Pro-USN Bias (cont'd)

[Tristanjohn]

Originally posted by Tristanjohn

I keep hearing this refrain of "Yeah, they're a bit too effective early on . . but just wait until Allied flak gears up," or words to that effect. And I'm moved to ask: so what? The point is they're too effective

Originally posted by TIMJOT

Actually, I didn't say they were "TOO" effective, just that they were very effective. Regardless AA upgrades are relevent when making historical comparisons for obvious reasons. If you are sailing into Lunga Roads with nothing more than 1" and 50cal AA then you can reasonably expect Kuantan-esque like results.

I wasn't singling you out, TIMJOT, in my response to Mogami, rather wished to reference all threads on this board which brush the same topic.

Anyway, Japanese air power in this game is too effective. Anyone who denies that either isn't familiar with the history or would argue against this reality in pursuit of some other agenda.

The response that, "Sure, but later on the USN becomes dominant so it all evens out" doesn't wash for the reason that this "swing" affects not the early Japanese advantage which, historically, that country only enjoyed in the very first days of the war against totally unprepared Allied air assets sending up (in all too many cases) hopelessly obsolete equipment (e.g., Whirraways, Brewster Buffaloes) flown by (to a large degree) inexperienced and demoralized Allied crews.

After America (mostly the USN) pulled itself together, this initial advantage which Japan enjoyed in the air started to evaporate; by the time of Operation Watchtower the scenario looked quite a bit more like an even fight, to judge from history. And this swing in favor of the Allies gained momentum as tactics were quickly devised to get the most out of the airplane equipment we then had to work with.

I don't say the F4F-3 (or even the improved -4) was on a par with the Zero in all respects. It was not. This stubby little Grumman airplane was, however, a very sturdy piece of equipment and proved to be, in its own right, a deadly weapons platform in the air when handled properly. This proper handling was learned fast by American pilots, and combined with knowledge gained in combat of the deficiencies of "Zekes" this led directly to more and more head-to-head success, until the kill rate by early 1943 began to approach 2:1 in favor of Allied air assets.

That's just speaking to the fighter squadrons. Allied bombers, medium and heavy, were at all times head and shoulders superior to what was flown by Japan (well, Japan didn't really have a heavy bomber). They were better armed (did you know that in the entire war more enemy fighter planes, in all theaters, were accounted for by B-17s than by any other weapons platform?), much better constructed and by and large carried heavier payloads, with the capacity to hit their targets (land targets with level bombers in mind) at a much higher rate (there's irony here insofar during the war American optics in general were mediocre yet the Norden bombsight proved to be the best of all--and went a long way in our defeat of both Germany and Japan).

My point's simple enough: Japanese air power in this game is off to a degree that hints at either 1) outright bias on the part of the designers (to make a better, more playable game?), 2) a certain misappreciation of this particular history and/or 3) inability on the part of the development team to get it right (assuming historical awareness on anyone's part to begin with).

Tristanjohn, I think I may have ask you this before, but have you every tried playing as the Japanese?

Only versus the AI. All of my PBEM opponents thus far have opted to play Japan.

I find it curious (though just a little curious ) that so many players not only desire to play the Japanese side but most especially in these "no-Midway, 120% IJN naval allocation" scenarios. And these same players come on the boards with detailed AARs describing their brilliant strategems for how (just maybe) Japan "wuz robbed" in World War II.

Right.

And yes, I understand these players are looking for a "balanced" game. (Why, I do not know. A person might suppose that someone who buys into an historical simulation in the first place is interested in the history of the game's subject. Sure, "what-ifs" are valid, but what I see at work here is almost like taking a game about Waterloo and stripping Wellington of any possible reinforcement from the Prussians while bucking up the French side to the tune of some phantom extra corps or two. What's the point to that?)

Moving right along: what's your point re whether or not I play the Japanese side or not? That somehow I don't "get it" or can't "see" what's actually going on in the system? In point of fact when I play Japan versus the computer I mostly enjoy the same advantages versus the Allies as do my PBEM opponents when they play me. The system doesn't change just because one side plays Japan and one plays the Allies. The system is absolute. And absolutely wrong in many areas.

I haven't bothered to mention this because I cringe when I do so, but if Brisbane is a 9-level port in the UV scale of things then I'd venture to say Noumea would represent something on the order of .1

I wouldn't get too bent out of shape about this. Its a simply a function of the limited map. The game needs supply points. Noumea has been deemed a supply point. So it needs to be a port size to reflect this. Just chalk it up to one of those game scale/mechanics compromises that we will not have to deal with in WitP.

I agree though that its far too easy to build up ports in UV, but this is generally a biased in favor of the allies with their super Eng. units. I am hoping this super base building ability gets toned down in WitP. The whole pacific strategy centered on securing the relative limited number of sites that could sustain a large fleet anchorage.

Just mentioning it.

I don't understand what you mean when you say "limited map." No matter the scale of the map no way Jose these relative port levels make sense in the real world.

I agree the building module ought to be revisited by the programmers/developers. This game revolves to a large extent around logistic concerns and base construction and support impacts that heavily. Still, I doubt any of this will be changed much. Such is life.

Mostly I don't see this aspect of the simulation biased in favor of the Allies, though I suppose it could be in a given scenario insofar as the Allies have more and better engineer units. If so, a constraint on any such abuse (with WitP in mind) would come in the form of strategic necessity (certain projects will become apparent as the game moves forward and even the Allies can't build large bases everywhere, keep them properly supplied and garrisoned and push on toward their ultimate goal, which is always home islands of Japan.

I do find it a shame that with so many details extant the developers couldn't get it right when it comes to sites like Mieta and Nevea (just for example--there are others). The system is so generic in some respects that it fails to function correctly at all on certains spots of the map. Taken in isolation none of this is a game breaker, but it adds up over time (which is likely where you sense a bias in favor of the Allies).

