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Brad,

Here are my thoughts from the IJ side.
1. Get all of your fighters together at one base, with an air HQ. Bigger base is better. i.e. maximize everything that will increase your sweep cohesion.
2. Target as you are: he is trying to protect Magwe, so sweep the AF's nearby. You're trying for CAP leakage. With that many fighters up, you'll be able to get 20-30 leakers. You may want to start your sweep targets farther away: Lashio or Taung Gyi.
3. Shift your sweep target randomly every day.

Once this start working, you will wear him down and there is little he can do to combat it except not fly. When he does, bring the 4E hammer and shut down a field.

As for his plane builds, his decision. What most beginner IJ player fail to realize is that there is a fixed number of HI that IJ will build over the course of the game and this is based on fuel. <period>. This total HI can be increased only if you take more fuel than the historic amount, or if you make severe cuts in the KB steaming days. Given this fixed HI, you can then only vary when you will build it. GJ has chosen to build it early and then to spend it on AC. I'm not suggesting this isn't a good strategy, but this is a finite sum issue. If he is spending it now on ahistorically high AC builds, then that means he will NOT be able to make historic builds for LCU's, Ships, and late war AC because he has not taken any more fuel than was taken historically.

Strategically, then you can easily see what you need to do (and mostly you are already doing it so just keep going).
1. Feints. Force him to steam the KB hither and yonder. If you can keep the KB steaming +20days/month you are depleting his potential HI severely. Worse, he probably won't realize the impact until too late.
2. LCU's. Keep up the pressure where you can. He doesn't have the HI to replace his losses. ARM and VEH cost 3 HI each and it take load cost of ARM/VEH to replace one device PLUS load cost of supply. Your replacements are essentially free. Get allied units that have good replacement pools in contact, and apply pressure.
3. Ships, he has undoubtedly cut way back on ship building to finance the AC. Keep you SS fleet in full gear. As you deplete his xAK's and TK's he will have to use ever more fuel inefficient ships to transport. His best TK (Tonan Whaler) is almost 2x efficient in moving fuel as the NEXT BEST, more than 4x the 3rd best ... etc. Ditto xAK's. Yusen S is really efficient, but once those are gone they get pretty inefficient fast.

In other words, without even getting into the DEI, you can put a lot of strain on his economy. But you do have to cut the DEI at near the historical date.

What about a landing in Sabang/Sibolga? If he has 1500 fighters in Burma, what does it look like in Celebs? For the IJ, it isn't how many fighters he has, he has a fixed amount of Aviation Support and that can't move quickly.

Just a bunch of thoughts, most you already know.

Pax: Good thoughts, though getting leakers doesn't work when the range is set to Zero

I need to ask the gallery: Should I ask for a dial back on the IJN Air?

This turn, the Taiyo/C unit and Ominato/C, 2 partial units, put up 86 Georges over the air in Lautem on LRCAP. That means the total combined parent unit must be at least 125 planes, probably significantly more, like 180+. Gamey?

Greyjoy is an honorable guy, and he probably doesn't think he did anything wrong. Maybe someone here can ask about the IJN air size?

I've been very decent on lack of CAP traps, but if I have this problem, I may have no choice but to take the gloves off

I think I have two courses of action:

1. Either ask the reduction of IJN air, or

2. Gamey on; 100 1-ship TFs, CAP Traps, night bombing, the works

We have a HR against restricted units crossing national borders; I let that one slide with the RTA in Burma, but I don' t think it's unreasonable to ask for changes.

Thoughts?

I think you should ask him to resize them back the their intended size. If he has split all his squadrons and resized them to huge units I think that has the potential to unbalance a lot of stuff. How many extra fighters is that on the fronline? 500? 1000? Its certainly nothing intended by the developers.

One of the problems is that you can´t do the same simply because you lack numbers to do so until perhaps mid to late 45. Besides I don´t think you can resize a single USMC squadron until the go through their 10/44 resize to 24 planes. Same with navy until their resize to 40. You could of course resize the CVE squadrons to 90 plane units but what are you going to fill them with? Wildcats which are useless anyway. Army you can´t resize at all.

Its certainly a "creative" move by GJ but I think stuff like this only leads to problems. He already has an advantage in having bigger squadrons sizes "un resized". No need to push it. I would certainly not be happy with it unless I played a "no HR game" like Bullwinkle.

