The Good The Bad & The Indifferent

[Lecivius]

Well, that answers all the posting in his AAR[:(]

[Canoerebel]

Yeah, John was quiet unusually long, but is now re-engaged and jazzed. We can all see why - he's making marked progress in Sumatra now and he thinks he's seeing the long-awaited counteroffensive in the Oz/DEI sector.

In three or four or five days, he's going to begin to suspect that Oz is a ruse. I don't have enough ships present to give appearances that would last longer. Then he's most likely going to wnoder, "If Oz is a ruse, is he coming for Sumatra after all?"

I don't need him to be confused much longer. Seven days. Ten days. Two weeks. Something along those lines should clinch things from my perspective. By then the Allies have too much of a headstart for John to intervene.

[Canoerebel]

Lots going on in SWPac. John's alert now, engaged, very excited. Here's the tale as told by some of his recent emails:

4/30/43 turn: "End of April. Do You KNOW where your invasions forces are? Better yet...do you KNOW where your carriers are???
5/02/43 turn: "Looks like Aussieland is waking up. PLEASE do not disturb the aborigines. They are quite pleasant and peace-loving. This is just a request..."
5/04/43 turn: "LOTS of movement. How about my Tanks and your Marines? Course about 2,000 8” Shells helped. Biting nails presently..."

The reference to movement is the sudden appearance of the Aussie armored unit at Exmouth, accompanied by 4EB hitting the airfield, following the recent appearance of an Aussie army on the march from Alice Springs to Tennant Creek, accompanied by Allied bombers targeting a Japanese tank regiment on picket duty between the two bases.

In some games, at some times, I've employed feints and ruses and just felt like they got off on the wrong foot and weren't working. This one feels different. The main reason is that John is primed for something in this area. I have his full attention, but he's also fully attending to Sumatra.

So Circus seems to be developing as hoped, with John concentrating on the DEI region as I'm about to move in strength into the upper SoPac/SWPac seam. John might expect me to hit New Caledonia or Efate or Luganville or eastern New Guinea, but I don't think he'll be prepared for a strike that begins in the Solomons and continues north.

[BBfanboy]

Looking forward to the action movie!

[witpqs]

4/30/43 turn: "End of April. Do You KNOW where your invasions forces are? Better yet...do you KNOW where your carriers are???

This one sounds a bit funny. Does he know?

[Canoerebel]

This is an innocent comment by John. I've seen the same from him in past games. He knows we've reached the penultimate moment in Sumatra; he knows I've had time to come up with the next big thing; he senses that something's coming, either because he's clever or because he's fallen for my fabulous deception plan, or maybe a bit of both.

[witpqs]

I was wondering if he had a sighting hit that your side didn't see and knew he had an ace.

[Canoerebel]

I don't think so. Everything I'm seeing is aligned with what I'd hoped and expected to see.

[Kofiman]

An Ace wouldn't be enough. Canoe has the Rook.

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

4/30/43 turn: "End of April. Do You KNOW where your invasions forces are? Better yet...do you KNOW where your carriers are???

This one sounds a bit funny. Does he know?

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

This is an innocent comment by John. I've seen the same from him in past games. He knows we've reached the penultimate moment in Sumatra; he knows I've had time to come up with the next big thing; he senses that something's coming, either because he's clever or because he's fallen for my fabulous deception plan, or maybe a bit of both.

Sounds to me like a comment about the action starting around the board, as you've mentioned. Seeing your broadly based and sudden activity for the deception that it is. It's a bit humorous in that context.

This is a big time, and although I know how meticulous you are about creating mis-direction possibilities and confusion, with only 2/3 of your fighters being Hellcats you'll still be a bit vulnerable in moving 5k AV anywhere without knowing absolutely that the KB cannot get to you. If he does have a breakthrough on Sumatra and doesn't need the CVs there, then it becomes a bit dicey.

You have to do something at some point, but a big step like without your best airframes installed make at least me nervous.

[Canoerebel]

I won't sail into the teeth of the utter unknown, but if the "Sumatra Division KB" remains accounted for in Sumatra for another week it won't be a part of the action (until too late to matter for my purposes). The Sumatra Division is carrying 500 aircraft. Based upon what I've seen on the Japanese carrier OOB, this is at least half of John's carrier power and possibly 2/3rds. That's going from old memory, so perhaps I ought to open the editor again and double-check. I don't want to face the full KB at this point in the game, but I am willing to face 1/3rd KB and possibly willing to chance 1/2 KB.

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I won't sail into the teeth of the utter unknown, but if the "Sumatra Division KB" remains accounted for in Sumatra for another week it won't be a part of the action (until too late to matter for my purposes). The Sumatra Division is carrying 500 aircraft. Based upon what I've seen on the Japanese carrier OOB, this is at least half of John's carrier power and possibly 2/3rds. That's going from old memory, so perhaps I ought to open the editor again and double-check. I don't want to face the full KB at this point in the game, but I am willing to face 1/3rd KB and possibly willing to chance 1/2 KB.

500 planes is half of a scenario one carrier power. Roughly.

