Taming the Bear - Rader (J) vs. jzanes (A). A jzanes-free zone.

[rader]

April 6, 1945

The Allies have moved on Makassar and we decided to strike back! Macassar is just within range of Japanese air bases on Java. And the KB was waiting to join the party.

So we launched massed conventional and kamikaze airstrikes against the allied fleet.

The KB concentrated on the invasion fleet, just out of range of the allied CVs. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't great and the KB didn't manage to get very many sorties off.

However, the air bases on Java did launch massive strikes against the allied carriers. It was a bloodbath. [X(]

Hordes of Japanese bombers met their doom as they attack the allied fleet throughout 2 days. Over 2000 aircraft were committed to battle: around 900 fighters, 800 conventional bombers, and 300 kamikazes. Over 1200 Japanese aircraft were lost. But many got through to wreak havoc on the allied CVs. I'll list the cumulative damage below.

The damage was pretty heavy, but the allied fleet is by no means out of action and it's not clear if he will retire or pursue (in fact, the fleet CVs were hardly touched, with CVEs taking the brunt of the damage). One thing is clear: he will start reducing the Java air bases with his new holdings in Celebes, and will likely be continuing the advance towards Palembang. We'll play the central position with the fleet and air force between the British coming from the west and the Americans coming from the East. If they overextend themselves, we'll lash out. Hopefully this will buy the empire some time.

[rader]

Cumulative damage:
CV Wasp, Torpedo hits 1, Kamikaze hits 5, on fire, heavy damage
CV Enterprise, Torpedo hits 3, on fire, heavy damage
CV Yorktown, Bomb hits 1, Torpedo hits 4, on fire, heavy damage
CV Bennington, Kamikaze hits 1

CVL Princeton, Bomb hits 1, Kamikaze hits 1, on fire

CVE Chenango, Torpedo hits 3, Kamikaze hits 2, and is sunk
CVE Makin Island, Torpedo hits 2
CVE Hollandia, Torpedo hits 3, and is sunk
CVE Long Island, Bomb hits 1, Torpedo hits 1, heavy fires, heavy damage
CVE Sangamon, Torpedo hits 2, on fire, heavy damage
CVE Bougainville, Torpedo hits 4, and is sunk
CVE Suwannee, Kamikaze hits 1
CVE Wake Island, Torpedo hits 3, and is sunk
CVE St. Lo, Bomb hits 1
CVE Cape Esperance, Torpedo hits 2, heavy fires, heavy damage
CVE Kadashan Bay, Torpedo hits 2, on fire, heavy damage
CVE Roi, Kamikaze hits 2, on fire, heavy damage
CVE Windham Bay, Bomb hits 1, on fire
CVE Bismarck Sea, Bomb hits 2, Kamikaze hits 1, heavy fires
CVE Attu, Torpedo hits 1, on fire
CVE Gambier Bay, Kamikaze hits 1, on fire, heavy damage


BB Tennessee, Bomb hits 5, Torpedo hits 2, Kamikaze hits 8, heavy fires
BB Massachusetts, Torpedo hits 2

CA Pensacola, Kamikaze hits 2, on fire, heavy damage

DMS Rodman, Bomb hits 1, on fire
DE Silverstein, Bomb hits 1

AP Gen. M.C.Meigs, Kamikaze hits 1
AP Gen. W.M.Mitchell, Kamikaze hits 1, Bomb hits 2, heavy fires, heavy damag

xAK Fordham Victory, Torpedo hits 2, and is sunk
xAK Howard Victory, Kamikaze hits 1, heavy fires
xAK Willamette Victory, Kamikaze hits 1, heavy fires

AM Scrimage, Torpedo hits 2, and is sunk
YMS-115, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
YMS-221, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk

LCI(G)-457, Torpedo hits 1, and is sunk
LCI(M)-630, Kamikaze hits 1, and is sunk

[PaxMondo]

Wow. You are better than 6 months ahead of historical results.  Great Job.  He has a long way to go.  How's your fuel/supply/HI stockpiles?