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[Tristanjohn]

[cont'd] 2 of 5

Anyway, if you're talking about the Lunga Points in the game then in some cases you'd be correct, TIMJOT (in that there wouldn't be a whole lot of room bombers to conduct torpedo runs--that, or reefs, sandbars, foul water in general would stand in the way), in others no. It would just depend on the site in question.

No actually I wasnt talking about Lunga roads, since I do not consider it a port and in any event it was one of the few places where multi-engine torp attacks took place (albeit with very limited attack runs). The shoals, shallows and narrow attack lane probably contributed to them being so uneffective though. Multi-engine torp attacks would be difficult ,nie impossible in most ports, even Brisbane I venture. Simply not enough room to maneuver, and to get to the proper level, and make effective attack runs, for the big planes.

I don't think the Japanese Bettys were limited in any manner, shape or form off Lunga Point. They enjoyed plenty of flight space and made their east-west runs (after circling round the north side of Florida Island) as they normally would have. A different approach might have served them better--no attempt was made to employ the "anvil" tactic, thus playing directly into the hands of Turner's countertactic of having his transports react to these runs with simultaneous turns (to keep the course of the ships parallel to the torpedo tracks--that isn't for your edification, TIMJOT, but others who might not understand everything we discuss).

A day earlier the Japanese dive bombers shouldn't have been (nor were they as far as I know) affected by these sorts of considerations at all.

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[Tristanjohn]

[cont'd] 3 of 5


Getting back to AA and CAP affecting Bettys and Nells: USN flak was already a fairly sophisticated weapons system (speaking on the whole) by the time autumn of 1942 rolled around. As the Navy adopted CIC doctrine, proximity fuzes, radar fire control, better tactical skill manneuvering its TFs with flak protection in mind, plus the addition of more and more AA platforms on its ships, the Japanese not only dropped like flies but began to shy away from this murderous fire in round numbers. (For that matter, study how adroitly Admiral Turner negated Betty attempts to strike his transports off Lunga Point right after the landing, and this without hardly any flak at all and only a few Wildcats overhead as CAP.)

I do not believe proximity fuses appeared until very late in 42 and not in any appreciable numbers until 1943. Getting back to the point. Turner had 8 Cruisers ( incl. 1 AA CL ) over a dozen DDs providing Flak. Most had 20mm upgrades and some 40mm. In addition each one of his transports had been fitted with 12 or more 20mm guns. The amount of Flak thrown up at Lunga on 8th and 9th Aug 42 was probably the heaviest up to that point in the PacWar. You can hardly call it "hardly any flak". Also the Sara Enterprise and Wasp provided CAP. IIRC it number between 16 to 18 F4Fs at any one time. Not exactly a few.

Regardless, Are you saying that in similar circumstances, ie Transport TF escorted heavily by AA upgraded CA, CLs, DDs and covered by substantial high morale low fatigue CAP (F4Fs). Are getting mauled by by Nells and Bettys??? I just havent seen it.

Are you playing PBEM or are you by any chance playing the AI on Hard?

Turner had what he had, the flak was okay but not great. His cruisers were Australia, Canberra, Hobart and Chicago (the latter provided fighter direction), plus nine destroyers (Desron 4 and Desdiv 7).

Also present was TG 62.3 (landing fire support) and for sure Vincennes from this group got into the action (it was quite near Jarvis when she took that torpedo--what a tragic story that turned out to be). As far as I know the main body of TG 62.3 was positioned to the north, up the channel, and the extent of AA support it was able to lend is unclear. I remember reading an account of a destroyer commander which claimed its line of sight was blocked by friendly ship profiles (this rings true--those Bettys came in at anywhere from 50 to 20 feet on their runs, and at that altitude it's easy to imagine ships losing sight of these planes the farther north up the channel you go).

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[Tristanjohn]

[cont'd] 4 of 5

Anyway, on August 7th CAP over the transports consisted of six flights off Enterprise and three more from Saratoga amounting to 60 Wildcats in total.

The planes from "Sara" ended up scrapping with enemy bombers over Savo Island. Two of these flights of 16 F4Fs lost five of their number to the escort of Zeroes, the third flight claimed 10 of 11 kills on dive bombers with no losses (Morison).

There were five flights (6,8,8,8,6) of fighters over the transports off Enterprise and they acquitted themselves more or less effectively.

Wasp drew CAP duty over the carrier force, but six of her SBDs, on a bombing mission over Tulagi, did what they could.

Final American tally: 14 Japanese bombers along with 2 "Zekes."

On the 8th Turner had warning 80 minutes ahead of time and made good use of it. Morison makes the point that while CAP saved the fleet on the 7th, the next day successful defense must be credited to flak and intelligent maneuvering of the task force.

For sure Turner's tactic of simultaneous turns (two successive 30^ turns away from and parallel to the Bettys) worked to perfection--not a single torpedo hit home on a transport. (This was not luck or a fluke or some last-second divine inspiration on Turner's part; he'd planned for this eventuality all along and practised the maneuver over and over on the trip to Guadacanal.)

The flak provided by the escorting ships was, I'm sure, as heavy as they could make it but nowhere near what this defensive fire would become in a year's time. Even so, accounts from people at the battle stated that only nine Bettys appeared to get through what flak there was, and after the war the Japanese admitted to the loss of 17 bombers out of 26 sent in that day, so our ack-ack must have hit something.

