Topic: Coming soon: War in the Pacific, Struggle for Japan, an After Action report

[AcePylut]

Picked up this game, as soon as I got the mechanics of it down, I'm going to replay WW2 history right here on the computer.  This game covers the entire Pacific War (Dec 7th 1941- Aug '45), including the China-Burma-India theater.  The scale is individual ship (down to individual PT boats), aircraft squadron, and ground based regiment detail.  So needless to say, with such a scale for individual units for a war that covered half the world... it's quite massive.

I'll be playing it in one day turns... and you'll all get to see what happens.  I plan on starting this sucka in a month or two.

[IndyShark]

Sounds like fun!

[Vipre]

This from Matrix Games?

[AcePylut]

Yeah.  Kinda the "big brother" to UV.  Pacific War was the historical subject I've been interested in since I was 5 years old.  Admirals Edition is coming out in June, changes hex scale from 60miles to 40miles.

Gimme a month or two to get up to speed on the differences between UV and WITP, upload a couple of the "more realistic" mods, and lets see what happens.

Me, I just wanna drop an atom bomb on Japan.  Gonna have to go through three years of war to get there though

[Vipre]

I have to give major credit to Matrix. I keep a rewritable cd around with a constantly updated copy of Steel Panthers: World at War on it. No naval aspect, but storming islands as the Marines is oh so satisfying.

If they could just mix Strategic, Operational and Tactical levels into one game I'd be hooked.

[AcePylut]

Me 2!

Matrix Games makes some great grog games, I must say.  Uncommon Valor, well heck, when I was like 5 years old I watched MIdway and got into the Black Sheep Squadron TV Series, so I was hooked on the battles in the South Pacific from that date.  Cops and Robbers?  Cowboys and Indians?  No, me and my brother played Japs and Allies.  UV was great to fed that addiction.

I also have Highway to the Reich, which in itself is a really fun game.  It's a RTS game, as in Real-Time-Simulation.

War in the Pacific, well the 70$ price tag turned me off, but since I had a little $$ left over from Xmas... I've got it now

[Hexx]

I've looked at it- does it have the sort of "open ended" builds/research or is it more fixed?
ie- Can Japan (say) build up more carriers and fewer  batleships, or develop turbjets?
CAn either side get the a-bomb?

[Lloyd007]

I don't have the game but reading all the AAR's on the Matrixgames forums is fascinating. Dark Side of the Moon is hilarious.

Building seems to be fixed but flexible for Japan i.e. there are only X destroyers/cruisers/carriers but there are plenty to build and you won't be able to build them all unless you have a dynamite economy. Research is similar for Japan.

Allies production is fixed which does cause problems wrt some aircraft designs if you mess up badly ie you have 100 produced of your crappy 1941 aircraft in 1944 but only 100 produced of your great 1943 aircraft as well which leads to some entirely implausible situations. As the allies you get more stuff than you know what to do with later in the war though...

[AcePylut]

Allies can get the bomb.  Something like 1 per month starting in July '45 or so.

Problem with the bomb is that for each bomb you use after the second one (I think), you automatically lose a "victory level".  So if my points would have given me a decisive allied victory, and I use three nukes, I only get a "(whatever level is below decisive) allied victory".

But I don't care. Bastards shouldn't have attacked us, and I"m going to nuke 'em.

I plotted my first turn (dec 8th) yesterday - after messing around with the game for a week "figuring it out".  Took me 4 hours.  But that's just the first turn.  Supposedly, that will drop to like 15-20 mins per turn once things get going.

[AcePylut]

I like the AAR's over there on matrixgames too, except for the ones that just post the combat reports. 

[Dracho]

I have this game and I've never had the time to invest to get beyond spring '42.

[AcePylut]

Well if it's like I play UV, then I'll play it heavy for a while, take a break, come back, take a break.

My only question is... do I start an AAR "now" (i.e. in a month or two), or wait for Admirals Edition (coming in Summer 08) and start one with AE? 

[Hexx]

Remember most wargames need a few patches after they're released, so more likely Winter before it's running.

[Dracho]

Wow.. that Admiral's edition looks interesting.  Your post made me dust this off, and after the latest patch, it seems to play a little easier.

[AcePylut]

Seems pretty smooth so far on my system.  I decided to load the CHS Mod and NikMod Air to Air, cuz they kinda answer "every single plane on CAP flying all the time" sort of thing.

[Dracho]

Mods?  Where did you find them?

[AcePylut]

In reading the AAR's, I found out a lot about how the various mods affect combat.

Then I clicked on the stickied thread about "links for WITP" (whatever the name is), and looked in the mod section.  There are some links to various mods there.

I loaded up the CHS and NikMod.

CHS requires a slightly extended map, and has a more accurate OOB.  The NikMod addresses Air to Air combat, and stops some of the silliness in air to air... specifically... if you set, for example, 100 fighters to CAP, all 100 of those fighters will attempt to make an intercept on every strike that comes in.  This isn't accurate, as this basically means the planes fly from sunup to sundown with no need to land and refuel and such.  Nikmod restricts how much CAP actually files (in addition to the % you can set in the AirGroup orders page), but that, of course, could lead to heavily outnumbered CAP... and given the "stock" A2A engine, numbers really matter in that instance... so the mod also reduces losses your CAP takes (to simulate the fact that bomber escorts don't pursue fleeing fighters 'much'). 

Basically, in stock WITP, when you decided to take a base (or vice versa), the Air battle for that base would be decided in a couple-three days.  With NikMod, that battle can take weeks, which is far more accurate imho than stock.  So that's why I went with NikMod on top of CHS.

Also, reading the forum, these two mods seem to have the least amount of detractors.

[Vipre]

Best of luck on this. I looked through the manual and walked through the tutorial scenario and that is a lot of details to manage. Total control over the entire Pacific is hard for me to imagine.

[AcePylut]

YOu just pick it up?

I played a bit of it's older brother Uncommon Valor, so I was able to skip past a lot of the manual and tutorial...

It takes me about 30 minutes to plot a "normal" turn.  I suspect that on turns where I'm plotting a major action it will take longer... but basically, in that 30 minutes, I cycle through all my bases and check on all my tf's.  Most of the time I just "check to make sure it's ok" (as in, my supply tf from LA to PH travelled 3 hexes, and it's half way there, nothing to change, no boats or subs around, continue onward... next tf...) and adjust my flight squadrons.