[rader]

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

Wow. You are better than 6 months ahead of historical results.  Great Job.  He has a long way to go.  How's your fuel/supply/HI stockpiles?

Fuel/oil have about a 2 month reserve, so once I lose the rest of the DEI, it will dry up pretty fast.

HI I have 1.9M in reserve... so I think that's about 6-7 months or so. Everything is shut down except aircraft construction.

[PaxMondo]

If I'm doing my sums correctly, 1.9M HI @ 900 single engines ac/month => about 1700 days worth of production.  (900 ac/month = 30 ac/day *(18+18) = 1080 HI/day).  Late game you are prolly building mostly single engine ac.  If I back it around the other way, you could build over 3000 single engine ac/month until June 1, 1946 (1,900,000/(18+18)/14 months left in game time).  That's a lot of kami's.  Trust your pilot pool is building up kami pilots.  [;)]
 
Let's do some more math: 12 CV/CVE's out of the war for 1200 ac.  You can do that 3x/month for the next 14 months.  You know, I don't think the allies can survive that kind of attrition.  [8D]  At this rate, they stall out before they even finish up the PI.
 
Can't wait to see your updates on how effective they are.
 

[rader]

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

If I'm doing my sums correctly, 1.9M HI @ 900 single engines ac/month => about 1700 days worth of production.  (900 ac/month = 30 ac/day *(18+18) = 1080 HI/day).  Late game you are prolly building mostly single engine ac.  If I back it around the other way, you could build over 3000 single engine ac/month until June 1, 1946 (1,900,000/(18+18)/14 months left in game time).  That's a lot of kami's.  Trust your pilot pool is building up kami pilots.  [;)]

Let's do some more math: 12 CV/CVE's out of the war for 1200 ac.  You can do that 3x/month for the next 14 months.  You know, I don't think the allies can survive that kind of attrition.  [8D]  At this rate, they stall out before they even finish up the PI.

Can't wait to see your updates on how effective they are.

Well, I'm going to keep building twin engine a/c as well, and a lot of HI comes off each month for pilot training. Plus, I haven't actually been able to mount any airstrikes until now because all my bases get shut down by 4E bombers before he gets close. This was sort of an error/fluke I think. If he just neutralizes all my a/c before moving in, he might not have to face many if any kamis. But of course, 1200 a/c for 12 CVs of various types is a pretty good trade. I would gladly do that over and over until I had no more a/c left or he had no more ships.

[PaxMondo]

With all of thetraining groups you are receiving at this point, you should be able to pull most/all of your pilots into the game. That removes/lowers that monthly HI cost.

If you produce ONLY twin engine planes, then you should be able to produce +1500 ac/month. Obviously you are producing a mix, so somewhere between 1500 - 3000 is what you will likely be able to support.

Yeah, the 4E's obliterating air bases ... tough to counter.

[desicat]

Is this game still going?

[rader]

Yes, but about a turn every 2-3 days (bcause they're long). I'll try yo send an update soon. We're in mid-0May 1945 I think. He's moving on Borneo and Java, and starting to break through in Siberia.

[rader]

The Japanese empire is lost.

Russian troops in Manchuria (and most especially, American B-29s based there) have routed the Kwangtung army and have nearly cut the link to China. I am losing about a division a day to air attack alone, and that is in addition to action by the Red Army.

Part of this is my own fault. These late war turns suck up so much time that I haven't really been giving them their proper consideration over the last 6 months of the game. Running the replay at this point takes about half an hour, and by the end of that I often just want to do anything extremely critical and then send the turn back. I am still trying to make a fight of it, and I'm trying not to make any really stupid mistakes, but I'm just not delving into the details like I used to. I should have started withdrawing to a better line in Manchuria earlier, but I just didn't want to put in the time to analyze the sitation and give the appropriate orders.

I will continue to play as long as he wants. He's earned it, and I can see how mopping up the remnants might be fun for him. But IMO, the game has been totally decided, and if he pressed hard, he could conquer Japan before Christmas. And the turns are so long that it will be slow for both of us.