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[Tristanjohn]

[cont'd] 5 of 5

In any case you might want to consider this. We are really dealing with just 2 examples of daylight Nell/Betty torp attacks, specifically Kuantan 12/41 and Lunga roads 8/8-8/9 42. The former very successful against light AA and no CAP in open seas the latter unsuccessful with heavy AA and CAP in enclosed seas. It really is a too small and diametrically opposing sample to formulate with any degree of accuracy what should be considered "Historical".

The sample is a small sample. So what? It's all we have to go on. It would be more than a little unfortunate (I was going to write "thick-headed" but thought better of it ) to simply ignore the historical action on the bald assumption that a small sample's necessarily meaningless. No sample (no statistic) is meaningless. The key is to know how to interpret what data is available. If we did ignore the two samples you've cited, what would we base our model on? Rumor? Someone's personal feeling that Japan was actually much stronger than it showed during the war, that Japan got clobbered due to a couple of bad hair days? That Turner "got lucky" off Guadacanal?

History tells us what actually happened. It is an historical simulation's work to arrive somewhere close to that happy place in the course of repeated play. Should the simulation does not wish to go there, then it's incumbent on the designer to explain why his model works to other purpose. I've read no explanation from Grigsby; I only see the bias.

Look. The same deal went down with Pacific War. My opinion is that this is nothing more than gamesmanship on the part of Grigsby, but I don't know. I certainly hope this ahistorical imbalance isn't due to a belief on his part that the Japanese war machine was in fact so well endowed when it came to its air assets.

Regardless: the model is still off by a significant margin in this area.

It would help discussions of this kind enormously if more were publicly disclosed about the internal workings of the various models at question here. Why aren't there any detailed designer's notes on this subject? Why is the manual in general so poorly organized, indifferently written, and absolutely lacking in information on some points?

Here's another topic for us if you're interested, TIMJOT. It's my belief that IJN surface assets do not perform well enough in the early going versus the USN in night actions. I've what I feel is pretty good reason to take this position. What's your sense for this?

[mogami]

Hi, The non midway scenarios are what allied players will face in WITP.
I give those Japanese players 200 percent (and take 100 percent USN) in Scenario 19 and the allies still win. (present record in Scenario 19 200 IJN 100 USN 3 Lost 21 wins) (So the game is clearly biased in favor of USN)(LOL) No the strategic situation is what is biased. The Japanese do not have the required ratio of force to win outright. (Unless Allied player helps them out)
I've almost forgotten what running the Japanese is like it's been so long since I played them in PBEM (Just began a game versus Bosun where the roles are reversed. He won auto victory in last game)

In WITP it is my guess that most Japanese players will try for an early offensive in South Pacific. Watch Tower will never be possible without Allied player first winning a Midway type battle. (I doubt any Japanese player leaves any base as unprotected as Guadalcanal was in Aug 42)


Testing WITP I don't really see a Japanese superiority outside of the fact that I always outnumber the Allies. (In fact I don't move into any area where allies would out number me)(Zeros are shot down in air to air beginning with PH strike)(Allied bombers score torpedo hits on Japanese transports from 1st turn)

In UV and WITP as Japan I always try to mass my force against smaller Allied forces. (the game is over once allies concentrate)

[Tristanjohn]

If the system stands as it is then for sure there will be no Midways in WitP. The mechanics won't stand for it.

You seem to confuse what my point wants to be for some kind of overall "strategic balance" of campaigns you have in your head. Of course the Allies can only beat themselves in the long run. There's no news there. This system is still off by a considerable degree, though, with regards to the air system.

It's entirely too simplistic: the Japanese have super pilots to start off, these suffer attrition and are replaced with mediiocre pilots, meanwhile the Allies gradually train up their pilots to something better than what they start with and get new equipment after a year . . . and the war is over!

That's the system in a nutshell.

Sorry, Mogami, but it was a lot more complicated than that, your LOLs not withstanding. A true simulation doesn't try to "even the scales" or "give a good game" but get at what actually happened and try to demonstrate if possible how it happened. In this area UV (and from the sounds of it WitP down the road) falls down.

Thanks for joining in.

[mogami]

Hi, I don't think you understand the system.
It is not super Japanese against rookie Allied at start.
There is more to it then this simple explanation.

As the allies I do not suffer as much from super Japanese for several reasons. The airgroups start the game under size, tired and low morale.
If the allied player jumps into combat he gets clobbered. If he spends 10 days or so resting his pilots before commiting them to combat they do much better. As I've tried to point out before the problems people have with UV is not the system. It's how they use the system.

If you play the regular Midway occured scenario (That begins in Aug) You will have no problem with Japanese.
If you back the clock up to a May start you have Japanese units that have been involved in combat for 6 months facing allied units that have never been in combat. The Allies are not organized. The player can organize them much faster then this actually occured. (Since his will be done)

There have been hundreds of Midway type battles fought using the UV system. When you say the system will not stand for it you reveal your lack of understanding of and experiance with the system. (Don't want to poke fun of you but your the first person I know of that tried to form a "Super" B-17 group by disbanding groups) I think you should play another couple thousand turns and then comment.

Where did you get the idea any force or item had been "balanced"?
Replacment pilots for UV are an abstract of National training.
240,000 Japanese entered pilot training before and during WW2
24,000 finished the course. 19,000 died while training (or towards the end students still in training flew Kamikaze missions) The remaining pilots that flew Japanese aircraft did not finish "school" (prewar pilot training required 3 years)(of this 240,000 those that did not qualify a pilots went into ground crew or non pilot aircrew) The most common experiance for a new pilot was 30 hours before entering combat. (This was a result of a delay in beginning the training of new pilots early in war and shortages of av gas begining in 43) There were few "good" pilots in the Japanese training pipeline in the UV period. The replacment ratings are not a result of trying to balance the game but what is thought to be acurate.

