Slitherine

quote:

However, I'm pretty sure the number of games where Japan does better than history is much smaller than the number of games where the Allies do better than history.

quote:

4. The initial Japanese amphibious landing bonus.

Can be seen to represent the extensive pre-war planning for the initial operations.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Anomander Rake

quote:

Allies do not have free spawning system for carriers and cruisers. No official scenario has enabled the spawning feature. To the best of my knowledge no user created scenario has incorporated this feature

Really? I thought it was the mechanism assigned to the game. So I will be more happy to sink allied cruisers (especially).
Amphibious bonus arguments are not convincing. It should simply be done. I mean on / off switch.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Alfred

Allies do not have free spawning system for carriers and cruisers.  No official scenario has enabled the spawning feature.  To the best of my knowledge no user created scenario has incorporated this feature.

As to  the Japanese ship acceleration it is most definitely not a limited option.  Just because most Japanese players prefer to invest most of their heavy industry points on other actions does not diminish the value of this capacity.  Plus the real world Japanese shipyards were already at maximum capacity, no ship which could be built in time and which was considered to be a useful ROI was left unbuilt.  Thus in the game additional ships can be brought into play before the end of the scenario without having due regard to historical bottlenecks such as appropriate quality steel, turrets, propulsion systems, loss of skilled workers impressed to serve in the military, inadequate electronic capacity, suitable shipyards.

The amphibious bonus is not an on/off toggle because the very same JFB players who insist on absolute religious adherence to exactly reproduce the eras weapons, doctrines, industrial capacity, would be the first to howl loudly at its removal.  As the feature is needed for the AI and there would undoubtedly be some solo human players who would toggle it off for the Japanese AI (and then complain about a weak AI opponent) it is easier to simply retain the feature on.

There are two fundamental different people types who play AE.  The AFB/JFB divide is not it and it is often unfair to label an individual as belong to one of those camps for the inference is that they are biased to that side and against the other.  The fundamental divide is really between those who accept the game design features and mechanics and work within them.  If they think a bug exists or that perhaps something is not working as designed, they will raise it as an issue.  Otherwise they quietly play the game, some only as the Allies, some only as Japan and some as either side.
I'll add that even those of us who fall into this category will sometimes make self-limiting adjustments, one example being only moving fuel on tanker types (or dedicated fuel tanks on other ships).

The other group (and they play either side) are those who under the cloak of historical accuracy will demand game changes which, as the French would say quel surprise, just coincidentally make it easier for them to win and again quel surprise, remain silent on ahistorical game elements which make it easier of them to win.  To make it even more pointed the historical record is usually misrepresented so they will justify doing something in 1942 which in fact was only possible and done in 1945, or insist on their opponent not doing something because it was rarely done in the PTO as if that was an absolute bar when in reality it wasn't done much in the PTO because there were higher priorities for the use of those assets, a priority which may not be applicable to AE because of the changed battlescape brought about by the game's abstractions.

Alfred

quote:

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

quote:

Original: Alfred
It is only the mindset of those JFB players who believe that somehow they are entitled to, in a game which is supposed to faithfully reproduce the historical factors, to achieve an absolute victory of an equal magnitude to that achieved by the historical Allies in August 1945.

quote:

Original: InfiniteMonkey
The lure for the Japanese player is to do better than his historical counterparts. The Japanese player never believes they will win, they just hope to survive beyond VJ day. The truest way for the Japanese player to do that is to never attack the US at all. In other words, the best course of action for most Japanese players in the face of continuous AFB whining is simply not to play WitP:AE.

quote:

Alfred hit it on the nose....GP

No, InfiniteMonkey hit it on the nose...


InfiniteMonkey repeats a common claim made by JFB but a claim which is not credible because their actions contradict their words. If it were really true these players would

(a) play the game using the VP system as the marker of doing better than history. They never do play the VP system so the claim is always hollow, and

(b) they would not agitate for crippling non-historical HRs on Allied opponents or come up with excuses for ahistorical and implausible Japanese capabilities. If they really believed in this claim they would instead rely upon their own skill in formulating appropriate strategy/tactics and anticipation of opponent moves to achieve a better outcome than the historical outcome[/I]


1. Japanese has absolute certainty that the Soviets will not launch a surprise attack on her before August 1945.

OTOH the Allies have the absolute certainty that the Soviets will declare war in August 1945.

Japan and the Soviets had signed a non-aggression pact, which was to remain in force until April 1946.

This allowed the Japanese to reduce the Kwangtung Army. It was "plundered" as a source of reinforcements to be sent elsewhere, units were reduced to peacetime strength and the "excess" wartime strength personnel transferred out of theater, some units lost entire battalions or even regiments transferred out of theater as cadre for new units. The 1945 Kwangtung Army was a hollow shell compared to 1941.

So why blame the JFBs for doing something in the game which has been done by the Japanese IRL ?!?


Read more closely what I actually wrote. In the 8 instances I am not addressing whether play is gamey or not but pointing out the game design elements which provide Japan ahistorical advantages.

The Japanese did not gut their army in quality in the way you are inferring. It was smaller than it had been in 1941 but was still expected to be competitive. In AE every AFV can be removed and sent elsewhere. Every heavy artillery unit can be removed. This was not done in real life so please don't claim that the JFB is doing what was done in real life.

