Japanese Troops on Java (Full Version)

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ADB123 -> Japanese Troops on Java (6/8/2010 7:47:16 PM)

February 27, 1942 -

This is the turn I posted about in the Tech Support section of the Forum where I found all of my fighters on the map re-set to the same, and very odd, settings. I'm hoping that there is a reason for what happened, and a way to avoid it in the future, because it took me around an hour and a half to go through and re-set all of my fighters back to the settings that I wanted, and I don't want to have to do this every time that I play a turn.

In any event, the night phase, and the turn in general, was very busy for USS Seawolf which found itself at the right place and the right time, but not quite with all the right tools to do the job. Right off the bat Seawolf spotted an xAK near Tandjoengpinang and shot four torpedoes at it, but the torpedoes missed. Then Seawolf spotted another xAK and shot off four more torpedoes, but the torpedoes were duds. Then later on Seawolf found yet another xAK and finally got a hit on it. And not satisfied, the skipper of the Seawolf stuck around long enough for the ASW ships in the escort to hit it with a couple of depthcharges during the day phase.

In between all of Seawolf's endeavors the Japanese continued their landing at Semarang, and new Japanese landings started at Bacolod and Ocean Island. The Allied troops that were at Ocean Island are long gone, so my opponent gets some real estate here, but nothing else.

Finally, USS Sculpin found a nice, big AV near Auki in the Solomons, but the torpedoes it shot were duds.

Daylight continued the large and widespread air attacks of the Japanese. Zeros swept over the retreating Chinese troops near Loyang, followed by escorted bombers. I didn't bother to try to fly LR CAP over those troops. Then Soerabaja, Bacolod, Praboemoelith, San Jose, Port Blair and Medan were all hit by Japanese bombers.

At the same time, Townsville was visited by a number of Japanese Recon flights, along with Wyndham. I wondered at the time why no fighters checked out the Recon planes over Townsville, but given how the fighters were re-set, I can see now why none flew.

The only Allied air attack was in China where Chinese bombers straffed and bombed a Japanese Armored unit on the road to Loyang. The Chinese pilots did pretty good and caused a reasonable amount of damage. The Dutch bombers didn't fly against Semarang although I had set them to do a strafing run. Afterwards they turned out to be re-set to no target. (I checked the previous turn and they had been set then; I'll assume that they didn't fly because of too much Japanese CAP, but I'm dubious because of the issue with my fighters.)

The Japanese attack column on the road to Loyang kicked out my retreating Chinese Corps this turn, but fortunately the Japanese didn't advance, despite having armoured units in their column. I am pulling my troops out of Chengchow and will retreat from Loyang too if I get the chance. My Chinese defense was compromised by the fall of Nanyang so I want to retreat into a more defensible line.

In other land action, an SNLF unit attacked a Philippine Infantry Battalion in central Mindanao, driving the already-defeated unit towards the base that the Philippine Base Force re-captured a couple of turns ago. It's nice to be able to delay the Japanese, even if by little bits.

The Semarang was captured, along with Ocean Island. A Japanese Base Force is already in place in Semarang and Japanese air units have moved in, so I withdrew my remaining Dutch bomber and fighter units. Maybe they will be of use later on, but there is no point in throwing them away now.

The end of the turn brought the arrival of lots of Australian LCUs, and even another Dutch LCU. It also brought a number of Allied planes into the “organizing” state in the air replacement list. I'm hoping that this is W.A.D. and not yet another little irritating bug.



ADB123 -> So far, so good (6/9/2010 3:17:01 AM)

February 28, 1942 -

Well, it appears that my opponent and I ducked-the-bullet on the matter of re-setting fighter planes. My fighters stayed under orders this turn, so hopefully my opponent's fighters will too. This is a very touchy game at times...

The night phase started with the continuation of the Japanese landing at Bacolod, followed by an attack on an xAKL near Truk by USS Gudgeon. Gudgeon shot six torpedoes at the freighter and missed. But the captain of the Gudgeon wasn't satisfied so he ordered the sub to the surface and began to shell the Japanese ship with the sub's 3 inch gun. Gudgeon's gunners got in six hits, but after another miss with a torpedo, and with an increasing amount of counterfire from the freighter, Gudgeon's skipper decided to call it a night and ordered the sub to submerge.

After this action Japanese troops started to land at Aitape on the north coast of New Guinea. Then the night phase ended as Japanese sub I-10 sank an xAK off of Suva with two torpedoes. I was hoping to sneak that ship into Suva with supplies, but it got caught. So now I'm sending another supply ship but this time with an escort.

Daylight brought more Japanese Recon flights over Townsville, and this time over Myitkyina too. Then the Japanese bombers hit their usual targets – Bacolod, Praboemoelith, San Jose, Batavia, Port Blair, and Medan.

The land battle phase brought an attack on Bacolod by two Japanese Infantry Regiments along with an SNLF unit. The battered and out-of-supply Philippine Infantry unit was kicked out of the base and is now moving towards the dot base at the other end of the island. I'm surprised that my opponent didn't land the SNLF unit on that dot before attacking Bacolod. If he had the Philippine unit would have surrendered.

In some good news, BB West Virgina reached San Francisco safely this turn. I am sending it on to Alameda for repairs and upgrade. I've got three big repair facilities in the Bay Area so I don't want to overload San Fran.

And in other news, the Air Fields at Prince Rupert reached Level 5 this turn. Now that Winter is over base-building in the Winter zones should pick up a lot. I have a large number of Engineers at Prince Rupert and it will be good to see them working at full capacity. I want to build both the Port and Air Fields up to Level 7 so that Prince Rupert will be the main base of operations in the North.



ADB123 -> March 1 Update - Intel (6/9/2010 9:43:26 PM)

I'm going to post a number of images now to update the situation as of March 1, 1942. First off comes the Intel screen. The big change since the last one is that Singapore has fallen and now the Japanese are in the lead for points. Fortunately, things like Ships Sunk and Planes Lost for the Allies haven't gotten significantly worse.

After this I'll show some the major map areas where things have changed since the beginning of March – China, Burma, Java and Northern Australia. Things are essentially unchanged in all other regions with no Japanese advances beyond the existing Front of a month ago.


[image]local://upfiles/32618/249AACC3CEC6476DA6BD59B2E26F411C.jpg[/image]



ADB123 -> RE: March 1 Update - China Map (6/9/2010 9:44:24 PM)

Here's China. As you can see, the loss of Nanyang has opened up a gash in the Chinese defense that can't be held. So I am pulling back and hope to avoid having the troops in Chengchow and Loyang trapped.

[image]local://upfiles/32618/4A842F7481914B269EB8786F3EC05F29.jpg[/image]



ADB123 -> RE: March 1 Update - Burma Map (6/9/2010 9:45:17 PM)

Here's the situation in Burma. My opponent is sitting back at Mandalay while I am fortifying the Indo-Burmese border. I expect my opponent to move into the Bay of Bengal once he has Java and Sumatra under control.

[image]local://upfiles/32618/C782DDE74446451B95669A57B14539DD.jpg[/image]



ADB123 -> RE: March 1 Update - Java Map (6/9/2010 9:46:04 PM)

Here's the current situation in Java. I'm hoping that my opponent takes his time because I will get two last Dutch LCUs in Tjilatjap in a few more days. They won't make a big difference, but they will help slow down the Japanese advance a little more.

