Great reading chaps, looks like it's about to get interesting! :D

That's an idea. I tend to focus them on one mission and some naval search. My escorts were OK numbers wise. I wonder if i should try to layer the strike aircraft at different altitudes more.


In the cold light of day I'm a little more sober about the KBs achievements, which weren't huge. To be frank, i never expected it to be Pearl Harbour 2. The main role was to provide for bombers that never flew, and to scare CCIP a bit. It will be interesting to see his reaction. Will he evacuate his shipping or will he stand his ground? I'm basing this stuff on the fact i haven't seen evidence of his carriers in the area. My fleet train is such that if he decides to try an attack me in a surface action he'll have a number of battleships and cruisers in the way before he gets to the flat tops.

24th August.

A mass evacuation of US ships at Guadalcanal, looks like. Running south I'm guessing. He put up another fight, hoping to intercept my carriers and, again we butchered him in the air. He lost 5 more Wildcats and what looks like 4 Dauntless, with another 6 damaged. He also lost a P-39.

The Japanese strike aircraft flew again, much reduced in numbers it has to be said, and found only two ships at anchor - the AP's Zeilin and Ara (which has been damaged yesterday.) By the time my aircraft left, Ara had gone under and Zeilin was listing badly and belching smoke into the darkening sky. I would think she'll sink.

I might not have sunk as much as I would like but I still managed to disrupt his supply runs. He will think twice about running ships in without air cover, whether carriers or marine units on the island. Anything that forces him to use extra resources to do the basics is a good thing.

KB1 is ordered to pull back north. She'll loop around and have a sniff over towards PNG unless any juicy targets of opportunity appear.

The fast attack TF miraculously shrugged off a pair of small attacks by Dauntless as the transit along the Slot. They'll reach Tass tonight if all goes well then there will be a cheese-fest the likes of which has never been seen in the south Pacific before.

My air groups at Rabaul and Lae are back up to nearly full strength. The Bettys have been told to get the torpedoes loaded as there appear to be several Allied ships at both Moresby and Milne bay. Extra Zeroes have been shifted to Lae to provide cover.

Thoughts

Well, a move into Milne bay by the Allies is hardly unexpected but not entirely welcome. I don't have enough troops to really commit to an invasion at the moment - and with at least two carriers out there and Moresby needing taken I'm unwilling to expend too much effort on this base. I'll keep an eye on what's going on there and Maybe the Bettys will stop them good.

Sigh... same here, WitP:AE = bought. :yep:

Worth it. :up:

Oh I don't doubt it. Played a bit of WitE some time ago and was quite taken by it. :yep:

It's just I'm trying to find time to learn all these darn games. Already got HoI3
I need to learn for the Great Subsim Noob War II.

Also, need to tell my brain to start planning ahead. Something it has never been
very good at. :O:

Only thing I'm not happy about is the price. IMHO, Matrix Games' pricing has
always been a bit high, even the older games like the Close Combat games
are still 20-30 euros. WitP:AE D/L copy was 53e, some 10e of that was VAT. :doh:

"A bit high"? :haha:

The most expensive dust-magnet in my collection... I'll drag the manual along for this christmas' family visit. Maybe I'll finally get through it. :hmmm:

Christopher Hitchens. 1949 - 2011. RIP. :cry:


A motto, I think, for the next few weeks.



25th August.

And the head-on confrontations continue. I-162 mistakes a destroyer for a whale or something, surfaces for a look near Ndeni, and is promptly chased down into the briny depths. The destroyer works her over pretty thoroughly but she survives albeit with nearly 70% flotation damage. Remarkably, she can still make a few knots so begins a long, fraught journey back to Truk. I am doubtful she will make it.

An S-boat takes a shot at one of the destroyers in the carrier fleet train but has no success. She is chased down but escapes any damage.

I-1, on patrol NE of Cooktown, comes across a small convoy heading towards Moresby and puts a torpedo into tanker, her cargo seems to blow, which is gratifying, but I don't know whether she will go under. She will be very badly damaged, though.

My Bettys finally ran out of excuses and decided to go out today. They swarmed over Moresby where they sank an xAP and sustained minor losses (two damaged, two destroyed.) The allies also lost a couple of fighters. Later on I lost a couple of zeros when they tried to attack some B-17s over Buna.

The fast transport TF appears to be arsing around beyond the Slot. I had expected them to have landed by last night. Lets hope they do it this evening. The situation on Tassaforonga is pretty bad.

Orders

Troops are loading at Truk and will be moved to Rabaul. These are an engineering unit for Shortlands and an SNLF unit who have been earmarked to take part in the eventual attack on Moresby. I have a lack of troop carrying capacity but some of my Cargo ships can convert some of their space for troops. I could do with a couple of APs, though. I have three infantry units, an engineering unit and a naval HQ to move over the next week or two. more units will be shifted forward to Rabaul, Shortlands and Buna when I get the extra capacity. Shortlands gets priority just now because progress on the airfield is going slowly. I'll get another supply convoy away to Rabaul as soon as I can get some escorts freed up - the next three days I hope.

