Another Reason To Hate UV

[tocaff]

So there we are with my forces holding onto EPV and a force of 4 DDs set to patrol do not retire/do not react to enemy at Noumea to deal with a IJN sub problem there. I have a nice conservative commander with orders to move to Noumea and what happens? The 4 DDs sail to EPV and take on the whole IJN! Now if that wasn't the dumbest, most unprofessional and unrealistic thing to happen I don't know what is. I understand a commander disobeying or twisting orders, but this? How many hexes did they travel on their death ride? I'm starting to like UV less and less with each game I play due to "quirks" like this.

[decaro]

Did this ever happen at v 2.3?

[tocaff]

I never faced this kind of situation before.  Yes, I know that the more aggressive a comander is the more likely he will go off looking for trouble.  Remember the distance involved, a cautious commander and the odds.  I thought that the situation was totally insane.  It's no a bug, just a thing in the game to allow commanders to not follow orders to the letter as a way of reflecting real life.  All commanders share the same problems of not enough of everything and subordinates who ignore, disobey or interpret orders so that the original intent can get lost.  This was to much though.

[Halsey]

You should try WITP.

Sometimes the same thing will happen, only on a grander scale.[;)][:D]

[xj900uk]

[font=arial]Remember the old SAS adage : ‘He who dares, wins.’[/font]
[font=arial]Although in the case of your DD fleet commander,  I think he dared and lost…  [/font]
[font=arial] [/font]
[font=arial]The comments though are valid,  if you want a commander to do what you want,  stick to orders and not tangle with the big boys,  then go for one who is cautious or extremely cautious.  If you want a maverick who may well go bouncing around like a loose 4.7” on deck,  then go for an aggressive or extremely aggressive.  They can never be trusted to do the predictable thing (which can be either an asset or a liability,  depending on if it works)…[/font]
[font=arial] [/font]
[font=arial]I’ve had in the past flotilla’s of half a dozen PT boats shaping up to a Japanese armada lead by the Yamato that is trying to tiptoe past my flimsy picket line to do a sneak bombardment of Munda or Tulagi.  My PT boats got pulverised to matchwood,  but it sure did make a mess of his surprise attack (used up most of his ammo trying blowing my PT boats to kingdom come…,  I had four flotillas there each of c. half a dozen that he had to fight his way passed before he even got within bombardment range).[/font]
[font=arial] [/font]
[font=arial]On the subject of aggression,  it is interesting to note that,  despite the Bushido code and Samurai spirit of most of the Japanese soldiers and airmen,  their commanders were surprisingly timid.  Nagumo’s over-caution threw away their advantages at the Battle of Midway (hindsight is a wonderful thing…) and the IJN also threw in the towel at the Battles of the Coral Sea and also Eastern Solomons,  handing draws to the USN when in reality the IJN should have pushed home and finished off the suffering American carrier groups (at Coral Sea they let the Yorktown escape,  and at Eastern Solomons they let the Enterprise off the hook).  It could also be convincingly argued that at the final great battle,  that of Leyte Gulf,  the Japanese Commander’s nerve broke when he was within one card of finishing off the US Escort Carrier Group that he was pulverising.[/font]
[font=arial]Perhaps the best most glaring example of this was at the first battle of Savo island (early hours 08.08.42) when the Japanese admiral (can’t remember his name,  think it began with an ‘M’) brilliantly surprised and outfought not one but two Aussie-American cruiser groups,  leaving four heavy cruisers either sunk or sinking and the rest of the surface units severely damaged,  then decided to withdraw with the Guadalcanal invasion transports and supply boats at his mercy.  Had he decided to carry on,  plunge in and either sink or else disperse them,  then unquestionably the Guadalcanal campaign,  and arguably the entire Pacific one,  would have taken a completely different turn…[/font]
 

[tocaff]

Well even if the Japanese fleet had sunk the transports at the 'Canal, won at Midway, sunk the Yorktown at Coral Sea or nailed the Big E the outcome of the war was ordained on December 7th.  The enraged American public was out for blood and the production of the USA was so great that there was no way for them not to eventually win in the Pacific.  Just think of how you feel as the Japanese player winning a tactical battle knowing that you can't sustain loses while the USN comes back bigger and better each time you fight them.  Now try to put that into a real life context and imagine how the real Japanese commanders might have felt the need for caution to save their precious and limited warships.  The USN needed audacious commanders early on who did more with less.  Possibly the greatest asset of the US commanders was their unpredictability.

