Divebombing "The Mark" (Marky keep out)

[Dive Bomber1]

January 2, 1942 – Marky and I came to an agreement that neither of us will use sub-borne troops to do suicide recons, capture empty bases, or cut off retreat lines. Therefore the game continues as before.

This turn started out with a big surprise for me – Palembang was occupied by the Japanese! [X(] I guess it was by the troops that had just capture Muntok. I didn't expect Marky to give up that base without a fight. Now I have it in perfect condition.

There is one slight problem – I don't have any troops available to move in! I've out run my ability to respond to opportunities like this. There are no base forces nor are there any combat troops available near by. I moved all my forces forward in response to Marky's rapid pull back, and also because of my need to put CAP forward to deal with his air attacks.

My nearest uncommitted combat troops are way back in Taan, so I am going to fly in part of an SNLF from Taan via Tina transport. As long as Marky doesn't have LRCAP over Palembang I should be okay, but it is a long flight and the weather is bad, so even without air interdiction I'll probably lose planes to operational losses.

As far as base forces go, I'm shipping my last free base force out of Tainan to Kuantan, and then will move the "special" base force that is already there out of Kuantan and on to Palembang. (I have an air engineering unit in place in Kuantan so that will maintain a high level of air support.)

The situation in the southern Malaya peninsula is coming along nicely. The BB TF bombarded Johore Bharu again, causing lots of useful damage. The my troops did a pretty good attack and got 1:1 results while lowering the fortifications to level 2. I am resting my troops again this turn and just having them bombard. With any luck my next attack in two days time will capture the base.

Despite the usual generally lousy weather some of my bombers in Malaya took off and hit Singapore again, keeping the air fields closed. I'm resting most of my bombers this turn because of the lousy weather. I'm not sure if Marky is resting his planes too, or if the weather closed down his airfields, but other than a recon flight there was no action from the Allied Air this turn.

One thing that I am keeping my eye on is the situation at Balikpapan. My recon now says that Marky has at least 40 fighters, nearly 60 bombers and dozens of other planes at the air field there. I'm assuming that he is planning to try more attacks on Brunei, so I've moved more CAP into place in both Brunei and Kuching. I'm not currently planning any attacks on the southern Borneo bases; I want to grab Menado first and that operation hasn't started yet. I do have a bombardment TF going in to hit Menado again this turn. This will give me a chance to see what, if any, Allied air units are on naval attack and within reach of Menado.

My troops landed at Wasile and others captured an empty Toboali this turn. Wasile will be attacked next turn along with Woodlark and Butuan. My troops also captured Kweilin this turn. As I had suspected, Marky only had a base force present. So I am moving troops forward to secure the region and to start to attempt to cut off Marky's forces in the two remaining southern Chinese bases that are still in Allied hands. I've also decided to move more troops in to attempt an assault on Ichang since Marky hasn't reinforced it. Marky has put around 20 units in Sian so I don't want to bother attacking it at this time.

In Luzon I have all of my troops in place at Manila so I will try a deliberate attack next turn. I can't imagine that Marky was able to build up the fortifications very much, but one never knows. In Bataan the two Japanese paratroop units were reunited with the rest of their units, so I no longer have any concerns about a breakout.

The BB bombardment TF hit Port Moresby this turn and is staying around for another blast next turn. Unfortunately, the CL that was torpedoed last turn in PM sank this turn, so Marky's record of sinking Japanese combat ships improves even more, while I still haven't sunk any Allied ship larger than a destroyer so far. And although that SNLF unit from Gili Gili hasn't reached PM yet and won't for another couple of days, I have ordered the 4th Division to try a deliberate attack anyway. We'll see how it goes.

In other naval news, there were a number of sub battles with damage on both sides as well as another Japanese sub sunk by Marky's DDs. But that just confirmed for me that Marky has a number of TFs in the south central Pacific, so I've got a cruiser TF heading south at full speed in search of targets after refuelling at Tarawa. The KB is a day's sail out of Tulagi where it will also refuel and then head off into the same region. With any luck I will soon get an opportunity to sink a few larger combat ships too.

