Payback - jzanes (A) vs. Rader (J). A Rader-free zone.

[Jzanes]

(May 12, 1945 con’t)

Other sectors:

British –

The Great Nicobar invasion force escorted by the British fleet has left Port Blair. I’m hoping to take advantage of the Japanese carriers being sighted and far away to slip in and take the base before Rader can react. Rader may quickly reposition his LBA but I suspect he will ignore this landing. He seems committed to keeping his LBA focused on stopping the Americans.

Soviets –

My division routed his brigade at the far eastern part of the line and I am now moving to cut the road and rail to Mogocha. At the same time, a soviet cavalry division has reached the rail south of Borzya. There is an unidentified Japanese unit in the same hex and I’ll be bombing it next turn to disrupt it and get some recon.

Meanwhile, soviet troops have reached Arshaan and are waiting for reinforcements before trying to capture this large airbase. I will be dropping Paratroops on Taonan. Capturing this base would at least temporarily cut the rail to Arshaan. Recon shows one unit of 1,000 men and no AFVs. The 2 parachute battalions will drop after B29s soften up this unit, likely only a base force.

[obvert]

The raid on ports in China has to hurt a bit. And if you got them once there, I bet there are a lot of them still stuck in port half dead.

The A7M2 should be his top carrier fighter, but maybe he hasn't been able to update them yet. It's odd he's making Oscar IVs at all, and I would think the Ki-83, Tony, and Franks would be the mainstays. Maybe he's just getting rid of surplus?

As in the game with GreyJoy, he seems perfectly willing to throw the air at you in waves, hoping quantity will at least equal quality.

[Jzanes]

ORIGINAL: obvert

The raid on ports in China has to hurt a bit. And if you got them once there, I bet there are a lot of them still stuck in port half dead.

The A7M2 should be his top carrier fighter, but maybe he hasn't been able to update them yet. It's odd he's making Oscar IVs at all, and I would think the Ki-83, Tony, and Franks would be the mainstays. Maybe he's just getting rid of surplus?

As in the game with GreyJoy, he seems perfectly willing to throw the air at you in waves, hoping quantity will at least equal quality.

Recon shows Shanghai empty now but I'll hit it again if recon shows any ships in port next turn.

Dunno why he isn't using the A7M2. is there a more advanced carrier fighter he might be researching? He's been using the Oscar's as kamikazes mostly. I suspect their long range makes them good at that role. Ki-100 Tonys and Ki-83s seem to be his top fighters and I just saw some Shindens for the first time. I'll have to check their stats, I know that in the original WITP, they were uber.

Throwing massive # of planes into the attack is actually a pretty good tactic. There is a good chance some of them will get thru and do some real damage vs. the fleet. At this point, I'm treading lightly in the SRA. I haven't seen any japanese air operations in any other part of the map for months and it looks like he's "going all in" hoping to land a knockout blow vs. the US fleet. I plan to keep his air focused in the SRA while making my move with the Brits and especially, the Soviets.

[obvert]

Dunno why he isn't using the A7M2. is there a more advanced carrier fighter he might be researching? He's been using the Oscar's as kamikazes mostly. I suspect their long range makes them good at that role. Ki-100 Tonys and Ki-83s seem to be his top fighters and I just saw some Shindens for the first time. I'll have to check their stats, I know that in the original WITP, they were uber.

Throwing massive # of planes into the attack is actually a pretty good tactic. There is a good chance some of them will get thru and do some real damage vs. the fleet. At this point, I'm treading lightly in the SRA. I haven't seen any japanese air operations in any other part of the map for months and it looks like he's "going all in" hoping to land a knockout blow vs. the US fleet. I plan to keep his air focused in the SRA while making my move with the Brits and especially, the Soviets.

There isn't a more advanced fighter than the A7M2, except for the marginally better A7M3 I think. But that comes a bit later and it would make more sense to go for the A6M3 first. It is about like the Hellcat, so great for a IJN fighter.