A good number of P-38's used in UV are flown by pilots that begin game flying P-39's. If the player does not maintain the P-39 groups he will have poor performing P-38 groups.
There is no sudden or mysterious change from Super Japanese to Super Allied pilots. If a player (no matter which side) throws his pilots away he will eventually have poorer pilots. If he takes care of them he will see them improve.
The allied player can lose enough pilots to where his replacements are poor quaility. (And the Japanese player can always recieve good replacements provided he does not lose too many)
Nothing is designed for "Balance" Poor players will always have poor results. Good players will have good results. But you have to understand certain measures must be maintained to achieve this.

[Tristanjohn]

Hi, I don't think you understand the system.
It is not super Japanese against rookie Allied at start.
There is more to it then this simple explanation.

As the allies I do not suffer as much from super Japanese for several reasons. The airgroups start the game under size, tired and low morale.
If the allied player jumps into combat he gets clobbered. If he spends 10 days or so resting his pilots before commiting them to combat they do much better. As I've tried to point out before the problems people have with UV is not the system. It's how they use the system.

If you play the regular Midway occured scenario (That begins in Aug) You will have no problem with Japanese.
If you back the clock up to a May start you have Japanese units that have been involved in combat for 6 months facing allied units that have never been in combat. The Allies are not organized. The player can organize them much faster then this actually occured. (Since his will be done)

There have been hundreds of Midway type battles fought using the UV system. When you say the system will not stand for it you reveal your lack of understanding of and experiance with the system. (Don't want to poke fun of you but your the first person I know of that tried to form a "Super" B-17 group by disbanding groups) I think you should play another couple thousand turns and then comment.

That was a mistake on my part. But where do you get the notion it was silly in theory? (At least that seems to be your implication.)

As for the mistake: I can find nowhere in the manual where it tells me not to do that. If it exists, fine. I haven't seen it. I've read the part a user directed me to, but that doesn't cut it.

In fact, the manual sucks. Big time. It must be printed out so right away it's hard to handle, and the writing is . . . not so good.

I believe it's a design flaw to even allow a player to try and disband groups (and not just one but many) into a larger one when the target squardron's maximum limit is threatened, much less have it appear as if the new larger group is okay with the world, with no warning whatsoever, and then just willy-nilly "withdraw" all of the surplus planes behind the scenes.

Sorry, but that's more than just plain dumb. How did that get past anyone? Why hasn't it been fixed? It's a huge hole in the system, just begging for someone to fall into it.

Finally, what has any of that to do with my position that this simulation is not accurate? Your argument is devious, an argument by deflection, and thus ad hominem. You might as well come right out and say, "Hey, bumpkin! You just fell off the wagon. Until you have played this game as long as "the rest of us" mind your manners."

Or words to that effect.

Well, I might not have that much time in on UV but I know one or two things. I know I'm not the only player who sees the same problems I do, and I know a bad simulation when I play it. A fun game, no doubt about that, but the model isn't close to being accurate.

You know, I could pull the same stunt on you. Tell you all about how I've been playing (in a formal sense) wargames for some 44 years, that I've playtested a lot more titles than you (and not just wargames, or computer games for that matter). But you see, that would be beside the point, Mogamia: that UV isn't accurate in some critical respects.

Okay?

[Tristanjohn]

Where did you get the idea any force or item had been "balanced"?

I don't believe it's balanced. The system, that is. I believe these "no Midway" scenarios wish to strike that sort of “balance” for players who feel this artificial need--this assumes I understand you correctly when you use the term "balance."

Your argument (and that of others) is this: in the start the Japanese are superbly trained, the Allies are not very well trained and short of assets in theatre on top of that. The Allies, therefore, must bide their time. Eventually all will be well as equipment upgrades and the Allies gain battle experience, etc.

So? None of that addresses the central issue: it's almost always suicide for an Allied CV TF to meet an IJN CV TF at odds of 2:3 or 3:4 early in the game. If play is against the AI then almost anything is possible for the reason the AI is one of the worst I’ve ever seen. I’m not sure any improvements over Pacific War in this regard have been made whatsoever. If the AI plays Japan I see the same old and all-too-familiar pointless moves: surface TFs shuttling back and forth between Truk and wherever, planes flown to bases and then left there to rot when no air support is provided, ships requiring work in port left to sail endlessly on the high seas until they become completely dysfunctional, or are sunk by the Allies, air assets sent on useless penny-packet raids with no apparent strategic purpose, until these air assets resemble their unfortunate naval cousins . . . and like that.

Back to human versus human: in general, the air module, taken in isolation and as it interacts with the naval module, is where one of the most serious problems lies. In real life the USN was capable to meet the IJN CV assets head on, only this system won't allow that regularly. Why must this be repeated? It ought to speak volumes to anyone with an open mind. Yet you tell me reality is the exact opposite, everything's rosy with the model, indeed, the actual problem isn’t with the simulation but that I don't know what I’m talking about.

Sorry, but I know I do know what I’m talking about. Wish I did not. Then I’d have no complaints, right?

Mogami, you mentioned that you're aware of "hundreds" of "Midways" during the course of UV play, Are you given to exaggeration? Have you personally conducted "hundreds" of successful Allied CV TF battles against the IJN, early in the game, at odds of 2:3 and/or 3:4? Is this something you've "heard tell"?

What's going on?

You've indicated you're not an apologist for this game, yet that's just how you come across in this thread, Mogami. It's all right to be loyal to Matrix Games--as far as I'm concerned the company deserves this loyalty on balance. I support Matrix, too. Good for you! And by all means be supportive of the game you love to play. But please, try to open your mind just a hair to the possibility that all’s not well with the model when we measure this by the yardstick of history.

I don't know why you and others resist. The game could only become something better, not worse, if the model is made more accurate.

