That CV you torped has to feel good, even if it is moderate damage. I always am on the edge of my chair whenever an enemy capital ship is in the sights.
I would agree with stacking a couple of groups with top pilots for your Tojos... you will love the results.
These stacking limits make me like this scenario more and more...I have always heard the ASW and AA adjustments in DaBabes is very nice. Love the map too.
Curious to see how Burma plays out for you.
Burma will surely be a problem, but i hope to be able to succesfully defend it up untill 1943 thanks to the stacking limits. I'm already sending units into the jungle to meet their allied counterparts in securing the approaches to the burma central plains.
Akyab will be lost somehwere in the next 12 months...it's not defendable in the long run... but as long as i'm able to mantain the air supremacy in central Burma i think i should be more or less safe (at least untill the spit VIII comes online)
Cocos Island - I would land a few BFs, construction engineers, and an Air HQ at Christmas Island (IO). Second, I would prep either Southern Army HQ or 5th Fleet HQ for Cocos now. Eventually, they will be placed at Christmas Island before the actual landing so their command range (9) can come into play (up to 18 hexes). You will need to land an Army HQ, but the problem with the main part of the HQ be destroyed will not help. I wish MichaelM would put a patch out to fix this. [:(] Third, start to sweep the base with Zeros until their is no fighters left before committing Nell/Betty. You have the time to do this right.
I agree with BBfanboy. I would not mess with Cocos except to mine it frequently with I-Boats.
You have a number of higher priority objectives to deal with and you're just wasting brain-power fretting about that minimally worthy rock. Wanna go land on unoccupied Christmas (IO)....okay, but go get Balikpapan and the rest of the DEI, like right now and stop frittering away time and forces on things like Cococabanadom. Damned place is filled with malarial misquitos, very ugly women, a significant shark population and a lot of jungle fevers unknown to modern science.
Now, go kick the crapola out of the remaining Chinese, and finish off the DEI/Phillipines. Get cracking lad. Stop whining and hand-wringing over some woebegone, nearly unihabitable rock, way out in the middle of nowheresville.
Do I have to drag you back to Dreadfort by your good ear and reintroduce you to your former "life"? I should hope not.
Endless days of work guys...very little time to update the AAR...sorry!
Situation at 05/12/1942
Burma:
Our 15th Army is advancing towards Mitikina very very slowly, being harrassed every day by 60/70 B26s escorted by several hurricanes. We tried some LRCAP missions, but due to the fatigue and the supply constraints, we have not being able to stop those pesky american bombers...result is that our divisions are still struggling along the trails from Katha, while he managed to push out my paras with 2 Aus Bdes, 1 chinese division and 1 burma bde... now we risk to lose the race for Mitikina...which would be a disaster for the whole Burma front.
Burma is always short on supplies. I should send them from Singa, but Singa has the same problem. With the refineries not producing supplies, everything has to be shipped from Japan...but Japan has very low reserves of supplies and they are also needed to repair the R&D factories...
The whole Empire produces only 24,000 supplies daily. 19,800 in Japan and the rest in China, Manchukoku and Korea... The situation will go grimmer and grimmer as soon as the air war will start to attrit my bases...
Java: moving very slow here...we're bringing in a division from Darwin and the Imperial from Padang...but it takes time... in the meanwhile 120 Ki-48s keep on bombing from Palembang...but they suck way too many supplies in the process and very soon i'll have to stop the bombing process...[:o]
China:
Things are going bad here. Despite the constant air bombing and the unit rotation, i keep on being repulsed in the contested hex. The stacking limits is really working against me here... not even close to a 1-1 and our losses are getting greater than his...
Southern-DEI/Northern OZ: slow...Whyndam is not yet conquered...waiting for some supplies (some bases have not even a cup of rice for a single soldier left[:o]).
SOPAC/CENTPAC: here the supply situation is good...what i lack is fuel here. I barely have 50,000 tons stockpiled between Truk and Rabaul...not even enough to keep my subs on constant patrol... shipping some from Japan but it's never enough. Hopefully in june i'll be able to start some CS from Tarakan...
