Fragment Disband and You (no Hemajor)

[Q-Ball]

If you play Japan in AE, one of the most important areas is Pilot quality. Although the pool in AE gives you a fair amount of pilots each month, the quality is poor, and putting them in front they will either get killed quickly or not hit anything, or both. There are alot of ways to get good pilots into front-line units, but "Fragment-Disband" to me is the best. It's not easy to grasp, so I took some screenshots of doing it lately, figuring it might be helpful.

Options: There are several conventional ways to get experienced pilots into front-line units.
Mogami Method: This is fairly simple; you use "Disband" to combine two fairly depleted units into one good unit, while the disbanded unit goes into the reinforcement queue, and comes back in 120 days. The problem with this is that last part; couple that with the 2-3 months it takes to train on-map to even a decent level, and that's 6 months that unit is tied up in only training. Too long, and I think Japan can't pull that many units offline for that long.
Disband/Withdraw: An AE modified Mogami, you can disband a good unit, and send all it's pilots into the pool. This is handy when you MUST withdraw a unit and gives you the opportunity to distribute the good pilots. But I wouldn't do this either for a unit you don't HAVE to withdraw, for the same reason as above.

The Answer: FRAGMENT DISBAND!: The answer is fragment disband. Fragments are NOT parent units; disbanding PARENTS you have to wait 120 to replace those plane and pilot slots, but if you disband a FRAGMENT, you don't. That is the key on this.

Let me demonstrate via picture

Situation: I recently had a nasty CV battle off New Caledonia. Shokaku ate 2 bombs and is heading for some repairs. Her KATE group scattered to several ships; I went ahead and disbanded those fragements to reinforce the Kate units on those ships. Only problem is that this stripped Shokaku-3 dry; only 1 pilot left!

I don't want to replenish with 23 Rookie pilots. They will just die quickly and not hit anything. Shokaku-3 is too valuable to do that. So, I flew her to Japan for a different way......

At start, as Japan you get one very good Land-Based TB unit in the Home Islands, Yokosuka Ku-2. Only problem is that it is stuck there. No problem, you can still use the pilots in this unit, and in effect turn it into a TRAINING unit.

[Q-Ball]

The key at this part is you have to make sure BOTH units are the same plane type, and you have to "break" the unit you are pulling from.

You can "Break" the unit one of three ways:

1. Upgrade/Downgrade to new aircraft type
2. Load it onto an AK, and immediately unload; not possible for RESTRICTED units
3. Fly it into the base, and march all the AV out for a few days; this takes a long time, but is probably the only way to do this if you are playing PDUS-OFF, and working with a RESTRICTED unit. But you CAN do this with PDU-S off.

[Q-Ball]

Sorry, no STEP 3, I miscounted when I was doing the Screenshots. I guess STEP 3 is "Go get yourself a Beer".

You fly off the ONE repaired plane to a new base; this is the PARENT. This is why it's important that you do this on an island like Matsuyama; if you did this at Yokosuka, a fragment would NOT be left behind; it would be loaded on traincars to go meet the Parent at the new base. Not helpful for this.

[Q-Ball]

Now you're pretty much done. Obviously you have to wait for Shokaku-3 to repair, and re-fill Yokosuka Ku-2 with new pilots and planes. But this is how FRAG-DISBAND works.

[Ghertz]

That is a clever idea.

[tbridges]

OMG!!

This is truly impressive. [&o] Do you approach every aspect of this game with this same degree of EXCRUCIATING attention to detail? How long does an average turn take you?

Oh, and remind me never to play you!

[Q-Ball]

Actually, I am a bit lazy in AE and cut some corners, like I don't move my subs every turn, so no I'm not that detailed. And other blow me away when it comes to production, I just don't pull it apart that much.

I am anal when it comes to pilot quality, because this is the life blood of the IJN in particular. If your pilot quality tanks, you're in trouble, because the best weapon in the Japanese arsenal is the 18in Torpedo, and you need good pilots to wield it.

