Western Civilization in Grave Danger - AU Tiger (A) vs. Skyros (J)

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

RAN = Royal Australian Navy

I now officially feel like an idiot.
[8|]

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

22 December 1941
Lost the Big "E"

Enterprise's burning hulk was found by both KB and mKB (good thing the Lex went south) and sunk quickly.

The Lex is nearing Townsville for a quick enroute refueling before heading on to Sydney. She, and her task force, have been at sea since the commencement of hostilities, often running at full speed, so they need some work. I need to give the Sara and Hermes both time to rendezvous.

At least I know where all of his carriers are!
[:D]

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

A couple of thoughts about AE vs. the old WitP

1) Naval search is SO much bigger of a factor, however needing to fix every single squadron's search vectors one at a time is tedious in the extreme.
2) I am beginning to get a handle on the pilot training scheme and realize I need to do some reorg in my squadrons back in the States.
3) The flow of the game is very similar to the old WitP, however the environment is much richer.
4) The Burma infantry units really suck.

[xnavytc56]

Quick question. Is there any way to move the forces in North Sumatra to Palembang, or get them off and sent somewhere or do you just leave them there to fend for themselves.

TC ET1(SS)

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: xnavytc

Quick question. Is there any way to move the forces in North Sumatra to Palembang, or get them off and sent somewhere or do you just leave them there to fend for themselves.

TC ET1(SS)

There are two ways:
1) "Pick up troops" with Catalina and transport squadrons, or change their HQ to an unrestricted one and load them onto ships.


NOTE: The "pick up troops" option will leave their heavy equipment behind.

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

23 December 1941
Uh Oh

The loss of the Enterprise just hit home a little harder:

AFTER ACTION REPORTS FOR Dec 23, 41
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sub attack near Canton Island at 154,141

Japanese Ships
SS I-24

Allied Ships
CV Saratoga, Torpedo hits 1
DD Talbot
DD Kilty
DD Crane
DD Kennison

The Sara has 30 float damage, 25 of it major. I am sending it to nearby Gardner Island to hopefully do a little damage control before I continue on to OZ. The TFis almost exactly halfway between Oz and Pearl, and I was tempted to route it back to PH I decided against it. Although several ASW TF’s around Hawaii are getting beaucoup experience prosecuting subs, they are hitting few, so the place is still rotten with Jap subs. If all of the “reported hits” from my aircraft were true the Japs wouldn’t have a sub left in their fleet.

The Lex has refueled at Townsville and is continuing on to Sydney.

I did a little swapping around of top pilots, bringing some into the Reserve to transfer to front line units. The best US Army fighter pilots will be concentrating in the AVG for now, because I believe they will be seeing more combat in the near future, and will have the best chances for survivability. After the experience levels get nice and high, I will start pulling them out to use as leavening for other squadrons, especially as they transition to better plane. I thought about putting them in TRACOM to improve air crew training across the board, but from what I have read it is a waste of time.

Recent Japanese landings at Mersing have cut the Malayan peninsula, isolating two units behind the lines: the 8th Indian Brigade and the 3rd ISF Base Force. The 8th Indian just got packed up at Temuloh for strategic move to Singapore, and would have made it in another day as the 22nd Indian Brigade just got to Johore Bahru from Temuloh. I have ordered the 8th to Malacca now, will air drop some supplies when they get there, and will cut the railroad out of Malaya for a little while at least. They will get some air support for temporarily. The 3rd ISF base force is on the jungle trail northeast of Temuloh – not a big loss, they had already been smacked by the Japanese when retreating from Kota Baru.

Singapore remains unmolested from the air. The troops there are well rested, have improving morale, and have plenty to eat. The Japanese are coming, but Singapore should be able to hold out for a good while, and will be plenty expensive to the Japanese in both time and manpower. The troops in Singapore have been “Replacements On” continuously, and lots of AA barrels are pointing skyward. Hopefully the Japanese will regret this.

Tavoy was captured by overland assault this turn, and I believe it is likely that Skyros will try to fly some aviation support into the place – he likes to move zeros in quickly I have noticed. I pushed the AVG 3rd squadron to Moulmein to fly LR CAP over Tavoy, and have ordered bombers in Rangoon to hit the airfield from low altitude, including 8 B-17’s.