GJ is a honorable guy. If you tell him you are not too happy about it I´m sure he will immediately resize them back without hesitation.

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

I think you should ask him to resize them back the their intended size. If he has split all his squadrons and resized them to huge units I think that has the potential to unbalance a lot of stuff. How many extra fighters is that on the fronline? 500? 1000? Its certainly nothing intended by the developers.

One of the problems is that you can´t do the same simply because you lack numbers to do so until perhaps mid to late 45. Besides I don´t think you can resize a single USMC squadron until the go through their 10/44 resize to 24 planes. Same with navy until their resize to 40. You could of course resize the CVE squadrons to 90 plane units but what are you going to fill them with? Wildcats which are useless anyway. Army you can´t resize at all.

Its certainly a "creative" move by GJ but I think stuff like this only leads to problems. He already has an advantage in having bigger squadrons sizes "un resized". No need to push it. I would certainly not be happy with it unless I played a "no HR game" like Bullwinkle.

GJ is a honorable guy. If you tell him you are not too happy about it I´m sure he will immediately resize them back without hesitation.

It is impassible for JAP player to resize airgrup's parts. To resize airgrup must be in one piece.
So, He can have several airgrups 72-81 planes(F,TB,DB) split into 3 sub-units and thats all he can do.
Q-Ball you have some marines/navy(land base) squadrons available to resize. 90 Hellcats can do a lot of good work on your side. You should look for them in PH and San Diego or on you escort carriers.

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

Pax: Good thoughts, though getting leakers doesn't work when the range is set to Zero

Sure it does. Test it. It is based upon odds/percentages. If you put 500 fighter on range zero and sweep a range 1 base you will get ~15 fighters on leaky CAP. At least, my tests show it. I tested 200 fighters on range ZERO you can still snip about 5 fighters per pass. Nothing in this game is absolute. Gary is all about randomness and odds.

EDIT:I think most people think that range zero works because for a group of 36 - 45 ac, yeah, you essentially won't see leakage. But when you increase the numbers, you see the effect of the randomness. And if he is using big groups like you think, the effect might be more pronounced. I would certainly test it in combat here.

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

I think I have two courses of action:

1. Either ask the reduction of IJN air, or

2. Gamey on; 100 1-ship TFs, CAP Traps, night bombing, the works

Don't go there yet, Brad. Work with him on reversing this misunderstanding. He'll do it.

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

Its certainly a "creative" move by GJ but I think stuff like this only leads to problems. He already has an advantage in having bigger squadrons sizes "un resized". No need to push it. I would certainly not be happy with it unless I played a "no HR game" like Bullwinkle.

And lovin' it! [:)]

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

What Erik said.

I don´t use LRCAP for offensive missions because they don´t perform as well as Sweeps and fatigue is just insane making the involved squadrons unavailable for days while recovering. I also think planes on LRCAP lessen the overall effect of the sweeps. Just a feeling though.

Use sweeps only and set up 3-4 rotations of 100-200 planes each so you can rest and replenish the rotations currently not sweeping. I try and keep squadrons with the same models in the same rotation. Makes it easier when giving orders to a large number of squadrons and it feels like it might increase the chance of "coordinated sweeps". Obviously use only your best pilots in the airframes you cherish like the P47. This is at least what I do and I think I´m doing well in the air! [:)]

Make sure you keep it up for a week or two and his fatigue and moral will be down the drain. This will lead to your KDR shooting through up to 7-8 eventually. If you can, force him to LRCAP something and then sweep that rather than his bases. That will skyrocket his fatigue. Its just about sweep, sweep, sweep. Eventually he will crack and then you can start closing his airbases.

Are you making sure your pilots have high DEF rating? Should be at least 60-70.

