Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: rader

What's with the My Little Pony? [:'(]

Ohh you hadn't herd?.. GreyJoy likes hairy redheads

For the last few weeks, I noticed that Greyjoy was leaving lots of valuable ships loitering in the Hokkaido/Kurile area, all in range of Japanese land based air from Ominato (lvl 9 airfield). A couple of recon flights over the Kuriles showed many CVEs (but no major CVs) docked at Uruppu and Etorofu Jima. Battleships and numerous transports were spotted at Bihoro. A battlecruiser and numberous cruisers were based at Hokkaido. None of these, appart from Hokkaido, appeared to have sufficient fighter cover to stop a major coordinated attack (maybe 100-150 fighters at each base).

Thus, yesterday, the Japanese high command decided to unleash Sakura Sakusen - "operation cherry blossom".

Since the strategic bombing raid at Tsu the turn previous resulted in a lot of allied 4Es damaged, I figured they would be out of action for a turn or two. And Greyjoy has demonstrated a pattern of 1 day of bombing followed by a couple turns of rest. I therefore decided that I could borrow almost the entire Japanese fighter force for the operation.

Apart from a few fighter-bomber groups and a couple of Tony groups, all Japanese fighters and pretty much the entire land-based bomber force was involved in the operation. Additionally, elements of the KB joined the strike, positioned 8 hexes from both Etorofu and Uruppu, and in range of a few other bases (Kushiro, Kunashiri, Shikotan). I was a bit concerned that the allied fleet might react into range (7 hexes), but I was happy to see that it didn't - thus we got off the mythical 1-sided long range Japanese strike.

Waves of Japanese land-based and carrier-based bombers escorted by the entire Japanese airforce struck, mainly at Uruppu and Bihoro. Many attacks got chewed up (over 1100 aircraft and many aircrews lost), but enough got through to inflict some spectacular damage. There were the odd hits on CAs, CLs, DDs, APs, AKs, TKs, etc., but the big ticket items by far were CVEs - over 30 reported sunk (!). Does anyone know how many he has at this point? I think he gets 100 or so during the war, but that's got to be the majority of them for mid-1944.

Interestingly, none of the kamikazes (about 100) even made it through the CAP, but the conventional bombers (Bettys & Frances') did extremely well.

Now the KB is going to run back to safety at high speed - hopefully before the Allied CVs can show up to spank it.

Bravo! Much better than fighting a battle of attrition in the air! A calculated risk that seems to have payed off.

Holy Cow! Well done Sir.

Congratulations Rader, great move and even though it shouldn't change the outcome of the game it might shift your very slim odds a little bit, if nothing else at least for psychological reasons.

Heading off to the other AAR to see how the AFBs take it... [;)]

Well played.

Might I say it is not a very Merry Christmas in the other AAR.  Well played.  A good opponent got sloppy and you took full advantage.  I hope it has been a great boost to your moral.  Excellent work sir

ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

Might I say it is not a very Merry Christmas in the other AAR.  Well played.  A good opponent got sloppy and you took full advantage.  I hope it has been a great boost to your moral.  Excellent work sir

Well, my aircraft industry is still going down in flames and the enemy is securely established in the Japanese homeland. But at least the loss of CVEs will make it hard for him to support an invasion. We can still throw back the Imperialist Geijin.

Happy winter soltice for all! From now on the days are going to get longer for us Northerner Hemispherians. Everyone but the Aussies, Kiwis, South Africans, South Americans, and Antarcticans.

Just counted the allied reinforcements and he gets a total of around 96 CVEs. Only have to do that 3 times before starting on the CVLs and CVs... He only gets about 50 of those. [8|]

Well done,
 
Now step back a bit and look for the next chink in the armour.
 
I reckon, maybe, that there might be an exodus of excess shipping heading back to the West Coast, surely he cant cover everything now thioose CVE are gone.
 
 

I won't say too much, as I'm reading both side's mail if you know what I mean, but very well done, Rader!  

Whohohoho--- Santa Clause is coming to your town!

That is most astonishing counterattack ive ever seen. Banzai!

You suprised not only GJ, but all of us (you know what im talking about!).

If i may advise you, but its obvious you dont need advices, dont let him reorganise! If you have the a chance - and i belive you have - deliver him another deadly punch.

BANZAI!!!

I'm looking at the reported allied a/c losses ... not sure he lost that many CVE's.  I tallied only enough a/c to account for maybe 10 -15 sunk (I think the allied CVE's hold 30-35 a/c, correct?).  I think FOW will cut that down by 50% or more. Of course, you also have the reports to look at ... I'm only looking at the a/c tallies here.

