Matrix Games Forums

Hi Symon, hi all,

so, me and Mr.Kane have been playing with the new DBB a/c files for some time now (more or less 4 months of game time).
We're now in Jan 1944 and so i think we have collected enough A2A results to be able to give some impressions.

I don't have any clue about the RL performances, so i believe they are all correct now.
What i do see every turn is that now the game overall balance has somehow changed A LOT.
Basically the new speed values given to the J2M, N1K and KI-100 lines have completely changed the A2A combat in the late war period.

The loss of mnvr at high altitude cannot compensate with the gain of speed at every altitudes imho.
Now the N1K is a roket and so is the J2M, and they basically roll over everything that isn't a P-47.
Just think that the George now is more than 50mhp faster than a P-40...
The Corsairs now have a max cieling lower than a N1K and, with equal speed, that means the N1K will Always get the "dive".
The Hellcat is outclassed both in speed and in altitude.
and so on...



So, under ONLY a gaming point of view, things haven't changed in a good way IMHO.
In stock Japan could compensate with numbers (thanks to production managment) and with the R&D the general inferiority of their airframes in late 1943 and 1944. The allies had lower numbers but better quality.
Now Japan has both quality and quantity.

Obviously it could be me and my inability to do the right thing (mr-Kane is a GREAT player, far better than me) and the right time, but my general feeling is that these new values, if they rapresent a more real simulation of the RL performances, do impact a lot on the gaming system, thus creating a situation which isn't exactly good for a balanced gaming experience.

Symon, you know how much i appreciate your work and i do love DBB, so please don't take it as a critic... it's just my impression. Obviously i could be wrong (i am wrong very often[:)]).

I'd like to hear what Tom (AKA mr.Kane) thinks about this

ORIGINAL: GreyJoy
Hi Symon, hi all,
<snip>
so, me and Mr.Kane have been playing with the new DBB a/c files for some time now (more or less 4 months of game time).
We're now in Jan 1944 and so i think we have collected enough A2A results to be able to give some impressions.

Hi GreyJoy.

There is no right or wrong. Your subjective thoughts are valuable. Thank you very much for taking the time to do this. Much appreciated.

The longest scenario I’ve written for a Babes CPX was 20 months. We don’t do PDU and the factory tweaking is right out. I suppose the whole econ thing has developed into the eggplant that ate Chicago. Michaelm was browbeat into tweaking pilots so Japan can acquire a gazillion 90 grade pilots. Against that and the production exploits, allowed by the game, giving Japan good planes does, indeed, seem a bit much.

I would be willing to peel back Jacks and Georges, somewhat. Would also think it appropriate to make a note that if you are playing Babes, PDU=off is preferred, and Realistic R&D is mandatory. Basically, the default game conditions. This has nothing to do with your results, just my response to fanboism.

I will run some more test scens, keeping your thoughts in mind. Thanks again.

Ciao. JWE

ORIGINAL: GreyJoy

Now the N1K is a roket and so is the J2M, and they basically roll over everything that isn't a P-47.
Just think that the George now is more than 50mhp faster than a P-40...
Obviously it could be me and my inability to do the right thing (mr-Kane is a GREAT player, far better than me) and the right time, but my general feeling is that these new values, if they rapresent a more real simulation of the RL performances, do impact a lot on the gaming system, thus creating a situation which isn't exactly good for a balanced gaming experience.

N1K and J2M are both IJN planes ... you don't have that many air groups to work with until you lose your CV's and neither are CV capable.

The IJA air groups are the majority and they are still pretty much the same. Now if the IJA could use IJN planes ... [;)]

ORIGINAL: Symon

ORIGINAL: GreyJoy
Hi Symon, hi all,
<snip>
so, me and Mr.Kane have been playing with the new DBB a/c files for some time now (more or less 4 months of game time).
We're now in Jan 1944 and so i think we have collected enough A2A results to be able to give some impressions.

Hi GreyJoy.

There is no right or wrong. Your subjective thoughts are valuable. Thank you very much for taking the time to do this. Much appreciated.

The longest scenario I’ve written for a Babes CPX was 20 months. We don’t do PDU and the factory tweaking is right out. I suppose the whole econ thing has developed into the eggplant that ate Chicago. Michaelm was browbeat into tweaking pilots so Japan can acquire a gazillion 90 grade pilots. Against that and the production exploits, allowed by the game, giving Japan good planes does, indeed, seem a bit much.