I'd imagine that those turns where I"m taking major actions (plotting an assault on Rabaul for example) will take longer.



First turn is definitely the biggest turn so far.  Gotta plot everything on that turn.  Phew.

[Dracho]

It takes a lot less time if you put the British in India and all of China under computer control.  The game lets you be a total control freak, or not so much.

[Vipre]

YOu just pick it up?

It's not a full version just sort of a demo. I got the manual from Replacementdocs. It's still very interesting though. The little bit of carrier action saw around 300 allied aircraft sink nearly every CV & CL in two Japanese task forces. Don't know what I set wrong on the Japanese side but they only launched about 20 fighters in defense, it was a massacre.

[AcePylut]

If memory serves, the demo has the tutorial, and you're prolly fighting around Siapan or such...  That's kinda setup for the allies to whip the Japs.

In general, from what I see and people say, for the US CV forces to defeat the Jap CV's before mid '43 is extremely rare.  As such, the real life historical combat model from the actual Midway battle must be borked.

I'm stealing this sort of, but this was a kinda of funny post about "real life" as it relates to the game


BS Man.  6Jap CV's march across the pacific without being detected and destroy my most heavily defended base and I don't even get any CAP up?

WTF, I just lost like 4 Carries out of 4 one day!  I have the Zero Bonus going against US CV's suffering a coordination penalty and that crap happens? Oh wait, whoop dee doo I shot down all the devestators in a squadron, but NOTHING on any of the other strikes?  what garbage.

The naval leadership aggression routine is broken.  My surface fleet of DD's, CA's and BB's commanded by a high aggression leader surprises 6 US CVE's and 6 DD's and MY... MY... forces break off? That's just bunk.

More UBER CAP.  Check out the combat log of this battle.  US Hellcats shoot down 330 of my planes and I only get 30 of them and my kami's only damage like 4 DD's?  The air-to-air routine is broken.  That wouldn't happen in real life.

(and my favorite):

%$#^@^% WTF bombing BUG WTF  major fricking bombing bombing bug. One of my cities just fricking disappeared and had all it's industry and manpower wiped out.  WTF.  STupid efffinn broken pos Game

[Vipre]

That's the one. The tutorial sets you up for a carrier confrontation just north of Siapan. The force made it one hex toward port when half the carriers went down, another hex and unanswered attack and the rest slipped below.

%$#^@^% WTF bombing BUG WTF... WTF.  STupid efffinn broken pos Game

  Man that's a player in need of a break.

[AcePylut]

That's what Hirihito said when Hiroshima and Nagasaki disappeared 

[Panzergranate]

The Japs were only just behind with the A-Bomb and secretly detonated a remote controlled speedboat A-Bomb against a rocky island off of the coast of Japan the day after Horoshoma. This proved that they intended the A-Bomb to be deployed against an invasion fleet and not as a terror weapons, as with the Allies and Nazis.

On occupying the Japanese homeland, US forces seized all 22 machines that the Japanese had used to enrich the Uranium and shiped them back to the US.

As for the 1941 US aircraft..... flog the F2 Buffaloes to the Fins and Commonwealth airforces as soon as possible.

My son is playing some WW2 Pacific wargame on the X-Box 360 and prefers the Jap cruisers as they carry torpedoes, which is what defines a cruiser. US ones, by some oversight, don't carry torpedoes and it is a big handicap.

Watching him trying to dogfight Zeroes with an F2 Buffalo, the world's worst and least maneuverable fighter ever built, was quite amusing. He did manage to take out a "Val" by sheer luck as even these outclass the F2 in a dogfight!! He managed to drop down on it vertically from above and catch it in maximum aspect.

I'm playing Blitz Kreig, on and off, at the moment as the Soviet forces.

[AcePylut]

The Japs were only just behind with the A-Bomb and secretly detonated a remote controlled speedboat A-Bomb against a rocky island off of the coast of Japan the day after Horoshoma. This proved that they intended the A-Bomb to be deployed against an invasion fleet and not as a terror weapons, as with the Allies and Nazis.

Japs never detonated an a-bomb at Konan.  That whole "story" came about due to some sensationalist reporting.

On occupying the Japanese homeland, US forces seized all 22 machines that the Japanese had used to enrich the Uranium and shiped them back to the US.

As for the 1941 US aircraft..... flog the F2 Buffaloes to the Fins and Commonwealth airforces as soon as possible.

My son is playing some WW2 Pacific wargame on the X-Box 360 and prefers the Jap cruisers as they carry torpedoes, which is what defines a cruiser. US ones, by some oversight, don't carry torpedoes and it is a big handicap.

Watching him trying to dogfight Zeroes with an F2 Buffalo, the world's worst and least maneuverable fighter ever built, was quite amusing. He did manage to take out a "Val" by sheer luck as even these outclass the F2 in a dogfight!! He managed to drop down on it vertically from above and catch it in maximum aspect.

I'm playing Blitz Kreig, on and off, at the moment as the Soviet forces.

Oh yeah I'm getting rid of the buffalo asap... but unfortunately, that isn't the worst fighter in the game.  Not by a long shot.  Worse yet are the P36 and P43 death traps, and that's not even getting into some of the "fighters" that the Chinese have. 

US also starts the game with the CV's at sea, and I have to get that CV and its Buff squadron back to PH to upgrade to F4F-3's.  Unfortunately, I need that CV to help out the beleagured defenders at Wake, so they're going to get stuck with da Buff until I get it back to base.  On top of that, I only get so many F4F-3's per month, and if I use them as replacements for existing squads, I might not have enough to upgrade this month.   Not to mention all those P36/43 squads that need upgrading.  A P40B never looked so good

I've decided upon this to upgrade... the Buffs on the CV have a high experience, so they are getting upgraded first.  The P43/36 squads all have low experience (which means even if they were in P51's they'd still get butchered by Zeros)... so they are going to stay in their crap planes while I train them up in experience, and sue the remaining F4F's as replacements (and to build stock).  Once they hit about "60" experience, then I'll upgrade their planes to Wildcats.  I see no reason to have these rookie pilots fresh out of flight school who don't know a broom from a control yoke flying the best plane I have.  Na, they're going to stay in their garbage aircraft until then can take off and land without ground looping.

