Assault question

[Frank]

Tony, how long can a amphipious invasion last? Can you simulate long battles like Guadalcanal with this engine?

Frank

[tony_glazebrook]

Tony, how long can a amphipious invasion last? Can you simulate long battles like Guadalcanal with this engine?

Frank

Frank - in short, I belive so, yes. The key is to maintain troop lvels on each side through reinforcements and renewed assaults. Destroyers can transport troops so you can certainly have troop runs down the slot, as the Japanese.

The number of troops and their morale, training, degree of entrenchment, proportion of combat supply availability and offensive and defensive firepower all combine to determine the length of a battle (in hours, days or weeks); and as I said an attacker may launch multipe assaults and a defender multiple reinforcement runs.

[Frank]

Thats good to hear Tony. :) So if i invade a port i can reinforce them with troops. Can i send supplies too? And if yes how are the supplies storaged? If i send more supplies are these lost or can you only unload so much as the troops needed?

[tony_glazebrook]

Thats good to hear Tony. :) So if i invade a port i can reinforce them with troops. Can i send supplies too? And if yes how are the supplies storaged? If i send more supplies are these lost or can you only unload so much as the troops needed?

Frank -
- the owner of a port can ship troops there at any time (subject of course to any interdiction by the enemy en route), and the number shipped adds to the defences of the port, and can joing in any battle underway. The ships can also bring supplies in, and these are added to the supplies at the port from which the troops draw supply.

- for the attacker
-- troops attacking by sea (ie an amphib assault) are part of a convoy that also carries supplies, and these are landed with the troops when they assault.
-- troops attacking by land, as part of a combined assault, will carry supply with them
-- an attacker can make as many assaults as he wants, and the new troops will join in any any battle underway
-- if a battle ends in a stalemate, the attacking troops will withdraw if possible - either back along the route they came from (if land troops) or to an available adjacent hex (if not).

- the amount of supply that land or amhib troops bring is determined by the AI for a combined ops mission. For a manually set up assault mission, the amount of suppy can be set manually.

[Christian Schwietzke]

So if an assault on an island base - say Malta or Wake - fails, the attacking troops cannot withdraw, and I presume are lost. If an amphibious assault on a non-island base fails, the troops withdraw, and... are they available to be picked up and taken elsewhere? Can they take join the next assault on that base? Or do they at least show up on the base if it is captured later on?

[Frank]

So if an assault on an island base - say Malta or Wake - fails, the attacking troops cannot withdraw, and I presume are lost. If an amphibious assault on a non-island base fails, the troops withdraw, and... are they available to be picked up and taken elsewhere? Can they take join the next assault on that base? Or do they at least show up on the base if it is captured later on?


Would be nice if the troops could be embarked on the transports if the assault fails.

[Christian Schwietzke]

Would be nice if the troops could be embarked on the transports if the assault fails.

If the assault takes more than a few hours, the transports usually aren´t there any more.

[Sinking]

I'm going to show my lack of knowledge here, but with the exception of Dieppe, where it was never intended to land troops permanently, were there any large scale amphibious assaults where the attacking troops had to withdraw during WWII? And if so, what happened?

[Christian Schwietzke]

I'm going to show my lack of knowledge here, but with the exception of Dieppe, where it was never intended to land troops permanently, were there any large scale amphibious assaults where the attacking troops had to withdraw during WWII? And if so, what happened?

I don´t think so. The closest we have was the first attempt to assault Wake Island which was beaten back before landings could take place.

[Sinking]

I guess the nearest thing to a fighting retreat into transports/warships to get an idea of how the game might model it are going to be where the defending troops were beaten by an assault, Crete springs to mind, Dunkirk (though those circumstances were fairly unique), maybe Narvik.

I'll have to have a browse

[tony_glazebrook]

I guess the nearest thing to a fighting retreat into transports/warships to get an idea of how the game might model it are going to be where the defending troops were beaten by an assault, Crete springs to mind, Dunkirk (though those circumstances were fairly unique), maybe Narvik.

I'll have to have a browse

Gary et al. - jut to clarify - SAS currently does not allow troops to be loaded anywhere but at a controlled port. So troops forced to retreat from an attack to a land hex that is not a controlled port can not be picked up; but the AI will add their attack value to any new assault that may be launched against the enemy port.