Those stupid Japanese TB flotillas...

[saddletank]

My Vladivostok squadron (3 cruisers and 10 TBs - the Bogatyr was detached doing high speed Bogatyr-y things on her own) was steaming down toward Tsushima strait off Fusan when an action started. I could see a mass of red triangles way down in the strait about 15000 yds ahead and assuming it was yet another of those damn omnipresent cruiser divisions with TB escort I prepared to turn about and flee. However upon closer inspection it turned out to be no less than 22 Japanese TBs all milling about in the strait, presumably given a patrol station by the AI. I approached cautiously, sending my TBs off to my starboard (disengaged) quarter and eventually got one of then in extreme range. They all turned and fled at speeds I could not quite match but I got a lucky hit on tail end charlie which slowed to a crawl, I closed up on him and began smashing him harder. I was scanning the horizon constantly expecting the cruiser division I assumed was out there with all these TBs to show up at any moment, but no, nothing.

Then those daft Japanese TBs all turned about and came at me. I turned to open my A arcs and within a few minutes 3 more were crippled. The rest turned to retreat again but this time only at 17 knots. My own TBs could only make 15 or 16 knots so the sea state was slowing them all down. My cruisers were limited to 19 or 18 knots so a long chase began and gradually as the morning wore on I picked off one after another.

Eventually after a 4 hour battle I sank 16, only 6 escaping with no loss to me.

My point here being, why send out TBs only on patrol? And if you do why hang about when enemy cruisers show up? It makes no sense and cost the Japanese navy dearly. I think the AI is struggling with some of it's strategic assignments. Has anyone else seen the AI do something similarly wacky?

 

[Neutrino 123]

The AI often sends its torpedo boats on suicide runs. It sometimes knows to run away, but the torpedo boats mill about trying to avoid colliding with each other for too long, so they can often be caught with somewhat slower forces.

 

[Spharv2]

I had an encounter with those same 22 TBs. They milled around as I steamed toward them. As I approached, I went to change the course of a trailing division. When I got back to the lead division, the TBs had straightened out and pulled off a perfect torpedo run with 12 boats on one side of my line and 10 on the other. Luckily, I was able to break it up by knocking out the first couple of ships in each line, but they did manage to get a torpedo into one of my cruisers. It did some damage but not too much. Then they turned and ran.

I did a lot of damage to them, sinking 14 of them, but they did make me return to base, so I guess they did their job, because by the next time I came out, he had ACs out and patrolling. Maybe their job is just to try and delay your Vladivostok force until the cruiser forces are able to get up there? Regardless, it's the next thing to a suicide mission if so.

 

[saddletank]

If the Japanese AI wants to stall you then sending 20+ TBs to their doom isn't the best strategy I can think of.

As a postscript to the daft battle above, I found my Vlad Sqn had used up almost all it's ammunition so I sent it home. The following night another battle started with some enemy TBs trailing my squadron. I turned to give battle and yep, it was the 6 survivors of that mornings action, which I sank in 30 minutes again without loss.

Now that IS broken AI. Hello Norm & Jim?

 

[PJJ]

I've seen exactly the same kind of torpedo boat behaviour in my campaign games as the Russians. The AI likes to send those tiny vessels to patrol the high seas. You can wreak havoc among them with a single old cruiser...

 

[String]

I've seen the same. Makes for nice gunnery practice.

 

[FuurinKazan]

I'm starting to refer to it as the 'death of a thousand cuts' torture!

Those 47mm's somehow find a way to damage ALL your guns (yeah, russian gun protection's a doozy), do about 48% persistent damage to your propulsion/steering, jam your rudder five or six times, and then, after a few hours of circling the wagons, you take a torpedo, or two...

End result (it's almost haiku like)
Battle 5 hours
Our 1 heavily damaged
Their 9 or 10 sunk.

 

[Bullethead]

In my campaign, I'd previously met these 22 TBs several times. First, Varyag met them right next to Takeshiki, but ran away from them as she had more important things to do. However, this encounter seems to have gotten them out of their patrol mode and into hunting mode, because the next day other ships had brushes with them. First Askold met them about 2 hexes SE of Takeshiki, near Fukuoka, and then Mandzhur encountered them about 2 hexes NE of Takeshiki, up near Ulsan. In both cases, my ships ran away from them and only a few followed, and those not for very long.

