Focus Pacific: down with the Wulf ( no durnedwolf please)

[BillBrown]

Here are the two Miri rollovers




and the three combat report entries.
Morning Air attack on Miri , at 64,87

Weather in hex: Partial cloud

Raid spotted at 20 NM, estimated altitude 8,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 7 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 8

Allied aircraft
139WH-3 x 11

No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
139WH-3: 5 destroyed, 1 damaged

Oil hits 5

Aircraft Attacking:
10 x 139WH-3 bombing from 8000 feet *
City Attack: 2 x 300 kg GP Bomb
---------------------------------------------

Morning Air attack on Miri , at 64,87

Weather in hex: Partial cloud

Raid spotted at 14 NM, estimated altitude 8,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 3 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 6

Allied aircraft
B-17D Fortress x 5

No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
B-17D Fortress: 3 damaged

Oil hits 2

Aircraft Attacking:
5 x B-17D Fortress bombing from 6000 feet *
---------------------------------------------

Morning Air attack on Miri , at 64,87

Weather in hex: Partial cloud

Raid spotted at 12 NM, estimated altitude 12,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 3 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 5

Allied aircraft
B-17D Fortress x 6

No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
B-17D Fortress: 2 damaged

Oil hits 4

Aircraft Attacking:
6 x B-17D Fortress bombing from 6000 feet *
City Attack: 4 x 500 lb GP Bomb
-----------------------------------------------------------------
I am going to stand down the bombers for a turn or two to get repairs done
and I found a better airfield. This scenario is full of surprises.

[Alfred]

ORIGINAL: BillBrown

... CA Louisville is out of 8" ammo, but full of 5" which would be very effective against a PB and an xAKL
Unfortunately Capt Sampson who is commanding CA Louisville has an aggression of 37, I think he will get changed as soon as he get to a port.

The aggression rating did not result in the Louisville not attacking. The same thing would have happened even if Halsey had been the TF leader.

The relevant factor was being out of 8" ammo. For a CA, the main weapon system is considered to be the 8" guns. Once they are down to 1/3 ammo, irrespective of how much other calibre ammo still carried, the TF automatically attempts to avoid combat and return to home port.

The 1/3 ammo reserve threshold is there to prevent the TF from being a total sitting duck in those circumstances where it is difficult to execute a timely retreat.

Alfred

[BillBrown]

Dec 12, 1941

Nothing really to report. A small tanker that was damaged a turn or two ago sank and a xAKL was sunk by LBA.

KB disappeared, not sure which way it went.

[btd64]

Looks like a good game. Good luck Bill....GP

[BillBrown]

Another quiet turn. Lost 3 xAKL and an xAP. Two to subs and two to air craft. He captured Sorong.

[BillBrown]

This is from my last scenario 78 AAR, but it is still true.
In the meantime, some musings.

I am going to try and establish a line of bases in the South Pacific, probably the ones most people use.
Noumea, Nadi, Suva, Pago Pago, Christmas Island and then Hawaii. It probably depends on who get there first.

I want to note that I will not talk about how I do my logistics. I really do not want to tell the world how I operate
since I might play a game against someone reading this AAR.

As always, I will defend India but not Burma. The troops in Burma are terrible, badly led, terrible morale, really bad
experience, and their weapons are not good. At this point the India troops are not a lot better, but time will fix that.

The Chinese are not the pushovers that they are in stock scenarios. I get 1050 squad replacements per month and I have
5000 Daily supply, most of which are in Chungking and Chentu. Heavy Weapons production is larger that stock also.
I will pull back into +3 and some +2 terrain and set up defense. I will also move a few( 6-8) corps to India for refit.
I plan on using some corps to try and move around some of his forces and cut them off from supply. I need to keep his
troops busy in China as long as I can.

The one thing about logistics that I will talk about, is that I will use every means I can to get as much supply and fuel
to Australia, New Zealand and the SoPac Islands as fast as I can.

