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Japan AAR Ironman - Let's see where it ends

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EvcRo

EvcRo

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Jan 23, 2011
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Hello,

i'm gonna play a Japan game (ironman, normal difficulty, 2 expansions - first 2, no mods). Mostly because i want some Steam achievements (i have none :D) and i never played Japan to much. Will see what happens, no weird stuff like atacking USA in 1937 and stuff like that, more classic path.

Note: i don't use battle plans at all, so AI has a huge advantage.

Naval focus will be carriers (because of the juicy air stuff from that side of the tree).

First year i will build civilian factories because Japan seems terrible at that.

I'm gonna have to remember few rules for the first hours

- dont disband garrisons at start, with them i can send 3 volunteer divisions to Spain, not 2 (?)
- farm the war in Spain, no encirclements
- in Spain pick battles that nobody else fights, so all 3 divisions fight
- cheapest way to light tanks template seems to be from motorized template, which has all support battalions, 55 army xp cost
- first 300 pp in +15%pp advisor and 2nd is extensive recruitment to balance total mobilization focus (5th focus)
- forgot to take puppets resources, realized after 2 years, probably lost 2 years worth or 3-4 civilian factories

There is a thing i don't know, is there any advantage wasting 3-4 focuses to go to rubber puppets annex war goals ? From what i saw in normal games, that war (against NL puppet) gets merged in european ww2. I just join axis and fight normal ww2 , while using those 3-4 focuses for other juicy things.

Is there any advantage staying Japan own faction versus going Axis ?

Will see where it end haha :D

TimeTable

December 12, 1937 - China War Start
March 21, 1938 - Dutch East Indies + Netherlands War
May 24, 1938 - China Capitulated
December 8, 1939 - British Raj
...
 
Last edited:
I can't proffer any gameplay advice, but I will be interested to see where you end up.
 
So let's start (again, this is 2nd start, i couldn't live with the 2 years of wasted puppet resources).

First thing i did was to take all steel from the big puppet.

Research rules for me, in this Japan game, are:
  1. Industrial techs
  2. Naval doctrine must have 1 research active all the time , to the bottom asap
  3. Rest balanced, never ahead of time. I should get Fighter 1 fast tough, also destroyer 2. I'm going carriers.
sVkRljD.png


Didn't disbanded anything so i get 3 divisions for Spain. Plan was to farm army XP but an accident happened and war was short, more later.

snXrX8E.png


First adviser, the +15% pp one. I plan to go very deep for achievments so its good in the long run. Second adviser is the war industrialist. 1936 is for civilian factories, i will start military factories in 1937

kYr99ue.png


Usually Spain war was till the last province, i accidentaly occupied Barcelona and good bye army xp. Could have been much better.

nAEmGgN.png


First 5 focuses, i think it's the standard?

urvINtI.png


China plans taking form ....

8UgBuMC.png


3rd pick with PP was extended conscription, because 6th focus will be total mobilization.


December 1, 1937 : War with China starts

This is how Japan was shaped when the china war started

Production + Military factories

vV7Mh8m.png


hA1ML60.png


DEWscvS.png


Will do more posts so there are not to many pictures per page (also i hate video AAR's, to much time wasted to get the message through).
 
4th PP pick was the general with -8% attrition , unfortunately for the 1st month of the war i will be without the 5th pick, the other general , the infantry genius.

I have 3 armies, one will stay near Beinjing, waiting for the defence to lower, one will land in peninsula and the 3rd will land in Shaghai. The 4th army is puppet divisions, to keep the Shanxi border.

So i took a deep breath and declared war.

First weeks went ok, but as usual, things are starting to slow down against the chinese division spam.

to be continued ...

P.S. was quite fun, Japan is a fun country to play imo.
 
I've been wanting to find time for a Japanese game for some time now.
 
stnylan said:
I've been wanting to find time for a Japanese game for some time now.
Click to expand...

Forster said:
Looks interesting. I have never played Japan.
Click to expand...

I think Japan is a fun country because of the specifics of the region, terrain and the Pacific war. Plus lots of island hops.

December 12, 1937 - China War Starts

China war is quite a mess. The chinese have tons of divisions that makes any tile capture take time. Add in 6 smaller warlord + 12-14 USSR volunteer divisions (that are as good as any of your japanese troops).

I decided to open 2 more fronts via naval invasions, one in the peninsula and one in Shaghai area. This will make China split their forces and they become manageable.

Another thing that i noticed to be good : China has infinite manpower but finite guns. If you keep a lots of green battles going their troop quality will go down slowly and steady.

Usually 3-5 weeks it seems like the progress is slow, but at some point the critical mass is reached and their entire defence will crumble.

wQWaqQ2.png


After a few week advance in peninsula is good. In the north i just keep the river, trying a encircle as many division possible, i don't push there.

oLtmEJF.png


After the 2 new fronts are open CHinese forces in Beinjing drop in number and at some point you can push them.

bBoKYZe.png


Capture the airbase near Shaghai , an important objective

Grk3P1e.png
 
Now China defence is very thin, i can spread a little, and im gonna solve Japan's biggest problem, resources.

I will do a small little thing, instead of declaring on Dutch pupper via focus (and save 3 focuses) i will declare via fabricate war goal, because of the bonus that Japan gets from militaris + war with a major (China).

yg9sLN9.png
 
So Chinese and Dutch United front - fun! :D
 
The enemy of my enemy. You don't have to defeat the Netherlands to claim the DEI, and, with the way peace conference work, when Germany captures the Netherlands, you may actually get it. Your casualties should be way more than Germany's.
 
Forster said:
The enemy of my enemy. You don't have to defeat the Netherlands to claim the DEI, and, with the way peace conference work, when Germany captures the Netherlands, you may actually get it. Your casualties should be way more than Germany's.
Click to expand...

I played few more months, China capitulated separately but, when i took Communist China, they all surrendered.

This had good parts and bad parts. I puppeted Dutch Indies so i still have to pay factories for resources, yuck, that's bad. But the brigh side is that now i own Netherlands (gg Paradox, why would a teritory surrender when enemy troops are at 12,000 km's ?) and a foothold in South America (Suriname).

I will post the screens later,

I have to think if i release Suriname and Netherlands, seems like something that completely breaks the feeling of the game, getting Japan in remote locations is one of the goals that make the game fun...
 
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