The KB is still lurking south of Rabaul. I believe a follow on invasion will come sooner rather than later. Unfortunately I have zero subs in the vicinity, other than one fleet boat near Truk.

[witpqs]

Better off sending Sara to Pearl. Repairs in Oz will be much, much slower, and protection against a KB raid tenuous at best. If the IJN subs around Pearl are spotted they have few chances of scoring. Route carefully when she gets close and put out all available ships on ASW duty as she comes in. YMMV

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

Better off sending Sara to Pearl. Repairs in Oz will be much, much slower, and protection against a KB raid tenuous at best. If the IJN subs around Pearl are spotted they have few chances of scoring. Route carefully when she gets close and put out all available ships on ASW duty as she comes in. YMMV

Having just looked at the so-called repair ports in OZ, I agree with you.

[BBfanboy]

Saratoga is too big [36K] for Sydney's drydock. You will not be able to fix the flotation damage there.

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: AU Tiger

A couple of thoughts about AE vs. the old WitP

1) Naval search is SO much bigger of a factor, however needing to fix every single squadron's search vectors one at a time is tedious in the extreme.
2) I am beginning to get a handle on the pilot training scheme and realize I need to do some reorg in my squadrons back in the States.
3) The flow of the game is very similar to the old WitP, however the environment is much richer.
4) The Burma infantry units really suck.

1. You don't have to use the directional search all of the time. I only use these when I'm really looking for something or want things to not look in a certain place due to CAP there or for another reason.

2. Make sure to change out group leaders, as all of the ones in the States and most early units suck. They should be higher leadership for training purposes.

4. Combine the ones you can into the Burma division, which sucks slightly less.

[Lokasenna]

I agree with Docup. That's a great day for you, even if you lose the Enterprise. If you don't, it's amazing. Those IJN CAs are almost certainly toast, and he doesn't get any more. That hurts, big time.

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

Can anyone explain how TRACOM works / is supposed to work?

[topeverest]

I really like your aggressive play. The plan fell short of total victory, but Halsey would have been proud. Below are a few thoughts for the tough minded after action report, but certainly, results = OK. Please don't dwell on any of these questions long, as they are only for discussion purposes. I find that after each major fleet encounter it is very useful to take a hard, disinterested third party look at all the decisions made and combat results to employ better tactics the next battle. Also, players tend to use very similar tactics time after time, so ponder if there is anything you can do to exploit you opponent's tactics?

IMHO, I view the loss of enterprise as a tactical defeat. You always want to trade or better in CV combat early on. When you pulse in a SCTF, it is important to have a high initiative commander who will pulse out before the morning. Patrol is better used when you absolutely do not want to pause in the counterpulse hex. Always assume the enemy will have carriers when counterpulsing, and make sure SCTF gets out of dodge. Also suggest putting fighters over the SCTF when possible, so that if it fails to clear, it will have at least some protection. Lastly, always suggest launching counterpulses from deep inside your territory, in this case south perhaps south of Rabaul. Why did you expose your forces by pushing them north of Rabaul? Sure looks like if you were south defending the base you might have been able to strike without as much exposure to the KB. I agree it is a strategic allied victory, but just. The empire strength comes from the KB pilots more than any other factor. If you bagged several dozen of those puppies, it would have been a better exchange. How many pilots and planes did you bag from the KB?

My thoughts also wander to your thought process in the turns before the battle. How certain were you that KB was in the area, and if you had poor spotting as it appears happened, how can you prevent poor spotting from being a factor in future counterpulses? How many searchplanes did you use, and at what range did you search?

[topeverest]

TRACOM...you probably don't need it.

Pilots with 80 skill can be put in there to accelerate delivery of existing pilots training their 12 months requirement. Pilots affect only their nation delivery. In standard scenarios, not terribly necessary unless you use very few training squadrons on map.

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: topeverest

TRACOM...you probably don't need it.

Pilots with 80 skill can be put in there to accelerate delivery of existing pilots training their 12 months requirement. Pilots affect only their nation delivery. In standard scenarios, not terribly necessary unless you use very few training squadrons on map.

OK, thanks. No, I have loads of antiquated airframes to train with....

