Question on Japanese Aircraft

[Uncivil Engineer]

For now, 2 specific types - D4Y1-C Judy recon, carrier capable and A6M5 d-S night fighter, carrier capable.

We're playing DBB-C and I don't see any way to use these aircraft types. There are 2 units of the Judy recon that come as reinforcements in '43. There are no A6M5 d-S units listed as reinforcements.

I thought perhaps the D4Y1 Judy carrier-based units could be split in thirds, with one third changed to the recon, but that's not possible. Same with the night fighter. The carrier-based A6M5's can be split, but not changed to night fighter.

So what good are they?

We're in Oct '42 and the Judy recons just started producing. The night fighters are still in R&D.

Thanks for any info.

[Dante Fierro]

So what good are they?

Sight seeing?

[Jorge_Stanbury]

in a PDU off game, you will have to wait until squadrons 121 Ku T-1 and 503 Ku T-1 arrives before you can use D4Y1-C

for PDU off game perspective, J1N1-C is the more useful model, as most "Babs" squadrons upgrade to it

same goes with A6M5 d-S; there are 2 squadrons that can upgrade to the model, only these can use it; so build/ R&D accordingly

[Maallon]

You only rarely can convert squadrons to a different plane type like a DB to a RC.
The squadron needs an upgrade path for it.
I think you need to put the dedicated recon squadrons into the carriers, if you want that your carriers have recon squadrons.

Also every IJN Night Fighter squadron should be able to use the A6M5 d-S.
The same thing applies to every IJN Recon squadron and they should be able to use the D4Y1-C.
The advantage of these planes is that you can then put the squadron on a carrier and resize them.
(Given you don't have a HR against doing so).

The A6M5 d-S itself is a fairly poor night fighter...
The D4Y1-C is actually a better recon plane than the C5M2 Babs and it can be worthwhile to upgrade your squadrons to them.

Also this only applies if you have PDU on, otherwise things are more complicated...

[geofflambert]

Japanese night fighters are pretty much useless regardless of model. The Judy recon plane is excellent whether it's on carriers or not. If you want to use them on carriers for some devious plan you make up let the squadron start with 2 or 3 planes with replacements off. If you still have carriers by the time you get them I wouldn't likely risk them getting close enough to enemy territory to recon it, though. If nothing else you'll be able to use them to keep track of the Soviets after you invade the USSR.

[Uncivil Engineer]

in a PDU off game, you will have to wait until squadrons 121 Ku T-1 and 503 Ku T-1 arrives before you can use D4Y1-C

for PDU off game perspective, J1N1-C is the more useful model, as most "Babs" squadrons upgrade to it

same goes with A6M5 d-S; there are 2 squadrons that can upgrade to the model, only these can use it; so build/ R&D accordingly

In DBB-C I don't see any squadrons that can upgrade to the A6M5 d-S. Perhaps they haven't arrived yet, but the reinforcement queue gives no info on future upgrades. Do you know which squadrons can upgrade?

The 3 active C5M2 Babs squadrons are upgrading to the J1N1-C Irving. I assume the one C5M2 reinforcement squadron can do the same. These can also upgrade to the Myrt, which has a slightly longer range than the Irving and uses only 1 engine (but of a different type).

Thanks for any additional information.

[IdahoNYer]

Respectfully, Jorge is incorrect, in addition to the two Sentais mentioned as reinforcements, the Yokosuku Ku-T1 flying the Mavis can equip with the D4y1-C Judy in PDU off. Has to go to the Mavis-5 first.

For the A6M5d-S Zero, the Zero equipped Tainan Ku-S-1 Sentai can get them after receiving the Irving. Two other late arriving Sentais, S-804 Hiotai and S-812 Hikotai take the A5M5d-S Zero.

All according to Tracker of course.....

[Lowpe]

The Zero NF is worth it --- you can convert your 18 plane squadron of Irving to Zero NF, move it onto a carrier, and resize it to size 24 to 36 (or even more) if you got approval from the Allied player first. Then you could convert it back...pdu on of course... to the NF of your choice.

Japanese Night Fighters are very much worth it as you can blunt the night bombing campaign greatly. Of course, if the Allies don't pursue a night bombing strategy...well then I guess they are worthless.

In Dababes games there are quite a few Japanese planes that you can't fly. I forget them all, but they are planes most JFBs don't fly much if at all.

[IdahoNYer]

Lowpe - not to hijack a thread, but a question.....

What advantages to Japanese night fighters have that do no have radar over normal fighters?

[IdahoNYer]

Lowpe -not to hijack a thread, but a question non the less......

What is the advantage of Japanese night fighters that do not have radar over normal fighters used at night?

