Island defense tips for Japan

[Speedysteve]

ORIGINAL: Hoplosternum
Many of us will have wanted to fight Guadalcanal style campaigns even if they occur in a different geographical area and at a different time. But the game rarely allows that. If you can support one Daitai of Betty's at Rabaul to fend off landings at Lunga then why not send four or eight? If you think your invasion of PM may be interfered with by US CVs then why send two CVs rather than the whole of KB?

It is possible though. As mentioned Faber and I have had a Guadalcanal type battle in the Aleutians for the past month. It is still ongoing.

More and more forces have gradually been drawn in by both of us but looking at plane/men/shipping losses it's certainly not a 1 sided-massacre but a gradual drawn out process where both sides have sustained losses. In short, I like the feel the battle has given me so far.

[Hoplosternum]

There have been some very interesting comments so far on the thread.

But I want more [;)] More details to be honest.

What do people specifically do. Lets take three island groups which usually are exclusively Japanese after a few months. The Marshalls, The Gilberts and The Solomons. All have the possibility of mutually supported air bases if the islands are built up. Do people tend to defend these three? And do they defend all the islands? And if not what is the point of defending any. Surely the allies will land on the less protected ones and flatten the others with Mediums or worse?

What do the Japanese defend with plane and ship wise? Once the allies can start thinking offensively is it worth having any planes and ships in these chains apart from a few recons, transports and pickets? Do you hold a central reserve of planes that gets flown in when the allies arrive? In '43 at least does anyone try a more mobile defence where you don’t have much on the front lines but you have a few divs, plus KB and a bag full of Betty's & escorts who flood the area to retake any allied conquests. Preferably just after the allies CVs have just moved off [:)] The allies are unlikely to be able to take all the Marshalls or even the Gilberts (which are anyway partially covered from the Marshalls) in one bite. Rather than spread yourself thinly has anyone tried holding their forces back and hit hard a couple of weeks later?

As the allies it is usually advantageous to have as many attrition points as possible. Attrition favours the allies usually unless the losses are very one sided. So does the typical Japanese player try and limit these or exploit them? Do people try and make sure typical attrition points like Timor, Darwin, PM etc. are in Japanese hands? Is it fatal not too?

And if/when the allies do manage to get a foothold on one of your island chains do you keep fighting the air battles and just keep feeding in hastily trained squadrons in to the meat grinder. Or do you abandon what is left? i.e. do you accept a new attrition point with the pay off that you are at least trying to hold the allies up for longer.

[Ron Saueracker]

ORIGINAL: Hoplosternum

There have been some very interesting comments so far on the thread.

But I want more [;)] More details to be honest.

What do people specifically do. Lets take three island groups which usually are exclusively Japanese after a few months. The Marshalls, The Gilberts and The Solomons. All have the possibility of mutually supported air bases if the islands are built up. Do people tend to defend these three? And do they defend all the islands? And if not what is the point of defending any. Surely the allies will land on the less protected ones and flatten the others with Mediums or worse?

What do the Japanese defend with plane and ship wise? Once the allies can start thinking offensively is it worth having any planes and ships in these chains apart from a few recons, transports and pickets? Do you hold a central reserve of planes that gets flown in when the allies arrive? In '43 at least does anyone try a more mobile defence where you don’t have much on the front lines but you have a few divs, plus KB and a bag full of Betty's & escorts who flood the area to retake any allied conquests. Preferably just after the allies CVs have just moved off [:)] The allies are unlikely to be able to take all the Marshalls or even the Gilberts (which are anyway partially covered from the Marshalls) in one bite. Rather than spread yourself thinly has anyone tried holding their forces back and hit hard a couple of weeks later?

As the allies it is usually advantageous to have as many attrition points as possible. Attrition favours the allies usually unless the losses are very one sided. So does the typical Japanese player try and limit these or exploit them? Do people try and make sure typical attrition points like Timor, Darwin, PM etc. are in Japanese hands? Is it fatal not too?