Luzon: we tried to bomb Manila... 2200 AVs there...and his subs are bringing lots of supplies cause his strenght seems to grow...i even got a mortar unit destroyed by counterbattery fire[X(]
The japanese economy is improving tough... in the last 20 days resources stockpiles have grown from 1,2 millions to 2,1 millions and fuel stockpiles are growing too. I think in a couple of months everything will be safe again.
I think i understimated the impact of lack of supplies for my war effort. I probably overextended and now i feel weak almost everywhere. Brad has drawn a line in the sand and i bumbed against it... and Batavia, Cocos, Ndeni and Manila are nails in my back... and the clock is running fast...soon the allies will feel strong enough to come out and play and i'm not so sure to be able to face them under the present conditions...
Hope to be able to update in a more fashionable way very soon
Totally agree with obvert. Supply is the key in China and he won't ever have enough. Just keep grinding and the Chinese army will eventually break. Don't destroy Chinese units just wear them down and push them back until you take Chunking. There are no replacement devices and squads won't replace due to the shortage of supply.
Also, I think you need to garrison Rossell Island. Not important for Japan but too valuable for the Allies if they take it and build a base there. At least make him fight for it.
Totally agree with obvert. Supply is the key in China and he won't ever have enough. Just keep grinding and the Chinese army will eventually break. Don't destroy Chinese units just wear them down and push them back until you take Chunking. There are no replacement devices and squads won't replace due to the shortage of supply.
Also, I think you need to garrison Rossell Island. Not important for Japan but too valuable for the Allies if they take it and build a base there. At least make him fight for it.
Rossell?? Where is it? [X(]... I know Rennell Island (already garrisoned) and Russell Island (garrisoned)...but Rossell?? So many islands in the map[:D]
Rossel Is. is SE from the tip of New Guinea. It's a dot base to start, but if you build a little field and some forts, put a good garrison there, it can thwart early Allied attempt to hold that or other dot bases nearby. Plus it's a good search base for early warning/ASW if you have a group of Jakes there.
"Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm." - Winston Churchill
Rossel Is. is SE from the tip of New Guinea. It's a dot base to start, but if you build a little field and some forts, put a good garrison there, it can thwart early Allied attempt to hold that or other dot bases nearby. Plus it's a good search base for early warning/ASW if you have a group of Jakes there.
thx obvert! got it! will try to occupy that island asap!
btw...my GF has never been to London, while i've been several times...i wanna bring her there for her birthday...I wanna make her watch the phantom of the opera at the Majesty theatre(seen it several years ago and loved it!) and bring her to a good chinese restaurant...she loves chinese food!
I only know the old "mr.chow" and "Mandarine kicthen" at Baywater... can u suggest me a good (and cool) chinese restaurant in London which is a bit "on the run" in these days?
May 13th...a bad day... a supply convoy reached Ndeni...and our bombers attacked...a TRAP! i lost 55 planes (against only 4 of his own!), losing 35 crack pilots[:@][:@][:@][:@]
At mitikina, for a couple of points, we didn't achieve a 2-1...and we're still there, with the australian getting there from the north...with high distruption and high fatigue....probably we'll lose the race for Mitikina[:(]
nothing much else to report.... but things don't look that good
What about using BBs to bomb Batavia and Manila (we conquered Bataan)? do u think i risk finding some CD guns and mines?
Manila has a LOT of mines at game start. I don't think Batavia has nearly as many at start and the Allies do not get that many mines to heavily mine it. I have found CD guns rarely hit anything beyond 10,000 yards, so just set your "Min bbdmt" value to 11 or so and do NOT check the "Escorts Bombard" option on the TF type screen.
Most of the time BBs can handle a mine hit or two and only be in repair for about a month per hit. I did have one BB get a magazine explosion from a mine hit though [:(]
No matter how bad a situation is, you can always make it worse. - Chris Hadfield : An Astronaut's Guide To Life On Earth
In SOPAC, after yesterday debacle with the loss of 55 IJN planes (among them some 15 crack fighter pilots and more than 20 bomber pilots), the IJNAF gets back to Rabaul for some rest and to fill their lines with new pilots.
