Slitherine

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Which shot glass has the poison in it? (Both?)

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

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Which shot glass has the poison in it? (Both?)

Come on moose! You know how hard it is get these 2 to the same party much less get along? A few Saki's and they start blaming each other for that whole Southwest Pacific thing. It will all end in tears.

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

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Perhaps it's the early date - we're in September '42 - but this is consistent with what I found in my previous PBEM game. Production seems to be out of balance in a major way. Or am I overlooking something?

A toast to unrealistic aircraft production!

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This pictograph broaches several important questions. I'd better state these before CRSutton beats me to the punch:

1. Why are they both wearing lipstick?
2. Why does the guy in the blue uniform have a cooked scrambled quail egg on his cap?
3. That thing coming out of the box in the upper right-is that some sort of demonic jack-in-the-box?
4. They appear to be gazingly 'intently' into one another's eyes whilest toasting. Are they standing a little close too? Does the IJN / IJA have any sort of policy on these matters of conduct in 1942?
5. That IS a sword hilt at the bottom of the image, right?

It's these questions (and my prescription medication) that keep me going throughout the day.

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Full disclosure. It is an ad from the 1930's from this site:
http://pinktentacle.com/2010/09/addictive-ads-1894-1954/

here is another one:

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ORIGINAL: Chickenboy


2. Why does the guy in the blue uniform have a cooked scrambled quail egg on his cap?

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ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

Here's a JFB point of view.  Yes, Japanese production can be manipulated in a way that Allied production cannot.  I don't disagree with anyone on that.  I don't want to argue whether it is a good or bad thing.  It's what we are stuck with. 

What I want to discuss is the long term ramifications of this.  Many people argue about the unfairness of this early in the game.  They don't think about the effects long term.  Japanese production is based on heavy industry points.  Yeah, there's oil, fuel and supply that are a part of it, but it's really HI that matters.  That's the limiting factor of Japanese production.  If the Japanese player puts all of his HI into engines and airframes, then he has to cut out something else.  The Japanese player starts with a surplus of all commodities.  If he doesn't take the SRA, that surplus dries up in less than a year.  Even if he takes the SRA intact, he still has to get stuff to the Home Islands to convert it into HI.  If there is no Allied interdiction of the SLOC, he's good.  Yeah, the sub torpedoes don't work initially.  They will.  I dread the day when the dud rate goes down.  My ships are going to sink like rocks.  That will reduce the amount of stuff that makes it to the Home Island HI factories.  Eventually, my surplus will disappear.  Suddenly, my fuel, supply and HI production will potentially drop.  I'm not looking forward to that.

There is definitely a limit to HI production.  Allied players will argue that the Japanese player can just increase factories to produce more HI.  Sure he can, but at a cost of supply to build factories and then more resources and fuel to use them.  All that is going to do is to make the point where the surplus vanishes happen sooner.  Then he has all those idle factories doing nothing. 

Gentlemen, I recommend you look at this game from a strategic viewpoint.  Yes, you need to plan tactically and operationally, but don't forget to plan strategically too.  What can you do now to make life a living hell for the Japanese player when your dud torpedoes vanish?  Maybe conserve your subs?  What about your carriers.  You know when they will arrive.  The Allies were pretty successful in conserving them in the early war.  Try some of the historical tactics.  Hit & run raids to kill off a few Japanese pilots.  Attack the odd Japanese outpost to wipe out a unit or two.  It adds up.  Prepare for the day when you have the strength to go where you want when you want.  Make sure you have that strength and haven't squandered it away.

Look at everything in terms of HI.  If you destroy a 1E fighter, you've just destroyed 36 HI forever.  You destroy 10 on the ground, that's 360 HI destroyed forever.  That's the limiting factor.  Do you want to make the Japanese player squirm?  Hit him where he won't like it.  Plan for an invasion of Java.  There's a substantial amount of HI there, along with oil, resources and refineries, not to mention some really nice airfields.  Take that island (or even half of it) and you'll see the Japanese player squirm and complain about how unfair the game is. Use  a couple of the airbases the Japanese player has politely built up for you and station some of your fighters and 4E bombers there.  The SRA would be in horrible danger immediately. 