I would be willing to peel back Jacks and Georges, somewhat. Would also think it appropriate to make a note that if you are playing Babes, PDU=off is preferred, and Realistic R&D is mandatory. Basically, the default game conditions. This has nothing to do with your results, just my response to fanboism.

I will run some more test scens, keeping your thoughts in mind. Thanks again.

Ciao. JWE

Well, we're playing PDU=ON and Realisti R&D Off.
And Pax, it's not something related to "numbers" of sentais around.
The Georges simply outperforms everything isn't a P-47s, both when sweeping and when CAPping.

This is an example.
My pilots are crack ones (in allied standards): exp avg is 70+.
Layered CAP. 1944 allied Radar. Weather good.

Morning Air attack on Sabang , at 44,70

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid detected at 49 NM, estimated altitude 24,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 14 minutes

Japanese aircraft
N1K2-J George x 45

Allied aircraft
Spitfire VIII x 54
P-38F Lightning x 21
P-38H Lightning x 41
P-40K Warhawk x 41
P-40N5 Warhawk x 83
P-40N26 Warhawk x 13
F4U-1 Corsair x 15
F6F-3 Hellcat x 16

Japanese aircraft losses
N1K2-J George: 3 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
Spitfire VIII: 2 destroyed
P-38F Lightning: 3 destroyed
P-40K Warhawk: 9 destroyed
P-40N5 Warhawk: 7 destroyed
P-40N26 Warhawk: 1 destroyed

Aircraft Attacking:
22 x N1K2-J George sweeping at 20000 feet *

CAP engaged:
VMF-222 with F6F-3 Hellcat (0 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 20000 , scrambling fighters between 22000 and 24000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 13 minutes
VMF-311 with F4U-1 Corsair (0 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 20000 , scrambling fighters between 13000 and 20000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 14 minutes
No.81 Sqn RAF with Spitfire VIII (0 airborne, 11 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36770 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 36000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 17 minutes
No.152 Sqn RAF with Spitfire VIII (0 airborne, 10 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36770 , scrambling fighters between 12000 and 22000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 12 minutes
No.155 Sqn RAF with Spitfire VIII (0 airborne, 11 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36770 , scrambling fighters between 19000 and 24000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 13 minutes
No.615 Sqn RAF with Spitfire VIII (0 airborne, 10 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36770 , scrambling fighters between 18000 and 23000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 28 minutes
20th TRS with P-40N26 Warhawk (0 airborne, 10 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 26000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 20 minutes
8th FG/35th FS with P-38F Lightning (0 airborne, 16 on standby, 0 scrambling)
5 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 34500 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 34500.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 12 minutes
8th FG/36th FS with P-38H Lightning (0 airborne, 16 on standby, 0 scrambling)
5 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 35440 , scrambling fighters between 20000 and 35440.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 21 minutes
23rd FG/74th FS with P-40N5 Warhawk (0 airborne, 17 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 22000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 20 minutes
80th FG/88th FS with P-40K Warhawk (0 airborne, 16 on standby, 0 scrambling)
5 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 12000 , scrambling fighters between 12000 and 24000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 17 minutes
80th FG/89th FS with P-40K Warhawk (0 airborne, 15 on standby, 0 scrambling)
5 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 19000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 14 minutes
80th FG/90th FS with P-40N5 Warhawk (0 airborne, 16 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 22000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 17 minutes
348th FG/341st FS with P-40N5 Warhawk (0 airborne, 14 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 14000 and 20000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 16 minutes
80th FG/459th FS with P-38H Lightning (0 airborne, 15 on standby, 0 scrambling)
5 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 35440 , scrambling fighters between 21000 and 35440.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 29 minutes
311th FBG/528th FBS with P-40N5 Warhawk (0 airborne, 15 on standby, 0 scrambling)
5 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 14000 , scrambling fighters between 14000 and 23000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 18 minutes



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on Sabang , at 44,70

Weather in hex: Light rain

Raid detected at 18 NM, estimated altitude 24,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 5 minutes

Japanese aircraft
N1K2-J George x 45

Allied aircraft
Spitfire VIII x 50
P-38F Lightning x 17
P-38H Lightning x 41
P-40K Warhawk x 27
P-40N5 Warhawk x 71
P-40N26 Warhawk x 12
F4U-1 Corsair x 12
F6F-3 Hellcat x 16

