Climb Mt. Niitaka - Xargun vs Mr Kane

[Aurorus]

ORIGINAL: Xargun

So going over my initial Aircraft plans I notice I already have 770 engines in pools that I have no plans on ever using. Should I just write those off or make old crappy aircraft just to have them for kamikazes?

Basically, I think most JFBs just write them off. You may find a use for some with the end-war Nate that comes out as a kamikaze.

Two other things come to mind. Mr. Kane just got caught off-guard in southern China by Olerin's early war offensive there. He may very well try to same tack with you. Be prepared to respond rapidly if he musters several thousand AV in south China to press Canton and Hong Kong right off, or take some precautions.

The other thing is political points. Air coordination for Japan early, especially on turns 1 and 2 is crucial, and some of your officers in your Air HQs are not the best. This is especially true for the Naval air HQs. The commander of the 24th, I think it is at Saigon, is very aggressive and very poor, which often leads to Nells and Betties going in unescorted. You actually have some very good Air HQ officers in command of fleet HQs. I think Southeast Fleet or 4th Fleet has one of your best Air officers attached. Do a little checking and make replacing the poor Naval Air officers your first PP priority.

Finally, no one tells you this... but Japanese aircraft that rebase on the first turn will not fly any offensive bombing missions except anti-naval missions. So do not rebase any aircraft that you intend to use to bomb. You can rebase your CAP and escort fighters, however. Don't worry that several of your airbases are overstacked. It will not affect your first-turn orders. You will need to shuffle them around on the second turn, however, if you want to get your planes off the ground and on target.

[PaxMondo]

As for the 'dead' engines pool, like Lowpe states, sometimes I build them and sometimes not. The first 3 months of a new game I am always supply constrained, the IJ starts out poorly prepared for the war it kicks off. So many factories need expansion to support the war, and you want to get that expansion in place ASAP to get the most return on your investment. The catch is that you only have about 1M in supply to do so and you only generate 20K supply/day. 1M sounds like a lot until you realize that is only 1000 factories which translates into only about 400 AC worth (1.3 eng/ac at best) of expansion including RnD forgetting any other expansion like ARM or HI that you might want to do. And of the 20K/day, you can't commit more than 5 of that to factories, you need 5 for bases and 10 for offensive ops. so in the first 100 days, you get another 500K of supply to use in factory expansion. That's it in round numbers. See how easy it is to overspend? So many players do, they wake up 15Jan42 and no factories are expanding because Tokyo supply is below 100K and they need to halt all factory expansion for a couple of weeks and then slowly resume.

Now back to the old engines, in most cases the ac factories in production are NOT my preferred model using that engine. So then I have to think is it worth the 30K supply to build the preferred (better) model, or use that supply to build say HI? Not an easy choice and usually not a clear result. So, I build some of the old engines, but not all ...

[Xargun]

Changing an Aircraft Factory from one model to the upgrade does not cause it to become damaged correct ? So upgrading a Ki-44-IIa Tojo factory to build Ki-44-IIb Tojo will not cause factories to become damaged.

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: Xargun

Changing an Aircraft Factory from one model to the upgrade does not cause it to become damaged correct ? So upgrading a Ki-44-IIa Tojo factory to build Ki-44-IIb Tojo will not cause factories to become damaged.

Correct. I always save the game prior to making any changes as it is easy to mess up.

When are you going to actually start?

[Xargun]

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

Correct. I always save the game prior to making any changes as it is easy to mess up.

When are you going to actually start?

Hoping to finish up the turn this evening and send it over to Mr Kane.
I've been working on economy stuff while at work where I can't actually work on the first turn. I started the turn last night and its slow going - have to use -dd_sw switch as Mr Kane uses it and he says if I don't it will cause
replay sync bug and the switch makes my game run real slow.. So I click a button and wait... click and wait..

Tonight I have no other plans, so I should be able to pound out the turn.

[Lowpe]

That is no fun! Not sure that is absolutely correct, but what do I know?

[Xargun]

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

That is no fun! Not sure that is absolutely correct, but what do I know?

That and I believe as long as I get my turn done before the Gorn I'm ahead of schedule...