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: Dive Bomber1

My nearest uncommitted combat troops are way back in Taan, so I am going to fly in part of an SNLF from Taan via Tina transport. As long as Marky doesn't have LRCAP over Palembang I should be okay, but it is a long flight and the weather is bad, so even without air interdiction I'll probably lose planes to operational losses.

[:D]

[Dive Bomber1]

ORIGINAL: AU Tiger

ORIGINAL: Dive Bomber1

My nearest uncommitted combat troops are way back in Taan, so I am going to fly in part of an SNLF from Taan via Tina transport. As long as Marky doesn't have LRCAP over Palembang I should be okay, but it is a long flight and the weather is bad, so even without air interdiction I'll probably lose planes to operational losses.

[:D]

For those of you who are wondering; Tiger's smirk is because in our pbem he used the AVG to catch my second wave of transports going into a base. It wasn't pretty... [X(]

[Cpt Sherwood]

Great AAR Dive Bomber 1. I do like your style of writting, I hate the cut and paste combat report type. It seems funny that Marky is so aggressive with his aircraft and so willing to just melt away with his gound forces. Does make one wonder what he is up to.

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

I was wondering the same thing. I am playing the SOPAC scenario with him, and he is strangely aggressive and passive at the same time. So far I have been in the wrong places to take advantage of his hyper-aggression, but that will soon change I believe.

As an opponent of Dive's I will give some insight into his tactical play. He is careful on the offense without being methodical. He likes to protect his assets from the ambush attack which makes it difficult for me as I am an bushwhack player on the defensive typically, but he gives little opportunity to bleed him without my suffering badly. He does like the flank attack when possible, but it is rarely a surprise although usually I can do little to prevent it. He picks his battles carefully. Thankfully, he has yet to learn to use his paras as effectively as he could, but he is learning.[:(]

As to his defensive play, we will see eventually.[8D]

[Dive Bomber1]

ORIGINAL: Cpt Sherwood

Great AAR Dive Bomber 1. I do like your style of writting, I hate the cut and paste combat report type. It seems funny that Marky is so aggressive with his aircraft and so willing to just melt away with his gound forces. Does make one wonder what he is up to.

I actually believe that Marky is on to something with his planes. Essentially, by using them as Allied "kamikazes" he has caused me a lot more damage than he would have if he used them "normally". For the most part, the early game Allied planes are pretty lousy and don't cause a lot of damage if used historically. But by using them as he is, Marky has gotten a lot more bang for his buck, particularly since it is so hard to defend against planes flying 100 ft off the ground.

The worst part about this from my p.o.v. is that Marky's fighter strafing attacks tend to damage my DDs badly - one even sank after being hammered too much by the P-40Bs of the AVG. So I have to be careful about how I attack with my combat TFs. And I don't even want to think about the damage that his fighters could do if they caught up to the mini-KB...

On the other hand, this has cost Marky 600 planes in one month, and it appears that Marky has now stripped his rear bases for most everything that he can, so that he can fill up Balikpapan. For example, he isn't trying any air attacks from Australia on my forces in PNG, my forces are operating without any interference in Burma, and he doesn't seem to have a lot of air patrols in the south and central Pacific.

All those planes at Balikpapan are very tempting. If I can sneak a good bombardment TF in for a hit I might cripple him badly. Right now the weather is surprisingly clear in the Celebes area, so I'm not trying anything yet, but if the rain comes in I'll definitely give it a try.

The question remains, what advantage can I get from wiping out Marky's land based air power? The one area where Marky isn't losing planes is his USN fighters, so I've got to be careful not to let my Zeros get worn down or Marky could start to turn the tide easily.

As far as the ground battles go, I get the feeling that Marky is trying to conserve his forces and build up in big bases for in the hopes of luring me into long drawn out battles. I'm surprised that he is using base forces and HQs as sacrifices, but that could be because he doesn't realize how long it takes to get support and engineering replacements.

Thanks for the comments.

[princep01]

ORIGINAL: Cpt Sherwood

Great AAR Dive Bomber 1. I do like your style of writting, I hate the cut and paste combat report type. It seems funny that Marky is so aggressive with his aircraft and so willing to just melt away with his gound forces. Does make one wonder what he is up to.

I agree, Cpt Sherwood.

