An Aussie Affair.

[Mike Scholl]

I don't know what height they actually attacked at, but I agree 20K is too high. I still think it COULD have happened at that height, although I agree they wouldn't be too accurate. Does anyone know if Kates had an oxygen system? If not, than they shouldn't be allowed over 10-12K or else the pilots would pass out...

Good point about the oxygen---and I'm ashamed to say I don't have that refer-
ence at hand to check. I would tend to doubt it, as the Kate with three crew-
men and an ordinance load was not exactly over-powered to begin with. Might
explain the air-to-air results---she would certainly handle like a pig if she could
get that high at all. My recollection (and at my age that's a less-than-sterling
resource) was that they bombed at PH from something between 8-9,000 ft.,
which is still over a mile and a half up. Ever try to hit anything from a mile and
a half? On the first try? Ain't easy without a really powerful gun and damned
good sights---or wire guidence.

[Luskan]

Maybe I'm missing the point - or you guys are missing the point?

I set the planes to 20,000 to avoid fighters, and Kates only level bomb on port attacks or if they are at maximum range. The idea was that they approach at 20,000 with all the other planes, the US fighters that were there have to climb to engage my escorting zeroes, while the kates then dive down to wavetop level and line up and launch their torps! Flak fires in 3 seperate pahses all calculated on how high each plane is when they're being shot at. Setting the altitude really highw as my way of bringing flak and fighter danger DOWN. Seems to have brought it up.

[Luskan]

Another great turn in this fascinating game. Raver's generalship in China is better than i thought. He's pressing my line quite hard (much harder than the AI-less AI I thought i "conquered" in my other AAR).

A few sub attacks, plenty of crippled ships limping home on both sides, and lots of land combat, mostly in china and mostly my way. Hwoever the allies just took their first ever base.


AFTER ACTION REPORTS FOR 12/22/41

Sub attack at 25,43

Japanese Ships
AK Hakonesan Maru, Torpedo hits 1

Allied Ships
SS KXVII


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Sub attack near Takamatsu at 62,42

Japanese Ships
AK Hakkai Maru, Torpedo hits 1, on fire

Allied Ships
SS S-37


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Sub attack at 115,67

Japanese Ships
SS I-19

Allied Ships
DD Schley


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Air attack on Taiping , at 23,45

Japanese aircraft
Ki-43-Ib Oscar x 23

no losses


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Air attack on TF, near Khota Bharu at 24,45

Japanese aircraft
Ki-43-Ib Oscar x 10

Allied aircraft
Buffalo I x 6
Blenheim IV x 3

no losses

no losses

Japanese Ships
DD Isonami


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Air attack on TF at 45,48


Allied aircraft
P-40E Kittyhawk x 10
B-17C Fortress x 3


Allied aircraft losses
B-17C Fortress x 1 damaged

Japanese Ships
AP Haaburu Maru


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Air attack on Changsha , at 47,36

Japanese aircraft
Ki-27 Nate x 18
Ki-30 Ann x 5
Ki-15 Babs x 1

Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-30 Ann x 1 damaged


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Air attack on TF, near Khota Bharu at 24,45

Japanese aircraft
Ki-43-Ib Oscar x 10

Allied aircraft
Blenheim I x 5

no losses

Allied aircraft losses
Blenheim I x 1 damaged

Japanese Ships
PG Hashidate
AK Tonegawa Maru


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Air attack on TF, near Khota Bharu at 24,45

Japanese aircraft
Ki-43-Ib Oscar x 10

Allied aircraft
Blenheim I x 3

no losses

Allied aircraft losses
Blenheim I x 1 damaged


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Air attack on TF at 38,70


Allied aircraft
Brewster 339D x 4
Hudson I x 6


Allied aircraft losses
Hudson I x 3 damaged

Japanese Ships
AP Hiyoshi Maru
AP Kasuga Maru #2


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Air attack on TF at 26,44


Allied aircraft
Buffalo I x 6
Blenheim IV x 3


Allied aircraft losses
Blenheim IV x 1 damaged

Japanese Ships
AP Choko Maru


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ground combat at Taiping (not Kuala Lumpur - I always get mixed up here. Kuala Lumpur is next).

