Miller (J) vs Mr Kane (A)

[Miller]

16th-31st Jan 45

Well considering the date this wasn't a bad period.

Firstly, Malaya. I've all but abandoned the bases north of the red line and currently have the bulk of my troops at Singora. I intend to defend there and the hex to the west (red line). To be honest I think he has lost interest here as his stack of 5k AV (green) has been moving at snails pace and he knows he would have to invest a lot more troops in this area to make a breakthrough. Further south Palambang continues to churn out the fuel without any interference from his B29s.

[Miller]

China





The orange area is still pretty much stalemate, he manouvers units to try and cut off retreat paths and I react accordingly. Those big Chinese units are good defensively but pretty poor in attack unless they have back up from US/Commonwealth troops, most of whom are currently at Canton (black). I had hopes that my 2k AV there would be able to hold out for a month or two against his 7k of mainly Aussie units and British armour but his massed 2E air attacks have battered their morale and he has the forts down to 3. With my troops having no escape route I'm going to try a massed fast transport and air evacuation to Formosa within a week. As Hong Kong is also his I doubt I can offer any air support so will have to hope he keeps his a/c off naval attack or it could get nasty....

The yellow circle shows a stack of 7k AV Chinese troops that he has moved away from the base to the east after failing to make a breakthrough. I'm guessing he will be moving them to north eastern China or Changteh to try and break the stalemate there. Sinyang (green) is his main B29 base. I tried a massed 2E strike on the airfield from Hankow but the weather grounded my bombers but sweeps from elsewhere tipped him off to my plan and I had no choice but to pull the bombers back the next day.

[Miller]

SOPAC





Pretty quiet at the moment. He has all the bases in the green circle well built up but apart from the odd sweep and bombing raid nothing is happening. I have a division on Jolo and enough on Mindanao to prevent an easy capture. I'm abandoning Ambon to the south as it has a division sitting on it that will be better employed elsewhere. I have lots of fighters on the northern coast bases of Borneo protecting my tanker convoys as they pass through, but to be honest if he was to pay a visit with most of his fleet I doubt they could do anything to prevent him creating mayhem....

[Miller]

CENPAC





As you can see after the drawn CV battle and my subsequent withdrawl back to the home island he has taken two of the three main Mariana bases. He was bombarding Saipan with multiple BB TFs to no effect and I managed to put a torp into two old BBs whilst his CAP over Guam was only 50-60 fighters, also sinking 4 or 5 medium sized TKs and a cost of about 100 a/c. However he now has 500[X(] fighters there so there will be no further airstrikes on his fleet from Saipan. No sign of his CVs for almost a week now, I think they are replenishing the air losses from the CV battle and will be back within a week to cover his next objective.

A bit of good news, by some miracle I manage to sneak the Hiryu north from Ulithi without her being spotted and she avoids detection long enough to meet up with a DD escort force which I sent south to meet her. She is then missed by some B24s on naval attack and finally makes it back to Kobe just before the end of the month. She's pretty much out of the game due to damage but at least she's still afloat...

[Miller]

Industry





Supply and fuel falling but very slowly, maybe 10k a day on average. HI remains static apart from the beginning of the month pilot tax loss. A large TK convoy carrying 170k fuel has just left Singapore, not sure how much longer he will allow me to continue this however...

[Miller]

Score





He now has a 10k lead. Night strat bombing has yielded him about 500 points in the last fortnight.

[Miller]

1st-20th Feb 45

Only China sees any real developments in this period. I manage to get the bulk of 4 Divs trapped at Canton out by fast transport and air transport to Formosa, thankfully they are not attacked by air in the process, and Canton falls. His 7k AV stack there is now headed for Kukong to the east. I still have 4 or 5 Divs en route there from the NE Canton region myself, I'm hoping to eventually get them to the Changsha area and make a stand there.

One other main development, after several abortive attempts I finally get a massed 2E strike on his B29 fleet sitting an Sinyang. I manage to get enough of them through his CAP to torch about 100 on the ground, but the cost is brutal, 450 a/c as you can see in the screenshot below. Some bozo forgot to order fighter sweeps the same turn to try and fatigue his CAP before the bombers went in[:(].






Elsewhere it looks like the bulk of his fleet is about to make a move on Saipan, I'm evacuating units from there by air whilst I still can, supply is in the red so it will fall within a day or two of him landing. The Sam fighter should start production a few days before the end of the month which will be a nice boost to my home defence naval fighter sqds.

The game has now been on hold a week as Tom is having medical issues so it could be a while before he picks it up again, obviously his health comes first and we all wish him a speedy recovery.

[mind_messing]

Good work getting those troops at Canton out. Where are you sending them next? I'd say Luzon would be worthwhile.

With a 7k Allied tank stack at Canton and a lot of IJA troops in the Changsha pocket, I think it's time to bug out of there. I'd move south-east and dig into the 2x terrain to the west of Shanghai and Hangchow.

A few minor tactical points:

- What CL, DD, E class ships have you left? They can sail on the Yangtze, so they can bombard at will. If you base them at Nanking or Shanghai you can bombard Chinese troops on a nightly basis and be back under CAP for daylight.
- Try night attacks against the Allied 4E hub with high EXP bomber units. It won't be anywhere near as effective as daylight strikes, but it impacts morale, and the B-29's are a nightmare to repair after being damaged.

