Too much Iron in my Diet - Mundy(A) vs KenchiSulla (J)

[BBfanboy]

How big is that SDD drive Hans - been looking at laptops and most seem to have a combo SDD with SATA Hard Drive.

[Capt. Harlock]

I'm leaning towards getting a solid state drive for the OS and leaving my current 1.5TB drive for games and such. The upside is that my computer would boot in about three seconds.

I'm using such a setup, and getting surprisingly variable boot times: from about 22 seconds to 48 seconds. (This is still a major improvement on what it used to be.) Admittedly I'm using less-than-cutting edge stuff: the SSD is only 64 GB, and I'm still running Win 7.

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

How big is that SDD drive Hans - been looking at laptops and most seem to have a combo SDD with SATA Hard Drive.

I spent so heavily on the rest I scrimped a little on the SSD and only bought a 500gig one. Big jump in price for terabyte ones.

I currently have a 500gig platter drive in it as well, but plan to eventually add a 3 terabyte platter drive for mass storage.

Still only running the GT740 2gig DDR5 card I had on hand.

Had been planning to add 2 4gig GT970s, cause I really wanted to give SLI a try.

Now after hearing many trash the 970s for having 3.5gigs of fast ram and .5 of slow ram I've been thinking about a 6 gig 980 instead.

Won't commit to the graphics card upgrade and the dual 27" gaming monitors until after Christmas.

[Mundy]

The real cutting edge ones fit right into the slots on the motherboard, and have about twice the read/write rate. Reading the comments, it sounded like you needed a cutting edge motherboard to make it the bootable drive. I went for a more average 400G drive. I did by another standard 2G Seagate drive for only $80, to supplement my current one, in case it dies. My current one is 1.5T, and I've only used about a third of it with all the games and stuff I installed.

I'm back in action, getting turns to both games out. WITP is the only game installed until I deal with my new drives tomorrow. I used overnight shipping for that.

[Mundy]

18 January 1944

Back in action.

CF is polishing off the one convoy near the west map edge. Two ships are left, both are wrecks.

I caught this one a few hexes NW of Horn Island.

Morning Air attack on TF, near Merauke at 88,125

Weather in hex: Light cloud

Raid detected at 42 NM, estimated altitude 10,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 15 minutes

Allied aircraft
P-47D2 Thunderbolt x 12
F4U-1 Corsair x 10
F6F-3 Hellcat x 11
SBD-5 Dauntless x 16

Allied aircraft losses
SBD-5 Dauntless: 1 damaged

Japanese Ships
xAK Yamagiri Maru, Bomb hits 1, heavy fires
xAK Teiyo Maru, Bomb hits 2, heavy fires
xAK Tamon Maru, Bomb hits 3, heavy fires

Aircraft Attacking:
11 x SBD-5 Dauntless releasing from 2000'
Naval Attack: 1 x 1000 lb SAP Bomb
5 x SBD-5 Dauntless releasing from 4000'
Naval Attack: 1 x 1000 lb SAP Bomb

Heavy smoke from fires obscuring xAK Tamon Maru
Heavy smoke from fires obscuring xAK Yamagiri Maru


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on TF, near Merauke at 88,125

Weather in hex: Light cloud

Raid detected at 38 NM, estimated altitude 2,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 10 minutes

Allied aircraft
B-25D1 Mitchell x 12
P-38H Lightning x 12
P-47D2 Thunderbolt x 13

Allied aircraft losses
B-25D1 Mitchell: 5 damaged
B-25D1 Mitchell: 1 destroyed by flak

Japanese Ships
xAK Yamagiri Maru, Bomb hits 8, heavy fires, heavy damage
xAK Teiyo Maru, Bomb hits 6, heavy fires, heavy damage
xAK Tamon Maru, heavy fires, heavy damage
DD Hakaze
xAK Teikoku Maru, Bomb hits 3, heavy fires

Aircraft Attacking:
11 x B-25D1 Mitchell bombing and strafing from low level
Naval Attack: 6 x 500 lb SAP Bomb

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Afternoon Air attack on TF, near Merauke at 88,125

Weather in hex: Moderate rain

Raid detected at 78 NM, estimated altitude 15,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 28 minutes

Allied aircraft
F4U-1 Corsair x 10
F6F-3 Hellcat x 11
SBD-5 Dauntless x 16

Allied aircraft losses
SBD-5 Dauntless: 1 damaged

Japanese Ships
DD Hokaze
E Tsuta, Bomb hits 1, heavy fires, heavy damage
DD Hakaze