Shindens rock from all I've heard. They're seemingly still uber if he's got pilots to use them well.

Check out the Nemo AAR from his Nemesis game for both Japanese and Allied tactics in a late war setting. He talks a lot about Allied amphib force make-up and the way he attacks different sets, uses his kamis, etc.

[Jzanes]

May 20, 1945

Another week of the war has passed and things are going well for the good guys. Let’s summarize the action in each region.

Russia:

The Japanese army that has long bottled in the Russians around Chita is in full retreat. I just routed a 2 ½ division rearguard and am moving to capture Shilka. His main force should be able to retreat but I doubt he’ll be able to use the rail line to quickly break contact since I’m just behind him and I have a tank division sitting on the rail line SE of Shilka. He’ll have to march away and I should be able to stay on his tail and hopefully disrupt any attempt to build a new line.

Rader abandoned Borzya and a SU divison just captured it. I need to clear out one cutoff unit further north on the line and then I’ll be able to rail in forces from Chita. I am also closing in on Hailar (the next stop on the rail line heading into Manchuria).

The SU para attack on Taonan was successful and the line to Arshaan is cut. Rader has been blasting my small force at Toanan with bombers but I keep flying in small forces to maintain a garrison. I want to keep the rail shut as long as possible. My army at Arshaan is already at about 2000 AV but I’m waiting for another few divisions before I assault the city.

The way I see it, Rader’s only chance is to get large blocking forces in place along all the routes into the Manchurian plain before I breakthrough. Once the Russians get into the clear terrain, it’ll be very ugly for the Japanese. Massed B29s usually cause 2,000 casualties a turn on units in the open and without a terrain AV multiplier, the huge highly mobile Russian army should roll thru any defense without too much trouble.

The red line in the screenshot below is the defense line I’d try to form if I was Rader. The problem is that my forces are just about up to or even thru this line already. The next month of game time should prove decisive.

[Jzanes]

(May 20, 1945 con’t)

China:

The Chinese attempted a shock attack at Changsha and got 1:1 odds but took horrendous losses. Their effective AV went from 6000 to 1900 in 2 days of attacks. Time to rest and rebuild for another month or two. I’m not counting on much from the Chinese for the remainder of the war.

British:

The british invade and capture Great Nicobar. There was no Japanese air or naval opposition and the british fleet has retired and the army (minus a garrison) is being pulled out to prep for the next operation.

The Japanese pull back one hex (and one river) in the north around Chiang Mai. I haven’t decided whether I’m brave enough for a river crossing shock attack or not. I may see about flanking the position instead.

[Jzanes]

(May 20, 1945 con’t)

DEI:

No major combat in this region. The Japanese have been flying small (5-10 plane) kamikaze attacks in the Manado area without much effect. Another CA raid hit Bandjermasin but was turned back with the CA hit by a sub torpedo and some light gun damage to several DDs on both sides.

I decided to invade Balikpapan/Samarinda. I quietly formed up an invasion fleet and moved it to Madjene (north of Makassar) trying to make it look like a regular convoy to replenish this base. Under the cover of darkness, I steamed north to Balikpapan and began the invasion. I didn’t want to expose my CVs, so the fleet was guarded by Celebes based LR CAP. Army bombers hit the nearest airbases of Miri, Tarakan, Jolo, and Basilan. My main concern was the threat of massive naval bomber/kamikaze raids coming from Java.

Everything went smooth and the fleet wasn’t even spotted until the troops began landing. No Japanese air raids flew against the fleet and all ships returned safely to Celebes after 2 days of landing troops and supplies. Balikapan and Samarinda both fell on the first assault and I’ve commenced getting these bases operatonal. Balikpapan is a level 9 base and within P47N range of Batavia and Palembang. Rader will either have to spread out his airforce currently massed in southern Java around Soerabaja or I’ll get some free punches vs. some key oil centers.