And if/when the allies do manage to get a foothold on one of your island chains do you keep fighting the air battles and just keep feeding in hastily trained squadrons in to the meat grinder. Or do you abandon what is left? i.e. do you accept a new attrition point with the pay off that you are at least trying to hold the allies up for longer.

And if/when the allies do manage to get a foothold on one of your island chains do you keep fighting the air battles and just keep feeding in hastily trained squadrons in to the meat grinder. Or do you abandon what is left? i.e. do you accept a new attrition point with the pay off that you are at least trying to hold the allies up for longer.

Why do this at all? Just run express train strategic naval bombardment missions. After all, naval bombardments are strategic in effect in this game. As good or better than bombers.

[Speedysteve]

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker
Why do this at all? Just run express train strategic naval bombardment missions. After all, naval bombardments are strategic in effect in this game. As good or better than bombers.

You're not happy with the game Ron I take it? [:D]

[DuckofTindalos]

What ever makes you say that?[:D]

[Speedysteve]

Not sure.....I call it intuition[;)]

[String]

Hm. In my PBEM vs Andy I had the opportunity to take my time with fortifying my perimiter.

I built up every base in the marshalls and gilberts and garrisoned them heavily. Gilberts had 6-700 AP's on them each. By april '43 andy hadn't invaded them (infact I still held canton) and I think he never would have invaded them anyway, as he tried to advance into SRA through northern australia. We had our nice little guadalcanal campaign there.

I also fortified solomons, but not that heavily, as I would have run out of ground units, and I wasn't prepared to commit my strategic reserve of 5 divs. I did put troops on every (1) and greater airfield capacity island.. or was it (2)?? there aren't many of them in solomons anyway. Shortlands and Lunga were my big strongpoints. As I still held Noumea, Efate and Luganville then I thought I had enough warning time to deploy forces into the area. The latter three bases were very lightly garrisoned. about 50 AP each.

IF Andy hadn't done a lot of small commando raids into southern SRA then he would have met about 150 AP's on timor and a few snlf units here or there, luckily I managed to throw in some reinforcements before he invaded in force.


Andy can elaborate on his offensive plans, but I don't see how he could have advanced through marshalls/gilberts without taking heavy losses. Marianas would have been even worse.

[Hoplosternum]

ORIGINAL: Speedy

ORIGINAL: Hoplosternum
Many of us will have wanted to fight Guadalcanal style campaigns even if they occur in a different geographical area and at a different time. But the game rarely allows that. If you can support one Daitai of Betty's at Rabaul to fend off landings at Lunga then why not send four or eight? If you think your invasion of PM may be interfered with by US CVs then why send two CVs rather than the whole of KB?

It is possible though. As mentioned Faber and I have had a Guadalcanal type battle in the Aleutians for the past month. It is still ongoing.

More and more forces have gradually been drawn in by both of us but looking at plane/men/shipping losses it's certainly not a 1 sided-massacre but a gradual drawn out process where both sides have sustained losses. In short, I like the feel the battle has given me so far.

That's a very interesting scenario and sounds a great game. But I am curious to know who initiated a fight over the Aleutians? I can't imagine that the game rewards a Vancouver or Bust strategy by the IJ and the air attrition must be even worse than usual for him [:)]

I also have had some good scraps with my opponents. Drex has let me keep Lae and most of the Solomons and I have retaken and lost again Shortlands. In my game with Belphegor we had a fairly long air campaign over PM which he has now retired from. But in both these games neither side are really 'power gaming'. KB plus 10 prepped IJ divisions have not appeared anywhere in my rear after the SRA was secured although who knows if that is what either has planned for the future [:)] I have long since stopped flying more than one or rarely two 4E groups at a time, nor are all my rear bases empty.

I just think the game does not encourage this or rather it rewards power play a little too much. It is one of the reasons talking to your opponent before the game and finding out what sort of game you both want to play is so important.

