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I think V2.3 is a good improvement, playing a pbem 41 game as Japan - here are some of my experiences.

Choosing a historically first turn:

Hong Kong is a bugger....it refuses to fall.
Didn't find enough forces to occupy it until well into 42. The key was the capture of Nanning, this opened up the supply routes.

The CV Akagi still got an annoying bug aboard! The zero squadron usually goes from 90's to 8 in experience!! This is old news, happens to me every time I play. Is this a consequence of exp exceeding 100?

I've not played to many pbem battles, so I got a few surprises. I usually don't use more than 4 CV's in each carrier group. Find this more historical accurate, and launching of airstrikes are more efficient.
Well, that is one thing I'll never do again.....
My US opponent gathers all his 6 US cv's into a single TF and that's it. 130 Wildcats on CAP.

We met at Midway, which I had occupied, I had 3 CV groups....each with 4 CV's. The first was a decoy group operating from Wake. This got smashed up as predicted. Now landbased airgroups attacked his 6 CV's, they all got decimated. The only Betty that came through scored a Type 91 hit on a CV....no result.
Now my main group with the Akagi, Kaga, Hiruy & Soryu attacked. The attacking aircrafts were slaughtered. His counterstrike sunk the Soryu and damaged another CV. This was a rather fortunate result acctually.
My 3rd CV group with the Zuikakus and 2 CVL's were in the same hex as the Akagi group. This was my trumph carb.....but it never launched any attacks at all : ( It sailed away with my dominance over the Pacific skies.

I thought penalties for grouping more than 4 CV's in a single group were much larger!?
In my next pbem game, I'll group 12 Jap CV's into a single TF....no matter how unrealistic it might be. Collective protection and numbers is what matters....in pbem games anyway.

Placing subs is another matter: Is there possible to get a chart which shows what hexes a sub group have to be placed in to succesfully intercept convoys passing through the area?
Ì'm trying to write down what hexes are being used, but it's a rather futile effort.

From the US point of view: The production of B17's and B24's can't be controlled. When production is switched to the B24 in mid 42, B17 groups gets depleted.. It takes valuable time to reequipp with B24's, which are less imune to interceptors than the B17. Is this really necessary.......

That's all from the problem front, as usual we don't mention all the positive sides :=}
The new map is great, and so is most of the new improvements!

Hi, Whew where to begin. A battle at Midway favours the US in that it is closer to his HQ base (unless you moved Combined Fleet to Midway)
so he gets the edge in PP's. 4 US CV in 1 TF is 12 command points so he had to have got lucky and had Nimitz and Halsey control the battle and even luckier you went first. Too bad the computer did not wait for the US TF commander to launch a few airstrikes at the LBA on Midway, oh well damn the bad luck. Your third group probly did nothing for lack of PP's (keep the number of 'other' type TF's low during operations where you expect a carrier battle. Every TF eats PP's. I have never seen the Akagi thing (but my airgroups never get above 100 exp) You have to move your sub groups around a little. Are you speaking of US or Japanese subs? Japanese early in the war one of my favorite hunting spots is...go to Midway, now move 3 spots to the right, place a group right here. Against the AI it's a great spot to sink AP's (and out of air range unless AI puts a PBY on Midway)
12 IJN CV/CVL in a single TF (LOL <img src="eek.gif" border="0"> ) with the kind of luck you talk about that TF would run into an allied surface TF. <img src="eek.gif" border="0">

Production use 'alt n' and place factories under human control. Now you can have both B-17 and B-24 factories. Although with the changes to the B-17 I don't see why any one would prefer them over B-24's. As you change airgroups to B-24's the B-17's go back into pool and are used to keep remaining B-17 groups equipped, there usally is not a problem up grading/changing airgroups since the 'returned' aircaraft are then used to keep the other groups flying intill you also change them.

[ February 24, 2002: Message edited by: Mogami ]</p>

Reading the manual, it seems that the penalties are for launching air strikes, not for CAP.

I have used 12 - 15 CVE's in a air strike task force, they usually launch 1/2 or 1/4 strikes but the CAP is huge. I use these TF's for supporting ground operations. with the large CAP i only use DE's with them. plus with all the A/C capacity they can stay around a few turns without any problem.

