Any tips on Japanese Production system?

[geofflambert]

I don't think the refinery at Port Arthur ever produces a significant surplus of fuel, especially if you capture some HI factories in China, which you better do.

Edit: In my experience, even if you capture all the oil fields in China, that oil is really sluggish making it's way to PA. You likely will be (on occasion) shipping a little oil from the DEI to PA to keep that refinery busy, and all the fuel it produces will go into HI in China and Manchukuo.

[rustysi]

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

ORIGINAL: jdsrae

ORIGINAL: AllenK




That's just what I need, Japanese production honed to perfection .

Don’t worry Allen, he won’t ace all those IJ industry setup mouse clicks in his first game as Japan.
It would take a good few games to “master” it, and those who play as Japan are always just one incorrect mouse click away from wasting 30k+ supply points!

Ain't that the truth! [:D]

+1

[rustysi]

Does anyone have any tips on the production system?

Yeah, don't do it.[:D]

But if you insist...

You have to read a lot of what others have posted and then make your own decisions. What's said above is all good, but in the end you will have to use your own ideas. As I've always said '100 gamers, 100 ways to play'. There's a tremendous amount to learn and most things are interrelated. You will make many mistakes at first so be ready to start a game, go for a while, and then restart. I did several times in the beginning. Then at some point your mistakes will be tolerable and you can just play through them correcting things on the next go-round.

I find it helps if you take notes about the decisions you make. Then before you restart read them and decide if they still apply or if you'd like to change something. Don't forget this is your game and you should develop your own style of play. I for don't usually 'go with the flow'. That doesn't mean I don't make 'sound choices', it just means I'm different. Believe me I do things that would cause most here to cringe.

[Mike Solli]

ORIGINAL: JoV

As an aside, was there ever any consensus on what to do with the fuel that stockpiles in Manchuria? Since the heavy industry there needs a steady supply of it, I've always been reluctant to ship it out to the Home Islands.

Is it safe to skim some/any of the top? I assume taking Siam et al helps keep this region self-sufficient.

A bit like the opposite of Hokkaido, where you need to make sure you keep topping it up to ensure the industry doesn't run dry....

Very rarely, I ship a bit of oil out of C/M/K (China/Manchuria/Korea). I do ship fuel into C/M/K regularly, usually from the SRA to Hong Kong.

[rustysi]

I do ship fuel into C/M/K regularly, usually from the SRA to Hong Kong.

End of May '43 and I've yet to ship fuel into C/M/K, but the stock at PA is getting low so...

I ship a bit of oil out of C/M/K (China/Manchuria/Korea).

Have done a bit, but that's gonna change with PA running dry on oil. I find I can get some of the northern China oil out through Hankow. Its been going to Nagasaki, but its beginning to look like I'll need it at PA.

[WingCmdr]

Here's a note I Pm'ed to one of our Russian friends:

I just want to help you out a little. Forgive me if you know this.

Everything starts in Shang, Fusan.
Use the radio knob to adjust the supply level at a couple of key cities.
The system does the rest, on main roads, slower elsewhere.

Pull the demand (like a rope) to get resources/oil from HK to Shang, PA, Fusan.

I thinks its that simple?

Cheers


It's kind of an old subject:

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2597400

[rustysi]

Pull the demand (like a rope) to get resources/oil from HK to Shang, PA, Fusan.

OK, but the difficulty I have is getting things to move to Fusan. The game will usually move things to the largest port, and for me that's PA right now. Don't have enough engineers at Fusan to build the port up enough.

Then again as I've said before I don't use the 'magic'highway' (if that's what we're talking about here) as I prefer not to. That's not to say I wouldn't try when my fleet is on the oceans' bottom.[:D] But that's just me and others may play how they feel fit.

[WingCmdr]

That's how you can tell the good from the average.

I build 100 LI in Fusan and Shanghai, a little in PA and Keijo.

The hard decisions are how much Arm and Veh to produce and do you expand in Korea?

Scen 78 had three armored divisions, no way you can predict the usage in the first year, but somewhere there are '43 targets
for these and HI. That's why I don't need Tracker. As long as you know the daily change and the direction of the trend you can feel comfortable in your economic decisions.

