quote:

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

I went back through your AAR. The first big Carrier clash was on 14 May 43 (on page 43) and the big clash was 20 Aug 43 on page 50. The first one did more damage to your ships but he lost tremendous numbers of aircraft, and especially the highly trained carrier pilots. The second clash he had some of his carriers absent, possibly just leaving Japan to join KB in the DEI when you surprised him by moving into the battle instead of staying with your landings. Your pilots were clearly superior and you had more aircraft. You got basically a double-Midway result.

quote:

ORIGINAL: apbarog

I was close to finishing the Japanese first turn for a new game. But I've realized that I didn't follow the correct procedures for starting a new game. I mistakenly thought I'd remembered starting the game as "Head to Head", doing all the setup, saving the turn before ending the turn, and using that to test with. When happy, then changing to "Email" game, ending the turn, and sending it to my opponent.

This is wrong. The procedure is right there on the main page: PBEM Startup

I need to save the game when I finish all the setup, then test it acting as both sides. When happy with it, go back to the saved game, end the turn, and ship it to my opponent.

3 very long days of work down the drain. I'm getting old. Memory isn't what it used to be.

quote:

ORIGINAL: apbarog

Thank you Evoken, Sardaukar, CaptBeefheart, BBfanboy, and castor troy, and all of you lurkers who, like me, don't usually comment on other's AARs. It's all about the journey. You know this if you've played a campaign over several years. The ending is a bit sad, win or lose. It's a long story played out with your input.

I've learned some things from this war.

As the Allies, I didn't have an invasion that I thought I had done too soon. Keep pushing. You have to be prepared, but realize that you may be more prepared than the enemy, even if you aren't fully prepared. My push to Formosa before Luzon had been secured worked very well. It cut off the South China Sea and paved the way for Allied forces to help the Chinese. Formosa wasn't ready for the invasion. Had I waited for Luzon to be completely secured, it may have been. If you can have the next invasion ready to go soon after the previous one, it can be wildly successful.

Mines plus fortresses equals a rough welcoming. I think that DBB has more fortress units than the stock game. They can be tough. Tsushima is brutal. OPilot saved a lot of mines for Japan, and they were effective. The fortress guns made sweeping the mines a suicide run. But it had to be done. Many YMS were lost. I'm thinking that it is more important to identify the minefields with sweepers than completely sweep the mines. Many more mine hits were achieved when the minefields hadn't been spotted before.

Franks are the best Japanese fighters through early 1944. P-47s, particularly the later model, could handle them. Other US fighter types could not. I learned after the war that the enemy pilot were typically still 80+ in skills. I had not depleted the enemy pilots much. I had squadrons that could match those skills, but most had skills in the 70's.

I felt that P-51s do not perform as well in the game as they did in real life. OPilot thought that P-47s perform better than they did in real life.

China is a real struggle for the Allies. Supply is just so critical there.

I'm sure that there are more lessons learned, but I've spent the day starting my work in our next game as the Japanese, and it is exhausting. I'll need a couple of more days, at least, to finish my first turn. I will be starting a new AAR soon.