In any case, a huge victory that likely will set your opponent back.  Very well done.

Withdrawn questions thanks to behind the scenes PM crap perpetrated by forum members who don't have the cojones to come out and say something straight.

I, too follow GJs AAR and comment in it, but I would have to agree with you Nemo...100%.

Very, very interesting watching this unfold from day 1 Rader.. makes me nervous in my Scen 2 game against Hartwig and Bill...

ORIGINAL: Nemo121


2. I'm interested in the strategic bombing side of things. I've advised GJ about strategic bombing in his thread. I won't go into the advice here to preserve FOW although, to be fair, I could give it all verbatim without breaching FOW since it isn't as though he is adhering to it much. He's like a cat who gets distracted by shiny reflections on the wall . My question is this.... Could you outline the following:
a) what your monthly fighter production WAS before he began his bombing campaign - ideally broken down by type.
b) what your R&D was ( again broken down by type ).
c) what he has taken out - from reading various reports it looks like somewhere between 400 to 800 airframe factories have been removed from play but I think a lot of them were strikes against R&D factories.
d) What your plane pools are like now.
e) Do you view the strikes on your R&D as having been useful or would you be in more trouble now if instead of R&D factories he had torched the same number of George or Frank or Sam factories instead?

I know that's a bit of detail but even rough answers would make an analysis of the success or failure of the strategic bomber offensive possible. My personal sense is that he had an immense opportunity to knock out your airframe factories producing Georges, Franks and Sams when he first landed but has squandered that possibility through taking too long to begin hitting them, failing to concentrate his bomber forces, failing to focus his forces on a single set of targets and then allowing force on force matchups between his air force and your largest fighter concentrations - all of which benefit you more than him. At this point in time it seems like whoever's nerve holds best will win the strategic bombing campaign --- and that looks likely to be you.

I'd be interested in your analysis though.

I am eager to participate in this discussion, but I have been warned by PM that you guys are very active in giving advice to Greyjoy, so I would prefer not to discuss too much the Japanese views on the strat bombing campaign while it is in progress. I trust you and definitely don't think you would consciously use any of the information to help the Allies, but it is more than possible that it would in some way influence advice Greyjoy receives.

Once the game is finished or farther along so that the information is no longer relevant, I would be thrilled to give detailed information and present my views. I would very much like to have a round table discussion with you and Greyjoy on the subject, as well as anyone else who would like to participate. [:)]

I've advised GJ about strategic bombing but he does his own thing. I think that if you are being told stuff which is casting aspersions it behoves whoever is doing that to do so publicly. Otherwise one could be forgiven for thinking people are taking the opportunity to privately bury the axe in someone's back whilst managing to publicly keep their hands clean - which is the lowest of low things to do.

I'd appreciate you clarifying what you mean by warned and asking whoever it might be if they'd be willing to say publicly what they are obviously so happy to rabbit on about privately with the cloak of anonimity.


As to a strategic bombing discussion. Well I hope you and GJ enjoy it but I'm not interested in being a target for behind the scenes crap.

It wasn't personal or a slander on your character in the least.

Rader on that we differ. I believe ANYONE going behind the scenes to say another forum member can't be trusted with a given answer is maligning them and doing so in the shadows ( which is even worse ). If I thought that someone couldn't be trusted with info I'd say so publicly since I think people have a right to know if they stand accused of something. Maybe they would disagree with me but at least I'd have done them the courtesy of letting them know their accuser and the accusation made.

You may view it differently, that's your right. Now to make it clear this is a load of utter bulls**t I'm going to withdraw from your and GJ's AARs so this "anonymous doer of goods through insinuating untrustworthiness in others" has no further ammunition for his PM asides. I'd thank you not to respond since I would prefer to not be drawn into further responses in this or GJ's AAR.

It might seem excessive to you but I take my integrity very seriously. YOu might think I'm an argumentative so and so or opinionated or contrary or whatever --- and if you do I don't really mind. I may or may not be any or all of those things, everyone's entitled to an opinion. But the one thing I won't stand for is having my integrity and honesty impugned. Anyways, feel free to PM me if you wish but ideally I'd prefer not to be made post here again in reply to a reply of yours. I trust my reason for seeking to show the baselesness through disengagement is clear.

Ok, I'm sorry to hear that you're offended and I respect your decision. I honestly don't think anyone was suggesting that you couldn't be trusted or that your character was in question.

Your opinions and advice will be missed.