Blitzkrieg in the Pacific
Moderators: Joel Billings, Tankerace, siRkid
You can also get smaller base forces by subdividing them via air transport. Have a C47 take one-days worth of a large unit to a new location and you will end up with 20-40 support points where you want them. They don't divide strictly proportionatly, but it's a quick way to get some support to a forward location. The rest of the unit follows on ship or maybe to another forward location entirely. Note that the radars won't move by air- they are too heavy.
An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile- hoping it will eat him last
- Winston Churchill
- Winston Churchill
Decisive Victory - IJN - 1/1/43
Okay, I just concluded scen 19 this morning as the IJN.
In the beginning of November I landed 2 divisions in Cooktown while a second group landed troops in Brisbane. 4 divisions worth plus artillery and armored units.
The northern force took Cooktown, Cairns, and marched south to Townsville where the offensive stalled (high fatigue, lack of supply, and massive attrition of units). A recon regiment headed inland and captured Charter towers.
The Brisbane force swiftly secured Brisbane (total assault strength of 1397) and then proceeded north to Rockhampton.
Note that during the landing I lost 10 IJN carriers to strike planes based out of Brisbane. And I didn't capture the port fast enough to dock ships there for repairs. I'd call this a Pyhric victory....
Rockhampton fell on 1/1/43 and the end of the turn I got the victory message. And I also captured every single allied base hex on the map with the exception of Townsville which would have taken another week.
Lessons learned:
Over long marching distances, army units get separated.
Individual enemy ground units can stop the advance of an entire army. IE-once you are in a hex with an enemy unit, you cannot set move orders to go past them...you must attack.
IJN carriers are incredibly prone to "operational failure." One carrier gets sunk so the planes transfer to another carrier...which then is over the 10% limit which shuts down that carrier...so the excess planes go to the NEXT carrier and shut that one down....I had no CAP or attack planes flying by the second day of the invasion. Repeated waves of 200+ SBDs and B25s swiftly crippled all of my carriers and sunk them (while my transports vommited troops upon the pristine beaches of Brisbane of course...)
I could have done more to protect the carriers and I could have brought some bombardment TFs (I didn't bring any) to close the air strips but hey, we were on a timetable okay? I lost about 1500 pts of ships in 5 days but he lost about 6000 pts in bases in that month alone.
Also, it is a real pain loading and unloading a small force and island hopping. The transport had a tendancy to leave before finishing the load or unload and also would just flip to retirement arbitrarily (I still haven't figured out all the nuances of moving transport TFs and doing loading/unloading---it's a real b1tch) and head to Egypt somewhere.
If I remember more lessons I'll post 'em.
-M
In the beginning of November I landed 2 divisions in Cooktown while a second group landed troops in Brisbane. 4 divisions worth plus artillery and armored units.
The northern force took Cooktown, Cairns, and marched south to Townsville where the offensive stalled (high fatigue, lack of supply, and massive attrition of units). A recon regiment headed inland and captured Charter towers.
The Brisbane force swiftly secured Brisbane (total assault strength of 1397) and then proceeded north to Rockhampton.
Note that during the landing I lost 10 IJN carriers to strike planes based out of Brisbane. And I didn't capture the port fast enough to dock ships there for repairs. I'd call this a Pyhric victory....
Rockhampton fell on 1/1/43 and the end of the turn I got the victory message. And I also captured every single allied base hex on the map with the exception of Townsville which would have taken another week.
Lessons learned:
Over long marching distances, army units get separated.
Individual enemy ground units can stop the advance of an entire army. IE-once you are in a hex with an enemy unit, you cannot set move orders to go past them...you must attack.
IJN carriers are incredibly prone to "operational failure." One carrier gets sunk so the planes transfer to another carrier...which then is over the 10% limit which shuts down that carrier...so the excess planes go to the NEXT carrier and shut that one down....I had no CAP or attack planes flying by the second day of the invasion. Repeated waves of 200+ SBDs and B25s swiftly crippled all of my carriers and sunk them (while my transports vommited troops upon the pristine beaches of Brisbane of course...)
