Groundhog Day! - No NJP

[Mike McCreery]

It works sort of!

[Mike McCreery]

Here is the result.

[Mike McCreery]

I send Paratroops into Wyhalla which was undefended. It says in the combat report he lost 6 Zero's but in the plane losses nothing shows up in the 'Ground' section but 7 planes show up in the 'ops' section.

These troops are trying to move immediately northeast to block the rail line.

[Mike McCreery]

The turn has been sent so we should see the results within a few hours.

NJP has a stack of about 60,000 troops with an estimated AV at between 1100 & 1200AV moving west into the hex southeast of Port Augusta. I have 4 units of tanks that are at almost full strength. their AV is estimated at just above 200. They will shock attack as his troops are moving into the hex.

My larger force will be following on and should be in the hex but probably will not participate in tomorrows battle.

NJP's armor forces have been punching holes in the 2 tank regiments still containing Valentine II tanks. The groups that will shock attack are all upgraded to Grant/Lee with some Stuarts thrown in.

[Mike McCreery]

PRO-TIP

If you would like to know if a hex is defended by land troops but you do not want to tip your enemy off in any way such as having a recon unit show up overhead....

Set a ground bombing mission to the hex. If there are ground troops there the bombers will attempt to hit them. If there are no ground troops there the bombers will do whatever they want to... Make sure you are willing to have the group self destruct against any other target within range when you do this.

Good for scouting for sneaky sneak attacks using small para units.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: Wargmr

The turn has been sent so we should see the results within a few hours.

NJP has a stack of about 60,000 troops with an estimated AV at between 1100 & 1200AV moving west into the hex southeast of Port Augusta. I have 4 units of tanks that are at almost full strength. their AV is estimated at just above 200. They will shock attack as his troops are moving into the hex.

My larger force will be following on and should be in the hex but probably will not participate in tomorrows battle.

NJP's armor forces have been punching holes in the 2 tank regiments still containing Valentine II tanks. The groups that will shock attack are all upgraded to Grant/Lee with some Stuarts thrown in.

Interesting that the prior map pics of the ground combat screens do not show the troops you had coming up the rail line south of Pt. Augusta - he may not have known they were coming and what danger he is in.

I would put the Australia Command and Australia Corp HQs in combat mode for the next turn so they can support the battles going on around them, even if they are not in the battle hexes. Their movement does not need to be cancelled - they just won't move as much.

I thought the Valentine tank had good armour but just a weak gun (but adequate for Japanese tanks). Maybe I am thinking of the Churchill or Crusader tank. Never thought of the Grant/Lee as a well armoured tank - certainly the Germans didn't. Have to look up the armour values I guess.

[Mike McCreery]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

ORIGINAL: Wargmr

The turn has been sent so we should see the results within a few hours.

NJP has a stack of about 60,000 troops with an estimated AV at between 1100 & 1200AV moving west into the hex southeast of Port Augusta. I have 4 units of tanks that are at almost full strength. their AV is estimated at just above 200. They will shock attack as his troops are moving into the hex.

My larger force will be following on and should be in the hex but probably will not participate in tomorrows battle.

NJP's armor forces have been punching holes in the 2 tank regiments still containing Valentine II tanks. The groups that will shock attack are all upgraded to Grant/Lee with some Stuarts thrown in.

Interesting that the prior map pics of the ground combat screens do not show the troops you had coming up the rail line south of Pt. Augusta - he may not have known they were coming and what danger he is in.

I would put the Australia Command and Australia Corp HQs in combat mode for the next turn so they can support the battles going on around them, even if they are not in the battle hexes. Their movement does not need to be cancelled - they just won't move as much.

I thought the Valentine tank had good armour but just a weak gun (but adequate for Japanese tanks). Maybe I am thinking of the Churchill or Crusader tank. Never thought of the Grant/Lee as a well armoured tank - certainly the Germans didn't. Have to look up the armour values I guess.

All of those troops on the southern rail hexes moved from 2 hexes east of Adelaide. They moved 1 hex northwest to cross the river into the open terrain hex, then west one hex to the spot northeast of Adelaide. Then they moved northwest with the armor in the lead.


The shock attack went much worse than expected. According to the outcome I have nearly 200 disabled or destroyed tanks. In reality it appears that about 40 of the Grant/Lee's. One regiment took the brunt of the damage and the rest have mostly disablements.

[Mike McCreery]

Another submarine redeems themselves. I should watch more closely because I thought this was one of mine going down at first.

Maybe I shouldnt think too much about it but this is the third AO of his that I have sunk or seriously wounded through the war. It might modify his strategy.

[Mike McCreery]

NJP bags a nice set of transports and some advanced air base troops at a base in the Pacific. Either he is getting really good or I am getting sloppy. Time to blame the staff!!

[Mike McCreery]

Another attack goes in on an oiler but misses...

