Meanwhile, in another corner of the multiverse (No Dmitry Z zone)

[GetAssista]

Lima class AKE can reload Japanese BBs except Yamatoes, and I would be surprised if Dmitry does not have a bunch of those in Nadi. There is still a very real threat of him concentrating his BBs and bombarding the hell out of Suva. Get your subs and PTs ready

Ehehe, we are posting simultaneously ))

[John B.]

Nothing is ever free in Suvagrad![:D]

I picked up 176 VP from this attack alone (or the equivalent of a BB or 1/10th the base value in VP of Suva). The very bad news is that he knocked the fort down a level but my guys are not going easy. I hope he can't do this again next turn and if he can rearm his BBs at Nadi it's all over but the singing. But, if he has to send them north then I'll get a respite. Now we have to see how many bombers he can send over Suva or will my fighters be able to repair?

I seem to have been lucky in that my aritllery, flak and base forces were all very disrupted by the shore bombardments but my infantry regiments were untouched. All of the infantry are at high morale and 0 disruption. Still if he got 1-1 with a level 5 fort he may try again this turn.

My sub luck continues to be awful. I am now up to 22 (yes 22!) misses in a row with the subs that have torpeodoes that explode. It's enough to make me wonder if I'm doing something wrong since they keep missing the slow moving transports, merchant ships etc... The fleet subs with the none exploding torpeodos do hit, and I'm up to 7 duds in a row. That's to be expected. In any event, I'll stop being a WLB (whiney little beeatch) about this topic, for now. [:)]

[John B.]

GetAssista, Alas Suva is not a US base so no PT boats. And, as you can see, my subs have been awful, just awful. We'll see about the BBs this turn!

[GetAssista]

Ouch.. 2 IDs go puff.
You must be joking about immediate assault next day. With these losses (~1/3 of AV) he should be in no shape to do it, needs to recover his fatigue/disruption.
Do you airlift infantry in?

Edit: I recall PTs can be spawned from Cargo TF, do not remember the mechanics though

[John B.]

No, I don't think I killed to IDs based on the combat report but there are a lot of weaker units! My guess is an arty battlion and or small infantry units. Still, those are pretty hefty losses. I did not airlift in any infantry, Suva is just too far away. I've had the infantry there for a long time.

Can I really make PT boats from a Cargo TF? That would be a godsend! I may even have to read the rules to see if I can.

[John B.]

Having actually looked at the rules, you can form PT boats from a transport TF. But, it says you have to load supplies onto the TF and then you click the form PT boat button. But,it does not appear that already loaded supplies can be converted into PT boats. Is that true?

[John B.]

Sadly, the trend is not my friend at Suva. He is able to rearm in BBs to bombard the airfield and all I have is a slew of badly damaged ships with which to contest him. He must have pretty much the entire IJN down at Suva or shuttling back and forth. So, I"m running out the least badly damaged surface ships this turn. Hopefully I won't lose too many to air attack. I have about 33K supply and about 10K more on ships. I do dock a AK each turn to try to unload it before it gets sunk but I'm not sure how much, if any, gets off. It will take awhile for Demitry to get me out of there, but I really can't see a way to get more supply in since it took almost my entire stock of CAs and CLs just to get in the one resupply run.

There is sub supply, but it is not nearly enough to keep up with consumption let alone the losses to bombardments and attacks.

I could bring down the Pearl BBs and use the CVs to try to get them close but the KB will likely be back by the time they get into position.

The biggest disappointment has been my subs down there. I have the best Dutch sub commander on a KX class boat a (80 naval and 75 aggression) and he has never even taken a shot. I'm not sure what happened to the subs but they are basically entirely passive even on turns when Dmitry could not fly any ASW patrols and I would have a high DL on his TF and he would not have any DL against me.

So, assuming that Suva is doomed in the long haul, what next? I should have all my flattops and my BBs and Suva has cost him planes, some ships, and a whole lot of time and effort plus men. Do I lay low for a year or so while I build up in India? It's like there are no targets for fighting letting him build up for a year which I really don't want to do.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: John B.

Having actually looked at the rules, you can form PT boats from a transport TF. But, it says you have to load supplies onto the TF and then you click the form PT boat button. But,it does not appear that already loaded supplies can be converted into PT boats. Is that true?

