1.2 Suggestions

[worr]

Originally posted by Nikademus
One on one.....a good IJN pilot in an A6M will win against a good or medocre (conscript) F4F pilot, or an F4F pilot who isn't fully aware of the characteristics of his enemy's mount. Unfortunatly for the Japanese, this wasn't WWI but WWII where "squadrons" and "flights" of aircraft tended to tangle.....thus the story could be far different when a gaggle of Zero's and Wildcats tangle

Which is to say its the pilot not the plane.

Any WWII flight simulation today where you can fly exact replicas of these planes in one on one fights...and worse in team fights....knows that the zero is an easy mark.

Ask the warbird pilots who are posting here. We've all been there done that. The zero could never make up for a lack of skill in its pilot. Its greatest strength was strategic...not tactical...namely range. But this strategic strength it had gave it the most glaring tactical weakness---firepower and constitutuion.

It was light, manuverable, and had a great thrust to weight advantage...but it was an easy kill, slow to dive, and could not disengage at will. The F4F and later US fighter planes...all had the advantage in durability, fire power, dive capability, and later would exceed the zero in speed and climb ability.

The problem with much of the praise of the zero in the 1930s was it was priased in a WWI context...not the WWII context that was yet to unfold.

As for the patch.

I haven't played UV in two weeks...and am still waiting.

Worr, out

[brisd]

I consider myself well-read on WW2 in general, the Pacific War as well. Currently 2/3 way through reading the generally excellent "Fire In The Sky" and my impression is the naval pilots on both sides (IJN/USN) were top notch, with more combat experience on the Japanese side. The US Army Air Corp was rapidly expanded in '42 and '43, quantity was stressed over quality and many pilots were sent to the front UV covers before they had minimal training on the aircraft they were to fly. I believe the game accurately portrays the strengths and weaknesses of the aircraft involved.

Also IMHO (from my readings) that the Japanese pilot program was superior till mid '43 when the attrition finally took its toll and their air arm collapsed under weight of numbers. I haven't done a study of pilot experience in UV, what experience starting and replacement pilots have but the Japanese should hold an edge here through most of the game period. I don't see the numbers of Japanese aces (kills of allied aircraft) that happened historically in my games so far, whether this is due to my or my opponents tactics or all the histories were wrong after all.

[msaario]

Originally posted by brisd
Also IMHO (from my readings) that the Japanese pilot program was superior till mid '43 when the attrition finally took its toll and their air arm collapsed under weight of numbers. I haven't done a study of pilot experience in UV, what experience starting and replacement pilots have but the Japanese should hold an edge here through most of the game period. I don't see the numbers of Japanese aces (kills of allied aircraft) that happened historically in my games so far, whether this is due to my or my opponents tactics or all the histories were wrong after all.

!! Someone is agreeing with me !!

My point is (still): Make the high experience guy relatively speaking more effective than the low exp guy. If it is linear now, change it. See my example below (oversimplified, disregarding morale, fatigue etc).

Two pilots go head to head, one with 90 exp, one with 60, currently perhaps go like 9-6 advantage for the better pilot??? A little tweaking, and we'd have - say - an 11-4 advantage for the better guy, or something like that. So, don't leave the algorithm linear, the difference should be more of logarithmic type. Now you got the better pilots scoring more often than currently (experience levels are still intact), losses higher on the low exp pilots (realistic, isn't it?) and kills more concentrated on the better pilots. Voila! Then you can factor in other stuff, like the Thach weave etc.

Once the Japanese lose these top pilots, well, they will start losing more and more planes and pilots, but they have aces with lots of kills (MIA, KIA, WIA...)!

Did anyone understand what I am saying? This is not Japanese-biased, on the contrary, the US pilots will make more aces later as their replacement pilots start with a higher exp level!

--Mikko

[Finnegan]

I know that this cannot be implemented in 1.20, but perhaps can be taken under consideration for a future patch, or for WITP.

Would it be possible to implement a feature that would allow one to combat load supply transports? The capacity of the transports involved could be halved, the loading time could be doubled, and the over the beach unloading of the supplies could be expedited because the loadmasters know where and what needs to be gotten to the invading troops. The transports would also be able to clear the area faster, thus lessening their exposure to enemy reactions.

The halved or doubled can be worked out by those who know the subject, as combat loading is most uneconomical when it comes to space available, but much more efficient than commercially loaded transports when it comes to unloading, especially over the beach. The option would be nice for a commander who has sufficient transport available.

For those who are considering buying this game, I will say that it is money well spent. I've had it for about a month now and find it to be all that I had hoped for.

[Black Cat]

The really nice feature and major improvement over PW is the loading troops screen that gives the capacity of the AP/AK and the "size" of the Ground Unit so you can accurately load the TF`s.

Unfortunately, the Ground units that show up in late June and July at Brisbane and Noumea have a size of say 3451, as an example.

This kind of defeats the purpose the "size" feature since there is no way ( I can see, help me here if I`m wrong ) to just load troops in the AP/AK since the program AI will fill the empty spaces with Supply to fill out the capacity.

This has serious results later, especially in an Assault Landing, where the TF`s just hangs around too long dumping off some supply with the troops and exposing it too long to the Air Strikes. Yes, I know you can send them home but then you have these little parts of units all over the Map.

If I`m not misusing the load interface how about just setting the program for Round Number Troop units sometime in the end of year "feature" update patch. ( or disabling the Supply thing )

Also, this is not Nit Picking, I think this is a _Great_ Game as is, and I can see it becoming the Classic that PacWar was, just expressing an opinion.

[mbatch729]

I think one of the common threads of many of the requests is flexibility. Some people want things one way, others a different way. As a programmer (and yes, I play one in real life), the best thing you can do is offer the end user the ability to set those things they way they want to. In another thread, there was talk on setting the default task force options, and who wanted what. Again, give them the ability to set things the way they want, if possible.

Now, this requires some extra programming, and some extra database fields. But in the end, the user is much more satisfied because 1) He feels he has more control 2) Things are set to his liking. My two cents worth, backed by over 10 years in the IT business.

[bradfordkay]

"This kind of defeats the purpose the "size" feature since there is no way ( I can see, help me here if I`m wrong ) to just load troops in the AP/AK since the program AI will fill the empty spaces with Supply to fill out the capacity.

This has serious results later, especially in an Assault Landing, where the TF`s just hangs around too long dumping off some supply with the troops and exposing it too long to the Air Strikes. Yes, I know you can send them home but then you have these little parts of units all over the Map."

Okay, the way I handle this is to allow the convoy to load all the supplies. You can carfully watch the loading on a day by day basis, and send the convoy on to its destination with a minimum of supplies loaded (the first day that you see all the troops aboard yet the convoy is still loading supplies is the point at which you'll want to do this). I prefer to allow it to load all te supplies because sometimes I can unload them all without too much loss.

On landing, I closely watch the situation. You need enough supplies on the beach for your troops to survive (much less attack), so dropping just troops seems to be a mistake. If at anytime the enemy threat is too great, I just pull the ships out and try again after the threat has subsided. I have lost a few transports using these methods, but have never most more than two or three in any one week (my latest game has reached mid-October '42 and I've only lost a total of 6 transports).

Note that this type of micromanagement requires plzying 1 day turns...