[mogami]

Hi, Well I might be mistaken but many of your obsevations concerning UV are incorrect. The "balance" issues you make are scenario related not system related. You say you do not understand why a player would want to play a non Midway scenario. You think the game is designed to have Japanese pilots go down while US pilots go up (having balance)
Go to section 7.11 of the manual for aircraft group screen and 10.19 for disbanding and withdrawing groups.

To Midway or not Midway

In my opinion Allies who wish for a Midway scenario should play the scenario that begins in Aug 42. Asking for a May start and Midway is really taking advantage of the Japanese player.
If in May you know Midway will occur you can begin setting up Watchtower. Also you can fight Coral Sea aggressivly. (If you sink or damage Shokaku or Zuikaku or both you have the campaign won If you lose it only slows you down a bit.)
Thats why player like the non Midway scenarios. They don't want the 600 turns being decided by an off map event. The Japanese are in vastly different situations in May 42 and Aug 42. An Allied player in May 42 knowing Midway is going to occur has a huge advantage over the Japanese player. (The Japanese player still has all their problems only without any hope of being able to alter the course. He wi never have sufficent force and he certainly does not have justifaction for commencing offensive operations.)
The non Midway scenarios place the allied player at no disadvantage. In May they did not know they were going to win Midway. It's up to the player to win a like battle (and he is given the forces to do so.)However unless he does win a Midway he is not entitled to an offensive.

I tried to address the pilot issue. The pilots are not the reason the allies lose air battles early. (nor even the aircraft) There are plently of players who as the allies gain air superioty without P-38 or other newer aircraft. There are player who control the air quite early in the game. (or at least do not suffer from super Japanese) Then again there are allied player who never gain control of the air even after they have the newer aircraft. The player who manages his assets well will not have the problems you say are built into the system.
What is ad hominem in my response to your "Midway type battles are impossible" when I say there have been hundreds of Midway type battles? You say you are a veteran wargamer. Yet you express surprise that airgroups have a size limit. I was able to play UV without reading the rule book. (The only question I ever had was how to form barge units and the designers pointed out where it was in the rules)
I see the info screen does not expressly state max number of aircraft.
(but still you are the first bumpkin ever to post it as a bug )
Why would a player wish to disband/withdraw airgroups?
First I guess the designers overlooked the fact anyone would ever disband or withdraw a full strength airgroup.

Now for the differences.
Withdraw airgroups. The player has two understrength airgroups both flying same aircraft. 1 group while short of aircraft has a surplus of pilots.
by withdrawing the other group the aircraft bring the remaining up to size. The pilots of the withdrawn group remain with it and once the group gets new AC it returns in 60-90 days.

Disbanding. The player has two understrength airgroups. He disbands one, both aircraft and pilots move to the remaining group. The disbanded group will reform and return in 390 days (since it has to form and train from scratch)

Suppose the airfield at Port Moresby has been closed and the base will soon be captured. Or even the airfield is still open and all aircraft that could be flown out have done so leaving small parts of airgroups with disabled aircraft behind. By withdrawing groups you leave the aircraft but save the pilots.

I won't pick on you over this anymore. You tried to exploit the system and found it didn't work.

Really I'm not trying to pick on you at all. Also I am not blindly defending Matrix or UV. We just don't seem to see the same thing here. I have no problem with what UV produces. (Also I don't seem to expect as much as you do)
Myself I have only been playing wargames since the late 60's (I mean ones where a company designed and sold them, I've been playing minatures slightly longer) I've played computer games since when they came on cassetes and required 30 minutes just to load.

My main point as what you see as system produced results I don't even see in my PBEM games anymore. All my opponents have been around the block a few times and the games are not decided by such things.
(And Midways still occur. Sometimes in reverse)

UV does produce non historical results. When did the IJN begin employing fast transport TF's? In UV they begin on May 1 1942.
UV/WITP are not "reinactment" programs.

[mogami]

May 1st 1942. Japanese player places his fighters and bombers on stand down.
Allied player moves max number of aircraft to Port Moresby. Orders bombers to attack Lae.

May 2nd 1942. Japanese airgroups continue to rest
Allied player orders all aircraft to attack.

May 3rd 1942 Japanese rest
Allies attack. Allied player is really getting experiance and has damaged airfield at Lae. (Japanese air loss to date 0 Allied loss 10AC (only 1-2 from each group so far)

Things continue untill Japanese airgoups 100 morale 0 fatigue.
Japanese player order bombers to attack Port Moresby. Assigns fighter to escort.

Allied fighters on CAP fail to turn back Japanese and lose 3 or 4 to 1 in air to air with Japanese.

Allied player runs to forum and posts "Allied aircraft stink, why does Matrix always favour Japanese? During war Allied did not lose 4-1 in this area during this period, you guys stink. My airgroups had 60 morale and less then 30 fatigue and were slaughtered I even had more aircraft in the air"



In another game on the other side of the planet.

Japanese player orders airgroups to attack from day one.
Allied player withdraws airgroups back to Oz and rests them while they build to full size.
One day Japanese and allied airgroups fight

Japanese player runs to forum. "Japanese aircraft stink, why does Matrix always favour the Allies? During the War Japan did not lose 4-1 to P-39 and P-40 in this area during this period. The Zero flew cirlces around Iron Dogs. You guys stink My airgroups had 60 morale and less then 30 fatigue and were slaughtered So what if I was outnumbered and flying at long range."


In current WITP test of full campaign after 6 days
air to air combat Allies have shot down 12 Japanese aircraft (one was Dutch Do-24k2 Patrol plane shooting down Zero)
Japanese have shot down 28 Allied aircraft.

