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ORIGINAL: Xargun

MrKane is active again.

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

ORIGINAL: Xargun

MrKane is active again. First turn back was slow, but I expect them to increase in excitement once he is back in the saddle again.

I'm taking the time to double check my engine plans for late 43 and 44. I'm looking at the Franks and Sams and trying to figure out how many of each per month I will need. I'm thinking more Franks than Sams, but will 500 Franks a month and 300 Sams be a good number?

Not really enough information to know. Maybe? It is very easy to lose 250 in a day or more during this time period.

Figure you will lose at least 3000 of those fighters countering Thunderbolts thru Oct of 1944. The earlier you can lose those 3000 attriting the Thunderbolts, the better off you will be.

Then there are Corsairs, Lightnings, Spitfires, Hellcats, and carrier needs but you should have some Jacks and Georges to help with some of that.

In April of 1944 the Army undergoes a huge fighter expansion. In June of 44 the Navy withdraws a lot of fighter squadrons that slowly reform and arrive later. So you are correct in thinking your army fighter production needs to be higher than your navy...but your playstyle & game also impact that, too.

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

Not really enough information to know. Maybe? It is very easy to lose 250 in a day or more during this time period.

Figure you will lose at least 3000 of those fighters countering Thunderbolts thru Oct of 1944. The earlier you can lose those 3000 attriting the Thunderbolts, the better off you will be.

Then there are Corsairs, Lightnings, Spitfires, Hellcats, and carrier needs but you should have some Jacks and Georges to help with some of that.

In April of 1944 the Army undergoes a huge fighter expansion. In June of 44 the Navy withdraws a lot of fighter squadrons that slowly reform and arrive later. So you are correct in thinking your army fighter production needs to be higher than your navy...but your playstyle & game also impact that, too.

So will Sams be ground-based as well or just mostly for my CVs and George will be my main ground-based navy fighters?

I am looking at the different models of Franks (A, B and R) and not much difference between them other than the B model uses cannons only and the other two have cannons and MG. Which should I produce? or all of them?

ORIGINAL: Xargun

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

Not really enough information to know. Maybe? It is very easy to lose 250 in a day or more during this time period.

Figure you will lose at least 3000 of those fighters countering Thunderbolts thru Oct of 1944. The earlier you can lose those 3000 attriting the Thunderbolts, the better off you will be.

Then there are Corsairs, Lightnings, Spitfires, Hellcats, and carrier needs but you should have some Jacks and Georges to help with some of that.

In April of 1944 the Army undergoes a huge fighter expansion. In June of 44 the Navy withdraws a lot of fighter squadrons that slowly reform and arrive later. So you are correct in thinking your army fighter production needs to be higher than your navy...but your playstyle & game also impact that, too.

So will Sams be ground-based as well or just mostly for my CVs and George will be my main ground-based navy fighters?

I am looking at the different models of Franks (A, B and R) and not much difference between them other than the B model uses cannons only and the other two have cannons and MG. Which should I produce? or all of them?

Sams versus George...well it is up to you.

Frank A...upgrades to Frank R
Frank B...perhaps the best anti-bomber Army plane you are likely to get, but no upgrade path to it.
Frank R...enough changes, a little speed and altitude and mvr that make is out perform the Frank A fairly substantially. The speed boost is enough I recall to put it in a better class if just barely.

Most people skip the Frank B because of the difficulty to r&d it.

Generally, although this mod maybe different, Sam is better than George except for range.

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

Generally, although this mod maybe different, Sam is better than George except for range.

Got tracker pulled up and looking at the Sam vs George

N1K2 George vs A7M2 Sam: George is better everywhere except climb rate and ceiling. Sam has 70 better climb rate and 900' more ceiling.

N1K5 George vs A7M2 Sam: George is better everywhere except SR which is 3 compared to Sam's 2. George has 2 extra MGs over the Sam on weaponry. How much affect would SR 3 vs 2 be ?


So it looks like I should be only using Sams on CVs and Georges everywhere else.

ORIGINAL: Lowpe
Sams versus George...well it is up to you.

Frank A...upgrades to Frank R
Frank B...perhaps the best anti-bomber Army plane you are likely to get, but no upgrade path to it.
Frank R...enough changes, a little speed and altitude and mvr that make is out perform the Frank A fairly substantially. The speed boost is enough I recall to put it in a better class if just barely.

Most people skip the Frank B because of the difficulty to r&d it.

