Beer gives you the wobblies

[herbieh]

Mixed reports from the front.
Small surface action North of espirito sees 2CA, 1cl and 4dd of mine mid ocean intercept 2 of his DDs, sinking them.They are quickly followed to the bottom by 2 AOs
Lunganville airfield is heavily bombarded

Wunpunko is captured!
Now to fly in some CAP, reload the troops and get them to Lunganville

At PM, things are in the balance, he has now 3 battalions there.
My forces are racing to the scene

[herbieh]

5/7/42We have insufficient troops to take Lunganville, which still has teeth, a CA creeps home crippled.

Very worrying, his CVs are somewhere south of PM, CV KAGA, 2 cvl, race to the scene, Ive put them on max strike, minimum CAP, I want to inflict max damage, even if it costs me
Losses at Lunganville ect are acceptable, some APs hit, some other damage , but nothing crippling.

PM is a worry:rolleyes:

[herbieh]

massive forces appear headed towards PM.
My LBA has hurt him, badly, but I dont think wobbly is going to stop now
His CVs strike, AAAAAARRRRRRGH!!!!
At least 4 DDs of mine are finished for, CL Jintsu is gone, and BB haruna has at least 20 system damage/.
Im in shock!!
Tomorrow Im banking a lot on KAGA denting him.

Man is this a good way to spend a day!

[herbieh]

Well, today I tell the emperor, we have captured Espirito, soon we have enough troops to take lunganville. All is well at PM, he will soon be ejected.

The truth is Wobbly may have pulled a great move in this PM dash, he now has 4 battalion there, I have about 1 and a half.
I think Im doomed there.
Worse, Kaga group launched, total surprise achieved......and failed to find target.

result, he remains unscratched, I will be lucky indeed if I see those 3 carriers again, Kaga if Im lucky, the other 2 are scrap.

on the positive my LBA again smashes 5 APs, but many more are on the way.

I grit my teeth, OK, Lunganville 1st, then we deal with PM.
Oh for more fuel

I have spotted another very big convoy between Brisbane and Noumea, its in range of some of my CVs, maybe I can kill some troops afloat.
Surely he is running out of battalions, if I hold my nerve, a landing at Rockhampton is still on the cards.
Waiting for a turn is so hard.........

[herbieh]

wobbly runs a large fast transport into PM, 2CAs,6dd,2dms, a apd
It has 4 seperate surface battles, 1st against some unscathed cls and dds.
We come out even, lots of damaged ships.
Then BB haruna gets into the act, more damage
Then another small dd force, some sinkings
then finally all my cripples reformed asa tf in PM
I dont think many troops made it

But...... all those damaged ships of mine, heaps of them, and 3 or 4 CVs in range.
I still cant believe the carnage
At best today will see a total of 1cv, 2cvl, a ca, 3cl, at least 10!!!!! dds go to the bottom.
Very depressed.
Only good thing is he still has less troops than me at PM, and all his efforts to retake espirito, and kick me off lunganville failed.
I still think I can take them.
Then its pull out quick ( leaving a surprise or two), and deal with PM, or other things.
MY remaining CVs are in 2 groups, one hunting way south, the other empty of fuel.
A large stream of cripples heads to truck.
OH well
:rolleyes:

[herbieh]

nearly a dozen cripples head towards rabual and home, for reasons only known to himself, wobbly doesnt launch, could it be My Cvs hitting his convoy of rockhampton?
I hope so.
damage done, and Im running for my life
Port Vila is cleared of the enemy, his attacks have failed at PM, lunganville.
The plan is to fast transport troops into Lunganville, Im still confident of capturing the place, and then rapid evac of all troops, , with any luck a month will go by as wobbly gets organised to retake those islands
As for PM, Im going to get concentrated, then blockade the place with my CVs.
A grab at Rockhamton is still on, 1 reg is loaded, waiting for the other 2 to arrive.
The big temptation is to use them at PM, Im going to ignore it, even if it falls, I still think I can isolate it , and starve the place out.