EDIT:

Big air bases can be closed. Either you wear him down like I described above or you can close it instantly. I´ve done that one 2-3 occasions with 500-700 fighters on CAP (Rangoon, Rabaul). You do need luck though. Just set up as many squadrons as you have to spare on Sweep, set all bombers you have available on AF attack and sacrifice something you hold dearly to the gods of AE that the Sweeps go in first! [:D]

Well, we have to disagree here.[;)] I use combined sweeps and LRCAP to great effect. As does my opponent. The benefit to LRCAP with sweeps is the LRCAP fighters can (not always) show up in multiple rounds to support sweeps, so if your sweeps go in one at at time, you will have support. And more fighting passes due to the LRCAP fighting in multiple rounds. In addition if you are sending in bombers on the same turn the LRCAP will provide them escort as well while not suffering the penalty that regular escort will. The drawback is high fatigue but this is worth it in my eyes if you can rotate units. I "never" escort bombers with anything but LRCAP. In my four year old game we have about 42,000 destroyed Japanese aircraft to 29,000 Allied. Seems about right.

I saw nothing wrong with Brad's attack except that he went in to combat vs superior numbers. A 55-85 kill ratio considering the odds is a pretty darn good result in my book. With the George and Frank having such poor service rating, all other things being equal, the Japanese will wear down. If the Japanese are not at a base with a rail line, then a couple of turns sweeping, and then as Obvert says a massive bombing attack to kill all of the disabled Franks and Georges that are stuck on the ground.

If he has too many fighters there then hit him elsewhere where there are not so many. The key is to have superior numbers when you attack and the Japanese aircraft will get chewed up.

One limitation to the Japanese player vastly expanding air groups is that he has no way of adding air support in his ground units. Something that he is short of anyways. GJ may be able to concentrate aviation support at one or two key bases but he will be short of this elsewhere. There are just only so many aircraft the he can support. If I recall the Japanese army gets one 81 plane fighter squadron and some that are in the 40-50 range. The bulk are smaller. It is the units that fit on carriers that can be expanded and you will need to discuss that with him.

ORIGINAL: crsutton


Well, we have to disagree here.[;)] I use combined sweeps and LRCAP to great effect. As does my opponent. The benefit to LRCAP with sweeps is the LRCAP fighters can (not always) show up in multiple rounds to support sweeps, so if your sweeps go in one at at time, you will have support. And more fighting passes due to the LRCAP fighting in multiple rounds. In addition if you are sending in bombers on the same turn the LRCAP will provide them escort as well while not suffering the penalty that regular escort will. The drawback is high fatigue but this is worth it in my eyes if you can rotate units. I "never" escort bombers with anything but LRCAP. In my four year old game we have about 42,000 destroyed Japanese aircraft to 29,000 Allied. Seems about right.

I saw nothing wrong with Brad's attack except that he went in to combat vs superior numbers. A 55-85 kill ratio considering the odds is a pretty darn good result in my book. With the George and Frank having such poor service rating, all other things being equal, the Japanese will wear down. If the Japanese are not at a base with a rail line, then a couple of turns sweeping, and then as Obvert says a massive bombing attack to kill all of the disabled Franks and Georges that are stuck on the ground.

If he has too many fighters there then hit him elsewhere where there are not so many. The key is to have superior numbers when you attack and the Japanese aircraft will get chewed up.

One limitation to the Japanese player vastly expanding air groups is that he has no way of adding air support in his ground units. Something that he is short of anyways. GJ may be able to concentrate aviation support at one or two key bases but he will be short of this elsewhere. There are just only so many aircraft the he can support. If I recall the Japanese army gets one 81 plane fighter squadron and some that are in the 40-50 range. The bulk are smaller. It is the units that fit on carriers that can be expanded and you will need to discuss that with him.

Well, we are in agreement to disagree! [:)] I should also add that my opponent and I have agreed on not using LRCAP for escort since it circumvents the penalties for escort. I thought this was a pretty standard HR? That HR certainly makes it even harder to use LRCAP in general. At least in areas where you are conducting bombing missions as you have virtually no control over where it shows up.

Sweep, sweep sweep!

ORIGINAL: crsutton

One limitation to the Japanese player vastly expanding air groups is that he has no way of adding air support in his ground units. Something that he is short of anyways. GJ may be able to concentrate aviation support at one or two key bases but he will be short of this elsewhere. There are just only so many aircraft the he can support.

