I dont care a fig about ENY or what they have the Brewster set at. I don't see what difference it can possibly make; the Spitfire V, Hurricane IIC, A6M5 (without being overloaded by fuel), 109F and a few others will ruin your day the same way. The Brewster is hardly the only manueverable fighter in AH? Its also not surprising that its flown like it is, its only strong point is its low wing loading, so thats how its going to be used. You cant BZ a P-47M while in a Brewster? so don't expect anybody else to try either.
The real complaint about ENY is actually related to seeing more perk planes in the MA then right? Get ez kills in BREW=perk pts= flying an F4U-4 or a Spit 14? Again, since Doras, P-51Ds, 109Ks, LA-7, Spit XVI, P-47M ect are not perked, I also se that as a mute point. Truth be told other than the Me 262...I dont see the reason to have perk pts at all anymore in AH. They would only make sense if the real top perfomers, all of them, were perked, but they are not. Somebody tell me how having 0 perk pts in any way handicaps a player in LWA as it is now? I dont see it, like I said, other than a Me 262 or an Me 163 sortie. Players so new to the game that they need to fly a BREW to get a perk ride are likely not going to be a threat in a better fighter anyways, they are going to merge with a Tempest, blow all their speed in a series of tight turns and die, or auger. I they suck in a F4U-1D they will suck in a F4U-1C.
So dont worry about it.
On to the historical part. The F4F/FM2 were more viable compared to the Zero because of their ruggedness. Not compared to the Brewster. So was the P-40 series. There is no evidence at all that the Zero in 1942 shot down many more Allied fighters than it lost in air combat. The only time the Zero really shone was in cases where they held all the cards; Pearl Harbor (surprise attack), Phillipines (most of the USAAC hit on the ground), China 1940 (vs I-16s), the tiny force at Wake island, the single raid on MIdway island (118 attackers vs 25 defenders). At both Coral Sea and Midway vs the USN carrier based F4Fs, they gave as good as they got and no better. Same in the Solomons and New Guinea 42-43, they were dangerous adversaries but did not gain air supremacy there. After 1942 it was all down hill. The Zero had the advantage in 1941-42 of being on the side that held the strategic initiative, backed up by land invasions that went their way.
The Dutch Brewsters flying in awfull conditions in the East Indies, did very well in their Brewsters, which were the B-339B/C models, based on the F2A-2, and the Japanese who fought them mentioned how manueverable they were and how well flown they were. Its innacurate to never mention them and just talk about Midway. Yes, the F3A-3 did poorly there, but the real math of it is interesting to look at. The 21 F3A-3s and 4 F4Fs scored 9 kills for 14 losses vs a force almost 4 times their size, and none of the VMF-221 pilots had ever been in combat before. Really not bad considering. Im not singing the praises of the F3A-3 but its highly doubtfull the reserve pilots of VMF-221 would have fared any better had they all been in F4Fs that day.
Just thought I would put that out there.