[geofflambert]

Lowpe -not to hijack a thread, but a question non the less......

What is the advantage of Japanese night fighters that do not have radar over normal fighters used at night?

He said the advantage was you could upsize the squadron on a CV then convert the squadron to a night fighter with radar. Most of the IJN night fighters have radar. I don't think much of night bombing so I wouldn't worry about it, though.

[Jorge_Stanbury]

Respectfully, Jorge is incorrect, in addition to the two Sentais mentioned as reinforcements, the Yokosuku Ku-T1 flying the Mavis can equip with the D4y1-C Judy in PDU off. Has to go to the Mavis-5 first.

For the A6M5d-S Zero, the Zero equipped Tainan Ku-S-1 Sentai can get them after receiving the Irving. Two other late arriving Sentais, S-804 Hiotai and S-812 Hikotai take the A5M5d-S Zero.

All according to Tracker of course.....

yes I stand corrected; you are right the Yokosuka Ku-T1 can go from H6K4 to H6K5 to D4Y1-C
somehow I thought the tracker was bullet proof; but I guess it won't go deeper than 1st upgrade... and the Japanese did some very bizarre upgrading... the beauty of PDU-OFF

And unless there is another hidden Sentai, the 2 squadrons that upgrade to A5M5d-S are S-804 and S-812 Hikotai, both arrive as reinforcement quite late (in 1944) as J1N1-S

With regards to using A5M5d-S for carrier size resizing; if I was the Allied player, I would demand, in general, a maximum resizing limit; I consider resizing to CVE/ CVL size (27 or 30 planes) OK but I would consider gamey if somehow every enemy squadron is sized to 81 planes (as Akagi/ Kaga)

[Uncivil Engineer]

Thanks for the info!

I had 2 sites researching the A6M5 d-S, which I now know is at least 1 too many. So, I changed it to A6M2 Sen Baku (for lack of a better idea). Both arrive in '44, which may be too late to matter.

[JanSako]

I was thinking about the resizing of naval air squadrons as being gamey or not.

Why would you think of it as gamey if the Allied player can do it too? Even the 'ahistorical' aspect is debatable, IJN (well, both sides) would have surely fielded more squadrons if they had the pilots/planes/logistics for it? I can see the argument that supply is cheap & plentiful in all but DBB-C scenarios which pushes the 'cost' of fielding planes way lower, but again that is true for both sides.

Also, since it is only for carrier-capable groups, and ones that do not yet have a resize in the pipeline, I would think the allied player has many more of them, and larger CV's later on?

I was thinking of maxing out the size of all IJN units that I can, then split them into 3rds and use 1/3 front line - 2/3 pilot training.

For the allied player the limitation will be airframes (at first), for Japan it will be availability of air support to field them outside Home Islands - in the mod I am playing the build-up is also much slower, in addition to having significantly less air support availability than 'usual'.

[Maallon]

I was thinking about the resizing of naval air squadrons as being gamey or not.

Why would you think of it as gamey if the Allied player can do it too? Even the 'ahistorical' aspect is debatable, IJN (well, both sides) would have surely fielded more squadrons if they had the pilots/planes/logistics for it? I can see the argument that supply is cheap & plentiful in all but DBB-C scenarios which pushes the 'cost' of fielding planes way lower, but again that is true for both sides.

Also, since it is only for carrier-capable groups, and ones that do not yet have a resize in the pipeline, I would think the allied player has many more of them, and larger CV's later on?

I was thinking of maxing out the size of all IJN units that I can, then split them into 3rds and use 1/3 front line - 2/3 pilot training.

For the allied player the limitation will be airframes (at first), for Japan it will be availability of air support to field them outside Home Islands - in the mod I am playing the build-up is also much slower, in addition to having significantly less air support availability than 'usual'.

The Japanese side has the planes to fill out their squadrons already in the early game while the Allies will struggle with even filling their default squadrons.
The problem here is imbalance, theoretically I could resize every single IJN fighter squadron to size 80 and fill them with Zeros. If for example I do this with 5 squadrons I have 400 fighters that I could bring to bear at once at any allied opposition.
The Allies cannot reasonably defend themself against so many fighters in 1942.

The ahistorical aspect here is doctrine, I think the Japanese never fielded squadrons larger than 45 planes.
You need to manage these number of fighters in the air, avoid collisions and keep them in formation.

Ultimately it boils down to the players and every PBEM need to set this straight individually.
But I could imagine that not every Allied player will think of 400 sweeping Zeros as particularly fun to deal with in 1942...

[Uncivil Engineer]

I was thinking about the resizing of naval air squadrons as being gamey or not.

