Translating VP victory levels (Full Version)

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



Message

Alfred -> Translating VP victory levels (9/9/2007 11:39:02 AM)

Gentlemen,

I thought I would raise the following for your comments.

In a recent post, Feinder observed that many PBEM players who publicly disclaim paying attention to VP victory levels, probably do keep regard, in secret, to VP. Personally I concur with that comment.

It strikes me as being quite unrealistic for players to totally disregard an auto victory to their opponent on the basis that IRL the WITP loser (almost always being the Allies) would not have surrendered. Based on my reading of AARs, disregarding VP (particularly when auto victory results) leads to quite unrealistic play, which is quite ironic bearing in mind that the player is supposedly playing realistically. Some examples of the resulting unrealistic play are:

(a) complete Sir Robin - Allied player retreats everywhere to await 1944 reinforcements. This results in a boring game and usually hands Japan an uncontested auto victory on 1 January 1043. It totally disregards the historical political considerations that led to Australian troops being left on Rabaul, Australian reinforcements being sent to Java, the sinking of Langley when she was ferrying aircraft to DEI etc.

(b) Japanese all out push in 1942 for auto victory which if not successful leads them to abandon game, perhaps because they are bored or realise they have expended too many assets to provide a challenge to resisting the Allied counterattack etc

(c) Allies confronting the Japanese in disadvantageous positions (eg premature Midway, unnecessarily losing units in "kamikaze" invasions as early as March 1942) and not caring about losses (and the attentdant VP racked up).

Whilst I agree that the VP levels are a somewhat arbitrary construct, nevertheless they should not be totally dismissed. In any case how otherwise do you exactly determine a WITP victor. In real life the Japanese surrendered unconditionally even though the home islands had not been invaded. It is also just jingoism to say that because of Pearl Harbor, America would under no circumstances ever have negotiated a cessation of hostilities - if Midway had been a Japanese victory, if Hawaii had been successfully captured, if Guadalcanal had been a defeat, if New Zealand + Fiji + New Caladonia + large chunks of India and Australia had been conquered, all actions which in WITP Japanese players can accomplish before the end of 1942 and therefore usually gain an auto victory, faced with such a list of Allied disasters, a negotiated peace might have resulted.

Consequently, I suggest that the victory levels detailed in section 16 of the manual could be translated as meaning the following:

Auto Victory - loser has surrendered unconditionally
Decisive Victory - a negotiated peace but with loser suffering occupation, pays substantial reparations and loses some territory
Marginal Victory - a negotiated peace but loser suffers no occupation and reparations are minimal
Draw - essentially an armistace with both sides mainly retaining their position on that date.

Just like the victory levels are adjusted in favour of the Japanese if the game ends because of time in 1946 or 3 or more atomic bombs are used, so should there be a movement (in favour of your opponent) in victory level for continuing past an auto victory. This adjustment could be 1 level. As an example, an Allied player who in scenario 15 loses an auto victory on 1 January 1943 but continues to play on and achieves a 1.8:1 VP score at the end of March 1946 would be credited only with a marginal loss (= marginal Japanese victory).

Any comments?

Alfred



Yamato hugger -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/9/2007 12:36:19 PM)

Well, the problem with any "historical" game is it is played by people that have read (and hopefully learned from the mistakes of) history.

As they say, hindsight is 20-20.



Mike Scholl -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/9/2007 2:29:05 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Alfred

I thought I would raise the following for your comments.
Consequently, I suggest that the victory levels detailed in section 16 of the manual could be translated as meaning the following:

Auto Victory - loser has surrendered unconditionally
Decisive Victory - a negotiated peace but with loser suffering occupation, pays substantial reparations and loses some territory
Marginal Victory - a negotiated peace but loser suffers no occupation and reparations are minimal
Draw - essentially an armistace with both sides mainly retaining their position on that date.
Any comments?

Alfred



My suggestion would be to throw the stupid VP's out entirely and play the game. VP's are always one person's artificial evaluation of the situation...., and rarely do two people agree on relative values. What really matters is how you feel about your performance (and your opponants); not how many randomly assigned and artificially created "points" somebody gathered.