[Jzanes]

Here's the whole map just to give a sense of the big picture. The lines of green dots in the oceans are my subs and note how close the russians are getting to the japanese home islands. B29 firebombing isn't far off now....

[Jzanes]

May 28, 1945

Another week has passed and things continue to progress nicely for the allies.

Russia:

The Russians have advanced steadily and have captured Skilka, Borzya, Hailar, and Arshaan. Several Japanese divisions have been shattered or cutoff and the main Japanese army has left the rail line and is trying to retreat thru the forests east of Borzya.

The Russians will keep the heat on his main force with troops advancing from the Borzya area while another large force advances down the rail line towards Mogocha. At the same time, I will keep pushing down the rail lines from Hailar and Arshaan. The army at Arshaan is already 2000 AV strong and is gaining a new division every couple days. I feel this is the point where I have the best chance of getting a total breakthrough. There is one more hex of forest before they break into the open. The Japanese have about 6 brigades of troops holding this last hex but half of them were just routed from Arshaan and the others are getting heavily bombed every turn.

All signs suggest Rader had hoped to quickly pull back his Chita area army but the Russian rapid pursuit kept him from using the rail line to quickly extract his army. Now he is forced to retreat down the forest roads and tracks and it seems possible I’ll breakthrough before he can redeploy his forces. With another large Japanese army engaged in blocking the Russians and Chinese farther west around Kalgan, it appears the Japanese have no reserves left to block the Russians in the central (Hailar-Arshaan) front.

[Jzanes]

(May 28, 1945 con’t)

Burma:

The main British army continues to prep for their next op while the Chinese have made some modest gains on the far northern end of the line.

One of the large (850 AV) Chinese corps routed the Japanese 1st tank division NE of Rahaeng and are now advancing to besiege this city. The Chinese were assisted by several hundred bombing sorties against the Japanese tank unit. The bombers didn’t cause a lot of casualties but I suspect they severely disrupted the Japanese allowing for a surprising 18:1 result when the Chinese deliberate attacked.

I will continue to move forwards as fast as possible but the Chinese are still a long ways from breaking thru into the open fields of central Thailand.

In other news, british DD raiders and torpedo bombers flying from Great Nicobar sank several tankers and escorts at Medan harbor. B29s hit the refinery again and it’s down to 1/3 production while oil production is down to 1/10. The oil producing base of Bengkalis is next up for the Burma based heavy bombers. I’m currently reconning all the surrounding bases to make sure Rader doesn’t setup a CAP trap for my strategic raids.

[Jzanes]

(May 28, 1945 con’t)

DEI:

I have moved a large chunk of the Burma based B29 force to the DEI. A few days ago I used these heavies plus B24s flying from Balikpapan and medium bombers flying from Bandjermasin to smash Batavia. Sweeping corsairs, hellcats, and P47s killed about 100 fighters in the air and the bombers destroyed several hundred naval bombers on the ground. In addition, about 10 AKs/escorts were sunk, the heavy industry is 75% destroyed, and the light industry is 25% destroyed. At the same time, American and ANZAC surface combatants bombarded Den Pasar and Banjoewangi (southeastern tip of Java) and destroyed 200-400 fighters on the ground.

Rader has since pulled back his naval bombers but continues to base large #s of fighters in the Soerabaja area. He made no attempt to contest my move on the undeveloped base of Mataram, nor have I seen any Japanese ships in the area over the last week.

Next turn, I’ll be bombarding Den Paser and Banjoewangi again. I will also be hitting Probolinggo and Loemadjang. I’m hoping to kill more planes on the ground and also see what kind of CD gun assets are present at these potential landing sites. The Wake Island CD unit fired on my ships bombarding Banjoewangi but didn’t cause any damage.

I’m reconning most of the significant Japanese bases throughout the DEI at this point with the intention of pounding any lightly defended target with heavy bombers.

