Thought the real Japanese were incompetent? warspite1 (J) vs AllenK (A)

[rustysi]

The Port is size 1 (with a Standard Potential size of 1) - so it could increase to a 4

Don't bother trying to increase the size of this port. It'll take too long and you'll be gone by the time its of any use. As said above, find a naval HQ and fly its NS to the hex.

There are 4 patrol aircraft (Mavis) located at the airfield. I will look at aircraft later.

And no AS. Look at the red down the page. These A/C are high SR (service rating = 4) and will 'break down' quickly. Being high SR aircraft their repair will not be that quick. Ground 'em until you get some AS devices to the base. See above as to how to get the devices there quickly.[:D]

[rustysi]

Here she is. She's not sunk but there's a lot of red and orange numbers here. Call me old fashioned, but I don't think that's a good thing.... There is no mention of any troops (it looked like she was carrying supplies?) and some of these were unloaded before the cowardly attack by the British.

Yeah 96 fires, she's toast (pun intended). She's still got 1099 supplies on her. I'd say these are gone. She won't even dock, even if she could, because of the fires. Not a terrible loss.

[rustysi]

1) You currently have sufficient force at Kota Bharu to capture it. The transports there will continue to unload, increasing the infantry regiment's AV to 126 (that's standard for a fresh IJA regiment) and unload supply and a bit of fuel. Set the units there to deliberate attack and you should defeat the demoralized and inexperienced Brit/Indian units defending the hex. It might also be a good idea to bring your BB TF there to cover the landing, because even though you've sunk PoW and Repulse, those pesky Brit DD's may try to mess up your amphib TF's (the AI will try this, don't know about your human opponent). Also, provide air cover (LRCAP) from Singora for the BB's. All three landing sites (Singora, Patani, and Kota Bharu) need to be covered by a combat surface force, with the strongest in the south.

2) Singora and Kota Bharu are connected by rail. Patani is not. But, the road from Patani across Malaya to Georgetown is mostly a major road; only minor roads connect Singora to the west coast. You can change the destinations for your amphib TF's to get 5th Div units to land at Singora and 18th Div to land at Kota Bharu, but they really don't need to be reformed into the divisions until Alor Star, Georgetown, and Taiping on the west coast are captured. At this point, speed of attack is more important than getting organized. I would want at least 1 good infantry regiment to land at Patani (or even better 1 tank regiment) to move west and cut off retreat from Alor Star.

+1.

[rustysi]

3) There is not much aviation support in the preplanned amphib TF's, but there is plenty in Indochina. That needs to be brought across the Gulf of Siam by ship (or rail thru Bangkok). The Imperial Guard Division is in Battambang and should be changed to rail movement and sent to Singora. It will take 3+ days to get there after the 2-3 day packing delay.

Differ here. Burma is a tougher nut to crack than IRL. I like to take the IG ID into Burma. You can get down the peninsular with the two divisions. Only need more for Singers. These can be found in a number of other places and shipped there in plenty of time.

4) Also, find the 4th Div (I think Osaka) and 33rd Div (Hiroshima?) and get them on an amphib TF heading to (whatever your plan is). The 33rd is prepped for Rangoon, but Palembang might be a good first target (don't change the prep). There are many targets available for the 4th Div - Wenchow, Palembang, Mindanao, Luzon, Rabaul, Malaya - I like Palembang. Also, the 21st Div is at Shanghai and is unrestricted, but if you move it Shanghai will not meet the garrison requirement of 720.

Pretty much agreed here as well. Yeah, the 33rd is prepped, but will take forever to get there. Not 100% sure, but I think this was one of those Dev decisions to slow Japan down. As for the 21st ID there are some other restricted units in the area you could get there pretty quickly and get it out. As for Palembang I like the 38th ID near Hong Kong to clear it out.

[rustysi]

Yes I've been looking at Kull's Japan set up and I don't think three divisions will cut the mustard......

It can be done with three, but its not optimal.

[rustysi]

I think you have got the wrong end of the stick old fruit. The English language is whatever we say it is. It was correct at the time Harold ordered his troops to Hastings, it was correct when Shakespeare wrote his plays, it was correct when Victoria became Empress of India, and it is correct now. If, at various times, we decided to mix it up a bit and change things here and there, then that is entirely for us - as owners of our language - to decide. We speak and write English. Any variation is totally and utterly wrong. FACT .

[:D][:D]

[rustysi]

ORIGINAL: warspite1

ORIGINAL: witpqs

ORIGINAL: warspite1

Kota Bharu, Malaya

I click on the Ground Unit icon in the hex and this provides me with the ground units I have there. Let's see what the manual has to say about this. The screen is a little different to that in the manual but most of the info seems to be the same so I'll plug on. At this stage I am most interested in finding the three divisions of 25th Army so I click on the 56th Infantry Regiment.

Remember to click on the lingerie button in the upper right corner.

warspite1

Yep I've been pressing that button all afternoon but I'm not finding any missing divisions.....

Yeah, that's trouble with a capital 'T'.

Hey maybe she'd make a good spy. Send her to Percival to mess him up a bit more.[:D]

I'll bet three divisions would work then.[:'(]

[rustysi]

OK, I'm toast. I hope some of this is useful to ya.

[warspite1]

Gents - a huge thank-you to those who have responded with comments. Sadly real life takes me away from the game today [&:] but will pick up in the week.

[rustysi]

real life

[&:]Huh, wait, this isn't RL?????[&:][:D]

[RangerJoe]

One way to mess up the Allied Signal Intelligence is to set the destination of an invasion Task Force to someplace like Midway but set a "waypoint" to where you actually want it to go to and also tell it to remain there. Then unload the troops at the real invasion site.

