What ammo restrictions should be placed on carrier aircraft?

[Subchaser]

The voice of numerically superior minority

May be this decision is wise, if we’re going to make WitP as easy to handle as possible, but if realistic simulation of ww2 flattop operations was claimed as a goal, I’m sorry but I have to admit it wasn’t reached.

500 strike points or unlimited carrier ordnance, there is almost no difference actually. No carrier in normal game situation will run out of those 500 points any sooner then will start experiencing problems with fuel or will be forced to withdraw. Yes it can prevent unrealistic amount of sorties flown from one particular carrier in some cases, especially ground attack missions, but this is minor problem, torpedoes as a separate type of ordnance that’s what could make WitP most realistic naval wargame among the games of such scale.

I don’t want to bombard you with historical facts and figures, I bet you know them all, I just want to ask playtesters, when they will receive new build with this feature implemented, to simulate US carrier final onslaught on Japanese navy or to create another game situations when carriers will get an opportunity to engage large number of naval targets and compare achieved results with similar historic battles. I foresee that carriers in WitP will be more dreadful weapon of war than they were in reality. We had a nice chance to tone it down.

Although I still hope that there is chance that respected WitP developers and playtesters will take into account the fact that majority of forum members made their choice in favor of 4 type ordnance and will discuss the possibility of implementing two carrier ordnance options into the game, one for simplified carrier ordnance (1 strike point for all sorties) and realistic carrier ordnance (4 type of ordnance) I guess there is still room for this on realism menu screen.

Anyway I also want to thank WitP team for this, whatever I say, great game and all that hard work you’ve already done. I do thank you.

SC

[Oleg Mastruko]

Yeah, generally speaking I'm with Subchaser on this, although I can understand the wish to avoid programming hassle that would be needed to deal with 4 types of ordnance. BTW, Joel, you never commented on my suggestion to have "only" 2 types of ordnance - bombs and torps. I mean at the end it all comes down to whether there'll be too many torpedo strikes or not.

And, besides, 500 strike points definitely seems excessive, even for US Essex class CVs, not to mention earlier classes (especially IJN).

With 500 strike points I don't see CV TFs ever running out of "strike points" (they'll run out of fuel first). Effectivelly it's like having unlimited ammo so why bother?

O.

[pasternakski]

SC, I am with you in spirit on this, but the goal of WitP was never to present a "realistic simulation of WW2 flattop operations." WitP is a strategic-level game that allows you some contact with, and control over, carrier operations. The idea is to produce results in the range of what players consider to be consistent with historical possibility, but not to model down to the last detail every aspect of any single weapon system's operation.

You may well be right. Actual play may disclose inaccuracies that have to be addressed in order for the game to accomplish its goal. Time and experience will tell. I am ready to be persuaded, but, for now, I think that the design team has made the right decision.

Just one more thing: a "majority of forum members" did not choose. 49 of them did. A more accurate statement would be that a majority of those who chose to respond to this poll voted in favor of more detail. This may or may not reflect the sentiments of a majority of forum members (most of whom, apparently, don't care one way or the other and are happy to leave the decision up to the designers).

I respect your opinion, remain open-minded for purposes of future discussion, but wait to see the fruits of the designers' labors before commenting further (and no, I did not just call the desigers' laborers fruits. I was just waxing literary in my diction, as much as I hate talking about my diction in public).

[MikeH1952]

I agree with pasternakski's resaoning here. If during testing the results are off the ordnance limit can be adjusted quite easily I assume.

[pasternakski]

I see from the poll results that the "gang of 49" has now become the "slick 46." Careful, fellas, if the trend continues, you may soon become the dreaded "plurality."

[denisonh]

ORIGINAL: pasternakski

SC, I am with you in spirit on this, but the goal of WitP was never to present a "realistic simulation of WW2 flattop operations." WitP is a strategic-level game that allows you some contact with, and control over, carrier operations. The idea is to produce results in the range of what players consider to be consistent with historical possibility, but not to model down to the last detail every aspect of any single weapon system's operation.

You may well be right. Actual play may disclose inaccuracies that have to be addressed in order for the game to accomplish its goal. Time and experience will tell. I am ready to be persuaded, but, for now, I think that the design team has made the right decision.

Just one more thing: a "majority of forum members" did not choose. 49 of them did. A more accurate statement would be that a majority of those who chose to respond to this poll voted in favor of more detail. This may or may not reflect the sentiments of a majority of forum members (most of whom, apparently, don't care one way or the other and are happy to leave the decision up to the designers).

I respect your opinion, remain open-minded for purposes of future discussion, but wait to see the fruits of the designers' labors before commenting further (and no, I did not just call the desigers' laborers fruits. I was just waxing literary in my diction, as much as I hate talking about my diction in public).