The point about the AFB knowing with certainty is comparing apples with oranges and irrelevant. Soviet auto activation comes far too late to help the Allied player achieve a decisive victory, which is the only way Japan fails to do better than history in the VP system. By 1 August 1945, if the Allied player is not on the verge of achieving a decisive victory without Soviet assistance then he won't get it once the Soviets enter the war before time runs out. A strong Allied performance which sees his opponent outplayed will probably result in a decisive Allied victory in the June-July 1945 period.[/I]


2. Aircraft do not consume AVGAS.

Was it an availability problem (not enough production) or more a distribution problem for Japan (lack of tankers / losses in transit)? As it is, the tanker issue goes for both sides. The Allies can also use all tankers exclusively to ship fuel for the fleet and thus speed-up naval ops, not having to worry about tanker capacity needed to ship the prodigious quantities of avgas the Allied 4E monsters needed to fly.


Again you are muddying the waters with gameplay which may or may not be viewed as gamey. Decisions made to "speed up" naval operations by either side is again apples and oranges to what I am talking about being game design parameters which ahistorically benefit Japan whether or not the player takes full advantage of them.

Allied tankers will still be sailing to destinations which need fuel for ships and industry and these are the same destinations which needed AVGAS. In the game Japanese tankers will be sailing to far fewer destinations thereby saving on fuel consumption and presenting fewer killing fields (which are patrolled by far more aircraft and ships than was possible in real life) for Allied subs. This is particularly so when combined with the magical highway.[/I]


3. The magical highway which allows the auto movement of oil/fuel/resources all the way from Singapore to Port Arthur (or even Korea).

How many JFBs actually (want to) achieve this? It is neither a common occurrence nor a standard strategy. In fact, it is hard to achieve and requires a considerable investment of forces and supplies. Plus it is relatively easy for the Allies to cut that route, forcing the Japanese to keep sizeable garrisons and mobile reserves.


You must be living in a hermit's cave.

In response to numerous requests, both PaxMondo and myself have posted at length on how to create the magical highway. It is not difficult at all. It requires a small amount of skill, mainly the English language comprehension skill to follow what we have written. Furthermore the only Japanese players who do not attempt to set up the magical highway are those who aren't aware of what it is. Even then anyone with a decent understanding of the game's logistics stands an excellent chance of creating it unintentionally for as I posted earlier it results from the games built in logistical design parameters.

Cutting the magical highway is easy when? In 1942? 1943? 1944? 1945? Think carefully before you answer to cut it requires Allied forces which are found nearby in 1942? 1943? 1944? 1945? Plus where exactly would it be cut? China is the most promising location but that would entail Allied players following my oft repeated advice for that theatre and guess what, they never do instead implementing a strategy which makes life easier for their opponent. But again this is a digression into gameplay and away from the design parameters.


4. The initial Japanese amphibious landing bonus.

Can be seen to represent the extensive pre-war planning for the initial operations.


If it makes you sleep better at night.

It is there for the AI.

The pre-war planning excuse would only be valid if it were limited to the actual locations invaded by Japan in those months. There was no extensive pre war planning to land at Mersing on 8/9 December 1941. Or land in December 1941 at Palembang. Or land at Port Moresby in January 1942. Or land in Ceylon in February 1942.

Alternatively, in order to allow the Japanese player flexibility the game design could have said in real life Japan landed at x locations in this period so you get the same number of x opportunities to benefit at locations chosen b the player. But that is not the design parameter. Instead we have one which allows much greater possibilities than were available in real life. There were only a few locations that the Japanese had the resources to allocate to preplan extensively.[/I]


5. Accelerated ship construction.

Difficult to afford for Japan and comes with a cost. Number of ship construction points is limited and yard expansion is expensive. Plus I faintly remember a Dev comment about Allied shipbuilding being considered "accelerated" by design from Dec 7th 1941 on.


Again not relevant what the actual game play is. It is a design parameter which exists whether or not the player fully avails themselves of it.

Dev comments are that there is no true ship building in the game. The issue is when do the scheduled ships appear in the game. The Allied player has zero capacity to bring them forward whereas the Japanese player can provided they meet the cost. Everything has a cost in the game so it does not support your proposition that because there is a cost involved, it somehow invalidates this as a design parameter which benefits Japan. It also costs to R&D and produce aircraft, surely you are not going to claim with a straight face that isn't a design parameter which benefits Japan.

Allied and Japanese ships which were built in the war are scheduled to appear when they did. There are no knowingly "accelerated" arrival Allied ships. Do not confuse this with the toggle to set variable reinforcements. Japanese ships in the queue for arrival after the historical surrender are largely "theoretical" and there primarily to provide some new capacity in the event the game goes all the distance to the end of March 1946. But the design parameter allows for these "theoretical" ships to appear when the Japanese player is playing to stave off a decisive Allied victory.[/I]


6. Unified Central Command

Certainly true for Japan, but also true to an extent for the Allies which had a fair amount of dissent, dabbling and plotting over strategies, timing, force allocation etc. - esp. in the CBI. As players, we are the supreme commander with powers to impose our will on all factions.


You are overplaying the extent of Allied disputation. No Alliance is ever dispute free but the historical impact on the Allied war performance was far less detrimental than that on the Japanese.



7. Air unit size

Matter of HR negotiation. In my PBEM with IdahoNYer we have limited resizing to six dedicated training groups per side which are not allowed to be used in combat, plus the FP groups. It does not make sense to overdo resizing - the Japanese economy may be able to produce the necessary airframes, but the number of pilots is fixed, and it is easy to run the trainee pool dry.