Japanese Shock attack

Attacking force 37652 troops, 468 guns, 7 vehicles

Defending force 13293 troops, 94 guns, 0 vehicles

Japanese engineers reduce fortifications to 1

Japanese assault odds: 6 to 1 (fort level 1)

Japanese forces CAPTURE Taiping base !!! and either inherit 30k of supplies, or had it transferred down from the bloody massive supply stockpiles at Songkia and Khota Bharu.


Japanese ground losses:
Men lost 196
Guns lost 10
Vehicles lost 1

Allied ground losses:
Men lost 428
Guns lost 20


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ground combat at 47,35

Japanese Shock attack

Attacking force 20507 troops, 268 guns, 0 vehicles

Defending force 22819 troops, 2 guns, 0 vehicles

Japanese assault odds: 16 to 1 (fort level 0)


Japanese ground losses:
Men lost 469
Guns lost 6

Allied ground losses:
Men lost 1215 - Chinese driven into the jungle and the front line is clear once more. Just as well because these troops are all off north now.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ground combat at Kaifeng - misjudged Raver's strength. More troops on the way.

Japanese Shock attack

Attacking force 19190 troops, 236 guns, 7 vehicles

Defending force 25577 troops, 180 guns, 0 vehicles

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


Japanese ground losses:
Men lost 658
Guns lost 14
Vehicles lost 2

Allied ground losses:
Men lost 423
Guns lost 18


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ground combat at 50,31

Japanese Shock attack

Attacking force 13643 troops, 167 guns, 0 vehicles

Defending force 2820 troops, 0 guns, 0 vehicles

Japanese assault odds: 338 to 1 (fort level 0)

Chinese beaten out of the way once again - they picked the wrong place to try and retreat to.

Allied ground losses:
Men lost 36


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ground combat at Naga

Japanese Shock attack

Attacking force 22802 troops, 294 guns, 7 vehicles

Defending force 8603 troops, 102 guns, 6 vehicles

Japanese assault odds: 7 to 1 (fort level 2)

Japanese forces CAPTURE Naga base !!!


Japanese ground losses:
Men lost 178
Guns lost 10 - this is ok.
Vehicles lost 1 - this is starting to concern me, have redirected some industry to help out with my tank losses.

Allied ground losses:
Men lost 68
Guns lost 5


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ground combat at Kaifeng

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 24864 troops, 152 guns, 0 vehicles

Defending force 19786 troops, 223 guns, 3 vehicles

Allied assault odds: 1 to 1 (fort level 3)

Allied Assault reduces fortifications to 2 - I'll be ready next turn, or probably the turn after so I'm ok here.


Japanese ground losses:
Men lost 159
Guns lost 11

Allied ground losses:
Men lost 27


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ground combat at Hsinyang

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 7679 troops, 52 guns, 0 vehicles

Defending force 2214 troops, 35 guns, 0 vehicles

Allied assault odds: 12 to 1 (fort level 3)

Allied forces CAPTURE Hsinyang base !!!



Allied ground losses:
Men lost 87
Guns lost 6


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Luskan]

A few production line pics for those who requested them.

Please note the numbers probably don't mean that much in alpha. To me, they mean that after 15 days of combat, I'm on the way (especially since you can't see my build rates) to running out of things like tanks and guns well and truly.

This is compounded by the problem that most of my combat losses have been suffered in areas away from the supplies/hqs (new rules coming out this week for all this stuff) required to be able to accept replacements, so there are a lot of units begging for replacements out there that probably aren't drawing them from the pool.

Also there is a screenshot of the situation in China (accidently chopped off the bit where Wuchow is all mine and there are shattered Chinese units in the surrounding fields starving and being hunted like rats - isn't any concern). Just note how vulnerable Nanning is, and how Changsha will soon fall - cutting off that entire rail line chunk in the middle there.