Marky's strategy is an odd blend of both Fabian and Patton tactics. It will be interesting to observe where it takes both sides. Personally, I see the Allies as relatively feeble for many months and, therefore, favor the Fabian style of play in the campaign game. The goal is to maximize force conservation, while creating the longest reasonable delay to Japanese intentions. In the end, he will still lose Singapore/Manila/DEI and most everyone there, but may find that his plan buys him relatively little time for gathering his forces elsewhere. Then, I could be all wrong. I don't have the extensive experience of multiple CG against human opponents like many do.

Divebomber, pour on the pressure. To coin a phrase....It doesn't get any better than this.

BTW, I don't know what your overall losses look like relative to his, but I think they must be quite low given your style of offensive play. Would it be possible to post a snap shot of the air/ship losses at the end of December 41?

[Dive Bomber1]

BTW, I don't know what your overall losses look like relative to his, but I think they must be quite low given your style of offensive play. Would it be possible to post a snap shot of the air/ship losses at the end of December 41?

Sorry, but the earliest data I have is January 2, 1942. I'll summarize it below, because I'm having difficulty getting a screen capture:

Score:

Japan: 4051

Allies: 7018


Bases:

Japan: 235 for 2017 points

Allies: 213 for 6481 points


Air Losses:

Japan: 252 - AtoA = 8, Field = 2, Flak = 133, Ops = 109

Allies: 607 - AtoA = 115, Field = 345, Flak = 91, Ops = 56


Ground Losses:

Japan: 26

Allies: 1327


Naval Losses:

Japan: 18 for 259 points

Allies: 22 for 85 points


As you can see, Marky did a remarkable job of getting his ships away from my forces, despite the non-historical start in which I had surface combat and light air combat TFs in the southern Philippines within the first few turns. He also hasn't committed any ships in the Philippines or Dutch East Indies.

My air losses have increased significantly in the past half dozen turns because I've been forced to commit to constant air attacks despite the weather in order to close the air fields that are within my lines. BTW - 2/3 of Marky's air losses, even his field losses, have occured after the December 7 air strikes.

My ground losses have been light because Marky has been retreating so fast that it is hard to force him to battle. And when I am battling him I am bringing massive force to play in order to defeat his forces quickly without taking many losses myself.

What this doesn't show is the dozens and dozens of my ships that are sitting in many different ports with significant damage. I've resorted to increasing the sizes of the repair facilities everywhere except where they are already larger than 100.

Thanks for the comments.

[Dive Bomber1]

January 3, 1942 – This wasn't the greatest turn for ground action for me, but all things considered it didn't turn out too badly. First off, as I had anticipated, the 4th Division was too low on supplies to be able to mount a serious attack on Port Moresby and was rewarded with a 0:1 combat result and no reduction in the fortifications. However, the Allied troops must be even more tired and short on supplies, because there were only a handful of casualties on both sides.

My heavy naval bombardment of PM ahead of the land attack probably had a lot to do with the result not being a lot worse for me. My reinforcement and supply TFs are still a few days away, so I'll have the 4th just do bombardment attacks for now. Oh well, it's no real loss since Marky isn't trying to move anything against my forces at PM other than subs right now.

In Luzon the first deliberate attack on Manila also failed, but the fortifications were reduced to level 2 so things are moving in the direction that I want. I'll set my forces to bombardment attacks for the next couple of days while I do constant aerial bombardments and then the next deliberate attack may well do the trick.

In Malaya my troops did a bombardment attack this turn on Johore Bharu which caused a fair number of Allied casualties. Next turn my troops will do a deliberate attack and my bombardment TF will hit the base again. A few Wirraways popped up on CAP momentarily over Johore Bharu when my bombers flew in, but they didn't do any damage to my planes. I'm guessing that Marky has the Wirraways in Bankha, since the airfields at Johore Bharu and Singapore are totally closed. So I'm sending bombers to hit Bankha as well as having some fighters go in on a sweep, and I'm also putting some LRCAP over my bombardment TF. To a good extent by putting that CAP over Johore Bharu this turn Marky let a chance get away to hit me with another surprise naval attack.