Amphibious Task Forces:

I thought I’d describe the composition of my usual amphibious force. My invasions are usually made up of two parts; the amphibious landing force and the carrier support force.

The carrier force consists of;
-multiple air combat TFs usually made up of; 2 CV, 1 CVL, 1 CA, 1 CL, 1 CLAA, 6-10 DD
- multiple CVE TFs made up of; 5-8 CVE, 1 CL, 6-9 DD
- one heavy surface TF made up of; 2-4 Iowa class BBs, 6-8 DD, 1-2 DMS.
- several replenishment TFs made up of; 2-4 CVE (replenishment type), 2-6 escorts, 1-2 AE, 10-15 AO.
- one ASW TF of 4 ships (DE or PF usually)

I usually have the air combat/CVE TFs follow the heavy surface TF. During an invasion, I’ll either have the carrier force stand off one or two hexes from the target and allow the “leaky” CAP defend the amphibious force OR I’ll have them stay way back and use LR CAP from 8-12 hexes away to defend the amphibious force. The first tactic is easier on the carrier air groups while the latter tactic helps keep the CVs out of danger.

The amphibious invasion force consists of;
- one surface combat TF made up of; 2-4 CA/CL, 6-8 DD, and 0-2 DMS. This force is for defending vs. raiders. It does not bombard.
- one ASW TF of 4 ships.
- one MSW TF of 4 ships.
- 1 to 4 amphibious TFs made up of; 1-2 heavy ships (slow BB or CA), 1-3 DD, 4-8 escorts (DE or PF), 4-6 MSW, 5-20 suppression landing ships (gun, mortar, or rocket equipped), 0-2 AGC, 10-60 troopships (big APA/AKA on down to tiny LST/LSM/LCI) grouped by speed usually, 10-20 supply AKs.

I load up the AKs separately (and earlier) and then add them to the amphibious TFs AFTER ordering the troopships to load troops only. The slow BB/CA in the amphibious TF does a good job drawing CD fire and kamikazes. Probably about 90% of the guns/bombers go after the heavy ship and when they do hit, they only rarely do any damage. I’ve lost several slow BBs in this role but it’s been worth it.

[Jzanes]

(May 28, 1945 con’t)

Gilberts/Central Pacific:

With increasing boldness, I’ve been sending small CL/DD TFs throughout the central pacific looking to shoot up anything they come across. On average, I’m sinking a couple ships a day. I also suspect, I’m keeping Rader from sending out his ASW ships vs. my submarine armada. I plan to continue to rove farther and farther until he commits enough naval/air power to stop me. My read is that Rader will continue to keep his navy and airforce focused on stopping the Americans in the DEI and allow these raids to continue without any real opposition.

In the Gilberts, I finally captured Tabiteau. My initial 800 AV force was badly disrupted by the atoll shock attack and it took over a week to rest up sufficiently to capture the base with the assistance of the 4 reinforcing brigades I brought in. I now have 6 NZ brigades and 3 american infantry regiments in the Gilberts and I intend to keep rolling up the bases as quickly as possible. Tarawa and Nauru Island both have garrisons of 15,000 japanese troops so I’ll have to take them one at a time.

The Gilberts force has a modest but growing number of support units available and is stiffened by 2 CVE TFs (10 CVEs) and several cruisers with plentiful DD escorts. The regional airforce consists of 12 NZ corsair squadrons, 5 NZ SBD/TBD squadrons, and a bunch of patrol/recon squadrons.

[obvert]

It seems like things are going well. Now that I'm playing the Japanese side it's hard to look at what I'll have to face in 45!

Is he able to battle any of your 4E raids at all if they come in uncoordinated or you don't have them escorted?

[Jzanes]

ORIGINAL: obvert

Is he able to battle any of your 4E raids at all if they come in uncoordinated or you don't have them escorted?

