Erkki
Posts: 1461
Joined: 2/17/2010
Status: offline
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March 3rd 1942
Not a good day for the Japanese. Lets go through today's disappointments clockwise, which happens to be from least to worst when it comes to things that pissed me off in this turn.
CENPAC: Another US xAK TF slips past the submarine screen, this one sails through at least 3 hex with a Japanese submarine, sub floatplanes spot it twice but dont engage. Nothing in ops reports either.
SOPAC: CVL Shoho raider TF near Pago Pago doesnt spot anything at all, but is itself spotted by Allied patrol aircraft. Why arent the Allied float and patrol planes never, ever, shot down by Japanese CAP, but my E13As and H6Ks and all the carrier-borne scouts get shot down left and right when they meet even handful of Buffaloes, but KB's 100+ Zeroes ignore the dozens of float planes that shadow the TF? Shoho now has to bug out, but we'll check the sea area to the NE first.
DEI: A squadron Dutch PT boats engage Japanese cruiser TFs 3 times today, we manage to sink just 3 of them (to no loss, however). The PT boat fleet is now rearming, I think, we'll probably see it tomorrow. My opponent is super boring: despite of some of the air attacks getting through yesterday, no bomber or fighter sorties today. He has hundreds of aircraft on Java but he simply wont use them.
Burma: I know I'm producing surplus of supplies in Burma and shipping more, I have the stockpiles set (we're playing the beta) but I'm still short or out of supplies in nearly every Burma base.  I cant wait to see what kind of the nightmare it is with the supplies once the Allied offensives begin...
China:
I have now 3,600 AV at Changsha, we'll bombard attack and see what they have there tomorrow. Judging by what happened during the rest of this turn, I dont have particularly high hopes... The KMT South Army is retreated like 15 times and they've lost maybe half a million men, but I wouldnt be surprised if they had forts 5, raw AV advantage and were well supplied.
And today's worst is:
Ground combat at Sian (83,41)
Japanese Shock attack
Attacking force 157851 troops, 1159 guns, 435 vehicles, Assault Value = 4940
Defending force 155722 troops, 884 guns, 0 vehicles, Assault Value = 4270
Japanese adjusted assault: 1853
Allied adjusted defense: 3515
Japanese assault odds: 1 to 2 (fort level 5)
Combat modifiers
Defender: forts(+), preparation(-), experience(-)
Attacker: shock(+), disruption(-)
Japanese ground losses:
36966 casualties reported
Squads: 427 destroyed, 2311 disabled
Non Combat: 214 destroyed, 1468 disabled
Engineers: 20 destroyed, 99 disabled
Vehicles lost 270 (49 destroyed, 221 disabled)
Allied ground losses:
15299 casualties reported
Squads: 50 destroyed, 616 disabled
Non Combat: 59 destroyed, 882 disabled
Engineers: 4 destroyed, 26 disabled
Units destroyed 1
Where did that disruption(-) come from? All units had disruption below 8 and very low fatigue... Notice how the 360+ engineers didnt lower the forts.
Those Chinese have been retreated at least once per unit. Clearly they were not short of supplies(Forts 5 too), and the KMT units in this area easily outmatched the Japanese even in raw AV, even before the losses! (Theres 3,000+ Chinese AV in the adjacent hex). Now people are going to tell me that if he has that much there he cant be strong elsewhere... OK. So I'm just going to ignore that 8-unit stack at Ankiang and 50+ units at, near and around Changsha, and the 8 Corps he has at Ichang. The Japanese northern army will now retreat, lets hope the Chinese wont start a counter offensive...
Despite of getting his units cut off destroyed for no gain, the rest of the force retreated multiple times and half a million men lost elsewhere, he still outnumbers the Japanese in raw AV, and sits in heavily defensive terrain behind 5 forts just about everywhere. This alone would be OK to me, that was pretty much the situation in real China, but what worries me is that the Chinese can probably move on offensive themselves by the end of 1942 and I'd be very surprised if they didnt drive me out of the country by early 1945, especially as judging by other AARs, Burma is next to impossible to defend.
In the South, Chinese have 18 units at Changsha, 22 more in adjacent hexes and 8 more 2 hex away. After what happened today I no longer think we can take Changsha, despite of knowing that at least 20 of those units have been retreated all at least 3 times and our bombers kill 500+ of them daily.
The people who say China cant be held against determined Japanese attack were clearly seeing just player experience difference - Smeulders had committed a largely failed Sir Robin and still outmatches me despite of 2 extra divisions from Honshu and committing 350 bomber sorties a day since the beginning of the war, and keeping his troops in clear terrain where they lost on the average about 1,500 men a day through January and February.
Now, I would probably want to start bombing Chinese industry, but we have a house rule against that. D'oh.
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Printable Version
RE: Aboard the Red Castle - Erkki(J) vs. Smeulders(A) -... - 
Refineries should produce 1220 supplies a day, more than enough. I can post you some tracker screenshots of Sumatra, Tarakan and Miri...
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