Why does it have to happen to me?

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It's 1st of january 1942, for a week or two both the allies and japanese have fought over rabaul, both sides making sorties to land more troops and supplies.

The Japanese first landed about 2000 troops which were not enough to dislodge defenders. Meanwhile i brought the Australian, NZ , Dutch and American ships stationed at PI together at port Moresby and sent them over to sink the invasion fleet. Because fuel was rather scarce at moresby i had to leave most of my destroyers and a cruiser or two behind. So my 6-7 heavy and light cruisers and 2 destroyers sailed right into the japanese invasion fleet without any escort. A total massacre ensued with 10-11 japanese merchantmen sunk before they ran north. I stayed at rabaul, bombarding the japanese forces there and organizing reinforcments from australia, spending my very limited political points on some small units.

Anyway... I also had sent the Saratoga and Enterprise from pearl harbour towards rabaul, with 2 AO's and a few cruisers in a replenishment TF trailing about 10 hexes behind.

The japs do a few raids on my fleet at rabaul with approx 30 betties but only manage to put a torp into one of the light cruisers, i send it to sidney for repairs.

Then lightning strikes, in the form of 15 kates. A small japanese carrier with several cruisers has appeared few hexes north of rabaul. Also my hudsons spot what appears to be 5!!!!! Battleships heading towards me... it later appears that the recon pilots are unable to make the difference between AK's and BB's. The kates damage over half of my cruisers and i leg it towards moresby, on the way a japanese sub puts a torpedoe into Houston (with about 20 system damage and no float or fire) and sinks it.[X(]

still, my carrier force is only 4-5 days from rabaul, I figure that a CVE or a CVL ain't gonna be a match for my two fleet carriers.[8D]

So the japs sail in, bombard my troops, land another 4k and sink one of my tf's carrying about 2k troops.[:(] I regroup at moresby, pick up the destroyers (i had a few tankers arriving a few days ago, bringing enough fuel to just about fuel every ship tehre) and head back out, calculating that my surface group would arrive approx. at the same time as the carrier force.

Anyway, i don't want my carriers at rabaul as they would be in the range of betties so i station them at Buka, i also send my AO's to there. The japanese jeep carrier launches 15 kates and 6 zeroes at me and they all get shot down by the cap, i suffer no losses. [8D]

I land about 2k reinforcments at rabaul, negating the earlier japanese advantage there...

I feel rather secure as i figure that without the planes the jap carrier is out of the picture and for a moment consider withdrawing my carriers. But, i decide to hang around incase the japs try to reinforce. New year arrives and with it the 5-6 cruisers and the CVE Zuiho (sp?) just a hex north of rabaul. My carriers launch two strikes, totalling 18 bomb and 2 torp hits on Zuiho and a few others into the accompanying cruisers [8D][8D][8D]

I feel all happy when up comes the popup that says that 3 betties from truk have just put a torpedoe into the Saratoga. Well .. just a torp hit, no fires no heavy damage. I hope for less than 30 system damage and very little float. Then arrive 11 kates, half get shot down, 2 smack their torpedoes right into the middle of saratoga. Totalling about 60 system, 40 float and 20 fire damage. [X(]

Ofcourse, the 35 wildcats did nothing to shoot down the unescorted kates....

[Dereck]

Did you lose the Saratoga or did she get away for repairs?

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ORIGINAL: dereck

Did you lose the Saratoga or did she get away for repairs?

well... she got away.. for three days.. then she split off the TF that was escorting her towards noumea.. so i sent her to australia.. when she was sunk by a japanese sub..

as i had already lost 3 cruisers and 5 destroyers to subs there in the previous 2 turns i felt like smashing things...

[Mr.Frag]

i felt like smashing things...

Now now ... remember, they are just little bits and bytes, not need to break things [:-]

[freeboy]

Hello M.F.
Have not you ever felt the need to injure your computer?

[tsimmonds]

.. then she split off the TF that was escorting her towards noumea.. so i sent her to australia..

Were you using the Escort TF mission? They are not supposed to do this....

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ORIGINAL: irrelevant

.. then she split off the TF that was escorting her towards noumea.. so i sent her to australia..

Were you using the Escort TF mission? They are not supposed to do this....

nope.. i wasn't.. now i know the use for the escort tf mission atleast... [:o]