Japanese aircraft losses
N1K2-J George: 5 destroyed

Allied aircraft losses
P-38H Lightning: 2 destroyed
P-40K Warhawk: 1 destroyed
P-40N5 Warhawk: 1 destroyed
P-40N26 Warhawk: 1 destroyed
F6F-3 Hellcat: 2 destroyed

Aircraft Attacking:
26 x N1K2-J George sweeping at 20000 feet *

CAP engaged:
VMF-222 with F6F-3 Hellcat (0 airborne, 8 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) not yet engaged, 4 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 20000 , scrambling fighters between 17000 and 21260.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 28 minutes
VMF-311 with F4U-1 Corsair (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
8 plane(s) not yet engaged, 4 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 20000 , scrambling fighters between 13000 and 19307.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 28 minutes
No.81 Sqn RAF with Spitfire VIII (0 airborne, 4 on standby, 0 scrambling)
8 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36770 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 21000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 14 minutes
No.152 Sqn RAF with Spitfire VIII (0 airborne, 4 on standby, 0 scrambling)
2 plane(s) not yet engaged, 7 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36770 , scrambling fighters between 13000 and 22000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 15 minutes
No.155 Sqn RAF with Spitfire VIII (3 airborne, 4 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) intercepting now.
7 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36770 , scrambling fighters between 16000 and 36770.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 23 minutes
No.615 Sqn RAF with Spitfire VIII (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
9 plane(s) not yet engaged, 2 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 36770 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 19000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 24 minutes
20th TRS with P-40N26 Warhawk (0 airborne, 6 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 20000 and 26000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 20 minutes
8th FG/35th FS with P-38F Lightning (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
9 plane(s) not yet engaged, 8 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 34500 , scrambling fighters between 18000 and 34500.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 16 minutes
8th FG/36th FS with P-38H Lightning (4 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) intercepting now.
5 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 35440 , scrambling fighters between 14000 and 35440.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 12 minutes
80th FG/89th FS with P-40K Warhawk (0 airborne, 11 on standby, 0 scrambling)
3 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 24000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 18 minutes
80th FG/90th FS with P-40N5 Warhawk (0 airborne, 8 on standby, 0 scrambling)
6 plane(s) not yet engaged, 4 being recalled, 1 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 22000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 41 minutes
348th FG/341st FS with P-40N5 Warhawk (0 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
1 plane(s) not yet engaged, 1 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 24000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 19 minutes
80th FG/459th FS with P-38H Lightning (0 airborne, 8 on standby, 0 scrambling)
9 plane(s) not yet engaged, 3 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 35440 , scrambling fighters between 14288 and 35440.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 13 minutes
311th FBG/528th FBS with P-40N5 Warhawk (0 airborne, 7 on standby, 0 scrambling)
7 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 3 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 14000 , scrambling fighters between 14000 and 23000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 38 minutes
23rd FG/74th FS with P-40N5 Warhawk (0 airborne, 17 on standby, 0 scrambling)
4 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 15000 , scrambling fighters between 15000 and 23000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 28 minutes
80th FG/88th FS with P-40K Warhawk (0 airborne, 12 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 1 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 12000 , scrambling fighters between 12000 and 24000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 17 minutes



Lost 52 planes for 8 N1K2....[X(]

if i did this against QBall in DBB with the old stock files, my Georges would be murdered. Now they perform like P-47s on the allied side.
In "stock" Japan in 1944 must be very carefull when sweeping. Basically only the KI-48 can sweep with the hope of obtaining a decent result.
Now i lose every sweep against J2M, N1K1, KI-48 and even against KI-100...only if i have P-47s at Max altitude on CAP i can hope to defeat the incoming sweep...but again considering that the P47 is my only offensive weapon, the eggs in my basket become really few[:D]

ORIGINAL: Symon
Would also think it appropriate to make a note that if you are playing Babes, PDU=off is preferred, and Realistic R&D is mandatory. Basically, the default game conditions. This has nothing to do with your results, just my response to fanboism.

Hear, hear!

Hi Guys,

Generally Symon a/c gives me to good navy fighters J2M & N1K. Both airframes let me fight on equal level Spit VII, F6F, F4U. Both are still dead meat for p-38, p-51 & p-47 on high alt. When I am able force this super fighter to fight at sea level I can get even 1:1 kill ratio.
I am not sure it good or bad. It depend where you sit right now -:)

And one more info we are in mid of Jan '44, GJ did not get his true super fighters yet.


