Canoerebel
Posts: 21100
Joined: 12/14/2002
From: Northwestern Georgia, USA
Status: offline
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I agree, Poodle. I've felt the same way, though unable to express it as well as you just did.
I look at how this game has developed and where the two sides stand, and I think the Allies are in great position and that this is the finest game that I've played.
Then I read negative comments from Forumites and scratch my head. Yaab says I've played sloppily. John Dillworth, a long-standing forum friend, tells me I seem to be be off my game. Alfred notes the great cost of the defeat in Sumatra and says I'm understimating it. These and others are valued members of the community and entitled to express their opinions. But I still say, "Huh?"
I think part of it may be that certain players read only occasionally or haphazardly or don't have encyclopedic knowledge of such an immense game. So Jeff posts yesteday that one of the problems with Sabang's defense was that there weren't any mines or ACMs. There were, of course, but he'd forgotten: 962 mines at one point protected by two ACM that ripped many a Japanese destroyer. Other players read of the fall of Sabang and the immense cost paid and think it was a mortal blow. And others are reading mainly from John's perspective, take note his excitement and achievements, and perhaps don't have a firm grasp on the overall picture.
John III is currently involved in three games against experienced players. He's taken on Herbie in a Scenario 1 match, meaning its a stock game in which Japan doesn't have any mod-bequeathed advantages. It's early in that game, but already Australia seems to be under siege with John pursuing his usual tactics of terror.
He's facing Michael (NYGiants) in a mod (Between the Storms, I think) that is a bit of a toned down version of Reluctant Admiral. Michael has far more knowledge of game mechanics and how to maximize forces and use HQs than I do. Due to the modifications, he has enhanced fighter pools. (I know he had three P38 squadrons operating in the Aleutians at one time to devastating effect, when I could barely cobble together one in my game due to the lower replacement rate. I was most envious of him.) In that game, John was his usual aggessive-self an conquered Hawaii (I think that's right) and most of SoPac. It's February '43 and Michael is preparing to begin his counterattack from over near map's edge. He's trailing my game by five months. He might way outperform me from this point forward. But he has alot of territory to reclaim.
And in this game? As we've noted before (but its worth stating again), John hasn't gone anywhere beyond the standard areas of conquest you'd expect in any Scenario 1 match. He hasn't invadaded India, Ceylon, the Perth region, the Line Islands, Hawaii, Midway, or the upper Aleutians. Why? He has the most enhanced OOB and fighter pool disparity possible, and he's playing a mod that he designed.
I think the answer is that while he's about as aggressive a player as there is, I was more aggressive than he was.
The Allies invaded the Middle Aluetians in the Spring of '42; Assam in the Summer of '42; the Gilberts in the Summer of '42; threatened to invade the Aluetians and then New Guinea in summer and fall of '42; and then invaded Sumatra in the Autumn of '42. Just when John was ready to expand beyond his deepest penetrations (the New Hebrides), he started reacting to Allied invasions. He's never stopped.
As a result of fighting fire with fire - of being aggressive against a most aggressive player - the Allies have incurred plenty of losses. But these losses were with a purpose and with good effect.
Lowpe (and perhaps Obvert?) make the good point that it can benefit a Japanese player (mainly from an economic standpoint deeper in the game) to play within a tighter perimeter. But this is not the case here. John has not chosen to play within a tighter perimeter. Instead, he's spent the entire game reacting and overreacting to Allied invasions here and there, hither and yon. I don't presume to know whether this has had a material effect on his future economy, but it's certainly not a case where he's sat back and efficiently attended to his defenses.
I knew Sumatra was a lost cause in January '43 unless I committed 100% to focus on its relief. I decided then to follow another course - to take advantage of John's preoccupation with Sumatra to strike elsewhere. By doing so, I knew I was consigning Sumatra to ultimate defeat. But I felt like the sum total would be of decisive benefit to the Allies. So when Sumatra finally fell - months after I most optimistically estimated - it was not the end of the world. By then, the Allies had already used its diversionary nature to very good effect.
I am aware of the costs (well, mostly I think) the Allies have paid to end up where they are. But I look at what they are and I am very, very pleased. The Allies are in fine position to take the war to Japan.
I am not saying that the game is over or that the Allies have won. There is hard fighting to come; fighting that may go against me and erode the excellent beginning. But I do say that Japan has danced to an Allied tune for more than a year, and the Allies are in as good a position as possible to keep playing the tune that the parties will be dancing to.
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Printable Version
RE: The Good The Bad & The Indifferent - 
While many Japanese players have made conquest of China a priority, for John he uses it to buy out troops on the cheap to rebuild and deploy in the Pacific. He has gone only so far in our game and will pay a steep price in 44/45. Dan and I have been on the receiving end of too many "Banzai" laced emails concerning sinking of ships of all sizes. If not in an email, its all over his AARs. 
Dan and I will each need to defeat John at sea. If one thing I would say to Dan is to use your subs to deny John the fuel for his ships. Economics is not a strength of John's even after all my years of mentoring him. 
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