[madflava13]

Luskan,
I agree completely that the losses at 20K were way higher than they should be. That just struck me as so odd that I chalked it up to an Alpha-build problem and didn't think much more about it...

Again, it's great reading this AAR... Thanks for doing this.

[Mike Scholl]

Maybe I'm missing the point - or you guys are missing the point?

I set the planes to 20,000 to avoid fighters, and Kates only level bomb on port attacks or if they are at maximum range. The idea was that they approach at 20,000 with all the other planes, the US fighters that were there have to climb to engage my escorting zeroes, while the kates then dive down to wavetop level and line up and launch their torps! Flak fires in 3 seperate pahses all calculated on how high each plane is when they're being shot at. Setting the altitude really highw as my way of bringing flak and fighter danger DOWN. Seems to have brought it up.

I'm not sure just how the game figures such things, but a couple of things come
to mind in reading your post. One is that it takes a lot of fuel to drag a Kate
with a torpedo that high---did you lose 25% of you max range in doing it?
Another thing is that Kate's don't have "dive brakes", so getting down to a
level of 100-200 feet would take a long time. (With that kind of load, and the
nose down at anything but a very shallow angle, you would pick up enough
airspeed to rip the wings off). Maybe the game is more detailed than we think,
and you took flak at all three altitudes? One thing is certain. If the game gives
you full torpedo-carrying range at 20,000 feet and then allows you to "whip it
down to 200 feet", the game has some serious problems modeling aircraft
performance.

[Luskan]

Have a look at the results and then tell me if the game lets me do it
Having done a few more experiments with both sides, there seems to be a sweet spot with alititude as well as with losses.

Although I haven't quite caught it yet, the results at the opening turn of Scn1 seem like they're almost calibrated to stop players doing different or gamey things.

1. I started as the US, set all my planes on LRCAP. Result: I loose WAY more allied planes than usual and loose even more ships.

2. Start as the IJN, leave settings along. Result: 1 time in 5 or so, pearl attack is cancelled by bad weather, but when the strike does fly it seems to do the most damage. Trying to tinker with the altitude, or setting zeroes to bomb as well and not sweep the airfields etc. etc. etc. seems to decrease effectiveness (I set everyone to port attack - let the US keep its Mohawks etc.).

Just look at Frag's dream start - and he didn't change anything.

[Raverdave]

Well guys, I am stuck in Sydney with work, and my web mail is kinda broken at the moment, so moves will be delayed till either I get back home at the end of the week or if and when I get my web mail fixed.

[DoomedMantis]

Luskan, did your avatar go only after you tried to put a new one in? Have you tried recently to put it back?

[Luskan]

Unfortunately there is another factor that has appeared in the last 24 hours - the new build of WITP with lots of new stuff in it has come out and we're all going to have to restart our PBEMs (they won't work or have any of the new changes in them. Amongst the massive list of new things are real production model numbers as well as a whole fat load of new supply rules we'll have to test.

So this game will have to come to a grinding halt, but never fear, Raver and I will no doubt start a new one (and I'll spend an entire week working on my PERFECT first turn, that is unless Raver wants to swap sides).

[Luskan]

Yes - tried to change my avatar - and thought I had to change it to nothing first. unfortunately, NOTHING is the only option.

I'm ****** about it. I had a fantastic waving aussie flag I was going to use.
Now I've got bupkis.

[Peteg77]

Well I am happy to see that my hunch about the altitudes may have been the culprit on the wacky loss ratio for the PH raid. As for Kates flying at 20K with torps, the post here showed they had bombs and not torps at 20K. There were two groups that went low with torps and 4 high with bombs from what I can see. Interesting how the programmers may have outgamed the gamers! LOL

[Mike Scholl]

Still the problem that 20,000 feet is WAY TO HIGH to try
to hit even a non-moving ship with a Kate's rudimentary
bombsight. As I recall the Japanese Pilots accounts speak of flying amongst the mountains on the North Shore of Oahu, not thousands of feet above them.