[image]local://upfiles/32618/61FAADF578CB4D939657CA0A26E30CC2.jpg[/image]



ADB123 -> RE: March 1 Update - Northern Oz Map (6/9/2010 9:46:45 PM)

Here is the situation in Northern Australia. As you can see, I've abandoned all of it except for the Darwin north-south line. That unit at Broome is the Base Force section that was originally at Port Hedland. Right at the beginning of the game I gave it orders to march and join the other two pieces which were at Broome and Derby. I didn't want to spend Political Points to change it to an unrestricted HQ so that I could send it by boat, but that turned out to be a poor decision. But it ought to reach the other two pieces at Derby before any Japanese invasion. BTW – the ships at Darwin are a handful of PT boats left over from the Philippines.

[image]local://upfiles/32618/ECF32CD6683440A39386AEFD518A42DB.jpg[/image]



ADB123 -> Bad Luck Messages (6/10/2010 3:17:38 AM)

March 1, 1942 -

Lunga was occupied automatically overnight by the Japanese, which saved my opponent the trouble of actually sending a invasion to the dot base. Now my opponent has to decide if he will try to develop it or not. At the same time the Japanese landings continue at Aitope.

USS Snapper was chased by some Japanese ASW ships near Singapore but escaped. Later on Snapper tried to hit one of the PBs in that ASW TF but the torpedoes were duds. This time when the ASW ships came after Snapper they scored a minor hit on the sub.

In the first of a pair of Bad Luck messages, BB West Virginia reported that its Temporary Floatation Repairs failed. Fortunately, the WB was already at Alameda so this was no problem. I just put the ship into the Repair Facility and told them to fix it. At the end of the turn a second Bad Luck message arrived that was much more of a worry - @#$%^ Pennsylvania reported that its Temporary Floatation Repairs had failed again, but Penn is still several days sail from San Fran, and the Floatation damage increased noticably this turn. I was under the impression that Floatation damage would stay constant if System Damage was removed before sailing a ship, but obviously I was mistaken. We'll see if my luck stays poor or improves enough to let Penn limp into port.

Daylight brought a fair amount of Japanese bombing on Praboemoelih, San Jose, Port Blair and Medan, but there were actually more Japanese Recon flights than bombing flights. Nothern and eastern Australia, Central China, and Burma and the Indian border all saw numerous Japanese Recon flights.

The only land action at the end of the day was the capture of Aitope. The “move” symbol showed up on the Japanese troops at Semarang, so they are obviously starting their spread throughout Java. And my own Recon planes reported that there are now at least eight Japanese land units at Mandalay, so things ought to liven up in Burma fairly quickly. The weather there has been very rainy the past few days so I sat out my heavy bombers again while I wait for the skies to clear a bit.



ADB123 -> A Quiet Turn (6/11/2010 3:03:28 AM)

March 2, 1942 -

This was quite a quiet turn. The only thing that occurred during the night phase was the occupation of Swebo in Burma. I was quite surprised because I've only seen this sort of thing with island bases in the past. Oh well, once my opponent moves some troops there it will be one less hex for my bombers to fly.

Even the day phase was relatively quiet. The only Japanese bomber raid was on San Jose. However, there were a huge number of Japanese Recon flights all over the map. Myitkyina in particular received multiple fly-overs. I guess that my opponent is trying to decide if he wants to take a chance on attacking. I've got the Malaya Division there, which is not the greatest thing, but I now have well over a half dozen bases in the Indian border area from which I can fly bomber and fighter sorties, so an attack on Myitkyina could turn out to be quite costly for the Japanese.

The end of the turn brought a successful attack by Dutch sub KXV on a Japanese xAK that was sailing north of Timor. Then a Japanese column consisting of 1 Infantry Regiment, 1 Armoured Regiment, and 1 Engineering Regiment attacked the Base Force and Philippine Infantry Division at San Jose and wiped them out.

So while my opponent is systematically working his way through the Philippines, Dutch East Indies and Burma, I am continuing to develop my positions further from the current Front. More troops and planes arrived at the Hawaiian Islands the past few turns and all of the bases continue to grow in strength. In Australia I have been flying out the survivors of the Fall of Rabaul and Port Moresby from PNG and most of them are now back on the Australian mainland and re-building. For example, the Lark Battalion is now back in one piece and is on its way to join its two sister Battalions in northern Oz.

BB West Virginia started refit and repair in the Shipyard at Alameda and should be back into action by Summer. BB Pennsylvania gained one more Floatation damage point to 66, but it is now only two days sail from San Francisco so baring extremely bad luck it ought to make it.

I continue to receive Air Units back that I withdrew two months ago. It would be nice if I had enough planes in reserve to fill out most of the returning units, but there's not much hope of that in the near future. I did withdraw the last two of the P-40E squadrons that arrived in Australia a couple of months ago with horrifically inept pilots. The unit had to be withdrawn in less than two weeks anyway, and I've got empty fighter squadrons with much better pilots that can use those planes.

In China all but one LCU from Chengchow made it to Loyang this turn. Only the weaken Corp that had been defeated twice is left and it ought to be out next turn. I am moving most of the Chengchow units to the road hex to the northwest of Loyang so that my opponent can't cut the road to Sian before I more my troops. It's a bit of a disappointment to have to give up those two bases, but I can't see a good reason to lose so many troops in a trap.

So things continue along mostly according to plan. My opponent has avoided making any major mistakes, and the mistakes that I've made have been non-fatal. I'm still far from being able to stand up and stop, or even badly hurt my opponent in open battle, but the time is getting closer when I won't have to continually fall back.



ADB123 -> Another Quiet Turn (6/13/2010 1:43:50 AM)

March 3, 1942 -

This was yet another relatively quiet turn. This is fine from my p.o.v. because it means that my plans are moving along without being bothered.

So there was no action during the night phase and the highlights of the day phase were Japanese bombing runs on Praboemeolih and Medan. There are a couple of Japanese TFs going up the Malacca Straights, so maybe they are invasion forces headed for Medan. It also appears that there are troops on the way towards Praboemoelih. I've got units in the “escape” paths for both bases, so when the invasions come my troops will simply melt into the woods and move on to the next location. Fortunately, my opponent is not attempting to trap my units most of the time which allows me to play “run through the jungle” for quite some time.

My opponent does have the coast of Australia locked up pretty tightly with subs. Today a Japanese sub sank an xAK off of Brisbane that I was trying to sneak up to Horn Island. I've got a couple of pieces of units at Horn Island that are too large to airlift out, so I'm hoping to get a freighter there to load them. If the freighter gets them back to the mainland that's great. If not, and they are lost on the freighter, then that's okay too because then the main units back on the mainland will start to fill out again. In any event, I've decided to try again, but this time with an ASW escort for the freighter.

In other news, I received an RAAF Kittyhawk squadron at Townsville today. I was very pleasantly surprised to see that the pilots have an average experience of 60. So I moved them up to Cairns to provide cover for my Patrol and transport planes that I am using to pull out the last remainders of the Port Moresby troops who are now at the dot base up the coast in PNG. I'm hoping that my opponent will send in some Bettys like he did earlier on. <g>

Another small Dutch Infantry Battalion arrived at Tjilitjap this turn. One last one will join the sacrifice in three more days. In the meanwhile, Japanese troops have moved into siege position at Djokjakarta. I have only minimal troops there so it won't be hard for the Japanese to capture it.