[Hoplosternum]

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker

And if/when the allies do manage to get a foothold on one of your island chains do you keep fighting the air battles and just keep feeding in hastily trained squadrons in to the meat grinder. Or do you abandon what is left? i.e. do you accept a new attrition point with the pay off that you are at least trying to hold the allies up for longer.

Why do this at all? Just run express train strategic naval bombardment missions. After all, naval bombardments are strategic in effect in this game. As good or better than bombers.

While this is not a bad tactic for the Japanese in the early stages of the game it's not necessarily going to work well later on. The allies are not really going to be trying invasions of the Marshalls etc without CV superiority. How will this tactic play if the allied CVs are close by. The allies are also likely to have a surface fleet or two spare to welcome your bombards at this stage and he can afford a crippled BB better than you can afford a crippled CA.

[Speedysteve]

ORIGINAL: Hoplosternum

That's a very interesting scenario and sounds a great game. But I am curious to know who initiated a fight over the Aleutians? I can't imagine that the game rewards a Vancouver or Bust strategy by the IJ and the air attrition must be even worse than usual for him [:)]

For a full description of events have a peek at my AAR: tm.asp?m=1037286

But in short:

I only planned a quick invasion of both Attu/Kiska (which Faber had taken off me). Neither of us knew what the other was planning and then BHAM on the first day of my sortie from Dutch Harbour my CV's bump into his mini-KB = he loses a couple of CV's.

From then on its been a slugfest. His LBA from Kiska/Attu was mainly nullified by my CV's and BB bombardments (a couple of hits on capital ships sustained by me) but then I lost Yorktown to an I-boat and have suffered moderate damage to 3 x BB's fom LBA.

Mines and CD's at Attu caused 10-15 ships to sink outright.

Attu was no walk in the park and it took my men a few weeks to surpress and take the place.

Faber has evac'd his remaining men from there.

Since then i've slowly built up Attu on a shoestring whilst Faber has been trying to get stuff into Kiska by the looks of it. He also tried bombarding Attu but some (in the nick of time reinforcements) Avengers/Beauforts put a couple of fish into Yamato which has made him think twice.

All-in-all it was supposed to be a quick and pain free exercise on my part but has turned into a prolonged campaign with us both committing more ships and planes. At least thats how I see it.

Certainly hasn't been 1 sided. We've both lost CV's, suffered damage to BB's, lost numerous support ships to various offensive causes. Only in air losses has he lost about 1000 planes to my 350-400 I would have thought so far.

[Ron Saueracker]

ORIGINAL: Speedy

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker
Why do this at all? Just run express train strategic naval bombardment missions. After all, naval bombardments are strategic in effect in this game. As good or better than bombers.

You're not happy with the game Ron I take it? [:D]

Some things I love but the guys have made some great points regarding the all or nothing nature of the game system. I'm really surprised that regions were not given minimum force levels like in Manchukuo. The wimpy PP system does not do squat after the first six months because HQs are basically toothless. I have no problem operating SE ASIA HQd units in SoPac or wherever. So inevitably, because there are no limits whatsoever (from stacking to AV capacity...) players just plop everything on one hex and roll. How like "Total Annihilation" or some other loser RealTimeStrategy game this becomes. Hogwash and inexcusable for a game supposedly this complex.

Seriously, give me a reason why the Allied player need to have any ship, air or land unit on the West Coast by Jan 43?

[Ron Saueracker]

ORIGINAL: Hoplosternum

ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker

And if/when the allies do manage to get a foothold on one of your island chains do you keep fighting the air battles and just keep feeding in hastily trained squadrons in to the meat grinder. Or do you abandon what is left? i.e. do you accept a new attrition point with the pay off that you are at least trying to hold the allies up for longer.

Why do this at all? Just run express train strategic naval bombardment missions. After all, naval bombardments are strategic in effect in this game. As good or better than bombers.

While this is not a bad tactic for the Japanese in the early stages of the game it's not necessarily going to work well later on. The allies are not really going to be trying invasions of the Marshalls etc without CV superiority. How will this tactic play if the allied CVs are close by. The allies are also likely to have a surface fleet or two spare to welcome your bombards at this stage and he can afford a crippled BB better than you can afford a crippled CA.

