Task Force Composition

[CapAndGown]

There are innumerous combinations possible for task forces with each mission requiring a different combination depending on distance to travel and expected opposition. There is no way to foresee all the possible types of missions and circumstances under which they will be performed. Nevertheless, I think there are a few observations that can be made about optimal task for composition for certain types of missions.

1) General comments
Wherever you go always expect enemy subs and enemy mines. There are two ways to deal with this: bring along minesweepers and destroyers with each task force; or sweep the area for mines and subs ahead of time. For the first case you simply add in the needed ships to the task force. The second way of dealing with these threats needs a little more explanation.
If you have a task for about to transit or arrive at a certain location you can send minesweepers and ASW ships in ahead of time to check for mines and subs. For instance, let us suppose that you have a large transport task force heading from Truk to Munda and that you have both MSW's and PC's based at Shortlands. These ships can be sent to Munda a day or two before your transport task force arrives to check for mines and to engage any subs. Or say that you have an air combat task force returning to Noumea. In this case you can form a surface task force made up of SC's which is set to "patrol/do not retire". Undock this task force and have its destination set at Noumea. Although SC's are not particularly good at hunting subs, they can at least use up the enemy's torps so that he has nothing left to shoot at the carriers with.

2) Mine Warfare task forces.
Occasionally you may find your opponent mining a hex and then having some of his subs hang out in the hex waiting for your mine sweepers to show up so he can put a torp in them. Be aware of this tactic and consider escorting your mine sweepers. Even though they have their own intrinsic ASW capability, it would be best if these valuable ships were not targeted in the first place.
For offensive mining operations you might wish to consider the fact that both sides did not simply send their mine layers out on their own but provided them support. You too may wish to consider escorting your mine layers.

3) Surface Combat and Bombardment task forces
More is better only works to a certain point. A couple of DD's that run into a task for of 2 BB's, 4 CA's, 2 CL's and 6 DD's are most likely going to die. But a task force made up of 6 BB's, 8 CA's, 4 CL's, and 6 DD's has no guarantee of defeating an inferior task force made up of 4 BB's, 6 CA's and 6 DD's. The manual indicates that a task force with more than 15 ships is less efficient than a smaller task force. This may not be so important for a transport task force, but it is critical for these combat task forces. If you pack 25 ships into your task force you will probably find that only a few of them engage in any surface action that occurs. It makes no sense to have 12 out of 25 ships take part in the battle when you could have had 10 out 15 ships fighting while the other 10 are performing some other task or even performing the same task in the same hex but in a separate task force.
Even though mines will probably not be a problem for these task forces, you should expect that your opponent will station subs in the hex you are attack. Therefore every surface force should have a destroyer escort.
When selecting ships, pay attention to belt armor. The Japanese Nachi class ships have a belt armor of 100. While this is respectable, these ships might serve a better function escorting your carriers since they have an equivalent amount of AAA to more heavily armed ships. Mogami and Takao class CA's should be your primary combatants for surface combat forces. Furataka class CA's, on the other hand, have only 75 belt armor and little AAA. Since they have little AAA, they are useless as carrier escorts. Therefore you may wish to use these ships in bombardment task forces where you are not expecting to face opposition (for instance, in your first bombardment run against an airfield you are about to invade).
For the Allies, many of your Australian and British CL's have a very thick belt armor. Rather than having these ships escort your carriers, you can effectively use them in a surface combat role because of their survivability. Conversely, some of your CA's have very thin belt armor. These CA's might be of most use escorting your carriers. Become familiar with the characteristics of various ship classes so that when you form a task force you can pick the best class of ships for the mission.
Finally, for bombardment task forces your BB's will inflict the most damage on the enemy airfield and port. In general, the larger the caliber the gun the more damage it will do. So allocate your ships accordingly.


4) Air Combat task forces
Many players fall into the trap of making mega-carrier task forces. You might wish to consider that the AI does this as well and the AI is none too sharp. Many new players come to this forum and as their first post complain that something is wrong with the game because all of their carriers were hit and severely damaged after just one combat while their opponent got away scot free. Much of this aggravation could be avoided if the players had used a more reasonable task force composition for their carrier groups.
In general you should have two CV's per air combat task force. If you have 6 CV's, for example, then you should have 3 air combat TF's, each with two CV's. This is the way the Japanese operated from the beginning of the war and the way the Americans operated from 1943 on.
Even though the carriers are not all in the same task force they can still operate together by intelligent use of the follow command. As of version 2.11 the procedure for using this command with air combat task forces has changed somewhat. Air combat task forces with a follow command will not react to an enemy carrier force any more. This is so that they will not uncover a transport task force they are following. What this means for one air combat TF following another, however, is that they will become split up during the reaction phase when the lead air combat TF reacts while the others do not. To avoid this problem, form a surface combat force of one or two destroyers and have all the air combat task forces follow this surface combat task force. Your carriers will no longer react to the enemy (assuming they have been set to "do not react") and so remain together. Note that this may change as at least one of the Matrix team agrees that this is a problem and would like to see it changed.
The point of having your carriers split up into different TF's is to split up your opponent's air strikes. If you have one mega-force then the enemy will probably send out one massive strike against your carriers and a good number of his bombers are almost certain to leak through your CAP. If your carriers are split up into separate TF's, then your opponent will have to send in several separate strikes to hit all your carriers, thus dividing his effort. Meanwhile, you still have the same amount of CAP as if all your carriers were in the same task force. Your combined CAP will now be dealing with smaller strikes and be much more likely to be able to handle them than it would be able to deal with one massive strike.
Finally, keep in mind that there are always leakers. Your CAP will almost never be able to stop all the bombers coming in. With your carriers split up it is more likely that some of them will survive as the enemy's main strike hits one of your TF's while your other TF's are hit by smaller strikes or even missed all together.

[m0ngoose]

C & G....always a pleasure to read your thoughtful analysis.

A question I have is this. Is there any kind of synergy between TFs in the same hex? So with my 6 carriers in 3 TFs of 15 ships each, do we have overlapping or superior AAA above and beyond what a single TF would have?

And CAP...everyone set to LRCAP and radars everywhere...I'm guessing all the planes are in the air and we get maximum effect since we are in the same hex. I guess you can't get better CAP than 100% of the planes engaging....

So with 3 CV TFs do his strikes come in smaller? To be slaughtered piecemeal? Kind of a retorical question...I might have to play two player hot seat and field test some of these theories....

Unless you already have the answers!

(*added later*)

What I was getting at in the above is am I reaping the benefits of so many ships in the hex without the penalties of being over 15 in the TF? But with three TFs of 15 ships do I get the AAA, CAP, and SEARCH abilities of 45 ships?

I'll try to see if this is the case in my own game testing but I don't really have a solid knowledge yet of the program. Maybe one of you fellows can shed some light on this one? Thanks.

[Toro]

M0ngoose: AA coverage is per TF, so each TF in your three formations will only cover itself.

However, CAP is collective, so any TF in the hex, and LRCAP, all combine into one CAP value. Note, however, that under the 2.x rules, LRCAP is diminished in effectiveness when combined with CAP (reflects coordination issues as well as radio silence, I believe).

[pasternakski]

"Innumerous" is not a word.

[CapAndGown]

The Illustrated Heritage Dictionary and Information Book (Houghton Mifflin, Boston, Mass., 1977 [1969, 1970, 1971, 1973, 1975, 1976]) pg. 678:

In-nu-mer-a-ble adj Also in-nu-mer-ous. Too many to be counted or numbered. See Synonyms at infinite. == in-nu'mer-a-ble-ness n. == in-nu'mer-a-bly adv.