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All Forums >> [Current Games From Matrix.] >> [World War II] >> War In The Pacific - Struggle Against Japan 1941 - 1945 >> Ship suggestions

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Ship suggestions - 5/16/2000 3:42:00 AM

Major Tom

Posts: 525
Joined: 4/8/2000
From: Canada
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Fleets and ships are probably the largest focus of Pacific War, and, most of the changes are relatively minor (as the original was really good on its own). MTB's. These were a problem in the original PacWar, as, they were WAY too powerful in making invasions turn away, without actually engaging anything. The only time I have seen MTB's in action is when they are hangning off a Battle TF. Also, PacWar only represented 60 or so MTB's, when, in reality there were hundreds on each side. And, their ability to fight off invasion TF's were not as good. They were VERY weak, and losses were high. Their range was pretty horrid as well. MTB's need to be rethought. Weapons upgrade. Virtually EVERY ship had it's secondary and AA armament upgraded as the war went on. PacWar includes this, but, I would like it to be better related to history. There are MANY charts created showing when and what number of weapons should be upgraded or changed. Also, there should be more weaponry than just what was included in the PacWar armoury. There should be 1.1" AA for pre-war USN ships, 5.9/50 for Dutch Cruisers, 6.1" for new IJN Light Cruisers and Yamato Secondary guns. More Classes of ships. Many ships were classified as being of the wrong class. The Renown and Repluse WERE of the same class, but, were modified to be completely different ships. The Renown had an extensive upgrade, completely modernizing the ships armour, speed, and weaponry. The Warspite had a different (earlier) modification than the Valiant or Queen Elizabeth. The two later ships had a better weapons arrangement and numbers (removed the 6" Guns, and added more 4.5 DP) Also, many IJN ships were slated for conversion to CVL (Nisshin, Muizuro (SP), Kamikawa Maru, Ibuki, etc..) like the Chitose class is in Pac War, but, historically they were sunk before the changes could be made. There should be some ability to modify certain ships (ie. IJN Seaplane Tenders) into CVL's or CVE's, or to complete them as designed.

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- 5/16/2000 6:39:00 AM

norsemanjs

Posts: 145
Joined: 5/11/2000
From: Enderlin, ND, USA
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Good Post: It would work nice if at certain times ships would have the ability to upgrade, this should be variable and not an automatic, free upgrade. It should cost supply points and days/weeks/months in the dockyard and of course taking up dock space. When armament (particularly AA) became available or a certain period of time elapsed (annually?) a ship could become eligible for an upgrade, the ship would then have to arrive in a port capable of performing the upgrade, supply points would be expended and the ship could then take damage (fake) to represent the beginning of construction this damage would then be removed as the upgrade completed. Note, I suggest the damage because once begun you would have to be penalized for pulling the ship out early, basically you've got the ship all tore apart to do this kind of work. Some upgrades were minor and should be reflected in the time/damage, cost. One other thing to think about is most (all) ships need a major overhaul about every 10-15 months depending on use. Let's face it during wartime conditions they ran the hell out of those ships and their equipment. Somehow ships should be required to spend some time in overhaul, some minor upgrades could be accomplished during these. And I like the idea of taking damage due to extended cruising. This reminds me of fatigue in civil war games. Hey, some ideas to chew on. Norseman

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- 5/16/2000 8:48:00 AM

Major Tom

Posts: 525
Joined: 4/8/2000
From: Canada
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About subs. There should be some order of priority you could give to your submarines, such as, target warships or convoys. The IJN should have some sort of penalty when ordering them to attack Merchant vessels, but, some bonus for when they go after Warships. Also, torpedo weaponry should change over time, notably the USN. In 1941-42-43? the USN had a HORRIBLE torpedo, but, it gradually improved. All subs/destroyers should get upgrades at a particular time in order to compensate. I have an idea about solving the pesky Royal Navy Eastern Fleet transfers. Everyone gets peeved when a ship leaves the fleet when you REALLY need it. I was thinking more of a points rating. For example, ships in the British Navy are rated due to their power (Gun, Speed, Armour, Capacity) and given a point number. For example, a King George V Class Battleship might have a value of 120, while an older Revenge Class Battleship might have a value of 80. What happens, every turn or so, there might be a request from the Home Fleet stating that ships are needed elsewhere, so many points of them. The player, or the AI would then select enough ships to equal up the required withdraw number to be sent back. For example Withdraw Order of 200 points Eastern Fleet CV Indomitable (140) BB Prince of Wales (120) BC Repulse (90) BB Revenge (80) BB Ramilles (80) CL Danae (30) CL Durban (30) CL Maritus (45) DD Paladin (10) DD Paladin (10) DD Paladin (10) DD Electra (10) DD Electra (10) DD Javelin (15) DD Tribal (15) DD Stronghold (5) DD Stronghold (5) You could select any number of vessels as long as you would get the correct amount to meet the requirements. You could select older vessels, but, it requires more fo them to satisfy the withdraw orders. You could choose to remove the Prine of Wales and the Revenge. Or, Revenge, Ramilles, Danae, and an Elecra DD. Or, any other combination. This will leave the player to decide what type of fleet they would like. A large fleet of old ships, a small fleet of new ships, or a mixed fleet. And it will quell the fears about losing necessary ships. Ships that are removed from the Eastern Fleet could also be sent back on a later date to be determined randomly by the game. USN Lost Ship Upgrades: When a CV, CA, or CL is lost there is automatically created an Essex, Baltimore, or Cleveland class to replace it. However, the delay in PacWar was only 40 turns (for CA and CL). This let the Allies have Baltimore and Cleveland Class ships WELL before they were historically launched if they lost a CL/CA in 1941 or early 1942.

