Here we go again! tc464 (A) vs. Mike (J) - No tc464

[Mike Solli]

Hi Q-Ball.  Yeah, I see 131,800 resources each day at Nagasaki as well.  I agree with you about some formula.

I didn't realize Tarakan was so minimally held.  I'll step up the pace and push a regiment there and the rest to Balikpapan.  If that isn't enough to take Tarakan, the third regiment is about a week behind and should be enough to do the job.  I have a base force allocated for each location.  They're just behind the invasion force and will land once each base is secured.

Assuming Bataan falls soon, I'll have 5 divisions, 2 infantry brigades, 2 tank regiments, ~12 artillery units, 3-4 engineer regiments and some other odds & ends.  I suspect that will be enough to take Java.

[Mike Solli]

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[Mike Solli]

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[Q-Ball]

In fact, that's so many troops near Bataan, I would prep a couple divisions for Darwin, and attempt a landing soon. You can't leave Northern Australia alone, or your opponent might be landing back on Tarakan in 14 months.

[Mac Linehan]

Original:

Resource/Oil/Transport Stuff

I have allocated 250 hulls (+ 3x 1250 ton TKs) to transport resources to Honshu from the other Home Islands as well as China/Manchuria/Korea (C/M/K). They are all in the 10-12 kt range. If you want I can post the details. There will be a total of 23 xAK TFs and 1 TK TF. The TK TF gets 2 escorts and the others get 1 escort each (for now) for a total of 25 escorts. I think this will keep Honshu supplied with resources and will keep the oil produced in Shikuka flowing to Honshu. I’ll adjust as needed.

Hi, Mike -

I know you may be tight with time, but am interested in any and all detailed info on how you manage your resource convoys to the Home Islands.

When setting up my Japanese first turn, I use Tracker to determine where the Resource concentrations are at what ports.

> Do you use one primary port for each geographical supply area (Occupied China, Korea, Shikoku etc.) then cycle multiple TF's of 20 ships each thru the port for that area; or do you send three or four TF's to different ports in (for example) the Korea Geographical area?

> If I load all the resources available at a port with a small amount of resources, will this draw more and larger amounts to replace the deficit that was loaded on a TF; or do I stay with a major port that begins with a significant surplus?

> In my current game, I have a series of TF's (three to five ships each), escorted by one PB, heading toward one port for each Resource area. After reading the above from your AAR this seems rather inadequate and inefficient.

Mike, as always, I am appreciative of the time and effort you put into this AAR, with another "Thank You" to all of the posters on this thread: you have taught me much.

Grasshopper Mac <grin>

PS - I am off this coming week because of Spring Break (Yeah, It's Tough... But I LOVE driving a School Bus!) and will concentrate on forging ahead with the important stuff - like AE!

[seille]

Mike posted a table in one of the first pages of this thread for his resource movement.
I still use it and it works (with some adjustments) very well.

[Cribtop]

I made use of the table you mention and it is working well for me. Note that per Mike it is necessary to send more ships to Pt. Arthur than he anticipated in his chart.

[Mac Linehan]

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

ORIGINAL: ny59giants
I'm still waiting for that gusty Allied player who picks up the fighters at Wake Island and heads Big E and Lexington through the island gaps and hits Truk on their way to Australia. Truk is a "target rich environment" and if those 4 older CAs happen to be there, then......

I gave this some thought actually in my game vs. Cuttlefish. There isn't crap for IJN Air Search at that time, so sneaking up on Truk isn't really that difficult. The difficulty is that if Kido Butai leaves PH right away, and sails straight for Truk they will get there before you, or even worse, about the same time. CF only did a one-day attack on PH, so too risky. In most cases, KB is heading for Truk after PH, it's the most logical place to go.

Now, if KB hangs around for a couple days at PH..........very possible.[8D]

Mike: Sorry to keep butting in, 90% of the stuff I put out there you were already doing or on top of, great minds think alike I guess.......

What are you doing with KB after Pearl? I personally like splitting off 1 Car Div and sending it to the Southern DEI.

Splitting CVs is usually a no-no, but there isn't any risk the first month or two, since there are only 3 USN CVs in the Pacific; considering they also have Buffs on board, easily handled by the other 4.

Appearing in the Southern DEI does a few things:
1. You'll likely catch some fleeing Allied shipping
2. You might catch some ABDA cruisers. If you don't, you will certainly chase them from the area.
3. You can provide air support for Ambon/Timor landings, when they are otherwise tough to support from the air. Moving on Timor in late Dec is going "deep", but if IJN CVs appear, it will chase the ABDA Navy away.

I wouldn't keep them there long, because there is a chance that USN CVs can be in the area by mid-Jan or so. Worst case, you could probably win a fight against 2 CVs, though it could be bloody. Or if you are paired with Baby KB, it could be a good thing.

