An Idiots Guide To Losing Your CV's Before 1942: WiTP:AE KyzBP vs UCG

Started by KyzBP, June 22, 2015, 04:02:39 PM

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airboy

I'll second the thought that the IJN and IJA did not have the logistics train to supply India.  Only if they had a rail route from the Chinese Ports do I think this could have been pulled off.

Enjoyed the AAR.  Pretty shocking that the IJA is in Australia and the allies hold islands so close to Japan.  How in the world the supply chains for both sides are pulling this off is beyond me.

JasonPratt

The supply chain for the USA advance is a lot easier than the one for the Australian invasion, or should be: there's a few thousand miles less to travel, although the weather is much worse at any given time, and the lines are so far secure. Geek put an expeditionary force on Attu, around the time Arctic Monkey was activating, but they can't project air or sea power so they're just handy target practice for the Dutch Harbor fleet.

I'm not sure how much supply Geek is getting from just being in Australia; maybe a lot, compared to being in, for example, New Guinea. But the US isn't pushing more than a few inept subs and an occasional surface raider task force into the supply line from Japan to the fighting (in real life American subs didn't start getting uber until summer 1943), and Geek is winding down island-taking operations elsewhere, so he can afford to safely send a lot of tankers and cargo ships to Australia. His supply is inherently more fragile, though.

(Or maybe not, if he has already begun setting up and strengthening supply runs from the resources of conquered Pacific Southeast islands.)

We could of course just jump over to his thread and ask him.  ;D
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

besilarius

Zeno's Warbirds put up this video on PBYs for March.

http://www.zenoswarbirdvideos.com/PBY.html

Considering their important role in the AAR, this might be of interest.
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KyzBP

I've said it before but I love when you guys begin discussing the game vs. history.  I learn so much.  And Besilarius, thanks for the video!

KyzBP

March 28th, 1942

Sorry for the delay but it's Kid's Sports season so the updates will be a bit sporadic for the next few months.  Please bear with me.

We continue the landings a Palmyra.

Of course the landings are taking place BEFORE the bombardment.  I really need to soften Palmyra up considering how badly I
underestimated the number of troops here.

Ahh, here's the bombardment.

That looks a little better.  We may be able to pull this off if I can keep the pounding going.

The assault begins.

And fails.  Between the assault and the bombardment we did some decent damage, maybe 15% casualties for Geek.  But we lost
on of the Marine units...completely.  The units following aren't going to add much to the next assault so I may pull back and regroup.
I can continue bombarding until the island is a little softer.  He can't replace his loses here so time is on our side.

Bombardments continue at Rockhampton.

Far less costly than trying to bomb his fields by air.  The problem is these guys are about out of ammo.  I'll start heading them to
Sydney to repair and rearm.  They should be ready to go in about 10 days or so I hope.  I'll try hitting the airfield by air tomorrow
and see if the CAP is any lighter.  His raids over Brisbane should be smaller for awhile.

The raids over Brisbane were smaller.


The bombardment of Rockhampton seems to have affected his ability to send bombers and fighters.  It figures my ships would run
low on ammo just as we gained a level playing field.

Geeks subs near Darwin claim some victims.


The 2 things I have an abundance of are AK's and Supply.  I can afford to lose a few as long as some get through to Darwin,
which they have:

The supply situation is much better.  I just have to figure out how to get that supply to Katherine.  There's another wave of
AK's inbound.  I'm sure we'll lose a couple but even if just 2 get through, Darwin will have enough supplies for a couple months of fighting.

Tomorrow we'll check and see what Geek's CV's are up to.

KyzBP

March 29th, 1942

Since I have a bunch of Brit and Aussie units up at Aden I thought it'd be a good idea to send a big AP that was just sitting
at Darwin.

Add that to the list of bad ideas.  She's still afloat and will head towards Perth for repairs.  Of course she'll probably be out
for 6 months or something.

I sent a small raiding force after some ships that were spotted near Kushiro(Hokkaido).

That one never stood a chance.  I would consider invading Hokkaido if it wouldn't trigger a butt ton of reinforcements for
Geek.  The last thing he needs is more troops.  I've been having a decent run just raiding though.

Geek decides on a new tactic.

He went for his first night raid.  It wasn't very effective but if he keeps it up he may get lucky.  I have no night fighters here
at all.  I barely have any fighters.  I have to dig some up soon.

ASW at Rockham

The sub took some hits but should also make it back to port.  The real news is how lucky I was that I pulled back my
almost-out-of-ammo Bombardment TF.  Timing is everything.