Aircraft Attacking:
7 x SBD-5 Dauntless releasing from 4000'
Naval Attack: 1 x 1000 lb SAP Bomb
9 x SBD-5 Dauntless releasing from 2000'
Naval Attack: 1 x 1000 lb SAP Bomb



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Afternoon Air attack on TF, near Merauke at 88,125

Weather in hex: Moderate rain

Raid detected at 37 NM, estimated altitude 9,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 12 minutes

Allied aircraft
Beaufort VIII x 9

Allied aircraft losses
Beaufort VIII: 2 damaged

Japanese Ships
DD Hakaze
DD Hokaze

Aircraft Attacking:
9 x Beaufort VIII launching torpedoes at 200 feet
Naval Attack: 1 x 22.4in Mk 13 Torp.

I don't know what he was trying to accomplish with that run. Obviously a fuel shipment somewhere.

Two more CVEs have showed up at Portland, now enroute to Pearl.

New Jersey arrived at Cape Town. I'll wait until KB cools its jets before sending her over.

[BBfanboy]

Nice to get a little payback![:)]

Since it will take about 10 days to make the trip, you could send NJ to the NW corner of the map where the transition strips (between on and off-map) form a corner.
Very unlikely KB will be within 7 hexes of there and you have the option to proceed to Karachi or (if KB is too close) duck back into the off-map area by going to Abadan.
If KB is not around you get a major unit on the map about 7-10 days earlier.

[Mundy]

The later model planes do get a boost in range, which is nice.

KB is actually pretty far north right now. I'm anxiously watching my pending incoming convoys to make sure they don't show up next to them. They're fairly close to where the normal Karachi convoy shows up on the map. Fortunately, I have that corner covered by patrol planes out of Socotra.

[Mundy]

Pain in the butt.

I got my new SSD drive. I migrated the data from my regular disk over no problem. Everything seemed fine. Only 40G had to transfer, since it was just the operating system and WITP.

Making it the bootable drive became an issue. I couldn't get it to boot from there. I had the bright idea of unplugging the original drive, hoping the new one would take over.

Big mistake.

After that, none of my drives would work to boot from. Win10 would seem to start okay, but when I got to the desktop, the screen would just flicker, allowing me to do nothing. This happened no matter which drive I selected as bootable.

Out of desperation, I re-installed Windows 7. That let me select the primary drive. I couldn't get any internect connection and started to panic, until I remembered the driver disk that came with my motherboard.

Now connected, I'm downloading Win10.

Lots of pain to finally get this going.

I just need to get ArmA2 running by tomorrow for the weekly run with my two brothers and my son.

All because Windows "forgot" the main user account.

[Mundy]

Back on track.

KB has moved south again, and is hanging around near Addu. My incoming convoys to Karachi are in the clear again. I'm sending a big B-24 (7 squadrons) raid to Addu to hit the port next turn. Hopefully, I can find myself a bunch of oilers. If that happens, KB's stay in the area will be shortened quite a bit, and I can get on with my plans.

At Baker Island, my fragment unit landed. I managed 1-1 odds on him in the last attack. I think it's just a matter of time until that island falls. I sent some AMs there ahead of the landing, and they've been clearing mines. Their destroyer escort sill managed to hit one, though.

At Cocanada, I'm waiting for two UK divisions and three Indian brigades to show up from Bezwada. Hopefully I can tip the balance over with these. If not, I'll keep funneling more divisions in until it breaks. I'll still have plenty for Calcutta, as I'm reserving the USA units for that. If he wants to keep reinforcing Cocanada with more divisions, I'm fine with that. The fall will be that much worse later.

I'm having issues getting Tracker and Combat Reporter running again. Driving me nuts.

[Mundy]

24 Jan 1944

Addu was spared, as weather apparently grounded the B-24s.

Troops on Baker got 2-1 on his forces, killing 300 Japanese to my 100. Base forces at Christmas Is are loading up for there now.

I'm sending more subs to Addu. Some luck would be helpful right now.

[Mundy]

25 January 1944

Baker finally falls.

Ground combat at Baker Island (149,136)

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 4689 troops, 214 guns, 156 vehicles, Assault Value = 61

Defending force 1880 troops, 9 guns, 0 vehicles, Assault Value = 12

Allied adjusted assault: 22

Japanese adjusted defense: 4

Allied assault odds: 5 to 1 (fort level 1)

Allied forces CAPTURE Baker Island !!!