Marky sent his big air attack from Balikpapan against Miri this turn instead of Brunei. This meant that my CAP was avoided, which I presume was Marky's intent. His attack did cause some damage to the oil fields at Miri, but since I've pulled all my troops out I really don't care. At some point later on when I've cleared Borneo of Allied forces I'll put some engineers back into Miri to fix up the oil facility damage.

In other land combat news, my forces captured Butuan, Woodlark and Wasile. For once I didn't have more landings happen simultaneously, but I've got several TFs on their way to deposit troops at other bases, mainly in the Solomons. Right now I'm deliberately not sailing my transport TFs into the teeth of Marky's air defenses – I want to capture Luzon and Malaya first.

In Burma it appears that Marky has abandoned Rangoon. The bulk of his forces are behind the river on the road to Mandalay, two hexes NE of Rangoon. There is one Allied unit behind the river one hex NE of Rangoon, but I am moving my big infantry units across regardless and intend to continue to pursue Marky all the way to the Burma Road.

In China Marky has finally moved two of the seven units that he has had sitting just across the border from Hanoi since the beginning of the game. I don't know if he suddenly decided to move them down the road to harass my forces further to the southeast or if he is pulling out to try to defend his own bases. But I'm not too concerned since my envelopment plans are coming along nicely in southern China. Hengchow and Changsha should soon become nice, crowded prison camps for a large portion of the Chinese army.

BTW – My air-lifted SNLF force got to Palembang without incident, so that location is now secure and I'll move in a base force at my leisure.

Naval action started to pick up a bit this turn, and with any luck it will pick up even more, and in my favour, if my plans work out. [;)] First off, one of my minelaying subs at Colombo got a chance to fire a couple of torpedoes at a big fat AK after laying its mines. There were two hits on the AK and the escorts didn't find my sub, which is now on its way home to reload with mines.

But more importantly, another of my subs tangled with a couple of USN DDs at the unoccupied but strategically tempting base of Nanomea in the south central Pacific. The sub's torpedoes missed, and so did the depth charges of the DDs. There have been no signs of cruiser-based float planes anywhere in the South Pacific, so I'm betting that this is a sub-hunter group that Marky has sent out to investigate my sub which has been openly sitting at Nanomea since the start of the game.

However, sailing just out of patrol range and heading at full speed towards Nanomea is a Japanese surface combat TF containing 2 CAs, 2 CLs and 6 DDs. Unless Marky orders his DDs back from Nanomea we ought to have our first naval battle next turn.

There is also another DD-containing TF at Canton Island this turn. I've got a number of subs in the south central Pacific and Marky's patrol planes have been spotting about a third of them regularly. But I keep on moving them each turn, and in this case I'm moving most of them in the general direction of Nanomea for the next turn, so I'm hoping that Marky commits even more ships to hunting my subs in that area.

The reason for that wish on my part has just totally refuelled at Tulagi and is set to sail at top speed for the same region where Marky is sailing lots of ships… [:D] With any luck the next few days may be quite interesting in the South Central Pacific.

[Dive Bomber1]

January 4, 1942 - Marky's DDs took a few parting shots at my subs at Nanomea and then they disappeared into the vastness of the South Pacific, leaving behind air symbols at a couple of the small islands in the region. So Marky dropped off small base forces and patrol planes to keep an eye on my movements. Therefore, my combat TF found nothing and returned home without firing a shot. There are still DDs at Canton and Palmyra, but I'm not ready to venture out there without some preparation.

Another sub noticed several large TFs in Brisbane, including one that was reported to contain a number of APDs, so maybe Marky is planning to stage an attempted reinforcement of Port Moresby. Just in case, I sent the KB back to Tulagi, from where it can go either east or west quite quickly.

Not all my efforts this turn were met with futility as I took a large step towards Singapore by capturing Johore Bharu. My bombardment TF first hit the base very hard, causing thousands of Allied casualties along with lots base damage. Then my bombers came in, and although they were met by some half-hearted LRCAP they got through and hit the base again. So once my troops made their attack it was easy for them to lower the fortification level to 1 and to drive out the Allied troops.

I am now sending my three infantry divisions in first, to be followed afterwards by the rest of my forces. I want to make certain that smaller units don't get ahead of the main force while facing the river crossing.