Crap - the Gorn has his turn.... I need to speed up.

[Aurorus]

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

The catch is that you only have about 1M in supply to do so and you only generate 20K supply/day. 1M sounds like a lot until you realize that is only 1000 factories which translates into only about 400 AC worth (1.3 eng/ac at best) of expansion including RnD forgetting any other expansion like ARM or HI that you might want to do. And of the 20K/day, you can't commit more than 5 of that to factories, you need 5 for bases and 10 for offensive ops. so in the first 100 days, you get another 500K of supply to use in factory expansion. That's it in round numbers. See how easy it is to overspend? So many players do, they wake up 15Jan42 and no factories are expanding because Tokyo supply is below 100K and they need to halt all factory expansion for a couple of weeks and then slowly resume.

Pax makes a very good point about overexpanding production. Many first-time Japanese players report that they err in overexpanding production. I had to play against the AI about 4 times before I really got the gist of the economy. To what Pax says, I would add that it is always helpful, especially since you will be going at Japan for the first time against a tough player, to maintain a "strategic reserve" of supply... maybe 200K... or a little less.

[BillBrown]

ORIGINAL: Xargun

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

That is no fun! Not sure that is absolutely correct, but what do I know?

That and I believe as long as I get my turn done before the Gorn I'm ahead of schedule...

Crap - the Gorn has his turn.... I need to speed up.

Don't worry, it looks like they messed up versions and such. The Gorn will probably have to redo his turn. [:D]

[Lecivius]

ORIGINAL: BillBrown

Don't worry, it looks like they messed up versions and such. The Gorn will probably have to redo his turn. [:D]

This should give you, at a guess, another month

[Xargun]

Well Mr Kane is unavailable this weekend to do turns, so that gives me 3 more days to finish up and get it to him before I go to bed Sunday evening. Should be plenty of time. I have finished up deciding on my aircraft and rough plan for Aircraft R&D factories. Currently I have 71 of my 79 AC R&D factories allocated.. so I have 8 more to 'spend' so to speak.

Now I am looking at Engines and whether I need to R&D them as well.. I see a couple I will probably push. I have a total of 25 Engine Factories to play with. A bunch will probably not change but I have multiple engines I will not be using at all so I will need to reallocate those factories.

I also need to plan my initial aircraft build - and have 23 factories for that. I have initially 14 aircraft types to build, so that leaves 9 'extra' factories. They will probably go to fighters, but I need to see what I start with compared to what I want.

I think I am going to hammer Manila Port with every Netty I have in range, along with the mini KB (enchanced with Kaga which Mr Kane let me use the editor to move). Should give me a great chance to sink or damage the majority of shipping in Manila harbor. Most of the Netty attacks against the various airfields in Luzon are worthless anyways. Then the mini KB will move around the DEI and try to sink as many fleeing ships as possible.

My 5 CVs will hit Pearl and depending on their success they may leave on day two or stick around another day.

I am toying with the idea of only committing a single division (plus a few bits) to Luzon and sending the additional troops to Malaya to take Singapore faster. I cannot take Palembang until Singapore is neutralized so the faster it falls, the faster I get the oil from Palembang.

A lot of my initial bases I want I am waiting on until turn 2 so I can see where Mr Kane is positioning his ships - he is allowed to move any already formed TFs on turn one. So he could be sitting at Ambon or another critical base waiting for my thinly escorted amphibs.. Also I'm sure Force Z will flee into the DEI so I need to keep an eye out for them.

[Encircled]

Just want to back up Witps here on the hit on PH.

If you don't hit the Catalinas on Turn 1, then the allies have a lot of search aircraft from day one.

As a former JFB turned into an AFB for my current game, this is an absolute godsend

[Aurorus]

ORIGINAL: Xargun

Well Mr Kane is unavailable this weekend to do turns, so that gives me 3 more days to finish up and get it to him before I go to bed Sunday evening. Should be plenty of time. I have finished up deciding on my aircraft and rough plan for Aircraft R&D factories. Currently I have 71 of my 79 AC R&D factories allocated.. so I have 8 more to 'spend' so to speak.