[Miller]

ORIGINAL: mind_messing

Good work getting those troops at Canton out. Where are you sending them next? I'd say Luzon would be worthwhile.

With a 7k Allied tank stack at Canton and a lot of IJA troops in the Changsha pocket, I think it's time to bug out of there. I'd move south-east and dig into the 2x terrain to the west of Shanghai and Hangchow.

A few minor tactical points:

- What CL, DD, E class ships have you left? They can sail on the Yangtze, so they can bombard at will. If you base them at Nanking or Shanghai you can bombard Chinese troops on a nightly basis and be back under CAP for daylight.
- Try night attacks against the Allied 4E hub with high EXP bomber units. It won't be anywhere near as effective as daylight strikes, but it impacts morale, and the B-29's are a nightmare to repair after being damaged.

I've sent 3 of them to Shanghai and the other is rebuilding on Formosa. It will be hard to get my troops all the way from the Changsha area to eastern China as he has units scattered all around from Wenchow (which I never bothered to capture) and to the north west of there. It's one giant game of chess at the moment. I'm thinking pull back to Changsha which has 7 forts and when that starts to crumble fall back again to Hankow.

Good idea about the use of E's to disrupt his units in the coastal hexes, I'd never considered that. I have 180 E's in play so I'm sure I could spare a few for that purpose[:)]. Any night bombing I have done so far in the game has been next to useless but I will give it another shot, nothing really to lose in trying.....

[Miller]

Just bumping this in the hope one of Toms other opponents has heard anything from him. Last message I got from him was over Xmas when he said he hoped to pick the game up again by the end of January, heard nothing back since despite sending him a message a week or so ago asking how he was...

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: Miller

Just bumping this in the hope one of Toms other opponents has heard anything from him. Last message I got from him was over Xmas when he said he hoped to pick the game up again by the end of January, heard nothing back since despite sending him a message a week or so ago asking how he was...

Interesting. How many games did he have going?

Hope you get to finish this one. It's been a mighty struggle.

[Lowpe]

Wargamr is playing him, too. Health problems, as I understand it. [:(]

[PaxMondo]

Yes, he has long, ongoing serious health issues.

Hoping he will show back up soon ...

[Mike McCreery]

Around Christmas he mentioned coming back mid January but I have not heard from him since. I do not want to burden him until he is ready.

[Miller]

Good news, Tom is back in the game and we are continuing[:)]

[BBfanboy]

.

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: Miller

Good news, Tom is back in the game and we are continuing[:)]

[&o]

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: Miller
Good news, Tom is back in the game and we are continuing[:)]

Yay! Good to hear.
MrKane is a great player. I always wished he'd write more AARs about his games, but now I understand why he does not.

[Miller]

21st-28th Feb 45

China: I get 6 divs retreating from the Canton area to Kukong, unfortunately his 7k AV stack of mainly Commonwealth troops with armour also gets there and kicks them out and rather than retreat north towards the Changsha area they go west instead. I think it would take a miracle to get them to safety now and they are effectively out of the game. I've decided to pull the troops in the triangle of bases to the west of Changsha back into Changsha itself as they are being pounded by air and are out of supply.


Celebes/PI: He invades Mindanao, landing on Dadjangas at the southern tip. Over a 3 day period my airforce attacks his amphibious forces and sink about 20 AP and APDs, but I pay to the tune of roughly 500 a/c. The base falls on his first attack.


Marianas: His entire CV fleet appears to be sitting at Guam and has made no signs of moving anywhere. He has invaded Saipan and it will fall in the next day or so as I've already airlifted the bulk of the troops there out whilst I still had a chance.

[Miller]

1st-2nd March 45

I've had some crazy schemes end in disaster in my years playing AE (usually fueled by alcohol), but this one probably takes the cake.

Reconing Canton and Hong Kong it was apparent he only had a small single Chinese unit at each base. The plan was to land a div at each using massed FT forces in the hope of getting a quick grab of each and give the 6 divs that were kicked out of Kukong an escape route back to Canton. I managed to land the troops in good order at each base without loss, however the next day was a total disaster.

A bombardment fleet of 5 BBs that targeted Hong Kong the night the troops landed did not retreat, due to some idiot failing to notice he had set them to "do not retire". The next day they are pounded and pounded by hundreds of low level 2E bombers. Despite being only 500lb bombs that do not penetrate, they start fires that build and build into inferno's and all 5 are burnt out and sink. Yamato, Musashi, Fuso, Yamashiro and Hyuga all gone, half of my remaining BB fleet, yielding him almost 1300 VPs in the process. (Edit) Yamato and Hyuga did eat a torp each but it was the 50+ bomb hits on each BB that did them in.



To add insult to injury my troops at Canton and Hong Kong feel the wrath of hundreds of 4E bombers and are completely disrupted resulting in their attempts to capture the bases failing. So as well as the 6 divs effectively trapped in the woods from being kicked out of Kukong I have another two at Canton and Hong kong.....I blame the beer[:(]