We're shifting forces and engineers, trying to reach a decent number of aviation support in every key base in the SOlomons/NG area. The lack of AV is really a problem with DBB, but it gives you a much more interesting challenge!
In China, finally, one of our land attack took place in a sunny day (northern China seems to have a weather much worse than Burma or Kuriles!)...200 bombers bombed the enemy stack, taking out of the equation not less than 700 enemies (which is a great result in mountain terrain!), then our 44,500 men attacked (stacking limit is at 45,000)...and we achieved a 1-1!!! After 10 attacks in a row where we got 1-2/1-3, this is indeed a great result! Our guys are in a decent shape...so we'll wait for some more supplies and rotate a division with a fresh one...in 3 days we'll be able to attack once again and luckly we'll get that hex!
In Burma i was really relieved...At Mitikina our 15th Army was fatigued and distrupted...with the ghost of the arrival of 2 Aus Bdes from the north... i had ordered a shock attack... this was the last day before the monsoon... i had to take Mitikina before he could reinforce...with the arrival of 2 Fresh Oz Bdes and the upcoming monsoon it would have been almost impossible to conquer the place, thus squandering all my plans for Burma...
So, while 130 IJA bombers from Mandalay and Magwe bombed the aussies, slowing their march, the 5th Division led the attack, followed by a RTA division, a Guards regiment and the 55th Cavalrly regiment... and......
we achieved a great victory![&o][&o][&o][&o]
Now the buma campaign can be called over. We'll march north again, in order to see if we can get that dot base 1 hex north of Mitikina...there the enemy is very exposed so he'll probably run away..let's see.
Then it will be time to dig in and prepare our defences
It also seems that he stopped any air offensive in Burma...it's been a week since the last time his bombers arrived.
A second 42 plane Sentai is ready to be equipped with KI-44a. By the end of the week i'll have 82 operative Tojos at Rangoon... i'm planning a summer air offensive in southern India. Wanna make his pool bleed!
Still undecided if Batavia worths the risk of using the BBs...not so sure...fear of damaging the HI and LI there (and i badly need all the undamaged industry i can get! ...remember that Singapore got conquered completely damaged [:(] so the supply production in the whole SRA/DEI is more or less ZERO!
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Morning Air attack on 30th Chinese Corps, at 82,38 , near Tienshui
Weather in hex: Light cloud
Raid spotted at 19 NM, estimated altitude 6,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 6 minutes
Japanese aircraft
Ki-21-Ic Sally x 49
Ki-21-IIa Sally x 43
Ki-43-Ic Oscar x 53
Ki-48-Ib Lily x 17
Ki-49-Ia Helen x 8
Also attacking 18th Australian Brigade ...
Also attacking 2nd Burma Brigade ...
Also attacking 22nd New Chinese Division ...
Also attacking 21st Australian Brigade ...
Also attacking 22nd New Chinese Division ...
Also attacking 21st Australian Brigade ...
Also attacking 2nd Burma Brigade ...
Also attacking 21st Australian Brigade ...
Also attacking 18th Australian Brigade ...
Also attacking 22nd New Chinese Division ...
Also attacking 21st Australian Brigade ...
Also attacking 2nd Burma Brigade ...
These were the Mitikina reinforcements.... Thank God they didn't arrive in time!!
Assaulting units:
110th Division
13th Tank Regiment
63rd Division
59th Infantry Brigade
12th Indpt Infantry Regiment
1st Army
6th Medium Field Artillery Regiment
1st Mortar Battalion
Botanko Hvy Gun Regiment
Defending units:
30th Chinese Corps
80th Chinese Corps
76th Chinese Corps
85th Chinese Corps
92nd Chinese Corps
4th Group Army
23rd Chinese Corps
38th Chinese Corps
14th Group Army
Japanese ground losses:
543 casualties reported
Squads: 2 destroyed, 86 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 10 disabled
Guns lost 10 (2 destroyed, 8 disabled)
Allied ground losses:
5294 casualties reported
Squads: 170 destroyed, 31 disabled
Non Combat: 258 destroyed, 84 disabled
Engineers: 12 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 20 (20 destroyed, 0 disabled)
Vehicles lost 22 (20 destroyed, 2 disabled)
Units retreated 8
Units destroyed 1
Defeated Allied Units Retreating!
