PBEM games...strategy questions on Japan tactic

[kaiser73]

I played only AI and a short PBEM and now starting a new one as Japan. some hints are welcome. about the long term strategy as Japan.

1) China: what can Japan achieve there? and is it worth? against AI you can take all china easy, but against a player? it seems to me that given the numbers of chinese divisions, allies player can bring to a stalemate losing maybe just one base.

2) Guina: is it worth? no resources, few vp compared to other areas, and pretty down south. why streching Japan in guinea? once you take amboina and maybe north guinea why going south?

[Captain Cruft]

ORIGINAL: kaiser73
2) Guina: is it worth? no resources, few vp compared to other areas, and pretty down south. why streching Japan in guinea? once you take amboina and maybe north guinea why going south?

The idea of taking New Guinea is to keep the US/Australians at bay. Whether it's worth the effort is an open question.

[2ndACR]

China - It is quite hard to defend China from the Japanese at game start. Every PBEM game I got going (4) I have taken 2 bases from them by 28 Dec 41 and start on number 3.
I am the Japanese. Those 2 bases do not include Hong Kong. Every Chinese unit is understrength and has supply problems. As the Japanese, you can slap around the Chinese if you use large Army groups. (4 divisions + art, eng, HQ)

Going South - The main reason is to take Rabaul and maybe PM. It is not too hard to defend this area if you put enough force in the area. Will change around late 42 - early 43.
It is more of a judgement call for the player. If you do not want to go south, then don't.
From Holliand the allied player can use LBA to start hitting Palau and use it as a jump off point to Guam, Saipan. If he has Rabaul, then Truk becomes untenable. Nice big base for the allied player to use as a forward supply dump, repair yard, mine resupply etc.

[kaiser73]

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR

China - It is quite hard to defend China from the Japanese at game start. Every PBEM game I got going (4) I have taken 2 bases from them by 28 Dec 41 and start on number 3.
I am the Japanese. Those 2 bases do not include Hong Kong. Every Chinese unit is understrength and has supply problems. As the Japanese, you can slap around the Chinese if you use large Army groups. (4 divisions + art, eng, HQ)

Going South - The main reason is to take Rabaul and maybe PM. It is not too hard to defend this area if you put enough force in the area. Will change around late 42 - early 43.
It is more of a judgement call for the player. If you do not want to go south, then don't.
From Holliand the allied player can use LBA to start hitting Palau and use it as a jump off point to Guam, Saipan. If he has Rabaul, then Truk becomes untenable. Nice big base for the allied player to use as a forward supply dump, repair yard, mine resupply etc.

ok, but what changes? the same problem of defending truk without holding rabaul you have if you hold rabaul but not PM. and PM if you don't take australia.
you just move the place of the battle while you have less troops to fight that battle. cause if you get rabaul, i don't think you don't defend truk.
I haven't played any PBEM to '43 yet so i don't know how a player would behave.

for china, i just looked at how many 250 A divs china has. it's impressive and got scared . bu

[2ndACR]

You do not have to garrison every base in NG proper. Right now in one PBEM game, me and Panzer are battling it out over Rabaul.
I see Rabaul as being important and I guess he does too. Like I said above, it is a judgement call. I do not think anybody has played a PBEM game from start to 43 either. Either way you go, you have to keep the allied player from getting in LBA range of the DEI area.
Once he is in range, he will start destroying your res/oil. THAT is your lifeline.

Do not let the numbers in China scare you. They can hurt you if you let them. The key is to pound them with bombardments, then attack them. Once they retreat, stay on them and hound them mercilessly. Use the bombardment phase to rest your troops up for the attack. I have still been hurt, but they usually get hurt worse. It is a balancing act in China, you can not rush forward too fast, yet you can not go too slow and allow them time to dig in or rest up. When you troops are tired, rest them in a city before pushing on to the next. If your troops get too tired, the Chinese can spank you.

[ZOOMIE1980]

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR

China - It is quite hard to defend China from the Japanese at game start. Every PBEM game I got going (4) I have taken 2 bases from them by 28 Dec 41 and start on number 3.
I am the Japanese. Those 2 bases do not include Hong Kong. Every Chinese unit is understrength and has supply problems. As the Japanese, you can slap around the Chinese if you use large Army groups. (4 divisions + art, eng, HQ)

Going South - The main reason is to take Rabaul and maybe PM. It is not too hard to defend this area if you put enough force in the area. Will change around late 42 - early 43.
It is more of a judgement call for the player. If you do not want to go south, then don't.
From Holliand the allied player can use LBA to start hitting Palau and use it as a jump off point to Guam, Saipan. If he has Rabaul, then Truk becomes untenable. Nice big base for the allied player to use as a forward supply dump, repair yard, mine resupply etc.

