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After spending several hours reading (or maybe glancing and read the most important) through this thread I must say I´m impressed of the game you and your opponent gives us. Even if the evening has gone into late night it´s enjoyable to read.

I´m looking forward to see your next move, and I can only imagine how you feel when things finaly looks better for you. Your opponent seems so offensiv that if I didn´t know better I would think he aimed at pushing you all the way back to the american east coast.

Since I´m just began to play this game I have no clue about the limits yet,
but is it somehow possible that he could manage to succesfully attack and invade the Hawaii islands?

Regards and good luck!

Sorry for the lack of updates guys. I have relatives visiting so the time available has been very much limited.
 
Thus meaning that next usual update will be on late wednesday night when things calm down.
 
We have managed to get some turns done though. Nothing significant hasn't happen as expected. The grinding at China and Burma have been main developments.
 
My carriers are repairing and I will get CV Hornet back within 20 days or so. The damage repairs on CV Wasp will take around 80 days still. After that things are looking up.
 
Sardaukar: First I agree that there are way too much red on the map. That colour kind of gives me headaches these days! [:D]
 
I can promise that by the end of 1943 this colour effect will be reduced though and by 1946 it has pretty much vanished!
 
The things you described sound all too familiar. The SYS damage levels are real killers in AE. I had POW sailing at full speed (not the thing to do) towards Colombo and it had 90 SYS damage before it arrived there.
 
I have been somewhat more lucky with other damaged vessels. The thing to do is to use "cruise speed" and the chance of survival is quite good.
 
The "lost" submarines were also found. They kind of "warped" towards Hawaji so this must have been related to the fall of Mid
 
Lord_Martin: Welcome to the forums. I actually noticed your threads on the main forum and I can say that the game is well worth the money spent. Also the forum members are mostly very helpful so the are no "dumb" questions to be asked.
 
Thank you! We had earlier clash in classic witp so I pretty much knew what I signed up for. He is very skilled player and most importantly reliable one. When/If you start PBEM it is the single most important factor.
 
At the moment still repairing and training. I wohn't go into 1/2 focused efforts and if allied make big mistake now than it will take long time to recover.
So, patience for now and calculated moves are in order.

The biggest battles are yet to come and most likely when these start it will "kaboom" all the way into 1946.
 
He has been very offensive and taken into consideration what he gained this was good move. Whether or not it will be good move in the longterm remains to be seen. I doubt he would have gone further than Anchorage though since moving to WC triggers substantial allied reinforcements which is suicide for the japanese player. Having said that I think he was aiming of seizing Alaska though.
 
The Hawajian operation is doable in my mind but this has to commence "early" 1942's. Now, it would be complete suicide to even try advance there. I say this because allied really lack fighters at the beginning and due to CD guns glitch this operation could succeed.
 
The next update is do on wednesday night as said.

I did promise and update last Wednesday but unfortunately things did not go as planned.

The relatives stayed extra day and now I'am in middle of finalizing the upgrade into Windows 7 operating system. This is almost done.

Here is an brief summary of latest developments. This is the "peace" time around Pacific which will not last that long.


China (December 14th - 28th 1942)

On the 20th december japanese army launched yet another ground assault near Kweiyang...

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

Ground combat at 75,50

Japanese Deliberate attack

Attacking force 186329 troops, 1665 guns, 813 vehicles, Assault Value = 6780

Defending force 137756 troops, 823 guns, 0 vehicles, Assault Value = 4744

Japanese adjusted assault: 1770

Allied adjusted defense: 6589

Japanese assault odds: 1 to 3

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

Japanese ground losses:
24081 casualties reported
Squads: 87 destroyed, 1326 disabled
Non Combat: 89 destroyed, 1272 disabled
Engineers: 5 destroyed, 118 disabled
Vehicles lost 182 (2 destroyed, 180 disabled)


Allied ground losses:
6968 casualties reported
Squads: 24 destroyed, 399 disabled
Non Combat: 77 destroyed, 328 disabled
Engineers: 2 destroyed, 16 disabled
Guns lost 3 (2 destroyed, 1 disabled)


Assaulting units:
69th Division
13th/A Division
14th RGC Temp. Division
11th Indpt Infantry Regiment
10th Tank Regiment
104th Division
13th Indpt Infantry Regiment
41st Division
35th Division
110th Division
22nd/A Division
39th Division
3rd/C Division
5th Tank Regiment
1st Ind.Mixed Brigade
6th Division
12th Tank Regiment
5th Armored Car Co
12th Ind.Mixed Brigade
37th Division
68th Ind.Infantry Battalion
116th Division
26th Engineer Regiment
22nd/B Division
12th Indpt Infantry Regiment
3rd/B Division
63rd Division
26th Recon Regiment
40th Division
51st Recon Regiment
13th/B Division
2nd Ind. Mountain Gun Regiment
21st Mortar Battalion
15th Ind.Medium Field Artillery Regiment
6th Medium Field Artillery Regiment
5th Ind.Hvy.Art Battalion
4th Mortar Battalion
5th RF Gun Battalion