Again you are mixing gameplay with design parameters which are structural. I am addressing the design parameter which sees bigger Japanese air units than Allied units at the start of play and the design decision to breakdown Allied Wings to individual squadrons, not the OP issue of whether resizing is gamey.

PaxMondo is also selective in his resizing but he uses different criteria. Any AFB who makes the blanket complaint that Japanese resizing is overlooking the game design intent to allow air units operating off ships to be resized to meet the ship capacity. What is not the game design intent is to then move those resized air units to a terrestrial base and operate them at their artificial enlarged size. In any case what is the dev intention is not really relevant in the circumstances when both PBEM players have agreed to a particular game play, although player agreement does not invalidate that one side benefits more than the other from a design parameter. But again this is a digression into game play and not what is my focus in this thread.



8. Absence of electronics

Improvements like VT fuze and radar gunnery are handled "under the hood". However, what seems to be lacking is a "reliability factor" for the search radar devices in the game, esp. for the notoriously unreliable Japanese radar.


I said there was some abstraction although on this occasion I did not spell it out as being largely under the hood. Still the abstraction comes no where close to representing the true disparity between the two sides. The clearest demonstration is that the opening salvo between opposing SAGs disregards radar contact details and only opens fire when the human Mark I eyeball makes contact. This means that Allied surface task force always come within range of the Long Lance.


The list could go on and on, with examples for both sides of perceived or real advantages / disadvantages which should or should not be in the game.

However, I'm pretty sure the number of games where Japan does better than history is much smaller than the number of games where the Allies do better than history.


This only occurs because almost all Japanese players stubbornly refuse to play the VP system. The few who do play the VP system actually do quite well, especially if their opponent is one of those macho players who declaim, whilst they thump their chest as if they were auditioning for a role in The Planet of the Apes franchise, they don't play no stinkin' VP system, they will know when they win.



Fact is, unless player skills are very unequal, the Allies will win no matter what - which is perfectly ok.


Again this is simply not true if the VP system is embraced. To make the claim that the Allies will win no matter what denigrates the achievement of all those Japanese PBEM players who have won either as a result of the final VP determination or because their opponent quit. Read the Opponents Wanted sub forum and there are countless Japanese players whose Allied opponent has quit. Just because they don't write an AAR or are not prominent posters to the forum does not mean they didn't beat their Allied opponent fair and square.



The Allied players will get so much stuff they don't even know what to do with it all. The Japanese will be increasingly outgunned, outbombed, outbombarded, outnumbered, outproduced, outmaneuvered, out of supplies and out of options. The only thing they can hope to achieve is to outblunder the Allies. So I have little sympathy for AFB whining about this or that unhistorical (dis)advantage - they should be glad about the additional challenge offered .

quote:

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

quote:

Original: Alfred
It is only the mindset of those JFB players who believe that somehow they are entitled to, in a game which is supposed to faithfully reproduce the historical factors, to achieve an absolute victory of an equal magnitude to that achieved by the historical Allies in August 1945.

quote:

Original: InfiniteMonkey
The lure for the Japanese player is to do better than his historical counterparts. The Japanese player never believes they will win, they just hope to survive beyond VJ day. The truest way for the Japanese player to do that is to never attack the US at all. In other words, the best course of action for most Japanese players in the face of continuous AFB whining is simply not to play WitP:AE.

quote:

Alfred hit it on the nose....GP

No, InfiniteMonkey hit it on the nose...
Sorry to vary somewhat with a brother monkey...

1. Japanese has absolute certainty that the Soviets will not launch a surprise attack on her before August 1945.

OTOH the Allies have the absolute certainty that the Soviets will declare war in August 1945.

Japan and the Soviets had signed a non-aggression pact, which was to remain in force until April 1946.

This allowed the Japanese to reduce the Kwangtung Army. It was "plundered" as a source of reinforcements to be sent elsewhere, units were reduced to peacetime strength and the "excess" wartime strength personnel transferred out of theater, some units lost entire battalions or even regiments transferred out of theater as cadre for new units. The 1945 Kwangtung Army was a hollow shell compared to 1941.

So why blame the JFBs for doing something in the game which has been done by the Japanese IRL ?!?
He is not blaming people, he is pointing out the advantage gained. BTW, you note that the pact was to run to April 1946,
yet the Soviets broke it in August 1945 IRL. The Empire did not and could not have relied upon the Soviets keeping the pact until August of 1945. Japan's draw down of forces assigned to the Kwangtung Army was made in extremis and (so far as I know) as Alfred points out certainly did not include all armoured units, all artillery, etc. So even with the activation mechanism in place the game still allows an advantage to the Japan player there. That is what I understand Alfred to be noting. I see it as "OK, this is what the game does with it." and not really a big deal. Could it be better? Sure, but it's what we have and not horrible. I think it's fair to note that it does vary from 'historical capabilities' (my own wording). When someone says it was realistic and no problem usually they are less concerned about the important details Alfred points out (armour, etc.) and more concerned about game competitiveness.


2. Aircraft do not consume AVGAS.

Was it an availability problem (not enough production) or more a distribution problem for Japan (lack of tankers / losses in transit)? As it is, the tanker issue goes for both sides. The Allies can also use all tankers exclusively to ship fuel for the fleet and thus speed-up naval ops, not having to worry about tanker capacity needed to ship the prodigious quantities of avgas the Allied 4E monsters needed to fly.
Due to the size of the Allied tanker fleet and the course of the vast majority of games this is not really an issue for the Allies. By the time the Allies' 4E armadas are making avgas disappear the Allies have so many tankers operating without fear that it would be the same (for the Allies) with avgas broken out into a separate game element.