BTW – my opponent continues to Recon Wyndham on a daily basis, so I expect a Japanese invasion there some time soon.



ADB123 -> Pacman in Java (6/13/2010 12:00:19 PM)

March 4, 1942 -

There was more activity this turn as my opponent started to put his next wave of plans into motion. First off, my opponent got a break in his assault on Java as the dot base of Soarakarta was occupied automatically. This saves him the bother to march some troops over there.

Next USS Seadragon was runover by a large and well-escorted Japanese Transport TF going up the Straights of Malacca. Interestingly, there were AVs in that TF along with APs. The escorts didn't catch Seadragon, but the sub didn't get off any shots either. Later on, when I was able to check SIGINT it told me that a Japanese Naval Support Base Force is on its way to Rangoon.

Hmmm – just why is my opponent interested in getting more help in loading and unloading ships at Rangoon? Is that to support an invasion of India? Maybe I need to send some 4-Es to visit the Port at Rangoon. If only the weather would give me a window again. BTW – later on during the day phase USS Searaven was chased unsuccessfully by more Japanese ASW ships in the lower reaches of the Straights, so my opponent is getting very active there.

Then IJN sub I-9 shot six torpdedoes but missed an AP in a large Transport TF that I had sailing off of Tahiti. The ASW in my TF didn't find the Japanese sub either, but my TF was able to continue on with no further disturbance. I have been negligent in putting air units in the far South Pacific so it's no wonder that a Japanese sub could sit in the sealanes there. I'll need to do something about it.

I'm wondering how my opponent will interpret that sighting. Those ships weren't going to Australia, instead they are going to Pearl and eventually the US West Coast where I need them. But if this helps my opponent to think that I have been reinforcing Oz, so much the better.

The day phase started out with a Zero Sweep of Townsville, so I guessed wrong as far as putting the Kittyhawks in Cairns. The British Buffalos were roughed up, but the Japanese did end up losing two Zeros in AtoA combat and 2 more to Operations losses, so that wasn't too bad. And although the Brits lost a number of airframes they didn't lose many pilots and still have a number in reserve, so I just brought in replacement planes and set everyone to train for a bit. If the Zeros come back they can take their Ops losses and like it.

Japanese bombing was limited again to Djokjakarta, Medan and for the first time in a while, Lautem.

There was one Japanese amphibious invasion this turn as my opponent sent some forces to recapture Dumanquilas in Mindanao. This time there will be no place for my unit to hide once the base is captured.

The Japanese besiegers made short work of the feeble defenders at Djokjakarta this turn. The Imperial Guards Division, along with two Infantry Regiments, an Engineering Regiment, two Artillery Regiments and an AF BF kicked out the tiny Dutch Infantry Battalion and the Dutch Base Force with ease. The Dutch troops retreated along the coast towards Tjiljatjap. According to the combat info two Japanese units were pursuing the Dutch, but no Japanese units appeared in the hex along with them. Maybe that's because there were no Armored units in the Japanese column.

Praboemoelith was also captured easily this turn as three small Japanese Infantry Battalions along with one Engineering Regiment kicked the already-multiply-defeated Dutch units out of the base. The Dutch retreated to the dot base to the west where another Dutch BF has been building up the Forts. Sumatra ought to keep my opponent occupied for some time yet.

And in some long awaited news, the three parts of the 1st RAN BF finally got together in Derby and were reunited. That's a very nice Base Force; I only wish that I had spent the Political Points early on in the game and had shipped the three pieces to a common base much sooner. Now I've got to march them all the way to the railroad in order to bring them to the Australian East Coast where I need them. I hope that my opponent gives me a couple of week's worth of time before he invades northern Oz – I don't want this unit to be run over by Japanese Armored units during an invasion.

BTW - BB Pennsylvania made it safely to San Francisco and is now in the Repair Shipyard.



ADB123 -> Sub-aches (6/14/2010 2:18:58 AM)

March 5, 1942 -

I've been able to pretty much ignore the Japanese subs for quite some time, but not any more. They are starting to become a bit of a nuisance. So it's time to turn my air units on for ASW in a much bigger way and see if I can't drive some of those subs back to port and out of my hair for a while.

The night phase started out with the dot base Waigeo occupied by the Japanese, followed by the continued landing of Japanese troops at Dumanquilas. Then S-41 was chased unsuccessfully by some Japanese ASW ships off of Palembang.

But the main lesson of the night was off of the southeast corner of Australia where the escorted AK that I was sending to Horn Island was ambushed by a Japanese sub and sunk with two torpedoes. The Australian escort never found the sub. So I'm going to stop trying to send TFs around the Eastern Coast of Australia for a while, and instead I set all of my bombers and patrol planes to a high level of ASW. We'll see if I can't discourage the Japanese subs the way that I did off of the West Coast of the US.

Daylight brought an aerial bombardment of Bataan for the first time in quite a long time. The Sallys flew in at 10,000 feet and only two of them were hit by flak. Obviously, the lack of supplies has now made Bataan ripe for assault by the Japanese.

Otherwise, there were no other Japanese air attacks and relatively few Japanese Recon flights. Afterwards when I looked at the Intel screen I was astounded to see that neither side lost any planes at all this turn, even to Operational damage! I've never seen that before.

There has been a lot of Japanese Naval movement around PNG and the Solomons, so I had USS Sculpin snooping around the Tulagi area. Sculpin spotted a PB and sent off some torpedoes, but all were duds. Then, because Sculpin was hanging around in the Shallows, the Japanese ASW had a good time and hammered the sub hard. So Sculpin will now limp back to Australia for some major repairs.

The only land combat this turn was at Dumanquilas where it turned out that my opponent sent an entire full-strength Japanese Infantry Regiment to retake the base. It was true overkill as the Philippine Base Force was in skeletal condition after starving in the jungle for a couple of months. In any event, this caused my opponent to waste time and resources, so it was well worth it.

And the last Dutch LCU reinforcement arrived at Tjilatjap this turn. This little semi-armored unit won't add much to the defense of the base or of Java, but ever little bit counts in the larger game of Stall and Delay.



ADB123 -> Battleships Blast Cairns (6/15/2010 1:49:18 AM)

March 6, 1942 -

My opponent pulled off a surprise this turn that shouldn't have been a surprise – a naval bombardment of Cairns. BB Hyoga, BB Mutsu, CA Suzuya and CA Mogami appeared off shore and blasted the base. Thanks to the fairly intensive recent Recon over Cairns the Japanese ships got off a good attack and hit the air fields and air base quite hard. Fortunately for me most of the planes that I had a Cairns were Catalinas, and they escaped the big guns. The lone Kittyhawk squadron had a handful of planes damaged, but none were destroyed. And the three C-47s were all damaged but again none were destroyed. The troops there also got off fairly lightly.

So my opponent succeeded in closing the air field for now, but that doesn't really matter since I was primarily using it to pull troops out of PNG. I moved the Kittyhawks down to Rockhampton to repair and sent the C-47s down to Brisbane via railroad. I suppose that if I had been using my Catalinas on Search instead of on Troop Pickup I might have spotted the incoming Bombardment TF, but there was nothing much I could have done about it anyway. The only good thing is that now the Japanese BBs must either go back to a very large base or an AKE to reload. But somehow I don't think that this is a foreshadowing of Japanese intentions – instead I think that this is just another of my opponent's attempts at misdirection. We'll see.

