UncleBuck
Posts: 633
Joined: 10/31/2003 From: San Diego, CA, USA Status: offline
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I agree, PT's were defensive arms. They were point defense. All of the major and some of the minor combatants of WW2 had some form of PT boat. They did it for a reason. I woudl liek to see some of the ideas here workied in, like the MTB Squadrons, Fatigue Morale, etc. on PT's. OTOH people need to remember that a PT boat is a light fast target. WOudl you venture a TF into an area where 6 Submarines were lurking? (one hex) The fact that in WW2 PT's were used as Barge busters, and coastal patrol craft does not mean that if they had the chance to attack larger ships they woudl be useless. In Daylight, they woudl be in deep trouble, and more likely to get killed, but, if they are used where they are intended, within 120 miles of the coast, I see no problem. One thing that is not in teh game is what happens if a PT squadron attacks an enemy TF in Restricted waters? Say a HArbor, or around one of the many Atolls, or SMall island CLusters? Let's see, they come in drawing a massive 4 feet of water, Launch there torpedoes,at heavy ships, and what happens? The Heavy ships have a choice, play with the throtle, and make Minor Rudder corrections and hope that they can make the Torpedoes miss, or they can take radical evasive manuvers and hope they do nto go out of the channel, hit an uncharted rock or rip themselves open on that reef. Planes should attack PT's without being set to 100' attack, but they shoudl nto be overly successful. Instead of sinking or damageing the PT's they should thwart the attacks. A common practice for PT's t avoid dive bombers was to wait 'till the bomb was RELEASED and then revese course , causing teh bomb to miss. If you are using planes that have no bombs, and are strafeing, be prepared to lose planes. They have 6 50 calier machine guns, and well you are coming in low. The one you are shooting at may be supressed but the other 4 or 5 are not. I think instead of having the unlimited PT boat available, I think that they must be tied to a MTB command, like other units. You sttion MTBS 4 at Tarawa. they have a Max of 18 MTB's. You can use it as a 18 boat squad or you can split it and have 3 squadrons of 6. Up to you, but it is not pull up an AK, and start pumping out as many as you want without support. Now on the positive for teh PT's woudl be to allow PT's that are stationed with there Unit MTBS 4 for example, will load torpedoes on the PT's without an AGP in a Size 1 port with 20K+ supply. They woudl nto have sent the MTBS out there without a means to reload. If you want to set one of the Partial units to another base MTBS 4/1 (6 boats) they get teh load they have, can re-fuel and load up AA ammo but must have an AGP or size 5 port, like we have now for Torpedoes. UB
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