Late war German subs

[paulderynck]

In my experience even when playing with more than two players we don't bid, we win or lose as teams and we don't have people on the same side (read Allied) trying to screw each other over in the last two or three turns so they can be the grander poohbah.

[michaelbaldur]

ORIGINAL: brian brian

It's not really Harry's fault that players on the same side play very cooperatively in some games. The game is designed to produce an individual winner, not a team win.

from my point of view, you can only win as a team.

I have even seen allies playing not as major powers, but as map power... basicly you control all units on your map.

when I played Italy I controlled all units in FRance, while he concentrated on USSR.

but then again im really a good defence player.

[paulderynck]

Yes, we played a lot of three-player games with version 3 of WiF, two Allied vs one Axis. And usually one ally looked after the Asia-Pacific theater and the other looked after Europe and North Africa.

[Twisted1]

>In my experience even when playing with more than two players we don't bid, we win or lose as teams and we don't have people on the same side (read Allied) trying to screw each other over in the last two or three turns so they can be the grander poohbah

Try playing with Days of Decision 3. You want to see a giant screw feast sometimes (usually on the Allies), have someone play the USSR who can be a total d*&k. Fun, yes, but it can get weird.

My last four live games have all been with DoD and loved everyone of them!

[michaelbaldur]

but back to submarines.. in late war game, Germany have to keep the CW fleet in Europa.. so a big submarine fleet can help Japan.

if CW can send all it´s ships against Japan, Japan is doomed.

so Germany and Italy need to keep their fleets intact, so they can pin down 1 or 2 CW fleets and maybe an American fleet.

[Ur_Vile_WEdge]

At least in my experience, the battleships are mostly meaningless in the Pacific, or at least those 4 moving ones that makeup the mainstay of the British fleet. It's all decided by CVs and their inevitable cruiser escorts, and maybe a few subs to do deep harassment.


And it's pretty rare that CV are being pulled in to do counter-submarine warfare. Really, what makes a difference to the late game pacific war is whether or not you can bag any carriers with land based air, like if the British carriers venture into the Med to try to put pressure on Italy early game or the like.

[michaelbaldur]

ORIGINAL: Ur_Vile_WEdge

At least in my experience, the battleships are mostly meaningless in the Pacific, or at least those 4 moving ones that makeup the mainstay of the British fleet. It's all decided by CVs and their inevitable cruiser escorts, and maybe a few subs to do deep harassment.


And it's pretty rare that CV are being pulled in to do counter-submarine warfare. Really, what makes a difference to the late game pacific war is whether or not you can bag any carriers with land based air, like if the British carriers venture into the Med to try to put pressure on Italy early game or the like.

In long naval battles, carrier planes are shot down, or avoided BY AA...

the only way to inflict massive casualties (on both sides) is to use battleships

[Numdydar]

Which again flies in the face of the historical record.

[Ur_Vile_WEdge]

Of course not all of the carrier planes make it. Which is why you have spares, and run away when your planes are out of commission, to restock back at base and possibly get reorganized by your HQs.


And unless the weather's bad, the planes hit way, way harder than the BB. You can inflict plenty of damage with just a few high factor bombers slipping through, and you won't have to spend 3 surprise points apiece to make sure that those X results go to the valuable carriers and not the ablative cruisers. The carriers both hit first and hit way harder than BB.

[alexvand]

ORIGINAL: michaelbaldur

ORIGINAL: Ur_Vile_WEdge

At least in my experience, the battleships are mostly meaningless in the Pacific, or at least those 4 moving ones that makeup the mainstay of the British fleet. It's all decided by CVs and their inevitable cruiser escorts, and maybe a few subs to do deep harassment.


And it's pretty rare that CV are being pulled in to do counter-submarine warfare. Really, what makes a difference to the late game pacific war is whether or not you can bag any carriers with land based air, like if the British carriers venture into the Med to try to put pressure on Italy early game or the like.

In long naval battles, carrier planes are shot down, or avoided BY AA...

the only way to inflict massive casualties (on both sides) is to use battleships

Not my experience. But then, we may have different play styles.