I do believe that GJ p-40/f6f loses are result to be always the lower lever of his CAP, my N1K always attack them with dive bonus, and this bird has a lot of firepower.

The "defensive" skill of my pilots probably has something with it either. I am not moving any pilot to front line unit before his "defensive" skill reach 70 or 71. (I have learned hard way that is the only way to not get killed them to the last one by high alt sweeps).

Right we decided to remove Symon a/c data and get back original one back.

Tom

ORIGINAL: GreyJoy

Well, we're playing PDU=ON and Realisti R&D Off.
And Pax, it's not something related to "numbers" of sentais around.
The Georges simply outperforms everything isn't a P-47s, both when sweeping and when CAPping.

This is an example.
My pilots are crack ones (in allied standards): exp avg is 70+.
Layered CAP. 1944 allied Radar. Weather good.

Lost 52 planes for 8 N1K2....[X(]

1st this in not rule, just happen once
2nd this was 251 Ku-S1 (Tainan Air grope before renaming) Elite unit with all pilots exp 85+, no fatigue, damaged airframes. Yours pilots where fatigued after long reallocation flight. Yes I I'm impress either, but I cannot repeat it
Nicola this is very bad example, when we are talking about a/c changes. Are all my sweeps are look like that ?
Or just one for 30 ?

That was a bit extreme, i admit [:)], but was to give an idea of what we were saying.
Generally speaking the N1K now does to the allied fighters (except for the P-47) what the P47 does to the Jap fighters in stock.
Speed rules, let's face it. And with a speed of 400 and whatever the N1K line (and the J2M) outperforms the Hellcat and the Corsair, so to say everything the USN have at hand in 1944.
This may for sure be real (i know from Flying "IL2-Pacific fighters" online how good the N1K2 is), but in game terms it really changes the balance.
Our game is still lots of fun, doesn't matter what files we use.
What i'm trying to say is that i'm not whining (sp!?), just saying that, against a very good jap opponent (and you are a hell of a jap player, let me tell u), the allies cannot engagé in a frontal air war not even in 1944, as they should be IMHO.

In my game against QBall (i know every game is different) the N1Ks and the Jacks are still doing very well on the defence, even if they tend to lose, especially since i can outproduce QBall easily, but on the offense (sweep) the only weapon i have is the KI-84r and, with its SR=3 we all know you can perform only a very limited offensive (basically some ambush here and then)

But if Symon has the patience to make a couple of Sandbox scenarios to test the sweep and CAP abilities of the N1K and the J2M i think he'll be find out kinda easky what we're saying

I didn't see the original discussion on the redoing of aircraft stats. For the Japanese aircraft were the new stats based on American post war evaluations, or on more realistic wartime performance numbers? The post war flight tests were done on 100 octane avgas with the engines tuned to take advantage of the better fuel. The Japanese rarely had even 92 octane fuel when these aircraft were active and their engines were tuned accordingly.

Bill

Bill, I am surprised. Out of everyone, I would have thought you knew better. My stuff comes from US and Brit tests, dated 1943, 44, 45. They are quite clear and explicit that they are using 92 grade fuel. They are also quite clear and explicit that they are using boost pressures that were obtained from captured operational specification documents. It's all there, in black-and-white. No bull$hit, no nonsense.

I thought you were too old a bunny to buy into that urban nonsense crap. J

Oh, yeah, and then the next urban myth. Japan couldn’t make avgas because she was so technologically inferior. What a crock of nonsense.

IJN combat fuel specification was 92 CFR-M for fighters and later DB/TBs, 87 CFR-M for bombers and early DB/TBs, and 82-85 CFR-M for transport/utility/training.

The base gas was:
IBP ….. 60C max
10% --- 80C max
50% --- 105C max
90% --- 150C max
97% --- 170C max
Rvp …. < 0.6 kg/cm^2
+ 0.085 vol% max tetra-ethyl lead = 87 grade min
+ 0.10 vol% max tetra-ethyl lead = 92 grade min

This process was in place till Aug 1944. However, it was noticed that certain crudes from certain DEI fields would not “quite” reach the 92 CFR-M minimum, so in November 1942 the spec was relaxed to 91 grade “min”, but the process was not changed. Over 87% of all “92” grade fuel was indeed “92” grade, until 1944.

