Turnaround? Lowpe (J) vs Tiemanj (A) Stock

[Lowpe]

The Kongo moves from Oita to Fukuoka and the Allies sweep Fukuoka heavily.

Spitfires, Corsairs, Jugs, Wildcat, Hellcats, oh my!

Our planes are for the most part second string, but my oh my, we do well with a layered approach all the way to the mid 20Ks. I am heartened that we do really well against the Spitfire sweeps, so I have figured how to counter them.

But the Allies keep coming, and coming, and then the 4E beasties come. A long, long day. The Kongo awaits the coming deathstar strike, but not this day..

The Allies are ruthless, trashing runways hither and thither, and for the first time I recall, bombing troops in the open with B29s. Ouch!!!!





What a hodge podge of junky planes. Oh, for a 1000 J2M5 or Frank A's.

[Lowpe]

When the dust clears, the Japanese Air Forces have pulled off another win, but we are losing the war badly as our Fighter production is less than 10 planes a day. Probably.

[Lowpe]

Looking bleak my friends, bleak.

[BBfanboy]

You are up against a mighty eagle, but the eastern S***hawk still has talons! Great to see the fight you are putting up! Hang in there! [&o]

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

You are up against a mighty eagle, but the eastern S***hawk still has talons! Great to see the fight you are putting up! Hang in there! [&o]

We are hanging on, if just by our fingernails.[:D]

As near as I can figure, the Allies took OkiShoto with an aim as using it as a battleship reloading port, and look to pound these three likely invasion beaches. With Honshu almost split, taking the two western ones would open up a lot of clear terrain and seal off Kobe and Osaka.

So, I am trying to move everything I can here to respond.

It will be very tough.

Almost all runways in western Honshu are destroyed.

Alternatively, the Allies are simply trying to surround Honshu with bases and the Western Japanese Islands are next, or even Tsushima.

Barges are transporting a SNLF unit to Tsushima and a Regiment to Honshu. Air transports are flying back troops from Okinawa and the Bonins.

[Rafid]

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

Six more 25mm AA guns per side and the AA goes up 132 points! The AA rating doesn't count in radars, does it? They should affect accuracy, not volume.

There is no relationship that I know of between the AA rating and effectiveness. Some Japanese ships get in the 2000, but it is because of adding those horrible AA rockets that can fire once and never hit.

No relationship either to radar as far as I know.

ORIGINAL: mind_messing

The ratings lie!

Japanese shipboard AA is anemic. It's just the 25mm for the overwhelming majority of IJN ships, with the occasional 12.7cm, 10cm or 8cm gun on the bigger ships that can fire higher than 4000ft.

The 25mm's generally never get a chance to fire. Torpedo and dive bombers on release and low level attacks. That's it.

The Allies, on the other hand, get an abundance of 5 inch guns and the wondrous 40mm Bofors. If Japan had just copied the design of that weapon and plastered it all over the sides of IJN ships...

From my own testing and with no guarantee for correctness, the AA rating is calculated as the sum of [NUMBER OF DEVICE] x [EFFECT OF DEVICE] / 2 – obviously with only AA capable devices considered (no 46cm guns here). This means that the following have no influence on AA rating of ships:

a) Device accuracy
b) Device ceiling
c) In-code late war allied bonuses modelling radar fire control and VT-fuses.

All of these effects inflate the AA ratings of Japanese ships compared to Allied ships. As MM already pointed out, b) is particularly bad, since the majority of the AA rating of many Japanese ships (eg 451 out of 567 for the Akitsuki 7/44 above) come from the 25mms which have a horrible ceiling and will fire very rarely (interestingly in my own – latest beta - scenario 1 they have an effect of 18, while they seem to have an effect of 22 here). An effect of 22 would rate them higher than a Bofor (effect 20).

Strangely in my scenario 1 here the AA rockets (device 1684) have an effect rating of 0 and the formula above works, if I just ignore them. So they could not inflate any AA ratings, but will they work?

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: Rafid

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

Six more 25mm AA guns per side and the AA goes up 132 points! The AA rating doesn't count in radars, does it? They should affect accuracy, not volume.

There is no relationship that I know of between the AA rating and effectiveness. Some Japanese ships get in the 2000, but it is because of adding those horrible AA rockets that can fire once and never hit.

No relationship either to radar as far as I know.

ORIGINAL: mind_messing

The ratings lie!

Japanese shipboard AA is anemic. It's just the 25mm for the overwhelming majority of IJN ships, with the occasional 12.7cm, 10cm or 8cm gun on the bigger ships that can fire higher than 4000ft.