Its a fascinating situation, and show how unpredictable this game can get.
The plan for the next 2 days is to gather 4 big cvs together somewhere north of the island of noumea, hopefully avoiding a cv engagement, then to seek one near PM, at the same time "tidy up "operation fork:D

[herbieh]

operation fork continues, extra troops about to fast transport in, they should do the trick.. Several dds sank last night, more cripples to follow. on the positive, another enemy ca sinks. As his surface forces must be very thin, operation spoon, a big surface force bombardment , (covered by CVs) will hit Noumea some time next week ( oh for more fuel!!!).Thunderstorms kept everything else quiet.

His cvs are in Cairns, giving mine a chance to retire to shortlands, I hope!
More CVs on the way.

[herbieh]

OK, how do you judge the time to attack?, at lunganville his bombardments are getting weaker, I seem to have heaps more assualt points, but actual numbers are very close to 2 to 1
Ive ordered a deliberate attack tomorrow, another half reg unloads there tomorrow as well

Wobbly is gathering DDs at noumea, a fast transport run for sure, hope he tries, lots and lots of BBs in harbour hopefully tomorrow.

My CVs crawl home, fuel is a real problem
Wunpunko is emptying fast, as is port vila, 1cv,1cvl are luking in ambush position

Lots of planes to top up the cvs, if I get them home.
At PM he has stalled, Im going to starve him out:D

[herbieh]

Well , the attack last night didnt go that well at lunganville, the last available troops go in tonight, it might be enough, it might not be.. If the attack fails, Ill start evacuating.

Overall Im not too dissapointed, I must have wobbly sending troops everywhere, he should be stretched badly.
My Cvs are tired, so its to shortlands for them.
Nothing much else to report, mines hit 2 dds of mine at lunga.

base building tro the rear is going well, a decent defence in depth will be in place if the auto victory plan fails.

[herbieh]

The 1st stage of operation cultery is finished, operation fork is completed. Although lunganville isnt captured , quite a few troops have been sucked in. Im pulling out, leaving behind garrison troops. I hope that when wobbly goes to take wunpunko and port vila back a few more battalions will leave noumea.

Operation spoon should see a bit more chaos, somewhere on that nice big island.

PM is stalemate, Im sure wobbly will try to take it , I see a few APs gathering, not much I can do at the moment, to react is giving him the initive (how do you spell that), and at this date,13/7/42, its far too early for japan to be giving that up

[herbieh]

everything heading north, pulling out. Im actually sending all A/.C ashore from the carriers, will restock them with fullest and best groups available for the next stage.
A few quiet days coming up I hope, as we recover from the last few days inrensive ops.

[herbieh]

wobbly appears to have evacuated PM?
I think his troops are in the herx next door.
Very perplexing


Well Im in a fix, operation cutlery is cancelled. In another game it worked perfectly, his CVs lured into the fray and sunk, with a bucket load of ships to boot.
Wobbly has simply avoided the trap, negating the whole plan.
Too much fuel, and wear and tear on my ships also.

Im going to continue to consolidate.
The question is, if I sent home to tokyo at least 4 carriers now (16/7/42), will that allow a few BBs to be released.
The A?C will stay at home, I think a few BBs would be more helpful for bombardment runs.
Anyway, nothing is going right, Im doing the old, pull everything back and start again routine

[Philwd]

Hi Herbieh,
I found out the hard way commit level for the IJN drops in early July. If you send those CVs back there is a good chance you will never see them again. Just read Luskan's AAR.

Quark

[herbieh]

Thanks quark.
Well wobbly doesnt appear to do much inthe way of recon. So , with a reg, coming down from marilum, him firmly hunkering down at Lea,lea, im going to pull aswifty, Im sending all my disrupted troops over to buna for evac, while a new reg marches across to PM.

Hope he doesnt notice!

Lots of evac happening lunganville, and thats it for today!