I doubt I will get any chances to even launch meningful naval strikes. He never goes near an airfield without destroying it first. I might get a chance to lauch some strikes in defense of Japan itself, but I suspect that he will play cautiously and destroy all the strike aircraft on the ground first.

We still control a lot of territory, but none of that matters now. The allies will very shortly be able to bomb Japan into dust with B-29s in level 9 bases with short range P-47 and P-51 fighter cover (all supported by Russian supplies and AV support). And 4E bombing of industry is so borked that only a single raid will be required to destroy the entire output of each Japanese city. He has wiped out pretty much all HI, LI, refineries, & oil outside Japan, and almost in all cases in a single raid (often opposed). And he can launch a major several hundred bomber raid each day.

Once the bombing begins, I expect all meaningful Japanese industry to be destroyed within a month. Then he will take his time, take everything outside Japan first, and send a massive invasion of 50+ divisions, probably in late 1945. By then, I will have maybe 40 division equivalents, mostly understrength. Paratroopers will be able to take any clear base hex in Japan after he bombs all the defenders to oblivion (a single 4E raid will be sufficient to destroy all defenders smaller than a division in any clear base hex in Japan, regardless of fort levels).

I saw this coming: forestalling this was the primary goal of my attack on Russia. Unfortunately, the Russian army supported by the American air force (and IMO totally borked ground bombing by 4Es) is too strong, and nothing I could have realistically done to Russia could have stopped this. I have asked for a house rule on western allied a/c in Russian territory, but considering that I attacked Russia, I have not pressed it too hard and I do see his point. So instead of buying more time, I have merely accelerated Japanese defeat by 2 months.

I think it's not so much that attacking Russia is a bad idea (I think I've gained as much as I've lost in the venture in terms of points, etc.), it's that Allied-Russian cooperation is completely unrestricted. This means that no matter what you do to Russia, the Allied airforce will kill you from Russian airbases in 1945. Actually, the one thing I could/should have done was press further into Russia to deny him a springboard. If I had gotten further up the rail line, I might have had a chance to hold off the hordes of allied aircraft. But I don't think that would have been likely to work. The Russians were consolidating their position by that point, and defending effectively.

In truth, I think WITP:AE is totally broken as a game without some kind of political restriction limiting the use of allied aircraft in Russia and maybe China too. Otherwise, come August 1945, the allies are guaranteed to destroy Japan from Manchurian and Korean airbases with their 4E bombers as soon as Russia comes online. This was my opinion even before starting the game (and seeing the impact of 4Es), which is why I decided to attack Russia. Luckily, we house ruled against this in my other game. Without political rules of some kind (like cooperation rules in WiF), there is very little reason for any campaign in the Pacific at all. The only goal of an allied player should be to link up the allied fleet with the Russians in Korea and have Russian troops invade Japan on American transports supported by Allied aircraft. Sit back until 1945, don't take any losses, and then head straight for the Kuriles, Hokkaido, the Ryukus, and Bonins in 1945 and link up with the Russians. Forget anything else. Needless to say, although I think this would be optimal allied play, it is also extremely silly historically. Perhaps there also needs to be something to encourage earlier allied aggression, but I'm not 100% sure of that.

[GreyJoy]

ORIGINAL: rader

The Japanese empire is lost.

Russian troops in Manchuria (and most especially, American B-29s based there) have routed the Kwangtung army and have nearly cut the link to China. I am losing about a division a day to air attack alone, and that is in addition to action by the Red Army.

Part of this is my own fault. These late war turns suck up so much time that I haven't really been giving them their proper consideration over the last 6 months of the game. Running the replay at this point takes about half an hour, and by the end of that I often just want to do anything extremely critical and then send the turn back. I am still trying to make a fight of it, and I'm trying not to make any really stupid mistakes, but I'm just not delving into the details like I used to. I should have started withdrawing to a better line in Manchuria earlier, but I just didn't want to put in the time to analyze the sitation and give the appropriate orders.