Combat modifiers
Defender: experience(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
2068 casualties reported
Squads: 18 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 200 destroyed, 0 disabled
Engineers: 4 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 11 (11 destroyed, 0 disabled)
Units destroyed 4

Allied ground losses:
45 casualties reported
Squads: 3 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 2 (1 destroyed, 1 disabled)
Vehicles lost 10 (2 destroyed, 8 disabled)

Assaulting units:
4th USMC Tank Battalion
147th(Sep) Infantry Regiment
641st Towed Tank Destroyer Battalion
7th USMC Field Artillery Battalion
225th Field Artillery Battalion
111th(Sep) Infantry Regiment
97th Field Artillery Battalion
76th Coast AA Regiment

Defending units:
85th Naval Guard Unit
6th Indpt SNLF Coy
Maizuru 2nd SNLF
7th JNAF Coy

Base units plus a USMC defense battalion are enroute from Christmas and Pearl. They'll also pull the current assaulting troops out. Stacking was something like 6,000, and I think I have 9,000 there now. Planes will be incoming too. I'll probably be hitting Tarawa and the Marshalls at nearly the same time. The Baker attackers will get re-tasked for one of these, but will need time to recover. I'm probably up to about 20 rocket blaster ships now too. New Jersey just pulled into Pearl last turn also. In addition to my two CVs and two CVLs there, I also have 9 CVE, with two more enroute from Portland.

No clue where KB is right now. I'm guessing near Diego Garcia. I hit the airfield and port at Addu, but caught no shipping there. A few Emily/Mavis type planes are there also, but not a whole lot past that. My Diamond Harbor attackers are prepped at around 50 right now. The British divisions I shipped over from Colombo have finally reached Cocanada, and they're all attacking next turn. I'm hoping CF didn't bring a bunch more troops, but after thinking about it, the more troops that are away from Calcutta, the better.

[Sangeli]

Nicely done with Baker! What's the next move in the critical CentPac theatre?

[Mundy]

I'm glad Baker is down, as that eliminates a recon "bubble" into my areas.

I do want to grab Tarawa. As weakly has he's holding the Gilberts, that base alone will dominate the area there. This will come sooner rather than later.

I also want to start grabbing the Marshalls as soon as I am able. With KB playing on the west map edge, I can do all sorts of mischief in this area. I have enough naval air to cover against any island air threat. Assault transports are still skimpy around Pearl, though they're trickling in.

I can probably do Tarawa cheap and dirty, but I need more time for the Marshalls. I've had a number of ARDs show up recently, and if I can turn the Marshalls into a major naval base, so much the better.

[Sangeli]

ORIGINAL: Mundy
I do want to grab Tarawa. As weakly has he's holding the Gilberts, that base alone will dominate the area there. This will come sooner rather than later.

Why aren't you looking at Tabiteuea first? That's can be built up to a larger air base than Tarawa. And I'm not sure you can do Tarawa cheap and dirty; depends what kind of LBA the Japanese have behind it.

ORIGINAL: Mundy
I have enough naval air to cover against any island air threat.

That is a bold statement to make. So far you haven't had to defend against a serious air threat against an invasion force that I recall. Even if you have 1,000 planes on CAP, a strike force of ~150 planes will see a few dozen bombers drop their ordinance. I know that CF gave up Baker island without much fight but it was merely just an outpost position. I doubt CF will give up Tarawa without a real fight.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: Sangeli

ORIGINAL: Mundy
I have enough naval air to cover against any island air threat.

That is a bold statement to make. So far you haven't had to defend against a serious air threat against an invasion force that I recall. Even if you have 1,000 planes on CAP, a strike force of ~150 planes will see a few dozen bombers drop their ordinance. I know that CF gave up Baker island without much fight but it was merely just an outpost position. I doubt CF will give up Tarawa without a real fight.

Didn't that get fixed in the last official update and the ongoing Beta? The problem was traced to the game not allowing enough air combat rounds in the same turn, and that limit was removed.

[Mundy]

I'll review what's in the Gilberts first. I won't go in blind. The last time I reconned the area, Tarawa was the only island there occupied, and it wasn't with much. I see that Tabiteuea is at air level three now, so he may have moved in. To aid such, I have some AVs, and AG and an AGP, along with 10 PTs in tow enroute to Baker.

27 January 1944

Some of that luck I've been whining about.