Now I am looking at Engines and whether I need to R&D them as well.. I see a couple I will probably push. I have a total of 25 Engine Factories to play with. A bunch will probably not change but I have multiple engines I will not be using at all so I will need to reallocate those factories.

I also need to plan my initial aircraft build - and have 23 factories for that. I have initially 14 aircraft types to build, so that leaves 9 'extra' factories. They will probably go to fighters, but I need to see what I start with compared to what I want.

I wouldn't use all of your R&D "factories" for actual R&D. Shut production at most of them off. You can just use 15 or so and expand them to 30 points each... or 60 points if you are so inclined. 30 is optimum number as you gain a bonus for a "full" factory of 30. As Pax stated, be careful not to overexpand. He recommends 400 points total for R&D, which is a little less than what I allocate... that is only 12 factories of 30 and 1 of 60 (and you already have a Frank factory for 55). Remember that any base must have 10,000 supply to expand any industry, including R&D, so set the base supply level to about 4K or 5K for each base where you intend to expand industry. The base will then draw in 3x the level you set and have enough to expand.

I think I am going to hammer Manila Port with every Netty I have in range, along with the mini KB (enchanced with Kaga which Mr Kane let me use the editor to move). Should give me a great chance to sink or damage the majority of shipping in Manila harbor. Most of the Netty attacks against the various airfields in Luzon are worthless anyways. Then the mini KB will move around the DEI and try to sink as many fleeing ships as possible.

My 5 CVs will hit Pearl and depending on their success they may leave on day two or stick around another day.

Sounds like a solid plan. See Lowpe's recommendations for a day 2 strike, if you decide to stay.

I am toying with the idea of only committing a single division (plus a few bits) to Luzon and sending the additional troops to Malaya to take Singapore faster. I cannot take Palembang until Singapore is neutralized so the faster it falls, the faster I get the oil from Palembang.

You can get to Palembang very quickly without neutralizing Singapore, if you go via Sinkawang, which is what many JFBs do. He may be on guard for this, however. Without fortress Palembang, the only thing you have to fear is him moving a pile of engineers there, which he will probably do if you let him. These can be disrupted later with a sustained and heavy air campaign. I believe that disabled engineers will not destroy the industry. If many are disabled. Maybe someone who knows the mechanics of hte game better than I can clarify. Whatever the case, if the engineers are disabled, many will be destroyed in the battle and will not participate in the destruction of the industry.

A lot of my initial bases I want I am waiting on until turn 2 so I can see where Mr Kane is positioning his ships - he is allowed to move any already formed TFs on turn one. So he could be sitting at Ambon or another critical base waiting for my thinly escorted amphibs.. Also I'm sure Force Z will flee into the DEI so I need to keep an eye out for them.

Are you going to land at Mersing?

[Xargun]

I am not hitting Mersing on day one. With the ability of Mr Kane to send Force Z anywhere I need know where Force Z and a few other DEI warships are before I send off any large under protected forces. I could use the 2 BB screening TF in the area to support the Mersing landing, but not sure that force is big enough to take on Force Z.

[Aurorus]

ORIGINAL: Xargun

I am not hitting Mersing on day one. With the ability of Mr Kane to send Force Z anywhere I need know where Force Z and a few other DEI warships are before I send off any large under protected forces. I could use the 2 BB screening TF in the area to support the Mersing landing, but not sure that force is big enough to take on Force Z.

It is a pretty even battle, which is not exactly what you are looking for at this stage in the war. If the engagement is at night, however, you will probably win handily... but... you never know. The problem is that your BB group has a poor commander and TF Z has a good commander to start. I believe that you can rectify that situation, however. Give 'em Tanaka and TFZ is toast.

[Xargun]

OK here is my aircraft plans.. Please pick apart if you see something I'm missing...