Defending units:
28th Chinese Corps
14th Chinese Corps
70th Chinese Corps
4th Chinese Corps
39th New Chinese Division
46th Chinese Corps
94th Chinese Corps
53rd Chinese Corps
16th Chinese Corps
2nd Chinese Corps
10th Chinese Corps
37th Chinese Corps
8th Route Army
59th Chinese Corps
20th Chinese Corps
18th Chinese Corps
36th Chinese Corps
76th Chinese Corps
85th Chinese Corps
79th Chinese/B Corps
60th Chinese/B Corps
11th Group Army
4th War Area
9th Group Army
35th Group Army

...the assault failed and inflicted heavy casualties to the enemy. This hasn't stopped them from trying though. After this battle japanese have conducted daily ground bombardments here inflicting some 200-500 casualties per day.

In addition to these japanese lba bombers have been very active here. There are several raids per day conducted around china. In grand total of maybe 250-400 planes participating in these raids.

Last turn the ground combat revealed that Dave has also pushed extra infantry units into battle near Kweiyang. The assaults worth revealed there are now around 7500av worth of infantry here. This is massive force.

I have send in extra reinforcements too. Currently there are some 4800av worth of chinese defending the terrain here.

I do expect an immediate ground assault here when next turn arrives. Here is an pic from the current situation.

Pacific (december 14th - 28th 1942)


No major action to report elsewhere. Dave is continuing of being very aggressive with his airforce at Burma. Next turn though there are 350 allied participating on the airstrikes againts Akyab. Hopefully things go smoothly.

At Australia we managed to intercept some Nell's and Betty's. In total around 40 bombers reported lost. I think he made an good trade here though since he managed to severely damage the resource centers at Cairns and Clonburry. Thus making allied movement towards north that much harder.

I'am training pilots. Repairing and upgradings ships and submarines. These things take time but we are not in bad shape at all.

CV Hornet should be back in action within 2-3 weeks time while CV Wasp is still 2-3 months off. The god thing is that were recieved a bunch of CVE's which are equipped with combat ready aircraft.

The map summarizes the latest developments.

Small question but why is bombing the resource centers making allied movement harder?
I thought that resource centers didn't matter for the allies as they do not have a economy.

ORIGINAL: Athius

Small question but why is bombing the resource centers making allied movement harder?
I thought that resource centers didn't matter for the allies as they do not have a economy.

Those resources feed aussie light industry that makes supply. Unless Aztez is badly supply short in Oz he should be fine tho. Doesnt directly impact movement at all though as you said. killing 40 netties is way more important than a kangaroo farm in the middle of no-where [:D]

Athius: I was refering to the supply production that Rob described. It is nothing major though but every little thing adds up.
 
The good thing is that supply situation is solid in Australia. I have plenty of it in southern oz.
 
Rob: You read my mind as stated above. I liked seeing those Nell's and Betty's destroyed since I hate the range they got even with tweaked effectiviness now with AE.
 
..than again being a good sport I sacrificed some +70 bombers at Burma. Even the odds so to speak! [:D]

China (december 28th - 31st 1942)


The intelligence information was solid and two assaults was made near Kweiyang. The first one was launched december 28th...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ground combat at 75,50

Japanese Deliberate attack

Attacking force 214874 troops, 2017 guns, 855 vehicles, Assault Value = 7694

Defending force 141678 troops, 877 guns, 0 vehicles, Assault Value = 4860

Japanese adjusted assault: 2844

Allied adjusted defense: 8539

Japanese assault odds: 1 to 3

Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), supply(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
21189 casualties reported
Squads: 83 destroyed, 1235 disabled
Non Combat: 37 destroyed, 970 disabled
Engineers: 7 destroyed, 160 disabled
Vehicles lost 169 (68 destroyed, 101 disabled)


Allied ground losses:
10119 casualties reported
Squads: 44 destroyed, 535 disabled
Non Combat: 22 destroyed, 666 disabled
Engineers: 6 destroyed, 16 disabled
Guns lost 3 (0 destroyed, 3 disabled)

...another massive bloodbath with japanese losing +20 000 men either dead or wounded. These chinese corps are putting up one hell of an resistance here.
The second assault was made on december 30th 1942. The results were even better for the chinese army...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ground combat at 75,50

