Zero vs Hellcat

[Quetzal]

I have recently purchased the game. Only played a bit of the tutorial so far. However, I've been watching a lot of early (Dec '18) videos.

Outside the insanely effective AA/AAA, it is incredibly noticeable in the early release (at least) that the Mitsubishi A6M seems to slaughter US Hellcats in job lots. At least one video I saw had a kill ratio of 7-10 Hellcats for one A6M. Is this still the case 9 months after release, or has this issue been addressed? Or, for that matter, is this WAD? I am aware that early war F6F's weren't much to write home about, but they weren't THAT bad.

Any response appreciated.

[ZiffyHead]

The Japanese fighters seemed to be pretty balanced in my game a few weeks ago.

Nothing like you are worried about.

The Japanese fighters are pretty good early on and you may lose 3 fighters and only kill 1 or 2 of theirs, but that turns around as American planes advance and upgrade.

[Quetzal]

Originally posted by ZiffyHead:

The Japanese fighters seemed to be pretty balanced in my game a few weeks ago.

Nothing like you are worried about.

The Japanese fighters are pretty good early on and you may lose 3 fighters and only kill 1 or 2 of theirs, but that turns around as American planes advance and upgrade.

Thanks for the response. I can live with a 2-3 to 1 kill ratio for a lot of reasons. The A6M was a good airframe early on, Japanese pilots were superbly trained (until the IJN started running out of warm bodies), a lot of them had seen action in the Sino-Japanese war of 1937, not to mention the Philippines and island campaigns, vs fairly green US pilots in aging equipment. Sounds like the devs balanced the A6M to make it more historically accurate. Good on 'em.

[Quetzal]

This proves I should never post while drinking scotch. My question should have been about the F4F Wildcat not the F6F Hellcat vs the A6M. The Hellcat was specifically designed to counter the Zero.