Other aircraft lost
AA 19 Allied 39 Japanese
on ground 88 allied 0 Japanese
Operations 47 allied 21 Japanese

[Drongo]

[cont'd] 2 of 5
A day earlier the Japanese dive bombers shouldn't have been (nor were they as far as I know) affected by these sorts of considerations at all.
[more]

According to Eric Hammel's "Carrier Clash":

The unescorted dive bomber force which made the attack in the second (seperate) strike on 7th Aug consisted of 9 Vals. These made the one way run from Rabaul at the Allied TF and the results of this strike was primarily affected by 2 factors. Firstly, they attacked (2) destroyers rather than the less manueverable transports. Secondly, some of them were intercepted by F4Fs just as they started their dives.

For what it's worth, 2 were shot down in their dives, a third was damaged and forced to break off. Four of the remaining six completed their dives free of interference from the US fighters, having to deal solely with the allied AA. It was one of those four Vals that hit the Mugford with a bomb (the Vals were only carrying 2 60kg bombs each that day, not the 250kg bomb that is standard extended range load-out in UV). Four of the nine Vals made it back to their ditching area near the Shortlands.

In UV, what result would you expect from 9 medium experience crewed Vals (if possible, with an edited bomb-load of only 2x60kg bombs) vs 18 F4Fs (with good experience) on CAP and the target US TF composed of the same ships as historical? Except for the Vals possibly targeting a transport, would it differ that much from what happened?

[Drongo]

[cont'd] 4 of 5
Anyway, on August 7th CAP over the transports consisted of six flights off Enterprise and three more from Saratoga amounting to 60 Wildcats in total.

The planes from "Sara" ended up scrapping with enemy bombers over Savo Island. Two of these flights of 16 F4Fs lost five of their number to the escort of Zeroes, the third flight claimed 10 of 11 kills on dive bombers with no losses (Morison).

There were five flights (6,8,8,8,6) of fighters over the transports off Enterprise and they acquitted themselves more or less effectively.

Wasp drew CAP duty over the carrier force, but six of her SBDs, on a bombing mission over Tulagi, did what they could.

Final American tally: 14 Japanese bombers along with 2 "Zekes."
[more]

Are you entirely relying on Morison's account for this? More recent authors like Frank, Hammel, Lundstrom and others have had greater access to Japanese sources as well as a more detailed examination of what happened from the allied side (this is not a criticism of what Morison achieved).

Their work may be more appropriate as a basis for conclusions on what happened in the air that day and why and what should therefore be expected to happen in UV.

[Drongo]

[cont'd] 4 of 5
On the 8th Turner had warning 80 minutes ahead of time and made good use of it. Morison makes the point that while CAP saved the fleet on the 7th, the next day successful defense must be credited to flak and intelligent maneuvering of the task force.

For sure Turner's tactic of simultaneous turns (two successive 30^ turns away from and parallel to the Bettys) worked to perfection--not a single torpedo hit home on a transport. (This was not luck or a fluke or some last-second divine inspiration on Turner's part; he'd planned for this eventuality all along and practised the maneuver over and over on the trip to Guadacanal.)

The flak provided by the escorting ships was, I'm sure, as heavy as they could make it but nowhere near what this defensive fire would become in a year's time. Even so, accounts from people at the battle stated that only nine Bettys appeared to get through what flak there was, and after the war the Japanese admitted to the loss of 17 bombers out of 26 sent in that day, so our ack-ack must have hit something.
[more]

Whatever the actual air losses (they were certainly heavy), I would agree it was Turner's orders (and the advance warning) that went a long way to nullifying a fairly well executed Japanese attack (which had avoided the TF CAP and was masked until its final, low-level run over the Florida Islands).

IIRC, the Japanese plan did not entail any attempt at making an anvil attack, relying instead for its success on a quick strike on an unprepared enemy. Had the TF not been fore-warned or had a less capable commander been in charge, they may well have had several transports torpedoed (although still at a heavy cost in attackers).

IMO, the only issues from this that I think could be considered for the game are:
1) Coastwatchers - Should they give early warning about enemy air strikes and under what circumstances? (How unique is the predictable flight path from Rabaul to the solitary strike objective of the area around Guadalcanal in '42. What happens when there are multiple potential targets in the same flight direction but varying along the NSEW axis as well as in distance?).

2) TF leadership - Should a TF leader with high ratings of the right types (ie Air and Naval) increase the survivability of ships under his command if attacked from the air (as opposed to (IIRC) only surface vs surface engagements)

with an end result of increased TF ship survivability when these are present (assuming an adequate way of modeling them could be determined).

However, I don't see the events of 7-8th Aug as a justification for the general dumbing down of Japanese strike accuracy across the board, regardless of your exposing of the diabolical Matrix/2x3 conspiricy (sneaky bastards).

[Apollo11]

Hi all,

I agree completely with "Mogami"!

This is what makes UV (and WitP) so great - so many factors and no
two games are alike...


Leo 'Apollo11'

[mogami]