[Panzergranate]

The Chinese were flying Spads and Brisfits, in some instances.

The Philipino Airforce was putting P26s up against Zeroes plus P35s with fixed under carts. The game sounds quite involved if it involves the efforts of other participants.

The Brits in Burma flew Gladiators which could hold their won against a Zero. They also used to rig spotlights accross the undercarriage legs and use them to strafe Jap nightime river crossings to great effect. Unfortunately they can't acrry bombs.

Have the French surrendered Indo-China to the Japanese yet, without a fight??

[AcePylut]

I have a number of P26's at Clark.  It's dec 10th and Clark is still shut down, will probably be shut down for quite a while.  I'm probably going to make my stand in Manila, not Bataan. 

Indo-China is a firm Japanese possession.  No french to be seen anywhere!  The game starts on December 7th, 41.

This game spans more than half the globe.  The oft forgotten (to westerners) China-Burma-India theater is fully represented.

Here's the map area... from East to West, you start at the US West cost (San Deigo, LA, San Fran)... travel west all the way to karachi.  All of India is represented.  From north to South, it goes from the artic circle to below Australia.

They made it a flat map though, so it looks kinda weird.  Here's the strategic map showing all the area covered.

http://www.matrixgames.com/games/screenshot.asp?gid=294&sid=14

Judging by my forces in the DEI, they are nothing more than a speed bump to the Jap expansion. 

In Malaya, I'm trying to setup a fighting withdrawal to get my brits to Singapore, but my boys are running to easily.  Hopefully, I can delay the Jap advance a little bit so I can upgrade my fortifications at Singapore a level before the nip lays siege. 

In the DEI, I have nothing of note to prevent the Japs from doing what they want, so I'm playing run-away and trying to get all my combat troops to Australia before they get surrounded. 

I've assembled my combat naval forces in the DEI at a base in the southern end of Sumatra.  They are going to slowly (to avoid detection) creep up close to singapore, and hopefully strike at any other invasion fleets that come close.  I hope I can get them into battle at night, and escape from Betty/Nell range by daybreak.

My boys at wake Island, however, are putting up a hell of a fight.  3 days of combat against the Japs, and I still hold the island.  I'm rushing some infantry troops asap to Wake to help out.  Maybe I can kick them out before their next assault.  What's good is that my 2 CV's (incl the buff laden CV) are 1 day away, and I've got a massive strike planned against the Jap SNLF.

In the Phillipines, again I'm withdrawing for Fortress Manila, and will fight it out from there.  these guys are going to be lost, eventually, but the longer I can tie up Jap forces in the PI, the longer it takes them to fight elsewhere.  I have no plans to try and rescue Dugout Doug.  He can fight and die or go to pow camp with the rest of his soldiers.

In the pacific, the US is still in shock.  Can't move anything out of PH yet.  Got all my air and ground forces on the West Coast training (cuz they are low low low exp).  Decided to do a few shakedown cruises by for ships on the West Coast to build up a little exp.  Loaded up a few engineer regiments to get them to PH to help repair the destruction.   Moved some forces forward in Aleutians to get my scout planes closer to the action.

In Australia, loaded up a bunch of supply ships and started moving war-making material to my forward bases. 

In the SWPAC, can't do anything yet.  only a few base forces (which build stuff like airfields, ports, forts) there, so I'm sending some ships to pick up these stranded base forces.  I'll relocate them to a few points that i'm going to designate as either fuel-depots, air bases, jump off points, what have you. 

[Panzergranate]

Singapore is defended well from the sea but the shore battery guns, even if turned inland, only have APHE anti-ship shells, which are useless for firing at land targets.

The idiot General Gordon Bennett, surrendered without a fight because he thought that the offiicers and troops would receive humane POW treatment.... wrong!!

At the appointed time of the surrender, he was hundreds of miles away escaping on a plane. That is why his name is used as a swear word in Australia, as a majority of the garrison were ANZACs. He was never given a command again and dismissed from the AIF shortly afterwards.

You'll probally find that a growing number of the RNZAF Buffaloes, based at Singapore, will suffer growing losses from undercarriage failures due to the rough grass aitstrip versus Buffalo weak undercarriage.

The Japs launched their only large tank assault on the Konami ridge against 3 x batteries of 18 and 25 Pounder guns with horrific armour casulties before succeeding. This ridge of hills covers Singapore. They lost 80% of their total tank pool in this attack and never launched tank attacks on this scale ever again.

Once they take this hill range then Singapore is pretty much in the bag as they will be able to shell the city, airfield and harbour from there. Hold it at all costs.

Singapore will give the Jap Navy a strategic supply and servicing base for the whole Pacific.

I've played Japs in WW2 wargames and find them a lot more flexible to use than western nations. Tree grenade snipers, lunge mines, human triggered boobytraps, etc.

I shocked a side in one game by taking out a couple of M4s with a Type 1 tank destroyer. Their tanks are quite well designed for purpose and the late Type 97 and Type 3 could take on a M4 head to head, unlike some of the others in the stable. Still, when fighting folks without tanks or anti-armour weaponry, any tank is an advantage, even it is a French NC 27 derived pop gun armed Type 87!!

Making a stand at Manila and not Battan might work though if you can provide air cover to fend off Jap bombers softening up your forces.

Don't forget that they also use paratroops, though not in large full scale assaults, more as a strategic part of a larger ground based attack. The Phillipnes was one of the instances where they used them, so be wary.

[AcePylut]

The detail level fo this game is individual ships, individual air squadrons, and ground units are regiment sized.  This is an operational/strategic level game, so you don't get to command troops in combat.  You just move them into a hex with the enemy and hit "defend, bombard, deliberate attack, or shock attack".  Airfields are abstracted, also.  A "level 1" airfield in the Gobi desert is the same as a "Level 1" airfield in Maui. 

Buildable Ports, Airfields, and Forts are all on a "0-9" scale.  0 = nothing.  level 1 - most basic (for airfield, think Wau).  Level 9 is a major major shipyard.  There are a few "level 10" ports and airfields, these are like San Francisco's shipyards and so on.

But the game doesn't make a distiction about specific conditions at specific bases.  Level 1 is level 1 is level 1. 

