Playtest of Pacific at War 3 25 14

[larryfulkerson]

Finally some good news.

[larryfulkerson]

Okie dokie........I've received some new moves from Thomas and I've watched the replay and wouldn't you know it.....Thomas
captured New Caledonia right out from under my nose.

[larryfulkerson]

I've sailed quite a few American land combat units to China now and I'm thinking it's just about time to start to try to push back.
I've got some attacks scheduled to go off and I've got my fingers crossed.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's a close-up of New Caledonia. There's no hope of taking it back with the assets still on the island. I've got to evacuate the
planes yet. I haven't moved anything yet to give you the "before" view. There's nothing to do here except dig in, go to three-dots,
and evacuate the planes.

[larryfulkerson]

I almost HAD to use the 1st Marine Division to oppose all that Japanese armour in the southern front lines. The 1st has a great
anti-armour rating and it's proficiency is outstanding, 90%. All that plus it was the only unit available at the time.

[larryfulkerson]

I moved a division, the 24th division, to Auckland New Zealand just in case there's some more expansion plans in the works.

[larryfulkerson]

I made the mistake of flying my SBD's further than the range of their escorts or something.....I lost them all and the Japs lost a
couple.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's a close-up of Noumea now. The Japs have moved in all kinds of aircraft and some land troops. It's a fortress now.

[larryfulkerson]

New moves from Thomas. He invaded and captured Colombo. Well, all of Ceylon actually. The entire island. Using paratroops and
some land combat troops he systematically disassembled my defense and defeated my dudes. He's already flown bou cou aircraft
and it's a small fortress now.

[larryfulkerson]

So here's what it looks like now. The Japs own the Aleutian islands and some off the bottom edge of the map as well. I can no longer
sail land combat troops from Oz to India with impunity and I'm outnumbered in ships so I'm going to have to wait until I get more
ships to strike back. And the mainland will have to fend for itself.

[larryfulkerson]

I'm on the lookout for a way to strike back effectively and I'm wondering about the Celebes. I'd like to take back the Phillippines
ASAP and I'm thinking I can leapfrog through the bases and airfields of the Celebes going north. I'm going to have to do some
recon of Makassar to see what's there because I'm pretty sure it's going to take a division at the very least to invade and capture
the base there.

[larryfulkerson]

Hey you guys.....I have some good news. I got to looking at the expected reinforcements display again and it looks like there's another
three or four DD's coming in T60. It used to be a carrier but the CV's were destroyed so now it's only DD's. And then there's an
actual CV carrier in T61 with a lot of new planes and everything.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's the Rabaul area now. I can't find a weak spot, the chink in his armour. It's all mutually supporting and formidable.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's some of my losses so far. Also, I've circled in yellow the ships I still own.

[larryfulkerson]

I did a recon of Makassar by bombing it with B-24's. There's not much there so I may be able to take it back.

[larryfulkerson]

I thought I'd turn on the PO buttons and view the objective tracks and some of them look severely complicated.

[Chattez]

IMHO you should start with trying to retake some of the islands between the US and Australia.

I think (?) that will make sending reinforcements (ships, planes, men) to Oz much safer.

And, being as those islands are on the far periphery of the Empire, they may be less easy for the Japanese player to defend.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: Chattez
IMHO you should start with trying to retake some of the islands between the US and Australia.
I think (?) that will make sending reinforcements (ships, planes, men) to Oz much safer.
And, being as those islands are on the far periphery of the Empire, they may be less easy for the Japanese player to defend.

Sounds good to me Chattez dude. I'll do it. I'm thinking somewhere like Phoenix island.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's the disasterous results of an airfield strike on Lae. I definately lost this one.

[larryfulkerson]

I thought that the Allies lost the contest above but Thomas tells me that the Allied production rate will make up these losses in no
time and that I shouldn't worry so much about MY losses but I should concentrate on causing Jap losses. Sounds like a good idea.
Here's the amount on hand and the production rate of several of the fighters I'm using. I've got to do a save game and boot up a
new game of this scenario and from the Jap side of things I should check out the production rate of some of the Jap planes to do
a compare-ison.