General Patton vs. larryfulkerson Focus Pacific #75

[larryfulkerson]

You should have some more troops in Canton that you can move south if you're having trouble dislodging his defenders in Hong Kong.

My troops are short on supply in the Hong Kong hex so they are just defending for now. But you're correct about Canton and the
surplus troops there. I have the 104th division or is it the 145th division I don't remember but one of them is headed for Hong Kong
as we speak. I don't expect to have much trouble taking down Hong Kong though. I'd really like to clear out the enemy swiftly so I
can sweep the mines and start using the port as a hub.

EDIT: It's the 104th division.

[larryfulkerson]

I guess that not even a level - 5 port is large enough to rearm the main guns on a BB. My BB has been sitting in port overnight and
still this morning it's not re-armed. I may have to take it to the home islands to find a port big enough. It's either that or move an
AKE to Pescadores to see if that helps.

EDIT: I have only one AKE in the fleet at the moment and it's at Hiroshima and I've just issued orders for it to move to the
Pescadores base. I've got more ships converting to AKE but they aren't finished converting yet.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's the ships I'm converting to another type. I felt like the AKE would be useful in many places so I'm making a lot of them. I need
to have enough AS's to last the rest of the war so I'm making more than one of those. And I just felt like making an AG to see what
difference it makes.

[larryfulkerson]

Back in post #96 I noticed out loud that there seemed to be duplicate names in the database and I think maybe I've figured it out
by looking around the game some more. I'm thinking I've found evidence that there's two entries in the database to cover the two
different models of mine, those available now and those available in '42.

EDIT: And yes, this image is from my anti-AI game in which I'm the Allies. Not trying a switch-up on you guys or anything. I've
sent my moves to Brian about two hours ago and now I'm practicing my gameplay by playing an anti-AI game. I'm on turn 83.

[larryfulkerson]

I put this together for me to better be able to visualize the airframe / engine situation so I cut and pasted the airplanes we're
producing now and the cities producing those planes and what engine they use and the cities that produce that engine. It's
starting to come together for me. I'm producing engines I don't need to and there's the Ha-35 that I need more cities to produce
etc. I'm getting organized.

[larryfulkerson]

So analyzing all that information plus the engines I already have in the pools and what I'm building right now, I've changed some
of the engine factories so they produce the Ha-35 and turned off production for those engines that are adequate in the pools
already. I'll have to keep an eye on it and adjust as necessary. I'm aiming for about 100 engines in each pool except for those
planes that aren't needed at the front all that much, or very often, or in great numbers.

[larryfulkerson]

I'm running into a tiny problem at Hong Kong. I'm outnumbered and he's got vehicles and arty coming out of his ears and I'm thinking
I might need another division present before I can start taking down the fortress as it were. I'm bombarding but not much is happening
as a result. More is better.

[larryfulkerson]

I've just now discovered that I have some ships that have had their spotter plane shot down. D'oh. So I'll have to put into
port to change them out or something.

[larryfulkerson]

I captured Miri in the afternoon of the 12th of Dec and here it is the morning of the 15th of Dec and I'm finally only just now getting
around to dispatching some tankers to Miri to start harvesting the fuel and oil there. I posted a unit of Zero's there to ward off the
enemy air power because Brian is surely going to be running some raids into there. Trying to destroy my stuff as well as the facilities
there. I would. I've got lots of engineers there as busy as beavers repairing the damage and expanding the port and airfield. I'm
toying with shipping in some shipping engineers to help with the loading and unloading of the goodies. I just checked just now and
I don't have any shipping engineers at Cam Ranh Bay and there they are definately needed what with all the traffic through there. I'll
have to hunt some down and ship them in here asap.

[larryfulkerson]

I found a fairly good shipping unit at Samah that isn't doing anything tremendous at the moment so I'll put together a TF to run up there
and pick that unit up and carry them down to CRB where they are badly needed. I'm wondering what kind of boost I'll get from the
deployment of some shipping engineers to CRB. I'm hoping to double the rate it's moving now somehow.

[larryfulkerson]

I've got the 292nd Inf Div loading on amphibious ships as we speak and I'm intending them for Lingayen to help the takedown of
Manila. And after Manila falls I'll use them somewhere else, maybe to try to take Rangoon. Although I'm hoping to have Rangoon
before too much longer. Maybe two months game time.

[larryfulkerson]

I've been running lots of night bombing raids on Singapore and so far it's not been getting any hits on the infrastructure. I've even
got a raid on the city itself targeting the HI factories. It's going to take a lot more pounding before a dent will start to show. I've been
pushing and shoving at the conflicted bases and more troops are headed inbound and I've got a TF headed for Mersing to try to
trap a lot of Allied units north of Singapore. My probem has been that I don't always send enough troops to take out the target. I'm
finding I have to send a follow up TF with more troops yet. And then THOSE ships have to go through the gauntlet of CD guns and
all the rest just to get those troops ashore. It's costly in equipment and troops and time. And I find that I don't always ship Engineers
with the assault troops and therefore have to make a second trip to deliver them. I'm slowly learning how to do this assault thing.