I usually use very few fighters on escort. Escorts just get eaten alive by CAP. The key is to sweep sweep and sweep some more. For example, for my attack on Batavia I had 200 P47s sweeping from Balikpapan/Samarinda, 200 corsairs from Sampit/Bandjermasin and a couple hundred P38s sweeping from Bandjermasin. Lots of the squadrons don't fly or fly after the bombers come in but coming from so many different bases in such large numbers, I always manage to wear down the CAP to the point that no fighters attack the bombers or if they do, they don't fight for very long.

However, I'm not attacking the airbase complex around Soerabaja (yet) because with so many fighters and so many large airbases close together, It would be hard to sufficiently suppress all the bases and allow for a "clean" bomber raid.

[Jzanes]

June 3, 1945

Got some time to kill today so I thought I’d post an update. However, I’m not at my gaming computer so no screenshots for this update.

The main developments have been in Russia and the DEI.

Russia:

The 3500 AV strong Russian army near Arshaan just routed the Japanese army guarding the last wooded hex before the open Manchurian plain. This prompted Rader to say this in his most recent email;

“Well, now that the Soviets are breaking into the open and the B-29s can base in Manchuria, the war is basically over

I'm willing to surrender on any terms that let the emperor remain in power.”

We’ve had some back and forth since then and the war will be continuing but clearly, the morale in the Japanese high command has taken a big hit. Rader is tenacious and I doubt he will quit early but I’m going to try to stay alert and watch out for a desperate move trying to blunt the allied momentum. I suspect a massive raid by the carrier and surface forces of the IJN would be the most likely tactic.

I intend to charge headlong into the Manchurian plain and attempt to grab everything I can before Rader can form a new line. I also hope to cutoff the large army he is moving thru the woods east of Borzya-Hailar. I will be sending the armored units of the Arshaan army (including 2 massive mechanized corps of 450 and 800 AV respectively) to the east in an attempt to cut the Hailar-Tsitshar rail line which looks to be Rader’s intended route for this retreating army.

The main problem I face is that being in the open will expose my forces to ground bombing. Rader and I both recognize that ground bombing is kinda borked in this game. Units in the open are quickly smashed by bombers while units in even “light” cover (woods, rough, etc.) suffer very little from bombers and units in “heavy” cover are basically immune from being damaged by bombers. I will try to cover my ground forces by flying LR CAP missions from Arshaan and Hailar but I anticipate this will be minimally effective since he’ll be using sweeps by uber Ki-83 fighters to clear the way for his bombers. Of course, I’ll also be smashing his units with my bombers (including B-29s) and hopefully, my badly shot up ground forces will still be able to push around his badly shot up ground forces.

DEI:

The Americans continue to prep for their next major effort. In the meanwhile, they continue to punch away at the Japanese positions in the DEI.

At the end of May, the allied airforces pounded the airfield, port, and oil refineries of Palembang. The oil refinery was reduced to about 60% productivity, 10-30 transports/escorts/destroyers were sunk, and 300 japanese bombers were destroyed on the ground. Sweeping fighters killed 75 fighters in the air while the allies lost about 50 planes to CAP/flak.

I’ve also continued to use surface ship raids to bombard the airbase complex around Soerabaja. These raids have destroyed around 500 japanese planes on the ground in the last week and the two southern most Japanese airfields (Den Paser and Banjoewangi) appear to be at least temporarily closed. I spotted a Japanese TF in the area on one of the turns that I wasn’t bombarding the fields and sent in multiple surface combat TFs to engage it during the following turn but it sailed away. I will continue to send multiple surface combat TFs in to the region on the turns I send in bombardment TFs. I’m willing to trade ships if Rader decides to oppose my naval bombardment with surface forces.

I’ve spotted the IJN carrier force at Singapore for the last several turns. I’ll try to keep an eye on them in case they try to move in and stop my naval bombardment of the Soerabaja area.