Price is high (see my previous thoughts elsewhere in the thread about that,) but since I got it two years ago I don't think there is another game I've sunk so many hours into. I'm lousy at forward planning too (as is probably becoming apparent..:D) and some of the savants over at Matrix flat out terrify me with their knowledge of the game. But for me, I'm not interested in using it as some sort of device for statistical analysis. I'm interested because you get aircraft carriers and subs and get to sink stuff with 'em. :yeah:

Again. Totally worth it! :D

I'd love to get WiTE. Maybe over Christmas...

26th August

Sailing on my APDs is a death sentence. They got in during the night and delivered the much needed supplies (still not enough, though,) but were hit by Dive bombers the next day as the mucked about. One sunk, another badly damaged. I'll have to use destroyers in the future. Japanese DDs can carry a small amount of supply. Better than nothing.

Betty flew en mass towards Moresby today, where she found several cruisers of various sizes. Leander, one of the smaller ships on offer, was the only one to fell Betty's slightly whimsical wrath. She went under with three torpedoes in her.

A number of Allied task forces are moving northward from Noumea. They seem to include cruisers as well as the expected supply ships. No sign of carriers, though. I wonder where they are?

If you (and I) learn it at some point, I'd love to have a game with you. Very much
enjoyed our CC5 games, too bad we never finished it. :up:

The unfinished aar can be read here:
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=170994

These games are no doubt best played against human player.

27th August

Nothing happened! At all!

Well, a couple of allied fighters bit the dust over Moresby. No Bettys flew. Apparently something good on the radio.

The APD is still bobbing along home, burning merrily. She's a gonner and I should probably think of scuttling her to deny CCIP some of the victory points.

KB1 closes on PNG. I've dismissed the SCTF that was travelling with her as I want them to return to Rabaul and refuel. I want to batter his positions on PNG with some big guns.

Elsewhere, The huge, hulking beauty of the Yamato sailed into Truk. My, she is a beauty, and I yet to decide what to do with her. From past run ins I know she is almost invulnerable to everything short of a nuke or a lucky hit.

Meh, I've got to work tomorrow. A long day of dealing with class A idiots. I'm going to bed. Night night.

It is nice. I just can't wrap my head around the elevation, rather difficult to figure out which positions give you a good firing arc. :doh:

(plus those MG-42s are bloody scary)

Game of WitP would be nice, more interesting playing with/against someone. :yep:

In CC, you can hold right-mouse and drag to get the elevation. Gotta say. you should've played as jerry, not fair to put you on attack. :-?

28th August

Bettys fly to Milne bay and sink an xAKs that's floating peacefully at anchor. Lots of Bettys fly today, unfortunately, at some point, they run out of torpedoes. This is something I wish was automatic. If i have aircraft that are set to use torpedoes, they game should automatically create more, as needed, from the supply stockpile. I've done it now, so it should be fine next time.

Kates flew from KB1 and hit Milne bay as well. They has slightly more success and sank both a steamer and a destroyer. KB1 continues to close on PNG but I would assume that CCIP will now be well warned of the approaching storm and get his ships out of dodge.

I did find out that he has P-39s at Milne, which is useful to know. These poor aircraft are dying in the sort of numbers that make even Bettys feel smug. I do not know what level of pilot experience he has but they aren't doing too well against my Zeros.


http://img845.imageshack.us/img845/2...to1280x800.jpg


What a beautiful ship. What a colossal folly, In my opinion. How many carriers and aircraft could the Japanese economy have built if they hadn't created the Yamato? Ah well, I'll enjoy using her. She's formed up with a number of cruisers and destroyers and been given orders to head to Rabaul in the first instance. I want to try those guns out in a test bombardment somewhere - Milne bay looks nice.

The Surface group that split from KB1 yesterday is leaving Rabaul again with orders to raid Milne. I've also got a couple of flotillas of smaller ships moving around now. I'm hoping it might throw CCIP off or make him think I'm getting geared up to take Moresby. Might he rush valuable troops and ships forward knowing my carriers are waiting? Might he commit his own carriers? We'll have to wait and see.

CCIP made an interesting point in his last email that we had so far skipped two major battles that took place in real life. I don't think they are skipped - they will probably still take place. I think there will be a big show down somewhere off Moresby at some point, if for no other reason than it might be fun. :yeah:

I'm excited to see how the Yamato will fare in a bombardment and possible gunnery duel.

Question, will this game model the fact that the Yamato's 18.1'' shells used a time fuse, in that, if you are striking at destroyers and cargo ships, the shells will simply go right through them without exploding?

I don't know, to be honest. There is so much stuff like that modeled I'll be surprised it this isn't. I'll check when I load up the next turn. I'm supposed to be going out tonight (I know, a real life...:D) so I don't know if I'll manage another one today.

I'm going to do a post about strategies soon, I think. I've been formulating plans here and there - as it's not the grand campaign it's easier to get away with a lot of forward planning. If anyone has any thoughts on the direction things are going in so far, or what they think might be possible I'd like to hear them and see whether they tally with my own views so far. CCIP doesn't seem to be having any major problems getting used to the game, which is heartening to know, and I'm looking forward maybe seeing how he operates with the big picture type games. I've enjoyed several CMSF PBEMs with his over the months and have been impressed with various elements of his play. In this game too i think he's getting to grips with things nicely.

Pfft, amateur :D Everyone who has a real life and gets out under that big circle in the sky isn't serious at gaming :O: