Mike Solli
Posts: 15792
Joined: 10/18/2000
From: the flight deck of the Zuikaku
Status: offline
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Geez, you're full of all kinds of good news, Lowpe. 
30 Jan 43
Sub War
The Tunny got lucky got lucky near Adak today. Many of my convoys (usually small xAKLs) heading to Adak with supply go unescorted in single ship convoys. The Tunny caught a Std-E (not sure if she was loaded or unloaded) and sank her. The other was a Husimi class, that had dropped off troops and supply. She did have an escort that did some damage to the Tunny.
5 Fleet
Adak’s port damage is down to 14% and has almost 13k supply. The base is in good shape with just a little of the 4 Garrison unit and 20 Artillery regiment still unloading, along with 9k+ supply.
4 Fleet
Nothing to report.
SE Fleet
Today, the 4E bombers hit Shortland Island, where I have a daitai each of Zeros and Betties along with a sentai of Tojos for CAP. Three of the 59 monsters were shot down, but half a dozen planes were destroyed on the ground (1 KIA and 3 WIA from the bombing) and Shortland’s airfield is now at 15 service and 47 runway damage.
Rabaul: 1% service damage.
Gasmata: 5% port, 98% service and 24% runway damage.
Rabaul has a ton of engineers so it’ll be hard to keep that base beat down without a sustained bombing campaign. If he does that, the other bases will be fine. Gasmata was hit 4 days in a row, which is why the damage is so severe. I’m thinking of sending some more engineers there, but if Ted wants to focus on Gasmata, I’m ok with that. I do hope he leaves Gasmata alone for a few more days so the airfield is operational because I want to ambush the Corsairs & SBDs that visit every day. Usually a dozen Corsairs and 18 SBDs hit daily now, but are focusing on the port, which is a mistake in my opinion. He’s letting the airfield repair. If the airfield repairs enough, I’m going to put 2x Tojo sentai (42 & 36 aircraft) there on 100% CAP to ambush them. I’d love to kill some Corsairs and wipe out the SBDs.
Basically, Ted has roughly 60x 4E bombers for use in this area. That’s enough to keep 1 airbase closed, leaving 2 other major and a couple minor bases open. I’m pretty sure he wants to begin invading here, but he won’t until he closes the airbases, and he needs more 4E bombers to do that. His 2E bombers need significant fighter cover to survive. They are currently limited to hitting Lae and occasionally Madang. Lae is a lost cause and Madang bounces back nicely from the occasional bombing. I occasionally station some fighters at Madang to ambush the 2E bombers.
SRA
We traded an Oscar for a Kittyhawk over Saumlaki.
Burma
Allied sweeps resulted in the loss of 4 Oscars (2 KIA) for 3 Allied fighters. Even the Oscar IIb, which has armor, doesn’t seem to be able to stand up to Allied fighters very well. Only the Tojo can do it now on the IJA side. See below for what I am planning to do here.
I am moving out the 4x artillery units from Akyab, leaving only the 77 Regiment and 8 Division. I’m keeping both there as a garrison and because of its engineers respectively. I want to repair the damage there and build up the forts to level 3. I need a different unit to garrison the base though. I’ll hunt around to scrounge one up. I will probably fly in a construction unit. Today I noticed that Ted started flying sweeps there to prevent me from using my transports there. I’ll counter his Hurricanes with fighters of my own to wear them down before using my transports there. I am going to send in small xAKL convoys with supply though.
China
My roving tank regiment up north finally got to Urumuchi and attacked to recon the place. There are 3x brigades and a base force there, along with some air units! The DA got only 1:2 odds with level 2 forts, and lost nothing to 297(1) Chinese casualties. A lot of infantry was disabled. They won’t attack again, but will wait for the 3 Tank Division, which will hit the end of the rail line in the north and then drive the rest of the distance to Urumuchi. It’s at 95% (short some support).
Other Stuff
Reinforcements:
SS I-38 – headed to the Aleutians.
SC Ch-41 – ASW
The Oscar is definitely inferior to the Tojo. Right now I produce 90 Tojos (30, 30, 30) and 128 Oscars (64, 32, 32 – weird, yeah, I know but I don’t have a clue why I set those numbers back when the war started).
Here’s the stats on the Ha-34 engine:
420 engine factories produce 14 engines a day.
90 Tojo factories produce 3 a day using 3 engines a day.
120 Helen (4x 30) factories produce 4 a day using 8 engines a day.
90 Tojo R&D factories use 3 engines a day.
I have 510 engines in the pool.
I have 2 options:
#1: Convert one Helen factory to 30 Tojos. That will decrease Ha-34 consumption by 1 a day so I can occasionally reduce factory production and save some HI.
Reasoning: My IJA bombers only bomb during the day in China. Everywhere else, they only night bomb, which doesn’t cause much damage. If they day bombed in Burma or SE Fleet, they would be decimated. As it is, the op losses from night bombing are creeping up. Eventually, most IJA bombers will be converted to ASW missions. I’m decreasing my ground bombing training and increasing my ASW training. At some point, I’ll withdraw most, if not all, of my bombers from the front lines. I expect that to happen not later than mid-43. I’ll probably keep 1-2 sentai in Burma and SE Fleet for bombing, but the rest become ASW.
#2: Convert one Oscar factory (32) to 30 Tojos. That will reduce my Oscar production to 96 and increase my Tojo production to 120. That will save 32 Ha-35 factories and increase Ha-34 engine needs by 30. This may work because when my Helens convert to ASW, their losses should decrease, allowing me to decrease Helen production.
Not sure which is better:
#1: +30 Tojo
-30 Helen
-30 Ha-34
#2: +30 Tojo
-32 Oscar
+30 Ha-34 (potentially- or decrease Helen production)
-32 Ha-35
Either way, I’ll have to pay for 30 more Tojo factories. But, do I want to decrease Helen or Oscar production? I’m leaning toward decreasing Helens, because I see the demand decreasing. Oscar on the other hand, their heyday is going away, but I don’t like decreasing fighter production. I can always shut off an Oscar factory if I don’t need them. I’ve read that the Oscar IIIa and IV aren’t good except for their range. Many use them as escort fodder. Kamikazes? I don’t plan on producing anything specifically for Kamikazes, but I always keep in mind that what I do produce needs to be a good potential Kamikaze.
Decisions, decisions… What do you guys think?
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RE: Once Again into the Breech - Mike (J) vs. tc464 (A) - 
Very few bases that can be expanded to level 9, but many that can go to 8 which gives the Allies a base with double Aviation Support. How is your defense here?? 
and launched 6 torpedoes at her, but unfortunately, they missed. *Sigh* The depth charge attack hit her twice and I thought she was a goner. She survived heavily damaged, 15-57(29)-7(3)-0, and began the long voyage back to Kwajalein. 
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