Cost of Heavy Urban Level 9 Fort Reduction

[HansBolter]

Ground combat at Osaka/Kyoto (109,59)

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 163493 troops, 3047 guns, 2634 vehicles, Assault Value = 4650

Defending force 133403 troops, 1507 guns, 250 vehicles, Assault Value = 2840

Allied engineers reduce fortifications to 8

Allied adjusted assault: 1196

Japanese adjusted defense: 24545

Allied assault odds: 1 to 20 (fort level 8)

Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), forts(+), disruption(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
1799 casualties reported
Squads: 7 destroyed, 110 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 33 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 17 disabled
Guns lost 40 (2 destroyed, 38 disabled)

Allied ground losses:
17281 casualties reported
Squads: 163 destroyed, 1150 disabled
Non Combat: 150 destroyed, 241 disabled
Engineers: 70 destroyed, 366 disabled
Guns lost 373 (19 destroyed, 354 disabled)
Vehicles lost 180 (40 destroyed, 140 disabled)
Units destroyed 1

Assaulting units:
XXXIV Corps Engineer Battalion
767th Tank Battalion
10th Indian Division
38th Infantry Division
9th Indian Division
10th Army Engr Grp
2nd Infantry Division
1st Army Engr Grp
86th Infantry Division
8th Infantry Division
31st Infantry Division
5th Infantry Division
87th Infantry Division
V Corps Engr Grp
XV Corps Engineer Battalion
4th Infantry Division
5th Indian Division
779th Field Artillery Battalion
8th Belfast Heavy Regiment
1st Indian Medium Regiment
134th (East Ang) Regiment
778th Field Artillery Battalion
789th Field Artillery Battalion
85th Medium Regiment
85th Mortar Battalion
72nd Mortar Battalion
786th Field Artillery Battalion
86th Medium Regiment
87th Medium Regiment
2nd Indian Field Regiment
147th Field Artillery Battalion
6th Medium Regiment
780th Field Artillery Battalion
88th Medium Regiment

Defending units:
355th Division
189th JAAF AF Bn
316th Division
143rd JAAF AF Bn
225th Division
190th JAAF AF Bn
6th Ind. Brigade
49th Division
216th Division
61st Ind.Mixed Brigade
13th JAAF AF Bn
56th Ind.Mixed Brigade
153rd Division
123rd Ind.Mixed Brigade
163rd JAAF AF Bn
144th Division
16th Ind. Brigade
37th Ind.Mixed Brigade
25th Ind.Mixed Brigade
84th Division
147th Division
61st JAAF AF Bn
246th JAAF AF Bn
2nd Machine Cannon AA Battalion
13th Ind. AA Battalion
65th Construction Battalion
121st AA Regiment
15th Area Army
Maizuru Naval Base Force
Osaka Naval Base Force
22nd Ind. AA Battalion
11th Air Division
26th Ind.Art.Mortar Battalion
45th Ind. AA Battalion
25th Ind.Art.Mortar Battalion
45th Ind.Hvy.Art. Battalion
13th Base Force
11th Machine Canno AA Battalion
Kinki JNAF Base Force
5th Imperial AA Division
8th Imperial AA Division
53rd Air Flotilla
Kakogawa JAAF Base Force


My American Combat Engineer pool is empty. The production rate is 24 per month and I have two months left in the scenario so none of the decimated US CE units will be replenished. I'm pretty sure the destroyed unit was a CE battalion. Battalions don't hold up well in huge siege battles.

I still have decent pools for all Allied combat engineers and they are moving to take over for the burnt out US units.

Tokyo has 753 LCUs in it and I harbor no illusions of being able to take it even though I am at the gates.

[BBfanboy]

That is truly scary, and a good indication of what the real Operation Olympic might have had to deal with at Nagasaki and Fukuoka.
Thanks for taking the time to show us that!

[Canoerebel]

That's very interesting.

I guess, were I in your shoes, I'd consider two options: (1) go somewhere easier, or (2) bomb and bombard the base for months, hoping to do away with supply (not possible in Ironman?) and disrupt the units, and then give it another try. That's the Singapore recipe. But, goodness, what a tiger.

[jdsrae]

Brutal. A brigade destroyed and two divisions disabled...
That would have been hard to sell to the public back home.

[Yaab]

Operation "Hubertus" in reverse.

https://www.stalingrad.net/german-hq/op ... bertus.htm

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

That is truly scary, and a good indication of what the real Operation Olympic might have had to deal with at Nagasaki and Fukuoka.
Thanks for taking the time to show us that!

I actually caught Nagasaki rather lightly defended and it fell quickly. Fukuoka took over two months to reduce.
Kagoshima has been my bane in this game. I have 8 burnt out divisions from the effort to take it.
I finally got things to a point where bombardments are destroying about a battalion a day there while I wait for the decimated divisions to recover.

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

That's very interesting.

I guess, were I in your shoes, I'd consider two options: (1) go somewhere easier, or (2) bomb and bombard the base for months, hoping to do away with supply (not possible in Ironman?) and disrupt the units, and then give it another try. That's the Singapore recipe. But, goodness, what a tiger.