Assaulting units:
4th Ind Engineer Regiment
15th Guards Regiment
14th Tank Regiment
4th RTA Division
RTA Cavalry Division
5th Division
5th Guards Cav Regiment
15th Army
Defending units:
1st Burma Brigade
BFF Brigade
13th Indian Brigade
36th Chinese Division
103rd RAF Base Force
101st RAF Base Force
Burma Corps
221 Group RAF
104th RAF Base Force
I think the Burma Corps won't be seen in combat shape for quite a long time [:D]
Might be silly but wouldn't attacking again straight away in that China hex be the best thing to do ?
mmm....tomorrow a thunderstorm is foreseen and without the help of the bombers i doubt i'll be able to obtain anything better than a 1-1...moreover, supplies are in red for a couple of units (usually, after an attack, it takes a couple of days to drain enough supplies from Sian to be in "white" once again). Then one of my division has high levels of distruption and fatigue, with an AV of only 230...
Don't know sincerly...maybe a shock attack?...mmmmm.....
Double check the leaders of the stack in China and replace the worse for the divisional units. You want high inspiration, above average leadership and land skill.
Double check the leaders of the stack in China and replace the worse for the divisional units. You want high inspiration, above average leadership and land skill.
Ok, they are good enough imho, but i'll double check anyway!
But what do u think? Wait, attack or shock attack?
Double check the leaders of the stack in China and replace the worse for the divisional units. You want high inspiration, above average leadership and land skill.
Interested in this. Why higher inspiration than Land, Aggressiveness or Leadership?
Inspiration deals with moral only, right?
Land is skill at combat itself. I usually rank this the highest for land commanders. Am I missing something?
Aggressiveness is their ability to push the attack, correct? This seems essential in China especially knowing most CHinese commanders have low aggressivenesss.
Leadership affects the unit's ability to improve experience levels, right?
All four seem very important, but I would rank them as follows:
1. Land
2. Aggressiveness
3. Leadership
4. Inspiration
I rarely have problems with moral if the Japanese troops are well supplied and support from HQs is good. Of course after getting routed or severely disabled/disrupted this is really important, as are supply and HQs, rest mode.
I'd love to know if I'm missing the boat on these. I got them from the big list made (I believe) by a dev ages ago.
"Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm." - Winston Churchill
thx obvert! got it! will try to occupy that island asap!
btw...my GF has never been to London, while i've been several times...i wanna bring her there for her birthday...I wanna make her watch the phantom of the opera at the Majesty theatre(seen it several years ago and loved it!) and bring her to a good chinese restaurant...she loves chinese food!
I only know the old "mr.chow" and "Mandarine kicthen" at Baywater... can u suggest me a good (and cool) chinese restaurant in London which is a bit "on the run" in these days?
This place I've seen and wanted to try, but haven't been. Looks good for celebration and is right in Soho near the theaters, etc. Sounds like you have a good plan.
Double check the leaders of the stack in China and replace the worse for the divisional units. You want high inspiration, above average leadership and land skill.
Ok, they are good enough imho, but i'll double check anyway!
But what do u think? Wait, attack or shock attack?
Sorry to inundate your AAR with posts, but I just would stress not shocking until a day or two after you've gotten at least a 1:1 and have good supply, low fatigue/disruption. I've had the 1:1 turn into a 1:2 and set me back a week. But once the supply is white it looks like you can break through by the above report.
"Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm." - Winston Churchill
thx obvert! got it! will try to occupy that island asap!
btw...my GF has never been to London, while i've been several times...i wanna bring her there for her birthday...I wanna make her watch the phantom of the opera at the Majesty theatre(seen it several years ago and loved it!) and bring her to a good chinese restaurant...she loves chinese food!
I only know the old "mr.chow" and "Mandarine kicthen" at Baywater... can u suggest me a good (and cool) chinese restaurant in London which is a bit "on the run" in these days?
This place I've seen and wanted to try, but haven't been. Looks good for celebration and is right in Soho near the theaters, etc. Sounds like you have a good plan.
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