The supplies must be loaded at a US base and you must have 10K on board + the amount needed to produce the PTs (about 60 supply each).
But before you do that, you need a way of re-arming PT torpedoes, so Suva must have an AGP. Not sure if an AE/AKE can provide torps to PTs, and I doubt Suva is level 7 port.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: John B.

Sadly, the trend is not my friend at Suva. He is able to rearm in BBs to bombard the airfield and all I have is a slew of badly damaged ships with which to contest him. He must have pretty much the entire IJN down at Suva or shuttling back and forth. So, I"m running out the least badly damaged surface ships this turn. Hopefully I won't lose too many to air attack. I have about 33K supply and about 10K more on ships. I do dock a AK each turn to try to unload it before it gets sunk but I'm not sure how much, if any, gets off. It will take awhile for Demitry to get me out of there, but I really can't see a way to get more supply in since it took almost my entire stock of CAs and CLs just to get in the one resupply run.

There is sub supply, but it is not nearly enough to keep up with consumption let alone the losses to bombardments and attacks.

I could bring down the Pearl BBs and use the CVs to try to get them close but the KB will likely be back by the time they get into position.

The biggest disappointment has been my subs down there. I have the best Dutch sub commander on a KX class boat a (80 naval and 75 aggression) and he has never even taken a shot. I'm not sure what happened to the subs but they are basically entirely passive even on turns when Dmitry could not fly any ASW patrols and I would have a high DL on his TF and he would not have any DL against me.

So, assuming that Suva is doomed in the long haul, what next? I should have all my flattops and my BBs and Suva has cost him planes, some ships, and a whole lot of time and effort plus men. Do I lay low for a year or so while I build up in India? It's like there are no targets for fighting letting him build up for a year which I really don't want to do.

Do you have any sub mines? Try mining Nadi and Suva.
If you think the island will be lost use PBYs to airlift out cadres of each unit (Troop Transport - Pick Up Troops setting).

[John B.]

Is that what an AGP is for? I always wondered!

I see, so no PT boats as Suva. It's only a level 5 port.

[John B.]

The mines used to work at Nadi and then stopped when he started doing aggressive mine sweeping (makes sense). He has not done mine sweeping at Suva but the mines there have never hit anything. Good point on the cadres. I also need to watch the air units. I need to withdraw them at some point so I don't lose all the sweet sweet pilots!

[GetAssista]

Bombardments are your main enemy currently, and it is war of attrition. When subs finally start hitting BBs, the latter will be out for a long time. And Japanese ASW is far from reliable and would not be able to make the deep sea hex between Nadi and Suva untenable for subs. Mines occasionally work against bombardments, and might make him set his TFs to stay at a distance when bombarding. Try to get PTs to the front in any way possible, they may end up arriving in time. Load up fast AKs at Pearl and run them to Suva. If you have any bases left nearby, create PTs from cargo TF there then run them in. You have inflicted a lot of damage to IJN and IJA already to justify your troops there, and the siege is far from over.

Also, if you beat Dmitry too hard at Suva he might throw in the towel just like he did in MrKane's match. Think if you really need this game to end this early

[John B.]

It is a war of attrition but right now it's good money after bad. His planes can get out to a range of 15 or so which means he can sink transports before they can get into close range.

There is a smidgen of hope in that he ignored my airfield for two turns. A couple of more and I can smash his planes again and, dare I hope, fly in dive bombers to hit his ships in port. But, that depends on him not bombarding. He only sent one ship in this time which took three shore battery hits but did not show any real damage (shore battery is 155mm)

Alas, this is just not my game for subs. miss miss miss. Just to taunt me I did get two explosions from a fleet sub against an AKL.

But, Suva does have a bit of sting left in its tail. It just shot down 22 Vals with AA fire. [:D]

[John B.]

Nothing new to really report. Dmitry is bombarding Suva nightly with 4 different TFs made up of CAs and CLs and has shut down the airfield so now he's just grinding down the F-4fs that are there. I've pulled out the elite pilots and it's my hope to get CVs close enough to fly out the squadrons and save some of the planes. My subs continue their amazing passivity. It's almost like a switch got thrown and now they don't even take shots anymore so there is no attrition at all on the bombardment TFs or even shots and they don't hit mines. Sigh.


