Slitherine

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ORIGINAL: Froonp

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ORIGINAL: Orm
Since Portugal now has some real interesting territories in the pacific a new US Entry Action for "Japan declares war on Portugal" seems needed.

Maybe this should wait for MWiF product 2?

Very good idea IMO.

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ORIGINAL: Froonp

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ORIGINAL: Norman42

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ORIGINAL: Froonp

About this last map (Middle East 1942), I wonder what is this diamond shapped territory west of Kuwait. It show on others maps of this area during WW2.
Like this one (Oil routes in Middle East, 1941) :

Anyone knows ?

I believe thats the 'disputed area'. Undefined border between Iraq and SA that wasn't settled til the 50's if I remember my history right. There were a few of these 'bubbles' on their mutual border.

My Collier Atlas name this area : "Neutral Zone" or "Neutral Area" something like that. Must be what you say.

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ORIGINAL: brian brian

Goa is a port and that is that. Wikipedia calls it "one of the finest harbors in south-east Asia". Gameyness should be fixed in the rules, not on the map. Japan doesn't have the army needed to campaign from the west coast of India and ever get anywhere, so you might as well make it a port. As the CW I'd rather see the Japanese start out there surrounded by mountains than some other possible landing areas, and the Japanese are more likely to land in the east where it is easier to deploy land-based air and protect their supply lines and actually get to something valuable like a red factory and/or some resource hexes connected to ports. Besides, India is now too huge of a target for the Japanese army to run around in, they would just get lost on the way to Dehli with huge flanks they would be unable to protect. Pondicherry and Damian don't seem anywhere near as similar, port-wise. If the CW wants to DoW Portugal, they can easily assign a unit to take Goa in case the Japanese align it. If the Japanese want to enter India via a DoW on Portugal, I'm sure the Germans would want to wring their necks for that and as the CW I'd be grateful.

If it's gamey for Japan to use Goa like that, how gamey will it be for the Allies to use Macao, a 15 square kilometer island now occupying an entire hex? Also a port. The CW can't garrison Hong Kong, but they could DoW Portugal to get the Azores and drop a garrison on Macao to annoy the Japanese....or later in the war take Portugal and simultaneously land in Macao to get a free port on the South China Sea. I'm sorry Patrice, but I feel pretty strongly about that and can't agree with treating those two tiny colonies so very differently and I see no logic in trying to fix gamey rules via heavy-handed map editing. You have done such an excellent job on everything and I know you wouldn't change basic hex terrain of clear or mountain to favor one side or the other, the terrain is the terrain, so why should ports be any different? Goa is a red herring, let the players fall into that if they want; as you note yourself elsewhere is better anyway.

I guess since it's last call on the map I'd put my two cents in again. If I hadn't just had a couple three beers I'd probably delete this and forget about it again.

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ORIGINAL: iamspamus
I concur. It is a great harbor. That's why the Portuguese took it.

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ORIGINAL: Froonp

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ORIGINAL: iamspamus
I concur. It is a great harbor. That's why the Portuguese took it.

If all great harbors in the world were to be represented, there would be 1 minor port in each and every coastal hexes of the map. If the original designers did not put a map here, I take it that they judged that it was not enough to be represented by a minor port.
For example there are tens of great harbors on the French coast between Marseilles and the Spanish Coast, but none are represented on the map. Should we add 1 port per coastal hex ?

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ORIGINAL: abj9562

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ORIGINAL: Froonp

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ORIGINAL: iamspamus
I concur. It is a great harbor. That's why the Portuguese took it.

If all great harbors in the world were to be represented, there would be 1 minor port in each and every coastal hexes of the map. If the original designers did not put a map here, I take it that they judged that it was not enough to be represented by a minor port.
For example there are tens of great harbors on the French coast between Marseilles and the Spanish Coast, but none are represented on the map. Should we add 1 port per coastal hex ?