I will continue to play as long as he wants. He's earned it, and I can see how mopping up the remnants might be fun for him. But IMO, the game has been totally decided, and if he pressed hard, he could conquer Japan before Christmas. And the turns are so long that it will be slow for both of us.

I doubt I will get any chances to even launch meningful naval strikes. He never goes near an airfield without destroying it first. I might get a chance to lauch some strikes in defense of Japan itself, but I suspect that he will play cautiously and destroy all the strike aircraft on the ground first.

We still control a lot of territory, but none of that matters now. The allies will very shortly be able to bomb Japan into dust with B-29s in level 9 bases with short range P-47 and P-51 fighter cover (all supported by Russian supplies and AV support). And 4E bombing of industry is so borked that only a single raid will be required to destroy the entire output of each Japanese city. He has wiped out pretty much all HI, LI, refineries, & oil outside Japan, and almost in all cases in a single raid (often opposed). And he can launch a major several hundred bomber raid each day.

Once the bombing begins, I expect all meaningful Japanese industry to be destroyed within a month. Then he will take his time, take everything outside Japan first, and send a massive invasion of 50+ divisions, probably in late 1945. By then, I will have maybe 40 division equivalents, mostly understrength. Paratroopers will be able to take any clear base hex in Japan after he bombs all the defenders to oblivion (a single 4E raid will be sufficient to destroy all defenders smaller than a division in any clear base hex in Japan, regardless of fort levels).

I saw this coming: forestalling this was the primary goal of my attack on Russia. Unfortunately, the Russian army supported by the American air force (and IMO totally borked ground bombing by 4Es) is too strong, and nothing I could have realistically done to Russia could have stopped this. I have asked for a house rule on western allied a/c in Russian territory, but considering that I attacked Russia, I have not pressed it too hard and I do see his point. So instead of buying more time, I have merely accelerated Japanese defeat by 2 months.

I think it's not so much that attacking Russia is a bad idea (I think I've gained as much as I've lost in the venture in terms of points, etc.), it's that Allied-Russian cooperation is completely unrestricted. This means that no matter what you do to Russia, the Allied airforce will kill you from Russian airbases in 1945. Actually, the one thing I could/should have done was press further into Russia to deny him a springboard. If I had gotten further up the rail line, I might have had a chance to hold off the hordes of allied aircraft. But I don't think that would have been likely to work. The Russians were consolidating their position by that point, and defending effectively.

In truth, I think WITP:AE is totally broken as a game without some kind of political restriction limiting the use of allied aircraft in Russia and maybe China too. Otherwise, come August 1945, the allies are guaranteed to destroy Japan from Manchurian and Korean airbases with their 4E bombers as soon as Russia comes online. This was my opinion even before starting the game (and seeing the impact of 4Es), which is why I decided to attack Russia. Luckily, we house ruled against this in my other game. Without political rules of some kind (like cooperation rules in WiF), there is very little reason for any campaign in the Pacific at all. The only goal of an allied player should be to link up the allied fleet with the Russians in Korea and have Russian troops invade Japan on American transports supported by Allied aircraft. Sit back until 1945, don't take any losses, and then head straight for the Kuriles, Hokkaido, the Ryukus, and Bonins in 1945 and link up with the Russians. Forget anything else. Needless to say, although I think this would be optimal allied play, it is also extremely silly historically. Perhaps there also needs to be something to encourage earlier allied aggression, but I'm not 100% sure of that.

I agree that a western air force based in Russia may completely unbalance the game and should be HRed (as we did).
At the same time however i think that, under the present data base, an invasion of Russia prior 1945 (and so its activation) should only be allowed IF the russians were able to get some replacements for their aircrafts... as we have discussed russian have no replacements at all till 1944...which is completely non-sense.
Not to produce a HUGE pool of a/c by 1945, probably the best way would be to edit the data base and get an emergency reinforcements of russian planes if japan crosses the russian border...should be pretty simple to implement...