But, I did get out a number of CLs and all the CLAAs and I do have my CVs. the main problem is going to be facing the landbased air/KB for any island campaign. Any ideas on how to keep the pressure on up until 1944?

[BBfanboy]

Only time I have seen subs be that passive is when their mission is set to sub transport instead of sub patrol.
Also, if their torpedo stocks are low they will be very picky about shooting at low value targets.

[John B.]

A little bit of good news. I noticed that Dmitry had a large number of bombers at Rangoon so I've been building up for a strike over the period of a few weeks and it seems to have gone off like clockwork. True, it's a bunch of Sallys and Oscars but it does keep the pressure on his airforce.

As for the subs I really have no idea. I have two dutch subs in the full sea hex off of Suva. Naval rating of one commnader is 80 and the other one is 78. Both have aggression of 60+. Four japanese bombardment TFs pass over head every night for bombarding Suva on the way to Suva and on the way home. They get hit with ASW now and again but they have never even taken a shot. It's really like all the subs down there have shut down since I think it's been three weeks now with no ships appearing in my periscopes. Not sure which is worse, the previous run of about 23 misses in a row or the lack of shots since then.

Oh, I did figure out how to get PT boats into Suva. I changed it's command from NZ to North Pacific. Cost a LOT of poltical points and the PTs boats did nothing but now I know for future reference.

[GetAssista]

Try running your subs in a 2 hex patrol route to shake off detection. A player worth his salt will try to detect your subs with all assets available. By the way they are on patrol setting right? not just sitting in a hex with remain on station?

How much was Suva in PPs, just asking for a friend? Good time for PTs is with low moonlight. Use them in small TFs too, 1-2 boats. The goals is to harass, eat up opponent's action points and make him afraid of occasional torp. Dock them for most nights to keep him guessing, otherwise he will sweep with light TFs which are good against PTs

[John B.]

Yeah, they're on Patrol. Dmitry has a lot of ASW and the detection levels are high, but even if I run them out to bleed off detection and then send them back they don't do anything. Sort of like my birtish torpedo bombers at the start of the war.

Suva cost me 1,000 PP. Probably not worth it in the grand scheme of things but it was nice to see that it can be done.

Alas the moon is pretty high right now so the PT boats did not do much. I'll wait a bit and if I still have supply I'll try again but the bombardments are eating up supply at a very fast rate about 2,000 per turn or so. I figure Suva has two weeks left tops.

[John B.]

Well, first the good news, the Dutch sub finally took a shot at one of the 4 bombardment TFs that run back and forth with between Nadi every night. [X(] But, the more things change, the more they stay the same because, as you can guess, he missed. A US sub took a shot as well and, wait for it, he missed as well. [8|]The fact that I"m now up to 25 misses in a row is not good. I'm really at a loss since, when I had an entire carrier group worth of planes flying ASW a couple of weeks ago along with PBYs right off of Suva his subs hit 5 in a row and sank two CAs and a CL. So it can't just be that my subs have high detection levels on them. This game is great with the FOW and on many different levels but when something does not seem to work over and over it's incredibly frustrating

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: John B.

Well, first the good news, the Dutch sub finally took a shot at one of the 4 bombardment TFs that run back and forth with between Nadi every night. [X(] But, the more things change, the more they stay the same because, as you can guess, he missed. A US sub took a shot as well and, wait for it, he missed as well. [8|]The fact that I"m now up to 25 misses in a row is not good. I'm really at a loss since, when I had an entire carrier group worth of planes flying ASW a couple of weeks ago along with PBYs right off of Suva his subs hit 5 in a row and sank two CAs and a CL. So it can't just be that my subs have high detection levels on them. This game is great with the FOW and on many different levels but when something does not seem to work over and over it's incredibly frustrating

USN and USAAF skill levels in Nav S and ASW are well below the KB pilots at game start. The IJN ship crew experience/ naval skill also seems to affect their DDs being in position to force a sub down or prevent a shot at a bigger ship. They may not be able to hit your subs very effectively but they sure get in the way.