[jdsrae]

ORIGINAL: rustysi

OK, but the difficulty I have is getting things to move to Fusan. The game will usually move things to the largest port, and for me that's PA right now. Don't have enough engineers at Fusan to build the port up enough.

In my current game I moved every engineer unit in Manchukuo to Fusan from day 1.
They had Fusan port maxed at size 8 before the end of Dec 41, but PA is size 9 so will always be the bigger port and therefore magnet for oil/resources.

The size 8 Fusan port supports 2 x big Lima convoys to haul resources Fusan—>Shimonoseki and they draw enough resources to fill them, but if I lost my marbles and stopped those convoys for any reason everything would stockpile back at PA.

Coincidentally, the total haulage capacity of the Lima class is close to the daily resource excess produced in CMK. It’s like the devs planned it or something!
The trick is to avoid any of the Lima that start with troops on them getting sunk in the first few weeks

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: jdsrae
Coincidentally, the total haulage capacity of the Lima class is close to the daily resource excess produced in CMK. It’s like the devs planned it or something!
The trick is to avoid any of the Lima that start with troops on them getting sunk in the first few weeks

There are so many better uses for your Limas though than shuttling 2 hexes - AKEs, AKVs, sturdy troop transports. Shuttling the short route can be done by anything, fuel expenditure is minimal and hence fuel efficiency does not matter much

[jdsrae]

GA I have to disagree on anything being converted to AKV, and for me the Lima is better used moving resources rather than sitting in port as an AKE.
I use Yusens for strategic and assault troop transport so the only real question for me is which resource route(s) to use Lima on.
I don’t have any long haul resource routes, so the choice for them really boils down to Fusan or Hokkaido?
They should be able to run either convoy route non-stop for 3 full years so that would add up to a lot of fuel wasted if you ran less efficient xAK instead.

[inqistor]

ORIGINAL: jdsrae

ORIGINAL: rustysi

OK, but the difficulty I have is getting things to move to Fusan. The game will usually move things to the largest port, and for me that's PA right now. Don't have enough engineers at Fusan to build the port up enough.

In my current game I moved every engineer unit in Manchukuo to Fusan from day 1.
They had Fusan port maxed at size 8 before the end of Dec 41, but PA is size 9 so will always be the bigger port and therefore magnet for oil/resources.

The size 8 Fusan port supports 2 x big Lima convoys to haul resources Fusan—>Shimonoseki and they draw enough resources to fill them, but if I lost my marbles and stopped those convoys for any reason everything would stockpile back at PA.

Coincidentally, the total haulage capacity of the Lima class is close to the daily resource excess produced in CMK. It’s like the devs planned it or something!
The trick is to avoid any of the Lima that start with troops on them getting sunk in the first few weeks

After 3 months I have sucked Korea Resources dry, and there is barely anything at PA now, except supply. Like, maybe 17k Resources, but they tend to accumulate at two production Centers on the west Korea coast now. They will probably move to PA, if I let them accumulate, but I save few hexes route, by loading them directly there. No Korea port was expanded so far.

[WingCmdr]

Can you put some names on these ports, I know they are hard to spell.

Fusan is the only port you need, PA only for oil.

You waste fuel if you pull resources from anywhere else in Korea.

[WingCmdr]

ORIGINAL: jdsrae

GA I have to disagree on anything being converted to AKV, and for me the Lima is better used moving resources rather than sitting in port as an AKE.
I use Yusens for strategic and assault troop transport so the only real question for me is which resource route(s) to use Lima on.
I don’t have any long haul resource routes, so the choice for them really boils down to Fusan or Hokkaido?
They should be able to run either convoy route non-stop for 3 full years so that would add up to a lot of fuel wasted if you ran less efficient xAK instead.

GA I have to disagree on anything being converted to AKV, and for me the Lima is better used moving resources rather than sitting in port as an AKE. I use Yusens for strategic and assault troop transport so the only real question for me is which resource route(s) to use Lima on. I don’t have any long haul resource routes, so the choice for them really boils down to Fusan or Hokkaido? They should be able to run either convoy route non-stop for 3 full years so that would add up to a lot of fuel wasted if you ran less efficient xAK instead.