+1

Pax, I didn´t write that! [:D]

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

ORIGINAL: crsutton


Well, we have to disagree here.[;)] I use combined sweeps and LRCAP to great effect. As does my opponent. The benefit to LRCAP with sweeps is the LRCAP fighters can (not always) show up in multiple rounds to support sweeps, so if your sweeps go in one at at time, you will have support. And more fighting passes due to the LRCAP fighting in multiple rounds. In addition if you are sending in bombers on the same turn the LRCAP will provide them escort as well while not suffering the penalty that regular escort will. The drawback is high fatigue but this is worth it in my eyes if you can rotate units. I "never" escort bombers with anything but LRCAP. In my four year old game we have about 42,000 destroyed Japanese aircraft to 29,000 Allied. Seems about right.

I saw nothing wrong with Brad's attack except that he went in to combat vs superior numbers. A 55-85 kill ratio considering the odds is a pretty darn good result in my book. With the George and Frank having such poor service rating, all other things being equal, the Japanese will wear down. If the Japanese are not at a base with a rail line, then a couple of turns sweeping, and then as Obvert says a massive bombing attack to kill all of the disabled Franks and Georges that are stuck on the ground.

If he has too many fighters there then hit him elsewhere where there are not so many. The key is to have superior numbers when you attack and the Japanese aircraft will get chewed up.

One limitation to the Japanese player vastly expanding air groups is that he has no way of adding air support in his ground units. Something that he is short of anyways. GJ may be able to concentrate aviation support at one or two key bases but he will be short of this elsewhere. There are just only so many aircraft the he can support. If I recall the Japanese army gets one 81 plane fighter squadron and some that are in the 40-50 range. The bulk are smaller. It is the units that fit on carriers that can be expanded and you will need to discuss that with him.

Well, we are in agreement to disagree! [:)] I should also add that my opponent and I have agreed on not using LRCAP for escort since it circumvents the penalties for escort. I thought this was a pretty standard HR? That HR certainly makes it even harder to use LRCAP in general. At least in areas where you are conducting bombing missions as you have virtually no control over where it shows up.

Sweep, sweep sweep!

It's interesting that since we stopped using LR CAP offensively Jocke has figured out the other methods that are just as effective but not so abstract and uncontrollable.

The issue for me with LR CAP and escorting bombers is that it is there supporting EVERY fragment in the raid. So somehow even though those fragments are meant to represent packages arriving at different times and in different portions of the sky over the course of a phase, the LR CAP magically appears in ALL areas, always at 32-40k, above my planes' max altitude (by 2nd best maneuver HR) and is immediately back at FULL strength and diving. That is silly and gives a tremendous advantage to the attacker. Escort is screwed of course, but if played well, the Allies don't really need much of it for 2E and 4E raids. Just a lot of sweeps and mass concentrated strikes.

The main point in all of this is that wearing down a big base or set of bases is and should be a process. There should not be a magic bullet to get through those kind of defenses. Would the game be much fun if there was? [;)]

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

Pax, I didn´t write that! [:D]

Oooops!!! Sorry, fixed it. A little to quick with the delete key. [X(]

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

ORIGINAL: crsutton


Well, we have to disagree here.[;)] I use combined sweeps and LRCAP to great effect. As does my opponent. The benefit to LRCAP with sweeps is the LRCAP fighters can (not always) show up in multiple rounds to support sweeps, so if your sweeps go in one at at time, you will have support. And more fighting passes due to the LRCAP fighting in multiple rounds. In addition if you are sending in bombers on the same turn the LRCAP will provide them escort as well while not suffering the penalty that regular escort will. The drawback is high fatigue but this is worth it in my eyes if you can rotate units. I "never" escort bombers with anything but LRCAP. In my four year old game we have about 42,000 destroyed Japanese aircraft to 29,000 Allied. Seems about right.

I saw nothing wrong with Brad's attack except that he went in to combat vs superior numbers. A 55-85 kill ratio considering the odds is a pretty darn good result in my book. With the George and Frank having such poor service rating, all other things being equal, the Japanese will wear down. If the Japanese are not at a base with a rail line, then a couple of turns sweeping, and then as Obvert says a massive bombing attack to kill all of the disabled Franks and Georges that are stuck on the ground.

If he has too many fighters there then hit him elsewhere where there are not so many. The key is to have superior numbers when you attack and the Japanese aircraft will get chewed up.

