Slitherine

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Also, while Allied sigint/code breaking did provide a lot of information throughout the war, it doesn't seem like we routinely had detailed OOB/schedule information. Midway and Coral Sea seem to me like the exceptions here instead of the rule, and in Midway's case, the sheer size of the operation would have made it hard to keep totally secret.

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ORIGINAL: Terminus

And that's EXACTLY what we're doing. It's "what did", not "what if" (good term there, Shark).

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ORIGINAL: jwilkerson

From my perspective this is an open issue. Meaning we have not closed it on the design team.

My preference (which doesn't mean much) would be to end the game on 15 Aug 45. IIRC I got voted down by acclamation, but I still haven't changed my mind. The historical scenario should start and end on the historical date. Now that being said, I have not seen all the plans as to when it is proposed to end the game and what additional units will be added. So we will continue to cogitate on this issue and see what comes of that.

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ORIGINAL: spence

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Also, while Allied sigint/code breaking did provide a lot of information throughout the war, it doesn't seem like we routinely had detailed OOB/schedule information. Midway and Coral Sea seem to me like the exceptions here instead of the rule, and in Midway's case, the sheer size of the operation would have made it hard to keep totally secret.

Read the TROMs for IJN ships at combinedfleet.com. Your perception is quite off the mark. Allied submarines were routinely detailed to ambush speicific Japanese ships or ship types sailing from point A to point B. The lousy torpedos saved the Japanese from serious problems for the first year but after that things got pretty bad. In particular lots of Japanese submarines and convoys were ambushed in this way. USS Archerfish knew a Japanese CV (if not its name) was coming, about where, about what time, and with what escort. Archerfish still had to be well handled because it would only get one shot but the intel was excellent.

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ORIGINAL: Dili

I think for modders and those that want to continue it should be open ended. Btw will it be possible for a mod to start a scenario in 1940?

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ORIGINAL: John Lansford

After Coral Sea, SUBPAC tried to vector submarines along Shokaku's path back to Japan in time to intercept her based on decoded sigint.  They knew what route she was taking and which ports she was going to stop at, but since her speed was unaffected by her damage she was a hard target to catch and no subs managed an attack.

Yamato was intercepted several times during the war and IIRC torpedoed twice, both times inflicting enough damge to put her in the repair yard for a few months.  Those intercepts were based on sigint as well.

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The Japanese player saves the allied turn to the game and, having completed his turn, executes the end of turn sequence so a new combat round is conducted.

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One thing I would find helpful is more capability in the Commander selections. I don't know to what if any extent you are tweaking commanders, but in the current version it is maddening to try to find the "ideal candidate" without being able to sort based on his skill levels. For example, if I'm searching for a CV commander I might want to sort on air skill rating to find commanders with good values for air, sea and aggressiveness.

More generally, secondary sorts would be really helpful, (above) for example in selecting a ship for a fleet, I might want to sort first by speed, then capacty to select for ships to carry something specific or in selecting which ships to evac from port based on float and sys damage.

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ORIGINAL: Kull

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ORIGINAL: Terminus

And that's EXACTLY what we're doing. It's "what did", not "what if" (good term there, Shark).

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ORIGINAL: jwilkerson

From my perspective this is an open issue. Meaning we have not closed it on the design team.

My preference (which doesn't mean much) would be to end the game on 15 Aug 45. IIRC I got voted down by acclamation, but I still haven't changed my mind. The historical scenario should start and end on the historical date. Now that being said, I have not seen all the plans as to when it is proposed to end the game and what additional units will be added. So we will continue to cogitate on this issue and see what comes of that.

I've dragged these early March comments over from the Naval Thread because together they indicate something of a conundrum: How does the AE team reconcile the goal of "staying true to history" ("what did" happen as Terminus/Shark would put it) with the even more fundamental reality that people play WitP largely (maybe even entirely) with the goal of trying to alter history?

WitP AE will undoubtedly have a near-perfect 12/7/41 OOB for every major power represented in the game, but once that button is pushed and we arrive at the morning of 12/8, history is over, and a new path has been set. The classic in-game example is the naming of Essex Class carriers. There simply would not have been a Yorktown or Lexington in that group if the namesake carriers hadn't been sunk. So if AE uses those names (or the "Lexington II" equivalent ), you are tacitly following a "historical path" that will usually have no basis in the "reality" of each new WitP AE game (i.e. those carriers might very well NOT be sunk).

Joe wants the Historical Campaign to end on 8/15/45 because that's what actually happened. But the reality is there IS no "historical campaign". Unless two players follow a script, there will never be a single WitP grand campaign that is factually correct in every sense. Be aware that much of "What Did" happen is the direct result of a chain of circumstances that may have no relationship whatsoever with the path followed by individual WitP games. By contrast, an embrace of "What If" would lead to the "Fantasy WitP" dreaded by one and all. The balancing act chosen by the team seems to be more of a judicious application of "What Could" have happened, as exemplified in the "by acclamation" decision to extend the campaign end date. Personally I think that's the right choice, and it will make WitP-AE a more entertaining and well rounded game.

But I am curious. Is the design conundrum recognized by the team? And if so, is the tendency toward "what could" a tacit groping for consensus or a recognized internal goal?

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ORIGINAL: Gem35

Not sure if this has been asked yet but will there be toggles on the options screens for certain new rules being turned on or off like PDU or Jap sub doctrine like witp currently has?
i.e. can u turn off a rule like fleet carriers can carry only 36 torps or bases can only build forts to 6 and the like.

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I did not realize that warship routing and transit was also routinely coming from electronic eavesdropping, except for the IJN subs regularly reporting their locations; I had heard that before. Thanks for correcting my error, Spence. I'll have to check out the TROMS. Any specific examples you can think of?

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Yes.

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ORIGINAL: Terminus

No.

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ORIGINAL: JWE

To amplify just a bit on Joe’s post, it is quite true that any “historical” game breaks down as soon as any player makes an ahistorical decision. The main idea for the scope and development of things, is that it took “time” to develop new technologies and procedures (often years) and so the general trend of doctrine and utilization will follow that which was established and internalized by the respective combatants.

There will be some peripheral doctrinal and tactical opportunities available to both sides in the conflict (based solely on late 20th century hindsight) but nothing that changes the fundamental juxtaposition of forces, or the fundamental disproportion of resources.

The game does not contemplate unfolding history and attempts to view it that way will always be doomed to irrelevance. What the game can do is give some degree of flexibility to the players so they won’t be so constrained by a “strict IRL interpretation”. In this regard, your Essex carriers (and others) can be renamed, when under construction, so that you can get a new Essex “Saratoga”, or whatever, depending on who was sunk.

As to CORONET, or OLYMPIC, they never happened. So what if the game system wants to play them out. Nobody, has any idea about who, what, where, when, why, did anything in support of those ops. Nobody in the whole universe “KNOWS” what would have happened (very sorry, I’m beginning to sound like el Someone). Pushing the end date out just gives the Japanese some additional room for accommodating the peripheral doctrinal and tactical opportunities they may have; basically, how far could they have pushed it.