[herbieh]

As 35th brigade begins to arrive, debate again breaks out at Imperial HQ, what next
The situation is in balance, wobbly is consolidating at lea lea, has he spotted the troops that are slowly coming down from marilin?
They are making very slow progress, but are in great shape still
Troops at PM are basically stuffed, they must be relieved, so, Im heading over the hills to BUNA, whils a new regiment goes the other way.
Hopefully all wobbly will see is the kokoda track full of reinforcements, for PM, recon doesnt say which way they are going.
Im going to start bombing Lea lea with everything Ive got, it should help experience levels at l;east

At lunganville ive still got a lot of troops , evac continues, how long before he realises that wunpunko and espirito are empty:D

A evil plan is forming in my mind, he will take them back with ,what, half a regiment?. How peeved would he be if I took them again?:D

navy wise, still aformidable fleet, CAs are low in number though, and DD losses are tragic. 3 good BBs, a sick BB, and a very sick BB still on hand. 5 CVs, but 2 are very tired, and 1 cvl

A lot still depends on what I percieve wobbly is up to, I will leave decisions for a few days, man, I cant wait to read what wobbly was thinking at this stage






:p :p

[Luskan]

From one IJN player to another - keep your transports out of range of anything he can launch, anywhere. One mistake can cost you half a dozen transports, and that is enough to make supplying yourself impossible as the IJN (depending on how many transports you got sent to start of with).

How are you holding up transport wise? In some IJN agmes you get so many transports that you can easily mass 200 000 supply points at PM, Lunga, Rabaul, GG, Russell, Gasmata! In others you struggle to make ends meet.

You realise of course that to loose to a Kiwi puts you at the absolute lowest of the all important pecking order around here don't you???

No pressure

I've got two Kiwi scalps (And Crocky is going to be my third if all goes as planned) <evil cackle>!

Time for a sunk ship list/some point tallys. Is a confusing picture of a campaign when you don't have the map to gawk at.

[herbieh]

Lots of pooeee weather, under which the evac of lunganville continues. Nothing else happening, hope it stays that way for a while

Sitrep.
I hold all of New guinea except lea lea, where wobbly has at least 3 full regiments, although I think they must be disrupted badly.
I hold lunganville, (all the dots on guadacanal are manned), Irau has about 1000 troops, as does Rennel island

Wunpunko flies the imperial flag, as does espirito, although only very small forces are there.
Lunganville has about 9000 troops, same as wobbly, they are being evacuated
Im returning 38th,2nd division to truck.
I have only 3 bomber squadrons, 2 zero squadrons in theatre.
Scores
Japan 7031
Allies 4206

men lost points
Japan 61
allies 377

A/C loss points
japan 278
allies 398

Ships sunk Allies japan
CV 1
cvl 2
AV 1
CA 4
CL 2 2
DD 16 22
MSW 3 5
SS 4 2
AP/AO 12 39!!!!

I think this is going to be whos nerve will break 1st
And yes Luskan, if a Kiwi beats me, I will be publically humiliated!

[AmiralLaurent]

Your sunk ship list is lacking 0 to show wich side doesn't lost CV, CVL, AV and CA.

I understand that you lost 2 CL, 22 DD, 5 MSW, 2 SS and 39 transports. Last number would be interesting to divide between AP/AK and TK/AO (last ones being very important for IJN).

I will ask wobbly the score and sunk list, should be interesting (for us watchers) to see the differences...

[herbieh]

computer skills are shite - (Ican spell, just watch me type)

Japan has lost 1CV,2CVL, no CA, 2CL, 22DD, and the Marus include 4 tankers

Stacks of Transports in theatre, the biggest thing I am noticing with scene 17 ( this one ) against 19 is the rate that Japan doesnt get A/C reinforcements, only for the fact Kaga's airgroup got ashore Id be berift of planes.

Anyway, some one do us a hint and tell wobbly my current strength is 22 BB, 18CV and nothing sunk yet, as the cheeky buggar via E mail tried to tell me that he had 4 BB arriving soon, LOL!!!!

[herbieh]

please, please,please, more storms, Ive got one last evac fast transport headed to lunganville, and CVs have been spotted to the south of lunganville.

I am worried that hes going to have a stab at lunga, lots of shipping there, I just cross my fingers and hope.

Little else to report, sub i-31 scores another kill, LBA still wont fly, wobbly I hope has a totally wrong picture of what is going on!!