However it's interesting to note how different this game is from ours...
In our game my 4Es get slaughtered every time they find a decent opposition in terms of CAP, not to speak about AA...I have lost nearly all my B-17Es due to your AA in India and i never feel that my 4Es are an "uber weapon" against your positions or airfields.
But don't you have an HR against para-landings on non-base hexes? I think this is a critical HR to have...with a good AA (and i know you can place some very good AA in a single place) and some good forts i think base hexes in Japan should be easily defended against allied raids...

Also a sustained campaign of 4Es flying every day is something i don't understand how can be accomplished... after a couple of turns of constant use (and i always keep 10/20% of rest to my squadrons) my 4Es need to be grounded for 2 turns cause their % of ready a/c is dramatically low and fatigue gets so high that op losses become not acceptable...

Really don't understand how Jzanes can accomplish these results...also because i know how stiff and high performance the IJAAF and IJNAF can be under your command!

However i hope you are still having fun with this match[:)]

[rader]

I agree with you here. The lack of Russian replacements is another big problem in the game. There should certainly be "emergency reinforcements" for this.

On house rules, I generally don't like them and wish these things would be solved through changing the game code. But since that's probably not going to happen, house rules are the best secondary option.

It's the clear base hexes that I'm worried about. And you can defend a single hex really well with AA... the problem is that the game dosen't scale numbers well. You can defend a single hex much too well if you stack up your assets, but if you do this, you can defend anywhere else. Fewer than around 5 AA units in a hex is next to useless. Put 30+ AA units in a hex, and the hex is totally unbombable. So while I could defend a single clear hex from Jzanes, there's no way I could defend all the clear base hexes in Japan.

[darbycmcd]

Rader, you are looking at it in a mixed up way. If you are analyzing the situation historically, well it is just too bad for Japan, it probably would have happened that way. And from an historical gamer perspective, there isn't much to complain about.

BUT, you are not an historical gamer, right? Think about it in terms of victory points and victory level. If you hang on until the end of the scenario, Mar 46 I believe, the victory level shifts 2x in Japans favor. This is to reflect that if you can hang on in the really really difficult circumstances Japan faced IRL then you are 'winning' in game terms. Remember, if he allied player can't auto victory you by the end, you basically can do no worse than a draw.

Look, from the first turn, the game is about 'when does Japan get beaten to death'. Don't worry about IF you will get beaten to death, you will. But if you manage to last longer, you count that as a win. you say that come Aug 45 the allies can do whatever they want, but even a win at that point is a 1x shift in your favor, so the best they can do is minor victory. Hang on 7 more months and the absolute worst you do is a draw.

Sack up man!

[rader]

ORIGINAL: darbymcd

Rader, you are looking at it in a mixed up way. If you are analyzing the situation historically, well it is just too bad for Japan, it probably would have happened that way. And from an historical gamer perspective, there isn't much to complain about.

BUT, you are not an historical gamer, right? Think about it in terms of victory points and victory level. If you hang on until the end of the scenario, Mar 46 I believe, the victory level shifts 2x in Japans favor. This is to reflect that if you can hang on in the really really difficult circumstances Japan faced IRL then you are 'winning' in game terms. Remember, if he allied player can't auto victory you by the end, you basically can do no worse than a draw.

Look, from the first turn, the game is about 'when does Japan get beaten to death'. Don't worry about IF you will get beaten to death, you will. But if you manage to last longer, you count that as a win. you say that come Aug 45 the allies can do whatever they want, but even a win at that point is a 1x shift in your favor, so the best they can do is minor victory. Hang on 7 more months and the absolute worst you do is a draw.

Sack up man!

True enough, but I highly doubt I can hold out until Christmas 1945...

[rader]

ORIGINAL: GreyJoy


However i hope you are still having fun with this match[:)]

I wouldn't call it "fun" but I do feel as though I have a duty to continue and don't want to quit. [:)]

It would be better if I didn't have to watch half an hour of allied unnoposed bombing (i.e., if I could skip the darned replay). It sucks up way too much of RL time.