Hi, yes that is why I said 'too bad you went first.' Fighters go on strikes and are lost or damaged too (lowering whats available for cap) then the US carrier strike would have been low (combination of loss from airstrikes on LBA and poor command control from too many CV in TF) but by Japan launching first strike every possible future course of turn was against him. (he lost his fighters on strike so they were not present for cap against the half strike of US CV-which was still equal to what 2 US CV's would normaly send.) Over stacking CV's past command limits does not hurt if all you are interested in is CAP. Later when the US has all those large CV's they also just ignore command limits since even half or 1/4 strikes over power weak Japanese air defense. And the massive CAP slaughters the Japanese strikes. It is sometimes possible (presuming Japan still has the ships) to get a surface battle against these fat CV TF's (I once sank 5 Essex CV in a surface battle with TF of 6 CA 4 CL and 5xDD group) I was mad when my LBA did not attack the US TF after the battle (3 CV damaged in surface battle escaped along with the few escorts surviving) But it is very rare to see IJN surface TF's react to US CV TF's

Hi Mogami, we had a go at a 41 campaign a year ago or so. We cancelled it due to supply problems in the current version!

I tried to change B24 production when factory controll was human. Will give it another try.
The B24 got better range, but the B17 stands much better up to the Zero fighter.

I did move the Combined Fleet HQ to Midway, the other TF's operated from Marcus Island.
You're right, it's in CAP that the huge CV groups got its largest advantage.
There are always 100+ fighters on CAP and the terrible amount of flak put up by such a huge group turns most of the surviving ac's into turkey shoots...
The flak of a huge Jap TF is around 1100 vs 3-4000 in a similar US group.

The 6 CV group has now toured Australia - I captured Darwin and layed siege to Broome and Cloncurry - , it just went down the (captured) New Guinea / Australia slot. I think it shot down 250 ac's that tried to intercept [:-]

Trying to fight a surface action against such group is rather dangerous....in most cases you'd loose a score of ships to Dauntlesses'!

It would be tough for the Allies to do the 6 CV TF, at least until late 1942 when the first Essex CV's show up.

What is a good way in countering this? Strike where his CV's are not. If he has his one CV group sitting in the Central or South Pacific, just focus in the opposite theatre, knowing full well that it is carrierless.

A way to counter this Allied Massive CV TF is to stick your 6 IJN CV's in one TF, commanded by Rear Admiral Yamaguchi. Chances are it will be a 100% strike!

In 2.4 the B-17 will have a range of 8. However, the B-24 is better (heavier load and range of 9).

If you want a high reaction rate, choose the option MOVE HQ TO TF. If you do this, then your HQ will be as close to the TF as possible (in fact, right at the TF!) Your chances of a high assault will be greatly increased. It does eat up a lot of PP's though.

this is a great topic. so much to post. i'llpost ion only one field for now.

re: move HQ to TF:

many IJN players get frustrated when the routine convoys dump masses of fuel on islands serving as fleet HQ's( example, Truk has 11,000 + fuel as SSF HQ )

As the fleet HQ bases get fuel transfers from Japan, there is a penalty for fuel stocks dropping in Japan: the Oil Reserve falls. As the Oil Reserve falls, so do future PP for all HQ's. This is unacceptable if Japan is waging a campaign on many fronts and often relocating Fleet HQ's to keep them near their TF's, like early '42.

A solution is to move the fleet HQ's (COMB, SSF, NSf) to TFs. In fact, in one ganme I had both SSS and NSF HQ in the same TF![Note, this must be done at a base udne the control fleet, an does cost 5 PP). Another the advantge is that a fleet HQ like Truk can then be changed from SSF to 17th army control, for example, allowing air staging/traing missions that don't eat up fleet PP's.

When the trasfer of HQ to TF occurs, the convoy function ceases to send fuel to the HQ TF (and its base), so one can build up the Oil Reserve more easily. As soon as one disbands the fleet HQ TF, the routine convoys will begin sending fuel to the land base where you disbanded the HQ TF( careful!). Also recall that when the the HQ TF's are extant, pick a high number for the HQ TF; PP's are allocated in order of number, so 2 is good for a COMB HQ, 4 for the SSF/NSF HQ. You might want to leave TF slots 1 and 3 open for "super" TF's (e.g a vital Transport or Surface combat)

Sometimes the IJN does not NEED that much fuel. Capture of NEI fuel in Bangka is. and Sumatra is crucialfro the above to work, however. LBA requires very little fuel, and much of the early Japanses success in '42 is due to MCS killer groups of LBA deployed in forward bases (some favorites are rabaul, maloelap, kendari, kuala lumpur). Save fuel for TF's.

Of course, there is an Allied counter to that. I'll post that another time

good luck!

GT

There IS a CAP penalty as outlined in the errata of the original SSI game (unless matrix deleted it), but that is based soley on the total carrier points in the TF something line if 6 + random(1-8) < CV points then CAP is halved. US Carriers get a benefit in 44-45.

The problem is that the max penalty is 1/2 not 1/8 as in a strike.

question if a LBA unit is on a convoy that is totaly destoryed, are the squads then add against the score and in included in IJA units lost ???

if the convoy is not totaly destroyed how are LBA squads losses figured out???