[larryfulkerson]

I've been concentrating on getting RES from the nearby bases to the Home Islands. And when they start running low I'll have to
branch out to the outlayers that have RES. I'm counting on getting a lot of RES from Nauru island and Ocean island once I capture
them. And I'm going to have to start planning for capturing Singkawang for the tactical position and Palembang for the oil. The oil
levels have been dropping on the home islands and it's almost time to start to worry about the oil. I've been getting some from Port
Arthur but it's only got a little. Shikuua has some oil but it's far away. Boela has oil but it's in range of Darwin's air cover so I'll need
some fighters there before ships can come in a park there. I'm thinking about bombarding the airfield at Darwin to neutralize that
hot spot for a little while. Just long enough to get a ship in there grab some oil and vacate the premises.

[larryfulkerson]

Brian has sent me an email with his moves. He says he's not back from vacation just yet but soon
and I'll have some updates for you guys shortly.

[SqzMyLemon]

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

I'm counting on getting a lot of RES from Nauru island and Ocean island once I capture
them.

There are sources of resources much closer to the Home Islands than these two guano infested islands. It's your fuel, waste it as you like. [;)]

[:-]

[larryfulkerson]

There are sources of resources much closer to the Home Islands than these two guano infested islands. It's your fuel, waste it as you like.

One of my main hubs is Truk and Nauru and Ocean Island aren't all that far from Truk so I thought that I could ship supplies and
fuel to Truk and on the return trip I'd carry some oil and RES. Sort of, pay for the trip, so to speak. Boela has some oil and I very
much want that too. But it's out of the way as well and there's going to be some technical logistical problems getting ships in and
out of that area without being attacked by Allied air power. That area is going to need some fighters at any rate.

I'm getting a good look around after having watched the combat replay and overall things are proceeding on schedule and I have no
complaints. There's a lot of troops still inbound for their target destinations so invasions are ongoing and I'm having to scramble to
keep track of which places need engineers yet and which ones need AA units, and how much supply are they needing now and when
will another load be needed and should I lay some mines here and so on.

This image is a shot of the PI now that I've been there a while. The fighting has gotten as far south as Lingayen and the Allies slightly
outnumber the Japs there and the struggle is ongoing. There was a bombardment by Jap BB's that helped a lot and I've got more
troops inbound so that will help. The supplies are starting to filter south from Aparri into the countryside and I've got engineers
following the sound of the fighting repairing what they can. The port and airfield at Aparri has a high priority.

I've been pounding Manila by night to avoid most of the fighters and to keep the number of forts as low as I can. The troops from
Legaspi are inching up the peninsula but they will arrive too late to help out much until they get to Manila, about a week from now.

[larryfulkerson]

Meanwhile, this is what's been happening at Tokyo. I'm running really low on RES there. I get a shipment every once in a while but
not nearly enough yet. I've diverted all the incoming shipments of RES to the nearest port to the pickup point and not many are
running into Tokyo anymore. looks like I need to turn on the arrival of RES at the Home Islands to Tokyo again.

[larryfulkerson]

Hakodate passed through one of those reality distortion zones recently. It caused the downpour of RES there and a
large amount of oil to be deposited there. I have no theory for this surge except for maybe the stockpiling of things
got turned off somewhere and the pile is spreading out to other cities. I'm not sure that's accurate either.

[larryfulkerson]

I'm posting this economic chart here so I can refer to it later. I'm trying to monitor a lot of things simultaneously.

[larryfulkerson]

I'm trying to give Brian a good game so my policy has been to take risks and be agressive and take the war to him and it's starting
to show up in the number of ships that are damaged this turn. Actually, they weren't ALL damaged this turn but a lot of them were.
This is not the ships under repair, this is the active ships. And you can see for yourself the carnage that's going on. A lot of
subs are returning to base early because their shake down cruise showed minor damage just getting on station. I don't like to run
my subs with damage because it degrades their combat performance and I need them to be on line and ready to go constantly. So
far there's been enough subs to fix the broke ones, send out the fixed ones, stand down the arriving ones that are broke, otherwise
they go right back out with full fuel and max reloads. Kwaj. had an AS already there at the start of the scenario if I recall correctly.
But it didn't have an AKE and I thought it needed one so there's one there now. It's keeping up with the demand so far. Kwaj. has
been going through a LOT of supplies here lately. It must cost some supply to repair the small boats.