bombardments

[Pier5]

I was hoping we could get more testing of amphibious operations and we didn't. First on the list are bombardments, which have a problem. I imagine, correctly I think, that a bombardment for an amphibious assault would be a methodical, fairly time consuming affair. Kwajalein, for example, received a three day bombardment from the battleships. Don't try it in WitP. A single overnight bombardment consumes 6 units of fire! This leaves only three units of fire and they won't bombard. Heavy calibre amunition cannot be replaced at sea, so the bombardment force must steam to a base to load ammunition, then steam back. That could easily consume the better part of a week. The bombardments occur at night, so we are to believe that the battleships virtually emptied their magazines in one night. I bet that gave the turret captains one big time headache!

Is the six units of fire an error, or does someone actually think this is the way it should work?

Pier5

[DrewMatrix]

You can bombard for 1 phase (one night) or day and night for weeks on end. If you set "retirement allowed" and Bombard then a) the bombardment will be at night b) then it will run.

If you set "Patrol do not retire" the ship will arrive night or day (depending on the distance, you can still control that by stopping a few hexes away if you with), bombard when it arrives, then sit there. You can keep resetting it to Bombard again and again day after day. Eventually it will run out of ammo. DDs will run out of ammo later than BBs (because the DDS carry so many rounds). When you run out you need to go get ammo (base, usually. An AE class replenishment ship in some cases (late war, Caliber < 5" I think).


The reason it is set like it is, is to allow you to choose EITHER a Tokyo Express hit and run bombardment OR a sit around for days bombardment.

As to "6 units of fire" that depends on the size of the guns. BBs carry (and shoot per 12 hour turn) very few. DDs a lot.

[madmickey]

In the Mariana campaign I captured Tinian first because of it weaker ground forces than used it as a base to bombard Saipan and Guam Full bombardment every night than replenish in the morning. This is pretty gamey as Tinian had a very small invasion beach and CD gun from Saipan may have given a Tinian invasion a hard time.

[Wooglin]

I noticed that too. 2/3 of BB's main gun ammo used up on one night of bombard seemed like a lot of metal. I know I can patrol/do not retire and reselect bombard. My question is whether the subsequent bombard, presumably using the secondary guns, is substantially lower than what would have been achieved if the BBs had full main gun ammo.

My anecdotal experience if that the effectiveness of subsequent bombardment, even with BB main gun ammo almost depleted, is not materially reduced compared to the first. If that is the case then either (1) the ammo screen is wrong, or (2) the bombard calculation does not take account of ammo levels.

Has anybody tested this?

- W

[Pier5]

Everything you state is correct and irrelevant. A battleship, which is specifically what I mentioned, carries 9 units of fire. It uses six in a single evening and will bombard no longer. Yes, with do not retire, it will sit there, but it will not fire because is has gone down to 3 units of fire and will not expend more. Perhaps you did not notice that the casualties inflicted after the first night were very few. The 5"-38's still have some ammo. The heavy guns do not. By the way, heavy cruisers carry 12 units of fire, and also expend 6 on a single bombardment. Extended bombardment, without a nearby base, is impossible.

Pier5

[Pier5]

Interesting. My experience bombarding a well-defended Buin was six to nine hundred casualties and several guns on the first (big gun) bombardment. Afterwards, only a handfull and no guns. That's when I noticed that the BB's had expended all their ammunition in one night. I also noticed you don't put destroyers in the bombardment force[;)]

What I really wonder is whether this is a mistake or 2by3/Matrix thinks this is reasonable. Should the BB's be firing a single unit of fire for the casualties inflicted; should the casualties be less for a single unit of fire; or do they think they have it right. If so, I'll just change the data base so that the old BB's carry 30 units of fire, because I don't think they have it right.

Pier5

[Pier5]

Yeah, I think it's gamey also, but not for the reason you submit. The idea of establishing an ammunition depot in the middle of all that carnage in a short amount of time is really stretching it. I think WitP has the amphibious model totally wrong. Invasion transports DO NOT anchor in range of coastal defense guns. They do not get hit by field artillery, which lacks the fire control systems and range to interfere with anything but the landing craft. So the whole deal of transports getting all shot up is unrealistic in the extreme. Coastal defense guns, with the necessary range, fire control, ammunition handlers, etc. to interfere with the transports require years to implement (ie, a fortress). Otherwise, they are detected and annihilated by battleship fire, as you don't readily roll 200mm artillery out of a cave, fire, and get it back in before all hell breaks loose. Particularly, with aircraft constantly overhead.

I can't find how long the bombardment of Saipan actually was in my reference material. I do know it was bombarded once by the fast battleships (they didn't then pack up and head for Hawaii for ammo). Then the old bombardment BB's took over.

Pier5

[mongo]

Pier,

have you checked your bombard groups after turn 1? I've noticed a tendency to revert to surface combat. You need to manually reset the mission after the first bombard.