I mentioned the LRCAP over Johore Bharu. My plans to deal with those planes fell through as I made things too complicated and lost track of which units were watching where for this turn. So one extra fighter unit flew LRCAP over my bombardment TF, leaving one of my bases sending out bombing missions without escorts. Fortunately, the Allied LRCAP consisted mainly of Wirraways and my planes didn't take much damage.

For the next turn I've consolidated my planes into fewer and closer bases, which increases the chances of total rain-outs, but also allows me more flexibility in sending out multiple missions. So I still have Oscars flying LRCAP over my bombardment TF, which will be sailing against Bankha once it is fully refueled and replenished. BTW - I destroyed a number of planes on the ground when I captured Johore Bharu.

Otherwise things were fairly unremarkable. I landed troops at Ormoc, but my days of sending out dozens of invasion fleets simultaneously are long gone. My troops at Manila bombarded the base nicely, as did my air units. I'm repeating the bombardments next turn, but I'll try another deliberate attack the turn after that.

Marky sent his bombers after the oil fields at Miri again. I'm more than happy to let him wear out his bombers against targets like that because it allows me the time to prepare for my next phase of major invasions.

One of the more interesting bits of intel that I received came from the presence of a squadron of P-40Bs that tried to intercept one of my recon flights in Burma. It appears that Marky is flying CAP or LRCAP over a few Burmese bases, maybe to try to intercept any paratroop assaults. He needn't worry, my paras are still keeping his Philippine divisions penned-up in Bataan and will stay there until I capture Manila and can send some infantry divisions to finish off Bataan.

[Dive Bomber1]

January 5, 1942 - My big SNLF unit started to land at Port Moresby this turn. The coastal guns were still able to fire at it a bit, but there were no hits. Surprisingly, the supply transport TF made it to PM too and will be unloading this turn. So I set both of my units to attack again in the hopes that this will push things over the edge.

Our sub wars continue all over the map. One of my escorts at PM hit one of Marky's subs hard. Then one of my subs hit a DMS at Suva. But one of Marky's subs hit a transport of mine off of Luzon, so neither of us is getting much of an edge, although my overall feeling is that Marky's ASW is usually a bit better than mine. Speaking of subs, that swarm of US subs showed up off of the south coast of Japan this turn. It turns out that Marky has them under his control and not computer control, so whatever is going on is Marky's idea.

There were small but useful land actions this turn. I landed troops at Vella Lavella, so I'm getting closer to capturing all of the Solomons. Ormoc was captured, so now all of the unoccupied Philippine bases outside of Luzon are under my control. And the last free US unit in Mindanao surrendered at Cotabato, which saved me from having to chase it down. I'll capture Cebu and the other remaining US-occupied Philippine island base once I've captured Manila.

Marky continued with his air campaigns against my newly captured resource bases by sending some B-17s after the oil fields at Palembang. I don't have a base force there yet, so there isn't much I can do. At least it is better than him going after my ships. More interestingly, Marky's big raid on Miri turned sour for him this turn as I had a good Zero Daitai on LRCAP from next door Brunei. The Zeros shot down 19 of the incoming planes including both fighters and bombers without taking any losses. The bombers did a bit of damage, but I am still very happy with the result.

Marky is pulling back in Burma faster than I can move forward. I figured that he would attempt to defend the river line NE of Rangoon, but he hasn't. So I am sending all of my big forces to Mandalay and sending my smaller forces on to smaller bases. I am tempted to not even capture Rangoon at this stage because Marky will probably just start to bomb the resources there, but I'll decide when I get closer to Mandalay.

My infantry divisions should move into Singapore next turn. The rest of the troops will follow in a couple of turns. I want to move into Singapore quickly while most of Marky's troops are still disrupted from their defeat at Johore Bharu. This way their defense against my river-crossing shock attack shouldn't be so bad. And I set my troops at Manila to do another deliberate attack.

[Dive Bomber1]

January 6, 1942 - The Big News this turn was that Port Moresby fell to the combined attack of the South Seas SNLF and the 4th Division. So my "sandal strap" operation worked. Now the PNG and Solomons will be reasonably safe from nuisance raids for a while, I hope. What is equally good is that a strong base force started to land at Gili Gili this turn.

