Turn 243: 1265 AD

[Aeson]

Originally posted by DeepO
If we land in the open, there is another possibility. What about Q 77? With 2 settlers, it would fork on Quanto and Sando. Add the Marine threat on Abilene and Tipperary down S, and Lego has to split its defenses over 4 cities.

I'm not sure it's feasable, though, to get the M out of harms way.

DeepO

It's something to consider. Sando would require the roads stay up, in which case landing just about anywhere will fork more cities too.

I don't even want to go over the chaining that would be required though... It may be possible to use empty Transports to get the Marines to safety, but at first glance I think we'd be in range of shore bombardment at least.

[DeepO]

Aeson, don't forget there are at least 2, maybe 3 bombers nearby which could also attack our ships. That tips it to attacking the Lego ships (possibly not the 1/3 DD) I think: with 4 ships less to worry about, we could even have enough protection from a few empty transports (which we'll have anyway)

One remark: we're better off with a couple of 1/4 DDs, then with no DDs at all. In case Lego blocks one of its harbours again, we need a bit of offensive capabilities.

DeepO

[Aeson]

You need to get to sleep.

(I definitely agree on attacking the S Lego ships... I was assuming it in the post.)

Originally posted by vondrack
Our 1265AD war thread has 96 posts ATM, which is close to what has been posted in our forum from March to September 2004...

At least we are almost sure to win the post count competition!

[Jon Shafer]

Total Posts: 168
User Posts
DeepO 83
Aeson 33
Theseus 14
vmxa1 13
Trip 7
OPD 6
Shiber 3
Krill 3
vulture 2
Cort Haus 2
notyoueither 1
asleepathewheel 1
alva 1

[DeepO]

hum... slept through my alarm clock. I don't have much time, I've got to run. I should be back around 10 pm GMT, at which time I'll play the save. There are a few things to decide yet, but in principal we land at Abilene 87, and will end our marines at Abilene 441.

A few of the minor things: If possible, I'd like to end one transport so that we can have a chain next turn. This requires that the DD protecting hub2 has to attack the 3/5 BB next to our N fleet, and succeed. Also, I'd like to change the build in Hurricane to DD if possible... we might get another turn out of our chain before Lego breaks it.

As to how many settlers to land: I'm still not convinced we should land only 1. If we lose them all next turn, the invasion is over. But let me think about that for a while...

DeepO

[vulture]

Some stack combat calculator results:

for 55 marines vs Quanto: 0.8% chance to take the city; on average they lose 8.6 units, gain 13.1 promotions and 1.1 great leaders

for 55 marines vs Abeline: 1.2% chance to take the city; on average they lose 10.3 units, gain 12.4 promotions and 1.1 great leaders

Don't know the details for Forkmouth - for the sake of argument I've assumed the same units as Quanto, and that it is not on hills (and since is size 12, doesn't get the metro bonus; if it is on a hill, it won't be much different to Quanto)

55 marines vs assumed Forkmouth: 22.9% chance to take the city; on average they lose 15.3 units, gain 11.5 promotions and 0.8 great leaders.

If Forkmouth isn't on a hill, it's worth investigating. Even with the risk of running into a submarine, it's by far the best shot at taking a city with marines. And they probably won't have that many tanks there: they have 27 total, and 17 of them are already accounted for, and surely they have some on the GoW side if the GoW invasion is actually a plausible threat.

[OPD]

Forkmouth is on hill, the only non-metro not on a hill is Sandronico but that's seemingly blocked by BB's

[vulture]

That's not so good. It still probably represents the best shot at taking a city with marines though, although not a brilliant one (unless it is woefully underdefended).


Trying to find a bright side, surely this means that GoW won't be facing nasty odds on their side for a marine attack.

For those who are interested, if Sandronico were completely undefended on land, our odds of taking out the 4/4 BB to get through to it using 7 transports (i.e. the marines' transports) is 9.7%

[OPD]

I guess this is a situation where a couple of cruise misslies would actually be very useful. A tactical nuke would be better though, and more fun too, then you'd really see some rolling armagedon.

[asleepathewheel]

damn I've missed a lot.

[DeepO]

vulture, that's about the best chance we heard... 9.7% is the best way to take a city, and have a rolling invasion after that

I'm about to start on the save again, but first I'll have to do the stuff up to this point. I'll get a screenshot with a detailed movement plan in half an hour or so.