It also seems to follow that the first salvo of 6 does much more damage than the 2nd of 3, and completely more than the following (secondary arms). I've seen it from from 1500 to 30 casualties.

I also wondered about the 9 capacity for main gun rounds. I've checked a few books I have that list stats for the Iowas and various cruisers for instance, but can't find ammo loadouts. It just seems low to me.

I've seen someone here in the forums who served on the Wisconsin - care to comment (if you aren't happily playing and staying off the boards [:)])?

As for transports getting hit, there has been a couple threads regarding this (waiting for SunDevil to weigh in here with links [:D])

I know i've read accounts of after Saipan was taken, arty units set up on the southern shore and bombarded parts of Tinian. I think they were 6 or 9 miles apart? This would >theoretically< make transports vulnerable to regular 155 fire as I don't believe troops would care to go much over 6 or so miles at sea in a DUKW. It's the suppression of those batteries that is the question.

Playing Devil's Advocate against myself however..

I am reading Catanzano's account of his time in the 41st ID currently. He said that he watched pits dug and a 155 battalion resited out to sea in the space of an evening to defend against a possible bombard/counterinvasion force. It never came, but they did get regular arty units around in quick order (with complete air superiority and not under heavy naval gunfire however....

[Pier5]

Yes, they revert, and you change to bombardment again and very little happens. We know from history that bombardments went at least three days (Kwajalein), probably longer. You won't learn anything about this from how much ammunition these ships carried because we have no idea what they are calling a unit of fire (obviously 1/9 of the available ammuntion, but what is a reasonable expenditure in a single night's shoot.) Life is simple. We know that we can't bombard a target for three days. We know that bombardments lasted three days (or more) in the actual event. Therefore, WitP is wrong and should be changed.

Pier5

[DrewMatrix]

Therefore, WitP is wrong and should be changed.

Wow!

"There are things not dreamt of in your philosophy" Hamlet

You can shoot a gun a lot in a short period of time (I seem to recall IJN BBs with their decks stacked with extra HE shooting it all off, into the dark (and not very accurately, I suspect) in a couple of hours. So I am pretty sure you can burn through all the ammo you carry and _still_ move a long way in 12 hours.

You can spend days sitting off Okinawa shooting (Very accurately) at individual pillboxes as FOs or spotters in planes call in fire. So I am pretty sure you can spend a week using up the same number of rounds of ammuntion.

Not all BBs fire their guns at the same rate of fire in all circumstances. Some shoot at an island, some at one bunker for example

[madmickey]

The fast battleship would be used for AA protection of Carriers after bombardment. 25 DD would cause 50 casualties, 6 BB would cause 2000 casualties Better to use DD in invasion TF reduces your casualties substantially. By the way the Tinian invasion was difficult because of the small size of beach landed on.

[Pier5]

Actually, it won't fire the big stuff on the second night. The ammunition level remains at three after the first shoot. I think this is reasonable, as even the old guys carried a reasonable percentage of AP. What you are seeing, I think, is the secondary battery firing. Also, if you have any CA's in the force (I usually do), they expend six of 12 units in the first shoot and then have three available for the second shoot, I assume.

Pier5

[Pier5]

Those numbers you use look pretty typical, so far. But the real reason for not using the DD's is they get absolutely nailed by a well defended target, whereas the BB's get trivial damage (as I discovered the hard way).

Pier5

[mongo]

Actually, it won't fire the big stuff on the second night. The ammunition level remains at three after the first shoot

Now that's odd... I see the ammo drain out to zero if I make it bombard again....

[madmickey]

Cruiser (CA) will only fire 6 for bombardment. CL may be able to have 1.5 bombardment session. Somebody can confirm I have deleted all my old games. (I hate the save system in this game).

[madmickey]

Pier to reduce DD damage use BB or CA to bombard first then DD (they still have little effect, and DD really reduces casualties for invasion TF). You can actually include CA in Invasion TF but I do not know if they are any better than DD and you loose the bombardment effect of CA.

[Pier5]

That is simply impossible. They would have to manhandle 1200 to 1500 pound shells through a turret hatch to do that, plus handle several 100 pounds of powder bags through the same door. If such an event occured, it had to have been for the secondary armament.

Pier5

[Pier5]

Yes, odd. I had bb's at Buin for four nights (I'm a slow learner), before I realized that the magazines continued to hold three units of fire. I'm talking about early '43 and the old battleships. Were you using fast battleships? Maybe they act different.

Pier5

[mongo]

The only time I've really done it is in the Marianas scenario.

I had both the fast and the old ones (actually every piece of big iron I had) because I saw the IJN BBs sortie [:)]

[madmickey]

Fast and old battleship have same firing effect, I did not check if the 12 gun ships are any better but 9 big guns ships are same old and new.