AI for MWiF - China

[paulderynck]

Playing in CWIF the Chineese theatre have been mostly about moving your units around the other guy trying to cut his supply or outflanking him, actual battles without overwhelming odds was few.

Very unhistorical all in all.

I'm no expert but the above is how I picture the war between Japan and China. In WIFFE a major battle in an impulse involves 6 corps against 2 which interprets as a two week battle between two armies "in the real world". Were there really as many major battles fought between China and Japan as we typically see in a game of WIFFE?

[c92nichj]

ORIGINAL: paulderynck

Playing in CWIF the Chineese theatre have been mostly about moving your units around the other guy trying to cut his supply or outflanking him, actual battles without overwhelming odds was few.

Very unhistorical all in all.

I'm no expert but the above is how I picture the war between Japan and China. In WIFFE a major battle in an impulse involves 6 corps against 2 which interprets as a two week battle between two armies "in the real world". Were there really as many major battles fought between China and Japan as we typically see in a game of WIFFE?

I'm no expert either but as I understood the war it was not much action going on.
Advance building HQ's by the japaneese to be able to keep more of his units in supply was seen in two of my three CWIF games, never in a WIFFE game.

Encircled armies(4-5 corps) permanently set of of supply was seen in my games both Chineese and Japaneese.

Flank and outrun your enemy was the major part of the game, unit density was to low for anything else.

To compare with WIFFE it plays quite like a campaign in the middle east, low unit density and often units outof supply both so is your enemy so not many fights, more moving into objectives unopposed.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: paulderynck

Playing in CWIF the Chineese theatre have been mostly about moving your units around the other guy trying to cut his supply or outflanking him, actual battles without overwhelming odds was few.

Very unhistorical all in all.

I'm no expert but the above is how I picture the war between Japan and China. In WIFFE a major battle in an impulse involves 6 corps against 2 which interprets as a two week battle between two armies "in the real world". Were there really as many major battles fought between China and Japan as we typically see in a game of WIFFE?

I think that historically, the war in China was characterized by the lack of will from either side to attack the other side.
Only at the end of the war (1944) did the Japanese pushed out from the Wuhan area, but for most of the war, nothing happened.
Players in the WiF Community have devised means to reflect this in WiF FE, but these are unfortunately out of scope for MWiF.

[paulderynck]

Advance building HQ's by the japaneese to be able to keep more of his units in supply was seen in two of my three CWIF games, never in a WIFFE game.

Encircled armies(4-5 corps) permanently set of of supply was seen in my games both Chineese and Japaneese.

Flank and outrun your enemy was the major part of the game, unit density was to low for anything else.

To compare with WIFFE it plays quite like a campaign in the middle east, low unit density and often units outof supply both so is your enemy so not many fights, more moving into objectives unopposed.

I guess what I'm saying is that we know that because of the change in scale, MWIF in the Pacific will be a different game then WIFFE is. I think you're right in saying that CWIF (which keeps the European scale as well) is a better predictor of what it will be like.

Perhaps the end result will even be "more historical" and personally, I'm beginning to leave behind the urge to have everything identical to WIFFE and look forward to learning the intricacies of MWIF in the Pacific before my opponents do. [;)]

Mind you if I'm playing Japan, being forced into Land impulses late in the game because the war in China is going to heck in a handbasket ...scares the heck out of me.

[coregames]

A few thoughts about China:

1. Coordinating specific CC and NC movements is important when one has to take up slack for the other. This is a relatively common occurence, when the Japanese have attacked along the line and forces must be shifted North or South to deal with it. The less-pressed Chinese faction can take up the vacated end of the line when such a shift happens. Unified scale will make this even more of an issue. It's at these moments that the Russian AIO and the Chinese AIO need to be in agreement, to maximize the benefits of the transition and avoid mistakes.

2. I mentioned this in the Japan AIO thread, and it's appropriate here as well. Assume the Japanese and the Russians are at war. If the CC can gain control of a resource in Manchuria, the Russians can conquer it without lapsing the war. Japan hates it when that happens, as it will probably lead to the CC taking Pyong Yang as well, allowing the Russians to conquer Korea also while staying at war. Once the U.S. is in the war, strategic bombing and sub warfare make a continuing Russian war very painful for the Japanese, well worth the commitment unless Russia is very hard pressed by the Germans. No special coordination between AIOs is required for this, unless the Nationalists can move North to free up Communists for a drive on the Manchurian resource (see thought 1 above).