Palmyra bombarded.

That may be a continuing headline for awhile.

Geeks CV's.

They're just South of Port Blair.  I have every fighter on Port Blair set to CAP.  I moved the bombers here to Rangoon in
exchange I sent the AVG to Port Blair.  I also have my surface TF undocked so they can provide AA fire should he launch a
carrier raid at Port Blair.  It'll be a bloodbath if it happens.  Both of our blood.

Geek's Surface TF

These guys caught an unsuspecting tanker that was returning to Colombo.  This little TF will be able to run wild for a bit.
I'm setting up a Surface TF at Colombo to guard the port and airfield there.  I don't want Geek to get any cheap shots like
the ones I take at his coastal fields. ^-^

The Brit's CV's.

I don't want to take any chance of losing these carriers so I off loaded the planes onto Ceylon and am moving the carriers
to Bombay.  If he's coming for Ceylon, the carriers wouldn't be much help anyway.

Darwin looking good.

The supply situation is well in hand now.  There's still a few more AK's on the way so we are set here.



JasonPratt

Something the game is reinforcing that my recent reading is mirroring, is:

1.) Naval bombardments look great but achieve almost no real casualties. "The Navy pounded that beach for a day, and are complaining they ran out of targets to destroy!" 93 casualties.  ::) :2funny: Casualties were always much less than expected. What bombardment did do is shake morale and somewhat mess up entrenchments (depending on the entrenchments).

2.) More importantly, carriers work great against (a) unprepared land defenses (of which after Pearl Harbor there were none); and (b) other carriers. Land based air is much more effective against anything, air, sea, or land, than carrier based air. Several carriers together in one fleet (or a couple of nearby joint fleets) can bring a moderate amount of air power to bear on a target for a day or two. This can produce some striking results with a few planes wiping an important battleship or two, at a cheap loss risk. But at the end of the day, land based air and sea based guns (and torps) won the air and sea war, and helped the land war more than the carriers did on either side.

What carriers were great at, even fleet carriers, were zipping a small to medium-sized air field somewhere to attack unexpectedly. Pearl Harbor and Doolittle's raid were different extreme examples of that principle.
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

KyzBP

Quote from: JasonPratt on March 09, 2016, 07:24:23 PM
Something the game is reinforcing that my recent reading is mirroring, is:

1.) Naval bombardments look great but achieve almost no real casualties. "The Navy pounded that beach for a day, and are complaining they ran out of targets to destroy!" 93 casualties.  ::) :2funny: Casualties were always much less than expected. What bombardment did do is shake morale and somewhat mess up entrenchments (depending on the entrenchments).

2.) More importantly, carriers work great against (a) unprepared land defenses (of which after Pearl Harbor there were none); and (b) other carriers. Land based air is much more effective against anything, air, sea, or land, than carrier based air. Several carriers together in one fleet (or a couple of nearby joint fleets) can bring a moderate amount of air power to bear on a target for a day or two. This can produce some striking results with a few planes wiping an important battleship or two, at a cheap loss risk. But at the end of the day, land based air and sea based guns (and torps) won the air and sea war, and helped the land war more than the carriers did on either side.

What carriers were great at, even fleet carriers, were zipping a small to medium-sized air field somewhere to attack unexpectedly. Pearl Harbor and Doolittle's raid were different extreme examples of that principle.

Great observations, Jason. 

What I think I like carriers for, right now at least, is attacking unguarded TF's. :knuppel2:  Things like convoys or surface combat TF's are currently my favorite things to send my carriers after.  Once I get more and better carriers I'll start looking for Geek's CVs.  Right now they scare me.

JasonPratt

Right, they can project artillery power. (As one officer said whose name I can't recall, "In the Pacific, artillery flew.") But that arty power, at the moment, isn't as good as what a battlecruiser raiding party could do: the plane gets a couple of bomb drops and then has to go home, and even against a little AK that might not be enough, even with seven planes. The nice thing about PBYs is that they fly slow and low enough to make level bombing more accurate, and can even do a bit of dive bombing from medium height -- still slow, so better aim. But carrier planes, even the dumpy ones, necessarily stress speed (relatively speaking).

Whereas a couple of cruisers and some destroyers, or a sub on the surface, would make short work of a lightly or unarmed task force. BUT they can't zip into an area, strike from over the horizon, and zip out again.

Oh, and American subs didn't start getting broadly uber historically until mid-43, so anything you pick up now is gravy; and obviously they're getting better.