< Message edited by jdsrae -- 6/20/2019 8:39:59 AM >

_____________________________

I think you need to read the manual about the uses of an AKE.

You can use to transport supply as well ya know.

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: jdsrae

GA I have to disagree on anything being converted to AKV, and for me the Lima is better used moving resources rather than sitting in port as an AKE.
I use Yusens for strategic and assault troop transport so the only real question for me is which resource route(s) to use Lima on.
I don’t have any long haul resource routes, so the choice for them really boils down to Fusan or Hokkaido?
They should be able to run either convoy route non-stop for 3 full years so that would add up to a lot of fuel wasted if you ran less efficient xAK instead.

Well, it all can be calculated. Including the need to run your BBs back to large ports wasting fuel (much more of that compared to xAKs) and time because you don't have large enough AKEs on hand to reload them.

Also with my current haul of 50k res a day from Korea, running Adens instead of Limas on Fusan-Shimonoseki 4 hex route would consume an additional 14k fuel a year. I can perfectly live with that.

[rustysi]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

ORIGINAL: jdsrae
Coincidentally, the total haulage capacity of the Lima class is close to the daily resource excess produced in CMK. It’s like the devs planned it or something!
The trick is to avoid any of the Lima that start with troops on them getting sunk in the first few weeks

There are so many better uses for your Limas though than shuttling 2 hexes - AKEs, AKVs, sturdy troop transports. Shuttling the short route can be done by anything, fuel expenditure is minimal and hence fuel efficiency does not matter much

My ideas are more along these lines, than what's been said above or below.

[rustysi]

for me the Lima is better used moving resources rather than sitting in port as an AKE.

This AKE conversion used to be needed as the Lima's were the only vessels capable of reloading 16" (40cm) shells for Japan. That said there wasn't a large need, so I used to convert six and spread them throughout the empire for the Mutsu and Nagato. Now things have changed and AKE's will 'add' to resup larger cal weapons. Intended? Either way it is what it is. As of now all one need to convert to AKE are some of the plentiful Aden's. They can handle Japan's requirements.

IIRC these vessels will also convert to AK's, which is something Japan will need after the early war load/unload bonuses expire. AK's will load/unload at a rate of 600, compared to 250 for xAP's/xAK's.

As for using them on short haul runs, I don't. They are long haul guys with a very good capacity. I really don't understand how players don't haul resources from the SRA and other areas home. If I use fuel to do so, so be it. As long as I see my fuel levels increasing I don't care. If they were dropping for some reason I would check to see why and then act accordingly. If that meant that my resource haul was the cause, then at that point I would suspend my long haul gets.

Let's keep in mind that everything in the game will probably change over the course of same. So, what works in the first few months of the game will not in the later stages. As for merchie conversions most may be changed back later. So, if a Lima is an AK, at any point I desire it may become an xAK again, and haul resources from an expanded Fusan. Again I can expand Fusan whenever I wish. The key is to be flexible and change with the conditions of the game at the current time.

[Mike Solli]

In my game with Ted, I used Limas to haul from Fusan and from Hakodate (in addition to half a dozen as AKEs). Why? Because the math worked out well. In my game with Mike, I'm using Adens. Why? Because the perfect math doesn't really matter here and the Limas are more useful as AKEs and AKs.

Just my $0.02.

[USSAmerica]

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

In my game with Ted, I used Limas to haul from Fusan and from Hakodate (in addition to half a dozen as AKEs). Why? Because the math worked out well. In my game with Mike, I'm using Adens. Why? Because the perfect math doesn't really matter here and the Limas are more useful as AKEs and AKs.

Just my $0.02.

<takes notes> .... wait, what's an Aden? That's supposed to be MY base! [:D]

[Mike Solli]

ORIGINAL: USSAmerica

ORIGINAL: Mike Solli

In my game with Ted, I used Limas to haul from Fusan and from Hakodate (in addition to half a dozen as AKEs). Why? Because the math worked out well. In my game with Mike, I'm using Adens. Why? Because the perfect math doesn't really matter here and the Limas are more useful as AKEs and AKs.

Just my $0.02.

<takes notes> .... wait, what's an Aden? That's supposed to be MY base! [:D]

Not for long! [;)]