Playing the Japanese in WITP

[Bulldog61]

Mogami - You've almost got me convinced I need to start a thread for playing the Allies.

[mogami]

Greetings, Just a quick count for now. I will do a more in depth breakdown by class later.
Japan has approx. 160 PC/MSW ships with depth charges.
(roughly 45 are speed 20k and 115 speed 10-16kt)

There are two types of DC. The type 91 is good for shallow water (164 feet)
the type 95 has a 294 foot limit)

The Yellow Sea leading to the NRA is completely shallow water.

I would advise mining all of it except for shipping lanes. ML placed with convoy (2 per convoy) could then mine the unmined hexes on ether side of enemy sub (MSW could clear later)
Also Japan should alter the routes from time to time (after enemy sub found in unmined hex.)

So far I have counted 26 DD suitable for escort/ASW duty (Apart from types that should remain with fleet units)

Also there are 9 Momi class APD (18kts Type 95 DC)

My first tests when time comes will be to assign escorts to Yellow Sea at 1 DC armed escort per 4 merchants. Also each convoy will have 2 ML (some of which also carry DC-but Yellow sea is good area for low endurance non DC ML)

Convoy into South China Sea will go with 1 escort per 3 Merchants
Since these routes also use shallow water hexes ML will also be assigned to TF.

Convoy moving to Truk/Kwajalean areas will have DD escorts in addition to 20kt type PC/MSW. Minelayers will not normally be assigned except for those with scout plane and DC.

There will also be patrols of all areas/routes.
CVE/CVL TF's will be used to patrol in advance of major convoy.

[madflava13]

Mogami-
Are you able to actually pick the specific route the convoys take, or are you sending them to one hex, then another, and so forth?

[mogami]

Hi, I make a TF in Osaka. I set it to move to Palembang. I look at the route. (The path of yellow outlined hexes)
TF's will avoid hex with mines. So I am going to try to mine "bad hexes" and see if I can guide them that way. I don't think I'd like having to drive every supply/resource convoy.
Since the Yellow Sea is all shallow I think I can set up paths I want the convoys to use. The hard part will be areas where the entire distance is deep water. I'll have to conform to the paths rather then the paths conform to me. (I may have to set up a relay system here.)

[madflava13]

Ok, i gotcha now -- Thanks Mogami

[elcid]

This is a historically dismal topic. However, it is by no means totally that way by necessity. Japan had good designs for ASW ships well before the war. It also designed ASW aircraft not listed in the discussions above, including a new sensor they pioneered we use to this day - the Magnetic Anomoly Detector. When the Kate left service (being replaced by higher speed torpedo bombers) she became an ASW plane, and she carried the MAD gear to indicate when to drop her weapon. It was not quite as good as ours today - it would indicate a sub about 200-300 feet distant only - but that was so close it was a good indicator when it went off! The Ki-49I became an ASW plane in some numbers. And the Q5Y1 (I think) was designed to purpose for ASW. The Army also devised a way to use a spotter plane for ASW from Army carriers, as well as its autogyro, the first operational rotary wing military aircraft in the world (beating several autogyros and even helicopters in other countries into service). Japanese ASW also includes some interesting weapons we do not think of, like ASW shells for most guns, and ASW rocket projectors late in the war (which eventually were copied by the Russians). They created the Grand Escort Command, and eventually evolved proper ASW tactics. Thus, when USS Wahoo was on her last voyage, they deliberately went after her, and didn't stop hounding her, by air and surface, until she was gone. It is often written the Japanese didn't know how to do that, because so often they didn't do that, but it is not quite true...

[Mike Scholl]

When you finish planning your "mine barrage' for East Asia,
you might want to calculate just how many mines you are
talking about? Mines certainly don't require the craftsmanship
of torpedoes, but it sounds like a LOT of mines. And to be
laying them in a lot of open water, subject to storms and such,
requiring a lot of "maintaining" (They have a nasty habit of
breaking loose and floating around when subjected to bad weather).

Seems to me your efforts may finally expose to 2by3 the need to LIMIT the number of mines available on both sides. Which
would be a solid playtest achievement.

[elcid]

actually, japan used a mine barrage of gigantic proportions

it was successful in isolating the Yellow Sea until the late war advent of minehunting sonar for submarines - when it was still a problem

there was a serious proposal to extend this mine barrage about two thousand miles, covering the entire route to Balikpapan! some parts of that also were laid, but other developments rendered it moot

the lack of mines for other missions was in part due to their defensive use for the ASW campaign

there should indeed be limits on mines - and torpedoes - and other things - but players should be able to decide what gets priority - THE MOST CRITICAL RESOURCE for BOTH Japan and the USA was steel by the way - you can do lots of things with steel - but only one thing with any given ton of it! Thus Yamato = about 150 escort ships = about 3000 light tanks - which matters more???It is up to the player, limited by resources and industrial capacity, to decide. Or should be. A proper system is going to look at several kinds of resources. Japan captures the largest copper mine in Asia (near Baguio City, Luzon) and NEVER uses it - but it COULD HAVE used it. There are fantastic resources on New Caledonia, and they matter to the Allies, and they COULD matter to Japan. Tin and rubber in Malaya and Indonesia matter as much as oil in the latter. Coal and Iron matter, and most of them come from Manchuria, but a lot more could come from China, and even Russia - which trades with Japan! It is a complicated picture and it is the decisive one - the one about which the war is fought in fact. If players have zero influence on this, and if the game does not represent what comes from where (in some form), there is no way to tell if Japan wins or loses. The key thing is this: does Japan set up an effective autarky by the end of 1942, or not? Does it behave in a way that wins it support of natives (as it did in such diverse places as Truk, Manchuria, Indonesia and to some degree India, or not?). Even where it does not there is significant anti-colonial sentiment, particularly in Burma and Malaya, and Indochina, which matters at first. And Thailand is a true Axis state, complete with Fashist doctrine, dictator, and racist (anti-Chinese) policy. It is also the only successful Fashist state (unless Spain or Argentina count), its head of state returning to power after the war! It should be given special abilities to "change sides" when convenient, as this is something it learned to survive during the long colonial experience - Thailand is the only nation to more or less escape colonial domination in Asia. [It did lose territories to the British in Malaya and the French in Indochina, though. Its Burma claims are entirely without foundation, true mini-imperial dreams.]