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I had loaded a fast transport with CA Aoba, Kitakami and Oi, and 10 DDs to bring in 12cm DP guns (the non-airliftable portion of the 7th Kure SNLF) to a besieged Port Moresby. My timing was unfortunate, as they didn't make it by the 5th, when a big Allied landing came in, and were 3 hexes out along the coast of NG during the action, unmolested.
I changed them into a surface combat TF and sent them in the next day to see if they could hit the convoy leaving PM (3 hex react, mission speed, retreat allowed), but instead of reacting to it as it left Port Moresby, they skirted around it and began landing the DP guns! In surface combat mode! [:@][&:][:(] I have had CA/CL fast transports loaded and changed them mid-path to intercept Allied ships, and even fight battles with the troops onboard. I know it has worked before so this seems very odd, and the unintended behavior led to the eventual sinking of the cruisers. Perhaps when I've seen this before they didn't come in contact with the destination base and so never tried to unload until after combat and a reset to fast transport?
I checked them on the 6th and they were in Port Moresby, still in surface combat, and I set orders to flee and potentially lock horns with 7-8 Allied ships (led by modern CA/CL including CA Baltimore) that had ended up 1 hex to the SE of Port Moresby. Instead they stayed in the hex and unloaded their supply as well!!! Still in surface combat mode! [:-]
Again, they were not hit that day, but on the 7th they finally retreated and moved an entire 2 hexes (!!!) which means (in mission mode) they stayed the entire night phase in PM and didn't even move a full day's allowance during the morning phase. (The supply was completely off of the ships by this point, so it was not that they were still unloading). They did interact with two subs in those two hexes, but that has never slowed a TF of this kind nearly this much in my experience, especially since no damage was accrued. They were then sitting ducks in range of Allied strike planes in broad daylight. WTF?
Jocke's B-25D1s came in low and did their job, sinking Aoba with 4 500lb hits (old and frail, I guess?) and putting enough hurt on the CLs that Kitakami was hit by 3 TT from the Finback and sank while Oi burned out and went under the following day. Frustration!?! Yes.
Obviously this was partially my fault for sending them in, and I was prepared to lose them for maybe a DD or two and a shot at a CL during a surface tussle, but not like this. Very cheap.
Has anyone else ever had something similar happen with fast transports? Am I off-base in thinking this is unusual? Aside from not sending them in the first place, could I have set things differently to get the results I was looking for in changing the TF to surface combat and in trying to get them to retreat?
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[font="Trebuchet MS"]The DDs ended up fine, but the cruisers went down. Good work by the B-25D1s flying in low and skip bombing, strafing. [/font]
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