The most devastating naval battles I've experienced are with carriers. Sometimes one sided, but have had plenty of balance too.

[michaelbaldur]

but time .. if you have the enemy engaged. (which Is hard enough, when the Axis refuse to leave port)..

should you really stop attacking because you lost your carrier planes.. no you pick surface and eat the casualties..


and time. the allies really have to hurry.. before you know it, it is 1945


and if the Americans loss most of their carrier planes.. should they stay in port and wait for new.. which can take a turn or more... you need pilots, carrier planes and transport capacitive to get them to the carriers. where they sometimes arrive disrupted, then you need air missions to place them on carriers.

that takes time, especially if you have 5-10 empty carriers...

Japan don´t need transport, and can place new reinforcements directly on carriers.. so Japanese reinforcements are ready on the first impulse, American reinforcements are maybe ready next turn

[michaelbaldur]

ORIGINAL: michaelbaldur

but time .. if you have the enemy engaged. (which Is hard enough, when the Axis refuse to leave port)..

should you really stop attacking because you lost your carrier planes.. no you pick surface and eat the casualties..


and time. the allies really have to hurry.. before you know it, it is 1945


and if the Americans loss most of their carrier planes.. should they stay in port and wait for new.. which can take a turn or more... you need pilots, carrier planes and transport capacitive to get them to the carriers. where they sometimes arrive disrupted, then you need air missions to place them on carriers.

that takes time, especially if you have 5-10 empty carriers...

Japan don´t need transport, and can place new reinforcements directly on carriers.. so Japanese reinforcements are ready on the first impulse, American reinforcements are maybe ready next turn

or you move empty Carriers back to USA(which you are often forced to do because of limited numbers of transports.), but then they start the turn there, and can´t react to anything

[alexvand]

ORIGINAL: michaelbaldur

ORIGINAL: michaelbaldur

but time .. if you have the enemy engaged. (which Is hard enough, when the Axis refuse to leave port)..

should you really stop attacking because you lost your carrier planes.. no you pick surface and eat the casualties..


and time. the allies really have to hurry.. before you know it, it is 1945


and if the Americans loss most of their carrier planes.. should they stay in port and wait for new.. which can take a turn or more... you need pilots, carrier planes and transport capacitive to get them to the carriers. where they sometimes arrive disrupted, then you need air missions to place them on carriers.

that takes time, especially if you have 5-10 empty carriers...

Japan don´t need transport, and can place new reinforcements directly on carriers.. so Japanese reinforcements are ready on the first impulse, American reinforcements are maybe ready next turn

or you move empty Carriers back to USA(which you are often forced to do because of limited numbers of transports.), but then they start the turn there, and can´t react to anything

And that's why you have Nimitz (Or someone) in Pearl. Those carriers load up with new planes then sail straight into port on a naval move where they get re-orged and are available for action immediately.

[brian brian]

1 garrison Wake with HQ, elite INF, and SeaBees ... stuff with 3 FTR. Wake, unlike a CV, can't be sunk, and air can be reinforced to it by TRS missions ending east of Pearl beyond most Japanese raids

2 force Japan to defend Marianas lest the FTRs from Wake are used to cover early/surprise landing on Truk or the Bonins

3 smash your way through every hex of Marshalls with GARR off AMPH and MAR across land/sea hexsides and lots of BB fire support from Hawaii zone (trench warfare)

4 stuff Marshalls with more FTR, HQ & ENG, plus TRS, AMPH

5 send the whole USN (fast BB & CV from Pearl) to the Marianas under cover of a big pile of P-38s, Corsairs, and Hellcats; threaten Truk? Smash onto Bonins.

