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Desert Fox -> A comparison (10/30/2000 5:26:00 AM)
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I will start off by saying that I have never played Pacific War, nor do I know what Matrix did to improve it. I have read through the messages here, and I think I have a fair idea of the bigger points of the game.
Now, I think that this is a game that will fill an incredibly big gap in wargames. The last pacific wargame I bought and played religiously was PTO 2 for the Super Nintendo. That was an excellent game, but it also had some odd and ridiculous abstractions. However, I will assume that no one else here has ever seen or played this game. I think that a lot could be gained by combining the better features from these two games. I encourage you folks to find a copy of the game and give it a try. Unfortunately, I think you would have to get an emulator, since it is probably not in any stores anywhere anymore.
Anyways, I think that it had a lot of things that, apparently, pacific war never had. First and foremost was the research and production elements of the game. You actually had to negotiate with the Army, Commander in Chief, and a couple of cabinet members to get your particular agenda filled. This was very unrealistic in the way it was implemented (it was decided by a kind of card game really), but I do think that it is a necessary feature in a game of this scale. Things negotiated would be strategic goals, resource allocation (between army, navy, and developing the GNP which was abstracted as production capacity), troop division deployments (army divisions, marine divisions, european divisions, and GNP, probably better off called factory workers), money allocation (army cash, navy cash, GNP, technology, and diplomacy), technology distribution (air tech, naval tech, electronic tech, etc), and diplomacy policies (declare war--yes, depending on the campaign, you were not at war yet with certain countries, improve relations--there were a number of different countries that were neutral in the beginning of certain campaigns, offer an alliance, or offer a trade pact). This negotiating all happened at the end of every month. You could destroy the economy, leave the army without any cash, make peace with enemies, declare war on allies, or leave europe without any help. Each of those had their advantages and disadvantages.
But right after this negotiating took place, you then got the production screen. From here you make planes, and ships with the resources and money the Navy ended up with. You could determine the type of planes made and the class of ship built, as well as how many transport ships you want to make. You could spend a lot of resources and cash on an Iowa class battleship, or a wolfpack of S-class subs, or you could develop your own class of ships (technology level dependant), or you could build a few hundred avengers, or skyraiders(assuming your technology boys had developed them), or you could do nothing with your resources and cash to build base improvements like harbors and airfields, as well as refuel your fleets with your resources. You never got to play with the army, the AI did that, but they also had their own production abilities where they could build B-29s, supply trucks, and even tanks (shermans, grants etc.).
All your ships took time to build, and once they were finished, they would be available in the home port (Pearl or Kure). Aircraft would be put into a pool where you could load up your carriers with them or allocate them to your bases. Transports could be assigned to bases or fleets. Marine divisions were also assigned to your home port where you could move them to reinforce bases, or load them on transports to sail with a fleet.
Now, fleet movement was done by giving orders. You could give the AI orders to move, make a port call, attack fleets in an area of ocean, bombard a base, invade a base, hit the base transports, or simply do some reconnaisance. Bases could also be ordered to attack fleets, defend the base, or to just do recon. Bases could attack other bases and transports, but you had to do it manually, the AI would not do it on its own.
The turns were all 1 day in length, with a movement phase, a planning phase, and if battle was initiated in the planning phase, there would be a battle phase. In the movement phase, fleets and subs and bases were ordered, supplied, and everything else. In the planning phase, you made plans to attack a base or fleet. In the battle phase, you were given the option to goto the tactical battle(very much abstracted) or just let the computer autocalculate the results.
The tactical battles were very much abstracted, with air attacks or fleet battles, or fleets bombarding bases as the 3 kinds of battles. In air battles, your planes would first run into escorts (if any) where you would match air group for airgroup in a dogfight. Each air group was 20 planes in strength, and your fighter escorts would go to the dogfight first. If the enemy had more escorts than you have fighters, then some of your bombers would be forced to dogfight. Whoever was left would attack the fleet or base. If you were attacking a fleet, you could decide which side to attack from. There were some limitations for torpedo attacks based on that fleet's formation, though. Your attacks could damage the right side, front, rear, or left side armor, as well as damaging AA guns, main guns, fire control, the magazines, or even the bridge. All of these areas had certain things happen when hit.
