Japan R1 attack on pearl harbor

KJF, anti-KJF, the overview.

1. KJF in 1942 Online is trash compared to 1942 Second Edition. Less powerful by far, less interesting to play.

2. I don’t think KJF in 1942 Online is even viable. (Note I don’t hesitate to personally play bad lines. I just don’t recommend anyone else do the same unless they don’t care about “winning”.)

3. For those that read my comments elsewhere, I’ve said if UK1 hits East Indies there’s a probability distribution worth looking at. But when you look at the percentages on the “failure” outcomes and consider all the drawbacks, it’s just too much.

Yes, you can put in preconditions. But if you stipulate Germany gets a 6% result on German battleship vs UK destroyer (and German battleship being sunk) and USSR having a fighter on Caucasus to pick up the German Med transport, or if you stipulate Germany doesn’t hit Egypt or Trans-Jordan and builds a Med carrier, in the first case perhaps German income can be contained, in the second case even though the German line transposes to only slightly inferior to G1 11 inf 2 art buy off KJF - but even then it’s not enough. UK still can’t effectively add to US’s speed of progress in the Pacific what with 1942 Online’s rules changes; going south around Australia is just too slow.

I think for KJF in 1942 Online to work you also have to stipulate multiple lucksacks and/or the Axis play badly. That’s a bit much for me.

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For execution:

1. You can ignore or overlook the details but the details still matter.

2. Pick your battles. You have limited resources, think about how your choices will change projected outcomes over time. Not in a vague way, but in very specific ways.

3. Japan can’t afford to skimp on ground to Asia. Especially in KJF.

4. Japan needs subs against KJF, but it doesn’t need them early or all at once. The Allies threat in the Pacific only develops over time, and Japan only needs enough subs to make any early hard Allied push expensive. If the Allies push early light then Japan smashes.

5. If Allies go KJF, UK should hit Japan’s fleet off East Indies. It’s not a “good” battle, there’s decent chance of failure, no good contingencies in case of failure, no alternate plan for even partial failure. But considering 1942 Online’s rules changes, UK can’t land fighters on US carriers to speed US’s progress in Pacific, and Japan can too easily cut off UK navy built at India trying to unite early with US fleet in Pacific. So it’s East Indies or bust.

There’s a load of second-string options, ranging from UK1 India naval build with UK doing attack/retreat into Japan’s East Indies fleet, UK capturing East Indies, UK capturing Borneo, UK threatening early IC on Borneo / East Indies, UK positioning transports south where they can hit Burma and French Indochina Thailand, UK building 3 India ground and 2 London fighters, blah blah. But it all comes down to you’re going to roll the dice at East Indies and there being no real option because there’s just no way Allies can deal with a full-strength Japanese fleet and air force threatening India and pushing off any US naval threat. If UK wants to make a contribution to the Pacific it’s going to involve dice at East Indies, there’s just no way around it.

6. There’s a bunch of KJF so-called threats ranging from US dumping units into Asia from a protected fleet off Soviet Far East (too close to Japan’s logistics at Tokyo, and too late to help Russia), US grabbing Japan’s money islands (Japan can see US coming a mile away, can build in response to US’s builds, and still be in position for cheap punishment, plus Japan transitioning to bomber is expected anyways for when Japan breaks India and Japan decides when to go for India or not; if US wants to sacrifice its whole fleet for cheapo subs and delay Japan capturing India a turn fantastic), US pushing Japan off the coast (only reason Japan lets US push it off the coast is if Japan is using the time to help Germany secure the position against Russia without serious Axis losses so the expectation is Germany crushes Russia and/or chases Allies away, then between income and production at Russia, Axis income at Africa it simply becomes an Axis win off position, stack size, economy, and attrition), US going mass subs to try to blow up Japan’s fleet (doesn’t work, massed US subs are vulnerable to destruction, splitting means sacrificing a few and it takes too long for US to mass a serious threat against a decent Japan), US going transports and air to island hop (doesn’t work, Japan either reclaims in force which it can afford to do with four transports and two carriers, battleship, plus, or possibly Japan just sacrifices a transport, again sacrifices only happening if the Axis are pretty well crushing it on the rest of the board so again Axis victory). Then there’s UK building fleet at India (gets cut off too easily from US’s forces in Pacific, Japan can just pick them both off unless UK goes south around Australia and that takes too long), UK going bombers (not the worst but you can imagine what happens when you’re trying to mass 12 IPC bombers against 8 IPC destroyers and Japan having that huge navy stack advantage). Any of those Allied plans works eventually but I expect each to be a bit too late.

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You can legitimately play KJF against players if you think their reactions might not be correct. But against a prepared opponent you just need too much luck.

I am not a strong player (gold about 250). I like to play only allies, and near all my games I go for KGF. I am happy when J1 doesn’t Pearl me.
If don’t Pearl, I don’t have to buy a carrier and my fleet and all the process to attack Germany speeds up.
In reverse, if Pearl and a japan carrier with 1-2 fighters survives, I have to counterattack with destroyer, battleship and planes, and the 2 navy units go out of position for a very long time. Sometimes I don’t counterattack to avoid this.
Pearl is like that damned germany subs that sometimes sunks the US destroyer and 2 transport in sz11… it slows a lot US forces.

@moonzar someone attack UK, other US, other none, depends. Tastes are many…