3. Fiinally, what if the Chinese have an OC later in the war, and the opportunity pops up to spend it on Mao? This would require agreement as well.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: coregames

A few thoughts about China:

1. Coordinating specific CC and NC movements is important when one has to take up slack for the other. This is a relatively common occurence, when the Japanese have attacked along the line and forces must be shifted North or South to deal with it. The less-pressed Chinese faction can take up the vacated end of the line when such a shift happens. Unified scale will make this even more of an issue. It's at these moments that the Russian AIO and the Chinese AIO need to be in agreement, to maximize the benefits of the transition and avoid mistakes.

Maybe I'm wrong, but wasn't CC & NC supposed to be the same AIO ?
CC units are played on Russian activity limits, but still are Chinese units played by the Chinese Player, am I wrong by RAW ?

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Froonp
Maybe I'm wrong, but wasn't CC & NC supposed to be the same AIO ?
CC units are played on Russian activity limits, but still are Chinese units played by the Chinese Player, am I wrong by RAW ?

Seems that I'm wrong.
24.1.2 indicates that CC are always controlled by the Russian player.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Froonp

ORIGINAL: Froonp
Maybe I'm wrong, but wasn't CC & NC supposed to be the same AIO ?
CC units are played on Russian activity limits, but still are Chinese units played by the Chinese Player, am I wrong by RAW ?

Seems that I'm wrong.
24.1.2 indicates that CC are always controlled by the Russian player.

I am still unsure how this will work out. The Communist Chinese activity limits are restricted by the USSR but oil is shared with the Nationalist Chinese. It might not matter all that much since neither of them can provide air support to the Communist Chinese. Coordinating the land moves is the crucial bit - and that is done by the AIO using Field Marshals.

[dale1066]

Having messed around with CWif in this area and found that given usual luck with weather and combat die rolls I'm coming to the conclusion that what happened historically ie not a lot[:)]may well be the best strategy for the japanese player. My thoughts for what they are worth are below

Should be said I use the 1d10 cbt tables (is the 2d10 ? table more or less bloody?)

Pushing the chinese army back into the mountains and capturing Chenh chow, Cheng sha and Naning by the end of '40 seems doable and capturing and using the two resources associated with those cities is also ok (it takes quite a bit of careful garrisoning to keep on getting them ) Taking Sian in Cwif seems difficult if both chinese players set up strong in cities and mountains around cheng chang. By the time the weather is good up north japan can be busy else where and also the CC are increased in strength.

With reasonable skill and luck the chinese army should not take too many losses just gars and the two mil may be the odd inf and div that can be fairly easily replaced (never used the warlord units) even if they come back a bit too far away. (not such an issue with the new cities)

Flip side is japanese losses, It seems difficult, or at best time consuming, to get really good attacks against strongly defended (two chinese units + div ) hexes as with the poor japanese ground strike values of 2 for almost all early units at best you get the equivelent of a 4 or 5 to one assault and that means some attacks will cause losses. Care must be taken as even the chinese units can mount a good attack against an unorganaised non-elite unit that has been caught out of supply buy a surprise weather roll. Over the course of several turns the chinese player will get some good luck at some point and can lash out against a careless or unlucky japan

Since you can't just melt around all the chinese strongpoints ( to get the resources out by rail means certain hexes must be taken) japan must take losses in this period. So how many losses (don't forget to include the precious saved oil thats required to reorganise the japanese air, hqs and transports) can the japanese player afford to take before the benefits of these two resources which may be the only end product of a lot of effort are wasted.

There is also an interesting decision is what to do down south in 40/41. Do you try and braech the mountains to take kwei-yunh and chungking? Again it is doable but will incur losses and a little bit of bad luck or a misjudgement or can cause the japanese forces to be out of position when planning and executing the grab for the rest of the pacific.

As another aside has much been made of the planning for the switching in weather its usually ok in noth temperate and bad in north monsoon and vice versa so the japanese player with careful planning can maintain pressure on china continuously.

Any way getting back to the first point, maybe one strategy is to not worry about a heavy involvement in China, just be satisfied with the resources that you have and garrison correctly to ensure their safe arrival every turn. Use you initial advantage to capture the terrain to enable you to set up a strong defensive line (it would require too many units for a contiguous one) save your oil don't take many losses and prepare slowly and carefully for the really fun bit against the CW/US and NEI. Has the added advantage that the russian player will be convinced you're after Vladivostock so may keep those unit there too long and will keep him off your back in manchuria.

Oh and be on the look out for opportunities for a bored = rash chinese player who tries any fancy out flanking move to be counterattacked hard.
Or indeed a careless russian leaving opportunities to nab his resources in a swift campaign

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Thanks. It's nice to have these additional details for when Japan's strategy in China is not all out conquest.