Daylight brought a Zero Sweep of Oostahaven. There was nothing to sweep so the Zeros just flew around the cloudy sky. Later on Japanese bombers, along with Oscars on escort, came in to hit Oosthaven, and also hit Medan, Bataan and Cebu. Sallys from also Djokjakarta hit Tjiljatjap – the first Japanese air attack from within Java.

The Hurricane Heros of Impal swept the skies over Mandalay again this turn. The 11 Hurris ran into 8 Oscars, 5 Zeros and 2 Tojos. The Hurricane pilots shot down 1 Zero and 1 Oscar and lost two Hurricanes in return, but no pilots. Then the B-24 and B-17E squadrons flew in, blew past the remaining Japanese fighters, and hit the Air Base at Mandalay hard while not sustaining any damage to themselves. If I only had 160 4-Es in Calcutta instead of 16... (sigh).

Otherwise, the day phase was fairly quiet except for multiple Recon flights over Derby. My suspicion is that my opponent intends to invade Northern Australia once he has Java under control. The only other thing of note this turn was that Japanese troops arrived at the gates of Lautem. Lautem ought to fall readily.



ADB123 -> Poor Anticipation (6/16/2010 3:34:16 AM)

March 7, 1942 -

Chengchow was occupied by the Japanese overnight. I bet that surprised my opponent. Now he has to garrison the base or lose Victory Points. As I move my troops out of the cities like Chengchow and into the Countryside my supply worries slowly vanish. It makes little sense but I'll give the Devs the benefit-of-the-doubt and imagine that my troops are now “living off of the land” rather than starving in the cities.

My opponent questioned what had happened to my submarines because they have been relatively quiet recently. One sub, S-37, did get into action this turn and put a torpedo into a Japanese xAK off of Buna. The sub escaped from the TF's ASW and then came back later to put two more torpedoes into the same xAK. But my opponent is correct – my subs have been rather unsuccessful recently. That's mainly because I have been doing a poor job of anticipating the moves of my opponent and for the most part my subs have been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

But now April approaches, and with it comes the Radar upgrade for most US subs, so I started to order most of my US subs back to major ports in preparation for refit. I am going to rebuild the older odd subs into SSTs while the rest get Radar and a fresh chance to try to be heroes.

Daylight brought Zero sweeps over Oosthaven, Medan and Horn Island, before Japanese bombers hit all of those bases and also Bataan and Cebu. I get the impression that my opponent is trying to smoke out my Dutch fighters, but I already withdrew all of them along with the Dutch bombers. If they come back in Oz in two months, that's great. If the don't, then at least I didn't waste the airframe points against overwhelming Japanese Air Power.

A strong Japanese Infantry Regiment wiped out the worn down Dutch Base Force and AA unit at Lautem this turn. There are still some stragglers on Timor, but either the jungle or Japanese Infantry will eventually get rid of them.

Speaking of getting rid of troops, that Japanese bombing raid on Horn Island did me a big favor and got rid of the odds-and-ends “stuff” that was left on the island after I flew out the Horn Island Detachment. The equipment was too big to fly out, and I already lost two transport ships trying to get in and remove the stuff, so this was a big relief. Now the Horn Island Detachment is “whole” again so I am shipping it down to Brisbane to rebuild. It will come in handy in one of the inland railroad bases if there is a Japanese invasion of Eastern Australia. BTW – as I assumed, despite the damage to Cairns from the Naval Bombardment, the Catalinas at the base continued to fly back troops from PNG.

In other news, after months of trudging through jungle and swamp the last piece of the North Sumatra Base Force finally reached Medan and the entire unit was reassembled. It's too bad that this unit will be lost with Medan – it would have been a good unit if it were rebuilt. I now have a couple hundred defence points at Medan, but they won't hold out long against any serious Japanese assault. My troops all have low experience and morale in the teens thanks to incessent bombing raids. But I'll leave them in place in case they can sabotage some of the Production Facilities once the base is captured.



ADB123 -> Australia Threatened (6/17/2010 3:19:04 AM)

March 8, 1942 -

It appears that my opponent is not feinting at northern Australia but intends to attack it in a serious manner. The night phase started out with USS Sailfish shooting and missing at a Japanese DD around halfway between Cooktown and Port Moresby. Several other Japanese DDs joined in on the subsequent ASW attack, but Sailfish got away okay. However, the Japanese TF turned out to be the same large Battleship Bombardment TF that hit Cairns. The fact that it is on the move again in the region suggests that the Japanese AKE could be sitting in harbor at Port Moresby.

Daylight brought more signs of the Japanese intentions as a small Naval Air attack hit the Australian straggler troops in PNG. The attack originated from a Japanese TF at Horn Island. The quantity of Japanese planes suggested that it was the Baby KB at Horn Island and not the main Japanese CV force.

This was followed up by a landing at Horn Island by a Japanese SNLF force. The Japanese troops eventually captured the island with a Shock Attack. But when I checked out the island afterwards there appeared to be two major Japanese TFs there, and one of them was reported to contain BBs. So if that was the 4-BB bombardment TF, what was it doing there? Was it guarding the Horn Island invasion or heading elsewhere?

The “elsewhere” may well be Darwin, because SIGINT gave me something useful for a change as it reported that the Japanese First Raiding Regiment is preparing to attack Darwin. Isn't that a Japanese Paratroop Regiment? I wonder if my opponent is planning to hit Darwin with the BBs in an effort to close the airfields, and then drop in Paratroops.

Otherwise the day was relatively uneventful. Japanese bombers hit Bataan, Tjilatjap, Cebu, Madioen and Medan. And Japanese sub I-15 hit an xAK in a transport TF off of San Diego and sank it before taking some hits from the ASW escorts in the TF. This was one of the rare times when I actually lost some troops to a submarine attack. I'll have to go back to using waypoints again.

So I spent some time and focus on northeastern Oz this turn. I pulled a couple of the Catalina units out of Cairns, and set them on Naval Patrol instead of troop transport, thus leaving the stragglers in PNG on their own again. I also pulled some of my combat air units back to non-coastal bases and set them to Naval Attack. I could use more time in Darwin and region to better arrange my forces, but things aren't too bad right now so I can live with it.

So it looks like I may well soon be looking at the Battle of Australia. It will be interesting to see if this will be a serious invasion or just some nuisance raids.



ADB123 -> Cebu Invaded (6/19/2010 3:05:56 AM)

March 9, 1942 -

Once again there were a lot of reports of ship movement in the Solomons. My opponent must be moving a large number of units into the region. However, he isn't expanding out of there yet.

Japanese expansion resumed in the Philippines as Japanese troops landed at Cebu. Surprisingly, the Philippine Base Force and Division that are there still had enough left in them to attempt a bombardment of the Japanese Regiment that invaded. Of course, the Philippine troops didn't have enough supply to cause any damage, but it was interesting to see that they could still try to fight.

There was a land-based air attack on Darwin this turn. Bettys, escorted by Zeros, attacked and were greeted by a fair amount of flak. Nearby, the Mini-KB bombed the Australian stragglers at Terapo again, while the TF moved to the West. I presume that the Mini-KB will provide air cover for the upcoming invasion of Darwin. I wonder if my opponent will really attempt a landing at Darwin, or will he land at Wyndham and attempt a flanking attack.