In general, you have 3 types of pilots:
GREAT: All exp 70 and 80 pilots. Almost all the ones you get are on the board at start.
DECENT: 50's in experience in critical skill; about as good as you can get with on-map training.
ROOKIES: 35 exp, what you get right out of the pool.

I would NEVER put a Rookie in a fighter or IJN bomber unit and send to the front. Rookie fighter pilots die fast, and rookie bomber pilots can't hit a ship. It's OK to use rookies in front-line Transport units, and somewhat OK in Patrol or IJA Bomber units, but never in IJN units. Don't!

DO NOT:
*Mix good pilots and bad pilots in the same unit. It's a good idea to have 1-3 Great pilots in a unit that is TRAINING, but if it's 1/2 and 1/2, that unit should not be at the front, and if it's training, you are having good pilots sit around.
*DISBAND alot of units to extract the pilots. Unless you need to withdraw it, bad idea.

DO:
*Expand all Kate and Val reinforcement units by re-sizing on a CV. You need as many slots as possible to train them. Consider most of these units TRAINING units for KB.
*Extract good pilots, over time, from the Home Islands. You have a number of units stuck there, they may as well be advanced training units
*Prioritize the best pilots for your Carriers. I would rather pull pilots from a good LBA unit to a CV, then have CV pilot quality go down. The last good pilots in the IJN should be on your Carriers.
*On CV's, you are better off having a couple pilot slots empty than put a rookie in there. You can carry 2-3 more A/C per unit more than the number of pilots; in a second round of combat, there are usually more pilots than planes anyway.

BTW, all of this works for the Allies as well!

Hopefully this all helps, most WITP players are familiar with this, but there are alot of folks new around here, and it took me a year of WITP before I caught onto this.

[GB68]

Excellent work Q-Ball. I will employ this ASAP. 

[canuck64]

Awesome-[&o][&o][&o]

I think you'd alluded to this in another post, and while I've toyed with the same, your imperatives
-particularly the one about NEEDING to do this on an island, lest railcars take away the remnants on their own-, I doubt I'd have managed to pick up.

To my own credit, -and likely due in part to havin read your previous post, I did sense some interesting pilot transferral possibilities that may not be really evident-but I have a followup question-

Why would it be bad to shuttle outany/all experienced pilots
and then in the "fresh out of school" pilots into
.....the entire Manchukuo air system,

as they CAN then subsequently patrol and run actual missions, though not combat of course...
-which would then complete the process as a middle ground for class graduates, and push the pilots assigned to Manchukuo out into combat situations thereafter..... I see this as pushing my 30/35 pilots up rather quickly-at least to the 50's uninterrupted.

Is this obvious as a subsequent, or am I overlooking a downside?



Is this assumed? From a larger perspective, I can see refining my CV pilots, but does it not follow I can do this -assuming I have no life-[>:]

throughout the respective commands? Thus hastening -I'd hope- the ripening of raw recruiits.....

[BigBadWolf]

Q-Ball, how does exactly resize on CV works? If I put just one unit on carrier and tell it to resize, will it resize to maximum number ship can carry?

[Mike Solli]

ORIGINAL: tbridges

OMG!!

This is truly impressive. [&o] Do you approach every aspect of this game with this same degree of EXCRUCIATING attention to detail? How long does an average turn take you?

Oh, and remind me never to play you!

That's the only way to play as the Japanese player.

[Mike Solli]

ORIGINAL: BigBadWolf

Q-Ball, how does exactly resize on CV works? If I put just one unit on carrier and tell it to resize, will it resize to maximum number ship can carry?

Put the carrier in a TF. Load the planes on and set to resize. Disband the TF and voila, the air unit has resized.

[Mike Solli]

Hey Q-Ball, very nice explanation. [:)]

[Q-Ball]

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

Hey Q-Ball, very nice explanation. [:)]

Thanks Major Mike! Maybe you can help me out on engine production, because apparently I did manage to screw that up so far.[8|]

Oh, and all those Aks sitting around in WITP....not happening. I am converting xAK to xAK-ts like MAD!

[Mike Solli]

Hey Q-Ball, you're really converting to the -t?  Granted, i haven't started my game yet, but I don't expect to have to do that.  Interesting.
 
