Dutch AVP Arend: Scenario 1 Exploits

[WEXF]

Thanks for the comments. It makes sense that penetration is improved as range decreases.
WEXF

[WEXF]

All guns have a calculation of their ability to penetrate based on range. You can see this in naval combat when a US cruiser firing 6" guns cannot penetrate Japanese CA belt armour until it gets to about 6K yards range. Similarly, US CAs cannot penetrate the belt armour of a Kongo class BB until they are very close. And there is a small window of range in which enemy deck armour might be penetrated by a plunging shell fired from long range. I have only seen this a couple of times and don't remember the relevant guns and ranges.

I thought about this some more and I wonder if you can help a bit further?
Here is the Editor listing for the gun I was talking about in my post. It has a "Range"=17000 yards and "Penetration" of 108.
In the Editor the definition of "Range" is the effective range of the device.
The Editor defines "Penetration" as the maximum armor mm the weapon can penetrate.
Is it correct to say that the Penetration stated is the maximum at the upper limit of the effective range and that as the range closes the penetration maximum increases?

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So for this gun the 108mm is the max at 17000 yds. As for the armor that can be penetrated as the range closes there is no way to figure that out other than watching combat animations and taking notes on what happens.

[BBfanboy]

It's the other way around - 108mm penetration at very close range and declining with increased range. The calculation is hidden 'under the hood' so other than observation you cannot determine what the penetration will be for a given distance. Most of your hits will be on the deck or superstructure anyway because of the arcing shape of the ballistic curve. You need to be very close to get a near 90º impact of shell to armour. You can't control the ranges of engagement anyway, so just sit back and enjoy the show.

[WEXF]

It's the other way around - 108mm penetration at very close range and declining with increased range. The calculation is hidden 'under the hood' so other than observation you cannot determine what the penetration will be for a given distance. Most of your hits will be on the deck or superstructure anyway because of the arcing shape of the ballistic curve. You need to be very close to get a near 90º impact of shell to armour. You can't control the ranges of engagement anyway, so just sit back and enjoy the show.

I am glad I revisited this. Your response tells me that since the two BB that bombarded (Ise and Hyuga) have Belt Armor of 300, Deck Armor of 145 and Tower Armor of 300 there is no chance for the CD guns that had a maximum penetration of 108mm to score a penetration hit regardless of the range. Thanks.

[WEXF]

5Jul was a pretty quiet day at Geraldton. The AF was now 98%>level 3, the ships that had been docked and unloading were empty or just about ready to leave port and most of the resources that had been unloaded had moved out of Geraldton. On Arend PO Caruthers saw his low level naval skill rise to 29. Interestingly, all of the training had been done by Caruthers whose skill level was now higher than WO Hazard's. Both were still quite low so any improvement was welcome. No sign of enemy activity was reported nearby. Japanese recon of northern Australia and continued pressure on Palembang was all that was reported at the morning intel briefing.

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[WEXF]

6Jul was a quiet day at Geraldton. The airfield had reached L3 and was 4% of the way to L4. No improvement of air skills was recorded by the pilots on Arend. No enemy activity had been reported nearby but there was a worrisome report of significant air action over Darwin.

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The 45 A6M2 Zeros likely came from Koepang, 12 hexes away. The airfield at that base had recently been enlarged to L5. It was the largest enemy base in the region and posed a threat of attack to almost all of coastal Northern Australia. To reach Darwin form Koepang, the Zeros had to have flown at extended range with drop tanks. It appears that in addition to the one reported Zero that was destroyed 2 others were significantly damaged or ran into mechanical difficulties.
Everyone at Geraldton feared that this was not going to be the last attack on Australia.

[WEXF]

7Jul was another quiet day at Geraldton. The AF was now 10% of the way to L4. Fuel levels at the base had dropped as the ships that had been docked had finished their unloading and left. On Arend there was some good news as the skill ratings for PO Caruthers had improved. His Experience had gone from 52>53, Defense 51>52 and Low Naval from 29>33. The fatigue of the Walrus was now just above 20 so it would soon be time for some maintenance to be done,

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[WEXF]

8Jul found the airbase at Geraldton 17%>L4. On Arend, PO Caruthers continued to improve his low naval attack and defense skill levels from 33>34 and 52>54 respectively. No enemy activity was reported in the area around Geraldton.

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At the morning intel briefing there was a report of a successful attack by Allied aircraft against some enemy shipping about 400 miles north of Darwin. Torpedo attacks by PBY-5 Catalinas hit a Minekaze Class APD carrying troops near Dobo (83-116). No confirmed report of the sinking of the APD was received.

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[WEXF]

In addition to the PBY attack a squadron of Hudson III (LR) also attacked. No bomb hits were recorded but there were some casualties to troops on a third Minekaze APD at the location. These APDs were all converted DDs and were likely on a mission to capture some of the "dot" bases in the area.

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For everyone at Geraldton, the big question was whether or not the enemy was getting ready to invade Australia?

[BBfanboy]

Those additional casualties were likely from the fires on the APD hit by a torpedo. The game shows any casualties it calculates from fires burning during the time of the attack. I have never seen casualties from bomb 'near misses'. The good news is that the fires are still burning, so that APD is likely to sink.

[WEXF]

Good to know. Thanks for the response.

[WEXF]

9Jul found the airbase at Geraldton 23%>L4. On Arend, PO Caruthers continued to improve his low naval attack skill level from 33>36. No enemy activity was reported in the area around Geraldton but enemy float planes continued to recon many areas of northern Australia. Word was spreading about another influx of important troops but no details were shared at the morning intel meeting.

