IJN Road to Manila: What to buy?

[Longasc]

Hi there!

I managed to have a great result at Pearl Harbor, only gripe is that my Zero got reduced to 3 Strength, my Val Tac Bomber is 100% intact though.
So I have a Fighter and a Tac Bomber and 7 strength points to repair. All bonus goals got achieved.

Any suggestions what I should buy to secure victory in this scenario and also to be ideally prepared for the coming battles?

Thanks for your valuable input, Generals/Admirals/Sky Marshals!

[stragen]

Normally your Zero shouldn't have this much damage but no problem.

You have to ask yourself if you want to get the secondary on the airfield in the southwest or not. You can achieve this with 2 Tac Bomber + Zero as Decoy for the AA or you can use Paratroopers. The second one cost you 100 RP (80 for the unit and 20 for the plane to transport them) and is imo the bigger gamble. You have to place the Paratroopers on the airfield to board them on a plane. After that you can move the plane around.

For the rest buy normal infantry, engineers, maybe one tank and 2 ART. The artillery should have a transport. And for every two infantry units you should have 1 engineer unit. The approach from simcc is very good. I tested it. Always go engineer first in the attack, then the normal infantry/marines/paratroopers. In the first missions i wouldn't buy any marines or other special infantry. It's cheaper to reinforce the normal infantry. Don't use elite reinforcements on engineers. They don't get much better with exp. Later you in the campaign you should upgrade your 3+ star inf to marines, paratroopers or heavy inf (around halfway through the campaign). High level paratroopers can be nasty against any inf besides heavy infantry.

If you are fast enough you can buy a third ART in the middle of the second mission. That is enough for the rest of the campaign. You can use the ART also as Anti-Tank weapon with good results. And use your Tac Bomber and fighter almost every round if you can. Even if the inflict no damage, they get exp. Experience is not that great for planes but you have to use every advantage because the US fighter are more effective later on. Because they can use land based fighter (better stats) and you have only carrier based planes.

[Longasc]

Thanks for your input!
The Engineers first attacking is to reduce entrenchment, I assume?

I used a Paratrooper and a lone Zero escort, which was not necessary. I gained a Warhawk and the field way before turn 12, but the Marines there killed the Paratrooper shortly after.
Not sure if the maneuver is worth it. 1 Warhawk and reduced enemy air presence, is that worth it?

[Blathergut]

I think it's more a case of 'variety.' The secondary objectives allow for different play, sometimes markedly so. It's interesting to try and take the airfield but it puts more pressure on reaching those bridges. I like how you can try for or ignore secondaries.

[Longasc]

I ignored the airbase and rather captured the bridges. I used two tanks on the eastern approach (one bought mid scenario), the 100 resource point tanks. For the love of god, I cannot memorize japanese tank names...
I had a Paratrooper west and one artillery (2 all in all) for each lane of attack.

The defending Heavy Infantry in the penultimate objective left its entrenchment to go for an Infantry crossing the river, that didn't work out well for it. Erm do tanks ignore zone of control, as my tanks just passed by several units and raced over the bridge and hit that Heavy Infantry in the rear. Yeah, serious question - barely used tanks in OOBPac so far.

Thanks for your advice, thinks worked out nicely.

[adherbal]

Moving from a hex in ZOC to the next costs double the movement points. The starting hex is excluded from this penalty.

So if you have a fast unit/tank it may be able to move through some ZOC hexes, especially if there are roads/easy terrain.

[stragen]

Engineers also decrease the enemies efficiency (lower casualties for your important troops). Best order, if the enemy is entrenched, is engineer, artillery ( and ships if possible) and then infantry or tanks. If not entrenched switch artillery (and ships) with engineer for lower casualties for your engineers. But they are cheap to replace.

Yeah the paratroopers are a gamble. If your are lucky you can land near the airfield and kill the fuel depot with one attack and then move into that airfield. and in the next round you can start again and escape per plane. Most of the time your paratroopers are reduced to 3 or 4 strength. The safer variant is to fly there with 2 tac bombers and a Zero. Use the Zero as decoy for the first round when you attack the fuel depot. Most of the time you need 2 round of attacks. and then the AA can shoot one of your tac bomber down. If you place the Zero in lower distance to the AA then the tac bomber, then the AA will shoot at the Zero.

[simcc]

For me this are my units that fought for me in Road to Manila.

Air power- 2 kanbaku and a Hamaki suppress AA near Clark airfield then kanbaku clear the depo
- after that I use the kanbaku to clear out AT guns while Hamaki go get entrenched infantry

Naval power- NA still find it strange as why there is naval command as the sea is so small

Land power- 2 inf and eng FOC given so I buy 2 light tanks, 4 inf and 1 eng and also a recon

Don't bother to get expensive units like paratrooper, heavy infantry, heavy tank as the replacement will bankrupt you. In this scenario fly plane to neutralize airfield, the use the armors to clear the way in center zone (road) to reach the bridge. Tank take left side while 2 inf and an eng take the left side. There is a Stuart on the right side so I drove my first tank down near bridge and the Stuart will attempt to cut of your supply that's when I cut his supply and hammer him with 2 tanks and 1 inf.

The entire scenario is very focus on supply cutting so if you do it correctly you won't lose much unit and very low replacement. Cut that town section north via securing left side brigdge area then mop up with 2 infantry when their supply is down. Then after capture bridge proceed to cut of the main town supply.

Tips: tank must go right side as left side have 5 AT guns and 2 tanks to flank any enemy you find on right. Right side have a few bunker so tank is good there
If your inf take dmg do not reinforce them if possible as they will get an upgrade in the middle of the game so take the opportunity to upgrade and get back to full strength
Always hit an entrench unit with eng and infantry attack next and banzai works well on low efficiently unit and always try to cut them off from supply point. Take some time to master this but it's very useful.
Spend less than 20 RP on reinforce in this scenario doing kamikaze mode. Got all my inf upgraded and didn't use arty here but you will need arty in Bataan as its too tight to cut off supply.

Thx