Instead of complaining about how unfair the game is, try to work the game in your favor.  The Japanese player is simply trading supply now (inthe form of more HI factories) for more stuff faster.  The total amount really won't be any more than he would receive in the game.  He's just getting more up front.  You'll have your day.  He's just making it that much easier for you in the end game.

One last comment.  You don't like lots of Tojos apparently.  Let's say your opponent gets hot and heavy into Tojo produciton.  Ok, in mid to late 1942 there will be Tojos that run amok.  Let's say you can't shoot them down fast enough.  Avoid them!  So he has a bunch of Tojos.  How will they do against the later war Allied fighters?  He either uses them or complains about how unfair the game is and lets 500 of them sit idle in his pool. 

Canoerebel, sorry for all of this.  I sometimes get tired of people complaining about things they don't like.  They don't like the way things are in this game, but play to their enemies strengths.  Everyone needs to play to his own strengths and to his enemies weaknesses.  Example:  When I invaded Northern Australia in my game, my opponent sent me an email thanking me for opening up an nice bomb testing facility in Northern Australia for him.  Yeah, it is that.  I think that I'll gain more by controlling the bases in Northern Australia than I will lose from his 4E bombers.  We shal see.

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ORIGINAL: crsutton

One point. I totally disagree with you about the Allied sub threat. Although Allied subs are fun to play with and can have some nasty kills, there is no way that an Allied player will be able to duplicate the real situation where the Allied submarine force placed an eventual death hold on the flow of Japanese merchant shipping. At least, not if you are playing an opponent that knows what he is doing.

Two reasons that I have stated in prior posts. One is poor targeting. The AI insists on tageting the most craptacular escort in a convoy over the more valuable merchant ships. So 50% of the time or more, my sups take a shot (usually missing) at the escort in a convoy and then get pounded by the remaining escorts. I can't tell you have many times I have watched valuable tankers skate away this way.

The other is that a competent Japanese player can tweak up his ASW efforts to the point that by late 1943 life at sea starts to get pretty deadly for Allied subs. In May of 1943 on any given day I would say that I have 25 or more subs either in the yard or slinking home with damage (mostly air attacks) and I have yet to face the deadly later war E class escorts that Japan gets.

This perhaps is the most frustrating aspect of the game to me. I can take the wierd sort of advantages that a Japanese player can create early in the game, but to me, if the Japanese player is not sweating out a serious Allied sub campaign in 1944, then this is a major defect in the game.

Created by the amazing Dixie

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ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

At what point in the war do you find that to be the case?  It certainly is not the case in my PBEM in May 42.

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ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

At what point in the war do you find that to be the case?  It certainly is not the case in my PBEM in May 42.

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Chime in! I'm enjoying everybody's comments.

By the way, I just read FatR's AAR. I shuddered as yet another KB slaughter of Allied carriers (similar to what occurred in Cap & Gown's game).

This makes me very, very, very glad that I still have my carrier forces intact. I need to reevaluate any plans I have involving my carriers.

Back to the wacky air war topic, in addition to the production and pilot training issues that make Japan's airforce much more lethal than in the real war, here are some other factors that recently have received mention in other threads as having an impact:

1. Doesn't it require 70 exp. pilots for bombers to carry 1,000 pounders or heavier? It's going to be a rare engagement indeed in which Allied dive bomber pilots have that level of experience. If SBDs are carrying 500 pounders for most of the war, that puts the Allies at a disadvantage.

2. The Allies do begin the war with some decent carrier squadron pilots, but once the first big naval battle takes place with high pilot losses, the Allies may not reach that level of quality again for a year or perhaps two or three years. That's gruesome.

3. The Allies have a very hard time replacing SBDs and other naval aircraft.

4. The Netty factor - Japanese LBA can be lethal out to a range of, what, 15 hexes? The Allies cannot counter.

5. Anemic flak.

6. Anemic CAP. This idea has been dismissed as being without merit, but I still think CAP is far too porous from what I've seen in my games and plenty of other AARs.

These are some of the things that make it very difficult for the Allies to compete historically in the air war. Am I overlooking any others?

Created by the amazing Dixie

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Chime in! I'm enjoying everybody's comments.