The movement of my divisions into Singapore was also more successful than I expected. They achieved a 2:1 result on the shock attack and lowered the fortifications down to 4. I'm assuming that happened because so many of Marky's troops were defeated at and retreated from Johore Bharu, thus gaining high fatigue, high disruption and low morale. More of my troops are due to cross over to Singapore next turn, so with any luck I might have Singapore soon too.

My deliberate attack at Manila wasn't as successful, but the fortifications were lowered to level 2 and my bombing ought to keep them at that level. I'm going to rest my troops for a couple of more days before I attack again.

Speaking of bombing, rain scattered most of my air missions but enough still got off to keep the pressure on Manila and Singapore. An air strike even hit Balikpapan and got one Allied bomber on the ground. It now appears that Marky has pulled back most of his bombers and fighters from Borneo to Java. Marky's only air attack was another handful of B-17Cs hitting the oil at Palembang again.

My most effective anti-plane effort this turn came from my bombardment TF that is sailing out of the west coast of Malaya. It hit Bankha and caught 18 Allied fighters on the ground.

It turns out that I was wrong in my last post - I had two more unoccupied bases in the Philippines to capture in this game, and my troops landed at both this turn - Guiuan and Tacloban. So I'll capture them next turn.

Capturing empty all Allied bases is obviously going to have to be a priority for me, because Marky came up with yet another unexpected suicide move - this time sending a small base force and some patrol planes into Apamama - right next to my base at Tarawa. For whatever reason, Apamama refused to be "occupied" despite my early capture of Tarawa, so Marky finally moved some troops into it to spy upon my positions in the Gilberts and Marshalls.

I'm not sure how Marky got his forces there. I didn't see any subs around, and he certainly didn't sneak a fast transport in past my subs and patrol planes. (I've had a sub sitting at Apamama since the beginning of the game.) So I suspect that he fly in some air support troops via Catalina or other long range plane. He also has cruisers and maybe his CVs down there - some Seagulls spotted one of my subs at Pago Pago.

In any event, I already have a combat unit on its way to Apamama - it started out a couple of days ago and ought to arrive in two more days - so that will take care of any suicide squad. My concern is that Marky may try to fly in some serious troop numbers, so I put some Zeros from Tarawa on LRCAP over Apamama and I'll send my surface combat TF down there too once they finish refueling. (It's too bad that Marky didn't do this a day earlier when that SC TF was right next to Apamama.)

The bad thing about this is that Marky is obviously going to continue to use nuisance tactics to try to buy time and slow down my plans. I can just imagine what will happen once he gets his paratroops. But instead of complaining, I've just decided that I may start to do a few nuisance attacks too, just to show him what it is like. It's too bad, because I really don't want to play the game like a video game, but it looks like I may have to.

What this means is that I will have to go after the South Pacific in a bigger way and sooner than I originally anticipated. But I don't intend to do that until I get my next big bunch of reinforcements in a week's time. Then I will send an all-out attack on all of the South Pacific bases simultaneously, backed up by the full KB and the Surface Fleet.

[Dive Bomber1]

January 7, 1942 - This was a fairly quiet turn. A CA/CL/DD surface combat TF caught some of Marky's Dutch PT boats at Pontianak and sank four out of eleven with only one Japanese DD receiving a minor hit. Cebu and Bankha received naval bombardments. Tacloban and Guiuan were captured. And some Japanese troops landed at Munda. Marky did get a bit of revenge as his subs off of Gili Gili sank an empty transport.

More of my troops moved into Singapore and caused more casualties for the Allies. My bombardment of Bataan also caused more casualties for the US and Philippine troops there. I'll continue the land and air bombardments on both bases for a few more days then try more deliberate attacks.

Marky is pulling his forces back to Mandalay faster than my forces can advance. I've decided that my forces need a non-malarial rest stop so I decided to capture Rangoon next turn. In China I've started my march on Ichang. I brought over a number of the better divisions that had conquered Yenen so this attack ought to do better than my attacks on Ichang in my other pbems that only used the locally available troops.