Defenses can be bled dry of supplies in Ironman, as long as you don't run it on Hard all of the time.

Yea, those would be the normal approaches for me as well, but I am running out of the luxury of time.
I have only about 70 days left and am basically seeing what can be accomplished in the time remaining.

I have bypassed Osaka, while investing it, invested Nagoya and am building up there for a coming assault.
I landed two Russian Armies on the Sea of Japan coast opposite Tokyo. The 25th Army is pushing up against Tokyo while the 6th Guards Tank Army broke out across the plain north of Tokyo. The 1st Red Banner Army is slowly unloading at a level 5 port at Niigata and the 2nd Red Banner Army is queued up at Fusan. I have 6 Marine and 6 Army divisions prepping for the two cultivated terrain base hexes adjacent to Tokyo with landings planned for the first week in February.

In the North, the Brits and Canadians are scooping up the Kuriles with both them and the Soviet 53rd Army currently prepping for Bihoro. I expect to hit Hokkaido in the first week of February along with the landings adjacent to Tokyo.

As I mentioned, Tokyo has 753 LCUs and is likely unassailable with the time remaining.

I may not have mentioned that I am playing with full stacking limits everywhere which hinders how much force can be concentrated without deleterious effects. Once you have overstacked a hex threes times over in an effort to get enough AV to take the hex, bombardments become more devastating to you than to the enemy. This makes daily bombardment attrition impossible while recovering for the next attack and slows recovery. It has a decided impact on the dynamic of siege battles. It is often necessary to rotate out burnt out units as they will not recover in the heavily overstacked hex.

In the past week the air base complex at and surrounding Tokyo has been rendered ineffective and the back of the Japanese air force has been broken. The B29s were stood down from night ops and spent the week resting while the B17s and B24s decimated the air filed complex. The B29s will make their first ever daylight raid on Tokyo soon and I may decide to use them against ground troops to see if they have any impact on those 753 LCUs.

[Yaab]

Your CE units should be smoking those 6-9 forts with flamethrowers. How exactly can Japs fortify their cities in fort level range 6-9, which, per manual, represent concrete fortifications? Jap architecture at the time was mostly wooden. Are Japs leveling their wooden cities in order to make way for concrete bunkers? How on earth do Japs get all this concrete? Chinese and Japs should be limited to fort level 6 max in order to represent their reliance on timber, with same places going to fort level 9 where there is hard rock.

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: Yaab

Your CE units should be smoking those 6-9 forts with flamethrowers. How exactly can Japs fortify their cities in fort level range 6-9, which, per manual, represent concrete fortifications? Jap architecture at the time was mostly wooden. Are Japs leveling their wooden cities in order to make way for concrete bunkers? How on earth do Japs get all this concrete? Chinese and Japs should be limited to fort level 6 max in order to represent their reliance on timber, with same places going to fort level 9 where there is hard rock.

While most of their housing was wood and paper, didn't most of the large urban centers have multi-story masonry and concrete structures by this point in their development.

Yes, perhaps the term 'heavy urban' is a bit relative here when compared to the likes of Berlin.

I think the important lesson here for me is that I need to learn to conserve my combat engineers.

[jwolf]

I think the important lesson here for me is that I need to learn to conserve my combat engineers.

If I recall correctly from one of your earlier posts, you used the CEs heavily in earlier campaigning, so that when you really needed them in the major Japanese cities, they were burned out and the pools were depleted. Correct? If so, I wonder just how one would do this differently. I suppose you would have to keep a dedicated group of good CE units held back out of the fighting until you got to the "Olympic" stage of the game. But that would take a ruthlessly disciplined approach to campaigns in, say, Okinawa, Formosa, Iwo Jima, etc. and I bet that would be hard to maintain when you're always thinking "just one more CE unit over there and I could finally crack that tough fort."

It has been cool to see your reports on the very late game action, especially some of the late war or postwar units that we usually don't even see.

[Trugrit]

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

ORIGINAL: Yaab

Your CE units should be smoking those 6-9 forts with flamethrowers. How exactly can Japs fortify their cities in fort level range 6-9, which, per manual, represent concrete fortifications? Jap architecture at the time was mostly wooden. Are Japs leveling their wooden cities in order to make way for concrete bunkers? How on earth do Japs get all this concrete? Chinese and Japs should be limited to fort level 6 max in order to represent their reliance on timber, with same places going to fort level 9 where there is hard rock.

While most of their housing was wood and paper, didn't most of the large urban centers have multi-story masonry and concrete structures by this point in their development.

Yes, perhaps the term 'heavy urban' is a bit relative here when compared to the likes of Berlin.

I think the important lesson here for me is that I need to learn to conserve my combat engineers.

Yes, Mixed construction
http://www.oldtokyo.com/aerial-views-of-tokyo-c-1940/

[Gridley380]

ORIGINAL: jwolf

I think the important lesson here for me is that I need to learn to conserve my combat engineers.