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: tocaff
...a force of 4 DDs set to patrol do not retire/do not react to enemy at Noumea ... orders to move to Noumea

I don't have a screenshot of the TF orders display, but this indicates one user-created problem. When you order a TF to move to its home base, the program (for which I am no apologist, mind you) automatically reverts the "patrol" order to "retirement allowed."

This means that the TF was subject to a local command order to intercept hostile surface forces attacking a friendly base within cruising range.

The section of the manual that lists the conditions and consequences of various TF orders is a conundrum, to be sure, but it does help if you study it some. In the sec. 8.6 table for TFs ordered to seek "surface combat," you find that these guys are itching for a fight because you told their commander that's what you wanted.

Don't hate the game because your subordinates were carrying out your orders.

[DuckofTindalos]

Heeeeey!!! Look who's back![;)]

[xj900uk]

Well even if the Japanese fleet had sunk the transports at the 'Canal, won at Midway, sunk the Yorktown at Coral Sea or nailed the Big E the outcome of the war was ordained on December 7th

 
I agree with that statement to some extent,  the war was pre-ordained virtually from the word go - something that only Yamamoto on the Japanese side seemed to understand.  If I remember exactly from one of his quotes to an aide :
 'Those fools in Tokyo think that if we beat the Americans badly often enough,  they will eventually give up and go home.  The only way that Japan will win this war is when we march into the White House and dictate terms from there.  And even then,  I doubt the Americans will listen'.
 
However,  my point was that if the Japanese had managed to sink the Yorktown as well at Coral Sea,  or kicked the Americans out of Guadalcanal fairly early on before they had a chance to get established,  then certainly the war would have dragged on longer,  certainly into 1946 and possibly 1947.  If there had been no Guadalcanal, t hen the IJN air-arm would not have been bled white so quickly and it could have taken a completely different tack (perhaps just one thrust through the central Pacific rather than the double effort?).
But there wa s no way the Japanese could have won in the long-term,  not given the US's capacity for production and organisation,  and also given the serious Japanese short-comings in its own war-machine

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: Terminus

Heeeeey!!! Look who's back![;)]

You don't have 20,000 posts yet, T? Get busy, man!

[DuckofTindalos]

Very nearly there, Mr. P...[:D]

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: Terminus

Very nearly there, Mr. P...[:D]

Let me be among the first to offer my "congratulations," Mr. T...

'Tis an accomplishment that will stand beside many other Herculean efforts of stamina ... earth grimly circling the Sun year after gruesome year ... day following night following day following night et cetera ad absurdem ... George Dubya hanging on desperately by his fingernails trying to complete some 2,922 days in office (or thereabouts) ... lemming #198,556 patiently crawling along waiting for the first 198,555 to hurl themselves mindlessly into the abyss before it finally becomes his turn ...

Ah, such greatness. How I envy it.

[tocaff]

But does this accomplishment make Terminus the poster boy for the Get A Life Foundation?  LOL  actually he must spend lots of time plotting his next moves and waiting for his opponents turns to arrive.  

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: tocaff

But does this accomplishment make Terminus the poster boy for the Get A Life Foundation?  LOL  actually he must spend lots of time plotting his next moves and waiting for his opponents turns to arrive.  

Hee hee. 20,000 posts, 20,001 words. T is definitely a man who, in response to the question, "Boxers or briefs?" says, "I like brief."

BTW, while I am wallowing around completely off topic, tocaff, you indicate in another thread that you are a Vietnam vet. Keep the faith, bro. Like most of us, I never give details and never ask for any.

I just like to keep the contacts goin', the feeling flowin', and the flame of truth alive for those who be knowin'.

[DuckofTindalos]

I wear boxers, thankyouverymuch...[:'(]

[tocaff]

Actually I:

1  Love UV, not hate it.  I do wish I was better at it though.

2  Say things in jest and don't mean to offend.  We tend to take ourselves way to seriously.

3  Will someday when I grow up and then I might even play WITP PBEM leaving me no time to post.