My most recent capture (Mataram) has been built up to a level 2 airfield and this gives me an airbase within 2 hexes of Den Paser and 3 of Banjoewangi. I’ve already moved in multiple fighter squadrons to provide me some air support close to Java. I am just now starting to build up the 2 dot bases (Semandjaing and Kangean) east of Java that my paratroops captured last week. Recon shows the island base of Pamekasan (just off Soerabaja) to be empty and I’ll likely grab that soon with paratroops.

[obvert]

It's odd that he's feeling demoralized by the inevitable result of his own decision to invade in Russia. The B-29s will always get within range sometime in 45, and it seems like trying out some of the late war Japanese toys to stop them would be part of the fun.

You've had to wait a long time for the tide to turn so decisively in your favor in this game, so I hope he continues to let you realize the final goals of your campaigns. I hope to play in my current game until my opponent LANDS in Japan, just to see what that will be like!

[Jzanes]

ORIGINAL: obvert

It's odd that he's feeling demoralized by the inevitable result of his own decision to invade in Russia. The B-29s will always get within range sometime in 45, and it seems like trying out some of the late war Japanese toys to stop them would be part of the fun.

You've had to wait a long time for the tide to turn so decisively in your favor in this game, so I hope he continues to let you realize the final goals of your campaigns. I hope to play in my current game until my opponent LANDS in Japan, just to see what that will be like!

I think he still believes that we should have a house rule precluding the basing of american planes in Russia. We went back and forth on this issue several months ago and I refused any limitation then and I'm certainly not going to accept any limitation now.

I also think the speed and power of the Russian advance has caught him off guard and he's been getting demoralized by the repeated smashing of his roadblocks around Chita and Arshaan.

I think Rader is the kind of guy that is used to winning and overreacts when he starts to lose a few battles. For example, when I captured some bases in Burma way back when, it sounded like he was on the verge of quitting with lots of grumbling about the ground combat system. Within a few weeks though, he had stopped my advance in Burma and we went back to business as usual. Now it's a similar situation with the allies kicking butt hard in russia and the DEI and the grumbling is about his inability to use his airforce due to the overpowered allied 4E bomber menace, basing american planes in russia, etc. I suspect in the next few weeks, the russians will get held up somewhere, the americans will take some losses, etc. and the grumbling will die down.

[obvert]

Well, it wasn't Russia anymore until very recently, it was Manchukuo extension number 1. I'm sure the Russians would have been perfectly happy with this system in light of losing their entire eastern territory in 42. Plus, you can't really grumble about reality when you're doubling Japanese industrial output and advancing planes and CVs by 6 months or more. The game is not the war.

[Jzanes]

We've both had our share of grumbling over this long long match. I've given in on some things I thought were wonky and I suspect he'll continue to play despite these issues that he disagrees with me on. In the end, I gotta recognize and appreciate that it's a rare pairing of WITP opponents that goes this far without one of the players getting crushed, losing interest, or blowing his top completely.

re: the japanese industry/research issues; if i start a new game down the road, I'm considering a host of houserules aimed at keeping these loopholes from making things ridiculous. For this game, I'll just live with it though despite the fact that I've gotten lots of hints that Rader has really pulled out the stops in maximizing his industry/air unit sizes/research/etc.

[GreyJoy]

What really has umnbalanced your game, imho, is the fact that Russia, gets no air replacements till 1944...this was clearly designed when a japanese invasion of Russia in 1942 wasn't taken into a spectrum of the possible outcomes of a Pbem.
If you had some kind of russian a/c replacements (Mig1, LaaG 3, Mig 3 etc etc) you could have agreed on an HR limiting the presence of american planes over russian territory. But you had to lose the air war in Russia, and thus the 42/43 campaign, because Japan could exploit this flaw in the design, so i think it's correct that you don't agree on a new HR about that.
 
I think this aspect (air russian replacements) must be taken into consideration by the devs...
 
And the only way to protect your troops in the open is to advance with a HUGE portion of your AAs...which severly limits your ability to use multiple corps/vectors