One limitation to the Japanese player vastly expanding air groups is that he has no way of adding air support in his ground units. Something that he is short of anyways. GJ may be able to concentrate aviation support at one or two key bases but he will be short of this elsewhere. There are just only so many aircraft the he can support. If I recall the Japanese army gets one 81 plane fighter squadron and some that are in the 40-50 range. The bulk are smaller. It is the units that fit on carriers that can be expanded and you will need to discuss that with him.

Well, we are in agreement to disagree! [:)] I should also add that my opponent and I have agreed on not using LRCAP for escort since it circumvents the penalties for escort. I thought this was a pretty standard HR? That HR certainly makes it even harder to use LRCAP in general. At least in areas where you are conducting bombing missions as you have virtually no control over where it shows up.

Sweep, sweep sweep!

No I don't think that HR is very common. At least I have not seen it in many AARs. Besides if it is allowed for both players then it really does not matter if you allow it or not. I am not a big fan of the escort penalty and just look at LRCAP as a way of having free ranging escort over the target vs close escort. Something that the Allies were doing more frequently as the war progressed. Japan was stuck with close escort to the end, primarily due to the lack of sufficient radios.

Besides if I am not mistaken GJ uses this tactic himself. And why not? It works pretty well and in my mind creates much more historical results.

I would be curious to hear who else bans the practice in their campaigns.

I see your reasoning with LRCAP being more of a free ranging escort. But my experience is the LRCAP will pretty much guarantee success. As Erik says given enough numbers they can stay up all day protection virtually all incoming strikes and decimate the defending CAP in the process.

I very much doubt this was the intention of the developers. If so why put the escort mission in there at all? As I said I see your reasoning but using LRCAP instead of Escort is just too powerful. As long as I bothered to set the LRCAP up the defender would have almost no chance whatsoever to get to the bombers. That just doesn´t feel right to me.

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

I see your reasoning with LRCAP being more of a free ranging escort. But my experience is the LRCAP will pretty much guarantee success. As Erik says given enough numbers they can stay up all day protection virtually all incoming strikes and decimate the defending CAP in the process.

I very much doubt this was the intention of the developers. If so why put the escort mission in there at all? As I said I see your reasoning but using LRCAP instead of Escort is just too powerful. As long as I bothered to set the LRCAP up the defender would have almost no chance whatsoever to get to the bombers. That just doesn´t feel right to me.

Isn't LRCAP still constrained by ops points, or passes, or something? I ack that it hangs around for the whole phase--so does CAP--but CAP eventually runs out of points and lands. I see this all the time with multiple enemy sweeps. You're not saying the LRCAP is at the same effectiveness on every attack are you? For any N of attacks?

11-15-43:

I haven't posted in awhile, been busy, but so has the US Navy

HMS Hermes:

Remember her? She ate 3 torpedoes in the Indian Ocean, about 20 hexes from Cocos. Somehow, she survived the initial hits with a major float damage of 95. I almost scuttled her, but instead wanted to see if she could make it.

She actually made it halfway to Cocos before the pumps finally failed, and she went under.

It's not a big deal; HERMES has puny AA value, about the only use is to stick some Marine fighters on her as an add-on. Oh well.

Burma:

We swept Shwebo to see if we could get any leakers; but the 400+ fighters at Mandalay are all set to ZERO range apparently. We got our timing right for once, and after a couple turns bombed the crap out of Magwe; most of the oil now is toast, one or two more runs should do it.

I would have toasted Magwe sooner, but we had a HR against any strat bombing until late 1943, except in Aus/India/US. This is because the Japanese can bomb China easily to restrict supplies, and in return, I held-off on Burma. Gloves are off now, so Magwe can be turned into rubble.

Not sure if I will go after the 400+ plane death star at Mandalay; probably not, but if he keeps range at Zero, that means I own the rest of the airspace anyway, barring pop-up CAP.

Hollandia:

We focused a huge fleet north of Darwin; this facilitated a loss-free landing at Hollandia, of 2 Marine Div, 2 Tank Units, HQ, and guns.

There are over 30,000 defenders at Hollandia; I've been bombing it now for 6 weeks, and it is cut-off from supply. If the supplies are nearly out, it will fall pretty easily, since I can bombard it at will. If not, it will take awhile.