However, that night things were different. Just north of Hofu, the 3 Vlad ACs by themselves ran into the TBs at 2124 hrs at a range of about 3kyds. There followed a most intense night action that lasted several hours. The battle started with the TBs and ACs on converging courses but with the TB lines somewhat crossing the ACs' T. As the orderly rows of TBs broke up into scrambles trying to get out of each others way and at the ACs from several directions at once, the ACs immediately did a Gefechtskehrtwendung so for the whole of the action, Rurik led the division. However, for the 1st half of the battle at least, the ACs were on various lines of bearing instead of in line, due to the necessity of bringing all broadsides to bear quickly as groups of TBs appeared out of the darkness from different directions.

Luckily for the Russians, I was able to keep most of the TBs aft of the beam, so they had to remain under fire longer before reaching launch position. Even luckier, the few that came from forward of the beam were quickly disposed of in the brief time available. As far as I could tell, the IJN didn't manage to launch a single torp. However, the Russians did, and that almost had tragic results. The Russians were on a line of bearing about 150^ from Rurik, and Gromoboi, in the center of the line, STUPIDLY fired 2 torps to starboard at a crippled TB that was abeam of Rossya in the rear. Thus, Rossya steamed right into both of them, but very fortunately neither exploded :surprise:

When the battle finally ended, 15 TBs were dead and 3 more damaged. The Russians escaped serious injury, although Rossya had an 8" gun damaged. This might have been from friendly fire, however, as all the Russians took a few 75mm from each other. The 47mm of the IJN hit all the ships a number of times, especially Rossya that was always closest to most of them, but apparently without effect. However, the battle used up 40% of the ACs' ammo.

 

[Daedalus]

After spending a day reading about the Japanese in this war I do not think it is to out of line. They used the TB to do just about what they did to you and a few of us. There was heavy losses to the TB,s and the DD,s when they engaged , and by there style of thinking it was a dishonor to not fight and to turn and run. In fact they had a problem with some of there Captains taking the fight to the point they lost there ship, that could have been fixed and fought another day.
I am looking for more books on this and will put the titles up when I find and read them. I think it will shed some light on this and even what we saw in WWII.

 

[Doctor Haider]

I had the same night encounter with this TBs when my cruiser force from PA steamed to Vladivostok. I had 4 protected cruisers. Only 4 TBs survived after 2 hours of fighting. My cruisers were only slightly damaged because I managed to maintain the 1200-1500 m distance so no one torpedo hit. The most time TBs tried to avoid collision with their damaged conterparts and only 2-3 of them occasionaly tried to attack my cruisers together with close distance. So I easily sinked these packs of TBs one by one.

Hm, maybe AI has some problems in coordinating attacks by too large numbers of vessels and divisions especially in the fast changing environment?

But such a chaos has the precedences in the reality especially at night.

 

[Rhetor]

I say that the problem lies in too large squadrons. Eight or more ships in one long line is not the best method to make a torpedo run, especially with short range "eels".
Imagine these large squadrons dividing into two or three groups of 3-4 ships, and attacking from two directions at once. Or from one side in line abreast. They could prove to be quite a challenge.

 

[Bullethead]

Hm, maybe AI has some problems in coordinating attacks by too large numbers of vessels and divisions especially in the fast changing environment?

But such a chaos has the precedences in the reality especially at night.

I think part of the chaos is the AI playing us fair/realistically instead of cheating. From our god's-eye-view, personally unthreatened by all the carnage below, and with the ability to stop time and lay down the law to our sailors as we see fit, we have FAR FAR better C^3I than real admirals, especially admirals of 1904/5.

Have you ever noticed in night battles when you want to have 1 of your shipos target a specific enemy ship, and it doesn't work? Ever notice how the telescope info pop-up on the desired target says "Target ship visible to friendly ships but not selected ship" (as in the one you want to have shoot at it)? I'm thinking the AI plays by this rule without benefit of our overall view of the battle. So it reacts on what it can see, and this ends up getting it hosed when it meets things it can't see until too late.

 

[sea knight]

They played me a really bad joke

I saw in the night two division of TB, i was with the vladivostock force and i said: well, target practice for the crew.
So when i started firing (quite close but not too much) i saw a division of cruiser much stronger then mine and i had to turn back immediatly, i have been lucky because i managed to lose contact, but they were really close to sink one of my ship because when i encountered the TB i gave full throttle, the AI did the same so in the time i turned back they shelled me a little, but had they managed to slow me down with a pair of torpedoes or with a luky shot i' d had lost Grobmoski
But i learned and i repayed AI later sinking almost entirely theyr 4rd divison using TB

 

[Doctor Haider]

I'm thinking the AI plays by this rule without benefit of our overall view of the battle. So it reacts on what it can see, and this ends up getting it hosed when it meets things it can't see until too late.

I'am sure you're right.

And AI never can be smarter than a human also.