Your air squadrons will take "operational" losses in this game.  These are things like "got lost flying over the ocean", "crashed on landing", "bellyflopped on a dive bombing run".  I.e. losses that you take that aren't losses from combat.  Any air mission you fly can bring about Ops losses.  Factors that go into the "ops losses" die roll are, for a few examples but by no means is this list everything":  Weather, Morale, Experience, fatigue, Airfield rating, Airport damage, supply situation, Air Group leadership, distance, in/out of HQ command and so on. 

---

Yeah, the Japs pulled a major bluff job at Singapore there to get the Brits to surrender.

In this game, Singapore is a major industry center.  The Japs need this base to provide supplies to feed their war machine.  They have to have it, and they'll get it, eventually.  I need to make it's fall as bloody as possible.

[Panzergranate]

It isn't defendable from the land and will fall, but Aussie troops are the hardest fighters and don't mind close combat, being all hard drinking blokes, so will contest every inch.

If you can chew up as much of the Jap forces as you can to take Singapore, then they'll have to delay advancing south or try to keep the momentum of the advance going at consdierably reduced strength. Chances are, that you might be able to halt them before they even make it to New Guinea.

The also took Hong Kong at the same time as Singapore, another strategic naval installation.

Don't throw extra forces into Singapore as it is untenable but do try to plan to evacuate as much as you can, at some point.

 

[AcePylut]

This game has a "restricted command" feature.  All forces start the game under various commands, and you have to spend "political points" to change their command to something different.  For example, All the Brits in Malaya are assigned to the ABDA command, which is a restricted command.  Before I can move a British unit in the ABDA command by ship, I have to change it to another command (SE Asia).  Right now, I don't have the political points stockpiled to change any of their command. 

US forces in the Phillipines are also on a restricted command.  I can't pull them out until I get the political points stockpiled.  China forces can't leave China unless I spend the points.

If you happen to have a unit in a command  that is in a location outside of that command, it's ability suffers tremendously.  lets say I have an element of the 1st Marine Div under the SouthWest Pacific Command, but I transport it up to Attu for an attack on Kiska in the Alaskan Aleutians (which is the "north pacific command" sphere), it will fight at a greatly reduced ability.

Also, I can change TF leaders, Air Group leaders, Hq leaders, and such, but all that costs political points to do so.  So if I want Boyington commanding VMF-212, I have to spend political points else I might get some wet-behind the ears no exp no inspiration no leadership no administration no tactical ability type group leader.

The British will also call for me to withdraw ships from the theater from time to time, and if I refuse to do so and keep them in threater, that costs a crapload of political points.

Naturally, you don't have enough points to do 1/4 of what you want, so you have to decide where to spend the points.  Do I spend the points transferring the 1st Marine Div to SWPAC so I can assault Guadalcanal, or do I spend the points transferring the beleagured Brits at Singapore to a different command so I can save them?  Attacking Guaddy might pull forces from Singapore, but then they might not.  Pulling troops out of Singapore allows me to reconstitute them for an attack in a year, becasue that's how long it might take to build them up to full strength, but then I really can't begin a counter-attack in the Solomons.

So where I pull troops out - and what troops I pull out - depends on the strategic situation when it comes time to pull troops.  It also depends on if I CAN pull those troops out.  Tankers, Cargo ships, troop transports have a way of attracting enemy aircraft   Using DD's and CL's to "fast transport" (think Tokyo Express) those troops is great, but then I rack up operational damage (called system damage) on my warships.  So do I want an entire fleet in in drydock for a couple of months just to save those coupld hundred men that will take a year to reconstitute to full strength?  Maybe maybe not. It'll depend on the situation at the time.

The Nip has attacked Hong Kong.  Did that on the first day.  I'll probably play this game a month or so before starting over and getting an AAR on.  I'm also going to play 2 day turns when I restart, because I do want to nuke the nip before I die of old age.

As far as the game, if you're a WW2 buff and ever played an Avalon Hill game, and happen to have 70$ lying around, this game is for you.  It's "grog level" involvement, definitely not really for a casual gamer by any means.

Really, what other game allows you to give orders to a chinese air force squadron consisting of biplanes LOL commanded by a guy named Lop-Ting?

[Hexx]

How effective does the AI seem to be?

Honestly I'd (I think) have little interest in playing as the Yanks (mainly as it seems to be just a race to see how fast you win)
Playing as the Japanese might be fun though, if the game has decent American AI.
(I'm assuming it's set up to mainly play as the US, so figure the AI routines will be well written for Japan.. but dunno about the States)

[AcePylut]

Well, I've only made it a few days into the war, so can't really comment on the overall strategic quality of the AI.  Given the absolute power the Japs have at the start, wherever they want to go they can go no matter how great of a strategist one is at defending.  Where the allied skill comes into play is seeing how well they can prevent losses, and you won't really "know" that until the end of the game when the points are totaled up.  Decisions like this:  Maybe if I had pulled that division out of Singapore with a tokyo express type retreat and accepted having a fleet in port for a copule months, I wouldn't have lost that 300 victory points I lost from losing that Division to the japs, and since I got beat by 200 points, oops, bad decision on my part because I didn't use that fleet right to during that few months they "wouldn't" have been available had I withdrawn the troops at Singapore (if you can follow THAT rambling sentence, +1 to you ), .   

I'd really rather play a human, but then, typically from what I've read, lots of people quit games once the first CV duel is over, because that usually determines the general course of the game.  So I'm not really interested in playing a human that might quit after 1 year of time.  I would want to find a partner that carries through to the end.

The actual "game", when played as the allies, is a race to see how fast you win.  Flip side is that as the Japs, it's a race to see how long it takes to lose. 

Given that the Jap production model is a lot more involved than the Allied model, and that no matter how great you play as Japs the inevitable allied land-based air onslaught will destroy the Japs, I would tend to think it's easier for the AI to be the allies.  Typical game between humans, from what the pros say, is that the Japs run wild for about a 8-10 months, then dig in for about 6 months, then try and hold on as much as possible.  Most human allied players won't risk their carriers until 1943, so that tends to slow the allied counterattack slightly.... because they say that a Jap player that sinks the US CV's in '42 can then expand for another for another 3-4 months.  But again, most US players won't risk their CV's because the Jap players typically roll around wiht their fleet CV's in one TF.  Often, they'll tack in a couple more CV's to make it 8-10 CV's... and that's what's known as the Death Star, because it destroys everything around it until the Allied LBA overwhelms it.