One of the major points of this thread was the very brief period gamewise where opposing forces were relatively equal. Mid 42-43. Once the Allies get CV superiority, this balance evaporates, and despite the fact that the respawn feature cuts the heart out of the ESSEX class building plan, this parity still only lasts maybe a month or so due to all the other excesses the game allows (4E bombers from hell etc). But until the US gets CV superiority (or massive amounts of high performance fighters to LRCAP the surface TFs), the Allies can't really stop all these bombardments because the IJN can mass LBA armed with torps and gut the defending TFs.

[Mynok]

The game turns 180 degrees when Corsairs arrive. Once that happens, the Allies can cover anything with a powerful surface force so long as there are Corsairs in range to run LRCAP over it. It becomes a simple island hopping equation at that point, which means the only thing the carriers are required for is getting over distances longer than Corsair range.

[Dereck]

ORIGINAL: Sardaukar

ORIGINAL: dereck

Actually, I've found that it shock attacks every turn until it captures the base. I can agree with the first turn but once ashore I don't see why it has to keep shock attacking.

I seem to remember that units have to shock attack every turn they are *landing* troops on atoll. Even though due to bloody nature of shock attacks/atoll combat, it is usually same thing as shock attacking until capture...[;)]

I had ALL my units landed and they were still shock attacking. I can't see any reason to have to shock attack after the initial landing since they'd have beachheads established. Just another wacky thing about this game I don't agree with but that everybody else thinks is just honky dory.

[Sneer]

you mean developers ...?

[Dereck]

ORIGINAL: Mynok


The game turns 180 degrees when Corsairs arrive. Once that happens, the Allies can cover anything with a powerful surface force so long as there are Corsairs in range to run LRCAP over it. It becomes a simple island hopping equation at that point, which means the only thing the carriers are required for is getting over distances longer than Corsair range.

Give me Hellcats over Corsairs anyday. The Hellcat was designed off a captured Japanese zero from the Aleutians and shot down more Japanese planes than any other. It also outclassed the Zero in every category.

[Mynok]

That's certainly a reasonable position for real life. But in the game, Corsairs rule...bigtime.

[Dereck]

ORIGINAL: Mynok


That's certainly a reasonable position for real life. But in the game, Corsairs rule...bigtime.

Not in my modified scenario *evil smile*

[Andy Mac]

ORIGINAL: String

Hm. In my PBEM vs Andy I had the opportunity to take my time with fortifying my perimiter.

I built up every base in the marshalls and gilberts and garrisoned them heavily. Gilberts had 6-700 AP's on them each. By april '43 andy hadn't invaded them (infact I still held canton) and I think he never would have invaded them anyway, as he tried to advance into SRA through northern australia. We had our nice little guadalcanal campaign there.

I also fortified solomons, but not that heavily, as I would have run out of ground units, and I wasn't prepared to commit my strategic reserve of 5 divs. I did put troops on every (1) and greater airfield capacity island.. or was it (2)?? there aren't many of them in solomons anyway. Shortlands and Lunga were my big strongpoints. As I still held Noumea, Efate and Luganville then I thought I had enough warning time to deploy forces into the area. The latter three bases were very lightly garrisoned. about 50 AP each.

IF Andy hadn't done a lot of small commando raids into southern SRA then he would have met about 150 AP's on timor and a few snlf units here or there, luckily I managed to throw in some reinforcements before he invaded in force.


Andy can elaborate on his offensive plans, but I don't see how he could have advanced through marshalls/gilberts without taking heavy losses. Marianas would have been even worse.

After the debacles at Canton I had a new series of ops planned basically wait for Hellcats and some replacement carriers then go hell for leather for Singapore from North and South (I had an army of half a million men marching on Mandalay when String surrendered [:'(][:'(])

[:D]

[Andy Mac]

After Operation Goblin hits home against PZB ill let you all know whether atoll combat is possible or not.....god I really do pick some crap names......