Japanese Deliberate attack

Attacking force 199735 troops, 2013 guns, 782 vehicles, Assault Value = 6612

Defending force 135381 troops, 875 guns, 0 vehicles, Assault Value = 4324

Japanese adjusted assault: 1297

Allied adjusted defense: 6922

Japanese assault odds: 1 to 5

Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), supply(-)
Attacker: disruption(-)

Japanese ground losses:
23574 casualties reported
Squads: 58 destroyed, 1605 disabled
Non Combat: 95 destroyed, 1331 disabled
Engineers: 15 destroyed, 103 disabled
Vehicles lost 129 (39 destroyed, 90 disabled)


Allied ground losses:
4782 casualties reported
Squads: 29 destroyed, 387 disabled
Non Combat: 22 destroyed, 461 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 8 disabled
Guns lost 3 (0 destroyed, 3 disabled)

These two assaults total some +40 000 enemy troops destroyed/disabled. I guess the 1:5 odds could have bring even greater disaster to him.
Now we just must keep this line since he has +200 000 men here fighting on.

Burma (december 28th - 31st 1942)


The party days are over at Burma too for the japanese side. As stated US and RAF airforces launched combined strike againts the airfield at Akyab on december 29th.

The airfield at Akyab is pretty much done deal. Nice to see we destroyed some Tojo's on the ground too. Actual damage done here is hard to estimate but the this is no longer an operational airfield for sure.

That was the good news part. After neutralizing Akyab US and RAF bombers set sights on Magwe Oilfields. The end results +70 bombers downed with only minor hits on the target.

Why? Simply because we simply encountered do not fly out escorts day. This has been there since classic witp and happened. Somewhat frustrating since I have build up for this by training these crews. We have level 9 airfield at Chittagong so that was not an problem. In classic Witp these things hurt much less than in AE! Hopefully these things are further tweaked in upcoming patch.

Oh well.. another strike is scheduled on january 1st and 2nd. This time there will be +100 fighters flying sweep missions againts Magwe. There will be some ´+60 fighters escorts (hopefully) and around 150 bombers flying as well.

We shall see how this went down. If the strike will go in as planned than the airfield plus oilfield should be toasted at Magwe.

He has some Tojo's, Zero's and Nicks flying CAP there. Around 100 fighters in total.

Which kind of bombers did you lost?

The code includes lots of real life occurrences, like escorts losing contact with bombers, failing to form up, weather, etc. But when they just plain decide to stay home that is very maddening and, I think, quite unrealistic.

Sweep missions have a habit of 'sometimes' coming along at the same time the bombers and escorts do. so maybe a few sweeps ordered at the same time as escorts might give you 2 chances of having escorts (albeit at the risk that only 1/2 fly).

I've taken to always doing a sweep with bombing missions. I'll set the sweep for an altitude sweet spot and higher than the enemy's a/c like to fight and run them in along with some escorts that are at the same alt as the bombers.  I've had good luck with that. 

To be really safe, do you sweeps one or two days before. Sometimes sweeps follow the bombing attack with nasty things happening to your bombers. Couple of sucessful sweeps and you won't need much escort.

Yep doing sweeps ahead of any attacks is prudent. I was speaking directly to during the bombing attack as Rob mentioned.

Fishbed: The losses were mixed bag.  I think the biggest ones were to Blenheims but all the squadrons took an beating. Even few of them have now 0 aircraft at their disposal.

We actually lost some +130 aircraft to his +40 ones last turn too. More details on the losses tomorrow since it is getting late back here.

Rob: I know it somewhat risky but this is something that comes from the classic witp. As said no problems IF the replacements rates were not tweaked so badly.

As said to Fishbed there another bad turn over at Burma. Basically I had the following setup...

Sweeps = P40K's and some Hurricanes flying at 24 000 feet. There were around 100 fighters set on this mission.
Bombers = All set on 15 000 feet. Mostly on oilfield strike but few were set on airfield strike.
Escorts = All set on 22 000 feet.

What happened last turn:

1. The sweep missions did fly out first. I speak on "missions" since they were splitted in 3-4 of 25 aircraft each. Thus leading miserable failure since the CAP was up in full strenght in all of these assaults.
2. Thus the the sweep mission failure had bonus effect. The bombers took off and had some escorts but this didn't amount to much either since these were yet again uncordinated strikes. Few of them had proper escorts (btw the escorts did not shoot down single enemy fighter if the combat report is to believed) but this did not hinder japanese shooting down allied fighters and bombers.
3. There were medium size unescorted strikes launched too and you know how these will end up.

In total we lost 130-150 aircraft and japanese losses were 30-40 aircraft. This is the summary from the 2nd strike againts Magwe. These were no rookie pilots either since most of them had been trained.

I used the Chittagong airfield which is level 9. Simply because if I had split these up between many separate airfield I can guarantee that the results would not have been better.