In June 1944 supply was critical, so attempts were made to increase avgas output per barrel. The 91 CFR-M specification was instituted universally and the refining specifications were changed (Mod-1):

Mod-1 specification
IBP ….. 60C max
10% --- 80C max
50% --- 115C max
90% --- 150C max
97% --- 170C max
Rvp …. < 0.6 kg/cm^2
+ 0.13 vol% max tetra-ethyl lead = 91 grade min

This resulted in recovery of an additional 25% of product (i.e., 300,000 kilolitres).

In 1945, supply was nonexistent, so attempts were made to increase avgas output per barrel yet again. The output requirements were relaxed to 87 CFR-M, for summer grade fuel, and the refining specifications were changed (Mod-2):

Mod-1 specification
IBP ….. 60C max
10% --- 90C max
50% --- 125C max
90% --- 180C max
97% --- 200C max
Rvp …. < 0.6 kg/cm^2
+ 0.15 vol% max tetra-ethyl lead = 87 grade min

This resulted in recovery of an additional 60% of product over Mod-1 (i.e., 1,000,000 kilolitres).

At the end of the war, in 1945, Japanese aviation fuel production, while small, was still making combat grade fuels. In 1945, 40% of all Japanese avgas production was Mod-1 91 grade fuel. Contrary to urban myth, Japanese refinery techniques and petroleum chemistry, were quite up to Western standards.

They did not have liquid phase catalysis technology, and their fundamental research was a day late and a dollar short, but they knew enough to do the ethylene bromide thing as a push to TEL. And their uses of analine was an eye-opener to us, not to mention their blending of iso-butane and iso-pentane. And what about ethyl-bromide (in Japanese, ethyl fluid) as an intermixture with TEL as an AD compound?

This urban myth, that Japan was pathetic, needs to be expunged, right now.

Symon you forget one important true here. History books are always written by the winner.

I don´t think so MrKane. He knows this very well, probably better than you, and probably from first hand experience.

JWE has good connections and is able to acquire primary sources at will, a big benefit for such an undertaking. Also, the data he is using is from during the war, not after the war. So in case you wanted to argue that the data might be tweaked to show better performance, better think again. This data was used to help pilots survive, inaccuracies could have led to wrong decisions and death. So chances are high that it was gathered with utmost attention to detail and dedication to reflect the true enemy performance.

Yep I know my English ..... I was not addressing his knowledge and ability to find sources. I was try to refer to urban legends he does mention in his post.
I am completely 100% convinced that Symon's work & informations are very accurate.

Ah misundersstood your post. Sorry. [8D]

Am sorry guys, didn't want to start another of "those" thread.
as i said before, i don't know anything about the RL specs or perfomances and i do believe there's no one better than the DBB team to do this job.
All my observations were simply...well, observations, impressions, nothing else.
And those "impressions" were just by a strictly gaming point of view. Game balance etc.

Not a critic.Not at all.

And, probably, my POV is subjected to the game i am playing where, as the allies, i'm getting my butt kicked even in 1944, so possibly the evidences i think i noticed cannot be translated in a general picture.
I just dropped in and said those things because i thought could be usefull for the developing of our beloved DBB mod, nothing else.

Hope it makes sense

ORIGINAL: Symon

Bill, I am surprised. Out of everyone, I would have thought you knew better. My stuff comes from US and Brit tests, dated 1943, 44, 45. They are quite clear and explicit that they are using 92 grade fuel. They are also quite clear and explicit that they are using boost pressures that were obtained from captured operational specification documents. It's all there, in black-and-white. No bull$hit, no nonsense.

I thought you were too old a bunny to buy into that urban nonsense crap. J

I did say I hadn't followed the original thread on this and I didn't bring it up due to any beliefs about inferiority of Japanese industry. I have read (possibly wrong information) that much of the testing done on Axis aircraft was with 100 octane avgas which was widely available to the US and British.

It's pretty obvious that the Japanese were not idiots. In 90 years they went from a medieval culture and technological level to a power strong enough to put both the US and the British Empire in the Far East on the ropes for a while and build an empire that covered a huge swath of the Earth's largest ocean in only 6 months. They largely caught the Allies off balance and unprepared, but they played a weaker hand excellently and came up with some technological innovations to boot.