DeepO

[DeepO]

DeepO

[DeepO]

The following moves are planned:

1. Take DD to BB. Clears for subs for our chainer. There is another option where we'll leave the BB, and move the ship to the Hub 3 position instead (together with the carrier)

2. Move Chainer to N fleet

3. Use a TR full of M to scout for subs. If free, the other TRs can follow, otherwise we need to find another way

4. Use 3 DD + 3/4 DD to attack the 4/5 DD, 2/4 DD and 1/3 DD. Actually, I'm not so sure about this move... we'll run into 3 or 4 defenisve bombardments, I wonder what our odss would be. Will check this later before playing.

5. Move our S fleet, unload, chain M, and go to S fleet position. Take a few empties as well... layout of troops still to be decided, it looks like everyone agrees with every settler apart from the one on Abilene 78, I'm not so convinced. But let's decide this after we see how the attack in 4. goes.

6. One last TR, or possibly 2 if we're confident, move to Hub 3 position. These are out of reach of the BBs, and could chain more troops to us next turn. We could arrange for protection from one DD, but that means we don't attack the 3/5 BB, which can in turn attack hub 2 next turn. (at the end of this turn, Hub 2 will be defended with 2 DDs if we want)

7. Move 4/5 DD and 3/4 DD in range.

8. Move the remaining 3 moves on the 3/4 DD we used to scout. I think we got a couple of options with this ship. We could scout for subs for the N fleet, but I doubt we're going to find any. The most risky position for the S fleet is right next to it, as the stack was attacked by a sub last turn (IIRC). More to the South, there shouldn't be any subs left, or they would have moved towards the S fleet. So no scouting to the North... which leaves 2 options: either run so shore bombardment can't reach the DD, or try to outrun the BBs. We can't have both. The DD from Quanto (it was Quanto building a DD, not Abilene. When redoing the save I noticed I was wrong) can reach the 3/4 DD everywhere.

I prefer shore bombardment over drawing some BBs away from their shores, but closer to our Hubs. Every art on that DD won't be used on one of our MIs.

DeepO

[DeepO]

Actually, I don't know about attacking that Lego stack in view. We've got 4 DDs (one of which at -1 hp), they've got 4 DDs (one 2 hp down, one 3 hp down). We will face 3 or 4 hits from artillery (3 normal, 4 because Lego seems to have lucky shots at sea). That makes it the same number of hp.

We would have a slight advantage of winning the battle with our 4 ships, however we are surely going to lose 1 or 2 battles, maybe even more. Which will leave us with battered ships (think 1/4, maybe 2/4 DD if we're lucky), against their battered ships (possibly a 3/4 DD, otherwise 2/4). The problem is, our ships won't defend the TRs anymore. If they attack with their 2 ships, against our stack, TRs are going to be on top, with 2 DDs below.

OTOH, if we keep our ships, and only bombard the Lego stack, we will have 3 full health ships, and a 3/4 DD on top. Add the CV still present, and add 1 or 2 empty ships (depending on how much we send to Hub3, we should have 3 empties in total), and we will have a protection against 6 or 7 ships. With the bombing, we should get the Lego stack to below 3 hp at most, making them lousy attackers too.

So, even if I previously said otherwise, I think we should only bombard that stack, and not outright attack it. The margins are too small...

DeepO

[DeepO]

Something else: we are looking at the S stack for hiding our M. It's not entirely correct that that's the only hiding place. We will have 11 empty TR, within chaining range just next to it. Why not use that for at least a couple of M, perhaps even settlers?

Right now, there are 6 BBs threatening that stack of empties, all hit before. With luck, we will destroy one of those. Further, we've got the new DD from Quanto which can hit it, and the 4 ships of Lego's South Stack. So, 11 visible ships can reach it, many of which are at 1/4 hp. I guess that at least 1 or 2 TRs are going to be safe from destruction, and could be used for e.g. 3 settlers, and 13 M. Which would leave more room in the S fleet for empties (they are needed too, as chainers).

It's a matter of dividing risks: there is no way to Lego can destroy both stacks in the same turn, so we are going to have at least some settlers, and marines left, no matter how they spin it. And most likely, we will have more units present after they play their turn.

DeepO