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

[John B.]

One more for the day. I guess Dmitry did not take as many dead this time, but his odds got worse. He does have about 15,000 on the island now. As I understand it, he keeps shock attacking until he pushes me out of there. My troops are very disrupted, but still have morale in the low 90s. I can only guess what is happening to the Japanese troops! The 5th division has now launched 5 shock attacks in a row.

[morejeffs]

Forts are still level 6...He needs some combat engineers...Can you sub transport in a few squads from somewhere? Given the odds..Ever little bit helps and
it will make him very paranoid on how you got new units on the hex.

[CaptBeefheart]

Holy cow that's a lot to invade a small place like Canton. Doesn't it have a 6,000 man stacking limit? He's got to be hemorrhaging supply. You might want to rotate one unit at a time in reserve mode to un-disrupt some of your squads.

EDIT: Have you done any kind of an IJ division audit? You might want to try to determine where his free divisions (and tank regiments) are to give you an idea of what he has available to hit other targets such as India.

Cheers,
CC

[John B.]

Six shock attacks in a row! Forts still holding at level 6. Come on Canucks hold that line!

Canton is too far away to get anything in there right now. Dmitry has his usual massive invasion support force and my carriers are tied up in Oz getting refitted. CC, that is a good idea about putting units in reserve. I don't think I can with the Canadian Brigade since it is my main fighting force but the marine raider battalion might enjoy a spell in the rear, wherever that is on a tiny atoll with 25,000 men on it blasting each other. He freed up 9 divisions when he took Suva plus a host of lesser brigades. He has the three at Canton Island. He moved two divisions into Burma but I don't think they came from the So. Pac. I thought he would go for New Zealand but so far no hint of that.

PT boats did get another AK that went down with 50 squads. And, I running in two DDs at high speed to see if I can get among the transports and do a bit more damage. Or, they'll run into the IJN at high speed and go splat. We'll see what happens.

My shore artillery has had a few hits, but nothing to really write home about.

[John B.]

According to the land army VP screen since the invasion of Canton Island has started Dmitry is down 268 VP which is about 1,600 squads/devices/vehicles. I'm not sure if that reflects the FOW or not, but he has taken very heavy casualties thus far.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: John B.

Six shock attacks in a row! Forts still holding at level 6. Come on Canucks hold that line!

Canton is too far away to get anything in there right now. Dmitry has his usual massive invasion support force and my carriers are tied up in Oz getting refitted. CC, that is a good idea about putting units in reserve. I don't think I can with the Canadian Brigade since it is my main fighting force but the marine raider battalion might enjoy a spell in the rear, wherever that is on a tiny atoll with 25,000 men on it blasting each other. He freed up 9 divisions when he took Suva plus a host of lesser brigades. He has the three at Canton Island. He moved two divisions into Burma but I don't think they came from the So. Pac. I thought he would go for New Zealand but so far no hint of that.

PT boats did get another AK that went down with 50 squads. And, I running in two DDs at high speed to see if I can get among the transports and do a bit more damage. Or, they'll run into the IJN at high speed and go splat. We'll see what happens.

My shore artillery has had a few hits, but nothing to really write home about.

Regardless of outcome, you are bleeding him and tying up all those troops as ships - disrupting his plans. Never seen a Canadian Brigade in SOPAC so early in the game!
Well done!!

[Lovejoy]

Officer Commanding Canton Island to Chief of General Staff: Send us more Molson!

You're doing a good job of tying down his forces on these islands.

[GetAssista]

Oh, my. In my book this is rapidly approaching the example of how not to play Japan with amphib bonus expired. Mangling good experienced divisions against heavily fortified atoll of near zero importance, with no considerable future prize in terms of allied LCU destroyed. Those shock attacks smell like frustration. Congratulations on luring Dmitry into a deathtrap

Even for later-game Allies with their firepower it is adviceable to starve out these kind of atolls because costs of direct assault can be prohibitive..

[Aurorus]

As a JFB, it pains me to see the 5th division savaged in such a manner. That is one of the best infantry divisions that Japan has: maybe the best.

[John B.]

Canton Island Day 7.

His losses are way down but I now suspect he is pulling out as the remnants of the tank regiments are gone and they were not killed off. And, by the judge of the losses he does not have as many troops on the island. I'm 10% tempted to counterattack but no sense in ruining a good hand right now. I don't want to give him an opening to take the island.

Two DDs did get among his transports this last turn. I think they took 2 APDs and 3-4 larger AKs and almost got away with it when they dodged the morning air attack, but the afternoon one got them both. Good exchange ratio but no reports of drowned troops.

BBFanboy, the Canadians are there because they had a brigade, I had PP and needed someone there since so many troops went to Suva. I'm not too sure that they're happy about it. But, pixels don't vote so the Canadian government did not care.

To be fair to Demitry, I'm sure he did not expect level six forts and the Canadian Brigade and the artillery battalion. The Brigade has 24 25 pounders and there are 18 105s with the artillery so I have some killing firepower on that small island. Also, I"m not showing the screen shots because I'm lazy, but he is on his way to cleaning me out of the Gobi desert and killing lots of Chinese.

[John B.]

@GetAssista,

I don't think Dmitry has a choice on shock attacks. On a small atoll a shock attack is automatically triggered until you own the base. He may be frustrated (a gutted infantry corps and tank division are a heavy toll to bear), but I don't think he has a choice once he landed.

