Last request for comments: OVER

[el cid again]

We seem to be passing lots of basic tests.

RHS Level 5 and 6 are going to be issued in a final form with SOME of the changes in 7 - but not all.
Only if it might matter to functionality is it backfitted.

Level 7 will freeze until a round of long human games is completed.

We have done away with super heavy DP guns - but retained very heavy DP guns - meaning the
battleship guns are now SP again.

We have re re re re revised all P-38s -

G model is a fighter

J and L models get a maneuverability factor bonus - defined for flaps - which will apply to other fighters that have them
This can be 1 or 2 points, depending on the impact/success level of the flaps.

A number of minor craft are altered to appear damaged instead of needing to be built - junks - dhous - barges - LC - etc.
Not all - but enough to matter for production.

Anything else that should be reviewed should be mentioned now - or it will miss the boat.

[goodboyladdie]

This all sounds great. Thanks very much for all your hard work Cid.

[mikemike]

I've looked at the data of RHSEES 7.78, and I have found some errors with some German ships (AMC/AO):

the AO (class 830/ship 444) is written UCKERMARK; the class should correctly be called "DITHMARSCHEN", but UCKERMARK is ok, too.
The class had a range of 12.500 nm/15kts.

The AMC class 831/ship 446 is written MICHEL. The armament is not correct, it should be:
6in number:2 turret:1 facing:front
6in 1/1/center
6in 1/1/center
6in 2/1/rear
Device 062 (3.9in/45): 1/1/rear
37mm 2/2/front
37mm 2/2/rear
20mm 1/1/front
20mm 1/1/left
20mm 1/1/right
20mm 1/1/rear
torpedo tubes are ok
The ship carried 250-300 rounds per 150mm gun; maybe the ammo should be corrected upwards.
The captain's name is really written "vRuckteschell"

[Buck Beach]

ORIGINAL: el cid again

We seem to be passing lots of basic tests.

RHS Level 5 and 6 are going to be issued in a final form with SOME of the changes in 7 - but not all.
Only if it might matter to functionality is it backfitted.

Level 7 will freeze until a round of long human games is completed.

We have done away with super heavy DP guns - but retained very heavy DP guns - meaning the
battleship guns are now SP again.

We have re re re re revised all P-38s -

G model is a fighter

J and L models get a maneuverability factor bonus - defined for flaps - which will apply to other fighters that have them
This can be 1 or 2 points, depending on the impact/success level of the flaps.

A number of minor craft are altered to appear damaged instead of needing to be built - junks - dhous - barges - LC - etc.
Not all - but enough to matter for production.

Anything else that should be reviewed should be mentioned now - or it will miss the boat.

I love this level 7 RHS game and desperately want to start playing again. However, I want the issues pending to be settled as much as possible and that does not mean pending further testing. I can't contribute to this end so I am depending upon you (collectively and especially Sid) to get it right enough for a stable term game. If that means more wait, so be it, but I don't want to see that corrections has cause further errata. Those should have already been disclosed and corrected.

So, please be careful and get it right.

P.S. Not looking for yada, yada, yada about corrections, nature of the beast, etc.

I forgot to add my appreciation for your efforts and the fact that I am a RHS fanboy.

[el cid again]

I only had weapon caliber and number counts for Michael - so thank you.

The captains name is too long to include more than the first initial - and no space between it and the last name.

Ammo in WITP is in "shots" - and a "shot" is typically 6 rounds. I had no ammo count - but 250 to 300 RPG is a great deal (which a raider might want so it need not resupply often - but it is a risk - you lose the raider - you lose the investment in ammo -- and it is a danger since the ammo is not in protected magazines - it might explode the ship in a battle). 300 rounds is 50 shots.

[el cid again]

Buck - there is no way to get the data perfect - according to information theory. There must remain errors. And we have far worse data than 'normal' - whateve that means - due to too many cooks and almost no documentation/planning.

By avoiding any new development we should avoid making more potential problems.

ALL we are doing is marginal data erratta punching or making marginal changes to help mitigate identified issues.