Looks like the R version is a bit better than the A so I guess the question will be R&D the A or once fully repaired move the factories to the R version. Normal ETA in this game is A on 1/44 and R on 7/45... Might be a decision better made closer to the time the factories repair as I may be needing the A to compete in the air. Although with 10 factories R&Ding I can move the date quickly when the time comes. I'm leaning towards going to the R as it would only be a 3 month difference (if my math is correct) between getting the A or the R model.

Burma



Not a whole lot happening. From this pic you can see what I am calling a Good weather day over Burma - usually there is weather over all of my bases. I swept and bombed the hex marked in red to see what the allies had there. Fighters encountered nothing and my bombers went in uncontested.

Morning Air attack on Mandalay BMP Battalion, at 58,45 , near Mandalay

Weather in hex: Moderate rain

Raid spotted at 18 NM, estimated altitude 13,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 5 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 27
Ki-49-Ia Helen x 9
Ki-49-IIb Helen x 28

Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-49-IIb Helen: 2 damaged

Allied ground losses:
229 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 13 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 17 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

Morning Air attack on Mandalay BMP Battalion, at 58,45 , near Mandalay

Weather in hex: Moderate rain

Raid spotted at 20 NM, estimated altitude 15,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 6 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 9
Ki-49-IIb Helen x 24

No Japanese losses

Allied ground losses:
53 casualties reported
Squads: 2 destroyed, 10 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 2 (1 destroyed, 1 disabled)

Morning Air attack on Mandalay BMP Battalion, at 58,45 , near Mandalay

Weather in hex: Moderate rain

Raid spotted at 3 NM, estimated altitude 15,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 0 minutes

Japanese aircraft
Ki-49-IIb Helen x 15

No Japanese losses

Allied ground losses:
8 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Morning Air attack on Mandalay BMP Battalion, at 58,45 , near Mandalay

Weather in hex: Moderate rain

Raid spotted at 14 NM, estimated altitude 10,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 4 minutes

Japanese aircraft
Ki-49-Ia Helen x 20

No Japanese losses

Allied ground losses:
31 casualties reported
Squads: 1 destroyed, 4 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled


The Mandalay BMP Battalion is a small unit so this amount of damage should make it combat ineffective. Next I will see what is 2 hexes to the SW near Magwe.

Apparently even in the IJA Generals get their way...



What the heck is a Major General doing as a fighter Pilot ?

A good day in the air war in Burma nets us some nice kills from aggressive sweeps with Zeros and Oscars. Just wish the sweeps would be 100% of the aircraft and not send 2 planes later into the swarm of the enemy fighters.

Shwebo fell in 1 attack. The allies have 100k+ troops there and they achieved overwhelming odds on first attack, pushing my troops back to Mandalay and costing me an AA unit. The shear number of tanks he has is crazy - 2000+ AFVs.
I have identified 3 Armoured Bde, 3 Armoured Rgt and 1 Tank Rgt in the attacking force, along with 5 Inf Divisions. Was not expecting this kind of opposing force.

With Shwebo in his hands, he can cross the river directly onto the lifeline for Lashio cutting it off. So I need to decide to stay there or not. If I don't stay he opens the supply line into China.. if I do stay he cuts off my 2 divisions there from easy supply -- can still supply via the trails but he is closing the hex sides as well.

I just sent my Tank division towards Lashio to help clean up the allied units around it, but will prob pull it back to Mandalay. I just pulled my RF units (AT) from Lashio but not sure they can make the sprint to Mandalay before the horde descends there as well.

I have another Tank Division arriving in Rangoon in a couple days, but its at least a week away from Mandalay.

I guess I need to decide to hold at Mandalay or disengage and fall back.

You probably can't hold Mandalay unless you have lots of AA, ART, and or air superiority plus relative equality in AV. What are forts there?

Not a lot of supply will flow from Lashio to China yet...but he might be flying in lots. I think Mr.Kane can normally be flying in close to 2K supply a day at this time and with those bases, if they are built up.

What is the experience level of the troops at Lashio?

Lots of great terrain for you to defend in below Magwe...get infantry into the jungles digging in. Your picture from a few days ago show no troops there north of Prome and south of TuangGyi

Here is the combat report from the 'battle' at Shwebo..

Ground combat at Shwebo (59,45)

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 106710 troops, 1472 guns, 2505 vehicles, Assault Value = 3817

Defending force 42932 troops, 443 guns, 90 vehicles, Assault Value = 1266

Allied adjusted assault: 4579

Japanese adjusted defense: 395

Allied assault odds: 11 to 1 (fort level 4)

Allied forces CAPTURE Shwebo !!!