There were plenty of other air raids. Bataan was hit again multiple times, but surprisingly enough, the AA hit the incoming Japanese bombers fairly hard. Tjilatjap was hit again, as were Madioen and Port Blair. I currently have a transport dropping off supplies at Port Blair, so the troops there were able to put up some flak against the incoming Japanese bombers.

In Java it turns out that my opponent sent the Imperial Guards onto the coastal road to attack my retreating Dutch troops. As one would expect, the Dutch troops were easily kicked out of the hex and into Tjilatjap. Now the Imperial Guards have to waste the time to actually march to Tjilatjap on a slow secondary road.

In other news, I forgot to mention last turn that the Port in Prince Rupert reached Level 7. I can now fully replenish any combat ships that need ammunition in the North Pacific.

And the Forts at Johnston Island reached Level 4 this turn. I haven't added any more troops to the base beyond the original civilian engineering unit and the Marine defense unit, but it's nice to know that the fortifications are strong enough so that the defense can hold off a nuisance attack by a small Japanese unit if necessary.



CapAndGown -> RE: Cebu Invaded (6/19/2010 3:37:46 AM)

Was this game started after patch 2? If so, how is your supply situation at Darwin?



ADB123 -> RE: Cebu Invaded (6/19/2010 4:02:13 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: cap_and_gown

Was this game started after patch 2? If so, how is your supply situation at Darwin?


Hmmm - I don't remember, but I think it was before Patch 2. Looking back at the AAR, it looks like it was mid-December that we started.

Supply isn't great in Darwin, but it's not bad at the moment. (I brought in a fair amount of supply in Dec 41 and Jan 42.) However, I'm not trying to hold Darwin, just engage in a fighting withdrawal if and when my opponent shows up.

My plan at the moment is to get my opponent bogged down in as many areas as possible in 1942, then start to threaten in Burma and the North in early 1943. Once he moves to counter those efforts I plan to do invasions of Sumatra and Java simultaneously from Cape Town in Spring 43 with units that I move in from the US.

So the more units that my opponent commits to PNG and the Solomons, Burma, and Central Oz, the better.

Will all of this really happen? I won't bet on it, but it seems like a good idea to me right now. [;)]



ADB123 -> Delay, Delay, Delay! (6/20/2010 3:04:29 AM)

March 10, 1942 -

A dot base called Wetar that is off the north coast of Timor was occupied over night while the invasion TF at Cebu continued to offload while firing at the Philippine troops on shore.

Daylight brought a lot of Japanese Recon flights including a Glen over Palmyra. I've been moving a fair number of units into Palmyra so there are more ships for the Glen to spot than normal.

Bettys from Timor, escorted by Zeros, hit the Port at Darwin again. My opponent must be hoping to knock out some of the CD guns. So far the Betty attacks are not doing much damage to anything. Other Japanese air attacks hit Madioen, Bataan, Lahat, Cebu and Port Blair.

BTW – it looks like an invasion TF may be getting set in Rangoon to go after Port Blair. At the moment I have no idea where the main KB is located so I have no intention of rushing my CVs over to the Port Blair region in the hopes of intercepting that Japanese TF. There was a transport ship that was dropping off supplies at Port Blair, so I cut short the unloading and ordered it back to Columbo.

The Japanese TFs that were at Horn Island moved off into the Timor region so I brought my Australian Catalinas back to Cairns and ordered them to get back to pulling out the remaining troops on PNG. I had some B-17s flying Recon over Port Moresby and Milne Bay and it doesn't appear that my opponent has any Support ships there, so that Bombardment TF must be going further away to replenish.

I have been regularly losing Victory Points because I left Wuchow unoccupied, so a while back I decided to send a Chinese unit back to re-claim the empty base. But the trip was exceedingly slow and the unit only recently moved the first hex. Well, today three Japanese Infantry Units moved in and captured Wuchow, so I ordered my unit back up north. Oh well, now my opponent will have to keep the base garrisoned.

In Java, Madioen was attacked this turn by 2 Japanese Infantry Regiments. I have a Dutch Base Force and a comparatively good Dutch Infantry Regiment there, so the base held. The Japanese achieved a 1:1 result and lowered the forts from Level 3 to Level 2, but there were essentially equal losses on both sides. My opponent may have moved into Java a bit “lean”, so it may well take him more time than he expected to capture the island.

In Sumatra two Japanese Infantry Batallions easily kicked the already-defeated Dutch troops out of Lahat. But now those troops are on their way to the Indian Ocean coast and I've got a fair number of supplied-Dutch troops in the bases on that side of the island, so once again this could take longer than my opponent may have expected.

Interestingly enough, there was no Japanese attack on Cebu this turn, despite the continued offloading from the Invasion TF. My opponent may have realized that he came with insufficient troops and may be now working on how to bring more units to the battle.



ADB123 -> RE: Delay, Delay, Delay! (6/21/2010 1:40:40 AM)

March 11, 1942 -

There are a lot of little surprises in the Game. For example, this turn I learned that an Upgrade can be a Downgrade.

The night phase was fairly quiet with nothing going on beyond the continued unloading of Japanese troops at Cebu.

Daylight didn't bring a lot out of the ordinary. Japanese bombers hit Madioen, Bataan, Oosthaven, Cebu, and the Dutch stragglers in Sumatra.

Then a couple of new Japanese Amphibious TFs showed up at Cebu and began to land fresh troops. The Defenders of Cebu had nothing left to fire at the incoming Japanese, but the Japanese took a large number of casualties thanks to accidents, even without any enemy fire. All I can say is - Surf Rules!

There was another Deliberate attack by the two Japanese Infantry Regiments at Medioen. They achieved a 3:1 result and reduced the Fortifications down to Level 1. Medioen ought to fall next turn, but the Dutch are still doing a commendable job of slowing down the Japanese.

BTW, although there was no Japanese assault at Cebu, my troops attempted another bombardment and it turns out that another Infantry Regiment and a Recon Regiment landed this turn. Together, the three Japanese units ought to be able to capture the base next turn. But it is still good to see so many Japanese units used to take one starved-out base.

There was a Milestone this turn – the Fortifications at Pearl Harbor finally reached Level 6. I'll leave the orders in place to continue to build the Forts, but I can now start to move out some of the Engineering units and leave the building to the Engineers that are in the Infantry Units at the base.

Now for the Lesson of the Day that I was taught today. As I mentioned, to my great surprise, sometimes an LCU can have its AV downgraded when it upgrades. At the end of the turn I received a notification that I lost a Victory Point because Partisans were active at Ambola.

Huh??? I had been very careful at the beginning of the Match to make certain that all of the Indian bases that required Garrisons were adequately garrisoned. So what happened? I went to the base and to my shock there was a little Armored unit with an AV of 3 sitting there. The Garrison requirements are 20. What happened? Did I move out the Garrison unit by accident? Did the Garrison unit disappear and get replaced by yet another tiny, worthless Indian armored unit?

I stopped the Game and went into the folder where I keep the files for this particular match and found a turn from a few days before. I ran the turn, looked at Ambola, and that tiny armored unit was still there. I stopped the Game again, went back into the folder and found a turn from a few days earlier yet. This time when I checked out Ambola I found the same tiny armored unit, but this time it was tinier and had an AV of only 1. HUH???!!!