The 25mm's generally never get a chance to fire. Torpedo and dive bombers on release and low level attacks. That's it.

The Allies, on the other hand, get an abundance of 5 inch guns and the wondrous 40mm Bofors. If Japan had just copied the design of that weapon and plastered it all over the sides of IJN ships...

From my own testing and with no guarantee for correctness, the AA rating is calculated as the sum of [NUMBER OF DEVICE] x [EFFECT OF DEVICE] / 2 – obviously with only AA capable devices considered (no 46cm guns here). This means that the following have no influence on AA rating of ships:

a) Device accuracy
b) Device ceiling
c) In-code late war allied bonuses modelling radar fire control and VT-fuses.

All of these effects inflate the AA ratings of Japanese ships compared to Allied ships. As MM already pointed out, b) is particularly bad, since the majority of the AA rating of many Japanese ships (eg 451 out of 567 for the Akitsuki 7/44 above) come from the 25mms which have a horrible ceiling and will fire very rarely (interestingly in my own – latest beta - scenario 1 they have an effect of 18, while they seem to have an effect of 22 here). An effect of 22 would rate them higher than a Bofor (effect 20).

Strangely in my scenario 1 here the AA rockets (device 1684) have an effect rating of 0 and the formula above works, if I just ignore them. So they could not inflate any AA ratings, but will they work?

Rafid - I take no issue with your calculation. Just in case you are not aware, in the past the developers have confirmed that the AA rating has nothing whatsoever to do with combat. The AA rating is simply a composite number for display to humans. As such it can be handy, but you point out the danger. If a ship has lots of short range weapons it can display a high AA rating, but longer range guns are needed to provide better protection. You obviously know that (from reading your post), I just wanted to mention the bit about the ship AA rating not being used in the combat calculations. Same if true of a base's flak rating, BTW.

[Lowpe]

Thanks Rafid & W.[:)]

I think Obvert had some ships with the AA rockets and they did nothing.

Talking about AA, I airlifted my two type 5 AA guns to Oki Shoto. Where they were subsequently destroyed. Hopefully they did some damage first.

Now, the parent group is replacing them. That is interesting, since the production date for these bad little boys is 9/45. What gives, I thought they were gone for good?

[Skygge]

Okay, I am officially not having fun anymore, but at least I am taking those beasties with me

Every allied plane downed is a victory. Every allied ship sunk is a victory to celebrate.

[BBfanboy]

Must be retrieving those 40mms from sunken Allied ships!

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: Skygge

Okay, I am officially not having fun anymore, but at least I am taking those beasties with me

Every allied plane downed is a victory. Every allied ship sunk is a victory to celebrate.

Yep, every victory point counts![:)]

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

Must be retrieving those 40mms from sunken Allied ships!

Maybe. I will rationalize it as a working prototype under going early field exercises. I don't think it will break the game.

Finished the turn, and sent the bulk of the fighters to Tokyo, hopefully to avoid the lousy Corsair sweeps, and to protect 3 Es there.

The Kongo and company are heading to Shanghai, going to join up with the Tone and 2 DD there. That makes for a powerful surface group.[:D]

I sent the turn away, and realized I didn't CAP the Kongo. Uh-oh![X(]

[Lowpe]

August 30,1944

Very quiet day. Allies pretty much stand down their air force, except they bomb Lang Son heavily.

WE move most of a Regiment from Fusan to Honshu, going to try to put a SNLF unit on Tsushima, if they get intercepted perhaps the coastal guns will bark some.

The Allies are using lone minesweepers, and although they aren't disrupted, the coastal guns aren't firing on them. Plenty of supply, I double checked the leaders. I guess I need to improve the search...

We managed to sink one minesweeper the other day with a destroyer...

[Lowpe]

We finish off two of three submarines from yesterday, I think.

[Lowpe]

Just can't get supply here.

[Lowpe]

Allies get good detection on my ships fleeing Honshu, they will reverse course, merge and set up at Chinhae a level 7 airbase unlikely to get swept.

Hopefully they can draw those destroyers thru the straits.

If not, hopefully they will be attacked by Allied Air power.

[JocMeister]

Try moving in some HQs to the area. That usually draws in some supply.

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

Try moving in some HQs to the area. That usually draws in some supply.

You mean a command HQ?

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

Try moving in some HQs to the area. That usually draws in some supply.

You mean a command HQ?

IIRC corps and army HQs also draw, but less than a command HQ. Not sure about air and naval HQs.

[Lokasenna]

Given that every base shown on the "trail" there has a supply ! attached to it (and all of the ones over by Shanghai!! - or are those from garrisons?), it's just not going to happen unless you increase supplies in all of China.