This just covers the first month, after that it's probably wise to keep everyone together.

Other CV Notes:Don't forget to RESIZE the airgroups on Hosho and Ryujo; they will expand nicely when you do that. Hosho is now a 20-capacity CVE, and is more useful than before. Here is another trick: Load that 3-plane Val Chutai that starts in Pescadores onto Ryujo for a turn, and RESIZE; it now becomes a 19-plane Chutai. Set it to TRAIN, as you will need replacement pilots for KB.

Q-Ball;

You are an experienced, knowledgeable player; your posts are informative and educational. Please keep them coming....

Mac

[Mac Linehan]

ORIGINAL: seille

Mike posted a table in one of the first pages of this thread for his resource movement.
I still use it and it works (with some adjustments) very well.

seille and Cribtop -

Found it - page four, post 107. Last Sunday Nite I did not make it past page two, before shutting down for the week. Thank you for your help!

Mac

[Mike Solli]

Hey Mac, I'm on for just a few minutes (I have drill this weekend and just snuck on). I'd send ~15-20 Adens for Pt. Arthur and eliminate Hangchow, Tsingtao and all of the Kyushu convoys.

Gotta run. Talk later!

[Mac Linehan]

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

Hey Mac, I'm on for just a few minutes (I have drill this weekend and just snuck on). I'd send ~15-20 Adens for Pt. Arthur and eliminate Hangchow, Tsingtao and all of the Kyushu convoys.

Gotta run. Talk later!

Mike!

Good Info as always; take care at drill. I was stationed in Denver Colorado 1984 - 1987 as part of the Independent Duty Instructor ("I and I") Team for the M110a2 Howitzer (Hull Mechanic) training Reservists. As a Marine unit we did our training at Fort Carson. I remember those days so long ago....

Mac

[seille]

The Tsingtao Convoy i rerouted to Pt. Arthur also very fast.
After it seems to be clear that the Kyushu convoy´s are useless i´ll stop them.
&nbsp;
Some minor changes i made to Mikes plan, but for the basic layout i still like it.

[Mike Solli]

13 Feb 42

Reinforcements:  62-65 & 67 Naval Guard (4th Fleet) - Most of these guys will go to the outer perimeter.  13 Nav Const Bn (SE Fleet), 12 Base Force (Southern Fleet) - I haven't decided where these guys are going to vacation yet.

China

I caught a Chinese Corps 1 hex west of Chuhsien and routed it.  I caused 1582 casualties for 16 Japanese losses.

Singapore

I tried another assault today.  I consider this one successful because I reduced the fort level from 3 to 2.  I caused 2581 Allied casualties for 2883 Japanese casualties.  I'll attack again in a few days.

Bataan

This attack was a disappointment.  Ted increased the fort level back to 2 and I didn't reduce it.  I lost 1512 troops to 1718 Allied troop casualties.  I'll attack again in a few days.

Odds & Ends

I took Jesselton from a small base force.  I also took Boela with a small engineer company.  The infrastructure is in pretty good shape:  Oil 20(5) and Resources 16(4).  I'll repair the oil.

The Tarakan invasion is just a few days out.  There' are no enemy forces showing up in the area other than the 3 garrison units.

[Mike Solli]

14 Feb 42

Reinforcements: Yoko Ku T-1 (2x Emily) 4th Fleet (to Wake), 45 IF Chutai (12x Ida) 2 Air Div (training), 68 Sentai (42x Nate) 2 Air Div (training)
SC CHa-28, xAKL Atsu Maru, AMc Wa1

Quiet day, except for my stupidity. I sent 5 DMS to clear mines off Bataan. I sent them to an adjacent hex, 0 react, and of course they wandered into the hex and were all sunk by CD fire. [8|] Now I'm down 12 DMS due to stupidity. Gotta figure out an alternative.

A Dutch sub, sitting 1 hex SE of Babeldaob put a torp into the E Hachijo (Shimushu class) and down she went. That's too bad. There were only 4 (now 3) of them and the have long range. I was hoping to use them as escorts between Babeldaob and the Home Islands. I'm sending an ASW TF of 4x CHa class SCs over there to deal with that threat.

The two IJA air units arrived with 2 planes each. I will most likely transfer the 68 Sentai to a non-restricted HQ in the near future. Not sure which one yet, but I'll take a look at where they may be useful in a year or so. I'll use them as a training outfit until they are needed. I'm looking real hard at 5 Air Division, which will end up in the Southern SRA and is rather short of fighter units right now (2x Sentai and 1x Chutai). The Chutai is the Tojo outfit, which is down to 6 aircraft

Java

Another tank regiment completed offloading and the 4 Div is headed there, but still about a week away. My forces are still too weak to take on Batavia and Ted is content to sit in his base, probably building up forts. Time to bomb the airfield there to slow down the fort building process. I will take Merak before I tackle Batavia so Ted doesn't have a retreat route. Not sure how I'll take it, but it'll be either overland by a tank regiment or by air assault. Probably the tanks....