I stopped the Game once more, dug further into the folder and was rewarded with a save from a month before. This time when I checked out Ambola I found an Indian Cavalry unit there with an AV of 45. I looked at the name of the Cavalry unit, stopped the game again, and restarted with the March 11 turn and sure enough, the tiny armored unit had the same name. So the Cavalry unit was upgraded to tanks and armored cars, but not many, so its AV dropped from 45 to near zero.

Wonderful... [8|]

So I guess that the unit will eventually rebuild up to its original AV, but I can't wait that long and keep on losing more Victory Points. Fortunately, there was a “spare” Indian unit near by that I could set to Strategic Move and send to Ambola.

I wonder how many more surprises like this I'll get.



ADB123 -> Time Out for Work (6/22/2010 10:43:51 AM)

My opponent is out of town on business until the weekend, so there won't be any more reports until then.



ADB123 -> Shore Gun Surprise (6/26/2010 11:37:18 AM)

March 12, 1942 -

My opponent went away for a week and all he brought me back was a Bombardment TF.

The night phase started out with the Japanese invasion TFs at Cebu still unloading, then the big Japanese Bombardment TF that had hit Cairns a while back sailed into the waters off of Darwin. Waiting for the Japanese were the three surviving PT boats from the Philippines.

I've got to salute my PT boat skippers. They hit the gas and roared in against the four Japanese BBs, three Japanese CAs and five Japanese DDs with all guns blazing and their torpedoes rocketing out of the launchers.

Unfortunately, the Japanese gunners on the BBs were ready for them and sank each one in turn with a single shot. No US torpedoes hit their targets, and the Japanese Bombardment TF sailed along on its mission pretty much without noticing the debris that they cut through.

The Japanese TF then got into position to fire, but the Defenders were awake and prepared, and I was more than pleasantly surprised with the following results:

Naval bombardment of Darwin at 76,124 - Coastal Guns Fire Back!

546 Coastal gun shots fired in defense.

Japanese Ships
BB Hyuga, Shell hits 32, on fire
BB Yamashiro
BB Fuso, Shell hits 20
BB Mutsu, Shell hits 18
CA Suzuya, Shell hits 6
CA Ashigara, Shell hits 19, on fire, heavy damage
CA Maya, Shell hits 1

Allied ground losses:
201 casualties reported
Squads: 1 destroyed, 4 disabled
Non Combat: 9 destroyed, 12 disabled
Engineers: 4 destroyed, 5 disabled
Guns lost 15 (4 destroyed, 11 disabled)

BB Hyuga firing at Emery Point Fortress
BB Yamashiro firing at A/B Battery Heavy Coastal Artillery Regiment
BB Fuso firing at Emery Point Fortress
BB Mutsu firing at Emery Point Fortress
CA Suzuya firing at Emery Point Fortress
CA Ashigara firing at Emery Point Fortress
CA Maya firing at Emery Point Fortress

I had forgotten that there were 9.2 inch guns at Darwin, along with the usual 6 inch guns. Sure, none of the CD guns could penetrate the armor of the BBs, but they sure tore up the superstructure of the ships. Interestingly enough, the Combat Replay showed things a little bit differently – for example Yamashiro was shown taking superstructure damage – but never-the-less it was a very satisfying message to send to my opponent about the potential cost of an invasion of Darwin.

Afterwards, when I checked the damage, I was surprised to see that there was no damage to the Port or Air Fields; the Bombardment appears to have been focussed upon the Base Fortifications, as was reported in the Combat Report. And the CD units had suffered very limited damage. So if my opponent comes in again he will meet something of the same thing the next time. I can't wait to see those 9.2 inch guns against APs. [:D]

Otherwise, the night phase was quiet with the exception of Dutch sub O16 getting caught in the shallows off of Balikpapan and being harassed and damaged slightly by Japanese ASW ships. O16 will now have to head off to Colombo for some repairs.

Daylight brought Japanese Air attacks to most of the usual places – Cebu, Madioen, Bataan, Oosthaven, and the Sumatra stragglers. Then some Kates, escorted by Zeros, from the KB Lite hit Darwin, but they spent most of their time arguing with Flak. Allied Air was rained out in all theaters.

Japanese troops in Java made more ground today as the two Japanese Infantry Regiments at Madioen finally captured the base in a Deliberate attack. The two Dutch units retreated to a nearby empty base. And I was surprised that once again there was no serious Japanese attack on Cebu. Instead both sides fired off ineffectual bombardment attacks at each other.

So it appears that my opponent is pretty much committed to a direct invasion of Darwin. I am still wondering why he is his bothering instead of landing at Wyndham, which is undefended, and then cutting off Darwin. Maybe he has most of his armored units committed elsewhere, such as the one sitting around at Cebu. In any event, I don't mind either way because this simply causes the Japanese advance to slow down even more.

Although, who knows, maybe this is just another bit of misdirection. And considering that I have no idea where the KB is located at this time, I probably shouldn't focus too much of my attention on northern Australia.



ADB123 -> PTs vs no PTs? (6/27/2010 11:51:58 AM)

March 13, 1942 -

I received a surprise this turn which was rather interesting and potentially informative in a couple of ways.

The night phase started out quietly, other than there being multiple Coast Watcher reports of ships in ports in PNG and the Solomons. The one of my Surface Combat TFs that happened to be on its way to San Diego ran over sub I-15 off the coast of Southern California. The DDs in the TF attacked the sub but it got away safely. Immediately afterwards, I-15 attacked a DD in another Surface Combat TF that was in the same hex but steaming towards Los Angeles. The sub's torpedoes all missed, after which the DDs in that TF attacked the sub too, but I-15 once again got away safely.

Then, out of the darkness a Japanese Bombardment TF hit Darwin:

Naval bombardment of Darwin at 76,124

Japanese Ships
BB Yamashiro
BB Fuso
BB Mutsu
CA Maya

Allied ground losses:
3 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled

Airbase hits 4
Airbase supply hits 2
Runway hits 9
Port hits 8
Port fuel hits 3
Port supply hits 1

BB Yamashiro firing at Darwin
BB Fuso firing at Darwin
BB Mutsu firing at 2nd RAN Base Force
CA Maya firing at Sparrow Battalion

So Yamashiro, Fuso, Mutsu and Maya were back again, one night after they were involved in the exchange with the Emery Point Fortress.

Hmmm – there are a couple of unexpected things here:

1 – How did Yamashiro, Fuso, Mutsu and Maya get re-supplied with ammo so quickly?

1a – Were they able to get resupplied at sea near by?
1b – Were they able to get resupplied at a base in Timor and get back in one day?
1c – Did my opponent just reform a new Bombardment TF at sea and send the four ships back with the ammo that they still had on board?

I'm leaning towards the third answer because the bombardment wasn't that destructive, but if either of the first two possibilities are correct then the Japanese side can do something that I thought they couldn't do, even if a Japanese AKE is in the region.

2 – Why did the Bombardment TF encounter the CD guns at Emery Point last turn but not this turn? (Note that the TF fired at different Allied units this time than last time.)

2a – Do the targets of a Bombardment TF change each time it attacks?
2b – If the targets change, is that change random or sequential through the list of Defending units?
2c – Did the presence of the PT boats last turn “alert” the Base Defenses, allowing the CD Unit to “spot” the incoming enemy TF and engage them, and since there were no PT boats this turn the enemy TF was undetected?

I'm leaning towards the third possibility again because when I checked the Defenders at the base afterwards the Emery Point Fort unit was still in very good shape, had plenty of supply, and had all of its guns.