Hi, I'd also like to point out what ship commitment levels mean and why they are used.
When making the game and scenarios the designers had several choices.
They could have tracked each ship and had it arrive and depart on historical dates. But what if ship had been lost in actual events but was still there in game (or other way around what if on departure date a ship had already been lost in game?) So instead ships were assigned values and then points were assigned each side for specific periods.
These totals are limits to what player can have on map AND STILL EXPECT FUTURE SHIP ARRIVALS. (The Japanese might be over limit at some point. In this case even if he sends ships off map he will not receive new ships) The Allied total being higher it takes longer for him to arrive at max points on map.
However these totals do not count ships lost or returned damaged. Only what is on map. If a player is below his allowable total and ships are present in PH/Tokyo (with escorts in some cases) Then new ships will be dispatched. If the setting is set to historical arrival 100 percent commitment no ship should ever arrive that was not actually present at some point.
I've never checked what the actual point totals allowed are (or when they go up or down) I think I recall someone posting it was Japan 7k 10k 7k Allies 7k-12k (with the allied 7k lasting till middle or end of Japanese 10k) But remember even if Japan was set to 50k and only 2k ships were on hand in Tokyo Japan would only get the 2k. I've seen many posts by players about their keeping damaged ships because new ones do not get released. They keep the damaged ship (and its point value) on the map and ask why Japan does not get the ships listed as present in Tokyo.
Then when Japans total allowed goes down they are really in a bind. Since now even if they returned the damaged ship they would not get a new one. Unlike the Allied player who can afford a few lost ships (as long as there are replacements) The Japanese player has to form his assets in mid game to last to the end. He must decide early what ships to keep and which to return. Then he has to finish as many operations as he can as soon as he can in order to have time to send damaged ships home and get replacements. If he waits too long he will have a much smaller force to use while the allied force grows. If you give the Japanese player 200 percent he should be able to maintain an equal force longer. He will get the larger force sooner no matter what level you assign (100 or more) But with the 200 percent he is able to maintain it longer. (This represents the High Command keeping this theater a priority the actual levels mirror the ship totals used) In WITP these settings will be meaningless in full campaigns (and used just like UV in the South Pacific scenario)


How does the game try to be accurate in depicting events that never actually occurred? What factors lead to decline in pilot ability for Japanese? Why when Allies lose so many pilots early does their ability rise?
I agree with people who think the Japanese are over rated. I'm not impressed by the Japanese in China. Nor the 1939 battles with the Soviet Union. I think much of their success was simply being able to pick when and where in the first six months and then outnumbering their enemy. (I know in some of the land battles the Japanese did not outnumber the enemy but they controlled the battle zone)

I can't wait for the Great Nate Debate once WITP is released.

However why was there a decline in Japanese pilot ability? Was it excessive losses? A poor training program?
I personally pin it on two things.
Japan was not prepared to train the number of pilots needed to fight the expanding war.
Japan did not have enough aviation fuel to use training the number of pilots needed to the proficiency required.
By the time the pilot training was organized the fuel problem existed.
Since the Japanese player of WITP cannot alter this he will have to deal with the fuel issue.
UV tries to assign new pilots based on what they believe Japan could train to those levels in those numbers. If the Japanese player suffers too high losses then his replacement pilots are untrained. There is nothing the UV player can do to alter this. Hopefully in WITP pilot training will not be pre set levels (where a Japan with fuel and low combat loss still gets poor replacement pilots in 1943)
I'd like to see something like the real system in place.
Decide how many new recruits enter training every month.
Each month these "classes" advance (gain points)
aircraft fuel and experienced pilots required for each class to advance.
A full year of training with all requirements would produce a 60 pilot.
Then pilots could be assigned advanced courses for another year. (to get to 70) Carrier pilots would need to spend time learning carrier ops. (so CV would need to be assigned to training) Non Carrier trained pilots would suffer high op loss trying to fly from CV)
The player could choose to "graduate" a class at any time in training.
If it takes 12 months to get a 60 rated pilot then after 6 months you would be sending 30's to airgroups.
Pilots could get "accelerated" training at twice the fuel cost but with higher training op loss and to lower levels (rather then 6 months producing a 60 you would do 3 months to get a 30. You simply cannot rush training and get good pilots. A 3 month "accelerated" advanced course might produce your 70 pilot (but your starting with a 60)

The prewar Japanese program was 3 years. (and over 50 percent washouts)(washout became ground crew/non pilot aircrew)
So during the war Japan still had a few fully trained pilots coming in.
In 1942 the class of 39 In 1943 the class of 1940 and in 1944 the class of 1941 all these classes suffered somewhat from lack of fuel for training but they were perhaps the best of the new pilots. (The Japanese kept these students in training do to their age. They began at 15 years old and graduated at 18. (prewar pilots still had almost 2 more years of training advanced tactics and advanced navagation)
It's not difficult to understand why the bulk of Japanese wartime trained pilots did not match their prewar counterparts.
To counter this prewar slow low number of pilot output you have the USA that began the draft in 1940 and placed a large number of pilots into training. By the time the war began these "new" guys had over a year of training. (many of your front line airgroups have 1940 pilots) The length of training did not decrease once the war began but the number of pilots entering training went through the roof.
So if you give Japan a training edge (not as real or as large as many think) You can see it will not last. (even without pilot loss when you expand the size of the force you dilute the over all quality and the force must expand in order to meet all the commitments)
Pilot losses for the Japanese can not be trivalized. On the way home from the PH strike 2 CV were sent to aid in attack on Wake. 1 CV lost one of it's bomber group leaders. (The Japanese simply could not replace him with an equal) If you add the 10 percent lost during the PH strike you could say that after PH the Japanese were less a force (and would never again match their prewar skill)(there was no pool of trained pilots to draw from)
Add the losses during the Indian Ocean Adventure (effecting aircrew quality of 5 of the 6 CV) and the force that departed for Coral Sea and Midway is measurably less then the PH strike force. (although still potent)

Sorry I'm writing another of my novels. I'm trying to explain why it is not a simple matter to assign any rating to anything in a game. Then try to assign a rating to cover events that never actually occured.
You can't use a historical model to any situation except exact duplicates. (and then you get reinactment)
A simulation can not emply "On Aug 7th 1942 so and so did such and such with this result" because in the game it won't be Aug 7th so and so won't be present and the guy that is will do something different.
The game has to be "plausable" rather then "historical"

[Apollo11]

Hi all,

Mogami have you read "Midway" by Mitsuo Fuchida & Masatake Okumiya?


My friend Oleg (he is also avid UV player and posts here frequently) gave me
this book to read last week.