3. The magical highway which allows the auto movement of oil/fuel/resources all the way from Singapore to Port Arthur (or even Korea).

How many JFBs actually (want to) achieve this? It is neither a common occurrence nor a standard strategy. In fact, it is hard to achieve and requires a considerable investment of forces and supplies. Plus it is relatively easy for the Allies to cut that route, forcing the Japanese to keep sizeable garrisons and mobile reserves.
It used to be a big topic of discussion with some players able to coach others on exactly how to get it running once the required territory was owned. I'm not really sure how many achieve it.


4. The initial Japanese amphibious landing bonus.

Can be seen to represent the extensive pre-war planning for the initial operations.
Good enough for me. The amphibious planning requirements are pretty artificial anyway and the developers clearly stated they are there to slow the tempo of Allied offensives. In other words, as good as the game engine is, the game engine benefits from that adjustment to make the experience better overall.


5. Accelerated ship construction.

Difficult to afford for Japan and comes with a cost. Number of ship construction points is limited and yard expansion is expensive. Plus I faintly remember a Dev comment about Allied shipbuilding being considered "accelerated" by design from Dec 7th 1941 on.
I do not think the game accelerates Allied ship production vs IRL. Allied (read: "American") aircraft production was greatly curtailed part way through the war due to the favorable course of the war. The US could have produced substantially more aircraft. I think there also some slowdown in US ship production late in the war but not as early and not as much. I lack any details on this and other posters might be able to add to it. I do know the US altered ship construction early on to prioritize some types over others due to lessons learned early in the conflict. There might have been some additional ship building capacity but I recall reading that at some point steel production was seen as becoming a limiting factor, and certainly for Japan was much more of a limiting factor. Accelerated ship construction for Japan is, due to steel production limits, probably not at all realistic, but it's part of the game and (IMO, of course) adds to the overall game. Players who want to try something closer to historical limitations can always HR it out.


6. Unified Central Command

Certainly true for Japan, but also true to an extent for the Allies which had a fair amount of dissent, dabbling and plotting over strategies, timing, force allocation etc. - esp. in the CBI. As players, we are the supreme commander with powers to impose our will on all factions.
Plus no workable way to change this with 1 player on each side or multiple players working toward common Victory Conditions.


7. Air unit size

Matter of HR negotiation. In my PBEM with IdahoNYer we have limited resizing to six dedicated training groups per side which are not allowed to be used in combat, plus the FP groups. It does not make sense to overdo resizing - the Japanese economy may be able to produce the necessary airframes, but the number of pilots is fixed, and it is easy to run the trainee pool dry.


8. Absence of electronics

Improvements like VT fuze and radar gunnery are handled "under the hood". However, what seems to be lacking is a "reliability factor" for the search radar devices in the game, esp. for the notoriously unreliable Japanese radar.


The list could go on and on, with examples for both sides of perceived or real advantages / disadvantages which should or should not be in the game.

However, I'm pretty sure the number of games where Japan does better than history is much smaller than the number of games where the Allies do better than history.

Fact is, unless player skills are very unequal, the Allies will win no matter what - which is perfectly ok. The Allied players will get so much stuff they don't even know what to do with it all. The Japanese will be increasingly outgunned, outbombed, outbombarded, outnumbered, outproduced, outmaneuvered, out of supplies and out of options. The only thing they can hope to achieve is to outblunder the Allies. So I have little sympathy for AFB whining about this or that unhistorical (dis)advantage - they should be glad about the additional challenge offered .

quote:

ORIGINAL: Aurorus

think about 7 full-strength, high experience Japanese divisions, 10 armored regiments, and 20 battalions of heavy artilley moving across the Manchurian border into China on turn 4, and then imagine if all of these units proceeded through China to Thailand in January and February, through Thailand in March, and invaded India in April, along with another 5 or 6 unrestricted Japanese divisions. I would like to see any allied player try to stop 12 Japanese infantry divisions, 2 tank divisions, 5 tank regiments, and 40 or so battalions of heavy artillery from conquering the whole of India by the end of 1942.

So... stop with your nonsense.

quote:

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

You obviously don't know this game very well

quote:

ORIGINAL: RickInVA

quote:

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

Its HISTORY that is highly biased in favor of the Allies.

The GAME is actually highly biased in favor of the Japanese side.

That's apparently what it takes to make the Japanese side sufficiently appealing to have anyone actually play it.

Re: History, agree.
Re: Game, disagree. If that were so a majority of the AARs posted should result in Japanese victory. I do not see that.

Re: being appealing, agree. It is a game, if both sides do not have at least a reasonable chance to win then the side with the markedly lesser chance will be less appealing. Chess would not be as popular if the white side was not allowed to have a queen.

I feel, and I think many would agree, that a good game is one where the skill of the players determines the result, not the game itself.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna

quote:

ORIGINAL: Aurorus

think about 7 full-strength, high experience Japanese divisions, 10 armored regiments, and 20 battalions of heavy artilley moving across the Manchurian border into China on turn 4, and then imagine if all of these units proceeded through China to Thailand in January and February, through Thailand in March, and invaded India in April, along with another 5 or 6 unrestricted Japanese divisions. I would like to see any allied player try to stop 12 Japanese infantry divisions, 2 tank divisions, 5 tank regiments, and 40 or so battalions of heavy artillery from conquering the whole of India by the end of 1942.

