Slitherine

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panzerjaeger Hortlund

This is just a fake post, in case Canoe spots the thread subject. I want him to think there is something huge in the making, but I dont want to talk about it or drop hints in emails. Thats just too obvious. Sigint, recon reports and other means are much better to create the impression something big is going on.

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ORIGINAL: desicat

I think landing at Chittagong is a good idea, I'm just curious to see where you plan on drawing the line for the defensive perimeter.

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ORIGINAL: Crackaces

quote:

ORIGINAL: desicat

I think landing at Chittagong is a good idea, I'm just curious to see where you plan on drawing the line for the defensive perimeter.

I'm thinking the strategy is that no defensive line is needed if the IJ achieves an auto-victory

quote:

ORIGINAL: desicat

Having actually sailed through the straits on a Carrier they are not very wide and there is little to no room for maneuver in the navigable channels.

The fact that the British guns were not targeting the strait was not a known fact at the time and not even the craziest Admiral would chance running a Battle Group through that gauntlet with the airfields in and around Singapore in enemy hands and operational.

The harbor defense guns could possibly have been discarded but any infantry artillery would have been able to be positioned to pound passing ships. Old fashioned fire ships or channel blockers COULD have been employed to create serious havoc.

Just because something was possible with the perfect knowledge of hindsight doesn't make it something that could be casually done without considering the risk and the unknowns in the present (game time).

quote:

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

quote:

ORIGINAL: desicat

Having actually sailed through the straits on a Carrier they are not very wide and there is little to no room for maneuver in the navigable channels.

The fact that the British guns were not targeting the strait was not a known fact at the time and not even the craziest Admiral would chance running a Battle Group through that gauntlet with the airfields in and around Singapore in enemy hands and operational.

The harbor defense guns could possibly have been discarded but any infantry artillery would have been able to be positioned to pound passing ships. Old fashioned fire ships or channel blockers COULD have been employed to create serious havoc.

Just because something was possible with the perfect knowledge of hindsight doesn't make it something that could be casually done without considering the risk and the unknowns in the present (game time).

Not trying to hijack, so last one on this for me. I just haven't ever seen a discussion of the sailing-past-Singers issue in the forum before and it tweaked my interest.

I have not consulted nav charts of the passage, but atlas maps seem to show a strait about 7-8 miles wide for most of its length. I don't know how wide the dredged channel would have been in 1941, pre-supertanker, but less.

As I thought about the FC issue I also thought about a tactical topic which I've never seen discussed re WITP or AE at all, and that is the absence of smoke as a screen in the game engine. DDs had smoke generators as far back as WWI or earlier, and smoke was used quite a bit in the PTO, at least as late as Leyte Gulf (Taffy 3 action.) Also, in sum, the 15in batteries constituted less than one BB's-worth of tubes, and there were widely separated in known, fixed positions. Smoke rounds and/or harrassment fire from escorts could have helped a passage. And the 6in and any army artillery which could be brought up would not trouble BBs or CAs. Mobile arty would have been fully exposed to counter-fire from the ships as well. At flank a passing force would have been in range for about 90 minutes, give or take. I don't know the rate of fire for the 15in batteries, or the amount of ready ammo, but five tubes would have been an acceptable risk IMO. Admirals in many wars, from the ACW to the RN in the Napoleonic era, challenged shore batteries when necessary. It could be done.

Of course, the IJN didn't need to do it, so it wasn't done. But in game terms I think an HR forbidding it being tried is unwise. As I believe GJ said, the routing rolls sometimes blunder ships into Singer's hex even when told not to; I've had that happen with subs I've sent past which fell to mines. And the air threat is also a factor. But a Japanese player willing to take the risk, and to be cut off from fuel as he goes north up the Burmese coast, ought to be allowed to try. And the narrow strait rules are there to let him. Or, in this case, aren't there.

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ORIGINAL: witpqs

Is the Eastern Wind still blowing?

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Im not sure how to react to this. So any opinions are appreciated.

I had alot of high-value US ships cornered. Several APs, AOs, TKs, AEs, etc. I had a CS a couple of hexes away, and the enemy ships were without anywhere to run. From the north came 4 of my CVs, to the west, my CS with escorts, to the east, the map-edge. The only way was south, and I was "herding" the US ships with my CS while I was waiting for the CVs to arrive.

Then, the next turn, all the US ships were gone. Completely vanished from the face of the ocean. I spent another turn looking around, in case they had made an unexpected full-speed run, or broken up the convoy...nothing.

Then I spotted them in the Panama in-box. So, he saved his 10-15 high-value ships by moving them off the map, while I had ships not two hexes away.

Fair?

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ORIGINAL: Panzerjaeger Hortlund

Then I spotted them in the Panama in-box. So, he saved his 10-15 high-value ships by moving them off the map, while I had ships not two hexes away.

Fair?

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

quote:

Im not sure how to react to this. So any opinions are appreciated.

I had alot of high-value US ships cornered. Several APs, AOs, TKs, AEs, etc. I had a CS a couple of hexes away, and the enemy ships were without anywhere to run. From the north came 4 of my CVs, to the west, my CS with escorts, to the east, the map-edge. The only way was south, and I was "herding" the US ships with my CS while I was waiting for the CVs to arrive.

Then, the next turn, all the US ships were gone. Completely vanished from the face of the ocean. I spent another turn looking around, in case they had made an unexpected full-speed run, or broken up the convoy...nothing.

Then I spotted them in the Panama in-box. So, he saved his 10-15 high-value ships by moving them off the map, while I had ships not two hexes away.

Fair?

Hmmmmm, probably deserves an email. If they were headed to the worm hole anyway, not so gamy, if they came out, saw you and ducked back in perhaps a little gamy. Probably a little FOW as there are no AE's that arrive on the east coast, and there would little reason to send one through. I believe you guys are playing with no house rules and this is the first time I ever heard of the Canal Zone wormhole being an issue. I'd drop CR a note.

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ORIGINAL: Panzerjaeger Hortlund

They were not heading to the canal, if they were, they would have gone right at the off-map-box just off San Diego. They went south for 20-something hexes from San Diego, and then went into the box...

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panzerjaeger Hortlund

They were not heading to the canal, if they were, they would have gone right at the off-map-box just off San Diego. They went south for 20-something hexes from San Diego, and then went into the box...

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ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58
Given FOW, how do you know that whatever you're seeing in the transit route is what you were chasing?

quote:

ORIGINAL: Panzerjaeger Hortlund

Im not sure how to react to this. So any opinions are appreciated.

I had alot of high-value US ships cornered. Several APs, AOs, TKs, AEs, etc. I had a CS a couple of hexes away, and the enemy ships were without anywhere to run. From the north came 4 of my CVs, to the west, my CS with escorts, to the east, the map-edge. The only way was south, and I was "herding" the US ships with my CS while I was waiting for the CVs to arrive.

Then, the next turn, all the US ships were gone. Completely vanished from the face of the ocean. I spent another turn looking around, in case they had made an unexpected full-speed run, or broken up the convoy...nothing.

Then I spotted them in the Panama in-box. So, he saved his 10-15 high-value ships by moving them off the map, while I had ships not two hexes away.

Fair?