Historiker -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/9/2007 4:46:16 PM)

First of all, a question:
Is it possible - also in a PBEM - to go on playing even after a Japanese Victoriy by 01.01.1943?

For me, it is - and shall be - a part of this game, that after a fierce series of attacks the Japanese will be beaten hardly.  For me playing japanese, it would be already a vitory, if my Home Islamds still hold out in 1946 and the Russians are thrown back - because then, I would have done better than IRL...




castor troy -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/9/2007 4:58:20 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Historiker

First of all, a question:
Is it possible - also in a PBEM - to go on playing even after a Japanese Victoriy by 01.01.1943?

For me, it is - and shall be - a part of this game, that after a fierce series of attacks the Japanese will be beaten hardly.  For me playing japanese, it would be already a vitory, if my Home Islamds still hold out in 1946 and the Russians are thrown back - because then, I would have done better than IRL...





Since a patch (1.5??) it has been possible to continue after someone achieved an auto victory.



Historiker -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/9/2007 4:59:31 PM)

Great :)
In one PBEM it ist 25.000 to 3500 or something like this at 27. February 42 and I was afraid not to have the possibility to take revenge...



ctangus -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/10/2007 2:04:34 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Alfred

It strikes me as being quite unrealistic for players to totally disregard an auto victory to their opponent on the basis that IRL the WITP loser (almost always being the Allies) would not have surrendered. Based on my reading of AARs, disregarding VP (particularly when auto victory results) leads to quite unrealistic play, which is quite ironic bearing in mind that the player is supposedly playing realistically. Some examples of the resulting unrealistic play are:

(a) complete Sir Robin - Allied player retreats everywhere to await 1944 reinforcements. This results in a boring game and usually hands Japan an uncontested auto victory on 1 January 1043. It totally disregards the historical political considerations that led to Australian troops being left on Rabaul, Australian reinforcements being sent to Java, the sinking of Langley when she was ferrying aircraft to DEI etc.

(b) Japanese all out push in 1942 for auto victory which if not successful leads them to abandon game, perhaps because they are bored or realise they have expended too many assets to provide a challenge to resisting the Allied counterattack etc

(c) Allies confronting the Japanese in disadvantageous positions (eg premature Midway, unnecessarily losing units in "kamikaze" invasions as early as March 1942) and not caring about losses (and the attentdant VP racked up).


All good points. I mostly measure my success relative to the historical timetable and just knowing who played a better game, but I'll admit - I look at the points! I'll add:

(a) I think you meant 1 Jan 1943... [;)] But yes, if the war's going poorly, I think the threat of loss to auto-victory should be present for an allied player. The home front demands some good news!!!

(b) There was a deeply entrenched doctrine of the offense in the IJN. Auto-victory conditions can help simulate that to a degree.

For example - I have a game as Japan now in May '42. There's one (confidential) offensive I'm considering 'cause it would put me in very good shape to win an auto-victory. However it's beyond the original perimeter I wanted to establish at the start of the war and my defensive plans don't include it. I'm having debates with myself kind of like the IJA & IJN had between themselves. "It would crush the allied willpower!" "But we don't have the troops to defend it!" [:D]

But anyone playing Japan should realize their goal is ultimately defensive, not offensive, and probably should start planning for that from the start of the game. I've also seen a few cases where IJ player simply stays on the offensive until the allied player stops them & then quits.

(c) I've only noticed that once or twice in the AARs.

The victory point system does leave a lot to be desired. 1 destroyer = 6 4E bombers = 6 2E bombers = 6 fighters... But something like it should be in place & I, like you, don't think it should be ignored.



Alfred -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/10/2007 10:31:40 AM)

Mike Scholl,

I agree that VP is an artificial construct.  However without it how would you determine a winner in an AI v Human game.

As a concept (putting aside the difficulties associated with determining how to allocate/accrue points) a win by VP levels can be defended by equating it to breaking the enemy's will.  By August 1945 by no means were all Japanese in agreement that they had lost and they still held more foreign territory than they had held on 6 December 1941.  However sufficient Japanese, including the all important Emperor, had had their will to continue broken and were now prepared to surrender.

