Fast Transport and PBEM

Welcome! · Post by **Welcome!** » Thu Feb 06, 2003 5:20 am

It is my first PBEM game - Coral Sea - Japan

I go to Rabaul, on the first turn, disband the two TFs here and create one on Fast Transport with two DD (Mutsuki and yayoi) to bring part of the 8th Base force to Lae with Load Only Troops.

To my surprise, when my opponent send back my tour, and after resolution of it, the two DD sit in daylight unloading in Lae because they wanted to make the trip in only one tour. On all my previous games versus the AI or Head to Head, they always goes a few hexes on the south-west of Rabaul on the first turn to be on position to make the night trip and back to safety the next turn. So i don't understand this behavior that i was not able to reproduce with test games. On the same game, three CLs had the same behavior a few turns later on the same trip. Their mission is still Fast Transport and not Transport when i check them in Lae.

We use both 2.20, i try a fake PBEM game between two of my computers but didn't see this problem appears. It seems to be a problem between the computer of my opponent and mine.

The two dd have enough fuel and operation points, here the problem is not they don't want to go but that they go without waiting for the night.

Others Fast Transport to Gili-Gili and Buna were working OK.

Having Fun.

Joel Billings · Post by **Joel Billings** » Thu Feb 06, 2003 10:33 pm

If you have a save that repeats this behavior, please send it to 2by3@2by3games.com.

Joel

Sonny · Post by **Sonny** » Fri Feb 07, 2003 1:56 am

I've had similar problems.

Some of my fast transports do fine but recently I sent two of them to Irau and they got bombed severely because they did not run out unde cover of darkness. Both were at Irau when my orders phase came around. One was unloading but the other was idle. They both had retirement allowed set.

On reflection it could be that two fast transports to the same base may not be able to unload their entire capacity in one turn. But at leas one should have benn able to do this and retire.

Don't think I have the file though I will look for it.

Mr.Frag · Post by **Mr.Frag** » Fri Feb 07, 2003 4:03 am

I've run into this once or twice, I always wrote it off to a ship incurring SYS damage and it's speed being reduced throwing off the speed calculation or OP points getting burnt due to one of the ships leaching some fuel off another in the TF (god, I wish I could turn that feature off!) ...

Joel Billings · Post by **Joel Billings** » Fri Feb 07, 2003 11:07 am

I found out that this is a case of the rule book not being totally accurate. It turns out that the Arrive at Night function acts like the Sprint Away from DH function in that it will only do it if the DH is an enemy base or a friendly base that is considered in dangerous territory (the manual only lists this for the Sprint Away function). In this case Lae was full of Japanese aircraft and PM had few Allied aircraft and since the game had just started the Lae area had not previously been attacked. For these reasons, the computer thought it was safe enough to go in during daylight.

Welcome! · Post by **Welcome!** » Fri Feb 07, 2003 5:01 pm

It is logical. A Fast Transport should be fast, as fast as possible but i would have prefer a "Safety First" logic. Do you think a more cautious commander will have make it to do a night run, even in this case ? So we can have a little bit of control on this behavior and not be surprised of the result ? It doesn't seem to be the case.

The automatically chosen commander was K. Hatano ( very promising and careful officer)

Overall skill: 68
Inspiration: 55
Surface Actions: 71
Air Operations: 33
Land Combat: 27
Administration: 42
Aggessiveness: 56

So a bombardement TF can also arrive in daylight, and stay all day long, even with "Retirement allowed" if it is in range, if you owns the base and there is no Strong Ennemi Air nearby ?

Thanks for the reply.

Joel Billings · Post by **Joel Billings** » Sat Feb 08, 2003 8:56 am

Originally posted by Welcome!
It is logical. A Fast Transport should be fast, as fast as possible but i would have prefer a "Safety First" logic. Do you think a more cautious commander will have make it to do a night run, even in this case ? So we can have a little bit of control on this behavior and not be surprised of the result ? It doesn't seem to be the case.

The automatically chosen commander was K. Hatano ( very promising and careful officer)

Overall skill: 68
Inspiration: 55
Surface Actions: 71
Air Operations: 33
Land Combat: 27
Administration: 42
Aggessiveness: 56

So a bombardement TF can also arrive in daylight, and stay all day long, even with "Retirement allowed" if it is in range, if you owns the base and there is no Strong Ennemi Air nearby ?

Thanks for the reply.

The commander will not affect the move at night and yes any TF using Arrive at Night logic will only do so under the conditions previously stated. At least I think so.