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- 5/16/2000 10:08:00 PM

A_Master

Posts: 29
Joined: 5/12/2000
From: thornhill,ontario,canada
Status: offline

An unsupported invasion force, should turn back if they encounter an MTBs. Remember that a turn is a week. MTBs attacking a supported invasion force at night could force it to turn around. It should depend on the number of MTBs verses the size and number of invasion support ships. Commanders on both sides should also influence it. A word of warning for game designers, we don't want thousands of MTBs complicating the game play. KEEP IT SIMPLE. The task force number limiting restriction is key to keep the game from becoming too unwieldy. Does anybody know how big a MTB flotilla was? Ships should incur damage while at sea. To repair, the ship must dock at the appropriate size facility. When a ship docks, a pop up window should give the option of either 'docking' , 'dock & repair', 'dock & repair & upgrade' and 'upgrade'. Upgrade could be broken down into minor and major. A ship leaving dock while upgrading can be hit with damage to reflect unfinished upgrades. Formula should depend on size, percentage complete, type of upgrade, year and size of dock. Base commander should also influence this as well. Subs need to be redone. The AI tends to cheat (at least in my mind). With large numbers of aircraft with the Japanese I still couldn't sink an American sub. On the other hand, the AI was sinking Japanese subs half way between the US and Hawaii, and many of the aircraft couldn't even reach. The upgrade of torpedoes is a good idea. For the Eastern fleet. You should be asked if you want to withdraw a ship. If you say no, you get to keep the ship, but incur a score penalty. This way if you are looking for a high score, you can return the ships. If all you want to do is have FUN, then keep the ships.

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- 5/17/2000 7:53:00 PM

kfbaker

Posts: 35
Joined: 4/26/2000
From: Sheffield,UK
Status: offline

Another intresting what if on the subject of ships is the failure of the german axis fleet in general surface operations. What if the Graf spee or other ship joined entered the pacific, Graf spee is a little early technolcly but if you look back at the first world war the goeben joined the Turkey before it entered the war. Secondly the failure of success of german raiders tied up or released British ships in the atlantic and to a lesser extant US ships.

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- 5/18/2000 1:51:00 PM

Dunedain

Posts: 224
Joined: 4/4/2000
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Japanese TF's should get a significant combat bonus during any night fighting. This would simulate their unusally rigorous training for night engagements. Also, any Jap ship equipped with the superb Long Lance torpedo should get a bonus to hit with them (compared to the chance to hit with torpedoes of other countries) if they get a chance to fire their torpedoes. And I really like the idea of being able to upgrade the AA guns and such of capital ships. The formula that A_Master suggests for determining the cost and time to upgrade sounds *great*.

The "administration" characteristic of the leader in charge of that base would provide a bonus to upgrade and repair speeds (and possibly even lessen supply cost) if he has a good rating in that skill. The better the rating, the bigger the bonus. And if the player chooses to dock and upgrade a ship upon arriving at port, he should get a menu of upgrade options available for that ship class at that time. With costs and time needed (with bonuses due to presence of leader skilled in "administration" being noted) for each upgrade displayed. Same options would go for undertaking repairs. Does this game sound cool or what?

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- 5/19/2000 3:39:00 AM

Major Tom

Posts: 525
Joined: 4/8/2000
From: Canada
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I would hope that you would be able to delegate ship repairs and upgrading to the AI. I wouldn't want to have to do it for EVERY vessel! Also, this might result in a problem with how they create ship and ship classes. If they use the old formula they would be restricted to upgrade on a Class, not Ship basis. It might be too much effort put into the game just on the aspect of creating individual ships instead of individual classes. We will just have to wait and see.

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- 5/19/2000 5:44:00 AM

Dunedain

Posts: 224
Joined: 4/4/2000
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Hmm, good point. Maybe they can do it this way: When an upgrade to a class of ship becomes available a menu will pop up that turn asking whether you want to begin the upgrade process now (The menu would detail the cost in supplies and time with all bonuses for your leader at that port being displayed, too) on all ships of that type that are currently in port. If some of the ships that are in port are in ports that can't accomodate them for upgrades then an order would be issued automatically to those ships to head to the nearest port that can handle their upgrades (with an option at that point for the player to hand pick what port they are sent to, replacing the default port order). Or the player could choose to not upgrade some or any of the ships, but each time he brought that type ship into a port thereafter that could handle the upgrade work for that ship class, he would have the option of ordering the upgrade at that time. This process would happen each time a new upgrade for each class became available. The player might decide to skip an upgrade "generation" for a certain ship class, then upgrade later when a more comprehensive class improvement becomes available. This upgrade might cost more supplies and time than if the previous upgrade wasn't skipped if the newer upgrade's improvements rely heavily upon the previous upgrade's improvements having already been constructed. What do you think?

Sounds mighty complicated to me, hehe.

And requiring lots of research into how much work it would take to make major upgrades without going through the historical itermediary stages. Might have to stick with something similar to what PW does, with maybe some more flexibility. Not sure if this other stuff is practical.

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- 5/19/2000 6:06:00 AM

Major Tom

Posts: 525
Joined: 4/8/2000
From: Canada
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Well, all ideas here are really good. The problem is, we don't know how they are doing things. The best thing we can do is to list all possible ideas, and let them choose which ones to use, and which ones are impracticle. They just might be designing all ships to be completely independent of class. Indeed, not every ship had upgrades the same as others. From what I remember, the Yamato had it's secondary armament changed from 12x 6.1" and 12x 5" to 6x 6.1" and 24x 5". The Musashi did not have this change in secondary armament. So, the best possible scenario would be that each ship would be independent, or, could be independently upgraded from the rest of the class.

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