Do I even have a chance; lost Lexington 3 turns in

[Stele]

So I took the plunge and decided to start the grand campaign; however just 3 turns I lost the Lexington and supporting cruisers on December 10. It was a stupid mistake on my part; I didn't give the Japanese fleet that attacked Pearl enough room to get home; but I didn't anticipate they'd be that close to Wake already.

Already saved without a backup, but now I'm pondering whether to continue with just the remaining carriers I have now or start anew.

[Big B]

Of course you have a chance - it's a long war.
But if you are playing against the AI not a human - restart...you'll enjoy the game more.


B

[RogerJNeilson]

What's the problem, you only lost 1 CV.....

Losing all of them is inconvenient.

But in 1944 I forget where some of them even are.....

Roger

[Stele]

Thanks for replies. I will give it a go for the next few months. I was just really discouraged after losing the Lexington in such a dumb way. Lesson learned I guess.

[RogerJNeilson]

It will be one of many lessons you learn, every move I learn new things and my longest game is now over 1000 moves against a human. If you expect to never make mistakes then you need a simpler game - this one is mind boggling in its nuances.

Roger

[Lokasenna]

I've done this several times [;)]. You'll be alright.

[Encircled]

Everyone loses a carrier, don't worry about it.

Now two might be a tad more inconvenient!

[wdolson]

On the upside, you can respawn the air units from the carrier and use them to train pilots. In the early going the USN doesn't have much in the way of extra units to train replacements.

Bill

[CaptBeefheart]

I just lost two against Lowpe in the Focus Pacific mod. I didn't stand a chance before, and now the odds are even worse. Still, I look at it as a learning experience.

Cheers,
CC

[Shark7]

Hehe, over the course of the war, you will build far more carriers than the Japanese player will ever have. This is a *minor* setback so long as you think in the long term.

[m10bob]

Historically (and in game).."Haul Ass" Jack Fletcher is really weak on "agressiveness" because he went out of his way to keep his flattops from being spotted and sunk.
The Americans really were losing those valuable ships faster than they could be replaced and we al know about the battleships.
Fletcher has been judged by his critics during the Solomons campaign, when he took his flattops from Guadalcanal, leaving the troopship/cargo ships to fend for themselves, or follow Fletcher, (seen by the Marines as abandonment).
It was they who gave Fletcher that nickname..
To his credit, he saved the carriers for later at a time when the Japanese were still very much "on the roll"..

[crsutton]

Losing a single carrier means nothing. Odds are the Allied player will lose one or two to subs alone in the first year of the war. Don't give it another thought. Vs the AI it is a no brainer. Vs a human-well just don't lose another. It is hard for the Allied player to lose the game in the long run. Come 1944 and you will be crapping out carriers after your breakfast.[:D]

[Anthropoid]

I just lost SIX! DMS attempting to bombard the nasty Japanese badmen invading Midway.

The nice thing is, those shells were (I suspect) intended for the brave marines defending Midway, and as such those lives and machines lost may well contribute to my retaining Midway, despite my worthy foes dastardly efforts to strike an early (21 Dec) surprise attack.

[zuluhour]

Played with 1 carrier for over 8 months, excluding CVE/CVL. Sure makes you think more.

[Treetop64]

If you can hold out until mid-late 1943, you'll regularly receive more hardware than you know what to do with. By Winter 43-44, you'll feel like a rich kid on Christmas morning, and it only gets better from there.

Don't worry about it.

[m10bob]

ORIGINAL: Treetop64

If you can hold out until mid-late 1943, you'll regularly receive more hardware than you know what to do with. By Winter 43-44, you'll feel like a rich kid on Christmas morning, and it only gets better from there.

Don't worry about it.

So true!..Fall of '43, I have 3 CVE's patrolling for ASW off the west coast, 10 CVE's stationed at Adak Island,(now a big port with ARD), and "big boys" operating out of Pearl, Brisbane, Truk and Colombo..

[wdolson]

Look at the real war. The USN didn't lose a carrier until May 42, but by the end of 42 the USN carrier force was essentially spent and it took most of 1943 to rebuild. Despite having the carrier idle in 1943, it wasn't a very good year for Japan.

Bill

[rustysi]

Not to hijack the thread (it is somewhat relevant), the US lost how many Fleet Carriers (not counting CVE's/CVL's)? Let's see... Lexington, Yorktown, Hornet, Wasp... I used to know this but alas... So there was one other IIRC (or was it two). Or was it only four? Anyone know?

[rustysi]

http://ffhiker.tripod.com/index-7.html

OK, just checked. According to the above link it was just the four.

P.S. I don't count the Langly as a CV even though she is CV-1.

[wdolson]

Langley was not even a carrier by the start of the war. The flight deck had been partially removed.

In addition to losing the 4 CVs in 1942, the USN also had the remaining two damaged more than once. By the end of the 1942 battles the Enterprise needed to be withdrawn for an extended repair and refit. The Saratoga was available in 1943, but she was the only USN carrier available. The US borrowed a CV from the RN for part of 1943 to help have a little bit larger reserve force to counter the Japanese if they had tried anything, but their role was defensive until the new carriers were ready and the Enterprise was back near the end of the year.

The USN carrier airgroups were also going through massive expansion at this time and building up new carrier squadrons and training them into cohesive units was a priority.

Bill