You MIGHT take Changsa and Yenen from me, but that's about it. You will grind your teeth away at any more than that. A human Allied player can immediately get all units into bases and then move all INF units forward. It takes about month or so but once there the Chinese will outnumber the Japs at most cities 3 or 4 to 1 and be hiding behind size 3+ forts. That's more than enough overcome the quality difference. The Jap side then has to systematically move city by city and draw down his forces to barely large enough to prevent the Chinese from counter-attacking and forcing a retreat, to mass enough force to take a city. And as the Allied player I constantly use recon and bombardment to gauge the size of the Japanese force trying to take any city. If it I get around a 3+ to 1 troop advantage I hit him with a Shock attack and most of the time force a retreat!

Bottom line, against a good Human opponent, China is a Tar Baby for Japan.....

[ZOOMIE1980]

ORIGINAL: kaiser73

I played only AI and a short PBEM and now starting a new one as Japan. some hints are welcome. about the long term strategy as Japan.

1) China: what can Japan achieve there? and is it worth? against AI you can take all china easy, but against a player? it seems to me that given the numbers of chinese divisions, allies player can bring to a stalemate losing maybe just one base.

2) Guina: is it worth? no resources, few vp compared to other areas, and pretty down south. why streching Japan in guinea? once you take amboina and maybe north guinea why going south?

And New Guinea. Taking Port Moresby is the end game here. It's not so much what it can do for you but what you deny the enemy. You deny the SW Pacific command a major airbase to pound Rabaul, and nearby naval units with and to deny them a staging area for a counter offensive to the north side of the island. You can also bomb further down the OZ coast from a PM base as Japan.

[ZOOMIE1980]

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR

You do not have to garrison every base in NG proper. Right now in one PBEM game, me and Panzer are battling it out over Rabaul.
I see Rabaul as being important and I guess he does too. Like I said above, it is a judgement call. I do not think anybody has played a PBEM game from start to 43 either. Either way you go, you have to keep the allied player from getting in LBA range of the DEI area.
Once he is in range, he will start destroying your res/oil. THAT is your lifeline.

Do not let the numbers in China scare you. They can hurt you if you let them. The key is to pound them with bombardments, then attack them. Once they retreat, stay on them and hound them mercilessly. Use the bombardment phase to rest your troops up for the attack. I have still been hurt, but they usually get hurt worse. It is a balancing act in China, you can not rush forward too fast, yet you can not go too slow and allow them time to dig in or rest up. When you troops are tired, rest them in a city before pushing on to the next. If your troops get too tired, the Chinese can spank you.

The number should scare you....a LOT. Most Allied players leave large numbers of units in the rear. That a mistake. I have begrudgingly given up Wuchow(Sp) in the south, and Yenen in the north after a bloody fight. I managed to force a Jap retreat at two places, Hengchow and Homan. I have about 150,000 in Hengchow now. And have massed over 140,000 troops in Sian and have decided to abandon Homan without a fight to mass even more at Sian. I have another 30,000 heading for Ichang which will bring that force up to almost 75,000. Bottom line I have AT LEAST 100,000+ at EVERY forward base now, all size 3 and soon to be size 4 forts. I will have and additional 70,000 in Sian when those southern jungle division finally get there. My rear is empty of everything but base forces and a couple of HQ's. And my average experience is moving over 55 across the board and will soon reach 60.

Basically, the game is over in China for Japan.....

[esteban]

ORIGINAL: ZOOMIE1980


The number should scare you....a LOT. Most Allied players leave large numbers of units in the rear. That a mistake. I have begrudgingly given up Wuchow(Sp) in the south, and Yenen in the north after a bloody fight. I managed to force a Jap retreat at two places, Hengchow and Homan. I have about 150,000 in Hengchow now. And have massed over 140,000 troops in Sian and have decided to abandon Homan without a fight to mass even more at Sian. I have another 30,000 heading for Ichang which will bring that force up to almost 75,000. Bottom line I have AT LEAST 100,000+ at EVERY forward base now, all size 3 and soon to be size 4 forts. I will have and additional 70,000 in Sian when those southern jungle division finally get there. My rear is empty of everything but base forces and a couple of HQ's. And my average experience is moving over 55 across the board and will soon reach 60.

