Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Gary Grigsby’s War in the West 1943-45 is the most ambitious and detailed computer wargame on the Western Front of World War II ever made. Starting with the Summer 1943 invasions of Sicily and Italy and proceeding through the invasions of France and the drive into Germany, War in the West brings you all the Allied campaigns in Western Europe and the capability to re-fight the Western Front according to your plan.

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Grotius
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Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Grotius »

I have a question about combat losses associated with losing troop transports. I stupidly moved AFHQ by sea in very bad weather, through home waters but also "contested" waters (as none of my coastal patrols flew in the heavy rain). Yes, I was dumb!

Consequently, 3 or 4 transports were sunk -- ouch! I lost a total of 53,000 men or more. I don't normally reload my saved games, but I couldn't resist this time. I reloaded my save, moved AFHQ again, this time losing 1 transport -- and this time I see a loss of about 13,000 men. I know AFHQ is a huge unit, with more than 100,000 troops, not to mention scores of attached SUs. (In fact, the reason I was moving it was that I read here that SUs won't move unless I get AFHQ onto the same island as its subordinates.) Still, these losses seem high.

Are these loss numbers within the expect range? I'm no expert on troop-ship capacity in WW2, but some casual reading (and my recollections from WITP) suggest that 13,000 per transport is rather high. Transports typically carried more like 1000 (AP-A, say) to 5000 (AP), no? I looked at Wikipedia's list of USN ships lost in WW2, and when I followed links to transports lost, I didn't see many instances of losses as high as 13,000 per transport, or 50,000 for a single transport task force.

What do you all think? Are these numbers too high, or do they seem about right? (Bearing in mind that I chose about the worst possible weather and route to move AFHQ over the high seas.)
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Lictuel
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Lictuel »

My impression is that when you see : "transport X sunk" a certain percentage of men are lost. Since AFHQ is a damn huge unit that would result in higher losses.

Related question: are transport losses permanent? Can you have bad luck as an allied player and all your transports are sunk resulting in no ability to move units via ship? Or is the system more along the lines of the rail system of WitE, having some max capacity and each unit at sea uses some of that and that's it?
Smirfy
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Smirfy »

The RMS Lancastria was the biggest shipboard loss the British suffered. 1,700 killed. She was overloaded due to being part of an evacuation. In general ships took along time to sink and with regards the Allies were part of Invaision convoys with plenty of escorts to 1/ take survivors off sinking ships or b/ pluck them out of the water. Losses in WiITE so far look way out of whack
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by HMSWarspite »

You need to be careful here. Moving a major Allied HQ unit through contested sea is NOT something that can be compared with reality since I don't think it was (or would have been) done. Even Army HQs did not swan around forwards areas. Thus I am not sure you can compare this case with RL losses. As a counter point, the RMS Queens carried the thick end of a division each per trip. If one of those had been lost, 13000 casualties is not impossible. However the Allies made pretty sure one never was.

Why did AFHQ need to move through contested waters? Africa is fine for most purposes isn't it? What is the benefit of moving out of (say) Tunis until the Med is safe as houses?
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Grotius
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Grotius »

I was trying to move AFHQ because I read a thread indicating that its support units won't move unless they're on the same island/land mass as their subordinates. I've been gradually moving subordinates to Sicily and now mainland Italy, and AFHQ is alone back in North Africa. And indeed, once AFHQ arrived in Italy, its subordinates were now awash in SUs.

But maybe I should be leaving AFHQ in North Africa all the same? Is that what you guys do? If so, how do you get its SUs to cascade down the chain of command?
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Nico165b165
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Nico165b165 »

ORIGINAL: Grotius

If so, how do you get its SUs to cascade down the chain of command?

Giving them to its subordinates before they leave Africa.
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Grotius
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Grotius »

Yep, I should've done that. I didn't realize it would be a problem until after I'd moved out most of the subordinates. Live and learn.

Assuming I can get AFHQ to Sicily and Italy safely, is there any downside to having it there? Does it suck up huge amounts of supply or something?
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Nico165b165
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Nico165b165 »

You can look at the supply details of the HQ. It depends from units attached, but the AFHQ is a really big one and seems to draw lot of supplies. Three times more than smaller HQ's or combat divisions in my Salerno game. Better not to get it onboard before your supply network is really solid. Same reasoning apply to air units.
MisterBoats
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by MisterBoats »

I need to do a little research into when AFHQ relocated to Sicily. Rick Atkinson's The Day of Battle covers the Sicilian/Italian campaigns very thoroughly, so I may just start there.

It would be nice to set up convoys for shipping SU's to forward locations without having to attach them to other units en route. I have been able to do it in reverse -- attach SU's from AFHQ or 15th AG to HQ's in England. The transfer occurs right away.
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Joel Billings
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Joel Billings »

That does sound high. Transports carry 1000 tons of equipment, so it should be using 1 transport for every 1000 tons of equipment. Support squads are very light, so you might expect several thousand losses per transport. BTW, these are really transport points (with 1000 tons of capacity each), a bit of an abstraction. Anyway, 53k for 4 transports sounds like there's a problem. Do you have a save where I can run the AFHQ around and get some transports sunk and test this? Please attach it here or email to 2by3@2by3games.com. Thanks.
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Grotius
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Grotius »

Hey Joel,

As you requested, I've emailed a saved game to that email address. I tried attaching it here, but it kept saying I couldn't attach a saved game from "c:\fakepath". Strange error message, that one!

When you load the save, you'll see it's the very start of the ground movement phase, so the "L" losses screen shows zero ground combat losses for the turn. AFHQ is one hex east of Algiers. Walk it to Algiers, then ship it to Messina via the north coast of Sicily. (Yes, it's a stupid move.) I typically lose 1 to 4 transports doing this. That in itself is to be expected. But the loss rate per transport seems high: 13,000 per transport, every time I test it. I just tested it now, lost 1 transport and 13,000 men.

Hope this helps. If you didn't receive the save, post here and I'll try again.
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Joel Billings
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Joel Billings »

Got it thanks. It looks like the total men in showing in the unit is dropping only by 2-3k (right unit bar total), but the losses are much higher as you said. It'll go on the bug list and the save will go to Gary for a look. Thanks again for the save.
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Grotius
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RE: Huge losses when transporting AFHQ

Post by Grotius »

Glad to help.
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