My suggested VP level translation to real world constructs is simply a measure for players, either in PBEM or solitaire, to assess their performance (under ab initio commonly agreed grounds) in WITP against history.

ctangus,

I agree.  As an Allied player, it strikes me as being unfair when the attitude of Allied players is that they will disregard a Japanese auto victory on 1 January 1943.  That deprives the Japanese player of the fruits of their good play, who having achieved an auto victory, should receive some further benefit if he manages to hold off the Allies until 1946.

Alfred



bradfordkay -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/10/2007 6:40:22 PM)

I look at it as two games, should the Japanese player reach an auto-victory on Jan 1 '43, '44, or '45.

The first game was a decisive victory for the Japanese player. Should both decide to continue the war, this can be considered a second game. It will be difficult for the allied player to win the game, even based on victory points, should the Japanese player have already achieved an auto-victory. However, if the allied player wishes to continue after having lost on Jan 1 '43 (or later), I feel that he should be given the chance to see what it's like to have overwhelming force at his command. If you only keep playing '41-'42, the allied player never gets to experience that...



Feinder -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/10/2007 11:05:13 PM)

I’ve gotten to the point where I play my games (mostly) for enjoyment.  I don’t want to sound trite, but if my opponent would rather just surrender, I don’t want to waste either of our time on a game that (at least) one of us, isn’t having any fun.  The “realizing that you –can- have fun, even if your CVs are all reefs”, is the tricky part.  Still, if it’s no fun for you, then by all means concede.  But I’m also more inclined to play against a more experienced opponent who isn’t going to walk away when “Midway” happens.  But I certainly keep track of the vps, if anything because I don’t want to allow my opponent the satisfaction (perceived or real) of an auto-victory (*phhhttt* - yes, I am competitive).  But regarding auto-victory, I’m not going to do anything “stupid” just to try to achieve it, or stave it off either.

But if somebody wants to quit, I’ll admit it’s very tempting to have that tantrum, proclaim that WitP sucks, and dump the game (I almost did in my game vs. Erstad).  It’s taken about a YEAR of real-life time, to get the game to where I can at least compete (although I’d say he’s most certainly still got the upper hand).  Getting punched in the face for a year, is a -long- fekkin’ time to churn thru turns. Having “been there, done that”, I -do- understand wanting to walk away.  I’m glad that I did stick with it.  Erstad is an excellent (if somewhat painful) teacher.  But it took swallowing some pride and just gutting out about 5 months of hard knocks, before it even looked like it might be worth continuing.  I guess its a gray region of players that will try to gain (or stop) auto-victory at all costs, vs. those that keep an eye on vps, but aren’t going to have a coronary on January 1st, 1943.  Generally, if somebody is an AV at all costs, those folks are obviously playing for VP any way they can.  That being the case, the opponent needs to bear that in mind, and had better be playing in such a way to try and stop them.  Those –are- the fast and furious games, but as long as both players know that’s what they’re getting into, it’s no big deal (to me at least).  Of course, it’s easy for me to say that, because I’m not one of those types, and probably wouldn’t pick up that sort of game anyway.

That being said…

I think folks balk at the VP system because as noted, it seems very arbitrary, and certainly does not reflect the true effort or value of the various units and bases. 

I’m gonna play bi-polar here, and jump from on side of the fence to other a couple of times. 

The VP system for WitP was based on UV (just like the rest of the game).  But WitP is like ripples in a pond compared to UV – the farther you move away from origin (both in scale and time), the ripples/differences become magnified.  Also, the game has gone thru 3 years of code tweaks (plus two more if count the changes to UV upon which the engine was based), most of the changes affecting your ability to score vps in some way - except while the engine has changed, the scoring has -not-.

