Slitherine

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panjack

Thanks for your support! And, advice. I take it CVs are kinda important in this game? ;>

December 8, 1941

No disasters. Landings at Tarawa and a large invasion TF off of San Fernando, PI. The San Fernando invasion TF has 37 xAKs. Does that suggest a larger-than-average focus on the PI? That seems like a lot of ships.

Malaya: I had moved SAGs off Mersing to meet what appeared to be an invasion TF headed that way. This TF has now met up with 3 others and is 4 hexes directly east of Mersing.

Among the ships reported sighted in these TFs are 3 CAs, some DDs, and a bunch of transports, but that can’t be right for such an important landing. More big ships must be included. I assume the CV Kaga (which has been active nearby) might be in one of those 4 FTs (misidentified as a CA) or is lurking around nearby. The whole area is heavily searched (night and day) so the information I have is about as good as is possible.

I have 4 CL, 7 DD, and PoW and Repulse between these TFs and Mersing. None has experienced any battle damage. I guess the best grouping of these ships would be two TFs: (1) a TF with the 4 CL and 3DD along with (2) a TF with PoW, Repulse, and 4 DD. I want to have a battle during daylight and so the tentative plan is to set the PoW TF to “remain on station” at Mersing (so implicit 0 reaction distance, right?) and the CL TF set to patrol Mersing and with a reaction distance of 1.

Ideally, early in the morning the CLs react east and engage some of the invading ships, the ships protecting the invasion TF expend ammo and, I hope, get side tracked or otherwise discombobulated. Then later in the day the PoW TF does battle just offshore Mersing. The Japanese will be defeated and Singapore is allowed to survive for a couple of weeks longer! Or, more likely, the PoW, Repulse, and 3 CLs are heavily damaged if not sunk but a couple of J BBs and CAs are heavily dented and must spend time in the garage getting new fenders and other body work. Something between these two outcomes would be nice.

I’ll set all local fighters to LRCAP over the PoW TF and have all available torpedo bombers set to navel attack. Minelayers are headed to Mersing, but unfortunately Kates from the Kaga sunk the CM heading that way.

Is the above a reasonable plan of action?

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ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panjack

Thanks for your support! And, advice. I take it CVs are kinda important in this game? ;>

December 8, 1941

No disasters. Landings at Tarawa and a large invasion TF off of San Fernando, PI. The San Fernando invasion TF has 37 xAKs. Does that suggest a larger-than-average focus on the PI? That seems like a lot of ships.

Malaya: I had moved SAGs off Mersing to meet what appeared to be an invasion TF headed that way. This TF has now met up with 3 others and is 4 hexes directly east of Mersing.

Among the ships reported sighted in these TFs are 3 CAs, some DDs, and a bunch of transports, but that can’t be right for such an important landing. More big ships must be included. I assume the CV Kaga (which has been active nearby) might be in one of those 4 FTs (misidentified as a CA) or is lurking around nearby. The whole area is heavily searched (night and day) so the information I have is about as good as is possible.

I have 4 CL, 7 DD, and PoW and Repulse between these TFs and Mersing. None has experienced any battle damage. I guess the best grouping of these ships would be two TFs: (1) a TF with the 4 CL and 3DD along with (2) a TF with PoW, Repulse, and 4 DD. I want to have a battle during daylight and so the tentative plan is to set the PoW TF to “remain on station” at Mersing (so implicit 0 reaction distance, right?) and the CL TF set to patrol Mersing and with a reaction distance of 1.

Ideally, early in the morning the CLs react east and engage some of the invading ships, the ships protecting the invasion TF expend ammo and, I hope, get side tracked or otherwise discombobulated. Then later in the day the PoW TF does battle just offshore Mersing. The Japanese will be defeated and Singapore is allowed to survive for a couple of weeks longer! Or, more likely, the PoW, Repulse, and 3 CLs are heavily damaged if not sunk but a couple of J BBs and CAs are heavily dented and must spend time in the garage getting new fenders and other body work. Something between these two outcomes would be nice.

I’ll set all local fighters to LRCAP over the PoW TF and have all available torpedo bombers set to navel attack. Minelayers are headed to Mersing, but unfortunately Kates from the Kaga sunk the CM heading that way.

Is the above a reasonable plan of action?