By the way, I just read FatR's AAR. I shuddered as yet another KB slaughter of Allied carriers (similar to what occurred in Cap & Gown's game).

This makes me very, very, very glad that I still have my carrier forces intact. I need to reevaluate any plans I have involving my carriers.
And protect them well. If the situation does not favour you do not take on KB until you get
Hellcats. Then the tide starts to shift in your favour. As soon as you can put F4U-1A on your carriers CAP gets pretty decent. But Cap is not as strong as WITP. To kill a KB strike you need to at least have a cap:strike ratio of 2:1. And even this does not prevent some DB and TB to get through.

Back to the wacky air war topic, in addition to the production and pilot training issues that make Japan's airforce much more lethal than in the real war, here are some other factors that recently have received mention in other threads as having an impact:

1. Doesn't it require 70 exp. pilots for bombers to carry 1,000 pounders or heavier? It's going to be a rare engagement indeed in which Allied dive bomber pilots have that level of experience. If SBDs are carrying 500 pounders for most of the war, that puts the Allies at a disadvantage.
No your DB always will use 1000 pounders at normal range, later one get 2x250 as addition on normal. At extended most of the time they use just 500 pounders. I think at WITP(or was it UV ?) when EXP was > 70 you had a chance to drop 2000 pound bombs at normal range with DBs (not sure about it).

Your 4E and 2E bombers need a squad EXP > 70 to carry 1000 pounders or 2000 pounders on port attack (not sure about naval strike) but just forget it to get enough pilots.

2. The Allies do begin the war with some decent carrier squadron pilots, but once the first big naval battle takes place with high pilot losses, the Allies may not reach that level of quality again for a year or perhaps two or three years. That's gruesome.
If you have a good training program it is not that bad. As Navy Pilots start with quite high EXP you can train them to 55 XP which is usualy enough if they have 70 air 70 def rating. You can use your Float plane Squads at West Coast to train navy pilots. Aprox. 150 pilots space there which is enough.

3. The Allies have a very hard time replacing SBDs and other naval aircraft.
Yea that really sucks hard. You get a lot of Fighters/DB and TB later on (more than enough) but you lack patrol planes. (And all other planes until mid of 1943.

4. The Netty factor - Japanese LBA can be lethal out to a range of, what, 15 hexes? The Allies cannot counter.
I do not fear the Netties that hard. When you are in the defense phase until stay out their range and later just cap your units and pound their bases.

5. Anemic flak.
true

6. Anemic CAP. This idea has been dismissed as being without merit, but I still think CAP is far too porous from what I've seen in my games and plenty of other AARs.
For me CAP is quite ok, it might not be that slaughter which happen in RL for the later Carrier fights but usualy the Japanese XP is quite high cause of the pilot training. So not really comparable. And if you can put 500 fighters into the air your cap is quite ok. At least you will kill KB in the engagement quite sure and only lose some CVs.

These are some of the things that make it very difficult for the Allies to compete historically in the air war. Am I overlooking any others?
Air war just is quite nasty against an experienced opponent. You just do not have the frames to fight the Japanese endless stream of fighters and bombers until mid of 1943. Then it gets better. The production system produces to much planes early in the game and an acceptable amount later. It think only way to solve it is when the engines and the frames
cost HI and either the late war frames are cheaper (especial for example the wooden frames)
or each frame for example gets cheaper each month in production until with a limit. At least my opponent does not seem to be a heavy production optimizing guy so i still have quite a chance in early 43 in the air.

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Chime in! I'm enjoying everybody's comments.

By the way, I just read FatR's AAR. I shuddered as yet another KB slaughter of Allied carriers (similar to what occurred in Cap & Gown's game).

This makes me very, very, very glad that I still have my carrier forces intact. I need to reevaluate any plans I have involving my carriers.

Back to the wacky air war topic, in addition to the production and pilot training issues that make Japan's airforce much more lethal than in the real war, here are some other factors that recently have received mention in other threads as having an impact:

1. Doesn't it require 70 exp. pilots for bombers to carry 1,000 pounders or heavier? It's going to be a rare engagement indeed in which Allied dive bomber pilots have that level of experience. If SBDs are carrying 500 pounders for most of the war, that puts the Allies at a disadvantage.