Their industrial base was still much smaller than the west's and the fuel supply for ships and aircraft were in a crisis situation from 1943 onwards. Allied testing of the Raiden, Shinden, and Ki-84 all demonstrated good aerodynamics and good performance under good test conditions. You posted about Japanese avgas production, which was pretty decent for their industrial base with some new ideas the west hadn't tried. However, the supply was never enough. Part of this was due to the loss of so many tankers to submarines, but even near the DEI the Japanese had some fuel problems. At the Battle of the Philippine Sea the Japanese were hampered by poor quality bunker fuel (running pretty much pure crude), though they did have a decent supply of avgas.

I know by late 1944 the Japanese were sending people out to collect tree roots to make turpentine for aircraft fuel. They managed to make enough fuel to keep up some kind of air defense, but their fuel industry was pushed to the limit.

The late war Japanese fighters were also initially plagued with buggy engines. The Japanese were behind the west in engine design. Most of their early war engines were manufactured under license and based on western designs. The famous Sakae engine that powered the Zero was a licensed Gnome Rone engine. Japan hadn't licensed any powerful engines from anybody when the war broke out, most likely because nobody was selling their most powerful engines internationally. They did get license to build the DB-601 which powered a few aircraft, but the engine proved temperamental in the tropics.

They had to do a crash program to make their own large powerful engines from scratch. While they had the expertise to do it from experience building smaller engines, developing a new engine is as much art as science. Even in the west, new engine development was difficult. The new engines that powered the B-29 had a fatal flaw that resulted in a lot of engine fires on ops. The PW-2800 turned out to be one of the best radial engines ever designed and rock solid reliable, but it had a lot of teething problems when it was first introduced.

The Japanese problems were partially due to entering new territory with a new engine size design, but a lot of the issues were typical for any new engine program. They had fewer resources and less institutional knowledge to fall back on than somebody like Pratt and Whitney did. So it took them longer to work out the problems.

I know you are careful about your data sources, but everybody makes mistakes. Despite lots and lots of eyes on the details and a ton of collected expertise on the team when we were developing the original data set for the original version of AE, some errors slipped through (most of which were fixed with patches). I was positing a possible problem, it wasn't built on any conspiracy theory or anything else.

As you know, in engineering when something isn't working correctly it's common to spit ball possible sources of the problem and go from there. The most likely source is what changed most recently. I'm not a fan boy of either side, but it is unrealistic for late war Japanese fighters to take out all comers. The Japanese may have done better with these planes if they had a better experience pool to draw on late war, but I doubt they would have been war winners under any conditions.

The code can't model everything perfectly and somewhat minor changes can have dramatic effects. The air model is probably the best of the three combat models, but even it isn't perfect.

Peace,
Bill

Bill, John,

In my PBM we just don't have enough turns in with the new files (holiday and all) to have seen what Nic reported from his game. But...

Having seen what I have in A2A in AE, I strongly suspect the pilot experience model is the major factor. The difference in performance of the P-47 when piloted by ~50 to ~65 Exp versus a bunch with ~70 to ~80 Exp (against the same opponents) is just massive. And I mean even with other skills being much more comparable (but probably still somewhat different).

Mr Kane basically stated that position above. I think he's right. Not sure what the best approach is to addressing it.

Ok my 2c´s:

GJ, MrKane, I do think such threads are helpful to help to understand how the air model has changed with John´s tweaks. Thanks for providing first hand experience. [:)]

But I also think it is way early - and maybe the wrong PBEM - to assess the impact of the changes. Why? Because your whole conflict was shaped by the old air stats. Your mindset and offensive/defesive stance in the PBEM was as well. Right into an already expected and known situation, a brandnew variable is introduced that influences the tactical picture. This experience, in my opinion, is much different to an impression shaped by a whole conflict. I think we have to keep this in mind when using your game as reference, valuable as it is.

In addition, JWE pointed out that the new stats narrow the mission profile band where a certain airframe performs best. I think this is true, just by looking at the stats, and I think this is often neglected by players because the variations in strong and weak points of certain airframes were not as distinct before the change as they are now, while at the same time the delta in overall performance between airframes was larger before the stats changes. It is more important now to play an airframe to its strength. There are fewer overall performers now, instead there are planes which excel in a specific role but only perform mediocre in another.

