Land combat and base capture bugs?

[underdog]

We've had some things occurring in a PBEM game I'm playing that, based on my understanding of the game, shouldn't happen. My opponent (playing the Allies) conducted an invasion of Kitakyushu that included more than one wave of LCU/supplies landing. (That is, he had several transport TFs landing on the same turn). The first wave acted normally with his forces unable to capture the base, but during later combat that turn 2 strange things happened. He had landed a total of 7 divisions and 3 brigades by then. When the second round of combat occurred 2 of his divisions had 99 readiness and 2 others had 72 readiness while I still controlled the base. All other LCUs were 49 or less.

My understanding was that the highest readiness possible while being supplied over the beach was 49. (This was a over the beach supply situation as no adajacent bases were controlled by the Allies) This has happened during Allied invasions twice before in the game at other locations.

The result of the second round of combat at Kitakyushu was the Allied force getting odds of 17, and yet I didn't lose the base. Since the terrain of Kitakyushu is 6, odds of 7 or more should have captured the base, but didn't.

Anyone else have similar experiences or, better yet, an explanation?

[Ranger-75]

There is a 3rd leader / experience check. A unit must pass the first 2 of the third is not even taken. If it passes that one its readiness is upped to 99 for that combat only.

I don't know why odds 17 didn't capture the base. I haven't seen that, but I have seen odds in the 150s to 200 and the japanese defenders didn't retreat or get eliminated, so there is probably a code bug there, or posssibly there are units that have "special" attributes.

[underdog]

Did the units in question have a retreat path? According to the book if they don't have a retreat path they may surrender, or they may just have their entrenchment level reduced.

In our game there were some Brits in Colombo with no retreat path that didn't surrender with 80 to 1 odds for a couple of turns, so it happens against the Japanese also.

[Ranger-75]

One case was Noemfar which was an island with no retreat path. Not only did I get high odds as described but the Japanese defenders would take no losses. It eventually sorted itself out with the expected elimination result.

Another case was in Indo-china where there IS a retreat path. It took a couple of extra turns to toor out the Japanese from Penomh Penh and Saigon (they keep comming back during the Japanese orders phase you know until they are retreated with no supplies). But again eventually I was able to push them out.

On the plus side I think (but can't remember definately) that the Japanese units retreated once or twice with less than 125:1 odds. So I'm not complaining.

Your experience as detailed at the top was definately the result of that 3rd leader check.

[underdog]

Thanks for the input Mike. I now see the desciption of the leadership check you are mentioning in the rules. As you say, that has to be what happened. When they are talking about passing a leadership check by Random 100 being less than Leadership squared, what do they mean by "Leadership", the leaders aggressiveness or land rating?

[underdog]

Incidently, you said that if the third leadership check is passed it ups the LCU's readiness to 99. The book actually says it is upped by 50 points. That sounds right because some of LCUs in the battle I described had readiness of 72, which was presumably 22 before passing that check.

[ October 19, 2001: Message edited by: underdog ]</p>

[Ranger-75]

You're absolutely right. It says "readiness is increased by 50 points up to a maximum of 99". I don't think i ever benefitted from this 3rd check so far.

[Ranger-75]

Whenever leadership is mentioned it refers to the appropriate Air Naval or Land rating. However, bear in mingd that the commander for the battle is based on the on the spot leader's agressivness check, a lot of leaders fail this check, that's why you always see the HQ leader's name on the battle report.

The random(100) vs leader squared means a random number from 1-100 compared against a leader's rating squared. leaders with a rating of 7 or less and there is less than 50% probability.

There is also an experience part of the checks too. fir check # 3 it is random(10,000) vs exp squared. 70 exp or less and the probability drops like flies.