Combat modifiers
Defender: forts(+), preparation(-), supply(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
14467 casualties reported
Squads: 418 destroyed, 191 disabled
Non Combat: 480 destroyed, 81 disabled
Engineers: 51 destroyed, 7 disabled
Guns lost 342 (314 destroyed, 28 disabled)
Vehicles lost 100 (96 destroyed, 4 disabled)
Units retreated 8

Allied ground losses:
4020 casualties reported
Squads: 65 destroyed, 224 disabled
Non Combat: 7 destroyed, 78 disabled
Engineers: 5 destroyed, 59 disabled
Guns lost 100 (4 destroyed, 96 disabled)
Vehicles lost 115 (23 destroyed, 92 disabled)

Defeated Japanese Units Retreating!

Assaulting units:
254th Armoured Brigade
41st Infantry Division
40th Infantry Division
2/11th Armoured Car Regiment
I Aus Corps Engineer Battalion
46th Indian Brigade
Mandalay BMP Battalion
7th Armoured Brigade
2/6th Armoured Regiment
2/5th Armoured Regiment
150th RAC Regiment
75th Indian Brigade
27th Infantry Division
268th Motorised Brigade
2/10th Armoured Regiment
7th Australian Division
22nd (East African) Brigade
255th Armoured Brigade
6th Australian Division
50th Tank Brigade
39th Indian Division
85th British AT Gun Regiment
III Indian Corps
6th Heavy AA Regiment
2/9th Field Regiment
2/1 AIF Pioneer Battalion
48th Light AA Regiment
2/1st Med Regiment
26th Indian Mountain Gun Regiment
2/2 AIF Pioneer Battalion
28th Indian Mountain Gun Regiment
2/11th Field Regiment
22nd Indian Mountain Gun Regiment

Defending units:
18th Division
33rd Division
143rd Infantry Regiment
6th Guards Division
20th AA Regiment
35th Field AA Battalion
45th Field AA Battalion
21st Fld AA Gun Co
26th Fld AA Gun Co

When you have no supply and are out numbered in AV 3-1 things will end up badly for you.

ORIGINAL: Bif1961

When you have no supply and are out numbered in AV 3-1 things will end up badly for you.

The odd thing is I had supply. The base was yellow - but far from being out.

It still listed you as being out of supply as a negative modifier.

You are being nailed by thousands of tanks and have basically no anti-tank units there in the open no less.

Supply malus can show up for just one unit, probably an AA low on supply.

So, In short you had good AV there, but the devices that made up the AV were sorely supported and totally lacking.

You needed probably 10 or so artillery units sized 15cm or greater to stand a chance plus several tank regiments of your own, or better yet the 1st and 2nd Tank Divisions.

Fall back and try to hold in better terrain...if you can .

+1 on the arty, but anything 75mm and up will likely work fine at this point. A lot of the allied armor before '44 isn't too heavily armored and 75mm arty will defeat up to 26mm armor. Get all of your AT units there. Once you upgrade to the 47mm, they will defeat 52mm armor.

+1 on terrain. You shouldn't be trying to defend in less than 3x terrain any more. Get yourself into it and plan your retreat EAST, not South. 3x terrain and your AT units and he is going to lose AFV's that he has a hard time to replace. Be sure you have enough HQ's to keep your support units above the minimum. Stay out of bases so he cannot use command HQ bonus.

Rinse and repeat these tactics for the next 3 years on this front. All you need is a slow withdrawal and you win here.

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

Stay out of bases so he cannot use command HQ bonus.

You are referring to the target of the HQ to provide a bonus correct?

yeah I didn't have my RF Gun units there - several were at Lashio and others further south in Burma. I am consolidating all the Arty, AA and RF units at my next line of resistance - Toungoo. the unit stacking limits isn't ideal and I'm trying to decide which units to put there. Thinking 1 Inf Div and 2 Tank Divisions - that will probably put me over the stacking limit, but not too bad. Hoping that stack will at least hurt his massive stack if he moves that way.

I am basically abandoning all bases north of Toungoo except for Lashio. I'm leaving token units behind so he doesn't simply capture the base by being near it. I don't like abandoning Magwe (I like the ~3000 oil per turn) but don't want to lose any good units there.

I plan on doing better updates this evening from home.