I could have done more to protect the carriers and I could have brought some bombardment TFs (I didn't bring any) to close the air strips but hey, we were on a timetable okay? I lost about 1500 pts of ships in 5 days but he lost about 6000 pts in bases in that month alone.
Also, it is a real pain loading and unloading a small force and island hopping. The transport had a tendancy to leave before finishing the load or unload and also would just flip to retirement arbitrarily (I still haven't figured out all the nuances of moving transport TFs and doing loading/unloading---it's a real b1tch) and head to Egypt somewhere.
If I remember more lessons I'll post 'em.
-M
"May your sword be wet as a woman in her prime."
One easy way to fix this is to add some defense troops with the editor to the allied bases.
The sad part is the AI has no clue what to do after Port Vila and Luganville are captured. The AI allied keeps sending transports unescorted to Lunga where I have a carrier group based. The AI has not even tried to retake Port Vila or Luganville.
The sad part is the AI has no clue what to do after Port Vila and Luganville are captured. The AI allied keeps sending transports unescorted to Lunga where I have a carrier group based. The AI has not even tried to retake Port Vila or Luganville.
Originally posted by HawaiiFive-O
Yes, it is ridiculous that Base Forces don't have some sort of organic defense.
Yes, it is ridiculous that 40 men can wipe out 5000.
Is it likely to change? Nope.
Can two PBEM'ers make a house rule to avoid this situation? Yup.
Then again... in a scenario like this one historrically speaking- the Japs had a good time doing this
--------
Later, a contingent of about 1,500 Japanese and Korean laborers arrived to begin construction of an airfield. Another 300 Nauruan and Gilbertese were conscripted to augment the work force.
from http://166.122.164.43/archive/2000/April/04-03-19.htm
Results when the japs came was odds of like 1vs 100 and they took the island.
I guesse those realllllllyyyyy looooong odds can happen.
- See you at the Fire...
Originally posted by pad152
One easy way to fix this is to add some defense troops with the editor to the allied bases.
The sad part is the AI has no clue what to do after Port Vila and Luganville are captured. The AI allied keeps sending transports unescorted to Lunga where I have a carrier group based. The AI has not even tried to retake Port Vila or Luganville.
Looks like you may be ready for a PBEM opponent......
"Life is tough, it's even tougher when you're stupid" -SGT John M. Stryker, USMC
-
HawaiiFive-O
- Posts: 295
- Joined: Fri Dec 20, 2002 10:21 pm
- Location: USA
Originally posted by tri71669
Results when the japs came was odds of like 1vs 100 and they took the island.
I guesse those realllllllyyyyy looooong odds can happen.
Are you equating the combat abilities of ~2000 civilians, natives, and a handful of military personnel to the combat abilities of ~2000 rear echelon troops each outfitted with a rifle and given basic combat training?
Seriously?
TF composition
Something else I just remembered. The composition of my transport TFs.
I had two tfs with over 50 ships each (just to see what would happen) and because with all the stuff I was bringing in I didn't want to deal with 6 tfs. For the most part it worked pretty well although I'm sure I took a major hit for AAA effectiveness. But it sure was convenient in terms of managing landing that many troops at once. The way I formed the TF was to first form a TF of 25 and then load lots of large units above and beyond the transport capacity of the TF. The system then added as many APs and AKs as required to fill my load order. One TF had 57 ships!
I really don't think this would be smart in a PBEM game but if I could do something like this with a supply-only convoy (behind the combat zone) I would be set.
I had two tfs with over 50 ships each (just to see what would happen) and because with all the stuff I was bringing in I didn't want to deal with 6 tfs. For the most part it worked pretty well although I'm sure I took a major hit for AAA effectiveness. But it sure was convenient in terms of managing landing that many troops at once. The way I formed the TF was to first form a TF of 25 and then load lots of large units above and beyond the transport capacity of the TF. The system then added as many APs and AKs as required to fill my load order. One TF had 57 ships!
