Andy Mac v PZB This time India will Stand !!!!

[traskott]

Put a VERY agressive admiral  on the amphibious task force....

[beppi]

ORIGINAL: Andy Mac

Not going to say a lot just been fucked by the game again

Tried an attack in Bay of bengal

Was ready in position took my licks but then guess what not a single fucking man landed despite being set to absoulute do not retire or I will crucify every sailor in the fleet

2 Destroyers get in amongst them and a 5 Div assault fleet with over 20 escorting warships turns and runs despite the presence of seperate SCTF's

Next day same thing and again not a single fucking man lands

The casualties are not this issue I was willing and expecting to take losses but to not land a signel man is a fucking joke.

I had a similiar problem during my Marians invasion. A few enemy PT fleets where defending the Islands and my Amphib TF always did not land and retired even with do not retire on and absolut threat setting. Tried it 5 days in a row with different settings and never even one troop landed. I finally found out (at least for me, i did not do any systematic testing) that if you have TFs following your invasion TF (i usually have some CVE Fleets following just to provide escort) you have to set all following TFs to direct/absolute threat setting. After i did it that way the landing worked.

[hades1001]

Hi Andy, I have been following the battle between you and PZB since the WITP time.
This is the first time I jumped in, keep it up man. The allied will prevail

I do have a question for you. I notice that in many bombing missions your 50 heavy bombers can achieve 300 hits on the runway, even in bad weather. I'm wondering how did you train you bomber pilots and what's the exp level are them.

Mind to share the secrets of your successful bombing tactics?[8D]

[Andy Mac]

50+xp 70+ land bombing

Re the attack on Andamans I am not at all bothered by the losses I took in ships I expected the losses and was willing to pay that price to re open the theatre but to lose them without securing the objective thats the thing that bugs me

[Andy Mac]

Quiet few turns pretty slow due to my iT issues

Lowlight was i picked up a replenishment convoy en route to Port Blair

Aware of the CAP trap at Bangkok I set all my air search to the Port Blair quadrant with no one searching over Bangkok as I didnt want strike aircraft going to Bankok where they would be massacred I got unlucky and all my strike aircraft rather than going 10 hexes to South of Port Blair attacked the AK convoy in Bankok harbour also at 10 hexes

Sure enough my strike aircraft decided to hit Bankok in force....

result I lose 150+ aircraft

It was a deliberate CAP trap to take advantage of the rules where I cannot exclude a target brilliant move - not unhappy about it but it does mean the gloves come off.

PZB used the mechanics of the game to engineer a brilliant trap I am going to take a few steps of my own to deal with the issue.

(I have been wary of using 4E to flatten all these AF's as I know it bugs PZB that 4E are so ahistorically tough to kill but two sets of issues in a row 1st the fleet refusing to unload because of 2 DD's and then now this flak trap have made me reconsider)

As soon as my Sqns are back up to strength the gloves come off !!!!!

I will be hitting and exterminating every Japanese AF in fighter range of P47's with massed 4E strikes if that means his AF's are all toast so be it I have been playing with one hand tied behind my back for to long....

I reckon I can muster 400+ P47's and maybe 300+ 4E - if this is the way it has to be so be it [:D][:D][:D]

[janh]

Andy, from what PzB posted he was himself surprised to see such a huge strike coming into Bangkok and actually had taken measures to avoid his resupply efforts being discovered and attacked.  I hope I'll not disclose anything critical by saying that he had organized a decoy operation to draw your attention and keep it (and hence your assets) focused elsewhere. 

I honestly do not have them impression that he designed a CAP trap intentionally, but this time it was just an unfortunate combination of the whole area around Bangkok being covered naturally with lots of air bases your strike getting sucked into that. 
Otherwise, your hint on exclusions zones for air ops is a good one.  Could be very handy, but I assume that's got to be a good amount of time one would need to spent coding.

[Dan Nichols]

janh, this information seems to cross the opsec line a bit. You might want to reconsider what you are posting.

[Grfin Zeppelin]

ORIGINAL: janh
#####CLASSIFIED#####

[janh]

ORIGINAL: Dan Nichols
janh, this information seems to cross the opsec line a bit. You might want to reconsider what you are posting.

Made it a little more vague. Thought the previous post didn't disclose anything that was beyond the obvious anyways, but you might be right. Just wanted to step in to avoid sensible house rules going overboards and this beautiful AAR to the bottoms... This definitely is my favorite match.

GräfinZ -- Danke für's entfernen des Zitats, oder der Details.

[JeffroK]

I wonder what that translates to in English?

[Dan Nichols]

ORIGINAL: JeffK

I wonder what that translates to in English?

Danke für's entfernen des Zitats, oder der Details

"Thank you for removing the details"

[Alfred]

ORIGINAL: Andy Mac

... It was a deliberate CAP trap to take advantage of the rules where I cannot exclude a target brilliant move - not unhappy about it but it does mean the gloves come off.

PZB used the mechanics of the game to engineer a brilliant trap I am going to take a few steps of my own to deal with the issue.