IJA:

[Fighters]
Ki-43-Ic Oscar until Ki-44-IIc Tojo
Ki-44-IIc Tojo until Ki-100-I Tony
Ki-84r Frank
Ki-63 (if game lasts)

[Night Fighters]
Ki-45 KAId Nick
Ki-102c Randy

[Fighter Bombers]
Ki-45 KAIb Nick

[Level Bomber]
Ki-32 Mary [Build just enough to keep units full until they upgrade] [Uses an engine nothing else uses so I will not be building any more engines - starting pool = 85]
Ki-21-IIa Sally until Ki-49-IIb Helen
Ki-67-Ia (T) Peggy [Land based Torpedo bombers should make good kamikaze and attack planes]
Ki-115b Tsurugi [If game lasts long enough]

[Recon]
Ki-46-II Dinah until Ki-46-III Dinah

[Transport]
MC-Sally until Ki-49-II KAI Helen


IJN:

[CV Fighters]
A6M2 Zero until A6M5c Zero
A6M5c Zero until A7M2 Sam

[Land Base Fighters]
J2M3 Jack until Ki-N1K2-J George
N1K5-J George [Bomber defence]
J7W1 Shinden [If game lasts]

[Night Fighter]
J1N1-S Irving until P1Y2-S Frances
S1A1 Denko [If game lasts]

[DB]
D3A1 Val until D4Y3 Judy
D4Y3 Judy until D4Y4 Judy

[TB]
B5N2 Kate until B6N2a Jill [Maybe B6N2 Jill depending on need at the time]

[Level Bomber]
G3M2 Nell until G3M3 Nell
G1M4 Betty until P1Y2 Frances

[Recon]
C5M2 Babes until C6N1 Myrt
C6N1 Myrt until C6N2 Myrt

[Patrol]
H6K4 Mavis until H8K2 Emily

[Transport]
L3Y2 Tina until L2D2 Tabby
H6K4-L Mavis
H8K2-L Emily

[Float]
E13A 1a Jake until E13A 1b Jake

Please let me know what you guys think.

[Aurorus]

How many factories are you devoting to each one? As Pax noted, you can task factories to build the number of a plane that you think you will want. This isn't quite the same as this focused R&D.

For example, in a PDU:On game, I would probably do something like this, but I have not given it a great deal of thought since I haven't played PDU:on in ages and never in a PBEM.

Frank: 1: X 60, 3 X 30
Tojo IIa: 2 X 60
Oscar IC: 2 X 60
George: 2 X 30
A6M2: 2 x 60 (the problem with heavy, early war A6M2 production is that it never really upgrades for free)
Judy: 3 X 30
KI-61 Tony: 2 x 30
A6M2 Rufe: 4 x 30, 2 x 60
Nightfighter of choice: 4 x 30 (depends on a variety of factors)

I'm overlooking a few things here, but this is the gist. Really the only "focused research" is on Franks, Judies, a nightfighter, and A6Ms. I would decide later in early or mid 42 if I wanted to turn on the R&D production for the 1943 fighters and accelerate them by a couple months... depending on how the war is going. Keep in ming that if you accelerate your CVLs, you will receive some of them before you get Judies and Jills and can properly outfit their air squadrons. So if you accelerate your CVLs, you will want a little Judy and Jill research.

The choice of the A6M line and nightfighters really is where Lowpe and Pax disagree with me. They would have you focus on another latewar model fighter, other than the Frank. It really depends on what your overall objective is. If you are content to play to the endwar and try to hold the line late, then Lowpe and Pax are probably correct. If you are going for a Automatic victory in 43 or 44, you want to accelerate the A6M line to keep your carriers competitive through 43.

[Aurorus]

One note about nightfighters... the Nick nightfighter is very slow. While it is your first nightfighter, it is not a great fighter, in general. If you are hoping to use it to intercept bombers, you will be dissapointed since it "fails to catch" most allied bombers. I would recommend a later war model as your nightfighter if you go this route. It plays into the whole Automatic Victory strategy of research I have outlined. If all else fails, at least I have good nightfighter for 44.

I don't know what changes exactly your mod makes to the aircraft, but the Dinah Nightfighter is pretty good in stock. In stock, the Dinah is fast with a nice ceiling and has 2 accurate cannons. It also uses a Mit 33 engine, which you can build to 500 right off. It comes online in late 44, so you can get it to late 43 if you focus. In my current game, I have 4 30 factories working on it. The Myrt is also surprisingly good. Of course, any nightfighter research is fighter research that cannot be used for other purposes, such as the A7M2 that Lowpe and Pax advocate. The whole idea is to cede the daytime late war, except for key objectives, and be offensive with my airpower at night.