Beer

[Subchaser]

ORIGINAL: pasternakski

SC, I am with you in spirit on this, but the goal of WitP was never to present a "realistic simulation of WW2 flattop operations." WitP is a strategic-level game that allows you some contact with, and control over, carrier operations. The idea is to produce results in the range of what players consider to be consistent with historical possibility, but not to model down to the last detail every aspect of any single weapon system's operation.

You may well be right. Actual play may disclose inaccuracies that have to be addressed in order for the game to accomplish its goal. Time and experience will tell. I am ready to be persuaded, but, for now, I think that the design team has made the right decision.

Just one more thing: a "majority of forum members" did not choose. 49 of them did. A more accurate statement would be that a majority of those who chose to respond to this poll voted in favor of more detail. This may or may not reflect the sentiments of a majority of forum members (most of whom, apparently, don't care one way or the other and are happy to leave the decision up to the designers).

I respect your opinion, remain open-minded for purposes of future discussion, but wait to see the fruits of the designers' labors before commenting further (and no, I did not just call the desigers' laborers fruits. I was just waxing literary in my diction, as much as I hate talking about my diction in public).

In WitP where, as in reality, ground, naval and air forces intimately related at every step of the game, therefore unrealistic outcome of any ground, naval or air battle will seriously affect the course of entire war. Thus if one assumes that realistic simulation of ww2 flattop operations is not one of the goals of this game, he must also assume that realistic simulation of entire Pacific War is not a goal either.

Okay lets wait and see what tests will show.

[pasternakski]

You're not understanding me. Historical outcomes, yes. Detailed replication of historical processes, no.

[Mr.Frag]

You're not understanding me. Historical outcomes, yes. Detailed replication of historical processes, no.

That is the classic problem [:D]

You can have: (a) Historical outcomes or (b) Historical processes

The two do not work together to produce what you might think. (a) will lend itself to getting the right results in the game over the scope of the entire game. (b) will produce individual technically correct results, but with be so radically different from history that you will think you are playing a space simulator.

It is impossible to have both at the same time. I prefer (a) and can live with some strange (b) effects as the overall concept is workable and makes me feel like I'm really going through what happened.

I also happen to be a big (b) fan, but this is NOT the game for (b) to be in the works. (b) type games lend themselves to very small scale real time type stuff where it becomes truely important.

[Hoplosternum]

Mr Frag and Pasternakski,

The decision has been made and thats that - fair enough. But you're attempts at trying to kid the rest of us that it won't make any difference isn't very convincing while anyone can look in the latest AARs and see the sort of lame tactics the new limit is still going to allow [X(]

In the Pry/Nik 3 Day game Pry sent the Japanese Midway CVs to Noumea and hung around for many days striking repeatedly at the defenceless transports. The allied CVs were not there (it was February '42 I think). The four ammo load out would have made this very dubious indeed, as the US CVs could (and did in this case) make a late appearence. All the '500' strike will do is stop the slaughter going into the second week. I know that the Pry/Nik game is under the unlimited rules but 500 strike ammo seems a lot.

This kind of unrealistic, unhistoric and quite frankly gamey tactic is one of my chief fears for WitP. Kido Butai suddenly 'decloaking' off Noumea, or Sydney or Trincomalee and blasting the allied shipping for days on end. These kind of things should be raids, like they were in the war, not campaigns!

In the Pry/Nik game the only reason Nikademus risked his CVs was because he knew KB had been split giving him parity. If it sticks together it is likely it will be invincible. If it can operate for a week or so at full power then it's going to be unhistorically deadly. It will make the Pacific almost a no go area for the allied CVs and transports until they have their 6 backed by LBA just like in UV - [:(] Nor will it help the IJN once Admiral Kirk (I mean Halsey) comes calling in '43 warping accross the Pacific on Enterprize et al and the hellcats [X(]

I just don't understand why you and the others tried so hard to strangle the 4 ammo types. It was scarcely complicated. The player did not get to decide the load outs of individual strikes. For a game that makes you decide the altitude and % of Cansos on ASW patrol out of Vancouver keeping an eye on your ammo stores is hardly a big problem [:D] Edit: The big block on adding extra detail and in this case I think realism is the development time. But in this case the developers were on board and were offering it!

Oh well you won and it is done. But Mr Frag I don't want to be reading any strategy notes from you that recommend the US hiding away on the US West Coast until September after this [;)]

[Subchaser]

Let’s forget about carriers for a moment and imagine wargame, where regiment, or even division, is the smallest unit you can control (the game is also supposed to be pure strategic), every infantryman is armed with rifle, hand grenades and bazooka, infantryman has 500 ammo points for all 3 type of armament, thus he has 500 rifle ammo, 500 hand grenades and 500 AT grenades. Historical effectiveness of the infantry cannot be simulated correctly in this case. Infantryman made 500 shots with his rifle and exhausted all his hand grenades and AT rounds, a bit bizarre situation, right?