[Vipre]

The actual "game", when played as the allies, is a race to see how fast you win.  Flip side is that as the Japs, it's a race to see how long it takes to lose. 

That's one of the things that bumps me out of the mindset to play "Hearts of Iron". No matter what you do if playing Germany the designers force certain events. Choose not to have anything at all to do with Japan and instead focus on diplomacy with the US and Russia it doesn't matter they still declare war on you.

A game is no fun if you don't really have a chance to change the outcome of history.

[AcePylut]

Well, some things are going to be inevitable, but it's playing within those parameters that's the "game". 

Inevitably, the Japs are going to run wild at the start.  Can you, as a Japanese player, better Yamamoto's 6 months worth of running wild?

Inevitably, the allied are going to overwhelm the Nipponese with Land Based Air.  Can you, as the Allied player, turn the tide and defeat the Japanese  player faster than Nimitz?

What strategies can you employ to accomplish those tasks?  What if the Japanese focused their assault through Australia, how far can you go and is bottling up all your troops in Auzzie leave you weak to a devestating counterattack from India that causes you to lose the war in '44?  China?  Dutch East Indies?  South West Pacific?  Central Pacific?  North Pacific?  What if they you their assault in China? Burma?  what if they spread around and not expand "far" in one place, but extend a multilayered defense perimeter around the Southern Resource Area and the homeland?

What if the Allies employ the "Northern Route" as one of their axis of attack, instead of an Island Hopping Campaign combined with a push up from Australia?

Me, I don't know what I'm doing yet, I need to wait and see what the Japs can do, and when withdrawing troops, try to place them in locations where they will benefit me the most.  If I withdraw them to a base, then have to move them again, then again, they get fatigued, disrupted, and lose cohesion, so then I have to spend MORE supplies to get them "back up to strength" than I would had I disembarked them on the "right" base the first time.


As is any decent strategic game, however, logistics are 3/4's of the battle.  Yes, the US basically has unlimited supplies.  In the US.  Problem is that the US is only one small portion of the far edge of the map.  US does NOT, however, have unlimited shipping to move those supplies.  Supplies prevent you from doing everything at once.  YOu have to plan ahead. 

However, this game is all based on a simple rock-paper-scissors concept.... called Airplanes, Ships, GI's.

GI's control airbases for Airplanes and ports for Ships.
Airplanes control airspace to protect your ships and GI's.
Ships control sea lanes to ship supplies so your forces can make war.

On defense:  GI's control the air bases that airplanes need to fly off of to provide cover for ships to deliver supplies to the GI's on air bases that airplanes need to fly to....

On offense:  Airplanes suppress enemy airfields which prevents their airplanes from destroying your shipping so you can supply your GI's fighting for control of the base from enemy GI's that are out of supply and will be easily destroyed because your airplanes destroyed their shipping after your airplanes suppressed the enemy airfield....

[Vipre]

Well, some things are going to be inevitable, but it's playing within those parameters that's the "game".

On that I have to disagree. There was nothing inevitable about WWII. A push in the wrong place, a decision to move troops or equipment to Base A instead of Base B, a better showing in a battle or two and the outcome could have been different. Game designers though too often seem to start at the "Allies Win" outcome and work backwards.

If I spend all my time maxing out my reputation rating with Russia (HOI) and avoid any actions that may antagonize them, then forcing them to suddenly go hostile for no reason other than "It's what historically happened" is imo bad designing.

What if the Allies had lost at Midway and Guadalcanal instead of won? What if it wasn't the Japanese carrier fleet wiped out but the American? What if the Japanese had worried less about fortifying islands that ended up being bypassed, instead using those troops and supplies elseware? Every war has bad decisions and paths not travelled, it's that chance to "fix" past mistakes that excites me not "I know it's a lost cause but...".

When you start on December 7th 1941 the only "inevitable" should be December 7th.

[Hexx]

Actually I've found HOI2 (well the Armageddon pack) to be nicely unpredictable. Stuff usually happens, but in ( as a rough estimate) 1/4-1/3 of the games, Russia doesn't declare war on Germany if Germany doesn't attack them etc.
Always gets me as I'm constantly saying" Well I can use just a few more divisions before attacking the Soviets" .. only to find that the Soviets have created some 300 extra divisions. (Had  fun game once where the Soviet AI had constructed some 700+ divisions by May/June of '41. I chose not to launch Barbarosa.. iirc they finally declard war on me sometime in late '44, took an Abomb hit or two from me but just steamrolled my army.)
Another game had China'a AI (somehow) defeating the Japanese, firing the Korea creation event as well as a peace treaty with Japan.
And games where the Comintern and Allies declare war on each other before the Axis are even close to being defeated are always a blast.

That's kinda why I'm hesitant about WitP, seems like alot o fun, but also seem tied into "historical" production numbers.
I have no problem with dealing with (for example) Japan's inferior industry, but I'd like to be able to have the choice to build (again for example) a smaller number of superior fighters, or to try building more battleships and fewer carriers.
It sounds like it's pretty easy to mod though, so might be possible to play around with it.

 

[Vipre]

Actually I've found HOI2 (well the Armageddon pack) to be nicely unpredictable. Stuff usually happens, but in ( as a rough estimate) 1/4-1/3 of the games, Russia doesn't declare war on Germany if Germany doesn't attack them etc.

Really...  I have the Armageddon pack now but I think the game I was talking about might have been just Doomsday. I played until April '42 I think being super nice to Russia as to not tick them off in any fashion, and for no reason with a 189/200 rep rating they declared war. Tried reloading repeatedly but always sometime between the 10th and 15th a second front. My opinion of the two biggest blunders in WWII were Germany's invasion of Russia and Pearl Harbor. The Pacific probably wouldn't have been interesting without Pearl but General Campaigns shouldn't force either one, unless of course like WitP that's the jumping point.

[AcePylut]

Well, some things are going to be inevitable, but it's playing within those parameters that's the "game".

On that I have to disagree. There was nothing inevitable about WWII. A push in the wrong place, a decision to move troops or equipment to Base A instead of Base B, a better showing in a battle or two and the outcome could have been different. Game designers though too often seem to start at the "Allies Win" outcome and work backwards.

