Tristanjohn
Posts: 3027
Joined: 5/1/2002
From: Daly City CA USA
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Mogami
quote:
ORIGINAL: Tristanjohn
quote:
ORIGINAL: Ron Saueracker
It's not just the Allied ASW which is whacked, it is all ASW.
What is aggressive use of subs? Placing them in shipping lanes? Placing them in base hexes? Hex is 60 miles as we all know  , but how close is too close? 10 miles offshore under water? Surfaced at night? Surrounding Truk or some major base in the hopes of having a CV TF cross it's path while waiting in ambush? What?
This is what subs did historically. Prien sank a BB like this. Wahoo sank a DD at Wewak doing this. Battle of Lingayan gulf saw about 8 examples of this over a day or so. None of these subs was lost.
In WITP, just being in the same hex as an enemy TF is bad news for the sub, not the other way around. The hunter is the hunted.
That's been my experience in my first PBEM game. As Allied sub doctrine was toggled on my Allied boats, of course, don't see much of anything, much less actually attack anything. They are, however seen by Japanese surface assets (I assume these are ASW TFs) and attacked regularly. So far my losses have been just four boats (two Dutch jobs and a couple of S-class USN boats.)
My Japanese opponent, on the other hand, has had 19 of his submarines sunk through 5 June 1942. He does not use his boats recklessly but rather just places them in logical shipping lanes. When my convoys come along these Japanese boats then sometimes attack (what the percentage is of these attacks versus times when I run over them unnoticed I don't know). My convoys are what I consider to be normal in composition, about twenty transports with a typical escort of three destroyers. My kill percentage of Japanese submarines which attack my convoys is high--well over 50%, but again I don't have an exact figure to give you.
My Japanese opponent to date has sunk only one transport. His boats have also sunk one destroyer which was part of a fast-transport TF and have hit (only damaged) a light cruiser which was part of a bombardment TF which, for some unknown reason, failed to move that phase.
And that's it.
Granted, this sample is only from one game, but it does appear to me that the ASW routines are off by quite a bit based on this data. Add in any number of similar reports by players of other games and it's easier still to draw this conclusion.
Hi, Interesting. When I play I sink twce as many enemy boats. When you play you sink many times more enemy boats and yet we are not playing the same sides?
In my Allied games I have sunk 4 or 5 times as many Japanese subs as I've lost. (have not tabulated these games yet)
In the actual war the bulk of Japanese ships sunk by USN submarines occured after the IJN had lost a good part of it's ASW ships (Fleet DD) There was little action in South Pacific prior to Aug 1943. USN boats were used to protect areas where no Japanese ever moved. IJN boats in this period sank over 900k ton of shipping. (So they are being robbed more then USN)
If it needs to be pointed out over and over that attacking escorted ships in WITP is more dangerous then attacking unescorted ships in actual war. (I don't think Prien could have entered Pearl Harbor in 1942) I think Ron and others expect 1944 USN submarine results in 41/42 Like trying to fly unescorted bombers. You can do it but it works better if you eliminate the enemy fighters first. Before you conduct a massive USN submarine campaign sink a few IJN DD. (The PC/PG/MSW don't seem to sink many subs)
During 1942, I don't think many USN submarines got within 60 miles of Japanese Home Island port. Conducted a attack and remained in the area. (And in the entire year I would like to find 10 examples of a sub being that close)
When I am allied against AI I have no trouble with Japanese ASW around PI.
When good results can be had by a player runnign both sides it tells me there is more to it then the "system" As Japan I sink 2x USN subs. As USN I sink 4x IJN subs. In both cases my loss are not severe and my subs sink as many enemy ships as enemy subs sink of mine.
I just wonder why we single out submarine warfare. Players are losing 3 or 4 times as much other material as well. In the game with Ron he has lost around 500 aircraft per month. (And he posts he is doing well in air battles. An air freak would be howling)
You could hardly characterize Ron or me as players who single out submarine warfare, Mogami. Both of us are on record being critical of pretty much the entire game. I haven't kept up with every ebb and eddy of your AAR with Ron, but I'd dare say somewhere along the line he's mentioned that in his opinion the air system is entirely too bloody as well. In fact, he just made such a remark within the last day or so, as I recall, asking something to the effect, "Maybe we should have bombers grounded more often," this in an effort to slow the air model down.
I posted today on your AAR what my feelings are regarding Gary's game model as a whole. I believe it's fatally flawed for the reason not enough effort was made to build it with reasonably accurate data and effective schemes. This comes in the form of specific equipment ratings for airplanes, just for example, or in the case of the land-combat model dubious movement routines, no ZOC exercised in adjacent hexes, what appears to be a dysfunctional supply routine, either by design and/or function, etc. When false data values and incompetent game mechanisms begin to interact with one another during play it should not be unexpected that strange casuallties will result.
In my example of submarine warfare in the PBEM I have going with Chez, the results have to be only half of the picture, as with Allied sub doctrine toggled on only he can play that game from the point of view of boat skipper. What might transpire in this regard from the USN perspective once late summer or early fall of 1943 rolls around and the shackles are finally taken off my submarine skippers' hands is anyone's guess. I'll report back then.
In the meantime, I urge you to closely consider the Allied Submarine Doctrine rule as a good working example of what I've written above regarding incompetent game mechcanisms serving only to frustrate reasonable play. I don't know who dreamed this rule up or what the rationale for it was. I do know whatever that rationale was it's still baloney, and that its effect in the game is nothing short of ridiculous. Garbage in, garbage out.
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RE: Something has to be done about Allied ASW - 
. So, it´s possible that, if we want to decrease ASW efficacy, we should also decrease submarine torpedo accuracy
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