I've also decided to send the KB over to the Gilberts in time for my invasion of Apamama. Marky pulled his spy planes out and now only has some troops there. Fortunately, although I am short on troops and supplies in the South Pacific, I've got plenty of fuel to keep my ships in action.

BTW - one of Marky's British CLs hit a sub-laid mine in Colombo Harbor. I can't wait until I capture Singapore and build the port up to level 9 so that I can mine Marky's Indian ports more easily. [:D]

[stldiver]

FYI,

As an allied player that backpedals faster then a man on a unicycle, if you sense the opponent pulling back, advance faster till you fully feel the defense the hit with the steam roller. In other words I usually pulled back faster them my opponent then he stalled with insucurity, which was not the case it was usually I gave ground quicker then I should have. I have learned since and will fighter early where I would not have before. So I am saying If you sense early withdrawels push faster, it will only gain you as allied players reaize they can pull back and preserve vs delay, its a tactic that works.

p.s. I have blocked markey being to obnoxious in post so I am only giving my opinion based on your side, so don't take my comments as to his actions only my opinon.

[Dive Bomber1]

ORIGINAL: stldiver

FYI,

As an allied player that backpedals faster then a man on a unicycle, if you sense the opponent pulling back, advance faster till you fully feel the defense the hit with the steam roller. In other words I usually pulled back faster them my opponent then he stalled with insucurity, which was not the case it was usually I gave ground quicker then I should have. I have learned since and will fighter early where I would not have before. So I am saying If you sense early withdrawels push faster, it will only gain you as allied players reaize they can pull back and preserve vs delay, its a tactic that works.

I am chasing Marky as fast as possible where his pull back is giving me "freebies", such as in China and Burma, but I don't want to divert from my plans too radically elsewhere. Marky's moves in the Central Pacific make be believe that he is planning an early counter attack, or at least a raid in force there soon. I want to be certain that I am positioned to both stop and to take advantage of any such attack. At the same time I want my preparation to support my future moves in the region.

But for now I am very short of forces with which to do anything serious in the Central Pacific. Once Manila falls I will be able to free up most of my troops on Luzon and start to bring serious forces to the East. Having PM under my control makes that move easier. My big decision will be whether to sweep into the south central Pacific in force, or to grab northeastern Australia. I want to locate the US fleet before I make that decision, and I've given myself two weeks to do so.

Thanks for your comments.

[Dive Bomber1]

January 8, 1942 – I'm still in a state of shock. I was about two thirds through setting up my turn when I noticed a Chinese LCU symbol two hexes north of Changsha along the road between Chunking and Changsha. I had been moving some units up parallel to that road in hopes of cutting it, so I checked the Chinese unit symbol to get an idea of what was there.

What was there was listed as being 38 LCUs!!! My first thought was that Marky was bringing "everyone" south to add to the defense of Changsha and Hengchow, but then I noticed that there were no longer any LCU symbols at either Changsha or Hengchow! Unless my Intel is totally off, Marky has abandoned his last two bases along the central rail line in China!!! [X(]

I find this really strange. With those 38 units Marky could steamroll through most of my bases in China if he wanted to attack. [&o] Now my coastal bases will be safe from all but the longest range Allied bombers and Marky's inner Chinese cities will be within range of my Army bombers.

It also appears that Marky hasn't moved any Chinese units along the Burma Trail to try to defend it. He has all of his Burmese troops at Mandalay, along with what appears to be most of his remaining air units in the theatre. I might have China totally cut off before the end of January if things go well.

There was no other news this turn so momentous. My troops landed at Apamama and captured it without any difficulty from the partial USN base force that was there. I also captured Rangoon which was empty except for an abandoned Catalina. And a tired but still active NLF unit captured Munda. I'm now sending transports to pick up the NLFs that held the bases along the NE coast of New Guinea for me so that they can go back to Truk for well-needed R&R.

I only did land and air bombardments of Singapore and Bataan this turn, and I will continue with that approach for the next few days until my troops are a little more rested. Surprisingly, Marky had a lone Buffalo up as CAP to confront my air attacks on Singapore. My Nate Daitais swarmed over the lone plane and shot it down as if it wasn't really there.