[Mike McCreery]

Bombers take on the stack of tanks in the open in the Australian bush...

[Mike McCreery]

I attempt to attack the airfield at Port Augusta but am ineffective.

[Mike McCreery]

The Japanese have retaliated at Norfolk Island with a division, and two tank regiments plus more troops. Even at 5-1 odds the Japanese take a beating this turn. NJP is going to win this fight however, I cannot stand against a prolonged attack at this strength.

[Mike McCreery]

NJP sent a paradrop into Broken Hill last turn and it was wiped out. He must have forgotten to cancel it because a handful more of the poor bastards met the same fate.

[Mike McCreery]

A bombardment went in on the Japanese troops and they suffered something like 22 disablements to around 11 for the allies. It appears that NJP is retreating into Port Augusta.

There are 3 possible targets for his fighter planes this turn. I hit his armor effectively last turn and he may LRCAP that group of units. I made an unsucessful airfield attack last turn and so he may use his planes to cover the airbase at Port Augusta. Finally he could LRCAP the units moving to Port Augusta. As a different option he could just CAP at range and hope to catch the bombers.

Given that he is moving out I am going to take a chance and shock attack his large stack of units after pouring all of my bombers into the hex this next turn.

IF I do really badly then it is back to defense. If I do mediocre then we shall see. If I do great then I likely push on to try to take Port Augusta. If he loses this before his troops strat move out then he has a very long walk.

[Mike McCreery]

THE RESULTS!!!! Were mediocre

I killed approximately 4000 Japanese troops and destroyed just over 100 squads while disabling 100 squads.

The allies lost 1000 troops and 120 AFV's and received 200 squad disablements.

I have been bombarding him the last 2 turns and have gotten approximately 1000 more casualities on the Japanese side.

[Rio Bravo]

ORIGINAL: Wargmr

ORIGINAL: Rio Bravo

Hello Wargmr-

I've only read like the last two pages of your AAR. I am going to back up now, go to the beginning. This looks to an interesting read.

One thing I noted by what I've read, that stands out to me, is your ability to confine The Empire to a small piece in India and of which you are strongly contesting at those locations. Secondly, you have all of the Gilberts!

Well done..gives me hope!

Regards,

-Terry

Rio,

Some people have called me aggressive ;] Some really aggressive people have called me aggressive as well. I think that I am just impatient but whatever!!

Strategically my opponent decided to make a play for all of Australia. I believe that is a mistake as defending the territory taken is difficult and it is as far away from the Japanese Home Island as possible and provides zero oil for the effort. It would cause an Auto victory if he managed to roll me over but it didnt happen.

Because he had the KB and mini-KB stashed in the southwest corner of Australia he could not project proper power in the Gilbert/Marshalls and thus I have made an early move in that direction.

What I like to do is overwhelm my opponent by pushing from many directions at once. The KB can be only one place and the auxiliary carrier force can only be in one place so he can cover 2-3 areas max. By moving in multiple vectors I stress out the capabilities of the Japanese and exploit the weak spots while causing the Japanese player to start to react to my moves rather than execute his own plan.

The difficulty of an early strategy is that the allied fighter forces are weaker than the Japanese forces into late 43. By mid to late 43 the allies should be able to project power where they needed to and be on the assault.

You may want to check out my AAR in the first game against NJP called "What Could Possibly Go Wrong?". We went into January of 1945 where I won by invading the Japanese homeland. It is every combat in the game and some say hard to read but you can just scroll fast until you hit pictures and those parts are commentary.

Thanks for stopping by!

I am trying to catch up on this AAR. Afterwards, I will read your other war. And yes, Australia is a long way from the Empire homeland.

I like your agressiveness and your strategy. Avoiding the KB is essential and so far you seem to have managed that!

Good luck!

[Mike McCreery]

Pago Pago has been getting ground down for a while and the end seems near for the Japanese. I am in the process of landing a division there and another at Savaii. Surprisingly there are no Japanese troops at Savaii.

I guess he was augmenting the combat power from Suva by air or sea as he has been depositing a regiment at Pago Pago in bits and pieces to supplement his AV strength there.

Anyway, the resistance in this area is going to be quickly overcome advancing our objectives to Suva/Nadi and areas northwards.

[Mike McCreery]

What a difference a week makes!!

NJP realized that Port Augusta wasnt a great holdout base when a group of cruisers sailed up and smashed the airfield and his planes. The base is only a level 1 airfield so after that and a few bombing runs the airfield was useless.

The bulk of his army ~ 1000 AV railed to either western Australia or northern Australia with my bets on most of it going west.

I landed a paratroop fragment in the base west of Port Augusta this turn and with the help of massive bombing caused a Japanese SNLF at Port Augusta to be destroyed.

This is going to allow me to swing eastward and go after the coast on that side of Australia. I dont think NJP intends to defend it very heavily.

[Rio Bravo]

Perhaps, NJP will withdraw from Australia now?