[PaxMondo]

ORIGINAL: Xargun

OK here is my aircraft plans.. Please pick apart if you see something I'm missing...

Standard build plan. Nothing to comment on. What is your R&D plan?

Fighters break down into offensive v defensive based upon RANGE. For both IJA/IJN you should be identifying each one, so at any given point in time you have 4 fighter models. Now, you should research based upon priorities to support your overall strategic plan.

Ex: "my overall plan is to have the initiative until 4/44. During this time, I will be pushing the allies into fights of my choosing in order to destroy their units and take as much supply/oil/fuel as I can. After 4/44, I will switch to an elastic defense focused on preservation of my units and strengthening of my MLR's by controlled contraction of my forward lines. Spoiler bases will be established at Singers, Truk, Soerbaya, and HK."


Now, given the above, an RnD scheme for IJN fighters to support the above might be (I'm using Scen 1 data here as I don't have your mod loaded):

Best offensive IJN fighter models:
A6M3a (range=12/15)
N1K1-J (9/12)

Best Defensive Models:
A6M8 (350/2880)
A7M2 (392/3220)
J2M5 (382/3110)
J7W1 (466/2250)

After careful study of dates of arrival, armament, and how many R&D factories I want to commit to IJN vs IJA, I decide the following (PDU ON, REALISTIC RND OFF) (This isn't exactly how I would build these out, but this is how I would allocate factories):
6 A6M2
6x30 A6M3a
9*30 N1K1-J
6*30 A7M2 (this goes to 12*30 once the A6M2 is done building)

I'm committing a total of 27 factories to IJN fighters initially. with this build, I expect to have the following arrival dates:
A6M3a ~9/42
N1K1-J ~4/43
A7M2 ~6/44 (wide range here to due to probabilities, could be as late as 9/44 or as early as 3/44)
These aren't the only IJN fighters i would build, for example note that my preferred defensive fighter isn't ready when I switch initiative. Obviously , I will be already building defensive fighters for CAP. I might be using Tojo as my CAP fighter until SAM OR I might choose to build Jack as my CAP fighter. CAP doesn't have to match against a bomber, so I don't need both an IJN and IJA CAP until I switch initiative. So, up until 4/44 in my plan above, I could get by with only ONE CAP model between IJN and IJA ... not surprisingly I generally use an IJN model because the best bombers are IJA (Helen is 25% better than Nettie on bomb load and armored).

All things to think through ... now do the same with IJA and then merge the two and you have a final R&D plan.

All the games I have started through the years, I have never had the same build plan. Similarities? Sure. But there are so many choices and trade-offs. And it isn't that there is a wrong or right, but rather that you have a plan and use it to maximize your economy. Historically, the IJ did a piss poor job of that ... they built almost willy-nilly ... not very efficient ...

[Lowpe]

Very interesting Pax. I like the Sam focus, and I think that is a must.

10 factories on the Frank A. Sam and Frank...its a Japanese mantra.


Plus George (I would do 6 for George, and 3 for Jack). I would want the J2M5 in 44 for antibomber defense.

Those fighter builds will serve you very well till mid 44.

Interestingly enough you can get the Frank B in late 44 with 3 size 30 from day 1. A thought.

Night fighters are tricky, very tricky. It comes down to a numbers game, and you want to maximize your numbers and get the approximately 21 sentais eligible to become NF. you need the Nick to unlock the NF upgrade tree. Same with Dinah, which is a god awful horrible NF that dies in droves. I also think that is true for one Peggy squadron...your mod/scenario maybe different.

Nick and Irving are slower, but they work. Irving SA has radar around 6/44. Judy and Zero NF die in droves too.

Frances is the best NF with radar you are likely to get. Randy comes so late, and the radar activates late it is a worthless plane to try for.

Much better off with hordes of Nicks, Peggies and Irving-Sa and Frances. Myrt is really an underappreciated, but effective NF...doesn't look like it would be, but it is. It comes very late too.

Denko is junk. Too late. Too high an SR.