In any event, unless I'm proven otherwise, this tells me that it is a very good thing to have PT boats on a Picket Line at Front Line bases that are under threat of Bombardment attack. Therefore I ordered up more PT boats at Sydney this turn and I will send them along to Cairns, Perth, and Darwin (if they can get there before an invasion) just in case they can help my Defending units spot incoming TFs.

Interestingly enough, Japanese ships once again were landing troops and possibly supplies at Cebu this turn. But for the first time there was a report of Defending guns shooting back and a report that the Japanese lost a number of vehicles. This time the Surf wasn't to blame.

Daylight brought out Japanese bombers as usual over the usual targets: Bataan, Oosthaven, Cebu, and the stragglers in Sumatra. For the first time, Japanese bombers hit Tjepoe in Java. And more bombers came in to hit the Port at Darwin. The bomber attacks were scattered and some were unescorted, so I set a nearby sqaudron of British Buffalos on LR CAP over Darwin next turn, just in case my pilots get lucky and find an unescorted Japanese Bomber squadron looking down instead of looking up.

And the KB Lite sent some Kates to attack the Dutch stragglers in Timor. But there has still been no hint of the location of the full KB.

Things changed a little in Cebu this turn. The Philippine troops attempted another Artillery attack that once again did nothing, but then the two Japanese Infantry units, along with the Armored unit that was short a dozen of its vehicles, attempted a Deliberate attack. They failed and only achieved a 1:2 result against the Level 3 Fortifications without lower the fortification level. Both sides took around a hundred casualties. It's only too bad that I can't get any supplies into isolated bases like Cebu because if I could the troops could delay the Japanese for a very long time.



ADB123 -> Scratch That Theory... (6/29/2010 3:59:53 AM)

March 14, 1942 -

I ordered a swarm of subs to go down to the Timor/Northern Australia region a few turns ago and the first one got into some Japanese TFs this turn. Dutch sub KVII first got attacked near Roti Island by the DD escorts in a Japanese TF that also contained BB Hyuga, CA Mogami and CL Abukama. KVII got away okay. Then the sub was attacked by a PB in a Japanese Transport TF. This time the escort ship found the Dutch sub and damaged it with depth charges. So KVII is off to Perth for some repairs.

The next night action was yet another Naval Bombardment of Darwin by some of the same ships as the previous two nights:

Naval bombardment of Darwin at 76,124 - Coastal Guns Fire Back!

180 Coastal gun shots fired in defense.

Japanese Ships
BB Yamashiro
BB Fuso, Shell hits 35, on fire
BB Mutsu
CA Maya, Shell hits 12, on fire


BB Yamashiro firing at Darwin
BB Fuso firing at Emery Point Fortress
BB Mutsu firing at Darwin
CA Maya firing at Emery Point Fortress

Once again the CD guns had a good time, with plenty of 4”, 6” and 9.2” shells whacking Fuso and Maya.

There are a number of puzzling things here:

1 – The Japanese ships didn't appear to fire back, and if they did, they didn't hit anything

2 – Two of the Japanese ships hit Emery Fortress again, after they all skipped it last turn

At first I was ticked off and puzzled as to how the Japanese ships could have reloaded and come back again so quickly. But then as I thought about the results a thought struck me – are those ships out of ammo, and my opponent doesn't realize it?

But that aside, I still have no idea why Emery Fortress was attacked again and not one of the other units at Darwin. There were no PT boats there this time to give an advanced warning. So it looks like the theory that I favored after the first Naval Bombardment is invalid, and therefore I have no working theory to account for what is happening and how the targets of Bombardment TFs are selected.

BTW – when I checked Emery Fortress afterwards the CD guns are still all fine and there is plenty of supply.

In other night action, an AM in a US transport TF on its way back to Pearl Harbor attacked Japanese sub I-19 off of Washington Island. The sub got away, but the sub also didn't get off an attack of its own, so I am satisfied.

Finally USS Searaven attacked an AK off of Malacca, but its torpedoes were duds. Fortunately, Searaven was able to escape from the Japanese ASW escorts.

Daylight brought an air raid on Darwin by Nells, escorted by a handful of Zeros. The Buffalos that I had on LR CAP over Darwin attacked the incoming planes but couldn't get past the Zeros and the Nells were able to hit the Port a couple of times. Later on in the afternoon phase Bettys came in, once again escorted by a handful of Zeros, and again the British Buffalos attempted to get past the Zeros but couldn't. This time the bombers were distracted by Flak and didn't hit anything. The end result was that I lost a couple of Buffalos and my opponent lost a couple of Zeros.

The other usual Japanese air attacks hit Bataan, Oosthaven, Cebu, Tjepoe and the Sumatra Stragglers.

Then it was the Allied turn for Air Attacks. First off some Hudsons attacked a Japanese Transport TF that was halfway between Timor and Darwin. The first attack went after an xAK and the second attack went after an xAP. Neither attack hit the targets. But this leaves an interesting decision for my opponent – does he put some Zeros on LR CAP over the TFs or not, particularly since these are undoubtedly the Invasion TFs for Darwin, and the closer they get the better the chance of my planes hitting one or more of the Transports.

Then, way over in Burma, my Forts and Liberators in India staged an air raid on Rangoon. The Forts went after the Port and the Libs went after the air fields. There were a handful of Oscars on CAP, but the 4Es blew past them. The Libs got a handful of hits on the air fields but didn't catch on the ground any of the planes that are based at Rangoon. But the Forts caught a Japanese DMS in the harbor and sank it at its moorings. Both bomber squadrons got home safely so I am resting them up again for the next interesting opportunity.

I was surprised when the Japanese land units at Cebu only tried an artillery attack this turn. The attack caused no damage. Then a Japanese Infantry regiment attacked the remnants of the Philippine 73rd Regiment at Dumaquete and wiped them out.

So it appears that Darwin will be invaded next turn unless the Invasion TFs are slowed down by a sub attack or two. In any event, I am looking forward to seeing a “soft” Invasion TF run up against the guns of Emery Fortress.



ADB123 -> Hiatus (6/30/2010 1:48:08 AM)

Well, it turns out that I was correct and my opponent was forgetting to re-arm his bombardment TFs. Then to compound the problem he sent in a combat TF and probably the invasion TF into Darwin. The results were grim, as are shown by the screen cap below that my opponent sent to me. (He didn't send the next turn.)

So my opponent is rather discouraged at this point since he has been making a number of mistakes and his plans are pretty much falling apart at this point. So he asked for a stoppage in the game for now while he collects his thoughts. I understand how he feels and have been there myself plenty of times with AE and even more so in WitP. So I told him that was okay, although I did make the suggestion that we could consider a re-start once the next patch gets a full public release. I already have one of my Japanese pbems on hold for a re-start upon the next patch release too.

So it's up to my opponent if he wants to re-start or continue this game. I'll be busy for the rest of the week so that will give him time to consider.

In any event, it's been a great match up until now and I have learned a lot about the Game and have enjoyed the match a lot.