[Zorachus99]

When prioritizing objectives in the pacific, there are two over-arching factors I consider:
 
1)  If the U.S. can hit japanese convoys even in a losing proposition when trading BP for BP, the results to the Japanese economy can be nearly unrecoverable, while the U.S. grows more powerful every turn. 
 
2)  The Japanese at minimum, must control every single major port adjacent to the sea zone's they can assume control of.  The major ports should have extremely high value for Japanese AIO, not to mention govern defensive/offensive strategy in a sea zone.

[freeboy]

Again, I have not even seen this game,
? talking about Japan, or England.. I think the land combat uses hex? What about hte sea combat? Seems the abstraction neccesitated by 2 month long turns would, even with impulses, make hex sea war odd, is it zones? that would make more sence to me with algorithmic odds of attacks and intercentions... counterattacks by air etc.  perhaps I should have posted as seperate but seemed relevent.. thanks again,

[Mziln]

[:)] Welcome to the forums [:)]

For more information on the game see:

The RaW (Rules as Written) 7 Aug 04 and Scenario RTF

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: freeboy

Again, I have not even seen this game,
? talking about Japan, or England.. I think the land combat uses hex? What about hte sea combat? Seems the abstraction neccesitated by 2 month long turns would, even with impulses, make hex sea war odd, is it zones? that would make more sence to me with algorithmic odds of attacks and intercentions... counterattacks by air etc.  perhaps I should have posted as seperate but seemed relevent.. thanks again,

I just bumped an earlier thread on Tutorial #5 - Naval Units back to the top of the forum. There is a lot of discussion in that thread but if you start at the beginning and go through just reading the posts I made on the individual 12 pages in the tutorial, I think it will provide a solid background on MWIF naval units. I still have to write the tutorial on naval combat. Sigh[:(]

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Zorachus99

When prioritizing objectives in the pacific, there are two over-arching factors I consider:

1)  If the U.S. can hit japanese convoys even in a losing proposition when trading BP for BP, the results to the Japanese economy can be nearly unrecoverable, while the U.S. grows more powerful every turn. 

True

2)  The Japanese at minimum, must control every single major port adjacent to the sea zone's they can assume control of.  The major ports should have extremely high value for Japanese AIO, not to mention govern defensive/offensive strategy in a sea zone.

True, but the Minor Ports too. Menado / Makassar / Legaspi come to my mind as good Minor Ports for the US to have. Especially with this "super port" counters (Naval Supply Units) that the US have, which increase the capacity of a minor port from 4 to 14 or 19 ships.

[Zorachus99]

ORIGINAL: Froonp

ORIGINAL: Zorachus99

When prioritizing objectives in the pacific, there are two over-arching factors I consider:

1)  If the U.S. can hit japanese convoys even in a losing proposition when trading BP for BP, the results to the Japanese economy can be nearly unrecoverable, while the U.S. grows more powerful every turn. 

True

2)  The Japanese at minimum, must control every single major port adjacent to the sea zone's they can assume control of.  The major ports should have extremely high value for Japanese AIO, not to mention govern defensive/offensive strategy in a sea zone.

True, but the Minor Ports too. Menado / Makassar / Legaspi come to my mind as good Minor Ports for the US to have. Especially with this "super port" counters (Naval Supply Units) that the US have, which increase the capacity of a minor port from 4 to 14 or 19 ships.

Any port these NSU's are in should be considered a major port.

[Frederyck]

ORIGINAL: Zorachus99
Any port these NSU's are in should be considered a major port.

I am not too familiar with the workings of these NSUs during WWII, but since they're not considered Major Ports in WiFFE (the board game), they won't be in MWiF (the computer game) either.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Frederyck

ORIGINAL: Zorachus99
Any port these NSU's are in should be considered a major port.

I am not too familiar with the workings of these NSUs during WWII, but since they're not considered Major Ports in WiFFE (the board game), they won't be in MWiF (the computer game) either.

I think they represent the artificial harbor the Allies built at Normandy.

[coregames]

I think we've gotten off topic in the AI for China thread.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Frederyck

ORIGINAL: Zorachus99
Any port these NSU's are in should be considered a major port.

I am not too familiar with the workings of these NSUs during WWII, but since they're not considered Major Ports in WiFFE (the board game), they won't be in MWiF (the computer game) either.

I think that Zorachus was just saying that these should be taken care by the Japanese AIO just as if they were Major Ports, I don't think that Zorachus was asking for NSU to be Major Ports.