Adding 1 port per coastal hex is silly. However adding one port of the appropriate size per country next to a sea area allows players the decision to invade or defend. This puts the risk into the hands of players. Of course if there was no port then do not create what did not exist. As for size, the tonnage moved through them should be a fair representation of major or minor. If a country had multiple major or minor ports next to a sea zone, then I trust your judgement to which ports should be placed on the map based on tactical and strategical aspects of game play.

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ORIGINAL: brian brian

Capturing a major port drove strategy in western Europe in 1994, but not in WiF. Similarly, where one could unload tanks was pretty important in the desert to the point that intell on the unloading capacities in Benghazi influenced one of the ebbs-and-flows through Cyrenaica. In WiF, all you need to do is land an HQ on a friendly hex. Those are issues a future version of the computer assisted game could work on as well.

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ORIGINAL: micheljq

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ORIGINAL: brian brian

Capturing a major port drove strategy in western Europe in 1994, but not in WiF. Similarly, where one could unload tanks was pretty important in the desert to the point that intell on the unloading capacities in Benghazi influenced one of the ebbs-and-flows through Cyrenaica. In WiF, all you need to do is land an HQ on a friendly hex. Those are issues a future version of the computer assisted game could work on as well.

That's why they sent the canadians do the dirty work of taking Antwerp port in 1944. The allies were in need of facilities for unloading their reinforcements, supplies, etc. in Europe.

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ORIGINAL: brian brian
... I do think though that the US Entry penalty for a CW DoW on Portugal should be a little higher than -5 - breaking a 500 year history of good relations would've generated a few headlines in the US ...

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ORIGINAL: Neilster

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ORIGINAL: micheljq

That's why they sent the canadians do the dirty work of taking Antwerp port in 1944. The allies were in need of facilities for unloading their reinforcements, supplies, etc. in Europe.

Except the port had already been taken in early September by the British. The Canadians helped in the later (and nasty) campaign to clear the approaches (without which it couldn't be used). Your point is valid, however.

The loss of an almost intact Antwerp was a potential disaster for the Germans. Swift action to clear it's approaches by the Allies while they were virtually undefended should have been taken. It wasn't, to their later great cost. The glittering prize of the Rhine bridges and a form of "victory disease" due to their rapid advance after the breakout from Normandy deluded them.

IMHO, even if the Rhine had been forced via Market Garden, Antwerp was still required to sustain a drive into Northern Germany. After being obsessed with capturing and using a major port since D-Day, the Allies became strangely cavalier about the best one in Northern Europe.

Cheers, Neilster

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ORIGINAL: micheljq

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ORIGINAL: Neilster

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ORIGINAL: micheljq

That's why they sent the canadians do the dirty work of taking Antwerp port in 1944. The allies were in need of facilities for unloading their reinforcements, supplies, etc. in Europe.

Except the port had already been taken in early September by the British. The Canadians helped in the later (and nasty) campaign to clear the approaches (without which it couldn't be used). Your point is valid, however.

The loss of an almost intact Antwerp was a potential disaster for the Germans. Swift action to clear it's approaches by the Allies while they were virtually undefended should have been taken. It wasn't, to their later great cost. The glittering prize of the Rhine bridges and a form of "victory disease" due to their rapid advance after the breakout from Normandy deluded them.

IMHO, even if the Rhine had been forced via Market Garden, Antwerp was still required to sustain a drive into Northern Germany. After being obsessed with capturing and using a major port since D-Day, the Allies became strangely cavalier about the best one in Northern Europe.

Cheers, Neilster

This was called the battle of the Scheldt, interesting wikipedia page on it here : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Scheldt

The Scheldt was the area controlling the approaches to the port of Antwerp which the germans flooded, boobytrapped, mined, etc. A good defensive position did cost a lot to take. This is where one of the famous canadian brigades, the Black Watch (do not confuse with the british black watch), was virtually annihilated.

