Bombardment question.

[daddog]

I had a fleet of ships BB’s, CA’s, DD’s set to bombard an enemy field. They were within 10 hexes of the field and were set to retirement allowed, but they only traveled three hexes for some reason and not really toward the target base. There is an enemy CV in the area, which was spotted. Is that the reason they would not go bombard the field?

I am wondering if I leave them at “retirement allowed” might they do the same thing and just circle out in the open sea?

Should I set them to “patrol do not retire” and force them to bombard the field? Finally if I do that will they then sit at the enemy port after their bombardment to be pummeled by enemy dive bombers or will they after their bombardment change to “retirement allowed” and return for home base?

As always, thanks for your time!
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CO daddog
332nd Flying Mongrels
Roster
Noses in the wind since 1997.

To be ignorant of one’s own ignorance is the malady of the ignorant. – Alcott

[BillBrown]

Yes, bombardment TFs will avoid CV TFs.

It may just roam around, depends on what your opponent does and what the AI thinks of.

If you set it to "Patrol/Do Not Retire", then it will go to the target hex and stay there.

[daddog]

Rgr... was afraid of that.

Thanks for the info!

[Bobthehatchit]

If you set it to "Patrol/Do Not Retire", then it will go to the target hex and stay there.

This is not a good thing if your are within lba range or if theres a carrier hanging around.....

[Curval]

Hey daddog,

(happy belated birthday dude.. )

I have another bombardment question:

Playing against Swoop..I am Japanese.

I attempted to re-supply Lae. I formed a bunch of barges with some transports that had supplies just as I came into range of Lae, basically in order to try and distract his land based bombers. This turned out to be a waste of effort as his planes ignored the barges and slammed my transports.

Anyhooo...I left the barges just sitting in Lae, again as more of a distraction than anything else.

So, Swoop gets annoyed at having to view "TF spotted" messages over and over again and sent a sub and a small TF that had a Cruiser and a couple of destroyers to clean out Lae of my barges. They did so effectively...which was fine with me...but then his TF attempted to bombard my base.

To my surprise the shore batteries at Lae opened up on his TF and got a number of hits on them. The bombardment did not happen.

How does that work?

[daddog]

LOL how did you know it was my BD?

So, Swoop gets annoyed at having to view "TF spotted" messages over and over again and sent a sub and a small TF that had a Cruiser and a couple of destroyers to clean out Lae of my barges. They did so effectively...which was fine with me...but then his TF attempted to bombard my base.

Look at any Task Force that is a "Surface Combat" Task Force. In the upper right of the screen of that TF you can change its mission to "Bombardment". Then give it a destination. If you have a few BB's and CA's they can REALLY hammer a field.

It is important to remember that if you set the Bombardment Task group to "Retirement Allowed" they will Bombard at night (or try to) and then move away quickly in the hope of being out of bomber range. If you set it to "Patrol do not Retire" they will stay at the hex you wanted them to bombard. That would be ugly for your task group if that base had some dive bombers.

[Curval]

Hey man,

I know all about how bombardments and how they work...just ask Swoop.

What I have never seen though was the bombardment "not" happening and the shore batteries at Lae opening up on the ships...and a sub. The screen came up showing the attempted bombardment, but his ships never fired..they instead were fired upon.

I "think" what happened was that Swoop had his force set to Surface Combat right up until the ships finnished off my barges. Then I think he switched the ships to bombardment as an "after-thought". This gave the batteries time to really hone in on the enemy ships.

I think.

[daddog]

That is cool! Never seen that happen yet.