Sub attack near Diego Garcia at 11,62

Japanese Ships
CVL Ryuho, Torpedo hits 2, on fire
BB Kirishima
CA Nachi
CL Noshiro
DD Kishinami
DD Benigumo
DD Urazuki
DD Arare

Allied Ships
SS Cero

SS Cero launches 4 torpedoes at CVL Ryuho
DD Benigumo fails to find sub, continues to search...
DD Urazuki fails to find sub and abandons search
DD Arare fails to find sub and abandons search
DD Benigumo fails to find sub, continues to search...
DD Benigumo fails to find sub, continues to search...
DD Benigumo fails to find sub, continues to search...
DD Benigumo fails to find sub, continues to search...
Escort abandons search for sub

A bigger fish would have been nice, but I'll take what I can get. Being as far away from a real base as she is, I'd say her survival is problematic -- especially being on fire. The sub was right on DG itself when it struck. We'll see if he chooses to stick around.

Elsewhere...

Sub attack near Hengchun at 85,68

Japanese Ships
TK Nissyo Maru, Torpedo hits 2, heavy fires, heavy damage
TK Nitiei Maru
TK Gen'yo Maru
TK Akatsuki Maru
E Ishigaki

Allied Ships
SS Albacore

SS Albacore launches 2 torpedoes at TK Nissyo Maru
E Ishigaki fails to find sub, continues to search...
E Ishigaki fails to find sub, continues to search...
E Ishigaki fails to find sub, continues to search...
E Ishigaki fails to find sub, continues to search...
E Ishigaki fails to find sub, continues to search...
Escort abandons search for sub

Packed full of fuel this one was.

Nevada finally gets out of dry-dock at Sydney. She's enroute for Cape Town and then to Ceylon. I can't go directly, with KB about.

I finally got Tracker and Combat Reporter running again on this machine. Fricking Java apps... At least the Intel Monkey didn't give me trouble.

[Mundy]

29 January 1944

Luck ran a little short today.

Sub attack near Diego Garcia at 11,62

Japanese Ships
CV Akagi
BB Kongo
CA Atago
CLAA Tenryu
DD Shigure
DD Takanami
DD Kazegumo

Allied Ships
SS Tactician, hits 5

SS Tactician launches 4 torpedoes at CV Akagi
Tactician bottoming out ....
DD Shigure attacking submerged sub ....
DD Shigure is out of ASW ammo
DD Takanami fails to find sub and abandons search
DD Kazegumo fails to find sub and abandons search
DD Shigure fails to find sub, continues to search...
DD Shigure fails to find sub, continues to search...
DD Shigure fails to find sub, continues to search...
DD Shigure attacking submerged sub ....
DD Shigure is out of ASW ammo
DD Shigure is out of ASW ammo
DD Shigure is out of ASW ammo
DD Shigure attacking submerged sub ....
DD Shigure is out of ASW ammo
DD Shigure is out of ASW ammo
DD Shigure is out of ASW ammo
DD Shigure is out of ASW ammo
Escort abandons search for sub

I see two TFs one hex SW of DG, apparently heading SE. They may be pulling out.

Supplies are getting tight on Ceylon, and I'm readying another convoy from Cape Town.

I took another short at Cocanada. They must be pretty fortified right now. This one hurt a bit.

Ground combat at Cocanada (41,37)

Japanese Bombardment attack

Attacking force 741 troops, 68 guns, 24 vehicles, Assault Value = 1296

Defending force 108497 troops, 1577 guns, 1652 vehicles, Assault Value = 3002

Japanese ground losses:
13 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 3 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 22 (1 destroyed, 21 disabled)

Allied ground losses:
43 casualties reported
Squads: 4 destroyed, 2 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 3 (1 destroyed, 2 disabled)

Assaulting units:
18th/C Division
18th/B Division
2nd Guards/A Division
18th/A Division
2nd Tank Regiment
14th Tank Regiment
2nd Guards/B Division
2nd Tank/B Division
2nd Guards/C Division
2nd Tank/A Division
7th Ind.Tank Brigade
2nd Tank/C Division
25th Army
3rd Medium Field Artillery Regiment
3rd Mortar Battalion

Defending units:
72nd British Brigade
77th LRP Brigade
50th Tank Brigade
2nd British Division
18th British Division
50th Indian Para Brigade
14th Indian Division
111th LRP Brigade
14th Army Engineer Battalion
7th Indian Division
2nd Hyder Lancers Regiment
36th Div Engineer Battalion
25th Indian Division
3rd Commando Brigade
26th Indian Brigade
19th Indian Division
29th British Brigade
IV Corps Engineer Battalion
Waziristan Division
2/1st Med Regiment
2nd Indian Field Regiment
XV Indian Corps
6th Mixed A/T Mtr Regiment