[image]local://upfiles/32618/52C0D67BD511450196EBB2067C0B7700.jpg[/image]



ADB123 -> Back At It! (7/7/2010 2:18:58 AM)

My opponent was able to get the various Real Life things in order that were interferring with his ability to concentrate on the more important things, such as this match, so he accepted an offer to go back one turn so that he could avoid sending the Suicide Express into Darwin. As I pointed out to him, it's not like his invasion of Darwin was much of a surprise to me anyway. [:D]

So I re-did my part of the March 15th turn and sent it off to him. With any luck tomorrow night I will see how the War continues! [sm=happy0065.gif]



thegreatwent -> RE: Back At It! (7/7/2010 3:14:15 AM)

A gracious decision. Frank communication helps while riding AE's learning curve.



ADB123 -> Darwin Gets a Rest (7/8/2010 4:14:00 AM)

March 15, 1942 -

The shoreline of Darwin was not littered with burning and sinking Japanese ships this turn as my opponent wisely took advantage of our 1-day reset to pull back his ill-fated Task Forces. He was already gun-shy concerning CD guns thanks to his experiences in the DEI. Now he is even more so. Of course, there are plenty of empty bases along the north shore of Australia, so all my opponent needs to do is to start to consider flanking moves instead of direct assaults on strongholds.

And for a change the defenders of Darwin got a break during the night because there were no Bombardment TFs either.

BTW – I am now testing out a new Theory of Defense against Bombardment TFs. I have pulled all of the LCUs out of Darwin except for the Fort, which is static, and the RN Base Force, which has embedded CD guns. What I want is for incoming enemy TFs to only face LCUs that have CD guns in them. I want to see if this makes things any tougher for the enemy TFs.

BTW II – my opponent “blames” players like PzB for making the invasion of northern Oz seem “easy”... [:D]

BTW III - There was an unopposed Japanese landing this turn as Japanese troops finally landed on Manus.

The only other night action was USS Searaven being chased unsuccessfully by a Japanse PB off of Malacca.

While Darwin didn't receive any Naval attention this turn it did receive Air Attacks in the morning and in the afternoon. In both cases, the Zero escorts flew in first and swept at 15,000 feet while the bombers flew in later unescorted. I had British Buffalos on LR CAP over Darwin so they engaged the Zeros. I lost a few Buffalos and the Japanese lost a couple of Zeros. But my Buffalos were out of position after each Fighter engagement so they never engaged the Japanese bombers.

Japanese bombers also hit Bataan, Tjiatjap, Oosthaven, Benkoelen and Cebu.

Otherwise, things were quiet. There is no sign of the KB anywhere.

The big news this turn in the Building Front is that the Port at Seattle reached Level 9. I like having big Ports on the West Coast of the US so that I can repair or upgrade ships in multiple locations, and also so that any Transport TFs that I form there will load as quickly as possible. I've been using the big Restricted US Infantry and Armored Divisions to aid with the building of facilities since they usually contain a good number of Engineers and Engineering vehicles.

All the ships that were due for the March 1942 upgrades are now being upgraded. Most of the ships that will receive the April 1942 upgrades are also in safe locations for that upcoming event.

There are now only two Battleships left in Pearl Harbor from the December 7 attack. And the first Pearl Harbor BB to become repaired will leave the Shipyard tomorrow.



ADB123 -> Cebu Gets More Visitors (7/9/2010 3:08:20 AM)

March 16, 1942 -

Japanese troops continued to land at Manus near New Britain, and a fresh Japanese Transport TF dropped off more troops at Cebu. The shore guns at Cebu continued to fire back and disrupted a number of the incoming Japanese squads.

Naval action was limited this turn to a Glen that checked out a retiring Transport TF near Palmyra, and some more Japanese subs that showed up off of Colombo.

The Air War continued with more Japanese air raids on Darwin. This time the Japanese Bombers came in first and the Japanese Escorts afterwards. So my Buffalos on LR CAP got uninterrupted chances at the unescorted Japanese bombers, but the British pilots couldn't find their targets. Fortunately, AA on the ground did damage a number of Bettys. Afterwards a couple of Zero sweeps flew in and shot down a couple more Buffalos. I've still got plenty of Buffalos and British pilots in reserve, so it is still worth the effort to try to ambush Japanese bombers over Darwin.

The rest of the Japanese air attacks hit the regular targests – Bataan got hit multiple times, and Oosthaven, Cebu, Tjepoe and Benkoelen all received single attacks.

I did try something new this turn, thanks to some “inspiration” from one of my opponents in one of my pbems where I am playing the Japanese. Last turn I set the remaining Dutch Catalinas on Naval Attack, with Port Attack as the back-up order. Only one of the Dutch units flew and it missed the SC at Palembang that it attacked, but this ought to make my opponent think a bit about putting up some CAP in his bases in the DEI.

There was some action in China for the first time in quite a while as two Japanese Divisions at Loyang attempted a bombardment attack against the Chinese troops. The artillery attack backfired and only the Japanese suffered any casualties.

There were also artillery attacks from both sides at the Stalemate at Cebu, but as usual there was no damage on either side.

Things ought to liven up a bit in Sumatra soon because some Japanese troops have appeared a hex away from Oosthaven.

And the Big News this turn for the USN was that BB California got back into Service in San Diego – upgrades included! This is the first Pearl Harbor attack victim to be fully repaired. BB Tennesee ought to be fully repaired in another two weeks. For now I am leaving California in San Diego and will wait for the April DD upgrades to take place and be repaired before I send the Prune Barge back to Hawaii.



ADB123 -> 4E Failure (7/11/2010 1:12:59 PM)

March 17, 1942 -

There were multiple reports of Japanese ships at the various bases around PNG and the Solomons over night. My opponent is being very busy there. I can't tell if he is building up bases in anticipation of an Allied counter-attack in the region or building up an infrastructure to support further Japanese expansion in the South Pacific region. In addition, the Japanese amphibious TF at Manus continued to offload troops for the third night in a row.

The only action of the evening was off of Sinkawang where Dutch sub O20 fired four torpedoes at a Japanese xAK, but missed with all of them.

Daylight brought a resumption of Japanese efforts in the air over Darwin. Two Zero sweeps flew in and fought it out with the British Buffalos in the air over the base. A couple of Buffalos were shot down but no Zeros. After the Zeros flew in and cleared the skies Betties flew in to hit the base. The Bettys have been focussing upon the Port, in presume in the hope of reducing the effectiveness of the CD guns at the Fort. So far the only damage has been to the Port and not to the Fort.

Some of my best British Hurricane pilots swept the skies over Mandalay this turn. A large number of Oscars flew up to meet them but the Hurricanes did very well and shot down seven Oscars while losing none of their own. However, when the 4Es flew in afterwards there were still a sizable number of Oscars on CAP and for once one of the Liberators was shot down, while about half of the attacking planes were damaged. No hits were made on the Air Field at Mandalay.

This was the most unsuccessful attack yet by my 4Es in India. I will have to re-think my strategy in the region and likely have to move more 4Es in order to be able to cause significant damage to the Japanese effort there.

The other usual Japanese targets – Bataan, Oosthaven, Cebu, Tjepoe and Benkoelen – all received air attacks this turn.

Japanese Recon flights resumed over much of China this turn. My opponent has stopped his buildup at Loyang and isn't obviously threatening any other Chinese bases, so I'm not sure what his intentions are in China at this time.

There were no Japanese ground attacks this turn, even at Manus which is undefended. No new Allied bases were threatened by Japanese ground troops.

Therefore, while enjoying the relative quiet I just continue to build up my forces and prepare for any attacks in my “trip-wire” regions of Hawaii, South-eastern Australia and the Bay of Bengal.



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