In this scenario Tahiti is a major base. Here is a picture of it from tracker.
Note the size 25 repair shipyard, the large SPS for port and airfield. The aircraft factories.
It obviously is high on the list for reinforcements and building.

[HansBolter]

If Wake hasn't been invaded yet, the westward movement of the KB following the SW move would put it on track to cover that invasion wouldn't it?

[CaptBeefheart]

Tahiti is a must-keep location in this mod, sort of like a West Coast base. Noumea also has a shipyard if I remember correctly.

I always thought this was an interesting mod.

Good luck!

Cheers,
CB

[BillBrown]

Another fairly quiet turn. I lost an AS and an xAKL to damage suffered in previous turns.

I did lose Hong Kong today.
As you can see, Japan has more in China to take Hong Kong than stock.
Ground combat at Hong Kong (77,61)

Japanese Deliberate attack

Attacking force 36954 troops, 481 guns, 284 vehicles, Assault Value = 1695

Defending force 13255 troops, 246 guns, 148 vehicles, Assault Value = 169

Japanese engineers reduce fortifications to 0

Japanese adjusted assault: 1130

Allied adjusted defense: 285

Japanese assault odds: 3 to 1 (fort level 0)

Japanese forces CAPTURE Hong Kong !!!

Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), leaders(-), experience(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
379 casualties reported
Squads: 1 destroyed, 26 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 4 disabled
Engineers: 3 destroyed, 30 disabled

Allied ground losses:
15340 casualties reported
Squads: 317 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 1280 destroyed, 0 disabled
Engineers: 73 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 317 (317 destroyed, 0 disabled)
Vehicles lost 198 (198 destroyed, 0 disabled)
Units destroyed 7

Assaulting units:
19th Ind. Engineer Regiment
245th Division
38th Division
66th Infantry Regiment
104th Division
300th Division
20th Ind. Engineer Regiment
1st Hvy.Artillery Regiment
10th Ind. Mountain Gun Regiment
2nd Ind.Hvy.Art. Battalion
3rd Ind.Hvy.Art. Battalion
5th RF Gun Battalion
2nd RF Gun Battalion
2nd Mortar Battalion
20th Ind. Mtn Gun Battalion

Defending units:
Rifles of Canada Battalion
Kowloon Brigade
2nd Royal Scots Battalion
Winnipeg Grenadiers Battalion
1st Middlesex Battalion
102nd RN Base Force
Hong Kong Fortress

[BillBrown]

And in other earth shattering news, AM Penguin has made it to the Coral Sea and will be at Brisbane in 2 turns. [8D]

[BillBrown]

In terms of logistics, here is a picture of the three major West Coast bases that are normally used by players for moving LCUs, Air Units, Supply, and Fuel. Things to note, LA is the best fuel loading base by far. But San diego and San Francisco can lod more supply and troops than LA. LA will improve since its base force starts with only 200 NS and can grow to 500. Everyone should make this comparison for every scenario they play and look at the units in the bases to see if they need reinforcements turned on or not.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: BillBrown

This is from my last scenario 78 AAR, but it is still true.
In the meantime, some musings.

I am going to try and establish a line of bases in the South Pacific, probably the ones most people use.
Noumea, Nadi, Suva, Pago Pago, Christmas Island and then Hawaii. It probably depends on who get there first.

I want to note that I will not talk about how I do my logistics. I really do not want to tell the world how I operate
since I might play a game against someone reading this AAR.

As always, I will defend India but not Burma. The troops in Burma are terrible, badly led, terrible morale, really bad
experience, and their weapons are not good. At this point the India troops are not a lot better, but time will fix that.

The Chinese are not the pushovers that they are in stock scenarios. I get 1050 squad replacements per month and I have
5000 Daily supply, most of which are in Chungking and Chentu. Heavy Weapons production is larger that stock also.
I will pull back into +3 and some +2 terrain and set up defense. I will also move a few( 6-8) corps to India for refit.
I plan on using some corps to try and move around some of his forces and cut them off from supply. I need to keep his
troops busy in China as long as I can.