Yes, the English use the French spelling but we tend to use the French pronunciation over here.

Another way to speed up the land attacks is to have your armor set to "Reserve(pursuit)" so it will not participate in the attack but will chase the enemy. If done correctly, you can chase them right behind them across a river and not have a shock attack but have your bridgehead. A useful trick when it comes to Singapore. I think that you can also invade at Mersing(sp?) with units cutting across the peninsula and trap the units farther north. Just use lots of CAP/LRCAP. You want to get the Commonwealth forces running like old Hickory did here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VL7XS_8qgXM

[warspite1]

Having some trouble following Kull's spreadsheet (they really shouldn't allow muppets to attempt this game....) so I'll move on rather than get bogged down.

So looking at the helpful responses in order I come across this one first:

Wake's AF is most likely still operational. Further unescorted Nell's will likely suffer.

What I prefer to do here is to give the joint a whack with the KB as they sail past. Not much danger to A/C losses and it'll help prep the place for invasion. I'll even detach some surface forces from the KB (temporarily) for a bombardment.

I like this as I think its partly historical (didn't a couple of KB carriers assist the invasion?) and that remains my broad focus for this turn.

Right so looking at the Kido Butai's (TF1) Task Force Information Screen, I can see it is currently being ordered to head back to Osaka/Kyoto.

So I consult the manual to see what all these numbers mean, and what I am going to do with this force. The aircraft have just been on the Pearl Harbor mission so I need to ensure I understand all about CAP. I also have destroyers off Midway and so I will look to bring them within TF1 if they have the fuel to do so - otherwise these will head back to Japan.

[warspite1]

So I set KB on a course for Wake. I intend to divide the ships into separate bombardment and carrier strike forces later but want to keep the TF together while in hostile waters.

The destroyers at Midway will head for Japan. A look at the List all Task Forces screen appears to show the Endure column is similar to the destroyers in TF 1. But when I looked at changing to the Meet or follow TF order, the numbers after the ‘moves’ information in the top left hand corner of the Task Force Information Screen turn red (I don’t know what these relate to but on the basis red is bad it is simpler to head home).

So how long will it take Task Force 1 to reach Wake Island?

From the manual: Every TF has a calculated Cruising TF Speed. This TF speed in hexes is calculated by taking the speed of the slowest ship in the TF (in this case Kaga 14 knots) times the number of hours in a pulse (12) and then divided by number of miles in a hex (40) and the result (4.2) is rounded up or down based on the computer’s calculations. There are two phases per day (8) so by my reckoning it will take about 6 days to reach Wake (14th December). This ties in with the historical timeframe so that makes sense. In the Task Force delay there is the ability to request Full, Cruising and Mission speed – but I’ve word searched mission speed and nothing comes up.

In the top left hand corner of the Task Force display it states Moves (m/c) 8/4 so this would indicate maximum and cruising values which ties up with the calculation. So where does Endurance and Fuel come into it?

Ships use fuel whenever they move and each ship is rated for how much fuel it can hold as well as its maximum endurance, which is the number of miles the ship can travel at cruising speed. The TF display shows the amount of endurance remaining for each ship in the TF.

Whenever a ship moves in a TF, it draws on its Endurance, which in turn subtracts from the amount of fuel carried. Fuel is expended when:

» A ship moves the entire turn at or below its Cruising Speed (the cruise speed for the ship in hexes as specified on each Ship Information Screen); this ship will use up Endurance equal to 40 times the number of hexes moved. So TF 1 will be moving 8 hexes per turn, they will expend 320 endurance per day over the 6 days (1,920) out of the 4,400 the destroyers have.
However they will likely need a reserve as:

» For each hex moved over the ship’s Cruising Speed, the ship will expend an additional 240 endurance per hex. The cruising speed of the TF in hexes is figured by the Cruising Speed of the slowest ship in it. Since each ship checks the TF move against its own Cruising Speed, ships in the same TF can use up different amounts of Endurance in the same move.

» Every ship in a TF that is involved in surface combat expends 200 Endurance.

» Whenever a TF is bombed or strafed, all ships in the TF expend one Endurance per attacking plane.

[warspite1]

The Yellow and Green radius markers (F4 to toggle on and off) provide the ranges in visual form. I am not sure why these seem to indicate 10 and 5 hexes can be travelled. A) I thought 9 was the maximum and b) the calcs above indicated 8 and 4 anyway? Maybe one doesn't count the hex the line travels through. I'll see next turn how far this task force actually moves having started in hex 180,104.

[warspite1]

Right so let's have a look at the KB's aircraft situation following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Kaga's fighters and pilots have taken something of a hammering over Hawaii. I guess they must have run into Rafe Macauley...

My Vals are okay but my Kates also appear a little worse for wear and are low on torpedoes.

Let's look at what all this means in a little more detail.

[Anachro]

It looks like you left the fighters to strafe at 100 feet and the flak more than decimated them.

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: Anachro

It looks like you left the fighters to strafe at 100 feet and the flak more than decimated them.

warspite1

Not guilty - it was an historical first turn so any result - good or bad was not my fault!

[warspite1]

The butchers bill.....and a snapshot of the position post Pearl

[rustysi]

I also have destroyers off Midway and so I will look to bring them within TF1 if they have the fuel to do so - otherwise these will head back to Japan.

See that red TF at the top of the screen. That's a replenishment TF with plenty of fuel.

[rustysi]

I like this as I think its partly historical (didn't a couple of KB carriers assist the invasion?)

Yeah, after the initial invasion failed.