A base attack was much different. You could attack the base garrison which manned the antiaircraft weapons, or attack the factory (contributes to GNP and resources and money), or attack the base stores or airfields.
Fleet engagements were done by putting the fleets on opposite edges of the screen, at which point you advance to and try to get into firing position on the enemy fleet. There were no minimum ranges, but you could have a good old fasioned line of battleships exchange fire until one side sank or time ran out. Fleet vs base battles were much the same where you line up on opposite edges, and maneuver the fleet into firing position on the same targets as the air attack had. You could also land marines or army divisions in this battle. Or if you did not feel like going through the battle, you let the computer take care of it.
Fleet sizes were small, only 8 ships each, destroyers included. There was also a maximum 16 domestic fleet limit (other countries like Britain, Soviet Union, Germany, Australia, and Holland all had their own fleets which would become yours if you allied with them, or they would withdraw these fleets if your alliance was broken...). Subs had a similar limitation, with only 16 subs allowed, and each operating individually.
Diplomacy was pretty important to the game. There were an incredible amount of resources in foreign bases (Dutch east indies, Soviet far east) that you had no access to until either you allied with them, the enemy declared war on them, or if you declared war on them, then took over that base. Like I mentioned before, Japan and the US do not start off at war, depending on the campaign. You have to declare war before any battles can take place. China, Britain, Holland, Germany, the Soviet Union, Australia, and a few other countries all started neutral in that campaign. You could either declare war, or attempt alliances, or just leave them alone.
The supply line aspect of the game was far too abstract and just plain wrong. Transporting Marines from base to base was instantaneous, and dependant completly on base to base connnections, not distance/time factors. Supply lines were also nearly impossible to effectively interdict. You were forced to camp subs or fleets near a base and let the AI search for transports. If you were lucky they would find one, and might even sink it. Aircraft transport was even worse. It was instantaneous, you simply assigned aircraft to a base and presto, there it was, no transports to sink, no places to fly to, nothing.
Now, also because of the day scale and the distance a fleet can cover in one day, enemy fleets could pass by eachother frequently, and never see eachother. This made fleet killing only reality when the AI came to attack a base with all of its fleets. The AI was nothing special either. It followed its objectives to the letter. If it was supposed to invade Manila and Davao, you can bet the entire Navy would be there in the amount of time it takes to sail from the home port. However, you could not tell its objectives unless you invested some money into spy operations, or until your base was being bombarded by half the enemy Navy.
PTO 2 ended up being a fun game, where you could try to build a slew of extremely advanced battleships, or you could go for a lot of cheap, big carriers with a load of F9Fs and A1 Skyraiders. Often you could not do both because the AI would have lost by then.
You really had to decide whether to keep supplying Europe with troops, or to face the German battleships. The Japs never had to worry about supplying Europe with troops, but I always wished it was an option.
Ok, so enough about that game. What I really am saying is that I would like to see a lot of that game put into this game. R&D, detailed production, and a little resource allocation, as well as strategic and maybe even tactical manipulation of fleets, marines, and air groups.
I want to see a little bit of diplomacy, and a very advanced supply system to be able to interdict it at every opportunity.
I think a day scale would be best, or at least multiple orders being able to be completed within a week.
I want to see some very versatile submarine action, with options to shell, torpedo, reconnoiter, and harrass.
I really want to be able to build bases wherever I want, not have to deal with the preset bases.
I also want to be able to turn the Indian-China front into the major point of the conflict, with just a little fleet action going on to keep the enemy from total control of the seas, and to keep supply lines open. I want the ability to invade Washington DC and control the Panama Canal.
I want to build an entire fleet of Yamatos or Montanas.
I want an extremely flexible game, with lots of details, but with the ability to let the AI deal with the more mundane details. I also think a scenario/campaign editor would be excellent, if one is not already planned.
Ok, so I am tired of writing now, and you are asleep from reading, but I think that WITP could benefit greatly from some of the elements from PTO 2.
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