If I recall correctly from one of your earlier posts, you used the CEs heavily in earlier campaigning, so that when you really needed them in the major Japanese cities, they were burned out and the pools were depleted. Correct? If so, I wonder just how one would do this differently. I suppose you would have to keep a dedicated group of good CE units held back out of the fighting until you got to the "Olympic" stage of the game. But that would take a ruthlessly disciplined approach to campaigns in, say, Okinawa, Formosa, Iwo Jima, etc. and I bet that would be hard to maintain when you're always thinking "just one more CE unit over there and I could finally crack that tough fort."

It has been cool to see your reports on the very late game action, especially some of the late war or postwar units that we usually don't even see.

It *should* be a case of 'the more you use, the less you lose'; and the US, especially with transfers from the ETO, should have no shortage of combat engineers in the 1946 timeframe.

[Canoerebel]

The US gets massive combat engineer reinforcements beginning in the Summer of 1945, but they can get quickly chewed up against hard targets.

[RangerJoe]

That is a base that could be and should be pounded by naval bombardments, methinks.

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: HansBolter
Defenses can be bled dry of supplies in Ironman, as long as you don't run it on Hard all of the time.

I had spent quite some time in sieges against AI no Hard (capturing the map both as Japan and Allies against Ironman) so I have some recipes here.

Capital cities cannot really be bled dry off supply since by the time you get there AI had millions accumulated. No game mechanism can wipe supplies fast enough to get rid of millions. Your chance in those battles is the concentration of force and daily BB bombardments by everything you have (come AKEs). Bombardments will rack up disruption in all the support units and many of the combat ones, so your attack will come in much easier.

The strategy against AI is also very different (and even artificial) if you intend to capture the map. You need to prevent the revival of LCUs and their accumulation in the capital. Since AI does not lack resources to produce replacements the only way to prevent accumulation is to keep LCUs alive somewhere else on the map. Essentially you advance from one POW camp to another [:)]

There is also a dirty tactic of leaving a small but potent force in the sieged hex to provoke AI counterattack (artificial idiot is overaggressive), hence bleeding his force. But that makes things too easy.

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: RangerJoe

That is a base that could be and should be pounded by naval bombardments, methinks.

Two TFs of the old WWI era BBs have been bombarding it daily from adjacent Kure (Kobe).

The faster BBs have been making runs on Nagoya and Yokohama from Kure(Kobe).

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

ORIGINAL: HansBolter
Defenses can be bled dry of supplies in Ironman, as long as you don't run it on Hard all of the time.

I had spent quite some time in sieges against AI no Hard (capturing the map both as Japan and Allies against Ironman) so I have some recipes here.

Capital cities cannot really be bled dry off supply since by the time you get there AI had millions accumulated. No game mechanism can wipe supplies fast enough to get rid of millions. Your chance in those battles is the concentration of force and daily BB bombardments by everything you have (come AKEs). Bombardments will rack up disruption in all the support units and many of the combat ones, so your attack will come in much easier.

The strategy against AI is also very different (and even artificial) if you intend to capture the map. You need to prevent the revival of LCUs and their accumulation in the capital. Since AI does not lack resources to produce replacements the only way to prevent accumulation is to keep LCUs alive somewhere else on the map. Essentially you advance from one POW camp to another [:)]

There is also a dirty tactic of leaving a small but potent force in the sieged hex to provoke AI counterattack (artificial idiot is overaggressive), hence bleeding his force. But that makes things too easy.

I've been merciless about destroying every Japanese unit so I likely have only myself to blame for that 753 LCU stack in Tokyo!

[RangerJoe]

You need to prevent the revival of LCUs and their accumulation in the capital . . . Essentially you advance from one POW camp to another

A very good way to handle China. Just capture any base that has resources, oil, and industry. The same against the AI IJ until the very end.

Also, if you want the enemy to use up supplies, each attack increases supply usage 10% no matter what the damage is. So a lot of itty, bitty, teeny, weeny attacks along with the big ones might be the best combination.

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

The US gets massive combat engineer reinforcements beginning in the Summer of 1945, but they can get quickly chewed up against hard targets.

I still have a few of those at full strength getting ready to make the first deliberate attack on Nagoya, but once they attrite there is no rebuilding them.

I just moved four burned out CE units from Osaka to Kure for recovery. By the time the two decimated divisions recover sufficiently for the next attack I should be able to get some replacement Allied CEs into the hex. Also have three reserve divisions fully prepped in adjacent hexes so I may switch them out with the two decimated divisions. Decimated is a relative term here. I had two divisions out of the total there reduced to half strength.

Assaulting a concentration of hard targets with what is essentially the entire Allied land army is exceedingly fun!
I still have three Russian armies in reserve waiting for an opportunity to be shipped into Japan and a handful of Aussie divisions cleaning up locales in the DEI, but other than that, every last asset the Allies have is concentrated on Japan.

[jwolf]

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

I've been merciless about destroying every Japanese unit so I likely have only myself to blame for that 753 LCU stack in Tokyo!

Ditto here, though I am not as advanced as Hans. My game is in Feb 45 with the front line at Beijing, Okinawa, and Iwo Jima. Every Jap unit south of this line has been wiped out. So I fear that I will run into exactly the same problem with a mega-stack at Tokyo and maybe also at a few other major bases within Japan itself. Ugh.