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ORIGINAL: brian brian

I wouldn't compare the landings in Iceland to a potential British DoW on Portugal, though they would generate the same die roll in WiF. The Portugese and the British had that nebulous 500 year old treaty after all. What the British almost did in Norway would have made for disastrous press in the USA if Hitler hadn't beaten them to it. What WiF needs is a more dialed-in rule for Portugal's relations to the Allies. One would be to allow the CW to align Portugal upon an Axis DoW on Spain. Another would be to allow an eventual alignment at a point in the war where the Allies were obviously on the way to victory. We've experimented with a House Rule to allow it 3 turns after the last Axis hex is taken in Africa. A third important change would be to reduce the ridiculously over-useful placement of the Azores, and correctly model the 'Air Gap' in the Atlantic. Gaining basing rights to the Azores in late 1943 did finally help close the Air Gap for Med/Africa route convoys, but made for little change on the North Atlantic route. That gap was closed using Greenland and by diverting B-24 Liberators to the U-Boat War, by the personal intervention of Roosevelt over the heads of several of his commanders.

OTOH, the British did pretty much run roughshod over two countries in the Middle East, and the American public didn't even notice. So I've long thought the penalty for western Allied DoWs should vary some by map, with a higher price to pay for a DoW on a country in Western Europe than on other maps.

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ORIGINAL: Orm

I've always seen US entry as it affects the votes in United States Congress. When you make the die roll to see if US enters the war I see it as the President asks the Congress to declare war.
-Orm

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ORIGINAL: KosMic

US Entry has nothing to do with public opinion, only with how events influence votes in Congress along the Isolationist-Interventionist continuum.

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ORIGINAL: brian brian

I like the USE system. Media coverage was more variable in the 1940s and a lot of things could have been different with just one human interest story making a bigger or smaller splash on the radio or the front pages. The point that the system represents Congressional opinion more than public is a good one, but I think that both types of opinion were linked as someone mentioned. If Britain had chosen an ends-justify-the-means strategy such as invading Norway I think the Isolationists would have gotten stronger. But that is just my opinion.

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ORIGINAL: Froonp

Thanks for the drawings barbarossa2, but I think that we won't redraw the area to a so large extend.
There are multiple reasons for that.

First is that this area was debated and redrawn a couple of times already, and some of your modifications go back to the place it was before the last modifications. I don't want to go back and forth indefinitely. The last discussion had sound arguments too, one of which was that the Tigris should not be adjacent to the Persian border that's why we gave up those 2 hexes to Iraq. Now you come and say that the global shape is not good.

Second is that redrawing the area to a so large extend would necessitate assessing all the neighboring countries too, and I don't think that we want to do that. Redrawing Irak leads to redrawing Turkey, and Persia, and then the Black Sea, the easter part of the Med.

Third is that I think that due to different projections, we will never find a perfect MWiF map of all the places in the world, and we have to accept some differences. I think that Iraq as it stands now is both acceptable, and also an improvement from where we started with the original CWiF map.

You must also know that the awkwardness of this area of the map comes from the fact that a large part of it is on the WiF FE European map, and that this was decided to be kept as it was, with some modifications on the fringes, like the one we did for Scandinavia, and some we did here in Middle East, and particulary in Iraq. But I believe that here you are bringing us too far.

This said, I keep your proposed map and text in my archives, in the place where I keep all the work about this area of the world, we never know, and if we have the chance to improve the map deeper in the future, I'll use your work.

Opinions from other people ?

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ORIGINAL: warspite1

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ORIGINAL: Froonp

Thanks for the drawings barbarossa2, but I think that we won't redraw the area to a so large extend.
There are multiple reasons for that.

First is that this area was debated and redrawn a couple of times already, and some of your modifications go back to the place it was before the last modifications. I don't want to go back and forth indefinitely. The last discussion had sound arguments too, one of which was that the Tigris should not be adjacent to the Persian border that's why we gave up those 2 hexes to Iraq. Now you come and say that the global shape is not good.

Second is that redrawing the area to a so large extend would necessitate assessing all the neighboring countries too, and I don't think that we want to do that. Redrawing Irak leads to redrawing Turkey, and Persia, and then the Black Sea, the easter part of the Med.

Third is that I think that due to different projections, we will never find a perfect MWiF map of all the places in the world, and we have to accept some differences. I think that Iraq as it stands now is both acceptable, and also an improvement from where we started with the original CWiF map.

