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[Erkki]

Fabruary 7th

Singapore unfortunately holds for another day.

China: consolidating... Lots of Chinese units on the move, units trying to flank each other. Japanese forces advancing in the North.

Submarines: first loss to the IJN silent service is I-154, sank by a Catalina off Timor. This sub had good 3 kills already.

Air war: Rabaul's Zeroes sweep Port Moresby again, meeting about 2 dozen P-40Es! 16 of them are confirmed shot down without a loss to the Japanese. 

Kido Butai: now finally ready for action! Aircraft count at 468, 72 more than during Pearl Harbour, the mighty KB and its escorts are reorganized, and will tomorrow form up off Tavao, Formosa. Their escorts include battleships Hiei and Kirishima, and a cruiser fleet for picketing and surface action. KB will relocate at Bedeloab in next 4 days.

[Zrk2]

DUN DUN DUHHH...

[Erkki]

February 8th

China: 5 unescorted SB-2 bombers meet 20 Ki-27s of a training squadron, and 3 of the bombers are shot down. Good practice!

Burma: 50 Ki-48 bombers raid Moulmein's airfield with Zero and Ki-43 escort, 11 AVG H81 Hawks are shot down for 3 Zeroes and 1 Hayabusa, and the airfield is hit pretty well, very likely more Hawks destroyed.

Kido Butai: Now formed off Takao, heads to Bedeloab, then probably Truk. CVL Zuiho will join it at Bedeloab, CVE Hosho will stay there.

SignIntel: Reports again heavy voice transmissions, now 80 nm East of Brisbane. This is 4th contact in the same line, and the distance from previous report from anywhere near this matches the 3 previous. Enemy carriers. A Japanese submarine I-8 is just 40 miles away, it is sent to investigate.

edit: also Yamashiro, Mutsu and Fuso bombarded Chinese troops North to the coast from Hong Kong, that + LOTS of ASW patrols and 2 "well" timed supply convoys should give the enemy SignInt lots of contacts to look at for a few days. I hope the Kido Butai's departure will be unnoticed, theres so much action nearby. All the aircraft, except Hiei and Kirishima's search aircraft are also stood down, so that they dont give up the position to possible submarines lurking around, and keep the radio noise down. I want to keep the KB hidden for now, in the case the US Carriers move closer.

CVE Hosho will be in the reserve and available for a diversion raid, while CVE Taiyo will sortie early hours tomorrow to relocate to Amami Oshima, just North to Okinawa.

[Erkki]

Forgot 2 important-ish things:

1) The 1st Tank Regiment at Singapore seems to have just 1 working tank left. Trucks are all gone, but theres another tank, broken.

2) Davao fell to the Japanese, and the surviving Amis in Mindanao are now in a pocket in the middle of the island.

[Sheb]

Just a question. If you engage and sink his carrier, what will he have left to threathen Kido Butai? Would it be possible to ass supply ships to the KB and just make a frontal attack on Hawaii or California?

[Zrk2]

Just a question. If you engage and sink his carrier, what will he have left to threathen Kido Butai? Would it be possible to ass supply ships to the KB and just make a frontal attack on Hawaii or California?

I don't know, from what I understand he still has several BBs (from Pearl) that could possibly cause problems if not torpedoed before they can engage.

[Sheb]

BBs against the KB? We could raid them several time before the ever get into range.

[Zrk2]

I know, but if they avoided detection due to inclement weather...

My point was that we can't just go sailing off to the west coast and expect a cake-walk.

[Erkki]

Just a question. If you engage and sink his carrier, what will he have left to threathen Kido Butai? Would it be possible to ass supply ships to the KB and just make a frontal attack on Hawaii or California?

Good question. Historically the Americans played very conservatively, and managed to always use better numbers locally, with defensive position(Coral Sea and especially Midway where Americans knew exactly what the Japanese were going to do, add in Nagumo's mistakes). The only time a bigger part of the KB faced US carriers 1:1 the Yorktown was sunk for the small Shoho. If we can reduce US carrier numbers by even 1 before 6/42 or even before 1/43, the US carrier fleet will remain outnumbered for a long time, before the Essex class CVs start arriving mid 43 onwards.... The Americans might be able to replace any casualty given, unlike Japanese, but they cannot do it instantly!

After late 43-early 44 with the huge US numbers and better fighters it is not realistic to expect even small scale victory, better try to keep their numbers low. My opponent has so far played very aggressively(China, Burma, Moulmein bombardments with the cruisers, Lexington's desperate gamble), we might be able to use that to our advantage...

Those BBs arent a problem. Against something like the KB, they are best used as live baits. They are only able to get close in the night, and with the Japanese night training and equipment, even the escort destroyers will eat them alive.

Just sailing to West Coast is far from cake walk, even if Allies cant really strike back they can move their assets away in time... Nothing stops them to order their ships to head for Panama at flank speed. Surprise is the key element here.

[Erkki]

February 9th

China: war goes on, Ki -27 trainee squad shoots down 3 more SB-2s.

Burma: Japanese aircraft raid Moulmein again, 13-15 more Hawks are shot down for just one Ki-43. Thats the AVG! They must use poor replacement pilots or their morale is running really low.