[Mike Solli]

15 Feb 42

Not much at all today. Normal bombings occurred, but that's about all. Tomorrow, the Tarakan invasion occurs. Also, KB is escorting the 4 Division past Darwin. Hopefully, KB will clear out Darwin of any miscellaneous shipping.

[Mac Linehan]

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

I guess most of them are running to their rally points? How many bases do you use as such Mike?

Here's my theoretical plan for resource movement to Honshu:

Mike -

In reference to your shipping allocation chart (post 107):

The bottom of the chart, Shanghai to Shimonoseki gives a break down of 9x Aden and a #/Month 3.5

Are you indicating that the 9x Adens will be in one convoy and make the trip 3.5 times a month?

As I am probably missing the obvious - and just want to make sure I understand - thank you for your patience and help.

Mac

[Mike Solli]

Mac,

Yup, that's it. The #/month column is the number of round trips per month.

Note some changes:

-Stop all convoys from Kyushu. The stuff moves on it's own overland to Honshu.
-Move ~3 convoys from Toyohara to Shikuka. The resources move up there.
-Double the Hakodate convoy and eliminate ~half the other convoys from Kushiro and Sapporo. The resources move to Hakodate.
-Eliminate the convoys from Hangchow and Tsingtao. They don't get enough resources.
-Double the convoys at Pt. Arthur. Tons or resources accumulate there.

[Mike Solli]

16 Feb 42

The long awaited invasion of Tarakan began today. I'll take it tomorrow.

I attacked Bataan again. It was a bit too soon and my forces weren't ready. I reduced the fort level from 2 back to 1 but it'll be a few more days before I can attack again. My losses were a bit high, 2070 Japanese to 977 Allied.

I bombarded Singapore (a daily occurance) and noticed 2 Allied units had vanished, the AT regiment and an artillery regiment. I guess the air bombardment is working after all.

KB found an AM at Darwin and put her under. They will continue to the west, escorting the 4 Division toward Java.

A few hexes to the west of Espiritu Santo, the I-175 found an xAKL and pummelled her with her deck gun. She's showing up as being sunk.

In China, I beat up another Chinese corps 4 hexes north of Chingting, causing 2060 Chinese casualties to 465 Japanese casualties. Most of my casualties were disruptions, while most of the Chinese casualties were destroyed squads.

After a long battle with damage, the I-122 finally made it to the port of Hong Kong for final repairs. Her damage is 0-54(54)-18(18)-0. It'll take about 12 days to repair her.

The Kinugasa was returned to service at Rabaul after the beating she took sinking the Canberra off Tulagi. By the way, I'm invading the Solomons tomorrow.

[Mac Linehan]

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

Mac,

Yup, that's it. The #/month column is the number of round trips per month.

Note some changes:

-Stop all convoys from Kyushu. The stuff moves on it's own overland to Honshu.
-Move ~3 convoys from Toyohara to Shikuka. The resources move up there.
-Double the Hakodate convoy and eliminate ~half the other convoys from Kushiro and Sapporo. The resources move to Hakodate.
-Eliminate the convoys from Hangchow and Tsingtao. They don't get enough resources.
-Double the convoys at Pt. Arthur. Tons or resources accumulate there.

Mike -

Many, many thanks - a very clear guide to setting things up. I understand that there will be fluctuations and changes; this is an excellent start. A good learning experience too, not only am I learning so much more about each ship design; I have a much clearer picture of (and confidence in!) my understanding of the whole merchant marine organization - which I know to be critical to Japan's survival!

I also follow closely your merchant conversions; unfortunately I did all of mine before discovering this AAR - but hey! it's all a learning experience - and I love it.

Will also look for the Master's comments on ship upgrades and all things Naval.....

GrassHopper Mac.... <grin>

[Mike Solli]

Mac, you're hilarious.

I didn't do many conversions. 4 xAKs to AKEs. All the To'sus to PBs. I may convert more Ansus to PBs as well because they have a 14 kt speed. A few ACMs. Any To'sus that come as reinforcements will probably convert to ACMs. As soon as I can, I'll convert a few ARs. They're invaluable toward the front.

So far, I haven't done any -t conversions. I'm still not sure I need them. I don't use any xAPs for invasions. They're too valuable moving forces out of Japan to hubs (Truk, Formosa, Saipan). They're really fast. If I do any -t conversions, it'll be the 18 kt xAKs.

That's about it off the top of my head. I'll think about what else I've done tomorrow.