d0mbo
Posts: 569
Joined: 8/21/2009
From: Holland
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Hi forumites,
Today in a debrief of one of my PBEM's i shared some hints/tips/tactics or whatever yo want to call it on AE in general, and scenario #4 in particular. Maybe these are of use for players looking for a bit of info, so i thought i could just as well share them here. I hope they are helpful, but even more: i want to hear what others think! Note: i only play Japanese, so it's written from that perspective!
Here goes the copy/paste:
General thoughts
- You "win"the game by getting the most points. You get points by damaging the enemy assets (ground, air and most of all: naval). Most of the points, however, are given by simply holding certain bases;
- The bases of importance in this scenario are: Tulagi, Lunga, Milne Bay and Port Moresby. Check out their VP value;
- As the japanese player i tend to focus on one VP location at a time, perhaps as allies you could something like that; keeping the locations in your possesion is most important;
- The japanese player needs to dislodge the Allies, not the other way around. Keep that in mind.
OOB:
- The allies have the upper hand in the first week(s), as the Japanese were (historically) suprised - exploit that (not necesserily invading Truk right away, as that would be gamey, but somewhat aggressive moves can be done, if you should so wish);
- B17 is king, I can't do anything about them. Use them wisely. You will notice Japanese players (including me) react heavily when they start bombarding key bases;
- Kates are glass canons, they hit hard, but get mauled in the process
- Dauntlesses are the Allied weapon of choice. They are a lot more resilient than Kates; on the other hand they have difficulties sinking the Japanese BB's. (I think that's not correct: a 1000lb bomb should be able to penetrate anything afloat.)
Gameplay:
- After the intital weeks, Japanese surface forces will outnumber and outclass the Americans at night. I am not familiar with allied reinforcements, so i do not know if or when you will receive BB's/BC's and CA's;
- during the day the allies should be able to hold the field with land based and carrier based planes;
- use your carriers versus shipping mostly, only sometimes versus land targets;
- supply is the bottleneck in this scenario. if you think the allies are short on fuel/supplies; the japanese get only 2/3's of that. And what is more: they need to transport it to forward bases of operation - think about ways to hit the japanese supplywise
- the japanese player will want to keep tassafaronga supplied - the tokyo express will be running; find a way to do something about that or accept you have many well supplied japanese on guadalcanal;
- expect a prolonged battle on guadalcanal; don't get nervous; you are supposed to fight long and hard for it;
- recon is VERY important: if you want to get better results form air, naval or land attacks; recon recon recon. I think the PBY and F4's are magnificent planes, wish i had some!;
- don't forget to prep your trooops (have them planning for a location you wish them to be in), unprepped troops die in droves;
- i am a proponent of force concentration (see, i am a true armchair general ;): i want to keep CV's and BB's together to get the most out of them. do not use your forces piecemeal as they will get mauled by bigger concentrations;
- CV's will launch a coordinated strike if they are in the same hex, most of the time. As allies you can put a CV in different TF's in the same hex, that way only one will get damaged per attack (some consider this gamey - i think you can do this as allies, as the americans tended to form different TF's around their carriers - the japanese not so much, so i keep them together)
- Allies have a lower chance of launching coordinated strikes, however, so you better keep as much cv's together as possible to get the most planes in a strike. In the manual there's more on the American coordination penalty.
Technical order tips:
- Use waypoints, half-way destinations and the remain on station/retire toggle to get your TF's where you want them to be during day/night;
- Check the max range of your planes. I think allied torpedo bombers have a longer range than fighters/bombers. Make sure you set your carrier planes to the same max distance (e.g. all 6 hexes or something). An unescorted strike of avengers rolling in on my CV's mean they will get eaten for breakfast by angry little nippon warriors in zeroes;
- The best way to ensure an escorted strike means you have to set both the attack planes and their escorting fighters to the same height (e.g. 5,000 feet);
- Check your CAP/ESCORT/NAVAL ATTACk etc. %'s so your planes do as they are told;
- Dont forget to stand down (and or repair) your land, naval and air units once in a while;
- match the commanders with you want a unit to do (e.g. aggresive or is caution preferred?) - you don't want your APD's to hunt the Yamato when they are on a supply run!';
- the "Z" key shows your search arcs.
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Hints and tips for guadalcanal - 
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