I can't just crawl up the NG coast 3 hexes a month; but this will allow us to keep moving without naval support, and also will cut-off the 35,000 man garrison at Vanimo, which he would either have to withdraw by floatplane over 12+ hexes, or leave to rot.

I dont' know if this strategy of cutting-off IJA troops is really working; he has lots of stranded troops, I'll have to do a survey at some point, but there are many garrisons. The guys at Shortlands are impaling themselves on Torokina in order to die, but most are just starving, if they haven't been flown out. Rabaul has over 30,000 troops, and that will be left to die.

DEI:

Big move is in the DEI. All my CVs, and BBs, are focused there. See map below.

Not sure I am ready to charge to meet him, not while he has LBA support, and I don't. I want to even things out there, and get the last of my CVs back, before doing so (LEX and SARA are nearly there; they have completed repairs, and will join the fleet shortly). But when the time comes, I will gladly take a bloody exchange, especially near a major port like Darwin.

On the shot below, I have Bathurst and Darwin stacked with fighters providing more LRCAP over ships, plus bombers set to Nav Attack

The initial target is Selaroe; this is a very conservative one, but I want another airfield that cannot be shut down easily. This will even things out, and create some space for me. Once I secure Selaroe, I can move pretty quickly, because I'll have LBA, I won't care about a fight, and I have the troops prepped.

I am also buildling up for a landing completely elsewhere......but for now, we're here, where I can leverage my LBA, and where I don't need to defeat KB to make progress

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

Isn't LRCAP still constrained by ops points, or passes, or something? I ack that it hangs around for the whole phase--so does CAP--but CAP eventually runs out of points and lands. I see this all the time with multiple enemy sweeps. You're not saying the LRCAP is at the same effectiveness on every attack are you? For any N of attacks?

I can confirm LRCAP reduces in effect per combat cycles in a single turn.

From what I can tell in my game LRCAP seem to hang around A LOT longer than CAP. Don´t have anything more than a feeling to support that though! [:)]

11-20-43

A busy few days, mostly in the air....

Burma:

Greyjoy ambushed one of my bombing runs on Magwe, with over 500 fighters! Recon showed Magwe empty the turn before, most were LRCAP from Mandalay. We've had sweepers at Shwebo looking for leakers, so he must have guessed right.

The result was a bloodbath; I lost over 270 planes. We did sweep with 100 P-47s and 30 Spits, supported by 200 other types on LRCAP, but we only shot down 100 Japanese fighters.

I am out of answers on how to defeat the Japanese air in Burma, unless anyone has some. With 500 fighters at Mandalay, until I can get 500 decent fighters in Burma, I have no chance. I can bomb things here and there, but inevitably we end-up in a buzzsaw and get slaughtered. I had several successful runs before this one, so it only takes 1 good guess out of 10 to get a huge kill ratio.

With all the blood in Burma, the other issue is that his pilots there are undoubtedly the best he has

Any other suggestions? Otherwise, I give up in Burma, and I am going to land or attack elsewhere, until he has to move some of those 500 fighters. That has to be a good chunk of the IJAAF.

DEI:

We successfullyl landed at Selaroe, without oppossition in air or naval, and took the place quickly, annihilating the 10,000 garrison. He has 2/3 of a division there, we landed 2 divisions, with Corp HQ and engineers. It fell very quickly.

I attempted last turn to attack IJN shipping at Boela; it was there the turn before, but he moved his combat TFs; fortunate. The other problem is that I set 3 TFs to move the 9 hexes to Darwin; all were maxed in fuel, but only 1 of the 3 made it into position. I hate that with CVs! They never go as far as you want them to.

So, while our sweep on Boela was very successful, we lost alot of planes attacking relatively minor targets. We sank 3 Yusen AKs, at least they are the best transports, but not worth it. He lost 200 planes to my 170. At least my losses were all replaceable types (mostly Hellcats and Avengers)

We need to clear the area, because my airgroups are tired from this battle on the CVs; if KB is around, he'll run in looking for an exchange, but not while our guys are depleted....no thank you.

He may try to bombard Molu; I have lots of DDs, PTs, Mines, Subs there, so he can do it, but I hope to continue to make it expensive. I also cleared out any good fighters, and stocked it with ones I can lose (P-39s, Hellcats, etc)