You must also know that the awkwardness of this area of the map comes from the fact that a large part of it is on the WiF FE European map, and that this was decided to be kept as it was, with some modifications on the fringes, like the one we did for Scandinavia, and some we did here in Middle East, and particulary in Iraq. But I believe that here you are bringing us too far.

This said, I keep your proposed map and text in my archives, in the place where I keep all the work about this area of the world, we never know, and if we have the chance to improve the map deeper in the future, I'll use your work.

Opinions from other people ?

Warspite1

I agree, given the time to launch is closing rapidly and the knock-on effects on the maps of other countries. We all want this game as realistic as possible and I like the fact that you are keeping open the possibility of revisions to the map in MWIF 2.

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ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
It is tempting to redo Iraq, and even a lot of the rest of the map, but it is outside our feasible timeline at this point.

We have been reworking the map substantially since 2005. Having a "fresh go" at it now is less important than over 100 other things I can think of spending my time on. Anyway, from a designer's point of view, the 3 key elements of a historical military simulation are: map, units, and time. None of these should be modified separately, but rather reviewed simultaneously. The interaction of these 3 elements make the game what it is.

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ORIGINAL: Froonp

Thanks for the drawings barbarossa2, but I think that we won't redraw the area to a so large extend.
There are multiple reasons for that.

First is that this area was debated and redrawn a couple of times already, and some of your modifications go back to the place it was before the last modifications. I don't want to go back and forth indefinitely. The last discussion had sound arguments too, one of which was that the Tigris should not be adjacent to the Persian border that's why we gave up those 2 hexes to Iraq. Now you come and say that the global shape is not good.

Second is that redrawing the area to a so large extend would necessitate assessing all the neighboring countries too, and I don't think that we want to do that. Redrawing Irak leads to redrawing Turkey, and Persia, and then the Black Sea, the easter part of the Med.

Third is that I think that due to different projections, we will never find a perfect MWiF map of all the places in the world, and we have to accept some differences. I think that Iraq as it stands now is both acceptable, and also an improvement from where we started with the original CWiF map.

You must also know that the awkwardness of this area of the map comes from the fact that a large part of it is on the WiF FE European map, and that this was decided to be kept as it was, with some modifications on the fringes, like the one we did for Scandinavia, and some we did here in Middle East, and particulary in Iraq. But I believe that here you are bringing us too far.

This said, I keep your proposed map and text in my archives, in the place where I keep all the work about this area of the world, we never know, and if we have the chance to improve the map deeper in the future, I'll use your work.

Opinions from other people ?

quote:

ORIGINAL: Froonp

Thanks for the drawings barbarossa2, but I think that we won't redraw the area to a so large extend.
There are multiple reasons for that.

First is that this area was debated and redrawn a couple of times already, and some of your modifications go back to the place it was before the last modifications. I don't want to go back and forth indefinitely. The last discussion had sound arguments too, one of which was that the Tigris should not be adjacent to the Persian border that's why we gave up those 2 hexes to Iraq. Now you come and say that the global shape is not good.

Second is that redrawing the area to a so large extend would necessitate assessing all the neighboring countries too, and I don't think that we want to do that. Redrawing Irak leads to redrawing Turkey, and Persia, and then the Black Sea, the easter part of the Med.

Third is that I think that due to different projections, we will never find a perfect MWiF map of all the places in the world, and we have to accept some differences. I think that Iraq as it stands now is both acceptable, and also an improvement from where we started with the original CWiF map.

You must also know that the awkwardness of this area of the map comes from the fact that a large part of it is on the WiF FE European map, and that this was decided to be kept as it was, with some modifications on the fringes, like the one we did for Scandinavia, and some we did here in Middle East, and particulary in Iraq. But I believe that here you are bringing us too far.

This said, I keep your proposed map and text in my archives, in the place where I keep all the work about this area of the world, we never know, and if we have the chance to improve the map deeper in the future, I'll use your work.

Opinions from other people ?