If I spend all my time maxing out my reputation rating with Russia (HOI) and avoid any actions that may antagonize them, then forcing them to suddenly go hostile for no reason other than "It's what historically happened" is imo bad designing.

What if the Allies had lost at Midway and Guadalcanal instead of won? What if it wasn't the Japanese carrier fleet wiped out but the American? What if the Japanese had worried less about fortifying islands that ended up being bypassed, instead using those troops and supplies elseware? Every war has bad decisions and paths not travelled, it's that chance to "fix" past mistakes that excites me not "I know it's a lost cause but...".

When you start on December 7th 1941 the only "inevitable" should be December 7th.

I've thought about those very questions.

What if the Allies had lost at Midway?  IMHO, our victory would have been delayed about a year.  That's it. We built something like 100 carriers during the course of the war, compared to the Japs none (not counting a few ships that were converted to baby CV's& Shinano)

What if we had lost at Guadalcanal?  Same thing, victory delayed about a year.  We had too much LBA for the japs to stop. 

WITP doesn't play like HOI where you can set all sorts of "research" paths and control the "nation" as such  It's more for people that are interested in the war, and fantasizing "what you would do if you were Nimitz"... not "what would you do if you were in charge of the United states".

I never played much AI, but I, too, don't like scripted events that says no matter how much Stalin and Hitler get to be buddies, the Sovs will attack anyway.  NOthing like that is scripted into WITP (except the US get a nuke a month in the latter half of '45), except that the US will produce far more men ships and planes.

[Vipre]

I'll just never be convinced of the inevitable win is all.

There were some wins and the resulting base/port/airfield captures that were critical to the Allied offensive in the Pacific.  It doesn't really matter imo how many bombers you have if you have no carriers or airfields close enough to launch them from. Even with the A-bomb imagine if the ship delivering it had been torpedoed before instead of after delivering it.

I give credit to Matrix for offering a toggle for the Jap Sub Doctrine. Even pointed out in the manual how restricting operations in that field helped secure an allied victory.

Wish I had 70 floating around, I'd give history a run for it.

[AcePylut]

That's kinda why I'm hesitant about WitP, seems like alot o fun, but also seem tied into "historical" production numbers.
I have no problem with dealing with (for example) Japan's inferior industry, but I'd like to be able to have the choice to build (again for example) a smaller number of superior fighters, or to try building more battleships and fewer carriers.
It sounds like it's pretty easy to mod though, so might be possible to play around with it.
 

WITP is tied into historical production numbers.  No matter what, the US are simply going to produce too much ships planes and supplies for the Japs.

You don't get the choice to build more ships, however, you do get to set your aircraft production to produce different models in different quantities, so you can get the "late war fighters" earlier in the war... but you don't get to tweak Jap pilot training, so those pilots aren't going to be very experienced.  You really have to protect your starting pilots - becasue these guys are elite.  So you have to pull back depleted squadrons, transfer in some pilots, train them a bit, and back to war.  If you lose too many good pilots on stupid missions (flying supply transport missions in thunderstorms for example), you hurt yourself later in the war.

Don't get me wrong, the game - to me - is fun (and you might be thinking that I'm just saying that because I've only had it a couple of weeks - but I played the crap out of Uncommon Valor, which was very similar except it only dealt with the Solomon Sea battle when that was hot and heavy).

Dracho and I started a game, never finished it.  If you read this aar I started on it, I detail a lot of the nuts&bolts of the game.  http://www.dynaverse.net/forum/index.php/topic,163368063.0.html


All in all, though, WITP is definitely a game for a niche market, of which, sounds like it's not your type of game..  It won't appeal to everyone, but it does to me.

[AcePylut]

On starting on Dec 7th... well if Dec 7th was going to play out the same every turn no matter what, they'd start the game on Dec 8th.  There is a Grand Campaign that starts on Dec 8th for those wishing that option.

So if Dec 7th isn't going to play out the same every time no matter what, there has to be options to play around, within limits.  And there are.

One option is "Dec 7th Surprise".  If "on", then basically most US planes won't fly, and the japs do increased damage (this turn only, however.  So there's no magical "eat the health pack to restore ship power".. .hehe been waiting to say that).  If "Off", then the US is considered "at war" before you set orders for Dec 7th, and all your planes will fly, if they can.

Another option is "Vary Setup".  In that, the US Carriers will be in 1 of 4 places (there were 4 US strategies at the time, the computer randomly selects one of them)  - OPERATION OUTFIELD - Admiral Kimmel sends US forces to Midway, Johnston Island, and Wake Island; air Units in Central Pacific, Philippines, and Malay are more dispersed.... - OPERATION INFIELD: - Admiral Kimmel forms surface fleet and keeps it in Pearl Harbor area,  and brings both Carrier TFs close to home port. This opening usually produces fierce Carrier battle on turn one near Pearl Harbor (so the manual says lol.  more like US CV's get butchered 80% of the time.).... - OPERATION HOME PLATE:- Kimmel assumes safer course and is pulling all TFs into port.Surprise is likely, and Japanese can find 2 US Carriers in Pearl Harbor port......- DECEMBER 7th SURPRISE: - Standard turn one is played.

And the third option is Historical First Turn.  If "On" neither the jap nor yank can move forces around on the first turn, so you're are "locked in" to the historical Dec 7th Attack.  If "off", then the japanese can relocate all their forces upto a certain distance (within limits), basically this allows the Jap Dec 7th 6CV Death Star to send it to either the Phillipine Isles or Rabaul.. .and just completely forgo the "sunk 2 BB's and pissed off a nation that can outproduce us into nothingness woot good job guys" attack on Pearl Harbor... but no matter what the Japanese do, they can't change the "pissed off a nation that blah blah blah"

[AcePylut]

I'll just never be convinced of the inevitable win is all.

Wish I had 70 floating around, I'd give history a run for it.

It doesn't sound like you'd like the game, so might be better served saving your 70$.

[Vipre]

I'll just never be convinced of the inevitable win is all.

Wish I had 70 floating around, I'd give history a run for it.

It doesn't sound like you'd like the game, so might be better served saving your 70$.

I can be quite delusional when necessary so I can always tell myself the Japs can win. 

After all there is a Japanese Decisive Victory level, so it has to be theoretically possible.

[AcePylut]

Yeah, it's just that a Jap Decisive Victory means the Jap is still fighting as of Jan 1, 1946     

[AcePylut]

Just for you Lord Hexx  hehe, it's december 10th, and check out what my Signals Intelligence has shown me..  (this is two days in a row!)...