Naturally what you want to avoid is a Battle of Coral Sea before you can get your Midway; and maybe delay the Midway as long as you can, as that battle was dicey. The Japs historically wanted to draw the carriers into a decisive battle and finish them off, while they still had a chance.

But carriers plus a full aircraft complement are horribly fragile and expensive, compared to, say, three battlecruisers. But they can trade three Dauntlesses for a battlecruiser.

The flip side is that you want to make Geek use his carriers in bad ways, being suckered by the mystique of them, and meanwhile play your game to their strengths since you can fairly safely anticipate the enemy will play to their strengths -- and if you can anticipate the enemy, you can mess with him.  >:D
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

Staggerwing

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FarAway Sooner

It was a curious rock-paper-scissors kind of match-up.  Land-based air beats carriers beats surface naval units, BUT under the right circumstances (or when land-based air units can both contest air space) surface naval units can absolutely wreck land-based air.

Where the Japanese really screwed themselves was in their failure to develop any system for training or rotating pilots.  They took the naive "fighting spirit overcomes material challenges"  approach that all the other combatants in WW II had lost in The Great War 25 years earlier.  That was the Japanese approach to most of WW II, with absolutely devastating results for their homeland and their people.

KyzBP

March 30th, 1942

A busy day so let's get right to it.

Geek's Surface Combat TF catches some tankers.

These guys are leaving nothing but burning hulks in their wake.  I'm hoping they stray a little too close to Ceylon
before Geek's CV's catch up.

Sub attack of Hawaii.

WTH???  I thought we were done with this phase.  I guess that's what I get for sending 80% of my ASW assets to AM.
I'll have to send a few ASW TF's out to keep Geek honest.

At least that ASW at AM is doing something.

I know Geek has a large sub fleet but it seems like I'm playing whack-a-mole with them.  As soon as I feel like I'm
knocking a bunch out, another bunch show up.

ASW scores a hit at Port Blair.

That was the good news.  The bad news is now Geek knows exactly what I'm guarding Port Blair with.  I'm fairly ready
for a surface fight but we'll both lose a bunch of ships.  I have all the fighters ready should he come by air.  This is getting
kind of tense.

Air over Brisbane.

The air war over Brisbane continues.  My fighters are just about depleted though.  I have another squadron about to unload
at Sydney and then that's it for awhile.  I may try to transfer some over from the Solomons but I need experienced pilots.  I think
I know 2 places I can get some.  One may take a little while.  The other may be sailing nearby. ;)

Some of the 4 Engine Bombers over Marysville

These guys have done pretty well.  For whatever reason they're usually the last to launch and therefor hardly ever have to deal
with CAP.  There is another squadron of B-17's that just disembarked at Sydney so they'll be online soon.  Hopefully it won't be
too late.

Nevermind. >:(

Dammit!  I was hoping we could hold on a bit longer.  I had sortied out all the armor from Brisbane to try to hit Geek's troops
before they won control of Marysville.  The remnants will move up to Bundeburg but then that creates a strange situation where we
have each other cut off.  If Geek sends troops from Mary to take Bund then I'll send troops from Brisbane to take Mary.  Just when I
thought things were stabilizing in Oz Land.

Carrier planes sink an AK.

I bet you were thinking AM.  No, it appears Geek wants to take out my bases around Sumatra.  I thought for sure he'd be
headed to Ceylon.  Unless he thinks my carriers are around there somewhere.  What this does do is force my supply and troop
convoys transiting through here to Oz to detour West  before heading back South.  For now it's a minor inconvenience but we'll
see how this plays out.

Sally raid at Sibolga

This one kind of hurt.  These were engineers that were going to prepare defenses and build an airstrip.  Luckily about 900 of the
engineers were rescued by the other ships.  We have to get these guys offloaded in a hurry.

More hits, more losses.

I'd say Sumatra is on it's own for the time being.  I'm really just giving away things to sink.

I retreated off of Palmyra.  Here's what's there:

I definitely need more troops if I'm going to take this.  I'm beginning to think it may not be worth it and I'll just bombard
it at my leisure.  Possibly just let them starve until I have spare units.  I could probably use these troops elsewhere.

I lost another base in China but I can't find the screen shot of it.  Neither one of those events should surprise any of you. 

jomni

Looking grim for the allies. At least for the most recent turn.

KyzBP

Quote from: jomni on March 10, 2016, 08:35:20 PM
Looking grim for the allies. At least for the most recent turn.

I agree, Jomni.  The weird thing is I feel like I'm just about to start getting momentum. :idiot2:

jomni