombers. In that case though escort planes seem to act as a passive shield and are on tactical disadvantage. They dodge enemy bullets but are rarely able pay them off. After short fight the enemy damages and kills many of my fighters and still has enough planes to destroy bombers.

After short fight the enemy damages and kills many of my fighters and still has enough planes to destroy bombers.

You need lots of escorts to adequately escort bombers. I am very careful with these raids. Generally I will sweep a target for several turns prior to escorted bombing raids. On the other hand, B17/24s at 15k don't normally need escorts unless they hit a mass of fighters.

I took advice of Russian generals and gave another battle, this time with huge superiority of numbers on my side [:'(]. Japanese managed to shot down 40 of my fighters taking several losses but I had over twice the number of fighters so they were not able to do much damage to my bombers this time. However I must say the Japanese AA is impressive. One thing is for certain though - Hellcat is just a stop gap. I need jets [:)].

You need lots of escorts to adequately escort bombers. I am very careful with these raids. Generally I will sweep a target for several turns prior to escorted bombing raids. On the other hand, B17/24s at 15k don't normally need escorts unless they hit a mass of fighters.

You are right. I am implementing the same tactic right now in Indochina. Unfortunately I only have one wing of Thunderbolts. I do not want to risk my British suqadrons, as I do not have any more reserves and they would be beaten up anyway. In a month I should start receiving Spitfires. If the experience from New Ginea theater holds true, that should switch the odds in my favour.

It is harder in case of naval battles though, as I can not (or do not know how to) select the target of sweep in advance. It would be nice if I could put some of my fighter planes as a high cover of the air strike so they can engage enemy fighters without beeing burdened with close bomber escort duty.

After short fight the enemy damages and kills many of my fighters and still has enough planes to destroy bombers.

You need lots and lots of escorts for escorted raids. I agree with you about the P38, I use for training pilots for the P47d25. I have reasonable success with Hellcats and Corsairs. Try sweeping a few turns before sending an escorted raid, seems to help a lot.

I'm playing Ironman on "very hard" in May 43 and my P40s, Wildcats and Corsairs have performed very well. The P38, as of yet, seems to be garbage, so hopefully the J upgrade will restore its reputation.

I sweep the hell out of target for several turns prior to sending in any type of bombers. 17k ft seems to be the sweet spot for my Wildcats and Corsairs. I don't even bother using the escort option as my LB losses seem to come from AAA (I bomb low ~5,000 ft) The concurrent fighter sweeps seem to pick up any stragglers, so my bombers don't get hassled too much from the air, but the Japanese AAA is very impressive in AE.

I'm amazed at your casualty figures. I have been trying to goad the Japanese into a huge air battle, but even when the Japanese send a mass of aircraft at a hex with 3 CV TFs in them, the loses are only a handful. I took out the KB in late 42 (and there were some huge body counts on both sides taking it out), so I am wondering if the land-based pilots are less aggressive than the carrier piolts and tend exercise extreme caution. This may explain why I can't get anything remotely resembling a "turkey shoot".

How did you take out the KB in late 42?

ORIGINAL: usersatch

I'm playing Ironman on "very hard" in May 43 and my P40s, Wildcats and Corsairs have performed very well. The P38, as of yet, seems to be garbage, so hopefully the J upgrade will restore its reputation.

I sweep the hell out of target for several turns prior to sending in any type of bombers. 17k ft seems to be the sweet spot for my Wildcats and Corsairs. I don't even bother using the escort option as my LB losses seem to come from AAA (I bomb low ~5,000 ft) The concurrent fighter sweeps seem to pick up any stragglers, so my bombers don't get hassled too much from the air, but the Japanese AAA is very impressive in AE.

I'm amazed at your casualty figures. I have been trying to goad the Japanese into a huge air battle, but even when the Japanese send a mass of aircraft at a hex with 3 CV TFs in them, the loses are only a handful. I took out the KB in late 42 (and there were some huge body counts on both sides taking it out), so I am wondering if the land-based pilots are less aggressive than the carrier piolts and tend exercise extreme caution. This may explain why I can't get anything remotely resembling a "turkey shoot".

A bit of luck, a bit of bad AI decisions. The AI seemed fixated on invading Townsville and Rockhampton AND Midway and the Aleutians in 42. They split the KB to cover the Coral Sea and the Midway area. I only used two CVs to take out the Coral Sea group. It also helps that mini KB got too close to the OZ coast, as I sent two PT TFs on a one way trip. Scratch two CVs and three CVLs. I had a weird feeling that they would be pulling something near Midway, so I rushed all 6 CV TFs, BBs, and CAs and pulled a Midway. Scratch 4 CVs (maybe 5) and a huge invasion TF. I let them have the Aleutians, but fortified Dutch Harbor, so that's as far as they will go. Hiyo, Junyo, Shakaku, Soryu, Kaga, Zuikaku, Zuiho, Shoho, Ryujo, and Akagi. LBA was no help, I did everything with TBs, DBs, and PT boats.

There are two Japanese CVs operating close to Rangoon/Singapore, but other than that, I haven't seen an IJN carrier in almost 6 months.

any chance you are playing "quite China" or have silenced opposition elsewhere (SW Pacific)? This allows the AI to overload in Burma. It is hard to keep ahead because the AI gets many more planes. Best strategy is to just use land forces to take air bases. Also, the AI will keep doing sweeps against you . Good fighters at high altitude will eventually wear the AI out. Except for the home islands. Once you start doing carrier strikes there in 45 the AI will always outnumber you and you will lose lots of ships.