So... stop with your nonsense.

Which itself is.... not any size of a deal (and your timeline for those units reaching India is much too short, or assumes that China is being ignored). If Japan is allowed to do this, the Allies are allowed to move any number of Chinese Corps units to the Land of Plenty to fill out into 750+ AV monsters of fodder, for example.

quote:

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

You obviously don't know this game very well

You implied a few posts before this one that the Allies don't get very many planes, which is patently false. Particularly late-war, Japan just can't keep up with the quantity of high-quality planes that the Allies get - whether in production numbers or actually keeping them in the air.

quote:

ORIGINAL: RickInVA

quote:

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

Its HISTORY that is highly biased in favor of the Allies.

The GAME is actually highly biased in favor of the Japanese side.

That's apparently what it takes to make the Japanese side sufficiently appealing to have anyone actually play it.

Re: History, agree.
Re: Game, disagree. If that were so a majority of the AARs posted should result in Japanese victory. I do not see that.

Re: being appealing, agree. It is a game, if both sides do not have at least a reasonable chance to win then the side with the markedly lesser chance will be less appealing. Chess would not be as popular if the white side was not allowed to have a queen.

I feel, and I think many would agree, that a good game is one where the skill of the players determines the result, not the game itself.

I don't agree that Japan has a good shot to win the game barring an autovictory. I don't think it's impossible, I think I would just rate the degree of difficulty as extreme - even if the Japanese player is better than the Allied player. The time scale and weight of the Allied OOB is just too vast and the resources available to Japan are just too limited. I'm not sure how I could have done much of anything better in my late-war Japan game. It's currently November 1944 and I'm still at a 1.5:1 VP ratio, but it's deteriorating. And when I look at the VP math, and what summer-to-fall of 1945 looks like for the Allies, I'm still not sure I won't be looking at a minor defeat come the end of 1945 or early 1946. Barring a disaster, I'm certain that I will be able to get past the Allied Decisive Victory deadline, but beyond that is still entirely up in the air.

Some Allied players often note that there was not much testing done of the game beyond 1943, due to time constraints and the impossibility of playtesting a game that takes multiple years to play (human vs. human, anyway) prior to release - and then that this lack of testing is in some explicit ways biased against the Allies. However, this same lack of testing also shows in the very bones of the VP system - while it is close and a workable system, I'm beginning to notice that once the war reaches a certain point, the VPs available snowball in favor of the Allies. And that that point, while it can be delayed, is absolutely unavoidable unless the Allies lose large chunks of their major shipping on a continuous basis. Of course, all of this postulating is done on an extremely small sample size (for me, 3 games into 1945 soon), but the similarities between all 3 are striking. The early and middle wars in each could not have been more different from each other. The late stages of the war in the first 2 were more or less the same, and are shaping up to be basically the same in the 3rd. We're all playing for VPs, and without any house rules. Different opponents and different sides between the games. My hunch guess would be that, assuming evenly-matched players of a certain baseline level of ability, the chance for Japan to win the game on the VP system is less than 50%. I think substantially less.


Finally, this meme that Japanese PBEM players want to play for VPs and then also limit the Allies with crippling house rules needs to die. It's simply not true, is completely anecdotal and biased by personal feelings, is insulting and offensive, and is therefore counterproductive to this community. Several people in this thread are spouting it, in some cases in almost every post - stop it. You're being rude.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna
... completely anecdotal and biased by personal feelings, is insulting and offensive, and is therefore counterproductive to this community. Several people in this thread are spouting it, in some cases in almost every post - stop it. You're being rude.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna


... It's currently November 1944 and I'm still at a 1.5:1 VP ratio, but it's deteriorating. And when I look at the VP math, and what summer-to-fall of 1945 looks like for the Allies, I'm still not sure I won't be looking at a minor defeat come the end of 1945 or early 1946. Barring a disaster, I'm certain that I will be able to get past the Allied Decisive Victory deadline, but beyond that is still entirely up in the air...

quote:

ORIGINAL: DanSez

But that doesn't confront the ignorance that could be turning off new potential players. We are a small community.
Civility is much more important than winning or losing or even history.

quote:

ORIGINAL: DanSez

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna
... completely anecdotal and biased by personal feelings, is insulting and offensive, and is therefore counterproductive to this community. Several people in this thread are spouting it, in some cases in almost every post - stop it. You're being rude.

THIS.
I generally ignore ignorant rants and want to point out another great feature of the boards.
The Green Button.

But that doesn't confront the ignorance that could be turning off new potential players. We are a small community.
Civility is much more important than winning or losing or even history.

Thanks Lokasenna for standing up and speaking out.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna

You implied a few posts before this one that the Allies don't get very many planes, which is patently false. Particularly late-war, Japan just can't keep up with the quantity of high-quality planes that the Allies get - whether in production numbers or actually keeping them in the air.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Alfred

Furthermore, after 31 August 1945, the Allied player can never achieve a decisive victory.

Alfred

quote:

ORIGINAL: Alfred
In fact anything less than an Allied decisive win means that Japan has performed better than it did historically and as per the VP design intent represents a Japanese "win".