I think you're confusing LBA with carrier aircraft. I think for USAAF aircraft, your assessment is correct, but SBDs will carry 1000 lb'ers at 'normal' ranges in preference to 500lb-ers. Leastwise, that's my understanding.

2. The Allies do begin the war with some decent carrier squadron pilots, but once the first big naval battle takes place with high pilot losses, the Allies may not reach that level of quality again for a year or perhaps two or three years. That's gruesome.

Same same for the Japanese, perhaps moreso.

4. The Netty factor - Japanese LBA can be lethal out to a range of, what, 15 hexes? The Allies cannot counter.

Not to pick nits, but 17 for Bettys. So sorry. Zeroes can escort at extended range with droptanks to 14 hexes. You CAN counter if you wanna-load up your torp Catalinas en masse and escort them with P-38s. What sort of range would that buy you? I know, not entirely realistic comparison.

These are some of the things that make it very difficult for the Allies to compete historically in the air war. Am I overlooking any others?

Yes-the fact that the Allies are led by that gangster Churchill and his crony imperialist President Roosevelt. The Imperial Japanese code of Bushido, and our apparent liberal useage of lipstick for our warriors, makes all resistance futile.

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ORIGINAL: cap_and_gown

First, I just want to point out that Canoe was the one who asked for scenario #2, not #1. To then complain about unrealistic Japanese production abilities doesn't cut it since that is the point of scenario #2.

In scenario #1 the trade-offs the Mike points to certainly do exist. You cannot have it all as Japan, even if that is what it feels like from the AFB point of view. More planes = less ships or less fuel.

As to ASW, I have yet to see my ASW ships achieve any results. An occasional hit here and there, mostly in shallow water, but certainly nothing for the allied player to worry about. The air component, OTOH, has been very effective. I would say too effective at sinking, except that when I look at what dedicated ASW ships have achieved (which is close to nothing) it seems to balance out. Furthermore, a hit that sends a sub home but does not kill it seems to balance out the fact that subs spend much more time on patrol in AE than IRL. If you reduce the hit ratio for planes, you also need to do something about subs being out at sea 99% of the time.

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

These are some of the things that make it very difficult for the Allies to compete historically in the air war. Am I overlooking any others?

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ORIGINAL: cap_and_gown

If you reduce the hit ratio for planes, you also need to do something about subs being out at sea 99% of the time.

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ORIGINAL: vettim89

First, this is a game afterall. As I pointed out in another thread, no JFB would want to play "Japan Gets It's Butt Kicked (Again) in the Pacific". So lets at least agree that to make this game fun for both sides, some allowances need to be made.

So I am less likely to complain about Japanese airframe production because as Mike pointed out, it comes at a price. One issue I think should be addressed is that HI comes too cheap for Japan. This is modable. I have read some of the production threads where Japan can run its economy on the Resources available in Japan, China, and Manchuko as long as they have the fuel flowing from the SRA. In RL, Japan needed the tin, rubber, and other resources from the SRA just as badly as they needed the oil. Also, I have also read that the Japanese economy can also run with all the LI turned off. Again, we have a problem here.

ASW in general is a problem. What makes it confounding is that early war ASW seems about right. Its only the late war E class and USN DE's that can kill at will. I play the Downfall scenario a lot. A TF with one or two E class escorts will almost always sink a USN sub with 25-35 hits. The ASW routine is completely messed up and ASW value being dependant on the number of mounts is a joke. I am working on some ideas to fix this but it will take a lot of work to do what I want.

Another problem is that the game lets both sides use Army bombers to conduct ASW. Both sides had serious interservice cooperation issues. This would just not have been done. I wish the game would be more selective in what aircraft are allowed to do ASW patrol for both sides. Why do you think the USN bought all those B-24 variants? So they could use that great airframes LR capabilites for their use because the USAAF wasn;t going to task them to NavSearch/ASW. Now there was some NavSearch by the USAAF early in the war but it ended as soon as the USN was up to speed. Perhaps that would be a good HR - neither side may use Army aircraft for NavSearch/ASW after say 1/43

JOMHO