We all know many of the specific foibles of the VPs (what’s evaluated wrong, and what’s evaluated right).  I think it would be interesting to have a sort of “player panel” to recommend revisions to the point system, that actually would accurately reflect victory level.  Whether it’s re-evaluating the vps of ships or planes and bases, or simply coming up with scoring based on an event on a time-table.  Come up with a workable system that actually -does- fit the game.  However…

It’s not as easy as just saying 2e bombers are worth 2 pts, and 4e bombers are worth 4, and AK/APs are worth 4, or whatever.  As the game drags on, the game actually changes, the utility of the units themselves change (much as they also did historically, but perhaps not for the same reasons), and thus the value of the units should actually change as the game progresses.

For a small example, in 1942 things are a closer run for both sides.  If you lose 100 aircraft in a day in 1942, that hurts.  If you lose 100 aircraft in a day in 1945, well, that’s par for the course.

And there-in you can begin to see part of the issue that confronted porting the vp system from UV to WitP.  It looks good at start, but just as WitP evolved from UV (no longer retaining the relevance of the scoring system), WitP actually evolves as the game progresses, so that the scoring in 1942 is no longer relevant for 1945.

Maybe if you did something like I mentioned earlier, by scoring strategic locations on a time-table.  If you capture Manilla by this date, you get 100 points.  You score points for however long you hold it.  And the Allies score points by recapturing it by another date (or more for an earlier capture), and score points for holding it.  Obviously, players will gravitate to whatever generate for them to most vps, for the least “cost”.  And finding that balance of what things are actually worth, can be very subjective.  It’s -very- complicated esp considering the diversity of units, capabilities, bases, and grand objectives that WitP encompasses.  If you’ve really got to project the long-term scores that can be accumulated – you might as well be trying to pick the value of a stock in 2020.

-F-



bigjoe96912 -> RE: Translating VP victory levels (9/12/2007 4:59:55 AM)

Victory Points from both sides

I am currently playing bothsides with the game around the same time.

As the Japs I am playing to Auto Vic in 43 and as the Allies I am playing to stop.

If you ignore vp it would be easy for the Allies to stay on the defensive until mid 43 preserving there forces.

What allies need to keep in mind you must protect your own and choose battles wisely and pray for that midway turning point, ie keep in mind the US lost the Lexington protecting PM, Yorktown at Midway. Saratoga never really got into the war till 43 with the exception of a short bust at the canal. Wasp was lost in the first month of action and Hornet was lost and finally Enterprise was a shell by November. This timely commitment of forces will prevent that auto victory.

However if the Japs shoot heavily for Auto victory that means Noumea, Canton, and Palmyra. You need to be in a position to take advantage of where he is not. If he is at Canton or Palmyra the start socking them with LB-30's and B-17's cause he deserves it. If he is down at Noumea then you send the 2nd Marines to Wake and Marcus and next thing you know you have B-25's and B-26's defended by 2 Wings of P-40's to keep KB at bay while your LB-30's and B-17s are striking the mainland

As the allies I have seen KB supporting landings at Rabaul, so therefore I am attacking Wake with 3 carriers covering a 4 slow BB Bombardment, then run like hell, I anticipate a reaction so then I may sneak down to the south towards Nomea then a quick run up for a Rabaul strike. then a retreat east. Either he'll chase me ( preventing them from escorting landing forces) and I have a a few 6-8 CA DD or DD fast SAG's just waiting to pounce on a landing force. Yes I have bloodied my nose losing an Australian TF waiting for him in Rabaul. I commited POW and Repulse slowing up in the PI. yep they took hits but survived, keeps his forces commited to protecting transports.

As the Japs I am consumed with the victory disease. His one challenge I sank the Repulse and beat up the POW. Within 6 weeks I have consumed Kendari, Balikpapan, Ambona, Palembang the Malaya Pen, Singapore is waiting for me, Allies are bottled on Manila, and Ragoon has fallen. Nomea is waiting for me to land forces.

So in the end Vp's are something to either get a Jap victory or something prevent and it gives you goals in playing the game. So good bad or indifferent the VP's are an integrel part of game strategies. And without them how would the Jap win!!!!



Page: [1]

Valid CSS!




Forum Software © ASPPlayground.NET Advanced Edition 2.4.5 ANSI
0.640625