I really don't think this would be smart in a PBEM game but if I could do something like this with a supply-only convoy (behind the combat zone) I would be set.
"May your sword be wet as a woman in her prime."
I had two tfs with over 50 ships each (just to see what would happen) and because with all the stuff I was bringing in I didn't want to deal with 6 tfs. For the most part it worked pretty well although I'm sure I took a major hit for AAA effectiveness. But it sure was convenient in terms of managing landing that many troops at once. The way I formed the TF was to first form a TF of 25 and then load lots of large units above and beyond the transport capacity of the TF. The system then added as many APs and AKs as required to fill my load order. One TF had 57 ships!
That most certainly is a bug and should have never happened. Even with the AA penalty kicking in due to the large number of ships involved, it was probably immune to air attack.
Post your save in the bugs forum.
Originally posted by HawaiiFive-O
Are you equating the combat abilities of ~2000 civilians, natives, and a handful of military personnel to the combat abilities of ~2000 rear echelon troops each outfitted with a rifle and given basic combat training?
Seriously?
No, not at all...I only suggested that under some historic circumstances there were those rare moments such as in the case of the URL I posted that a very small contingent of japanese took over the local populace and began thier own designs on the islands. In UV we run into circumstances where local base units and some engineers are overun by a few opposing squads... It needs to be clarified by Matrix why this happens, I am only pointing out that gross numbers don't seem at least to mean a whole lot. Maybe it's a morale/fatigue thing.
- See you at the Fire...
organic defense value
I totally agree with prior statements regarding a basic defense-only value for engineering and non-combat units.
And really, it's already been implemented half-way. If you notice that during any bombardment phase all defending troops are accounted for? Every single person. So how about something like that for ground combat with non-frontline units? Seems an easy enough fix for the next patch....
And while we're on a wish list for ground combat, how about the ability to disband/withdraw ground units? That could come in quite useful...
One more wish--a way to keep an entire stack of ground units together when marching so that everyone arrives on the same pulse. This would have saved me MANY casualties....
And really, it's already been implemented half-way. If you notice that during any bombardment phase all defending troops are accounted for? Every single person. So how about something like that for ground combat with non-frontline units? Seems an easy enough fix for the next patch....
And while we're on a wish list for ground combat, how about the ability to disband/withdraw ground units? That could come in quite useful...
One more wish--a way to keep an entire stack of ground units together when marching so that everyone arrives on the same pulse. This would have saved me MANY casualties....
"May your sword be wet as a woman in her prime."
As often occurs, my reading habits follow my game playing habits. So I've been reading "The Pacific War" by John Costello lately.
After reading this thread a bit earlier, the following passage from this boodk caught my eye. This describes the end of the fighting for Saipan, when the Japanese General ordered one last all-out banzai charge when he knew he was beaten.
"Defying machine-gun fire, officers led the suicidal charges brandishing swords, while others advanced with only knives and sticks. Even the wounded joined in the attack, hobbling on crutches. The shear force and ferocity of the greatest Banzai charge ever made by the Imperial Army carried the screaming human tide over the mounds of bodies that piled up and through the American front line. Ultimately, it spent its force against scratch platoons of hurriedly rounded up cooks, typists, and base personel."
After reading this thread a bit earlier, the following passage from this boodk caught my eye. This describes the end of the fighting for Saipan, when the Japanese General ordered one last all-out banzai charge when he knew he was beaten.
"Defying machine-gun fire, officers led the suicidal charges brandishing swords, while others advanced with only knives and sticks. Even the wounded joined in the attack, hobbling on crutches. The shear force and ferocity of the greatest Banzai charge ever made by the Imperial Army carried the screaming human tide over the mounds of bodies that piled up and through the American front line. Ultimately, it spent its force against scratch platoons of hurriedly rounded up cooks, typists, and base personel."
Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism. ~George Washington