---------------------------------------------


Ground combat at Cocanada (41,37)

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 105923 troops, 1576 guns, 1592 vehicles, Assault Value = 2995

Defending force 38937 troops, 425 guns, 929 vehicles, Assault Value = 1296

Allied engineers reduce fortifications to 1

Allied adjusted assault: 1888

Japanese adjusted defense: 3457

Allied assault odds: 1 to 2 (fort level 1)

Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), forts(+), experience(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
2059 casualties reported
Squads: 6 destroyed, 157 disabled
Non Combat: 2 destroyed, 45 disabled
Engineers: 1 destroyed, 16 disabled
Guns lost 37 (4 destroyed, 33 disabled)
Vehicles lost 61 (11 destroyed, 50 disabled)

Allied ground losses:
9382 casualties reported
Squads: 216 destroyed, 198 disabled
Non Combat: 163 destroyed, 101 disabled
Engineers: 94 destroyed, 128 disabled
Guns lost 157 (77 destroyed, 80 disabled)
Vehicles lost 109 (55 destroyed, 54 disabled)

Assaulting units:
72nd British Brigade
7th Indian Division
14th Army Engineer Battalion
14th Indian Division
19th Indian Division
18th British Division
2nd British Division
50th Tank Brigade
111th LRP Brigade
26th Indian Brigade
29th British Brigade
25th Indian Division
36th Div Engineer Battalion
77th LRP Brigade
2nd Hyder Lancers Regiment
50th Indian Para Brigade
IV Corps Engineer Battalion
3rd Commando Brigade
Waziristan Division
XV Indian Corps
2nd Indian Field Regiment
2/1st Med Regiment
6th Mixed A/T Mtr Regiment

Defending units:
18th/B Division
7th Ind.Tank Brigade
2nd Guards/B Division
2nd Tank/B Division
2nd Tank Regiment
2nd Guards/A Division
2nd Guards/C Division
14th Tank Regiment
2nd Tank/A Division
18th/A Division
18th/C Division
2nd Tank/C Division
3rd Medium Field Artillery Regiment
25th Army
3rd Mortar Battalion

[Mundy]

31 January 1944

Fairly quiet right now. Armies at Cocanada are trading bombardments daily.

Most of the real action is at Diego Garcia. I've been funneling in subs there to get more shots at his carriers. KB seems to be parked there right now. I did lose a sub this turn.

Submarine attack near Diego Garcia at 11,62

Japanese Ships
CA Myoko
CL Agano
DD Minegumo
DD Yamagumo
DD Asashio

Allied Ships
SS Kingfish, hits 10, and is sunk

SS Kingfish is sighted by escort
DD Minegumo fails to find sub and abandons search
DD Yamagumo fails to find sub and abandons search
DD Asashio fails to find sub, continues to search...
DD Asashio attacking submerged sub ....
SS Kingfish forced to surface!
DD Asashio firing on surfaced sub ....
Sub slips beneath the waves

A transport TF showed up at Baker, only for me to realize it was port level 0, which prevented anything from unloading. Two convoys are re-routing to Christmas to re-package the cargo. Wasted time. I want to start scouting islands from there quickly.

Recon Liberators are relocating to Colombo from Karachi. They've the range to reach Diego, so I can get intel.

[Mundy]

03 February 1944

Time rolls on.

I have a squadron of PB4Y-1Cs watching Diego Garcia. KB has pretty much been anchored there the whole time. Some ASW groups are out hunting down my subs. More are on the way though.

The first of my Baker transports are at Christmas, repacking their load.

It's been fairly quiet, apart from that. I have enough assault transports at Pearl to haul a division right now.

[Sangeli]

Are the Allied CVs still in the IO? Seems to me that they should be making their way back to the Pacific. By now you should receiving a whole lot of CV and especially CVE reinforcements. With those you should really be able to push forward in the CentPac in spring 44. Eventually you're going to need to defeat the KB in battle and the CentPac is the best place to make that happen. I think you really need to get serious about your efforts in the CentPac and look to build up and occupy a lot more than what you have done so far. I'm around 5 months behind you in my current game but my CentPac bases are more numerous and developed than yours are. Having LBA in the Gilberts to sweep Japanese CAP while providing LRCAP to your fleets without risking those vulnerable CVEs will go a long way.