The Sun against the Eagle - WitP AE AAR - UCG v KyzBP

[undercovergeek]

Laptop - new gfx

Home PC - olde style

[airboy]

This game is sort of mind boggling.  One allies have successfully invaded the Northern Kuriles. 

The IJA is striking Australia with a vengeance.

How in the world are both of you keeping your logistics train working successfully? The Kuriles are close to...... Asia, Russia and still awfully far away from the Alaskan Islands.  Northern Japan is way, far away from any supply source for the USA outside of Russia.  The weather in the Northern Pacific is a bitch.  Do the allied forces get supply from Stalin????  How is this working out?

Given the IJA, land based air, and the IJN I can at least comprehend the Australian Operation.  But Northern Japan leaves me scratching my head.

[Sir Slash]

Clearly these two are Masters of game, Titans of Logistics and Strategy and neither play by the rules of Conventional Warfare. This is the King Kong vs Godzilla of the Strategy Gaming World. The only question is who is who? I mean weren't both monsters Japanese?  ;D

[JasonPratt]

I'm not sure how closely the game models weather effects on supply. But Kyz's supply route should be significantly shorter, and his supply situation has somewhat simplified thanks to UGeek's actions in recent months. Plus Geek still has to worry about raiders of various kinds -- even striking from the Kurls! -- whereas at the moment Kyz can operate along the northern arc with impunity.

[Airborne Rifles]

The Kuriles - a mess - its a bit of a conundrum but the answer seems to be to overwhelm the Allied fighters and whittle there numbers down - LBA against the CVs isnt working - the airfields arent big enough to get 100 bombers en masse into the air, but 50 - 60 fighters can, and although i expect them to lose if i can get those 60 over a battleship task force we should be able to hurt some landing craft or maybe catch the CVs with the TF - the BB TF is on its way from Java

From your perspective this looks like it could be developing into something like a Guadalcanal in the north. Do you have plans for trying to reoccupy these islands or are you planning to just do drive-by's with the BB?

[undercovergeek]

KyzBP has, depending on what way you look at it broken the game or become a jedi master at Allied warfare - by overloading 3 CVs with fighters theres a huge CAP umbrella in the area, from the bases and the ships - whilst this has severely hindered any offensive carrier operations elsewhere it prevents me doing anything until i can come up with a solution to this conundrum

There arent enough large airfields within range of where he has landed to mount a coordinated fighter/bomber attack - from anywhere else on the map i would send the bombers from one airfield and the fighters from another but theres no back up field on Hokkaido - after 3 seperate multi day attacks I lose too many unescorted bombers. The next attempt was to ground the bombers and put up a fighter force - this met with more success but as i cannot sweep his CV force im left sweeping a land base that then draws the CV cap and losses are pretty much one to one, 100 of mine versus 100 of his will after a number of days deplete his force but it will be a phyrric victory of sorts leaving either me or KyzBP with 20 fighters in the area.

The next plan then is to bring in some floating big guns to bombard the airfields and put them under a CAP on retreat - its been done against me many times - the ships come from nowhere, bomb at night and retire to the safety of a well CAPped harbour during the day - the only trick is getting in and out without meeting offensive ships - if i do i suspect DDs and maybe the odd cruiser - staging from Tokyo i can put up some BBs and see what we can damage on the fields - this leaves only the CV cap to deal with that i believe will have to go home to replenish as theres no level 7 airfields nearby - this is what i need to replenish

At the minute the priority is Augusta, Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney - i need 4 times KyzBPs score on any date in 1943, thats 8 months away - that will be the 'allies really would have surrendered by now' trigger that at least makes me feel like i beat history. Then we go get the Kuriles, and maybe Pearl  ^-^

[Airborne Rifles]

Thanks for the response. I can't help seeing the parallels between the situation for you in the Kuriles (minus the carrier CAP) and the back-and-forth that actually did occur at Guadalcanal, with the Japanese sending cruisers, destroyers, and BBs down the Slot to bombard Henderson Field at night, then retreating back into the protective CAP of Rabaul during the day.

BTW, Neptune's Inferno is a great book about the naval battle of Guadalcanal that describes this dynamic very well: http://www.amazon.com/Neptunes-Inferno-U-S-Navy-Guadalcanal/dp/0553385127/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1458671201&sr=8-1&keywords=neptune%27s+inferno

[undercovergeek]

thats exactly how its going to turn out i think  :o

[Airborne Rifles]

Historically it ended with the more modern US BBs (USS South Dakota and USS Washington, I believe) eventually intercepting and sinking the Japanese BB Kirishima on one of her night runs, but up to that point the Japanese were able to do a lot of damage with their surface raiders.