[Vipre]

Yeah, it's just that a Jap Decisive Victory means the Jap is still fighting as of Jan 1, 1946     

A win's a win. On level ground, meaning no nukes, a Jap DV as of scenario end means they managed a draw which shifted two levels in their favor per the time limit rule. Fighting the Allies to a standstill when history says the Empire should be a smoking husk by that time is an exciting prospect.

[AcePylut]

Here's Operation Leave on December 11th, a shot of the action int he PI.  That big red line going from North Central to South West... that's my ships fleeing the PI.  In the ocean to the east and north east of the PI are my subs, hunting the "mini-KB" of Jap light carriers used in that theater.  Japs have landed on the SouthEast and North Central portion of Luzon, and have my boys at Clark, Manila, and Bataan in a pincer move.  Japs control the airspace over everything you see, as a result of them waxing all my airfields on dec 7th.

[Hexx]

Just for you Lord Hexx  hehe, it's december 10th, and check out what my Signals Intelligence has shown me..  (this is two days in a row!)...

<sigh> crappy American intelligence.. pick's up the CBC and thinks it's something useful..

Hey does this have Canadian forces? Weren't much involved- directly-in the Pacific campaign, mostly as part of British units iirc, but did have a formation (although I'm not sure it was of big enough scale to be represented in the game) at Singapore. And we had plans to transfer a number of ships and an army division for the campaign after the war in europe ended.

Did they make it in?

[Panzergranate]

It is an interesting fact that the airship CV USS Makan patrolled the very area the Jap carriers launched their attack from on December the 7th 1941. If it hadn't been forced to ditch into the sea during a freak storm in 1938, the Japanese would have had to find a way of eliminating or avoiding it and its air patrols. Perhaps even abandoned the idea as being impossible to pull off. History could have been very different.

Space Empirse  is a strategic wargame and one of my tactics is to place a large number of my obstelete and older technology warships in large numbers near jump points so that the AI enemy scouts scan them, see that a large armada of warships is waiting, and avoid attacking. The fact that the ships are not really up to scratch isn't detectable, as the AI only counts the hull types and not how the vessels are equiped.

I played the same trick on my teenage son, who was supposed to be an "Ally" in campaign, but can't be trusted as such. Sure enough he'd checked out a jump point, saw a collection of old and obstellete cruisers, destroyers and frigates and so decided to disolve the alliance with an attack. I had a giant armada of 200 state of the art serious warships sat out of scanning range behind a planet in the sector. I eliminated his only ships covering several star systems, including his home system, and took all of them without a fight.

Strangely enough, he wanted to negotiate a new Alliance after that, but with control of his core systems and shipyards, I didn't need him as an ally anymore. Then the computer AI launched an invasion of his remaining territory....

Big Picture strategic games are qiute addictive and involving. History is full of instances where wars have been won or lost by a simple bad call. The Japanese faffing around with aircraft payloads during Midway is one such example.

The thing is, in warfare, bad calls take on a momentum of their own and can't be easily reversed.

You shoud try playing French in any wargame.... terrible command and control structure.... non-existant for 90% of their tanks (no radios) and troops still use runners and pidgeons.

Even the Russians were better than equiped and organised than the French were. Sadly let down by obstellete ammunition and propellants in 1941.

I presume that the Russians in Manchuria are inactive against the Japanese in the game or are they sticking to history??


 

[Vipre]

Russia has a few triggers...

The Japanese side (if played by a human player) must maintain a minimum garrison in Manchukuo in order to avoid Soviet Union (Russia) Activation.

Some scenarios, however, will already have Soviet activation set. Also, the Soviets will activate
automatically on August 1, 1945 if they have not been activated until that time.

If the Japanese player moves a unit into the Soviet Union or in any way attacks a
Soviet unit or base, the Soviet Union is immediately activated.

[AcePylut]

Canadian and Canadian forces are in the game.  They are part of the "Canadian Command", which is also a restricted command so you have to spend political points to set them to another HQ to move them out of Canada proper.

Vipre's got the Soviet Triggers listed for Soviet activation. 

[Vipre]

Of course, I plagiarized the manual. 

[Panzergranate]

Actually the Soviet - Japanese front was active in a small way, with skirmishes right up until 1945, with the Russian forces there starved of support, due to the bigger fight against the Axis forces in the west.

The japanese exploited this to advantage, but as the war progressed, they became starved of resources and manpower. By the time the Russians returned, hell bend on payback, the Japanese forces in the way were in a sorry state.

The Manchurian Front was a kind of forgotten war, as were the US fighting in the Aleutian Islands.

Remember that the Japanese were basically camped on Soviet territory for quite a number of years, during WW2, amd even tried to colonise it with Japanese settlers.

What pictures of Soviet forces in the conflict generally show them on horseback and wearing British style Pith Helmets or French style "Hadrian" helmets.

I have a picture of the results of a point blank hit from a Jap 70mm. field gun into the side of a BT7, during the actions there, with an HE shell. Needless to say, as HE has no effect against armour plate , no matter how thin, only the only damage is lost mudguards and a couple of bent wheels. The tank and crew survived to fight another day.

What tanks the Soviets had were mainly BTs due to the advantages of a medium tank capable of 60 MPH plus on open plains. Against Japanese tanks, they always had the advantage in armoiur, firepower and reliability.

[Hexx]

Actually the Soviet - Japanese front was active in a small way, with skirmishes right up until 1945, with the Russian forces there starved of support, due to the bigger fight against the Axis forces in the west.

The japanese exploited this to advantage, but as the war progressed, they became starved of resources and manpower. By the time the Russians returned, hell bend on payback, the Japanese forces in the way were in a sorry state.

Really???
You have any sources or is this along the "Japanese detonated the Abomb " claim you posted a bit back.
Haven't read anything about it in years, but iirc the Japanese and Soviets fought a small number of border conlficts up until '39, then signed the peace treaty which held until the Soviet's invaded in '45.
By which time the Soviet's were using mainly T34's of various marks transferred with the bulk of the invasion army from the Western front.

[Hexx]

Canadian and Canadian forces are in the game.  They are part of the "Canadian Command", which is also a restricted command so you have to spend political points to set them to another HQ to move them out of Canada proper.