Marky's subs continued with their lucky streaks, hitting ships while ducking my ASW. I've been moving my subs around a lot in the hopes of detecting major Allied operations, but without much luck so far. Things have gone quiet again in the South Pacific, but I'm going to keep the KB in the region just in case a "juicy" target shows up.

My next big operation is the invasion of Menado, and I started to load up the invasion TF this turn.

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

38 units???? Let them pass you right by and cut them off. That is a lot of mouths to feed.

[ctangus]

ORIGINAL: Dive Bomber1

Unless my Intel is totally off, Marky has abandoned his last two bases along the central rail line in China!!! [X(]

If true that's a big mistake on his part! [X(] In 6 months or less he'll regret not fighting for the resources there. My suggestion: keep bombing the sh1t out of his largest stacks in China & as you're doing, cut the Burma Road ASAP. Burn that Chinese supply. By the end of '42 or sooner you can effectively take China out of the war.

Enjoying the AAR, BTW. Good luck & BANZAI! [:)]

[Dive Bomber1]

ORIGINAL: ctangus

ORIGINAL: Dive Bomber1

Unless my Intel is totally off, Marky has abandoned his last two bases along the central rail line in China!!! [X(]

If true that's a big mistake on his part! [X(] In 6 months or less he'll regret not fighting for the resources there. My suggestion: keep bombing the sh1t out of his largest stacks in China & as you're doing, cut the Burma Road ASAP. Burn that Chinese supply. By the end of '42 or sooner you can effectively take China out of the war.

Enjoying the AAR, BTW. Good luck & BANZAI! [:)]

Once again I've been caught a bit short and I'll have to rush some base forces forward to be able to take advantage of the situation. Now if the weather in China starts to cooperate I ought to be able to have some fun.

Thanks for the comments! [:)]

[Dive Bomber1]

January 9, 1942 – My troops arrived in Changsha and Hengchow to find that both bases were indeed abandoned. Therefore I gratefully set my units to do deliberate attacks next turn. Thus, just over a month into the war my troops have captured all but one of the outer Chinese bases, and my units are starting to march into Ichang in force. With any luck I'll capture that base soon too.

Now that Marky has given me so many Chinese bases without a fight I decided to take advantage of the time that I gained to upgrade a number of obsolete or short range air units to more useful units. I can't really see the point of keeping Anns, Marys or Sonias around since PDU allows me to upgrade them to Sallys and Helens. I also took the time to halt a number of aircraft plants for planes that I'm not using, and to also halt some aircraft engine plants; particularly those which produce engines that don't appear to be used in any planes.

Otherwise things were pretty quiet this turn. Marky wasn't flying much of anything, and didn't do much other than to move his remaining Dutch PT boats to Batavia and to retreat his remaining troops in Burma to Mandalay. He has been attempting limited night bombing missions, but they aren't accomplishing much.

I will be interested to see if Marky actually tries to make a stand at Mandalay. Right now he appears to have left Pagan open, so if he keeps it that way I'll send all my troops through Pagan to reach Mandalay, thus avoiding the river crossing. Marky has a hundred or more planes in Mandalay, but I'm not flying anything other than recon in Burma right now, so that doesn't concern me.

My bombers hit Singapore and Bataan again this turn, as did my land bombardment attacks. The artillery attack on Singapore racked up over 800 Allied casualties, so things are rapidly reaching the point where I'll start trying deliberate attacks soon. Things aren't quite as "ripe" in Bataan, as is still being indicated by the flak damage that my air attacks are receiving, so I will wait a bit longer before starting serious attacks on Bataan.

For once my troops didn't actually capture any bases this turn, however, they will capture Changsha and Hengchow next turn, and I landed troops at Russell Island, so as long as I remembered to set the troops to attack they will capture that base too next turn.

Some of my LBA actually made a successful attack this turn, as a Daitai of Nells attacked a small TF at the Andaman Islands, sinking a PG and an MSW and hitting an AK hard. My Bettys and Nells are usually near to being useless for me, so this was a pleasant surprise.

Marky's best result this turn was against a bombardment TF that I sent in to hit Cebu. The coastal guns hit several ships hard, including one DD that has pretty severe damage. But I'm sending my ships back – minus the damaged ones – to make certain that the guns at Cebu don't do the same thing when I eventually sail in an invasion TF.