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All Forums >> [Current Games From Matrix.] >> [World War II] >> War In The Pacific - Struggle Against Japan 1941 - 1945 >> Page: <<   < prev  1 2 3 [4]
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- 4/1/2003 2:20:34 AM   
mdiehl

 

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Joined: 10/21/2000
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[QUOTE]What is your point anyway? Are you saying abstractions such as expirence, fatique, readiness and morale should not be modeled in the game?[/QUOTE]

No. My point is one ought to know what one is modeling before one starts labelling it or assigning values. The *only* successful game designs that I have seen that use "Morale" invoke morale in the context of battle -- to wit, a "morale check" that occurs as a result of fire or related battlefield checks preparatory to doing very risky things. Experience is a separate design element, as is readiness.

The idea that a ship simply can't move because it has failed a "morale check" or "system shock" or "paralyzing respiratory virus" (which is an exaggeration but illustrates my objection to naming things when you're not sure what you are modeling) is silly.

When "morale" comes into play in the real world, it is inevitably something that comes up in the context of immediate peril. This brings me back to my suggestion: merchant vessels should only be subject to capture if in immediate peril. Until in immediate peril, players should be able to move them at will. Ships with system damage will move slower, and are thus more likely to be placed in immediate peril.

[QUOTE]If yes, then I guess your are out of luck because they are in UV and undoubtedly will be in WitP.[/QUOTE]

Since you are in the habit of asking and answering your own rhetorical questions, in particular the ones that posit a situation that is already obviously not the case even in the previous generation of this product, PW, (absence of EXP and all that) one hopes that in the future you can have your conversation with yourself. Congrats, you just tumbled over a straw man of your own creation. What a brilliant rhetorical strategist you are.

[QUOTE]As it stands in UV air units that fall below a certain level of morale are less likely to fly. [/QUOTE]

Frankly it's a wierd and poorly done abstraction. The closest that adverse morale ever came to preventing a "unit" from flying is measured in abort rates. Even the hardest hit units like the "bloody 100th" (100th BG USAAF 8th AF) had impressively low abort rates given their unit histories and the targets to which they kept getting assigned. It is entirely inappropriate to posit an entire unit refusing orders to fly.

[QUOTE]Don't see why merchants should not be treated the same.[/QUOTE]

All you have to do is document what, exactly, you are attempting to model with this and document why the values are chosen as they are and you are in position to add realism. But to merely observe that "morale exists" with reference to some trivial dictionary definition and then assert that it needs to be modeled for all circumstances is inappropriate IMO.

[QUOTE]Quite frankly I find it hard to believe you feel that a simulation that hard codes the capture of 60 ships is better than one that offers variable captures and forces the Japanese player to work for them.[/QUOTE]

Matrix/SSI's past performance at modeling these kinds of abstractions leaves me in doubt that the requisite research will be done, or that the Jpns player will have to do much real work to achieve better-than-historical results.

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Show me a fellow who rejects statistical analysis a priori and I'll show you a fellow who has no knowledge of statistics.

Didn't we have this conversation already?

(in reply to Wasp)
Post #: 91
- 4/1/2003 4:54:58 AM   
TIMJOT

 

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Joined: 4/30/2001
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by mdiehl
[B]All you have to do is document what, exactly, you are attempting to model with this and document why the values are chosen as they are and you are in position to add realism.
[/B][/QUOTE]

What I was attempting to model were ships that were captured at sea, not because they could only make 9 knots instead of 12 knots, but because an IJN warship put a shot accross their bows. I was attempting to model the ships that were scuttled in port; not because they were physically unable to get underway, but because their civilian crews did not wish to risk their lives attempting to sail through enemy held waters. I was attempting to model ships that were captured in port (intact) because their crews simply ambandoned them without bothering to scuttle them. I can give you specific examples, but since the whole arguement now seems moot, as the alpha tester have alluded that some sort of hard coded reinforcement is the route that the designers will probably take. I will refrain unless otherwise requested.;)

(in reply to Wasp)
Post #: 92
- 4/1/2003 6:17:19 AM   
mdiehl

 

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Actually, even though the point is moot, I'm still curious. How many ships were abandoned, in port, undamaged, and not scuttled?

It's not that I object to exhaustive detail. The sort of stuff we're talking about now strikes me as fairly described as "routine business that gets overlooked when..." an Army HQ is collapsing or bugging out, or a regime is toppled, or in general extraordinary chaos sets in in the face of a rapidly advancing enemy. On par with failure to blow a key bridge, to sabotage a valuable stockpile of fuel, or to scuttle your Type IX U-boat (I'm recalling U-505)because you figure she's already so damaged that the notion of an intact capture never enters your mind.

Seems like some of this could be handled as fortuitous random events that might happen when a port is captured, or when a severely damaged naval unit comes into close proximity of a naval unit with standing orders to attempt a boarding.

_____________________________

Show me a fellow who rejects statistical analysis a priori and I'll show you a fellow who has no knowledge of statistics.

Didn't we have this conversation already?

(in reply to Wasp)
Post #: 93
- 4/1/2003 11:43:40 AM   
pad152

 

Posts: 2871
Joined: 4/23/2000
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Well I like the idea of captured ships, as long as it doesn't become a gamey tactic.

(in reply to Wasp)
Post #: 94
- 4/2/2003 11:40:58 AM   
madflava13


Posts: 1530
Joined: 2/7/2001
From: Alexandria, VA
Status: offline
I like the idea as well, but only for ships in port... and then only as a random chance (with warships less likely than merchants, etc.) My reasoning is that in WW2 in the Pacific, even severely damaged warships did not surrender. Most of the time, the ships were so badly damaged when the crew jumped overboard, there was no hope of salvage. In other instances, the nearby friendlies put the coups de grace on her - Such as the Wasp near Guadalcanal...

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Post #: 95
- 4/22/2003 11:35:31 PM   
Luskan

 

Posts: 1897
Joined: 7/11/2002
From: Down Under
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One of you guys might be able to jog my memory - what was the book (mostly pretty inaccurate as far as WW2 pacific histories go - all sorts of generalisations and gloss overs IIRC) that mentioned that the IJN fleet units boarded (DDs and a sub even managed to i think) and captured plenty of merchant ships in the P.I. prior to the fall of Bataan and off Malaysia/ Singapore just before the fall of Singapore.

Basically they were always lone transport ships without escort or convoy - usually civilian, that had delayed their escape too long, and sensibly surrendered rather than than die. They usually carried important personell and westerners trying to escape the IJ advance.

In this instance it isn't a question of the transport crew scuttling or forgetting to scuttle, it is a question of fighting or surrendering to IJN warships/subs/whatever that could blow them to hell without any trouble (especially at that stage of the war). I'd guess that the result of this fight or surrender in these circumstances was always to surrender (usually the ships were filled with civilian refugees that most captains would not risk the lives of in a firefight etc.).

I think that this has less to do with morale (even though an IJN transport is likely to stare down the barrel of a USN CA's guns, give them the bird and then order his crew to "open fire" or "broadside" than a western captain at that stage of the war) and more to do with the speed of the IJN advance.

Perhaps the chances of a clean mid ocean capture where a lone transport (civilian I guess, probably not military) met by any sort of IJN fleet unit in daylight (they're more liekly to shoot first, talk later at night) should begin quite high at the start of the game, and decrease as time goes on. Gives the IJN an incentive to attack fast and scoop up some extra ships?

_____________________________

With dancing Bananas and Storm Troopers who needs BBs?

(in reply to Wasp)
Post #: 96
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