Why would you think of it as gamey if the Allied player can do it too? Even the 'ahistorical' aspect is debatable, IJN (well, both sides) would have surely fielded more squadrons if they had the pilots/planes/logistics for it? I can see the argument that supply is cheap & plentiful in all but DBB-C scenarios which pushes the 'cost' of fielding planes way lower, but again that is true for both sides.

Also, since it is only for carrier-capable groups, and ones that do not yet have a resize in the pipeline, I would think the allied player has many more of them, and larger CV's later on?

I was thinking of maxing out the size of all IJN units that I can, then split them into 3rds and use 1/3 front line - 2/3 pilot training.

For the allied player the limitation will be airframes (at first), for Japan it will be availability of air support to field them outside Home Islands - in the mod I am playing the build-up is also much slower, in addition to having significantly less air support availability than 'usual'.

The Japanese side has the planes to fill out their squadrons already in the early game while the Allies will struggle with even filling their default squadrons.
The problem here is imbalance, theoretically I could resize every single IJN fighter squadron to size 80 and fill them with Zeros. If for example I do this with 5 squadrons I have 400 fighters that I could bring to bear at once at any allied opposition.
The Allies cannot reasonably defend themself against so many fighters in 1942.

The ahistorical aspect here is doctrine, I think the Japanese never fielded squadrons larger than 45 planes.
You need to manage these number of fighters in the air, avoid collisions and keep them in formation.

Ultimately it boils down to the players and every PBEM need to set this straight individually.
But I could imagine that not every Allied player will think of 400 sweeping Zeros as particularly fun to deal with in 1942...

Yeah, but!
How long does it take Japan to build 400 A6M2 Zeroes? And what is the quality of the pilots? And what is the cost in supply and HI? Those who think this is gamey are probably right, but Japan has enough problems without shooting itself in the foot. IMO.

[Maallon]

I was thinking about the resizing of naval air squadrons as being gamey or not.

Why would you think of it as gamey if the Allied player can do it too? Even the 'ahistorical' aspect is debatable, IJN (well, both sides) would have surely fielded more squadrons if they had the pilots/planes/logistics for it? I can see the argument that supply is cheap & plentiful in all but DBB-C scenarios which pushes the 'cost' of fielding planes way lower, but again that is true for both sides.

Also, since it is only for carrier-capable groups, and ones that do not yet have a resize in the pipeline, I would think the allied player has many more of them, and larger CV's later on?

I was thinking of maxing out the size of all IJN units that I can, then split them into 3rds and use 1/3 front line - 2/3 pilot training.

For the allied player the limitation will be airframes (at first), for Japan it will be availability of air support to field them outside Home Islands - in the mod I am playing the build-up is also much slower, in addition to having significantly less air support availability than 'usual'.

The Japanese side has the planes to fill out their squadrons already in the early game while the Allies will struggle with even filling their default squadrons.
The problem here is imbalance, theoretically I could resize every single IJN fighter squadron to size 80 and fill them with Zeros. If for example I do this with 5 squadrons I have 400 fighters that I could bring to bear at once at any allied opposition.
The Allies cannot reasonably defend themself against so many fighters in 1942.

The ahistorical aspect here is doctrine, I think the Japanese never fielded squadrons larger than 45 planes.
You need to manage these number of fighters in the air, avoid collisions and keep them in formation.

Ultimately it boils down to the players and every PBEM need to set this straight individually.
But I could imagine that not every Allied player will think of 400 sweeping Zeros as particularly fun to deal with in 1942...

Yeah, but!
How long does it take Japan to build 400 A6M2 Zeroes? And what is the quality of the pilots? And what is the cost in supply and HI? Those who think this is gamey are probably right, but Japan has enough problems without shooting itself in the foot. IMO.

It would be definitely a shot in the foot to do this.
I think the only reason to follow this strategy would be to try achieve auto victory as early as possible.

Regarding pilots and planes, I have not tested this before, but I think it could be doable to pull this off by April or May 1942. You would need to constantly upgrade the Zero factory/factories and resize the squadrons as soon as possible to start pilot training on them.
This is all just a thought experiment, but even if 400 Zeros are not possible, 300 Zeros could already pose a significant problem, too.

[JanSako]

We could argue that Allies cannot reasonably defend themselves against 50 Zeros in the first 6 months so what is the point of bringing more? That was a joke, yes, more planes can cover more bases, making you be strong everywhere.

Do we agree that past mid-43 this is irrelevant, right? If at that point an allied player pushes his DS into a 400 strong IJN CAP, they will probably still survive, and if not then it is their own fault...