Early on, I expected xAKs to be in short supply.  I'm not so sure anymore because the outer Home Islands can almost supply Honshu by themselves.  Yeah, it takes a lot of hulls, but I figure it'll take less than 1/3 of the starting xAK hulls to do it, and that's mainly small ones.  I'm finding that the chokepoint is port size.  There are lots of land units that can't load, primarily because of the limited docking space (at least at the beginning of the war).  Maybe the -t conversion would help, because you'd need fewer xAKs to load an infantry unit.  Hmm....
 
PM me your email address and I'll send you my airframe/engine spreadsheet.  I use it to calculate what engines I need to produce based on the airframe production.  Just plug in the airframe production by type and go to the engine sheet.  If an engine type is green, you're good.  If it's red, [:-].  [:D]

[scott64]

Can I get the spreadsheet? [:)][8D]

[BigBadWolf]

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

ORIGINAL: BigBadWolf

Q-Ball, how does exactly resize on CV works? If I put just one unit on carrier and tell it to resize, will it resize to maximum number ship can carry?

Put the carrier in a TF. Load the planes on and set to resize. Disband the TF and voila, the air unit has resized.

Yeah, I figured that out, but what I wanted to ask is to what size will the group resize? (Is this sentence even possible in English? [:'(] )

Let's say I take Akagi and remove both Kate and Val groups and tell Zero group to resize . Will it resize to 81, the maximum number Akagi can carry?

[Canoerebel]

Yikes, it's a Saturday morning and I just tried to follow Q-Ball's excellent and detailed formula...and now I know why Step 3 is to quaff a beer. 
 
[:D]
 
P.S.  Thanks for making it easier for Japanese players to inflict defeats on we Allied players.  [:@]
 
(P.P.S.  Really, though, well done and helpful.)
 

[Mike Solli]

ORIGINAL: scott1964

Can I get the spreadsheet? [:)][8D]

Sure. Last night I crawled into bed and realized it needed some work. I'm planning on doing that later today and then will post it here in this thread.

[Q-Ball]

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

Hey Q-Ball, you're really converting to the -t?  Granted, i haven't started my game yet, but I don't expect to have to do that.  Interesting.

Early on, I expected xAKs to be in short supply.  I'm not so sure anymore because the outer Home Islands can almost supply Honshu by themselves.  Yeah, it takes a lot of hulls, but I figure it'll take less than 1/3 of the starting xAK hulls to do it, and that's mainly small ones.  I'm finding that the chokepoint is port size.  There are lots of land units that can't load, primarily because of the limited docking space (at least at the beginning of the war).  Maybe the -t conversion would help, because you'd need fewer xAKs to load an infantry unit.  Hmm....

Thanks MIke, I'll look for the update.

I agree, you don't need more than 1/3 of your hulls to feed the Japanese economy. All the Resources you really need are close at hand, and you don't need to haul anything from the SRA in that department. Now, I am finding that if you conduct major fleet ops, you don't have enough TKs; I will run it a little more, but I foresee needing AKs to haul fuel. You might have enough TKs if the IJN sits in port, but that's not an option!

I started off conservative in Ak-t conversions, and initially it seemed enough. Once the SRA is done, though, and alot of reinforcements are appearing in Japan, I found myself WAY short of troop lift capacity. And with that conversion, it STILL hauls more cargo than troops.

I have been on a crash Ak-t conversion program, and am converting hulls like mad. I brought home alot of xAKLs that start on the perimeter for hauling resources. You need SOME out there for short supply runs, but not more than a couple dozen total.

I am also finding myself short of escorts; I only use DD escorts for Invasion or Replenishment TFs. I am converting to alot of Kiso and To'su PBs.

I am also converting all non-Long Lance equipped DDs to APDs (anything older than a Mutsuki), with the exception of the Momis, because they lose a boiler in that process. Converting all the TBs to Es when available is also a no-brainer IMO. With the sub-par torps they are not very good DDs, but as APDs they make terrific ASW escorts.