Nomonhan Redux: Seydlitz (Japan) vs. MBatch729 (Allies)

[Smeulders]

This should actually be a question for your opponent, but what do you think his plan was pushing those two infantry divisions forward only to be slaughtered ? This is the second time this game he's moved woefully insufficient forces into your stacks and I can't think of any reason for doing so that are worth the losses these moves get. 

[Caliban]

I am another one of those folks who are following your AAR with tremendous interest. One of the very first things I do each morning is to look for an update to this thread.

Best of Luck!

Caliban (JFB)

[rattovolante]

ORIGINAL: seydlitz

It's working pretty good. Fatigue seems to stay in the 14-22 area with very low op losses. I was also running 40-50% and decided to bump it to 70, then 80%.

Thanks! Although I prefer to keep fatigue under 10-15, will try 60%. I probably am overly cautious though.

[Streptokok]

After pilots go over 60 point exp they started to gain nothing. I wanted to see if I get get more points by training so I have left few units on 100% for a long time (a month?).
Didnt notice any op losses and they gained some exp:

[seydlitz_slith]

Turn 51 26 January 1942

The only significant thing that happened this turn was that Davao fell to Japan. I won't show any pictures because Davao falling is pretty standard in most games.

Now to discuss some points of interest.

First off, the weather continues to be bad. Thunderstorms plus cold zone in winter = blizzard conditions.

[seydlitz_slith]

The KB is trolling around the Marshalls. I don't have any definite goals in mind here. I just figured that I would take a slow tour through this area in case Mark got bold and tried to pull a harassing raid on the islands there. I will probably encounter nothing, but since there is no logical operational reason for my carriers to be in this area there is always the chance that I will catch him off guard. I have had the pleasure of doing just that a couple of times in our prior game (stock).

If I don't run into anything I will head back to Japan, refuel, then send the carriers against the Russians again.

[seydlitz_slith]

Due to the weather, I flew only two zero units over Russia. One was LRCAP over Rybilov and the other was a fighter sweep over Vladivostok. Both inflicted damage to the enemy. However, I think that 51 turns into the game and about 30 turns of fighting the Soviets I would take the opportunity to summarize the scope of the air war with Russia.

First off, here is a summary of allied aircraft losses to date sorted by total losses descending.

Out of 1,496 allied aircraft lost, 1,173 were Soviets. That is 78% of all allied aircraft losses.
The Soviets have lost 392 bombers and 781 fighters.
However, they still have significant forces flying every turn or listed on the bases. I feel tactically outnumbered, but I do think that his losses are heavy because he has definitely changed his habits regarding the use of his aircraft.

[seydlitz_slith]

On the Japanese side, I have lost 1,215 planes in all theaters, with 1,105 of them being fighters or bombers. The breakdown is 585 bombers and 520 fighters.

Among the fighter losses, 54% were Nates and 34% Zeroes. The remaining 12% were Oscars. By far the majority of the fighter (and bomber) losses were during the fight over Russia and Korea. Among the bombers, 30% of my losses were Nell/Betty and 21% were Sally. The remaining 49% were the lesser types.

[seydlitz_slith]

Again I would like to state that fighting in a winter climate against the Soviets is a tough and bitter experience. Their biplane fighters with the initial aircrews seemed to be overly strong and only now have I began to feel that I have started to gain the upper hand in dogfights.

Here is a look at my replacement pool. Fighters first.

[seydlitz_slith]

Next the bomber pool.

[seydlitz_slith]

Finally the engine pool.

I did not show it but I do have aircraft and engines under research. It seems that game has a mind of it's own when it comes to repairing research factories. I have found no valid reason for it but many of these research factories do not seem to be repairing. I have repeatedly rechecked the obvious stuff so that is not the reason.

[seydlitz_slith]

Over on the main forum there was discussions about the accuracy of some bombing attacks. I had mentioned that some of my light and medium bombers had very high bombing accuracy ratings on the main unit screen. Here is an example of one with a high rating. Most bomber units fall in the 0-15% rating from what I have seen, so for these units to have very high ratings is definitely worth noting. If I see a single engined army bomber unit with a high bombing rating, I try to convert them to Lily and then use them for either night port bombing attacks or for ASW patrols. My theory is that with a good bombing accuracy they may well be good at bombing submerging subs.

[seydlitz_slith]

I have been training this unit in ASW for the last 30 days as that is what I intend to use most of my Lilys for most of the time.

[seydlitz_slith]

If you compared that unit to the ASW rating of most units you will see that those are pretty high ASW ratings compared to the average army air unit.

Here is another unit that has a very high bombing accuracy rating. This time flying Marys. I wonder if these came from years of bombing helpless Chinese?

[rattovolante]

ORIGINAL: seydlitz

I did not show it but I do have aircraft and engines under research. It seems that game has a mind of it's own when it comes to repairing research factories. I have found no valid reason for it but many of these research factories do not seem to be repairing. I have repeatedly rechecked the obvious stuff so that is not the reason.