• The victory steps should be mirrored for each side (marginal victory for side 1 = marginal defeat for side 2) and not based on which side you're playing, or else the in-game victory system is not calibrated correctly. In order to be calibrated correctly, actual . This is where I think pre-release testing was (understandably) inadequate: they were making a best guess as to what the victory levels should be and should correspond to.
  
• I don't think the devs missed the mark on the VP system by that much, and it might be able to be rectified via a scenario that adjusts VP levels for bases in various locations (for example) with an eye towards rewarding Japan more for holding on to progressively more strategically important (not just politically important) locations - without accidentally giving Japan even more of a chance to achieve autovictory by increasing the number of Base VPs available to Japan but not the Allies in 1942/1943.
  
• Players that are evenly matched or pretty well matched should expect a roughly 50-50 chance of winning, but in actuality the Allied player has a greater than 50% chance of achieving a game victory if the players are of equal skill. I think this sentiment is often misinterpreted by a lot of readers as an expression that "Japan can't win the war", when actually those of us expressing it are saying that winning the game under the as-shipped victory conditions is not a 50-50 proposition if your opponent is of equal skill to you. If I had to hazard a guess, I would say it is closer to 60-40 or 70-30 that the Allies win a Decisive Victory, and about 90-10 that the Allies achieve any kind of victory, if the 2 players are of equal ability in all respects.
  
• My thoughts on the victory conditions are based on 2 completed Allied games and 1 Japanese game that is nearing the final stage - close enough to game out with some hypotheticals what is needed for the Allies to achieve a game victory.
  

quote:

ORIGINAL: Yaab

quote:

ORIGINAL: DanSez

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna
... completely anecdotal and biased by personal feelings, is insulting and offensive, and is therefore counterproductive to this community. Several people in this thread are spouting it, in some cases in almost every post - stop it. You're being rude.

THIS.
I generally ignore ignorant rants and want to point out another great feature of the boards.
The Green Button.

But that doesn't confront the ignorance that could be turning off new potential players. We are a small community.
Civility is much more important than winning or losing or even history.

Thanks Lokasenna for standing up and speaking out.

Exactly. Let's keep this forum civil and don't mention the war.

-Look forum, there is Lokasenna standing like a stonewa-- Damn, he is from Iowa.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lecivius

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna

You implied a few posts before this one that the Allies don't get very many planes, which is patently false. Particularly late-war, Japan just can't keep up with the quantity of high-quality planes that the Allies get - whether in production numbers or actually keeping them in the air.

I am not arguing either point. I do believe the point attempting to be made is that the clever Japanese player can, and in many cases does, outproduce the allied side in advanced airframes. As is mentioned here and elsewhere, the allied production is limited to historical fact. The Japanese are limited by game resources (industry, oil, resources, etc.). The ability of the Japanese player to 'roll' over the allied side and still avoid the pitfalls made at the time, but the allied player restricted by historical results, can and is inherently frustrating.

My completely worthless 2c

quote:

ORIGINAL: Alfred

There are two fundamental different people types who play AE.  The AFB/JFB divide is not it and it is often unfair to label an individual as belong to one of those camps for the inference is that they are biased to that side and against the other.  The fundamental divide is really between those who accept the game design features and mechanics and work within them.  If they think a bug exists or that perhaps something is not working as designed, they will raise it as an issue.  Otherwise they quietly play the game, some only as the Allies, some only as Japan and some as either side.

The other group (and they play either side) are those who under the cloak of historical accuracy will demand game changes which, as the French would say quel surprise, just coincidentally make it easier for them to win and again quel surprise, remain silent on ahistorical game elements which make it easier of them to win.  To make it even more pointed the historical record is usually misrepresented so they will justify doing something in 1942 which in fact was only possible and done in 1945, or insist on their opponent not doing something because it was rarely done in the PTO as if that was an absolute bar when in reality it wasn't done much in the PTO because there were higher priorities for the use of those assets, a priority which may not be applicable to AE because of the changed battlescape brought about by the game's abstractions.

Alfred

quote:

Finally, this meme that Japanese PBEM players want to play for VPs and then also limit the Allies with crippling house rules needs to die. It's simply not true, is completely anecdotal and biased by personal feelings, is insulting and offensive...

quote:

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

quote:

Finally, this meme that Japanese PBEM players want to play for VPs and then also limit the Allies with crippling house rules needs to die. It's simply not true, is completely anecdotal and biased by personal feelings, is insulting and offensive...

Amen. This is exactly why I cannot keep my mouth shut when I see posts portraying JFBs as being obsessed with winning the game, the war or both and demanding all possible ahistoric and unrealistic advantages while asking to manacle the AFBs in order to achieve this goal. That's propaganda. How about JFBs who exercise self-restraint and don't do everything the game engine allows. Case in point is the magic highway which is claimed as being the goal of all JFBs, except for those who don't know about it. That's complete BS - there are JFBs who don't pursue that magic highway strategy, because they consider it utterly unrealistic and gamey.

Sadly, some AFBs are quick to point out design parameters that favour the Japanese side, but tend to remain ominously silent about design parameters giving advantages to their own side. Nice agenda.

Re ship construction, IIRC the assumption is that the Allies churned out ships as fast as they could, i.e. accelerated construction, and that the scheduled availability dates were already the best they could do, which is why there is no ability for further acceleration of construction on the Allied side. Sorry, no Essex available in time for Watchtower.