Singapore still holds! No sign of defenders running out of supply. Instead of bombarding a day the units are ordered to try again tomorrow.

Kendari falls! Too bad I forgot to bring a base force so no torpedoes, but it works for a dive bomber/fighter base for now. Good staging base. A US(probably) submarine hits one of the cargo ships but it manages to stay afloat, it will try to return to Kendari for emergency repairs.

Submarines: The same Japanese sub that got a mine layer a few days ago and 2 cargo ships 2 weeks ago, still in the area, finds a convoy and attacks it ON SURFACE, sinking 2 very large tankers! The sub is out of torpedoes but the second tanker is sank with the deck gun. That crew just earned a medal.

[Erkki]

Would it be possible to ass supply ships to the KB and just make a frontal attack on Hawaii or California?

Forgot to answer this. There are special ship types for refueling and rearming other ships while at seas, AO for fuel(can be used to transfer oil as well) and AKE for ammunition(guns, bombs, drop tanks, torpedoes). At the moment I have I think 13 AOs, 10 of them prepared & fully loaded for Kido Butai at Nagasaki, but not a single AKE. Another thing to consider is that while the carriers, Kongo class battleships and all destroyers can do 27 knots + (actually only Kaga is slower than 30, at that 27 knots), and the fastest transport ship I know to have can do only 18, those KB oilers 16. Not so great problem for refueling mid-raid or pulling back for a day, but if the opposition includes carriers, any miscalculation in enemy waters is going to end up those support ships going down, the refueling itself takes a good 3-4 hours, and if theres need for flank speed(retreat, pursuit, flanking) the oilers and other support ships are just too slow.

A full invasion fleet with proper escorts(=battleships) is a different thing but I'm not going to invade Hawaii anytime soon. 

[Journier]

Im sorry to have to ask this, but i just got this game and I CAN NOT FIGURE OUT how to build ships. or modify whats being built... i select the docks but dont see any listing?

I have tokyo selected and i cant figure out actually how to build infantry divisions? Ships.... but planes seem to be an automated process dependent on factory size and plane selected?

can you help me out here?

[Erkki]

Im sorry to have to ask this, but i just got this game and I CAN NOT FIGURE OUT how to build ships. or modify whats being built... i select the docks but dont see any listing?

I have tokyo selected and i cant figure out actually how to build infantry divisions? Ships.... but planes seem to be an automated process dependent on factory size and plane selected?

can you help me out here?

Did you try the manual? When you select a hex it shows you the factories, ground and air units, from the hex menus you can only build PT boats, midget submarines and barges(and only if you have enough supply in the base, which must be controlled by you, and you have to have those barges/boats/subs in the pool).

Try the game's forums at http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tt.asp?forumid=528 lots of good info for learning and the AARs are great.

If you are the Japanese player, you see the ships being built in the "ship availability" menu(in the intelligence screen). Some ships are being blueprinted and cant be accelerated, planned ships can be accelerated somewhat, those being built can be accelerated but they eat 3x the HI points. You can halt the ships once they reach the building phase. The "arrival" date is current estimated time of arrival, depending on how the construction goes, how much resources you give it etc. Plane production is actually the least automated industry! You can manipulate very closely.

You should seriously get the Tracker too, you can play the game without but the heavy info(=industry) is much better compiled.

February 10th

China: The Japanese push advances towards Nangyan(I think), massive numbers of Chinese troops retreating.

Burma: Standard air action(7-8 Hawks for 0 Japs), a Thai infantry division soon reaches Moulmein, they'll help pushing the Brits back.

SignInt: Some radio activity reports today, one of them is Brisbane. How surprising...

I'm going to set up a trap for the Amis. Fuso, Kongo, Haruna, Yamashiro and Huyga with their escorts leave Hong Kong for Takao. They will meet up Admiral Tanaka's cruiser force. I have ordered some Marine units on Bedeloab and Saipan to prepare for Wake, one of them was already. An amphibious task force will load up supplies at Takao(the same ships used to invade Philippines), and will pick up the troops for Wake. The battleship force SHOULD make the Amis react, the Tanaka Squadron is more than likely well enough to deal with anything they might send. If all goes well, Kido Butai is not needed to get Wake, but it will position itself so that it can strike any enemy vessels trying to interrupt. With almost 100% likely at least one US carrier being at Brisbane, Rabaul's air units are also available for early warning & naval search should the enemy react.

Then fingers crossed their torpedoes dont work and bombs will bounce off the battleships' armour... 

[Journier]

i figured id find a good tutorial online which hasnt been the case :/

though thanks for your help, that part of the game for me is squared away now.

Now it figure out the ever so annoying intricacies of dealing with the chinese masses of 20k+ infantry 

Your attack on the phillipines was quite fast, it seems. My attack on the phillipines is 2 months into the game and slowly grinding through it.

[EuchreJack]

The 1st Tank Regiment at Singapore seems to have just 1 working tank left. Trucks are all gone, but theres another tank, broken.

Dude, that's MY tank regiment!  Am I dead?

Or, am I bravely piloting the last remaining tank?

Or, more likely, am I cowering inside the wreckage of a mostly-working tank?