Re: the Force Z react: - setting "remain on station" simply means it is not to return to port immediately. The "React distance" setting overrides the "Remain On Station". The other thing that overrides R-O-S is the threat tolerance. If it is normal and there is too high a threat of air strikes or enemy SCTFs, the TF will return to port. Change threat tolerance to "Absolute" if doing what you order is critical.
You were lucky with the air attack on Force Z - the AA is usually not enough to hold off the Nells and Betties - the CAP did that. He will add escorting fighters next time and your ships will be in trouble. He is also likely to move carriers to block your retreat to the south.

You may have been fooled by the movement algorithm that made it look like those TFs were headed to Mersing. Because of the way the hexes are laid out, horizontal and diagonal movement can be in a straight line but vertical movement requires the TF to zig-zag. So the algorithm always starts with the vertical movement first, and when it reaches a point where the rest of the path to target is direct horizontal or diagonal it switches to that. TFs coming out of Hainan or Formosa would zig-zag at an angle toward Mersing until they got on the line horizontal to their real target - Kuantan.

quote:

ORIGINAL: witpqs

quote:

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panjack

Thanks for your support! And, advice. I take it CVs are kinda important in this game? ;>

December 8, 1941

No disasters. Landings at Tarawa and a large invasion TF off of San Fernando, PI. The San Fernando invasion TF has 37 xAKs. Does that suggest a larger-than-average focus on the PI? That seems like a lot of ships.

Malaya: I had moved SAGs off Mersing to meet what appeared to be an invasion TF headed that way. This TF has now met up with 3 others and is 4 hexes directly east of Mersing.

Among the ships reported sighted in these TFs are 3 CAs, some DDs, and a bunch of transports, but that can’t be right for such an important landing. More big ships must be included. I assume the CV Kaga (which has been active nearby) might be in one of those 4 FTs (misidentified as a CA) or is lurking around nearby. The whole area is heavily searched (night and day) so the information I have is about as good as is possible.

I have 4 CL, 7 DD, and PoW and Repulse between these TFs and Mersing. None has experienced any battle damage. I guess the best grouping of these ships would be two TFs: (1) a TF with the 4 CL and 3DD along with (2) a TF with PoW, Repulse, and 4 DD. I want to have a battle during daylight and so the tentative plan is to set the PoW TF to “remain on station” at Mersing (so implicit 0 reaction distance, right?) and the CL TF set to patrol Mersing and with a reaction distance of 1.

Ideally, early in the morning the CLs react east and engage some of the invading ships, the ships protecting the invasion TF expend ammo and, I hope, get side tracked or otherwise discombobulated. Then later in the day the PoW TF does battle just offshore Mersing. The Japanese will be defeated and Singapore is allowed to survive for a couple of weeks longer! Or, more likely, the PoW, Repulse, and 3 CLs are heavily damaged if not sunk but a couple of J BBs and CAs are heavily dented and must spend time in the garage getting new fenders and other body work. Something between these two outcomes would be nice.

I’ll set all local fighters to LRCAP over the PoW TF and have all available torpedo bombers set to navel attack. Minelayers are headed to Mersing, but unfortunately Kates from the Kaga sunk the CM heading that way.

Is the above a reasonable plan of action?

Re: the Force Z react: - setting "remain on station" simply means it is not to return to port immediately. The "React distance" setting overrides the "Remain On Station". The other thing that overrides R-O-S is the threat tolerance. If it is normal and there is too high a threat of air strikes or enemy SCTFs, the TF will return to port. Change threat tolerance to "Absolute" if doing what you order is critical.
You were lucky with the air attack on Force Z - the AA is usually not enough to hold off the Nells and Betties - the CAP did that. He will add escorting fighters next time and your ships will be in trouble. He is also likely to move carriers to block your retreat to the south.

You may have been fooled by the movement algorithm that made it look like those TFs were headed to Mersing. Because of the way the hexes are laid out, horizontal and diagonal movement can be in a straight line but vertical movement requires the TF to zig-zag. So the algorithm always starts with the vertical movement first, and when it reaches a point where the rest of the path to target is direct horizontal or diagonal it switches to that. TFs coming out of Hainan or Formosa would zig-zag at an angle toward Mersing until they got on the line horizontal to their real target - Kuantan.

No - major error here! The part in bold is wrong per both several developer posts and experience. Remain on Station overrides any React distance setting. Using Remain on Station makes the React setting meaningless.

If you want a TF to hang around at a particular hex and have a React setting, use Patrol and set it for just that hex.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panjack
Still, I want to be "prudently bold" in my response to the Japanese onslaught so that Q-Ball can't just assume I'll not risk my carriers in any situation.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panjack

December 11, 1941
-----------------------------

Japan is unstoppable: landing seemingly everywhere, sinking transport after transport, and crushing any LCUs that get in its way. Fighter sweeps over everywhere fighters could sweep have lead me to pull back to safer airbases waiting a bit before I try to defend these bases again.

I am, however, able to move units down Malaya into Singapore and Chinese LCUs are moving promptly to defensive positions with good terrain. Two AVG air units have moved into China to help out. Japanese units seem to be moving toward Changsha from two directions but I hope to have enough units on good defensive terrain led by almost competent leaders to hold the Japanese back.

My first major goof: I overlooked a CL TF hanging out at Singkawang. The brown TF icon blended in too well into the brown/green landmass. The result: 27 Kates from the Kaga dropped lots of bombs on my CLs, but luckily only 3 hit. All ships should survive if they are able to flee the area.

And a bit of luck: CVs sailing through the northern Gilberts make two air attacks on Jaluit resulting in one sunk transport and heavily damaging five others, with about 900 casualties. But, Q-Ball informed me that my CVs got dangerously close to some torpedo bombers located in Roi-Namur. I assumed the Marshalls would have some bad guys but, not having played Japan or looked at the Japanese side before our game, had to guess about where and what Japanese were in the area. I will undoubtedly eventually pay the price for guessing wrong; but I dodged the bullet in this case. Better lucky than good!

Still, I want to be "prudently bold" in my response to the Japanese onslaught so that Q-Ball can't just assume I'll not risk my carriers in any situation.

I've got myself a bit of a problem in the South China Sea: I have far too many warships, CAs and CLs, kinda surrounded by Japanese carriers: the Kaga near Mersing, some smaller carriers in the northern part of the SCS, and perhaps one small carrier, or more, at Jolo. I'm hoping that some of these carriers, and lots of Japanese warships in the area, are running low of bombs and ammo. Unfortunately, I have to assume the bigger ships (BBs and CAs) still have their larger guns still fresh and shiny ready to sink my ships. My ships have most of their ammo but are running a bit low on fuel and so must soon exit the area.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panjack

Rook749: You're right: the THEORY of what to do with CVs early is straightforward, the actual practice is much harder. My main problem is my relative lack of skill in reading the tea leaves (of intelligence) so to have some idea of where the KB is hanging out.

BBFanboy: Very good suggestions about AVG. It looks like, given movements of Japanese carriers last turn, that I have an opening to have my SAG "trapped" in the South China Sea run away, but I'm playing with the idea of having them try to cause some trouble first.

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ORIGINAL: Panjack

Pontiouspilot: why does it take so long for the Betties/Nells to show up in the DEI?

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panjack
Rook749: You're right: the THEORY of what to do with CVs early is straightforward, the actual practice is much harder. My main problem is my relative lack of skill in reading the tea leaves (of intelligence) so to have some idea of where the KB is hanging out.

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ORIGINAL: Cribtop
Panjack - Win, lose or draw, your entries are funny, so you've got that going for you. Sometimes a hilarious recitation of disaster can make for a good AAR.

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ORIGINAL: Sangeli

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ORIGINAL: Cribtop
Panjack - Win, lose or draw, your entries are funny, so you've got that going for you. Sometimes a hilarious recitation of disaster can make for a good AAR.

Even more so given the title of the AAR. Let's hope for your sake it's Japan who makes of a fool of himself rushing into a bad situation

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ORIGINAL: Sangeli
...Indeed it is difficult and one can go through all the old AARs and see all the games that were ended based off of poorly executing this. I've always been of the opinion that CVs are just one of the many tools the Allies have and that an effective commander doesn't feel the need to use a tool just because he has it on hand. Especially with USN CVs; the risk reward ratio is generally not that great early on. Don't feel bad about leaving them in a (safe) port or in a vacant part of the ocean....