Btw, the availability dates are often fantasy. I have checked the dates of commissioning respectively of the deployment to the PTO of all APA and AKA types and selected ships of other types in DANFS/Hazegray and compared them with the availability dates in the editor. A number of ships show up between a few weeks and up to four months late, but a far larger number shows up many months earlier. For example AKA Andromeda, which redeployed from ETO to PTO in Dec 1944 - in the game it arrives on-map on Jan 15th 1944, almost a year too early. Furthermore, many ships that went to the ETO do not have withdrawal dates in the game. Example AKA Procyon: in the PTO at start of the war, went to the Med to participate in Torch, Husky, Avalanche and Dragoon, so was absent from PTO for two years > does not withdraw in AE. Or USS Nevada which participated in Overlord and Dragoon but does not withdraw to the ETO in AE. Never saw any AFB complaining about that, probably because they are too busy to point out ahistorical advantages on the Japanese side. To be honest, I suspect the availability dates on the Japanese side aren't 100% accurate either, but since JFBs can tinker with ship construction and stop and accelerate, it's irrelevant.

quote:

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

However, the fact is that change is NOT coming no matter how badly it is wanted*.

The last dev that was actively supporting has other activities.
Gary has stated clearly that there is no WITP2 coming from him.

Numerous threads have been started and finished about what it would take to get further effort done. So, to ask about change in pointless. The game is what it is. <period> There are mods and any player can mod within the boundaries that the devs have given us. However, most of the items asked for are outside of those boundaries, hence wasted space.

* My wish list is so small that it would never be worth the effort to enact. I'm pretty happy with what we have here.

quote:

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

quote:

Finally, this meme that Japanese PBEM players want to play for VPs and then also limit the Allies with crippling house rules needs to die. It's simply not true, is completely anecdotal and biased by personal feelings, is insulting and offensive...

Amen. This is exactly why I cannot keep my mouth shut when I see posts portraying JFBs as being obsessed with winning the game, the war or both and demanding all possible ahistoric and unrealistic advantages while asking to manacle the AFBs in order to achieve this goal. That's propaganda. How about JFBs who exercise self-restraint and don't do everything the game engine allows. Case in point is the magic highway which is claimed as being the goal of all JFBs, except for those who don't know about it. That's complete BS - there are JFBs who don't pursue that magic highway strategy, because they consider it utterly unrealistic and gamey.

quote:

ORIGINAL: InfiniteMonkey

Pretty much how I feel. I understand the superhighway and how to make it happen in game - I just would never do it. I would not do it for the same reason why I would restrict subs to operate Glen's instead of Jakes and not put the Grace on a CVE.

I'm not even sure I am happy with idea of doing research beyond a few items - and the funny thing is the most plausible of situations from my perspective (changing engines on the A6M2 and Ki-61) are the ones the AFB's complain about the most. The ones I am most skeptical of (Frank in 43, etc.) are the ones they accept most readily...

I'm not sure I will ever play a PBEM. I feel like there will inevitably be things I think are plausible that my opponent will consider gamey. At the same time, some things I think are gamey would be accepted as possible. I do not want to have an ongoing fight over what is acceptable in game and what strains the plausible into the impossible. I'd rather just play the AI for the time being.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Aurorus
Do not despair of playing PBEMs. It is sometimes difficult to find a good opponent. Despite certain AFB claims to the contrary, players from both sides quit games for a vareity of reasons. Sometimes real life intervenes. Sometimes people grow ill. Sometimes they feel overmatched, and often I think it is better actually for them to quit the game. I do not like playing a game in which there is a gross disparity between the ability of the players. It is not fun for either side.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna

I do the magic superhighway, insofar as it actually functions - but honestly, it's insufficient because you still have a chokepoint on the far side (you can't load all of your resources through a single Port 8 at Fusan). And it doesn't get you what you really need - the liquids from Palembang.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Alfred

1.  Japanese has absolute certainty that the Soviets will not launch a surprise attack on her before August 1945. 

It is of incalculable strategic benefit to the Japanese player.  It allows for a draw down of the Manchukuo army which simply was not possible historically.

This is a false statement, Alfred. The Manchuko army most certainly was drawn down to bare bones, and most of the artillery and tanks were withdrawn. Soviet post-war estimates grossly exaggerated the size of the Japanese army that they confronted: claiming for example that the army was nearly 1.5 million men in size and contained 1,150 tanks. Recent scholarship agrees with the Japanese sources that the Kwantung army had been stripped completely of all its best units, including most of its tanks and artillery. In fact, the Soviets encountered and destroyed very few tanks, and only about 370 were captured; most were inoperable. Here is a source. https://web.archive.org/web/20110723082515/http://www.cgsc.edu/carl/resources/csi/glantz3/glantz3.asp#c3-15 .

I quote, "Despite its numerical strength, the Kwantung Army lacked quality. The Japanese Imperial High Command had transferred most veteran Japanese divisions from Manchuria before the summer of 1945. Hence, most remaining divisions were newly formed from reservists or from cannibalized smaller units. In fact, only the 119th, 107th, 108th, 117th, 63d, and 39th Infantry Divisions had existed before January 1945. Training was limited in all units, and equipment and materiel shortages plagued the Kwantung Army at every level. The Japanese considered none of the Kwantung Army divisions combat ready and some divisions only 15 percent ready."

Finally, Japan could have some confidence that the Soviet Union was not going to go on the offensive, because substantial lend-lease materials were flowing through Vladivostok, which the Japanese could have cut off.