[rader]

ORIGINAL: darbymcd

Rader, you are looking at it in a mixed up way. If you are analyzing the situation historically, well it is just too bad for Japan, it probably would have happened that way. And from an historical gamer perspective, there isn't much to complain about.

BUT, you are not an historical gamer, right? Think about it in terms of victory points and victory level. If you hang on until the end of the scenario, Mar 46 I believe, the victory level shifts 2x in Japans favor. This is to reflect that if you can hang on in the really really difficult circumstances Japan faced IRL then you are 'winning' in game terms. Remember, if he allied player can't auto victory you by the end, you basically can do no worse than a draw.

Look, from the first turn, the game is about 'when does Japan get beaten to death'. Don't worry about IF you will get beaten to death, you will. But if you manage to last longer, you count that as a win. you say that come Aug 45 the allies can do whatever they want, but even a win at that point is a 1x shift in your favor, so the best they can do is minor victory. Hang on 7 more months and the absolute worst you do is a draw.

Sack up man!

But the problem with this is: why invest all the time to play this game if once August 1945 rolls around, no matter what you've done (short of earlier Japanese autovicotry, which is anticlimactic to the point where I would never try for it), the game is effectively over anyway? o, you've set your position, assembled your defenses, are hitting back, and *poof*, August 1945... you lose.

I guess that's how the Japanese felt [:'(]

Also, I don't think it would have happened that way at ll. I've read a lot about operation downfall, and by that point, Soviet-allied relations were deteriorating rapidly. There is no way they would have helped each other - quite the opposite, they would have done everything in their power to slow the other down. Of course, if Japan had attacked Russia earlier in the war, who's to say what would have happened?

The fact that I sort of brought it on myself by attacking Russia is the only reason I tolerate the allied air there. If this actually were August 1945 and the American air forces were concentrated in Japan to assist the Russians in Manchuria, there is no way I would play the game out. It's woudl be just too cheesy for me.

Additionally, the game dosen't do a good job of representing many of the logistical challenges faced by either side (but in late war, this is pro-allied). There is no way allied casualties will come anything near even conservative projections in an invaison of Japan. There just isn't the opportunity to inflict sufficient day-to-day attrition on the Geijin.

[darbycmcd]

Well, you are definately correct, the game does not capture many of the logistic difficulties there would be in operating large air groups in most settings. And I totally agree with you the Sovs would never allow large American forces to operate from their territory in 45.

My point is that it is historical that you can't stop the allies, but gamewise you only need to hold on until the end. Japan really cannot 'win' it just 'loses' slowly. From that perspective you are doing great if, by Aug 45, you are still putting up a battle. What else did you really expect the end-game to be like? my guess is that you are on track for a minor victory at very least. What is the VP ratio?

[rader]

In fact, if the Americans based several hundred 4E bombers in Russian territory (along with advanced fighters), that might have been enough to push them into declaring war on the west to seize the planes (or more likely, just seize them without war and see what happens). The US never would have permitted B-29s in Russian territory. The 3 that actually did land there because of mechanical problems were never returned. One was taken apart piece by piece to reverse engineer a line of Russian bombers (Tu-4); see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-4

[rader]

ORIGINAL: darbymcd

My point is that it is historical that you can't stop the allies, but gamewise you only need to hold on until the end. Japan really cannot 'win' it just 'loses' slowly. From that perspective you are doing great if, by Aug 45, you are still putting up a battle. What else did you really expect the end-game to be like? my guess is that you are on track for a minor victory at very least. What is the VP ratio?

Yes, I agree with you. However, IMO, it matters a lot how this endgame situation comes about. It is not a reasonble situation that progress (or lack thereof) made by the Western Allies (over 90% of the game in terms of time invested) makes almost no difference. I could still occupy the entire Pacific (other than India and Australi whcih have significant HI), I could control the Solomons, Noumea, Pago Pago, Peal Harbor, etc, and none of that would make a fig of difference - Japan would be just as dead. That dosen't seem right to me.

[witpqs]

The real problem with that is how you are defining victory. Forget the game's mechanism. Decide for yourselves. And yeah, you might disagree. So what?