There is another reason why the impact truly can only be assessed in a complete campaign. WitP is not about George vs. Thud. This impression might currently arise because both plane types arrivals mark significant changes in airframe quality relation of the two sides (and also because many PBEMs either recently arrived at this phase of war (again)), or just passed it, or ended at the end of this plane vs. plane shaped conflict - like my last PBEM. We are currently in preparations to begin a new PBEM and we will use the new plane stats, so we will be able to judge the changes early war and let our conflict be influenced and shaped by the new power relations. I very much look forward to this.

That said, I remember a discussion we had 2 years ago about pilot exp (and individual skill) impact on performance, and witpqs and myself had a long exchange about what would be the best way to address it.
We never came to an agreement on the second part – IIRC I favoured an approach to limit skill increase and increase its variation and witpqs preferred an approach where the impact of high skill would be reduced – but we always were in agreement on what the issue itself was:
High exp/high skill pilots perform too good ingame in relation to how easy they are trained ingame. In my opinion, and I am happy to see JWE agrees with us here, the premier reason was major, very early, patch, which increased training speed by an order of magnitude. I never understood this decision, and I believe it was simply implemented without much consideration, to satisfy a vocal crowd that did not fully grasp the implications of that change. This practically opened the door to retort pilots with 60/70/70 stats throughout the whole war with all obvious consequences. If there was one single thing I could make undone in WitP AE, it would be that ancient patch. But that is off topic and should be no part of a plane stats discussion.

Will stop the rambling now. Good discussion gents, I am really looking forward to contribute with own experience with the new stats in a couple of weeks.

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

Ok my 2c´s:

GJ, MrKane, I do think such threads are helpful to help to understand how the air model has changed with John´s tweaks. Thanks for providing first hand experience. [:)]

But I also think it is way early - and maybe the wrong PBEM - to assess the impact of the changes. Why? Because your whole conflict was shaped by the old air stats. Your mindset and offensive/defesive stance in the PBEM was as well. Right into an already expected and known situation, a brandnew variable is introduced that influences the tactical picture. This experience, in my opinion, is much different to an impression shaped by a whole conflict. I think we have to keep this in mind when using your game as reference, valuable as it is.

In addition, JWE pointed out that the new stats narrow the mission profile band where a certain airframe performs best. I think this is true, just by looking at the stats, and I think this is often neglected by players because the variations in strong and weak points of certain airframes were not as distinct before the change as they are now, while at the same time the delta in overall performance between airframes was larger before the stats changes. It is more important now to play an airframe to its strength. There are fewer overall performers now, instead there are planes which excel in a specific role but only perform mediocre in another.

There is another reason why the impact truly can only be assessed in a complete campaign. WitP is not about George vs. Thud. This impression might currently arise because both plane types arrivals mark significant changes in airframe quality relation of the two sides (and also because many PBEMs either recently arrived at this phase of war (again)), or just passed it, or ended at the end of this plane vs. plane shaped conflict - like my last PBEM. We are currently in preparations to begin a new PBEM and we will use the new plane stats, so we will be able to judge the changes early war and let our conflict be influenced and shaped by the new power relations. I very much look forward to this.

That said, I remember a discussion we had 2 years ago about pilot exp (and individual skill) impact on performance, and witpqs and myself had a long exchange about what would be the best way to address it.
We never came to an agreement on the second part – IIRC I favoured an approach to limit skill increase and increase its variation and witpqs preferred an approach where the impact of high skill would be reduced – but we always were in agreement on what the issue itself was:
High exp/high skill pilots perform too good ingame in relation to how easy they are trained ingame. In my opinion, and I am happy to see JWE agrees with us here, the premier reason was major, very early, patch, which increased training speed by an order of magnitude. I never understood this decision, and I believe it was simply implemented without much consideration, to satisfy a vocal crowd that did not fully grasp the implications of that change. This practically opened the door to retort pilots with 60/70/70 stats throughout the whole war with all obvious consequences. If there was one single thing I could make undone in WitP AE, it would be that ancient patch. But that is off topic and should be no part of a plane stats discussion.

Will stop the rambling now. Good discussion gents, I am really looking forward to contribute with own experience with the new stats in a couple of weeks.

I agree with opinion that our game should not be use as reference. I am still "noob" in PBEM. This my first game reaching beyond magic Aug '42 date. And my opponent is very experienced player, so I am trusting him when hi says that my airframes where overpowered, simply I do not have my own experience in area to question his judgment. Let see what feedback will came from game played by two experienced players.