2.  Aircraft do not consume AVGAS.

The historical Allies did not suffer a shortage of AVGAS but Japan was crippled by not having sufficient AVGAS, hence this design parameter greatly aids Japan.

This is also a plainly false statement. Japan was not "crippled" by a shortage of aviation fuel. Give me one instance where Japanese planes were unable to sortie because of a lack of fuel. Rather, the consensus opinion of most military historians is that Japan was crippled by a lack of spare parts for its aircraft. This would be a supply issue. Also, the lower quality of Japanese aviation fuel is accounted for in the specifications of the various aircraft in the game.

What is more, what difficulties Japan had in refining fuel are often attributed to the loss of most of their petro-chemical engineers in a single submarine attack, which occurred during the war. Unless you want to consider this loss as "built into" the game, then it is not realistic to assume that Japan would experience as many difficulties in refining high-quality fuel as it did historically. If you do wish to consider this loss as built in, why this loss and not others? Should Yamamoto be removed as a commander as well in 1943 because his plane was shot down?


3.  The magical highway which allows the auto movement of oil/fuel/resources all the way from Singapore to Port Arthur (or even Korea).

Oil will not move along this magic highway except in small quantities. It is not as if Japan can sit all of its tankers and oilers in port. Japan's tankers and oilers are constantly at sea and vulnerable to allied attack. Resources moving along this highway are helpul, but not essential to Japan's economy, because there are sufficient resources near the home islands. As I mentioned above, the "magic highway" has grown to mythical status in the minds of many and is not some sort of supernatural solution to the problems of managing the Japanese economy.


4.  The initial Japanese amphibious landing bonus.

The Japanese were the pioneers of modern amphibious operations. In the early stages of the war their xAks and AKs were outfitted with various launches for amphibious landings. The amphibious bonus improves the amphibious rate of these ships by 1200 points to 1450 for xAKs and mitigates the unload damage. Without this bonus, the unload damage (and devices destroyed, which is a different function according to the manual) is very high and ahistorical. To put this bonus in perspective for allied players, the amphibious unload rate for LSDs, LSVs, or APAs is 3000 points, which is double that of a Japanese AK during the 4-month period of the amphibious bonus. Japan has 1, yes 1, LSD, and 0 LSVs and APAs. Without the bonus, Japan does not have nearly enough AKs or APs for any player, including the AI (which does cheat, despite your repeated claims to the contrary, and will teleport ships from one port to another to load units) to replicate the pace at which Japan was able to move material and infantry.

Most Japanese amphibious operations during the early war period were uncontested landings, except those at Wake and Khota Baru. In game, the only combat advantage that Japan achieves from the amphibious bonus is during the invasions of small islands and atolls where the initial attack is automatic, resistance to the initial landing is likely, and very fast unload rates are essential. Otherwise, the amphibious bonus replicates Japanese amphibious operation capabilities and expertise. Of course, this amphibious bonus can be exploited to some extent if the Japanese player moves a large number of units, say 3 divisions, very deep into allied territory during the opening move. Which is why most games have a house rule limiting Japan's initial amphibious moves.

In one of my current games, the Dutch forces have holed up in a mountain hex with no hope, no actual supplies, and having lost all the key positions in Java. I have been bombarding them for 2 months. The Dutch surrendered on Java after a 10 day campaign when the key regions were lost. There is no "Dutch surrender" in this game. In fact, I have had SNLFs hunting down Dutch fragments for months: fragments, which, historically would have disbanded as part of a general Dutch surrender 2 months ago. Such is the nature of the game. To complain about the Japanese amphibious bonus, which has far more basis in historical fact than a "Dutch mountain fortress" or "fortress Palembang," is absurd.


5.  Accelerated ship construction.

The supply cost and the heavy industry cost for accelerating ship production is very large, unless other ships are "turned off." Again, this is not equivalent to aircraft R&D which does not consume additional supplies or heavy industry if the R&D program is tailored to meet eventual production. You know that these two things are not equivalent in any way, and I suspect that you are being deliberately argumentative and obtuse.


6.  Unified Central Command.

There are no restrictions on Red-Army and White Army coordination. No restrictions on Chinese-U.S. joint operations. No restrictions generally of this sort. So how is not having restrictions on Japanese army and navy cooperation a distinctive benefit to the Japanese player? Again, I suspect that you are being selective in your presentation of facts merely for the purpose of being argumentative.


7.  Air unit size.

Which is why we are discussing resizing, and it seems that the OP and most others agree with you on this point.

8.  Absence of electronics.

AE lacks a true electronics component and what there is, is very abstracted.  The abstraction provides the Allied player with only a fraction of their historical electronic advantage and tends to substantially reduce the historical deficiencies which plagued Japan.  As a consequence Japanese ASW and CAP efforts are better than they would otherwise be.

Pure opinion Alfred. If you wish to prove this point, you would have to provide a detailed analysis of how radar effects CAP response and surface engagements and demonstrate that Japanese radar in-game is more effective than it was historically and that the IJN frequently performs better than historically in surface engagements in the later war period, when allied radar was fully operational and staffed by well-trained technicians.

quote:

ORIGINAL: witpqs
I know that in Babes they made a huge effort to get all as right as they could. With 11,906 ships in the database (but who's counting?) there just have to be a bunch that are still wrong or that they made judgement calls on that could be better, but I suspect they got a lot more right than wrong. Yes: 11,906.