Talk:Shoukaku/@comment-26885376-20150825224205/@comment-26963228-20150906100316

As BatMoule mentions, she was damaged several times whilst her sister Zuikaku remained mostly unscathed until Leyte (though Zuikaku did survive a bomb hit at the Battle of the Philippine Sea).

The funny thing is that Shoukaku is often rated as one of the best Japanese carriers due to the fact that she could take hits and live on to fight another day after being repaired. This is in contrast to most Japanese carriers, which tended to sink after their first instance of being properly damaged (think of Akagi, Kaga, Souryuu, and Hiryuu at Midway), generally due to poor design or poor damage control (often a combination of both). Taihou was probably the best designed carrier of the IJN, but she was lost after being relatively lightly damaged by a torpedo due to the damage control team fucking up severely and allowing gas fumes to build up in her. Shoukaku, on the other hand, behaved almost like an American carrier - routinely surviving large amounts of damage.

It is a bit funny to me, then, that she is an "unlucky" ship.