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[WEXF]

10Jul continued to be quiet at Geraldton. The AF was now 29% > L4 and PO Caruthers, on Arend had improved his low naval skill rating further from 36>39. At the intel meeting there was mention that the anticipated new troop arrival was currently on trains and would arrive at Geraldton tomorrow. No enemy contacts were reported in the region except for the continued recon of the northern coast.

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[WEXF]

11Jul was a day that lifted the morale of all the troops at Geraldton. The AF was now at 35% > L4. PO Caruthers on Arend saw his low naval and defense skill levels increase from 39>40 and 54>55 respectively.

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However the real event of the day was the arrival of railroad flatcars carrying the armor of the 2/9th Australian Armored Regiment. Up until now the only armor at Geraldton were the 6 Humber I vehicles of the 22 Australian Brigade. Those were unlikely to be able to match the armor of an invading Japanese force.

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The newly arriving armor amounted to 5 M3 Grant/Lee and 5 Stuart I Light tanks in addition to 8 ACV-I armored cars. These vehicles were more heavily armed and had better armor than Japanese tanks and would be formidable against any invading force.

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[WEXF]

12Jul was another good day at Geraldton. The AF was now at 41% > L4. PO Caruthers on Arend saw his low naval skill level increase from 40>41.

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The major event of the day was the arrival of two TF. TF140 containing 4 xAK that had been loaded with over 20,000 supplies at Cape Town and TF256 with 7 xAKL carrying 7000 resources that had been extracted from Corunna Downs.

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There was a bit of a problem at the docks as the two TF together exceeded the maximum tonnage capable of docking at Geraldton. As a P3 Geraldton could dock 24,000 tons of shipping as long as none of the ships exceeded 12,000T. The largest ship in the two TF was only 6100T (City of Hankow and Mahout) but in total all of the ships were around 28,000T. A decision was made to dock all of the larger ships and as many of the smaller ones as possible. It was considered more critical to get the large ships unloaded and back on their way to Cape Town.
Command was worried about Corunna Downs as resources were being produced at a rate of 2000/day. The rail line was moving them quickly to Port Hedland but there were no significant roads in the area that could move resources. Presently there were over 270,000 tons of resources at Port Hedland and command was worried that the enemy would benefit greatly from capturing them. The small ships were removing a very small percentage of what the enemy would capture but Command wanted to do everything they could to address the issue. Enemy activity continued to be strictly float plane recon of the northern coast with concentration on the Darwin region but it was expected that an invasion of the northern coast of Australia was on the horizon.

[BBfanboy]

You don't need to worry about the Japanese capturing the resources at Port Hedland; they will have the same problem as you - finding shipping to move it - and they have much further to transport it. They can get all the resources they need much closer to Japan.

[WEXF]

13 July was pretty quiet at Geraldton. The AF was now at 48%>L4. On Arend both WO Hazzard and PO Caruthers saw their low naval skill rating improve from 28>29 and 41>42 respectively. This was the first change in Hazzard's rating in quite a while. No enemy activity was reported in the area although the recon flights by enemy aircraft of all types continued over the north coast.

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Activity at the docks continued at a heavy rate with the ships that had arrived from Cape Town still unloading their load of supplies. However, the most significant event of the day was the arrival of 16 3in M3 AA guns for the 2nd Marine Defense BN. They had been equipped with 3in M1918 AA.

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In trying to understand the impact of this upgrade in our "game", I looked first at the data in the AA Database. The numbers there for the two guns were exactly the same showing a "ceiling" of 29800 and "effect" of 13. I then checked the Editor and found that "Penetration" was the same for both at 100 but "Accuracy" differed. The M1918 had accuracy of 20 and the M3 had accuracy of 36, 80% better. Clearly, both guns were not very accurate but the M3 had a much better chance of scoring a hit.
There would likely be another upgrade soon as more 90mm M1A1 AA guns were produced. On 13 July only 8 90mm AA guns were in the pool. Where the 2nd Marine Defense BN stood in the queue of units waiting for the better guns was unknown.

[WEXF]

14Jul showed the AF at Geraldton at 54% >L4. Command was now considering if the AF should be expanded beyond level 4 to at least L5 so that heavy bombers like the B-17 and B-24 could operate without restrictions? AF was currently at Perth. B-17 with a normal range of 15 could not reach the northern coast. However, from Geraldton the B-17 could cover the coast as far as Port Hedland. The possibility of expanding the airfield at Carnarvon, 320 miles north pf Geradlton, was raised for the first time.
On Arend, PO Caruthers saw his low naval skill reach 45.
The port was very busy with 23,820 tons of shipping docked, just 180 tons below the maximum Geraldton could handle.

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[WEXF]

15Jul saw the airfield at Geraldton 61% > L4. On Arend PO Caruthers had his low naval skill go from 45>46 and his defensive skill from 55>56. The docks were still fully occupied.
Serious discussions were taking place at the highest levels about what the next steps would be in the defense of western Australia. Some ranking officers wanted to shift assets to Carnarvon, anticipating a start of an offensive. Others were less confident and wanted to see what the enemy would be doing, if anything, on the northern coast.

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[WEXF]

16Jul saw the airfield at Geraldton 68% > L4. On Arend PO Caruthers had his low naval skill go from 46>47 and his defensive skill from 56>57. The docks were still fully occupied.
Enemy activity continued on the north coast but nothing had been seen anywhere near Geraldton.

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