There are NO structural issues to work on I am aware of. Everything seems to be workiing - within the limits of the WITP system -
and the present files are usable. I just wanted a slightly cleaner file set = and that is all we will get.

EDIT: There IS a structural issue - but not with RHS - with WITP. The Soviet Far East Command - it does not exist in 1941, and
the Soviets need two (three or four) major land HQ - depending on various considerations. RHS will attempt to mitigate this issue -
we can certainly NOT locate it in the wrong place (where it is - at Vladivostok). See separate thread on this matter.

[m10bob]

In every mod I have looked at, it gives the American CVL Independence an aircraft complement of 30, (less than a CVE like the Bogue which is rated too high at 33 in game), when the true complement was 40-45.
BTW, those jeep carriers were generally 12 fighters, 9 Avengers, but some sources do rate the Bogue at up to 28 planes, which I suspect is for ferrying?.
Comments?


http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/carriers/us_light.htm

http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/carriers/us_esc1.htm

[goodboyladdie]

Mike and I are still holding off on a start as we can't walk away from RHS. Is there an ETA for the next version? Please do not feel hurried Cid. You work far too hard and it sounds like patience will be rewarded with some excellent additions. I too would really like to know what you think of m10bob's revelations. It would be nice to have CVLs with more offensive/defensive power than CVEs if it is correct.

[el cid again]

ORIGINAL: m10bob

In every mod I have looked at, it gives the American CVL Independence an aircraft complement of 30, (less than a CVE like the Bogue which is rated too high at 33 in game), when the true complement was 40-45.
BTW, those jeep carriers were generally 12 fighters, 9 Avengers, but some sources do rate the Bogue at up to 28 planes, which I suspect is for ferrying?.
Comments?


http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/carriers/us_light.htm

http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/carriers/us_esc1.htm

This is not just a problem with the Independence, but with CVs as well. The problem is the use of the "deck park." Joe Wilkerson - in the days he was my supervisor at CHS - and I looked at this carefully. We found that carrier capacity was generally overstated in game technical terms - I will explain why - and deliberately reduced it. The value used for ALL carriers - not just Independence - is NOT based on the aircraft embarked in practice - but on the HANGER capacity - and I went to ship design documents to do that. What I have considered doing - but never done - is to REDUCE that over time (in different "upgrades" of the carrier) - to reflect the fact capacity declines as planes grow (not that this would apply to Independence - which does not get the larger planes). There also are differences between USN and RN practice vs the CVEs, but the hanger capacity does not change. Some CVEs could not operate the entire air group efficiently - which is why they would not carry that many for operations - but might for transit - indeed might fill both decks for transit. [RHS also gives you carriers WITHOUT air groups - and lets you have qualified units which will operate on them as sometimes happened - since this was real practice. There are a fair number of RN and USN ships with no assigned air group - all CVEs. Unicorn should be - but isn't - as some squadrons did operate from her sometimes - you get them - but IRL she was NOT normally assigned an air group - she was a "maintenance aircraft carrier."]

This decision - to go with hanger capacity - was always controversial and to some extent unpopular. It was one of the first things I did that made me controversial in some WITP circles. But we have no real alternative because the game code does not force players to care (or pay any penalty) for "deck park" - while IRL a deck park comes with a grave risk - one sailors IRL paid much attention to - and it impacted operations: if you get into heavy weather the excess aircraft will be swept into the sea. IF that could happen, THEN players would run from storms - as they do IRL with overcrowded decks. BECAUSE that can not happen - in hard code terms - it is unfair to give the Americans (or anyone else) this advantage - nor do the Americans need it - given they have so many carrier decks.

In game terms there is also this: most carriers operated with fewer air craft than capacity - particularly in the critical early war period.
Also in game terms, you ARE allowed to have MORE than the defined air group: in two different senses: you can have 15% more planes and still fly - and still more but not fly. But setting a class so it is larger than capacity means groups will tend to resize too large. Resizing is always wrong IMHO - in that it almost always forces units to have non historical sizes - but it is an attempt to address a change in the fighter ratio - and that really did occur - so it is a compromise solution understandably popular with Matrix.

