S3 Series

Tis a good point, nothing says we have to use scouts. Odds are they make it to radar before we see them anyway. If they are NOE( don't see why they would), a quick launch will get us in position. Keeping fighters together gives us 1:1 odds to survive a big wing attack. If we use scouts, yes we may see them earlier, but those scouts will bear the brunt of the initial fighter wave.

Crappy thing about the TBDs is the Norden. They could level bomb to their hearts content without a major need to dive to our level. FGs on standby don't have much hope to catch them if the bombers come in high. Good thing is they are slow as hell so we have a long time in frame before we should see those.

If anything we could utilize early launch time to get a FG up high to pounce attacks when we get a warm fuzzy about Allied incoming.

Here is my perspective as CO of the 475FG....

We will do what we are ordered to do even if I totally disagree so barring Beaver posting something contrary we will fan out like a bunch of PBY's.

They have 43 fighters that will mostly likely all be in one big formation or within shouting distance.

We have 43 fighters. The current plan is to take 10-12 and scatter them searching for their 43. Our remaining 30 will sit in tower at the land base the enemy is attacking. Our best odds in a scramble will be 43 against our 30 as the scouts will be spread across the eastern side of the map. Under this scenario, when (if) the enemy is spotted I will order all 475FG not in visual contact with the enemy to rally at OUR CV or some other rear area spot that doesn't feed us into the Allied meat grinder in ones and twos. Once we rally into a coherent formation we will then head to the fight.

That is what I plan to do under current orders.

I don't want you to spread out so far from each other that you would lose icon range. All of your aircraft should be able to see the dots of their brother aircraft on either side, except for the end aircraft on each side of your string. If you spread out too far, you would be too vulnerable. I would expect they will come from the east, but don't go more than 20 minutes easterly, we don't want you too far away from support if you contact a large wing.

That is what we will do then. Line abreast search at limits of icon distance.

Thanks for the clarification.

Nothing says you have to patrol beyond what you think prudent. It may even make sense to sit in a central location inside radar coverage and move to intercept the enemy with altitude so you slow them down so the rest of the IJN force can scramble away and gain altitude. This is not an easy matchup considering the speed and firepower difference. The A6M5 is close to speed to about 5000ft with the F6F5 after which the hellcat is much faster. But the zero has an advantage in climb and you dont want those beasts diving on you so I expect the fighter action will start very high.

The key advantage is using IJN radar to dodge the enemy where possible and hopefully find their strike with little escort. Any fight on the deck should take place within Truk where there is some AAA protection from the various bases and AI ships.

The USN has numbers, speed, initial altitude, guns and armor. They can attack when and where they wish.

We have agility, radar and fighting over our bases. Mspiro who designed this map took me on a tour
earlier last week, and was pointing out the nests of 20mm and 40mm anti aircraft guns protecting the
fortress. Zeke pilots should not be afraid to dive out and ack drag when in serious peril. He said the 40mm
were especially effective.

Obviously they will hit us with their best coordinated big numbers fighter sweep initially, with bombers
coming in behind once we are battered and scattered and repairing. The trick will be to avoid, bob and weave with the
F6F's. There is no way under these rules we'll have fighting numbers at altitude when they arrive. Might be
best to keep the fight lower where we can have full numbers and ack working for us. This is not an easy
setup for the IJ. Have fun Beaver-san!

Think we need a little more detail in the next plan. Take off and find the enemy provides insufficient detail for those in the frying pan.

"Upon contact, and running west for your life, expect no help from scrambling aircraft as they all will be heading West as well."

475th pretty much all died within 10 miles of F20...low.


So here is what we discovered, F6F's outclimb Zeke 5s...handily.

They were 5k above us at initial contact, assuming they rolled when JABO called roll they easily climbed us.

Single con bee lined for us, ID'd us and then the higher cons came in....which asks the question how far is CV Dar?

F6F will turn with you for 90 degrees of turn...maybe 180.

If you match what GCI is calling, please ID yourself to increase GCI SA. Radar Contacts are radar contacts....

Suggest the 12 ship tasked for next First roll, don't go East..but Climb N/S/W and be prepared to help scrambling fighters....

Without Donkey Dar, we would not have intercepted inbound "bombers"....something to think about.

A6M bird cage 6 view will hide a con at 6:)

Dobs

From a scramble fighter point of view:

The initial scouting group on dar wasn't fanned out scouting, although by chance moving straight down the 6 grid east they actually went straight into the enemy's attack.
As I pointed out yesterday, the F6F's will not show themselves on dar until above 30,000 ft, and in numbers that will hopelessly outnumber our advance scouts. Running a
squad of advanced scouts as a group into the oncoming high alt enemy horde far away from the islands simply wastes one of our best fighter groups

------>There is no point, moving forward in this series, in sending out advanced scouts vs an enemy with greater numbers, greater alt and a stronger a/c. <-----

We have dar that sees 5 grids east (more than enough), and we are defending the islands. Keep our initial 12 a/c within the atoll ring at all times, and keep them climbing. Rely on island
dar only for the initial intercept vectors, it works fine. There is no chance, zero, that scrambled fighters can gain enough altitude to help with the initial enemy fighter sweep.
At all times we found them much higher than we could get. Our initial 12 scouts must only play cat and mouse with the high enemy sweep, do not take them on. Use
up their gas and stay safe and wait for the lower attacks to eventually come, where we can dominate over our bases and ack.

Play total defensive going forward, do not engage fighters far from the atoll with huge altitude advantages, and make them fight lower at our islands where we can beat them.
My 2 cents on frame 1 from where I sat.
<S>
tracer

from my perspective, I managed to stay up high and climb with the hellcats until eventually we were able to push em all low. This took awhile and was pretty nerve racking.
For what its worth I was high above and noticed two low groups. 1 was the fight that we lost some 475th guys, the other group was the TBDs. We did spot them without Jabo and FWIW the 475th tied up the 'cats and made it easy to wipe out the TBDs. Your efforts were not in vain.
Agreeing with tracer about the advance scouts. I wouldnt go out there with anything less than 34K and they can still catch you if they really want. I think we must achieve air superiority up high and then bounce the bombers once spotted in a blazing ball of fury.

Good inputs.

475th Followed Beaves inputs to remain as a group spread out line abreast at edge of icon range.

We climbed from the moment we took off, but were still below the F6Fs at contact.

Staying at the Atoll and climbing, or even going West and climbing is a good idea.

Glad to know we weren't sacrificed in vain.

We ended up lower because we were trying to 1) live, and 2) get out of the path of danger since we were the pins in the bowling tournament.

Glad you guys found the bombers, because when we were asked to provide dar it was a mess.

Dobs