It's very interesting read and it _EXACTLY_ pictures the situation you
describe in your post above.

The authors are essentially saying that the 6 carrier force after Pearl
harbour was never properly used and that this was the greatest mistake Japan
ever made (after foolishly entering the war in the first place).


In "Authors Preface" of that book Masatake Okumiya writes:

"I am firmly convinced that the Pacific War was started by men who did not
understand the sea, and fought by men who did not understand the air. Had
there been better understanding of the sea and air, Japan would have pondered
more carefully the wisdom of going to war. And even if she had then decided
that no other course was possible, many of the blunders she made could have
been avoided. Because she judged the sea by land standards and applied to air
warfare the concepts of sea fighting Japan's tragic fate was foreordained."


Leo "Apollo11"

[Tristanjohn]

Originally Posted by Tristanjohn

[cont'd] 4 of 5

On the 8th Turner had warning 80 minutes ahead of time and made good use of it. Morison makes the point that while CAP saved the fleet on the 7th, the next day successful defense must be credited to flak and intelligent maneuvering of the task force.

For sure Turner's tactic of simultaneous turns (two successive 30^ turns away from and parallel to the Bettys) worked to perfection--not a single torpedo hit home on a transport. (This was not luck or a fluke or some last-second divine inspiration on Turner's part; he'd planned for this eventuality all along and practised the maneuver over and over on the trip to Guadacanal.)

The flak provided by the escorting ships was, I'm sure, as heavy as they could make it but nowhere near what this defensive fire would become in a year's time. Even so, accounts from people at the battle stated that only nine Bettys appeared to get through what flak there was, and after the war the Japanese admitted to the loss of 17 bombers out of 26 sent in that day, so our ack-ack must have hit something.
[more]

Originally Posted by Drongo

Whatever the actual air losses (they were certainly heavy), I would agree it was Turner's orders (and the advance warning) that went a long way to nullifying a fairly well executed Japanese attack (which had avoided the TF CAP and was masked until its final, low-level run over the Florida Islands).

IIRC, the Japanese plan did not entail any attempt at making an anvil attack, relying instead for its success on a quick strike on an unprepared enemy. Had the TF not been fore-warned or had a less capable commander been in charge, they may well have had several transports torpedoed (although still at a heavy cost in attackers).

I mentioned this point re the lack of anvil tactics to TIMJOT (I believe it was) in the original thread. I agree with you, events could well have turned very sour for TF 62 on August 8th had Turner not been in command and had the Japanese attacked with a better plan. However, we know what happened and why it happened and so it's the simulation's work to get that part of the puzzle right.

IMO, the only issues from this that I think could be considered for the game are:

1) Coastwatchers - Should they give early warning about enemy air strikes and under what circumstances? (How unique is the predictable flight path from Rabaul to the solitary strike objective of the area around Guadalcanal in '42. What happens when there are multiple potential targets in the same flight direction but varying along the NSEW axis as well as in distance?).

Definitely. Morison must cite five or six examples of this in Volume V alone. Coastwatchers were forever giving advance warning to the people down at Guadacanal.

Leadership - Should a TF leader with high ratings of the right types (ie Air and Naval) increase the survivability of ships under his command if attacked from the air (as opposed to (IIRC) only surface vs surface engagements) with an end result of increased TF ship survivability when these are present (assuming an adequate way of modeling them could be determined).

Well, this gets complicated fast. Turner, for example, isn't even on the board for Guadacanal, doesn't "exist" in game turns until the V Amphibious Force arrives. And just look at his leadership ratings. I can't recall what I saw in the editor but they weren't real high. Yet he was something of a genius when it came to naval tactics. So we have ignorance at work. Not good.

And that's just Turner. There are many other Allied leaders, lots of Japanese leaders to account for. How do we arrive at reasonable ratings for them all in each specific leadership category? It would take time, and these ratings would need to be tested carefully in play to see what effect they had.

Still, this approach would seem to promise to at least try to plaster a crack in the present system with regard to the wedding of the air and naval modules. Why not give it a whirl?

However, I don't see the events of 7-8th Aug as a justification for the general dumbing down of Japanese strike accuracy across the board, regardless of your exposing of the diabolical Matrix/2x3 conspiricy (sneaky bastards).

Now you backtrack.

Who said anyone wanted to dumb-down the model? The model needs to be bucked up. That's been my assertion from the first.

In a sense, though, you're right. This game has been dumbed-down, only the result wasn't to take anything away from the Japanese but to imbue in this side relative abilities it did not historically possess early in the game.

I have a question. Where does this propensity for "fan boys" come from anyway? Don't you people desire a better simulation? You're unlikely to get one being wishy-washy all the time.

I say wake up! Quite squabbling amongst yourselves over "gamey" issues and work to get the model mechanically right to begin with, or at least very much better than it is. Then, perhaps, those "gamey" issues wouldn't crop up so often. (In a perfect simulation they would not. Think about that for awhile.)

[Tristanjohn]

Hi, Well I might be mistaken but many of your obsevations concerning UV are incorrect. The "balance" issues you make are scenario related not system related. You say you do not understand why a player would want to play a non Midway scenario. You think the game is designed to have Japanese pilots go down while US pilots go up (having balance)

I've no idea what your last sentence means, Mogami.

As for the issue of "balance," I haven't addressed scenario designs with this in mind, except in passing to note the (possible) rationale for these scenarios.

Go to section 7.11 of the manual for aircraft group screen and 10.19 for disbanding and withdrawing groups.

Thanks for the tip but if you'd have bothered to read those sections carefully you'd have noted as I have after reading them carefully that the problem I experienced with B-17s is not mentioned. There isn't even a hint that any such bad event might occur. It might be in those rules somewhere but if so I can't find it.