This is a month into my game (Bottlenecks mod):
- I have a grand total of 200 land based navy fighters in 7 groups, 60 are still Claude's. Some of which cannot be resized right away cause they have a resize coming. 3 groups will withdraw in/by April '42.
- there are 5 more group reinforcements until Feb '43, giving me a theoretical max 9*81 Zeros. I am pushing production to the max I can, I will have 90/month reached at some point in late January. So with essentially 0 combat losses 'maybe' I could fill those squadrons out with planes. (cause I have to keep the CV groups flying too!)
And we need training groups too, right?

It is real interesting how much difference the Bottlenecks mod makes:

- there is no way I can deploy enough air support to concentrate that much airpower into one area & still have remotely enough for everywhere else. SRA oil production must be protected & Nate's simply won't do. Japan only gets a bit over 200 days worth of oil!
- my economy cannot handle higher HI production, I simply cannot ship enough resources to Japan to expand HI much more than it is at game start. So if I want more industrial output I need to expand HI in places where RES are produced, which means I need to capture those places first & of course it takes time ( & cost a s-ton of supplies) to build said HI. By the time this happens, it will be mid-43 or later. Oh, in Bottlenecks only LI makes supplies .

Your point about the doctrine is well taken & it is one that probably sits best with me, although one can always split these (& should, arguably) & 81/3 is 27 which is a 'normal size'...

[Maallon]

We could argue that Allies cannot reasonably defend themselves against 50 Zeros in the first 6 months so what is the point of bringing more? That was a joke, yes, more planes can cover more bases, making you be strong everywhere.

Do we agree that past mid-43 this is irrelevant, right? If at that point an allied player pushes his DS into a 400 strong IJN CAP, they will probably still survive, and if not then it is their own fault...

This is a month into my game (Bottlenecks mod):
- I have a grand total of 200 land based navy fighters in 7 groups, 60 are still Claude's. Some of which cannot be resized right away cause they have a resize coming. 3 groups will withdraw in/by April '42.
- there are 5 more group reinforcements until Feb '43, giving me a theoretical max 9*81 Zeros. I am pushing production to the max I can, I will have 90/month reached at some point in late January. So with essentially 0 combat losses 'maybe' I could fill those squadrons out with planes. (cause I have to keep the CV groups flying too!)
And we need training groups too, right?

It is real interesting how much difference the Bottlenecks mod makes:

- there is no way I can deploy enough air support to concentrate that much airpower into one area & still have remotely enough for everywhere else. SRA oil production must be protected & Nate's simply won't do. Japan only gets a bit over 200 days worth of oil!
- my economy cannot handle higher HI production, I simply cannot ship enough resources to Japan to expand HI much more than it is at game start. So if I want more industrial output I need to expand HI in places where RES are produced, which means I need to capture those places first & of course it takes time ( & cost a s-ton of supplies) to build said HI. By the time this happens, it will be mid-43 or later. Oh, in Bottlenecks only LI makes supplies .

Your point about the doctrine is well taken & it is one that probably sits best with me, although one can always split these (& should, arguably) & 81/3 is 27 which is a 'normal size'...

Okay, I have no experience with the Bottlenecks mod so I can't comment how things stand there.

The question of whether the Allied player can deal with a 400 fighter strong CAP(or sweep) in mid 43 will depend on the state of the game. If for example Japan already got its hands on the first George model and the Allies suffered heavy fighter losses until mid 1943(partly because of oversized IJN squadrons) then no, they will probably not be able to deal with this.
If on the contrary the Allies have a healthy fighter/pilot pool and the Japanese still fly the by then obsolete A6M2 then things stand better for the Allies.
But it all really depends on the state of the game.

Something I would like to note is that you need to consider HI costs throughout your entire game.(And also supply expenses for your industry expansions)
The amount of HI you will produce is finite and in conclusion every HI point spent can no longer be spent for something else. So yes you can produce several hundred A6M2s per month in 1942, but every A6M2 you produce is a George, Sam, or subsequent Zero model that you no longer will be able to produce later on.
Also, If the Bottleneck mod didn't change research chains then you cannot upgrade your A6M2 factory to the A6M3/3a/5.
If you plan to achieve auto victory as soon as possible, this is not a huge issue, as you don't want to see the late game anyway. But if you are in for a longer game, you may need to take care not to overproduce at the beginning.

[Lowpe]

Lowpe - not to hijack a thread, but a question.....

What advantages to Japanese night fighters have that do no have radar over normal fighters?

NF are not hit with a malus for fighting at night, like regular fighters are. You can generally trade 1-1 with beasts which is actually a vp gain for Japan. It takes work to do that though...from almost the start of the game.

Allied bombers are not hit with a malus for fighting at night...hence why they outperform against non-NF at night.