6 move the HQ, ENG, and FTR stacks to those lovely little volcanic specks of land (one is in the N. Temperate, everyone's favorite weather zone) and grab Japan by the throat w/ effective 5 box stack (more Catalinas) attacking convoys in the 0 box

(even easier with the Naval Supply Units / the amazing USN Fleet Train)

MacArthur's SW Pacific "I shall return" strategy? Pointless, aside from tweaking Japan into a defense of Rabaul. Jeep Carriers, 10+ Essex class Fleet Carriers & maybe a couple lovely Midway class? No, just a half-dozen or so Essex' to carry the bombers which first go after the IJN flat-tops and then pound the island garrisons. A Mariner or Catalina is nice to absorb all the AA though, and they don't use up FTR bases. 1 Essex + 2 years to arrive in theater = 2 FTR2, or 2 Essex = 3 FTR3

real? no. but that's the way the game system works.


sorry, Wedge already explained late war German SUBs - plow right through them unless Patton is on board. the sooner you Damage them, the sooner they move to the Repair Pool and stay there. don't worry, the US will make more.

[Numdydar]

So Brian you tell us a plan to destroy Japan. So how would you counter what you have described above? Or can you?

[brian brian]

There are a couple ways to counter this US sledgehammer strategy, which is not unstoppable. It can still come down to skill at operational planning, and tactical decisions with the pieces. 1/10 splits never hurt either when you roll the 1. Japan needs every land unit in it's force pool, so it can fight on those unsinkable CV islands, especially the ones on sea zone boundaries.

Japan should realize that a CV is an offensive weapon, to carry airplanes into enemy territory, where you don't have any airbases. The 1930s IJN can get that done for you as you seize the perimeter of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. So yeah, it is fun to deploy the Shinano Super-CV on the map, but it is more useful to empty their FTR pool and their wicked NAV pool. The mid-war designs go through a lot of dreck (you can at least garrison Korea with the weak FTRs, and you can never have too many NAV in your two key convoy zones), but nuggets of good do eventually appear after the last variants of the Mitsubish A6M roll off the designer drafting table. And you need to rebuild the 1940-42 Zeroes whenever they are lost. They never get quite as many long range planes as the Americans do, but they do get some. Even their poorly factored LND pool becomes very useful in China as long range mobile artillery when Mao's hordes have reached maximum size.

They need to be able to plan ahead to get an Air Impulse occasionally to move their airplanes however, not simple. But when they can, they probably have more bases to fly from on the defense than the US does on the offense. If they invest in getting all their best range planes on the map, they can put up a pretty serious front via Naval Air Interception if they are willing to fight from the 2 box. (Just as the Euro-Axis can in the 1 box). Clearing through a lot of air-to-sea factors in a big battle can set Allied timetables back significantly, much more significantly than if Kurita's heavy cruisers break through the CVL screen to attack those precious AMPH behind the Surigao Strait.

It is also helpful to keep the Imperial Guard, the good SNLF division, and another corps (maybe on the 2-5 AMPH) in reserve. The USMC might be able to take a defended beach hex, but they might end up flipped and having taken counter losses along the way = vulnerable to a counter-invasion attack.


My point is that land-based air is more useful than big CV investments, due to the nature of the sea zones and the game system. I like the straight US attack through the central Pacfic (the general area, not the specific WiF zone - the historical Nimitz approach). Some Allies prefer a sneak attack via Christmas Island to break into the South China Sea on the cheap, though again the point is to get long range FTRs onto bases on sea zone boundaries. I don't like attacking Japan from the west, too much approach time for all the units involved and thus it is hard to reinforce success in Indonesia. Japan's defense lines are the same length in either direction.

[Ur_Vile_WEdge]

While I generally agree with the "ignore the stuff in southeast asia, go straight for the jugular" strategy, I just find I need a big carrier stack to make it work, in addition to the big LBA stack coming in from the front. Assuming you can get marines from an all sea hexside to join in, you're still at best attacking with 4 corps sized units, all of whom will be at half strength, plus your fire support. And if you're using most of your fighters to secure sea areas, it can be hard to stop the Japanese using their own LBA to throw a defensive fire support curveball your way on assaults.


Overcoming a 2 high stack of Japanese units (which, granted, aren't all that common, but he can place enough to make your life difficult) usually requires knocking them out of supply, which means you need something that can strike further than your LBA, who are 1 sea zone at a time guys. Plus, possessing a deep strike capability means that the Japanese player has to split his own air assets to cover multiple zones, whereas the LBA attack is usually very telegraphed, and that gives the Japanese the chance to concentrate their own planes.