Cool
Well taking the Japanese on using only the Canadian forces would likely be a challenge.
I'll have to give it a shot. 

[Dracho]

Guess I need to read the manual.. I played around with the tutorial last night and didn't realize how much isn't like Uncommon Valor.  I learned quite a bit just doing that, but I need to do a couple of things:

Figure out how to reduce the fortification level of an island before I attack it
Learn all the ship abbreviations, and the special ship functions, like the command transport.

[Vipre]

Most referenced way in the manual is attacking with Combat Engineers in the force. They get a special "destroy fortification" phase during combat. Outside that I'd guess air and shore bombardment but I couldn't find a reference in the manual to that.

[AcePylut]

Ship abbreviations are kinda hard in a way... the ones that got me were the "Ax" abbr.s

So I remembered it like this

AK - trAnsport, Kargo
AP - trAnsport, Personell
APD - trAnsport, Destroyer
AG - trAnsport, barGe
AR - Repair
AS - Sub tender
AV - aViation tender
AVD - aViation, tender, destroyer
AGP - Pt boat tender
AGC - Amphibious Barge Command
ML - MineLayer
DM - Destroyer Minelayer

TK - Tanker, Kargo (I.e. carries fuel from port to port, but can not replenish ships at sea)
AO - trAnsport, Oil (oiler - can replenish fuel at sea)

With fortifications, you have to bombard the crap out of it I think, otherwise use Infantry Combat Engineer Regiments in your assaults.  Fastest way I've found in playing around is to use combat engineers.  You lose men, but it goes a lot faster than trying to reduce forts by bombarding with ships and planes

[Dracho]

Does it work like the old Grigsby Pacific War game where, if the engineers are at 25 experience, they have a minimal chance of actually particpating in the attack?  Until they reach 50 experience?

[Dracho]

Found it:

8.4 and 8.4.2

Fortification is dropped by one if combat odds are 1:1 or greater.  If no units are using deliberate attack (i.e. using bombardment or shock attack) the fortifications will be reduced by 1 for each odds level (i.e. 4:1 will recuce fortifications by 4).  Also, combat engineers participating in an attack may reduce the fortification level by up to 1 per day. 

6.1.25.2 seems to indicate that naval bombardment is likely to focus on infrastructure rather than fortifications.  However, the manual also states that a naval bombardment is the same as a bombardment attack by land units, and 8.4.1 goes back to indicating that 8.4.2 is in play.. logic loop...

[Lloyd007]

From reading a lot of AAR's bombardments of any kind land, sea or air will never reduce fortifications. A major problem in some games is where apparently the Japanese player has turned every island and land base into the Maginot line and it takes 200k men 6 months to dislodge 20k men. Although some of the more ridiculous fights like 500k men on Wake and Iwo Jima and etc. do show the need for some coding limit for islands and atolls. I mean even though Japan has it hard as it as after 1943 it doesn't seem much fun for either player when to take a 5 mile square piece of sand you have to bombard it for months with the entire pacific fleet and then land every single troop and tank and when you do get the 5 mile patch of sand you can base 1000 B-29's on it to flatten every base in the Home Islands.

AE looks like it should fix a lot of those problems nicely.

[Panzergranate]

Bombardments are intended to destroy men and materials, who shelter in fortifications in order to avoid becoming victims of the bombardment.

I would expect that fortifications made of wood would easily be destoryed by bombardment, as they are in the real world.

Concrete should prove a littel tougher but not indestructable.

However, stone fortifications do seem to survive through many wars and bombardments. Take the Serbian Navy's futile attempts to penetrate the old Medieval coastal fort with numerous gunboats and frigates during the Balkans War in the 1990's...... they used up there ammunition over several days and only managed to chip the stonework.

 

[Mog]

Panzer, the general commanding Singapore was General Percival not Gordon Bennet 

You really need to check your facts more.

[Panzergranate]

The had it on history channel.... Percival was Bennet's second in command and took the surrender. Bennet was on a warship heading away after he had arranged a cease fire with the Japanese and a time for the surrender.

He surrendered his men and then abandoned them. The Australian government sacked him from the Army.

[AcePylut]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Gordon_Bennett

[Panzergranate]

Now if an ordianry private decided that it was in his country's interests to run away (dessert) he'd be shot.

So the History Channel was actually wrrong (once more) on somwthing!!

[Dracho]

After reading the Wikipedia page, it rather sounds as if the nationality of the historian would play a major role in the opinion of Bennett's actions.

[AcePylut]

Well I found an opponent for a PBEM game.  I'll be the allies, he'll be the japs.  Like me, he's a historian of the era, doesn't know all the exploits of the game engine, and seems most interested in playing the game for fun, not playing it to exploit every gamey bug to "win".  We have a couple of house rules, and both of us are willing to discuss and address anytying gamey we "discover" throughout the game.

He launched his attack on me, and far more aggressively in the DEI than the Japs did irl. I see Borneo, Java, Malaya falling much quicker than irl.

[Panzergranate]

I've played quite a few 20mm. wargames around WW2 in the far east and even ended up converting a couple of A12 Matilda II tanks into Aussie "Frog" flame thrower tanks.

I'm still working on a A13 II Covnanter bridge laying tank and the Aussie Sentinel  tank models.

I do prefer playing the Japs though (well someone has to in a game) as the morale structure is always more favourable, some of the tanks are quite good compared to the hand me downs the Allies received from the middle estern theatre, anti-tank weapon, especially the infantry ones, are bizare (Luinge Mine or Cherry Picker anyone??) plus I can use grenade snipers.

It is just that playing Japs allows me to put up a formidable defence to my opposing players with very little in the way of equipment than I could if playing a defence with Allies. Make for a good game as well.

Best moment in a WW2 Jap versus US game..... taking out two of the four M4 Sherman the other players had in a game with a Type 1 tank destrioyer a minute after they claimed that the Japs, quote, "Don't have any decnt tanks that can take out an M4!!"

Another player took out a thrid M4 the on the next turn with a Lunge Mine (HC bomb on a pole porpelled by a running Jap soldier) and the final one was finished later with a Type 3 Ceramic Thermide Grenade.

Needless to say, we won that convention game!!

I think that you're in for a tough war for the first part, at least, due to limit resources and manpower, until Allied war production picks up.