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: topeverest

I really like your aggressive play. The plan fell short of total victory, but Halsey would have been proud. Below are a few thoughts for the tough minded after action report, but certainly, results = OK. Please don't dwell on any of these questions long, as they are only for discussion purposes. I find that after each major fleet encounter it is very useful to take a hard, disinterested third party look at all the decisions made and combat results to employ better tactics the next battle. Also, players tend to use very similar tactics time after time, so ponder if there is anything you can do to exploit you opponent's tactics?

IMHO, I view the loss of enterprise as a tactical defeat. You always want to trade or better in CV combat early on. When you pulse in a SCTF, it is important to have a high initiative commander who will pulse out before the morning. Patrol is better used when you absolutely do not want to pause in the counterpulse hex. Always assume the enemy will have carriers when counterpulsing, and make sure SCTF gets out of dodge. Also suggest putting fighters over the SCTF when possible, so that if it fails to clear, it will have at least some protection. Lastly, always suggest launching counterpulses from deep inside your territory, in this case south perhaps south of Rabaul. Why did you expose your forces by pushing them north of Rabaul? Sure looks like if you were south defending the base you might have been able to strike without as much exposure to the KB. I agree it is a strategic allied victory, but just. The empire strength comes from the KB pilots more than any other factor. If you bagged several dozen of those puppies, it would have been a better exchange. How many pilots and planes did you bag from the KB?

My thoughts also wander to your thought process in the turns before the battle. How certain were you that KB was in the area, and if you had poor spotting as it appears happened, how can you prevent poor spotting from being a factor in future counterpulses? How many searchplanes did you use, and at what range did you search?

I just now saw this post. I will answer part now, and more tomorrow.

I had been searching extensively to the north and saw two of the task forces en-route for about three days, and frankly it never occurred to me the KB would show up to the east like it did. If I had attacked with the CV's to the south of Rabaul my tactical situation would have been no different, the range to the KB would have been about the same, and I still would have lost the Big E.

The plan for the attack was for the CA TF to run "through" Rabaul to meet the bombardment TF, and hopefully damage some of the ships - in this case I considered the CA TF somewhat expendable. I assumed the invasion TF would react away from the CA's, and that is why I ran the carriers around the west side of the island. My intention was to have the CA's chase the invasion fleet towards the carriers. In either case, my CV's were not going to stick around at all; they were going to flee south after the strike. I thought the KB was likely at Truk.

I cannot search everywhere, especially early in the war like we are, so some chances have to be taken.

As to my opponent's tactics, I don't have a good feel for them yet - I think KB showing up where it did was more accident than anything else. Of course I could be wrong on that. So far his play has seemed fairly straightforward.

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: topeverest


My thoughts also wander to your thought process in the turns before the battle. How certain were you that KB was in the area, and if you had poor spotting as it appears happened, how can you prevent poor spotting from being a factor in future counterpulses? How many searchplanes did you use, and at what range did you search?

As to the KB, I did not know where it was and took a risk. Due to geography, and the hasty nature of the attack, I was unable to search to the east where the KB appeared from. Had this been a planned attack, I would have, at the least put a seaplane tender in a spot where I could search the area from. I took a chance, and paid for it, but overall I am very happy with the results. I can guarantee you that Skyros will think twice before making an uncovered movement, and he cannot protect everywhere.

Speaking of which, we may be hearing from Force Zulu soon.....

[bradfordkay]

Actually, the presence of the KB escorting this Rabaul invasion makes sense because of your carrier attack on his Tarawa invasion. After that attack, the only one of his invasions at this stage that could be reached by your carriers would be the Rabaul invasion so bringing the KB down to cover it was what a prudent IJN commander would do.

[Canoerebel]

You don't have to set search vectors. I almost never do. I just leave them at 360 and it works like a charm. (I have, on very rare occasions, tinkered with vectors when I had time and the situations obviously called for it - IE, there was land for 270 out of 360 degrees of arc), but I didn't detect the slightest improvement in performance when I did so.

[AU Tiger_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

Actually, the presence of the KB escorting this Rabaul invasion makes sense because of your carrier attack on his Tarawa invasion. After that attack, the only one of his invasions at this stage that could be reached by your carriers would be the Rabaul invasion so bringing the KB down to cover it was what a prudent IJN commander would do.

I reject your reality and substitute my own.
[:-]


Yes, in hindsight it is fairly obvious he would support the Rabaul invasion.