Isolated units and replacements

[el cid again]

In my games players have pretty much independently come to the conclusion that isolated air units should not upgrade or accept replacements. Isolated means "they lack the range to jump from a friendly airfield." Well - that is pretty easy to grasp and also to calculate.

Vlad has proposed a different concept: turn off replacements for units that are isolated. Land units.

I think the design intent was to let you "feed" critical units vice less critical ones. But his idea may have merit.

How could we define when a land unit is "isolated" from supply?

Clearly - if it has a road/rail connection - maybe even a secondary road/trail connection - to a supply source it is NOT isolated. Also if the connection can be made by ports Level 3 and above. But what about a unit in good supply on an island or otherwise not so connected? Is there a simple way to define a state of isolation?

[herwin]

It's a function of what logistics can get through to the unit. The game treats all classes of supply (food/major end items/POL/construction materials/ammunition) as equivalent in the tonnage, and requires the unit to be out of contact for reinforcements. Ammunition and POL are equivalent in that a ton of either requires about the same amount of toluene, major end items come under reinforcements, and the base consumption rate of the unit might be considered food.

I don't think this area really needs to be tweaked.

[Shark7]

And even if it is in a port city, how much can get through if (in Manila for example) the rest of the bases are taken and air coverage is such that any transport other than submarines can't get through without major losses.
 
Granted you can supply by sub, but one would expect only a minimum of food, medical and ammunition would be feasible.  Troops...in the case of Bataan, IIRC the US was withdrawing as many key personel as possible before the fall.
 
My take on it.  Foreign troops that are cut off should not take replacements.  Indigenous troops could still recruit from the native population (though the experience level of those replacements should be 1 due to having ZERO training).  Example, US troops in Manila/Bataan should set to not accept replacements, though the Philippino units could accept replacements.
 
DEI and Malaya are the same.  Native troops can replace, foreign troops should not.
 
Obviously Japanese troops that are cut off probably shouldn't.
 
And honestly this should be a game mechanism, instead of the player needing to do it manually.

[ChickenOfTheSea]

I tend to treat my units the way Vlad does. The way I look at it, if there is good local supply units regain strength through the recovery of disablements. However, replacing completely destroyed units and especially upgrading to new equipment should not occur. Sometimes a little judgement is required. For instance, when the Philippines are isolated, I allow Filipino units to receive replacements, but not US ones until resupply fleets can reach the Philippines. I view stockpiles as going into disablement recovery.

Sometimes, however, it can be difficult to define when an LCU is isolated.

[Bogo Mil]

I think one should also restrict the other way: A Fillipino unit should not receive replacements, if most of the PI is in Japanese hands. I think it's quite gamey to rebuild large parts of the PI army in San Francisco.

Similiar thing for the Dutch: The Netherlands are occupied, so it should not be possible to rebuild Dutch base forces, aviation regiments etc. from fragments. You can even enforce this in the mod: If you make the TOE size of the units very small, those evacuated fragments can not magically acquire hundreds of (aviation) support squads any more.

[el cid again]

Good comments all.

In some ways Dutch and Filipino units DO rebuild - and automatically - regardless of settings. A number of reinforcement units are exactly this sort of thing - and indeed they do appear at the map edge in most cases. Also - several Philippine Army formations appear in Manila - and one at Zamboanga. The Philippine Army (an institution and also the title of a book written by a Filipino academic which one of the CHS team and I myself both have and follow) was in a process of acceleration of forming up (it had been forming for about a decade) because of the fears of war - and it was overtaken by events before it was really ready - in several senses. That didn't prevent it from continuing to form units and also to some extent replacements in country. Aside from that, the US Army also formed up Filipino units - which indeed it long had done - the Philippine Scouts being US Army vice Philippine Army formations - and these tended to be sent to PTO and indeed to the Philippines. Dutch units tended to form up under British or Australian auspices and using mainly British/CW equipment - unless there was enough Dutch equipment of a particular sort. However - just about every case of this sort of thing that did happen has been put in RHS - so a player might decide to limit it at that. The RHS primary house rule leaves a certain room for player judgement - in part to help create uncertainties - in part because sometimes peculiar circumstances might justify rationalizing a different choice which would not be the general choice of the same player. There are lots of unusual events of this sort IRL - and a game is supposed to maximize player choices IMHO - so I only advocate having a rationale for your choices - rather than trying to define them strictly in all circumstances for you.

An oddity of the Philippine Army is that, while the First Regular Division formed up first as you might expect - it as virtually completely gutted or experienced officers and NCOs just before the war began being the source of cadres for forming up the ten reserve divisions (and other formations). This unit then was fielded under the very same name - but in a very green and inexperienced form - so it isn't really any better than - and perhaps not as good as the best of - the reserve divisions. Another oddity is that a para military institution was used to form medium sized combat units. This institution - the Philippine Constabulary - had been formed by the US Army in the colonial period - and elements and individuals had actual combat experience - unlike the Philippine Army itself - which had very few people with experience and no operational experience. The unit that forms at Zamboanga had, in its cadre, people who had defended the city from Muslim insurgents early in the colonial period - and the Constabularly had always been organized - in theory - so it could form up battalions and even regiments in a war situation. Nevertheless, it was primarily a police institution, and it still exists - under the name Philippine National Police. Its officers are still military officers as well - there is a single Academy to train all officers regardless of branch - and PNP is a branch just like the Army, Navy and Air Force are branches. In the Philippines there are places with no local police at all - as in Canada or Alaska - and PNP visit when police are required for some reason - something like RCMP or Alaska State Troopers do. But while all police are para military in the sense of using military rank structures - not many are organized to become light infantry in wartime: the Constabularly had to engage very large bodies of "pirates" (or whatever you might want to call the Morros and similar) from its formation - so it always organized and trained to form larger parties than police usually do.