To address and defeat resizing, RHS has done a number of things. One of these is to define deck capacity slightly wrong in a few cases - using the resize code as the foundation - so units will "resize" to their correct, historical size (which is usually 18 or 12 - or sometimes 9 - in USN).
Another is to create "carriers" you NEVER see - assign air units to them - and so those carriers which do not appear never let their air units resize - and are always the right size - giving players "building blocks" of carrier qualified and carrier capable units NOT really on any carrier.
Then we trick code into having them appear when we want anyway - and they appear at the default land location. So in the end RHS uses a modified standard: carrier class capacity is hanger deck capacity as designed MODIFIED slightly if that results in historical squadron sizes for the ship as it appears even after a resize happens. I think only CVEs were modified slightly - but some CVLs might also have been. There is also the problem that code wants more than one squadron per CVL - and some don't have more than one - and if they do not - squadron size will resize to 80% of capacity - so we sometimes looked at that when dealing with the few cases of one squadron CVEs (which include CVMs).

[el cid again]

ORIGINAL: goodboyladdie

Mike and I are still holding off on a start as we can't walk away from RHS. Is there an ETA for the next version? Please do not feel hurried Cid. You work far too hard and it sounds like patience will be rewarded with some excellent additions. I too would really like to know what you think of m10bob's revelations. It would be nice to have CVLs with more offensive/defensive power than CVEs if it is correct.

This latter comment is why Joe and I felt that not permitting that was pretty important: most players will always max out carriers, and mostly carriers did not sail maxed out. Facilitating that is something a modder must attempt to prevent when making a compromise choice. Ideally we want the average carrier to operate with its typical air group. Note, however, that in RHS you DO have the ability to CHANGE assigned air units - so an Independence (with I think 21 machines in fact) can have an extra squadron (of 9 or 12) added - giving it 30 or 32 which will fly -
or it could beach its two squadrons in favor of one with 18 and one with 12 - and so you don't have to fly with 21 if you do not want to. You have numbers of squadrons which appear carrier qualified AND carrier capable - but not on any carrier - for this purpose - and to defeat resizing if it messes you up.

I will release today - but there is no need to wait unless you wish to. I am starting a game someone sent me a turn to yesterday - and the differences are small. Only wait if you want the changes you see being described. [Formal ETA was yesterday - but software is usually late]

[m10bob]

ORIGINAL: el cid again

ORIGINAL: m10bob

In every mod I have looked at, it gives the American CVL Independence an aircraft complement of 30, (less than a CVE like the Bogue which is rated too high at 33 in game), when the true complement was 40-45.
BTW, those jeep carriers were generally 12 fighters, 9 Avengers, but some sources do rate the Bogue at up to 28 planes, which I suspect is for ferrying?.
Comments?


http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/carriers/us_light.htm

http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/carriers/us_esc1.htm

This is not just a problem with the Independence, but with CVs as well. The problem is the use of the "deck park." Joe Wilkerson - in the days he was my supervisor at CHS - and I looked at this carefully. We found that carrier capacity was generally overstated in game technical terms - I will explain why - and deliberately reduced it. The value used for ALL carriers - not just Independence - is NOT based on the aircraft embarked in practice - but on the HANGER capacity - and I went to ship design documents to do that. What I have considered doing - but never done - is to REDUCE that over time (in different "upgrades" of the carrier) - to reflect the fact capacity declines as planes grow (not that this would apply to Independence - which does not get the larger planes). There also are differences between USN and RN practice vs the CVEs, but the hanger capacity does not change. Some CVEs could not operate the entire air group efficiently - which is why they would not carry that many for operations - but might for transit - indeed might fill both decks for transit.