If different armament types represented, they require different types of ammunition, otherwise, implementation of different armament is pointless, needless details. It’s better to have coefficient system for infantryman in this case: anti-soft – 5, AT- 1 etc. This makes more sense for pure strategic game, effectiveness of infantrymen is predictable in every type of ground combat, it doesn’t rely on amount of ammunition anymore and no further details needed.

As you remember we have different weapons (aircraft here) for carriers in WitP, therefore we also need different types of ordnance.

We already have the similar system working in game, ammo for other warships. Warship doesn’t use abstractive points, every gun type has its own amount of ammo. Situation when BB bombarded port and participated in naval combat one turn, on the next turn run out of AA ammo, is impossible and this is right.

If game can generate historical outcomes it somehow deals with historical processes, which can be very abstractive or very detailed, it doesn’t matter. Historical outcome is a measure of accuracy of historical process simulating, it’s not a separate issue. We have the game where historical outcomes are not hardcoded, they generated by ‘historical process’ simulation and if ‘historical process’ has not been coded accurately, forget about historical outcomes.

[Mr.Frag]

Oh well you won and it is done. But Mr Frag I don't want to be reading any strategy notes from you that recommend the US hiding away on the US West Coast until September after this

The code is not up yet and the number is not fixed at 500 yet, relax a little.

A fair percentage of those here will be playing WitP against the AI. Ammo types are well beyond the capabilities of the AI to figure out. Fuel for the planes on the other hand is a fairly simple concept, you either have it or you don't. Not beyond the AI to figure out. This is not about winning or loosing, this is about making WitP a good game that resembles history as much as possible.

As far as me telling you to hide your CV's, that was a UV specific tactic based on the rules of the game. It is pointless sending CV's that happen to be short almost a full wing of fighters into harms way.

The Lexington starts with 70 (note! Buffalos, not F4F-3) out of her 90 aircraft at sea, the Enterprise 76 at sea, the Saratoga in San Diego with 70 also. Thats 54 aircraft short! If you want to race them into harms way with 2+ wings of aircraft missing, thats your business. The Yorktown is 37 days out before entering into the fight.

If you can restrain yourself to February, you can launch a credible threat against Japan with the 4 CV's loaded with 90x4 (360) aircraft. KB has 421 aircraft, of which a number will be lost during the PH attack. It becomes a fairly even match at that point in time, although the range of the attack will dictate the odds (stupid puddle hopping TBD's!)

As far as waiting until September, what year? [:D]

[HMSWarspite]

I think the 'more detail regardless' crowd have got to consider the effect that the extra detail has on the game, not just the detail per se. If 2by3 had put in the 4 ammo types, I am willing to bet a large drink, or 2, that the forum would be deluged in 'stupid AI' threads, and 'we must have the ability to set CV targets properly'. Also, as Mr Frag pointed out, do we really need ANOTHER issue where the human can deal with the rules better than the AI? I suspect the AI would have to cheat, or would end up being very conservative in order to avoid falling for the old 'small transport TF decoy, followed 2 days later by the CV' attack.

2by3, all we need now are: realistic refuelling at sea, proper limits on ammo replenishment (I believe you have ammo ships now?), and other realistic brakes on the 'WW2 on Speed' style of game.

Anyone know ho easy it is to replenish BB ammo? I would like to think something like size 6 ports and above, or ammo ship, and say 10000pts supply on hand (or something). This stems from a UV game I am playing - capture Efate (as IJN), fighting a naval battle to protect the TFs. Then pop in to the port the day after I capture it, where upon some IJN supply officer wins a major commendation because (wonder of wonders) the 6000 supply points he sent includes 14" SAP!!! (I am not expecting the supply system to change, but limitations such as I suggested would limit abuse.)

You could go the whole hog, and go for something like:
Gun type...min port........min supply
sub 5"......any.............any (enough points to replenish only)
6"..........2 (or ammo ship)2000
8"..........4......"........4000
14".........6......"........10000
16".........6......"........12000
etc (If there is evidence to split 14, 16, and 18")
(and you could add torpedoes etc as well, as well as CV ordnance points - size 4 port, and lots of supply say))

(Note numbers completely made up!)

[pasternakski]

Even better, HMS. You capture an Allied base and, voila, inside a warehouse is a stack of 18.1" ammo for your Yamato and Musashi.

Yes, it's silly when you sit in analytical judgment, but the reality is that "supply" is an abstract concept that has sillinesses built into it that just can't be avoided without a 100-year design process.

Yes, individual weapons have their own mounts on surface combatants, but the ammo load is generic. The CV air armament solution is both consistent with this design constraint and geared toward providing players with a game situation that has a decent chance of resulting in something resembling historical possibility.