Basically, the game is over in China for Japan.....

If you leave your rear area bases unguarded, a smart Japanese player will drop paratroopers on those bases and capture them.

This messes up your supply routes, which are pretty tenuous for the Chinese. Permanently reduces your heavy industry in those cities by 3/4 (1/2 when the Japanese paras take the city, another 1/2 of the remainder when you retake the city from the Japanese paras) since you can't expand HI unless you are the Japanese player. And it can also cause a lot of damage to resource and oil centers in any base the Japanese can capture, and repairing that damage takes a lot of supply that the Chinese player can not often scrape together.

Also, with the air transport "pickup" mission, the Japanese player can play hit-and-run. Capture a city with paratroops, and then fly most of the paras out before the Chinese can retake the city.

So, you should keep 1-2 infantry corps in each or your rear area bases that you need for production or supply routes.

[ZOOMIE1980]

ORIGINAL: esteban

ORIGINAL: ZOOMIE1980


The number should scare you....a LOT. Most Allied players leave large numbers of units in the rear. That a mistake. I have begrudgingly given up Wuchow(Sp) in the south, and Yenen in the north after a bloody fight. I managed to force a Jap retreat at two places, Hengchow and Homan. I have about 150,000 in Hengchow now. And have massed over 140,000 troops in Sian and have decided to abandon Homan without a fight to mass even more at Sian. I have another 30,000 heading for Ichang which will bring that force up to almost 75,000. Bottom line I have AT LEAST 100,000+ at EVERY forward base now, all size 3 and soon to be size 4 forts. I will have and additional 70,000 in Sian when those southern jungle division finally get there. My rear is empty of everything but base forces and a couple of HQ's. And my average experience is moving over 55 across the board and will soon reach 60.

Basically, the game is over in China for Japan.....

If you leave your rear area bases unguarded, a smart Japanese player will drop paratroopers on those bases and capture them.

This messes up your supply routes, which are pretty tenuous for the Chinese. Permanently reduces your heavy industry in those cities by 3/4 (1/2 when the Japanese paras take the city, another 1/2 of the remainder when you retake the city from the Japanese paras) since you can't expand HI unless you are the Japanese player. And it can also cause a lot of damage to resource and oil centers in any base the Japanese can capture, and repairing that damage takes a lot of supply that the Chinese player can not often scrape together.

Also, with the air transport "pickup" mission, the Japanese player can play hit-and-run. Capture a city with paratroops, and then fly most of the paras out before the Chinese can retake the city.

So, you should keep 1-2 infantry corps in each or your rear area bases that you need for production or supply routes.

That's what those jungle units along the Vietnamese border are good for. Put one or two in each of the five central cities. That should keep Japan from doing anything silly behind the lines.

Bottom line, if the Chinese are being played correctly, Japan probably cannot take China at all without committing all the Malay and PI forces (after securing the SRA). That will then leave NG and the Solomons in the hands of SNLF and Nav Gd units to defend against the Marine and USA divisions coming online during 1942...
Against a good human player, Japan is not going to do a whole lot more against China or India than it did historically.

And another thing I'm noticing, all those bombardment and fruitless deliberate attacks by the Japanese at 0-1 odds are gradually building up Chinese experience points. IF they keep it up the Chinese will have 400,000 troops in crack divisions with 65+ experience by late 1942!

[esteban]

I would commit most of the Chinese SEAC divisions to Burma. The Burma Road is very valuable to the Chinese, and those divisions force the Japanese to send a lot of troops into Burma. They also take a goodly amount of pressure off of India.

So far, in my one PBEM game that I had to resign after 3 weeks, I was able to take Yenen and Changsha. I was starting work on Hengchow.

Rear area cities that need to be garrisoned:

Yunan, Lanchow, Sian (Unless you pull front line troops back from Homan), that city northwest of Lanchow (It has valuable HI and resources, but I forget the name), Chungking, that airfield about 4 hexes north of Wuchow (again, forgot the name, but it is the key to the supply line to Changsha, Kweilin, Wuchow and Hengchow), and a couple other HI and resource centers.

The Japanese can launch a good sized parachute drop from about an 8 hex range.