This decision - to go with hanger capacity - was always controversial and to some extent unpopular. It was one of the first things I did that made me controversial in some WITP circles. But we have no real alternative because the game code does not force players to care (or pay any penalty) for "deck park" - while IRL a deck park comes with a grave risk - one sailors IRL paid much attention to - and it impacted operations: if you get into heavy weather the excess aircraft will be swept into the sea. IF that could happen, THEN players would run from storms - as they do IRL with overcrowded decks. BECAUSE that can not happen - in hard code terms - it is unfair to give the Americans (or anyone else) this advantage - nor do the Americans need it - given they have so many carrier decks.

In game terms there is also this: most carriers operated with fewer air craft than capacity - particularly in the critical early war period.
Also in game terms, you ARE allowed to have MORE than the defined air group: in two different senses: you can have 15% more planes and still fly - and still more but not fly. But setting a class so it is larger than capacity means groups will tend to resize too large. Resizing is always wrong IMHO - in that it almost always forces units to have non historical sizes - but it is an attempt to address a change in the fighter ratio - and that really did occur - so it is a compromise solution understandably popular with Matrix.

Sid, a couple of months ago, you told me which "WP" file contains aircraft,(and I have been able to do my own aircraft "mod within a mod"..Which "WP" file contains the ships?

[el cid again]

Ships are defined in the class file - wpc. But ships as such are in the ship file - wps.

IF you change the wpc file - use the Matrix 6.0 editor and "update" all ships - otherwise you must hunt down every last ship in the class
and change that record in the ship file. I think Editor X also lets you update in this way.

[Historiker]

I'm not at home, but if you haven't changed it yet, there's a japanese AV which has a FF group with 12 or 16 planes instead of 8 - so no FF and FP is starting from it.
Moreover, there was a CVE which had an AG with only one 250kg AP Bomb on it's Kates while the others had three - don't know whether this is changed already.

[Historiker]

The mongolian units are declared to be philippean.

[el cid again]

ORIGINAL: Historiker

The mongolian units are declared to be philippean.

Many nationalities are assigned in RHS to take advantage of peculiar aspects of code. These are in two forms:
some nationalities do not reform (Dutch and Philippine for example); and all nationalities have a combat modifier -
using Philippines gives you a lower quality of troops in combat than - say using Soviet - and probably higher than -
say - using Chinese. If we used Soviet or Chinese nationality (there is no Mongolian of course) -
units would respawn and then appear at (wherever Russians appear? Krasnyarsk?) or Kunming. The Chinese might
be a better option except for that. Whatever is done must be a compromise. No respawn seemed better to me.

[el cid again]

ORIGINAL: Historiker

I'm not at home, but if you haven't changed it yet, there's a japanese AV which has a FF group with 12 or 16 planes instead of 8 - so no FF and FP is starting from it.
Moreover, there was a CVE which had an AG with only one 250kg AP Bomb on it's Kates while the others had three - don't know whether this is changed already.

This is hard to figure out with no specifics. What scenario? What ship? What air group slot?
It is normal in RHS to not have torpedoes on CVE groups.

[el cid again]

The seaplane carrier is a CVS - Mizuho - and she indeed has 16 float fighters (and 4 Jakes). Since her capacity is 24 - this is not a problem - all will fly. This in CVO and BBO family scenarios - in EOS family she is a CVL.

Chitose and Chiyoda are similar - also with 16 FF on board - as they start in CVS form. And again - it works fine.

[el cid again]

It was Taiyo ASW group that had only 1 x 250 kg bomb. This is right - except it omits the DC also carried. Thanks.

[Historiker]

It's the AV Kamoi! It has 16 FF and 4 FP - but only a capacity of 12! This is in RHS EOS but I guess in the others, too?

[Buck Beach]

ORIGINAL: goodboyladdie

Mike and I are still holding off on a start as we can't walk away from RHS. Is there an ETA for the next version? Please do not feel hurried Cid. You work far too hard and it sounds like patience will be rewarded with some excellent additions. I too would really like to know what you think of m10bob's revelations. It would be nice to have CVLs with more offensive/defensive power than CVEs if it is correct.

Don't jump the gun, Sid is off and running again. Must be an Alaskan winter thing. If you don't sit still long enough, your butt won't freeze to the bench.[:D]