[Airborne Rifles]

Also, the range from Rabaul to Guadalcanal was such that the Japanese air attacks suffered from many of the same problems of coordination between fighters and bombers that you report here, IIRC.

[JasonPratt]

I am super curious to see Geek's anti-Kurly plan in action! (And the continuation of the push for an early autovic vs. Oz.)

[jomni]

Yes. Use fast BBs to sneak at night and bombard. Good luck!

[Sir Slash]

The Tokyo Express-- Northern Leg.

[JasonPratt]

I have a slight preference for foregone historical losers in a wargame to angulate a victory instead, so while I'm certainly cheering Kyz's various moves (sometimes a lot, like his invasion of ultra-north Japan), I'll be happy if Geek can force a technical win. 

[undercovergeek]

Ok, epic update - well, not so epic, theres only 4 main areas of operations at the moment so we'll take a tour -



Eastern Oz - probably the most frustrating of the areas at the moment. Starting at the top and working up - Bundaberg, in the hex is about 1000 points of assault troops, bombed daily by at least 8-15 sorties from bases further south (the worst part of watching the replay when the turn is received - click, bombers, click, bombers, click, bombers, click, bombers) - now, heres an interesting tidbit, fairplay to Sir KyzBP and the RAAF and their brave efforts but in what can only be seen as a fault in the game its having ZERO effect on the troops - after 3 weeks of continuous bombing my mens fatigue is at 4/100 and disruption is 0/100 - it has certainly changed my approach to bombing ground troops elsewhere. To the west is 2000 points of assault troops, they were due to arrive in Bundaberg this turn but took a detour southwest and will now march east into the hex. Looking at the map i see theres no road southeast from directly above B'berg so imagine thats why they turned. Anyway - probably 3 more days of marching and we'll be in - I'm hoping this is the core of the Oz defenders as i cant see us losing the fight - therell be a few days of attacks while the forts come down and then we can chase the defeated troops all the way to B'bane.

Further North, R'hampton. Chock full of construction engineers - the airfield and port and fortifications here have been built up to hold anything we have, aircraft have been moved due to uncontested bombardments from KyzBP - our navy is busy elsewhere

Further North to T'ville. Again, a huge base for us, built up to replenish any fleet we land and any planes we use. Most of the areas planes are here but KyzBP has recently found us here so we may move to Port Moresby - im trying to find a place where they can rest and replenish, its not that numbers are low, just that the men are tired and need a rest.

Just off Cairns is a fleet of DDs and cruisers - it looks like the Oz navy has seen something juicy somewhere, although im not sure what - there are a few auto convoy fleets bringing fuel and supplies from Truk but they are 1 or 2 ship convoys - theres no big fleet out there - nevertheless it gives us a rest from the endless bombardments



To South Oz, an area of tears and hair tearing. Ill start at the beginning - we sent a surface combat force to Port Augusta to make sure there were no defenders or transport fleets mooching around the area before the landing force gets there. KyzBP had some bombers on standby and found the TF - the damage isnt anything we cant handle but the TF has run out of fuel and can only withdraw 1 hex at at time. A few turns later the landing force arrives and what do you know? It runs out of fuel 6 hexes short of the target, again it will advance but only 1 hex at a time - both TFs fuel values displayed they would make it to this area with no problem when we set off so shrug to whats happened here. I sortied the landing force and the KB to meet in the same hex so they could share some fuel, it gives the landing force just enough to get there and the KB just enough to make it back to base - we should be ok, the limping TF can be left to limp - fuel is on its way. In Albany the Perth invaders are on their way, arty is following - all is well here EXCEPT an idiot decision to put all the defending surface combat ships into port - so in his own mini version of Pearl KyzBP bombed Albanys port and hit all 6 BBs - very minor damage but still enough to piss me off - theyve all been sortied and are heading home to Soerbaja for fuel, upgrades and mischeivous stuff



Northern OZ - Not much doing really, Wyndham has built up its port enough to take a decent sized landing force to take Darwin, but its low on the list. Right on the shoulder is a TF bringing an Air HQ to Albany ready for Perth, to provide decent support for the invasion - once Perth and the surrounding towns are neutralised this entire coast should be trouble free for a while - we'll see

Thats Oz, next up Java, Sumatra, China and Japan and the story of a resurrected fleet sent back to hell again