Basically all in all we lost anywhere between 200-260 aircraft while the japanese lost around 40-60 aircraft. Bad, bad and than again bad result.

I can say two things about the air to air warfare...

a) Fly your fightes at MAXIUM alltitude on the sweeps. No matter what the figures indicate in aircraft info. In AE in all comes down to who fly the highest and have good dice rolls. Alltitude is the only thing that matter.
b) Engage, engage than again engage even more. I know you are playing as japanese so keep on banging the allied side. You can outproduce the allied replacements in whole 1942 and most likely in 1943 too. Yeah, you take losses but than again so what?  The allied pilot experience is not that much higher and the Tojo's, Zero's can tangle up the allied fighters. You also have the production system benefiting yourself. Even with high losses you can do even more harm to the allied side.

I have been following quite a few AAR's. In my opinion the only ones that allied side has been succesfull have had the common nomination that japanese have not kept engaging with fighters + bombers. Even with high losses allied cannot keep up with the fixed replacements given.

My advide ... engage + max. alltitude = You should be doing more than fine.

offenseman: Basically you are saying the same I noticed. Max. alltitude is the key. Everything else comes "third". I hope it would not be so but it is really.

The problems with sweeps is that even these can "split". I had few 20-30 fighter sweeps and his CAP was numbering 50-70's. So, each of them got short end of the stick.

Sweeps are prudent but keep them at Max. alltitude. I should have max. out all of the P40K's and Hurricanes doing these missions.

crsutton: I know that is good advice. Allthough, sometimes the element of suprise should be decieding factor and it was here. I had the proper lvl 9 airfield etc at my disposal.

Unfortunately, things went down very badly. I know you "lacking behind" so take the advice about MAX. alltitude very seriously. It is the key and IF your opponent tries to engage blow by blow than mass your fighters. You cannot win the attrition in AE. At least not until late 1943 or 1944.

witpqs: Absolutely. Those events should not happen much or at least very rarely. Nothing knew here since I guess all of us have experienced these in the classic witp and AE +100 times.

The key diffrence is that in Witp you could afford to see these but not with AE.

These past "4 days" have really hurt the RAF and US bombers staged at India. I don't whether it is worth the effort to train these squadrons manually  and it will take longtime to see them at full strenght again.

I have been following quite a few AAR's. In my opinion the only ones that allied side has been succesfull have had the common nomination that japanese have not kept engaging with fighters + bombers.

Well, the Allies have a choice about whether to be engaged also. If the Allied player fights forward and meets the enemy's strength head on then, obviously, they are going to get disproportionately attrited. It is player choice. In the situations you refer to the Allied players are making the mistake of engaging the Japanese when they probably shouldn't and are paying the price for their sub-optimal choices.

IF your opponent tries to engage blow by blow than mass your fighters.

And following this advice will have crsutton end up in precisely the same situation as all the other Allied players who get hordes of poorly trained pilots blown out of the sky throughout 1942.

Just because the enemy sweeps a base doesn't mean you HAVE to engage. In my game vs 1EyedJacks I would say I actually contest less than 10% of his sweep or escorted missions.

Aztez, as the allied player what is your opinion on the performance of the oscar and the Tojo?

There has been a lot of debate which one of the two was the better fighter (oscar IIa / IIb or the Tojo IIa) and some people believe that the oscar is superior because of its arnament (the oscar's 12.6mm are center lined and more accurate then the F mounted 12.6 mm's of the Tojo and the additional 2 7.7's don't seem much on paper) and the oscar gets armor earlier. The Tojo has the superior climb rate and max speed but the oscar is more manouvrable.
You have been fighting these planes for some time now, what plane do you think is performing better?


Thanks, Jasper

Nemo121: I think we have an misunderstanding here since I pretty much concur what you are saying.

No, you do not want to intervene nor engage japanese missions but when you do than do it with force.

When I talked about engaging as much as possible I was saying that as good strategy for the japanese side.

Athius: Well, my vote goes for Tojo's. Personally I have had harder times againts them.

It is actually somewhat hard to say since I have no idea on pilot experience he has had on these aircraft.

It was first time I engaged Tojo's in Burma and they performed well even againts the Hurricanes.

My vote goes for Tojo.

China (january 1st - 4th 1943)


Dave has kept bombing my troops via air and artillery. The losses has been mediocre so nothing to worry about.

I have flown recon missions in the southern china and it seems there are sizeable troop movement near Kweiyang.

If this intel is correct Dave has some 4500av worth of units there while large stack has moved further south.

Either he is resting them or reorganizing and given up on the push towards Kweiyang.

There are two enemy units spotted behind the frontlines. I have already given orders to strike againts these formations.