A Lemon rises in the East: SqzMyLemon (J) vs. JocMeister (A)

[SqzMyLemon]

In light of recent events, I have no choice but to call off further offensive operations in 3x terrain where stacking limits prevent me from contesting Chinese AV that is enhanced to Superman status. I will redeploy most of my forces to the capture of Chungking where I know the forts can eventually be reduced and VP's for destroying 90+ LCU's will hopefully be accumulated. Stacking limits has turned every 3x hex in China into an atoll and Japan simply lacks the ability to counter.

Jocke and I have a HR stating no Allied strategic bombing in China until Jan. 1/43 which has passed. I need to confirm that means I can strat bomb if I so choose. If so, then I will begin targeting the remaining LI production in Paoshan, Kunming and Chungking.

[SqzMyLemon]

Jocke says knock myself out with strat bombing as he's been out of supply in China for six months. Seems like a slightly disingenuous answer after the recent combat.

I guess it was simply the trees and rocks that just trashed five Japanese divisions. [8|]

[catwhoorg]

He had some Ewoks improvise a few traps for you.

[witpqs]

Yes, Emperor SqzMyLemon made the classic mistake of underestimating the Ewoks. [:-]

[SqzMyLemon]

Yub Nub

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: SqzMyLemon

The travesty of what constitutes a land combat model continues in China. Despite a 3:1 advantage in raw AV I still get crushed by three Chinese Corps outside of Kunming. I don't know what else I can do, these results continue to favour the Chinese whether I overstack or not. Over 200 destroyed Japanese squads compared to five for the Chinese? Give me a break. And the artillery losses have been crazy. How so many guns are being lost is beyond me. The ridiculous AAR follows:


Don't sweat China Allied players, you can abandon the entire country and just head to the hills, the land combat routine will take care of the rest for you. [8|]

Just remember the same thing will favor you later. [:)]

Also, are you bombing the troops before the DA? Even if it appears nothing is happening, the disruption goes up and that can help.

I find my troops also do better if they have forts built for counter battery fire protection, so if you are rotating and bringing new troops in make sure they build a fort or two before a DA, and test with some arty bombardments. once hey get a positive arty bombardment result they usually do well in the DA.

[SqzMyLemon]

Thing is I had a 7:1 advantage in guns compared to the Chinese. Pax said the Chinese mortars were range 3 while my mountain guns were range 9 so the fact I'm losing artillery like this to counterbattery during assaults seems odd. I am bringing way more firepower to the party.

I don't think it will favour me later. I'll only be able to have 1 Japanese division per hex if stacking limits are 25k or less. One Allied division, some armour and dedicated combat engineers will make short work of my resistance especially when the Allied heavies cause massive disruption. Erik, Japanese tactical air in anything less than 2x terrain is ok, in 3x it has zero effect. DaBabes tones down the bombing effect and that really affects Japanese 2E's effectiveness.

I try and stay positive, but I'm facing Chinese troops here and the fact that terrain is trumping everything there's little hope to make further progress. The China campaign will end in failure as a result. I can't protect the Burma side of things and that will mean Chinese forces will be flush in supplies before the year is out once I lose Myitkyina, Bhamo and Lashio.

[SqzMyLemon]

ORIGINAL: obvert

I find my troops also do better if they have forts built for counter battery fire protection, so if you are rotating and bringing new troops in make sure they build a fort or two before a DA, and test with some arty bombardments.

This won't work, I can only have one division in the hex to not over stack. If I bring in more divisions and wait for them to build forts I'm getting hit with 1-5 points of disruption/fatigue per unit per day. I can't stick around for weeks building up fort levels because that will make it impossible for me to attack without high disruption and fatigue. My frustration is I don't understand what is happening during the combat in order to know what works and what doesn't. Nothing is working at the moment and every result has been bad. I'm facing an atoll like defence in every 3x defensive terrain hex in China and all that goes with it. Whether I over stack or don't I can't budge the Chinese.

The previous attack, I had disruption of less than 2-4 points per division and full supply. I now have five divisions with disruption of 89, 80, 60, 55 and 31 respectively. I got crushed in a 1:1 odds attack and the Chinese suffered squat. I got hit with the massive disruption during the attack, not before and that's what I don't understand. What do the Chinese have TOE wise that could cause me that much disruption and outright kill over 200 infantry squads and disable an equal amount? Without over stacking I can't generate enough AV to offset the Chinese AV, the forts or the defensive terrain bonus, and when I did over stack with a 3:1 raw AV advantage I got slaughtered. This just doesn't seem right.

[SqzMyLemon]

Jocke's quit the game. I'm not going to comment further. I thanked Jocke for the game and an offer for a replacement Allied player was declined.

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: SqzMyLemon
Jocke's quit the game. I'm not going to comment further. I thanked Jocke for the game and an offer for a replacement Allied player was declined.

Unexpected. Sorry, dude.

[SqzMyLemon]

If anyone is interested in checking out the Japanese side of things in terms of the economy, production or just out of curiosity I can provide the game file and password upon request.

[PaxMondo]

Very sorry to see this end ...

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: SqzMyLemon

If anyone is interested in checking out the Japanese side of things in terms of the economy, production or just out of curiosity I can provide the game file and password upon request.

Hey. Sorry to see this one die too. So much of interest going on still, and probable was about to get even more interesting as the Allies moved ahead. Glad you have another new game to feed the need.

I'd love to take a look once I'm home. It'd be really interesting to see someone else's IJ from the inside!

[Symon]

I was asked to look into this by several people, so I did. And it’s WAD. Joseph sent me the savegame, and I captured the area/units of interest and ran it under 3 different executables; 1123r, 1117, and mine. Ran it with and without stacking limits. Ran it with launch from desktop every time, so all random seeds are different.

Can’t help one without helping the other, so I’ll post this on both ya’lls AARs.

The executable (Beta) has nothing to do with the result. It is statistically the same no matter what Beta you use.

Stacking limits have a significant result vector, but not anywhere close to the “blame game”.

Avg results under all Betas, with SLs:
Ground combat at 70,48 (near Kunming)
Japanese Deliberate attack
Attacking force 64857 troops, 627 guns, 194 vehicles, Assault Value = 2234
Defending force 20956 troops, 88 guns, 0 vehicles, Assault Value = 726
Japanese adjusted assault: 746
Allied adjusted defense: 659
Japanese assault odds: 1 to 1
Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), experience(-), supply(-)
Attacker: disruption(-)
Japanese ground losses:
6022 casualties reported
Allied ground losses:
869 casualties reported

Avg results under all Betas, without SLs:
Ground combat at 70,48 (near Kunming)
Japanese Deliberate attack
Attacking force 64857 troops, 627 guns, 194 vehicles, Assault Value = 2234
Defending force 20956 troops, 88 guns, 0 vehicles, Assault Value = 726
Japanese adjusted assault: 804
Allied adjusted defense: 460
Japanese assault odds: 1 to 1
Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), experience(-), supply(-)
Attacker: disruption(-)
Japanese ground losses:
3345 casualties reported
Allied ground losses:
1172 casualties reported

So the attacker would have got whacked, no matter what the limits. As to disruption, the avg SL hit was in the 60-80s. The avg non-SL hit was in the 40-60s. That says, to me, that SLs are working exactly as intended. The attacker wanted to play “big stack” and got penalized for it. He would have lost in any case, in stock, but he lost bigger with SLs because he didn’t use the little grey cells.

Please don’t blame SLs for bad results due to lack of proper planning. Thank you.

[SqzMyLemon]

Appreciate you looking into this. All I wanted was clarification so I can try to make better preparations. Not having the experience it remains a learning process by trial and error.