What more do you want? It reminds me of the old Stephen Wright line about his map of the world: "It's actual size."

[mjk428]

I'm a bit late to the party but I agree with the decision for generic ammo. This seems more appropriate for a game of this scale. I believe that it was mentioned that fuel is more likely to be the limiting factor anyway.

Hopefully, an amount can be found that satisfies those that are concerned about cheap tactics and also allows the AI to function reasonably effectively.

Thanks.

[Hoplosternum]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag


The code is not up yet and the number is not fixed at 500 yet, relax a little.

Well hopefully it will be tweaked downwards if the testing shows that the Cvs can do too much. As for relaxing I shall try, but no promises [:)]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

A fair percentage of those here will be playing WitP against the AI. Ammo types are well beyond the capabilities of the AI to figure out. Fuel for the planes on the other hand is a fairly simple concept, you either have it or you don't. Not beyond the AI to figure out. This is not about winning or loosing, this is about making WitP a good game that resembles history as much as possible.

This is a good argument for the chosen system. I just hope that it does not enable the CVs to do too much beyond their historical capabilities. As HMS also points out there could be an obvious exploitable ploy of using many dummy taskforces. However I suspect this is just a problem with the rather limited AI that we have to day. In many ways the UV one is good as AI's go but a human can always play the game system rather than the game. Bait taskforces were used in the war of course but in UV and I suspect WitP the way the game works can be exploited.

[Subchaser]

ORIGINAL: HMSWarspite

I think the 'more detail regardless' crowd have got to consider the effect that the extra detail has on the game, not just the detail per se. If 2by3 had put in the 4 ammo types, I am willing to bet a large drink, or 2, that the forum would be deluged in 'stupid AI' threads, and 'we must have the ability to set CV targets properly'. Also, as Mr Frag pointed out, do we really need ANOTHER issue where the human can deal with the rules better than the AI? I suspect the AI would have to cheat, or would end up being very conservative in order to avoid falling for the old 'small transport TF decoy, followed 2 days later by the CV' attack.

HMSWarspite, please, do us a favor, be a little bit more polite, we’re not stupid crowd, we’re customers as well as you are, and we can tell what we think and can have an opposite opinion.

Now take a look at this situation: I have Shokaku and Zuikaku raiding somewhere near Fiji in august 42, and I see juicy US convoy and dozen of cruisers approaching, about 40 ships total. No US carriers nearby. Since I’m far away from the nearest IJN base, I have to use 2x 500 (or so) strike points wisely. What can I do, I can order Vals and Zeros to rest and use Kates exclusively, there are 48 Kates onboard. Here we go, 48 Kates do 160-180 sorties in two turns and I bet most of US ships will die, some immediately, some later because of high float.damage far away from port. Kate drivers in 42 are desperate killers, if you’ll give them 180 torpedoes they will crush any target without appropriate cover. More than this, I’ve already killed 30 ships from this convoy for just 180 (out of 1000) points used, but I can repeat this bloodbath somewhere else, oh yes, there is another convoy sighted, deadmen are trying to reach Australia, I’m taking another 150 torpedoes out of my magic pocket. BTW I still have enough torps to deal with US carriers if they will appear. All I need in this situation is just a couple of TKs for replenishment. There are many other generic ammo problematic points.

You can bring even more arguments for generic CV ordnance but they won’t make such results and tactics any bit realistic, there cannot be hundreds of torps in carrier holds, if they are onboard there cannot be realistic carrier combat (detailed or not, it isn’t realistic). And please do not tell me about great scale of this game, WitP is just several UVs in one box, and UV is not grand strategic, whatever you say; you have 3000 ships now, but you still have to handle them manually.

In the same time I understand all those problems with 4 types, AI choosing ordnance etc., I was hoping that this option would trigger further improving of AI and carrier combat model. Looks like developers think it is already perfect, I can’t agree here and I don’t want to make a virtue out of necessity.

[tsimmonds]

Why not just make torpedoes cost more generic ammo points than bombs do? They actually did weigh more and take up more stowage space, or? Say arming a dive bomber costs one of the ammo points, while arming a torpedo plane costs 3, or 4. That would take care of this hypothetical situation that you describe, without adding unnecessary complexity.

[Subchaser]

ORIGINAL: irrelevant

Why not just make torpedoes cost more generic ammo points than bombs do? They actually did weigh more and take up more stowage space, or? Say arming a dive bomber costs one of the ammo points, while arming a torpedo plane costs 3, or 4. That would take care of this hypothetical situation that you describe, without adding unnecessary complexity.

well this won’t solve problem completely but it’s better than accepted generic points option anyway, these points are nothing but aviation gas, no ordnance is represented actually.

[tsimmonds]

I thought it represented ordnance. If it represented avgas, then fighters flying CAP and escort would use up these points also.