#37 Santa Cruz Hornet - Ready

Thats okay, some units are specifically geared to specific playstyles. Given how good yorktown and enterprise are in regular games

No disagreement.  However, the ExB+survival SA combination is already done, and done well. Repeating that becomes a choice between bookmark or powercreep.
It needs to be its own thing

What if we gave her one of the following mechanics:
(1) Dice reroll (limited or full)
(2) Bonus damage

For (1.1) we could have: Experienced Bombers 2: Once per turn, you may choose a friendly Dive Bomber. That Dive Bomber may reroll up to 2 attack dice during your Air Attack Step.

For (1.2): Experienced Bombers: Once per turn, you may choose a friendly Dive Bomber. That Dive Bomber may reroll its Bomb attack.

For (2) we could have: Once per turn, when an enemy Ship is damaged by a Bomb attack from a friendly Dive Bomber, roll a die. On a 6, that Ship takes 1 additional Hull Point of damage.

Is there historical justification for all three Expert abilities? Saratoga has all three but is a very different carrier.

She scambled a pretty decent cap force but the direction wasnt great and it didn't really blunt the jspanese attack.

That said i dont think there are significant criteria for experts anyway.

EdF, EB, ET. No flag, no other ability seems a decent option

In my experience, there is no threshold for minimum success to earn a expert ability.

So while USN dive bombers were more successful in the 1942 battles, torpedo squadrons were operating on carriers normally.