I read somewhere in the forums that research factories have a random chance to repair each turn - they don't automatically repair every turn like production factories.

This seems to fit well with my experience in the game, but I don't remember if the post was by a dev or a player, so don't take it for 100% sure.

[LoBaron]

ORIGINAL: seydlitz

Over on the main forum there was discussions about the accuracy of some bombing attacks. I had mentioned that some of my light and medium bombers had very high bombing accuracy ratings on the main unit screen. Here is an example of one with a high rating. Most bomber units fall in the 0-15% rating from what I have seen, so for these units to have very high ratings is definitely worth noting. If I see a single engined army bomber unit with a high bombing rating, I try to convert them to Lily and then use them for either night port bombing attacks or for ASW patrols. My theory is that with a good bombing accuracy they may well be good at bombing submerging subs.

From what i noticed the bombing accuracy is higly dependent on the target. Since this value is a thrown-together result from every attack the unit made you get extremely different results
depending on mission type so i doubt that the percentage says much on the performance of the unit.
For example i had a B26 Group that had 65% accuracy after a couple of days bombing the harbour at Buna, when the Japanese tried to reinforce with several convoys the mission changed
to naval attack and naturally the accuracy dropped to as low as 20% in only a few missions. So the accuracy value by itself doesnt tell you that much as long as you dont take the mission
history into account.
In general i noticed that light bombers have a high hit-rate attacking land targets. When searching for units that qualify as good ASW id only watch for ASW, LowN and NavS values
of the individual pilots.

seydlitz one question to the fighter losses: on hindsight do you think it would have made a difference if youd put more emphasis on converting the Nates to Oscars? I guess 90% of the
Nate losses were on the Russion front and i wonder if the Oscar would have performed better.
So if you had tried a different approach using maybe some Nates at the beginning but stepping up the air war only after you have a respectable number of Oscars in the area to preserve as
many IJA pilots as possible - would this have been better or do the Russians have so many fighters to play with that you had to beat him with numbers and just accept the losses?

[seydlitz_slith]

LoBaron,
I still stand by my choice of continuing Nate production early in the game. Since I had increased zero production (by a lot) and also increased Oscar production (by some) there would not have been enough engines to satisfy needs for both. My philosophy has been to use the Nates in situations where they were not sitting ducks until the Oscar population built up and to upgrade Nates to Oscar starting with the best unit and working down.

If you look at the loss breakout, the low Oscar loss percentage is due to the low number of Oscars in theater and not due to their superiority. When you look at the zero losses compared to the Nate losses, it underscores the fact that the fighting has been brutal due to the high numbers of Soviet aircraft. The Oscar units in theater have proven to be nothing but long range Nates. They are better able to defend themselves and have a range advantage but ultimately they suffer from the same poor hitting power.

I will however be glad when I can replace all frontline Nates with Oscar Ic.

[aztez]

Nice going in russian front. To me it seems that you might have this wrapped up in summer of 1942 unless your opponent succeeds with his counterstrikes.

I think he needs to start doing proping assaults around Russian fronts. I know he has quality troops so I'am dazzled he hasn't made anys serious push yet.

Btw, what is you estimate on enemy av worth "trapped" around Vladivostok/Voroshilov?

Keep up the good fight.

[TOMLABEL]

ORIGINAL: SuluSea

ORIGINAL: TOMLABEL

ORIGINAL: seydlitz

AWESOME PLANE TOPS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

These look like they belong to Cathartes - very, very nice!!!!

OK - WHERE CAN i GET THEM????[&o][&o][&o]

Yes ,the plane tops look fantastic. On a side note this AAR is interesting as heck. I can't remember if I commented on this before. Thanks

Agreed - Great AAR!!!

Please post more plane tops!

[seydlitz_slith]

ORIGINAL: aztez

Nice going in russian front. To me it seems that you might have this wrapped up in summer of 1942 unless your opponent succeeds with his counterstrikes.

I think he needs to start doing proping assaults around Russian fronts. I know he has quality troops so I'am dazzled he hasn't made anys serious push yet.

Btw, what is you estimate on enemy av worth "trapped" around Vladivostok/Voroshilov?

Keep up the good fight.

I think that the bulk of his mobile combat units are at Voroshilov, the hex that I am moving to attack. I figure that he has about 1500 AV there.

One of the issues that is keeping him from probing heavily are the border fort units. This works both ways. He has been trying to defeat the fort at Kotou for the last 10 turns after an additional 7 turns of air bombardment. The static border fort units (both Japanese and Russian) seem to be extremely hard to kill. You have to use overwhelming force for several turns in a row until you totally destroy the unit. These forts guard most of the good crossing points on both sides of the border. It took me almost a week of attacks on the Russian border fort north or Rybilov with 3800 AV to eliminate it and take the hex.