(I have been wary of using 4E to flatten all these AF's as I know it bugs PZB that 4E are so ahistorically tough to kill but two sets of issues in a row 1st the fleet refusing to unload because of 2 DD's and then now this flak trap have made me reconsider) ...

This is not the first time your opponent has benefitted from the game's mechanics. Frankly I'm quite surprised you give any credence to your opponent's concerns about the effectiveness of Allied 4E. He enjoys several "ahistorical" benefits and yet you handicap yourself against not using one of the few effective Allied weapon systems.

Setting a CAP trap is quite a legitimate tactic. Using 4E to counter it is also a quite legitimate tactic. For every tactic there is always a counter tactic to neutralise it. What is quite wrong is to deliberately exclude the use of a legitimate neutralising counter tactic.

Alfred

[JeffroK]

ORIGINAL: Dan Nichols

ORIGINAL: JeffK

I wonder what that translates to in English?

Danke für's entfernen des Zitats, oder der Details

"Thank you for removing the details"

Thanks Dan

I thought it might have askling for the removal of the picture and its symbols.

[EUBanana]

Sucks. But I've seen worse.

Apparently in an amphibious landing there is a "panic, run away!" roll that the Allies have to pass. If they fail the roll, then they abort the landing and try and re-embark.

I landed a division of troops at Port Blair, they landed fine in D-0. Ordered to attack in turn 2, which was in error, because they had disruption 80+ and I didn't notice. But bear in mind, they did land. The transports were still there unloading more supply/support.

So D+1 due to the ordered attack, the roll is made, and failed. Rather than attack the bombed out of supply IJ brigade there which had 0 chance of pushing them back into the sea even with high disruption, the commander decided to re-embark on the transports. About 95% of the division was disabled in so doing. If he attacked, even with dismal results, it wouldn't have been 1/10th as bad. As it was, he may as well have shot half of his division in the back of the head. Took 4 months for them to recover.

The thing that irks me most is, if the ships had left and not continued to unload arty and supply, then this wouldn't have happened, there would be no divisional self-immolation. Next time I'll be careful to make sure there is no avenue of escape for cowardly commanders to take. [:'(]

[EUBanana]

ORIGINAL: Alfred

There is no need to identify the individual units. The aggregated troop number divided by 30 will give you a very good and close approximation of the unadjusted assault value of the garrison.

Alfred

Nice rule of thumb, thanks. I shall bear that in mind.

Up till now I assume that 20,000 reported = 1 division = ~350 AV. The game seems to double estimates of troop numbers, in general.

[Alfred]

ORIGINAL: EUBanana

ORIGINAL: Alfred

There is no need to identify the individual units. The aggregated troop number divided by 30 will give you a very good and close approximation of the unadjusted assault value of the garrison.

Alfred

Nice rule of thumb, thanks. I shall bear that in mind.

Up till now I assume that 20,000 reported = 1 division = ~350 AV. The game seems to double estimates of troop numbers, in general.

EUBanana,

Your former rule of thumb can also be used, although you will understand if I maintain that I prefer my rule of thumb.[:)]

Actually in the game 18,000 reported is closer to a division equivalent, and most fully equipped divisions fall within the 400-450 unadjusted AV range. Consequently if you see 6,000 reported that is the rough equivalent of a brigade or a /A sub unit. So with these adjustments, you could continue with your former approach.

The problem with your former approach is that you have no way of distinguishing whether the 18,000 reported troops all belong to the one unit, in which case it is almost certainly a division, or the 18,000 is made up of many support units and consequently the unadjusted AV would be seriously overestimated.

On the other hand the 30:1 ratio already takes into account that even non combat troops which have no AV, such as Support troops, actually provide some defensive AV (on the ratio of 1:10) when atacked.

Alfred

[EUBanana]

ORIGINAL: Alfred
The problem with your former approach is that you have no way of distinguishing whether the 18,000 reported troops all belong to the one unit, in which case it is almost certainly a division, or the 18,000 is made up of many support units and consequently the unadjusted AV would be seriously overestimated.

Yeah, you tend to pick up things like this automatically with experience I think. A handful of units and 8000 reported men is probably a brigade + baseforce/engineers. A single unit with 15000+ is almost certainly a division, etc.

Interpreting recon info is pretty daunting as a newb though, I remember when starting out that trying to work out what you were likely to be up against was a nightmare.

[crsutton]

Yes, eventually you just get a feel for whats there. Sort of learn what to expect from a long time opponent as well. We all develop patterns. You can also just run the detection level up and then ground bomb with aircraft. This will ID the units getting hit as well, but not necessarily the strength. It is pretty hard at first but play a campaign for two years and it comes easy..

[Andy Mac]

OK my IT is more or less fixed and I am going to get ready to kick him hard.

[Andy Mac]

Invasion TF's are loading up for my next operartion covered by 32 CVE's 8 CV's and 10 CVL's

So about 2,000 carrier aircraft with Superfort support and LR P38's from forward bases

Things are about to heat up again