WingedIncubus
Posts: 512
Joined: 10/3/2007
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As a newbie player, I would strongly recommend that you take it slow. The first six months of the war, the Allies are in defensive mode. That's not being pessimistic, but realistic. However, unless you throw your carriers in the jaws of the Japanese Kido Butai and lose them in December 1941 (and even then...), nothing you can do will make you lose the game outright as the Allies. So take this time to take a good stock of your situation, theater by theater separately, and take some long-term decisions. And of course, begin by cleaning the mess the Japs have left in Pearl Harbour.
That said, defensive does not necessarily means playing possum and laying passive. I do not subscribe to "Sir Robin" (refusing any fight, flee all opportunities and hide the all carriers in San Francisco) becauses a) it sucks, b) it surrenders complete control of the game to the Japanese player, without fear of any action to counter his plans; c) this is an operational simulation of a war between two great powers and their allies - No self-respecting commander, conscious of his career, would argue to Franklin D. Roosevelt to flee for the hills and wait two years leaving the Japanese in full operational control of the Pacific until the US have enough CVs to sink the KB; d) Australia, New Zealand, Britain, Congress, and the American public would never politically fathom such a plan.
Military operations are an ensemble of both big, overarching plans and small, local opportunities, driven by human beings. As a commander, your overall objective is to mininize your mistakes (because you will make mistakes. Bull Halsey, MacArthur, and Nimitz all made pretty serious mistakes!) while creating the right conditions to help the other poor, dumb bastard make mistakes or suboptimal decisions to exploit. Being on the defensive does not mean refusing to take risks if your objective is worthwhile. Even with mediocre assets, ways can be found to keep an opponent on its toes and throw small wrenches in his plans. You have six months on the defence, yes, but on the other side the Japanese player has also six months to reach all its objectives, so any small, local victory you may grab is time, resources, and peace of mind lost for your opponent.
I remember a PBEM game as a newb in which in mid-December 1941, reading my reports and SigInt information, I deducted my opponent was sending a troop landing task force somewhere (Kuching, IIRC) without sufficient surface fleet protection. Being so early in the game, I was sure that KB was somwehere in the North Pacific, back from Pearl Harbor. So I asked myself - what would Nimitz do, had he the information and intelligence I had? I decided to take a gamble: a quick sortie from Indonesia and Singapore with parts of my ABDA task forces and set a coordinated SC attack right where my reports said they were going to land.
My thinking process was that my opponent would not be expecting me to take such an aggressive action, and risk cruisers in the open South China Sea so quickly. Yet, I could also have been totally wrong - and my task forces might have been in deep trouble. But such is the chaos of war, and in the end I was right! To my opponent's shock, my fleet indeed caught him with its pants down - and with inadequate surface fleet cover.  I did not seek battle with his cruisers or destroyers, though, but with its transports so it was worth some risk.
While I did suffer some damage in that fight I managed to damage or sink a few of his troop transports - one of them lost with all hands on deck including a complete, several-thousand IJA unit that was still to be landed. I remember reading the report! Might seem tiny in scope, but that I was an incredible victory for me - and threw a huge spanner into my opponent's planning because these troops, so early, were irreplacable. Yet, it was nail-biting stressful for me because if I was spotted, consequences could be dire... and yet, I cannot tell you how good you will feel when your first plans will succeed. And the more complictated they are, the more overwhelmingly awesome you will feel of planning such an operation against a human player and (not all the time, but sometimes) succeed! 
So practice weighing the pros and cons of every opportunity you may seize. Any Japanese ship or transport lost is a ship or a transport less it may use in its later operations, but if it is too costly do not feel ashamed to wait and fight another day.
I would also strongly advise that you grab a big notebook - and that you take notes. LOTS of notes. Each day, each turn, make a diary of it: What has happened, what has changed? What decisions do you need to take? What are your schedules?
WITP:AE is a game that is heavily focused on operational and logistical planning, and if you are playing with 1-day turn you have a lot of time to plan and organize yourself. Remember, the strategy you decide determines your operational choices and, from these, logistical decisions.
- So, what is your long-term game plan? What are your battle lines in China, Burma, India, Australia, etc.
- WHERE THE F*** is KIDO BUTAI?
- What assets do you have? What assets will you acquire, and when? What is your timetable, and where will you assemble them?
- Which will be your future staging grounds for supplying Australia and India in raw materials and prepping your future operations? What is needed in terms of supply, material AND convoy shipping to keep it under supply as you upgrade them?
- Dependent of your decisions above, which bases are you willing to sacrifice to the Japs? Which bases are you ready to fight for? Which bases will you absolutely fight tooth and nail to defend?
- Where are you putting your carriers? Which bases will be your hiding base for your carrier operations in the South Pacific? Where will your carrier task forces train?
- Where will you send your submarines and, from there, which bases will serve as sub bases or place your submarine tenders into?
- Mines... what minelayers do you still have? Where would it be best to lay your mines?
- WHERE, AGAIN, IS KIDO BUTAI?
- Which bases produce raw materials and oil, and how many oilers and transport ships are needed to bring them to production for fuel and supply?
- What intelligence do you have? SigInt, sighting reports, etc. Keep in mind that visual sightings can be erroneous or exaggerated, so always take them with a grain of salt
- WHERE, YET AGAIN, IS KIDO BUTAI AND BABY KIDO BUTAI (Zuiho, Ryūjō, etc)?
< Message edited by WingedIncubus -- 7/6/2019 5:58:31 AM >
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New player strategy help - 
I agree with most everything you've said.
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