[Aurorus]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

Oh, my. In my book this is rapidly approaching the example of how not to play Japan with amphib bonus expired. Mangling good experienced divisions against heavily fortified atoll of near zero importance, with no considerable future prize in terms of allied LCU destroyed. Those shock attacks smell like frustration. Congratulations on luring Dmitry into a deathtrap

Even for later-game Allies with their firepower it is adviceable to starve out these kind of atolls because costs of direct assault can be prohibitive..

That is an experience 90 division with light tanks and 47 mm anti-tank guns (about the only division that has anti-tank guns better than 37 mm the early war) and a large number of high-caliber howitzers. In fact, it is the single best division that Japan has... well.. in this case.. was the best division that Japan had.

The 5th division should not be on an atoll in SoPac for any reason... ever. That division should be in the most important position possible, used judiciously, and heavily fortified. It is an allied assault buster that can go toe-to-toe with any U.S. or Australian division.

[CaptBeefheart]

Well done, Canuckies. Can you show us a screenshot of the troops on Canton with "soft" parameters selected (i.e. showing the fatigue, disruption, morale, etc.)?

I'd have cancelled the invasion after seeing the first day's results. Sometimes an atoll isn't meant to be invaded. Also, you might not want to counterattack as that would probably finish him off and he'd back off. Let him continue dribbling in squads.

Cheers,
CC

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: John B.
@GetAssista,
I don't think Dmitry has a choice on shock attacks. On a small atoll a shock attack is automatically triggered until you own the base. He may be frustrated (a gutted infantry corps and tank division are a heavy toll to bear), but I don't think he has a choice once he landed.

In my understanding shock attack is triggered when new troops unload. He should've stop unloading after the first day's disastrous results and begin the evacuation. Thus subsequent shock attacks would've not happened

[John B.]

CC, here is the screen shot of the Canadian Brigade. It has been in this condition for awhile and has really held off the IJA. My thought is if my guys are this bad off in terms of fatigue and disruption his guys must be in awful shape.

GetAssista, you were right. He did not unload anything this time and so there was no shock attack. It must just be a trigger like crossing a river. So, all that happened was my bombardment that killed about 25 squads etc... He did use the KB to do another air raid that killed several allied squads. I'm not sure what he'll do now. He has the three divisions on shore. Will he reinforce them? Pull them out? I'm less inclined to attack and happy to simply bombard and kill troops for awhile as I still have 25K supply even after a week of intensive combat. And, I'm sure he's burning through his own supply right now. The map show him having 20K troops on the island and the bombardment screens shows 10K or so for his side. Either way, he's more overstacked than I am.

I'm not sure that that 5th will be 90 experience anymore. I believe it was at the Suva bloodbath and it took it on the chin for 6 days here. The replacements won't be as good (or at least I hope not!).

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

ORIGINAL: John B.
@GetAssista,
I don't think Dmitry has a choice on shock attacks. On a small atoll a shock attack is automatically triggered until you own the base. He may be frustrated (a gutted infantry corps and tank division are a heavy toll to bear), but I don't think he has a choice once he landed.

In my understanding shock attack is triggered when new troops unload. He should've stop unloading after the first day's disastrous results and begin the evacuation. Thus subsequent shock attacks would've not happened

That was his dilemma - he could not load up his troops to evacuate until his ships had unloaded all the troops and their equipment (but not supply).
His only other alternative was to go to another island he owns to unload the remaining troops so he could return to load up his shattered units.

[John B.]

Well, I don't think he's running away. He just landed at least one AK full of supplies!

[paullus99]

I've seen "brute force" tactics before, but this is ridiculous.

It's overkill & bleeding units which appear to be completely out of position to accomplish what they should be. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

[John B.]

No dramatic developments. I don't think Demitry is going away. The three divisions are still there and he has kept his fleet off of the island so there have been no resupply convoys and I'm at 22K or so. I've continued to bombard each turn and thus far I've killed about 75 squads/guns/devices in about a week. I'm happy to keep this up for awhile so I can run up his final tab. My guess is that he wants to rest his troops and then come in for another series of attacks when he gets his BBs back on line for bombardments (and he may bring in the Yamato as well). If he waits too long my CVs in Oz will be on their way home and may have something to say about the final result. But they could not be there for 2-3 weeks at the earliest.

In Burma the Chinese have held just outside of Lashio and now the Brits and Indians are heading to their relief. The road from Mytikyana to China is now open so let's hope at least something flows into the China theater.

Demitry has finally given up trying to sink the Revenge in port. He had the Kaga/Akagi launch a series of port attacks and hit it turn after turn with Betties and Nells. he came really close, but has now stopped so I can repair it up again. I have about a year until I need to withdraw it and every strike it absorbs is that much less supply and fuel Dmitry has. And, I've been happy to have it occupy so much attention while my offensive in Burma has pushed forward.

[Bif1961]

He is in a world of hurt on Canton, he has two bad options, withdraw all shattered troops and admit defeat and 3 shattered division, or dig deeper spend 2-3 more weeks and reinforcements to try and take an Island at this stage of the game he didn't need. The good news is you k now where the KB less Kaga and Akagi is. Maybe you can take advantage of him being stuck at canton and bring your carriers and BBs to attack him when he is tired and about to withdraw.