The one thing about logistics that I will talk about, is that I will use every means I can to get as much supply and fuel
to Australia, New Zealand and the SoPac Islands as fast as I can.

In this scenario Tahiti is a major base. Here is a picture of it from tracker.
Note the size 25 repair shipyard, the large SPS for port and airfield. The aircraft factories.
It obviously is high on the list for reinforcements and building.

Somebody's imagination has gone wild! I've been to Tahiti and the entire middle of the island is occupied by the remains of an extinct volcano with walls several thousand feet high (enough to make a mini-climate inside the cone). The area that can be developed is a thin stretch of shore along the outer edge of the cone - only a few hundred yards to a kilometer wide . The harbour at Papeete is not protected except by another island a couple of miles away. The International Airport is fairly small - not a lot of room to park aircraft. They generally transit through rather than RON

I'm not against the idea of adding some more facilities in SOPAC, but they should be possible IRL, not complete figments of imagination. But I guess once you start a what-if scenario it is hard to figure out where to draw the line! [:)]

[BillBrown]

Dec 15, 1941. Another reasonably quiet turn. Guam fell today and I lost a PT and an xAKL damaged a turn ago.
i saw in Combat Reporter that Chaing Mai went to level 2 airfield. I suppose he will be using that base
for air interdiction in Burma. Makes sense, it is on a rail line to Bangkok so supply should not be a problem.
I will have to make up my mind if I want to fight in the air in Burma. I still do not have many good pilots
and my aircraft stocks are low yet, even though I get a lot more than stock scenarios. And the ones I do get
now are not the best.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: BillBrown

Dec 15, 1941. Another reasonably quiet turn. Guam fell today and I lost a PT and an xAKL damaged a turn ago.
i saw in Combat Reporter that Chaing Mai went to level 2 airfield. I suppose he will be using that base
for air interdiction in Burma. Makes sense, it is on a rail line to Bangkok so supply should not be a problem.
I will have to make up my mind if I want to fight in the air in Burma. I still do not have many good pilots
and my aircraft stocks are low yet, even though I get a lot more than stock scenarios. And the ones I do get
now are not the best.

Regardless where you decide to fight the air war, I think one of the keys in the early game is to defend over your own bases so you save more pilots while the Japanese lose their more experienced ones. It's not just about saving numbers of pilots, it's about saving their accumulated experience that will make them more effective when they fight again.
In the early game I try to do deep bomber raids where Japan does not have much CAP or AA. The obvious airfield near the front are going to be too well defended and you will end up not being able to shut them down anyway. Maybe in mid-1942 you can bring together enough fighters and bombers to make a surprise sweep/strike here and there.

[BillBrown]

Dec 16, 1941.

Again a quiet turn. I lost an HDML and a xAK. I feel my opponent is moving too slow given the big hammer he starts with.

I will post a few picts in a little while.

[BillBrown]

Here is a single picture of most of the western area.
As you can see, after 10 days, not much headway in this area.

[BillBrown]

PNG, New Briton, and Solomon Islands.

[BillBrown]

There has been some action in China.

[BillBrown]

Dec 17, 1941. I know it starts to sound like a broken record, but another turn with little to no action.
As most of you know, this is the period of time that not a lot happens. I do have air units and SC TFs in
the DEI/Malaya/PI area, but he has not pressed forward enough for me to try and engage him.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: BillBrown

Dec 17, 1941. I know it starts to sound like a broken record, but another turn with little to no action.
As most of you know, this is the period of time that not a lot happens. I do have air units and SC TFs in
the DEI/Malaya/PI area, but he has not pressed forward enough for me to try and engage him.

OMG, he must be trying the "Invade the US ASAP" strategy! [:D]