[Canoerebel]

The Allies will have something like this:

Seven fleet carriers (five USN, plus Wasp, plus one RN) and eight USN CVEs. That's enought to carry roughly 750 aircraft (two of the CVEs are designated to carry land-based fighter, so I didn't include them in the total). So you can perhaps see why I'm willing to face 500 enemy aircraft on KB but don't want to face 750 or more.

I'm reconfiguring plane load on the carriers to allow more fighters and less TBFs. The plan is to achieve suprise, take a couple of airbases, and thus have friendly ports with land-based CAP before full (or dauntingly competitive) KB shows up. Once the airfields are properly operational, the carriers would return to their traditional plane loads.

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I won't sail into the teeth of the utter unknown, but if the "Sumatra Division KB" remains accounted for in Sumatra for another week it won't be a part of the action (until too late to matter for my purposes). The Sumatra Division is carrying 500 aircraft. Based upon what I've seen on the Japanese carrier OOB, this is at least half of John's carrier power and possibly 2/3rds. That's going from old memory, so perhaps I ought to open the editor again and double-check. I don't want to face the full KB at this point in the game, but I am willing to face 1/3rd KB and possibly willing to chance 1/2 KB.

500 planes is half of a scenario one carrier power. Roughly.

Isn't this RA and not scenario 1. In fact it's an early, overly beefed up Japanese version of RA IIRC.

Didn't John tone down the Japanese side a bit in later versions? I'm not sure as I have only played his BTS scenario, not any of the RA versions.

I would be reviewing the Japanese side very closely to get a total CV count and taking into allowance the Japanese ability to speed up ship building.

[Lowpe]

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I won't sail into the teeth of the utter unknown, but if the "Sumatra Division KB" remains accounted for in Sumatra for another week it won't be a part of the action (until too late to matter for my purposes). The Sumatra Division is carrying 500 aircraft. Based upon what I've seen on the Japanese carrier OOB, this is at least half of John's carrier power and possibly 2/3rds. That's going from old memory, so perhaps I ought to open the editor again and double-check. I don't want to face the full KB at this point in the game, but I am willing to face 1/3rd KB and possibly willing to chance 1/2 KB.

500 planes is half of a scenario one carrier power. Roughly.

Isn't this RA and not scenario 1. In fact it's an early, overly beefed up Japanese version of RA IIRC.

Didn't John tone down the Japanese side a bit in later versions? I'm not sure as I have only played his BTS scenario, not any of the RA versions.

I would be reviewing the Japanese side very closely to get a total CV count and taking into allowance the Japanese ability to speed up ship building.

My point Hans, and I think Obvert did some comparing a few pages back in the AAR.

[ny59giants]

John has admitted that this is one of the more Japanese powerful versions of RA. Later, we worked together to tone it down somewhat. It will make Dan's eventual victory all the sweeter. [:)]

[Canoerebel]

5/4/43 to 5/6/43

Battle of Sumatra: No enemy invasions. But the noose is tightening. The Kongos bombard Sabang on the sixth. 2nd IJA Tank Div. does not attack on the west side nor do the Six Sister bombard there. I think John is awaiting supply to his unit before trying.

An IJA division has "appeared" in the jungle in the middle of the island. It's making its way slowly across to the east side to interdict the road. I don't think John can take a hex since I'll post a division wherever this one is heading, but it will prevent rapid rail transport between Sabang and Langsa. But I think it will take this unit so long to make it across that the campaign will already be winding down by then.

No attacks or other major developments on the east side.

On the 6th, there was a strike by Georges (first appearance), Judys and Zeroes against 1st Marine Div. I'm not sure whether this is KB or land-based from one of the Nicobars. No other signs of KB during these three turns.

I can continue to give the appearance of strength in Sumatra for perhaps two more weeks. After that, supply will become problematic. I think that until that point, John will focus very heavily on Sumatra and keep KB or a major subset thereof in this vicinity to ward off any threatened reinforcement runs. So if I'm going to take advantage of John's Sumatra focus (with seven BBs, hundreds of LBA, lots of divisions, part of KB, etc.), I'll have to move fast. Very fast. But I think it's doable.

Operation Circus: SigInt again that 116th Div. is inbound to Darwin. On the west side, the Aussie armor corps reached Exmouth, attacked, accomplished nothing, and was booted from the hex the following day. In the middle, the advance continues on Tennant Creek. This is a much larger operation. The IJA garrison at that base should be badly disrupted and low on supply, so I retain some hope of success.

I'm going to take another hard look at the Japanese carrier OOB tonight when I get home. I took a look previously and wrote down a list of what can conceivably be present by this point in '43. My recollection, now fuzzed a bit by the elapsing of months since that analysis, was that John wouldn't be able to put together something on the order of 2x the big carrier force currently (or just recently stationed in Sumatra). At least in the way of fleet carriers. He can probably cobble together a sizeable force of CVLs (including conversaions from CSs) and CVEs. But I'll review my notes carefully.

[obvert]

Is the George version the N1K1?

EDIT: Actually the N1K1-J

[Canoerebel]

Yes. What does that signify to you?

[crsutton]

BTW Dan, nice edition of Georgia Backroads this quarter. You probably would not do it here but I got no problem giving your magazine a shameless plug. Those who have read my posts over the past ten years already know how shameless I am....[8|]

http://georgiabackroads.com/