Invasion of the US by Japan

[Mr.Frag]

Damien,

I do not think you understand what Mogami is saying.

The balance of the game is quite simple.

Japan will win the game automatically if the Alllies do not fight and win decisively. That is the balance factor. Because Japan enters the game knowing that they will win by default as long as they can stall long enough, the pressure is put completely on the Allied player to not only perform , but perform well!

VP for Japan losses are not as valuable as VP for Allied losses. As long as Japan gets as good as she's loosing, her score will be rising all the time.

To counter this, the Allied player has to carefully exploit Japan's position into winning fights without long protracted slug fests as these types of fights while moving the Allies closer to Japan actually end up costing the Allies points and move Japan even closer to victory.

Japan has a lot of work to do, but given the change, she is more then able to get the job done. It is up to the Allies to win the game. They have to actively pursue victory, while being careful to not screw up. It is really no different then UV for the Allies. They must ensure that they never take a step backwards because they can not afford to loose the time and points.

While you might think the pressure is on Japan, really it is on the Allies. Stalemate in this case is a Decisive Victory for Japan.

[Mike Scholl]

DAMIEN With your perspective on "winning" and "losing" you should probably
restrict yourself to playing only the Allies unless you are playing a scenario of
the opening six months of the war. A "game victory" for Japan won't look a
great deal different from a "game defeat"---it will just occur later. Short of
warping historical reality beyond all reccognition, they don't stand a chance
of "winning" in the sense you seem to desire. Just like the Zulu's or the Boer's
weren't going to "win" against the British Empire, or Poland "win" against Ger-
many and the USSR.

MOGAMI has the right Idea..., a Japanese "win" in the "whole war" scenario is
going to be a struggle to avoid their historical mistakes, minimize their short-
comings, and hope to toss a "spanner into the gears" of the Allied "steamroller".
There are no "Magic Bullets" they can fire to win some kind of "automatic victory".
Which is good, because it means Japanese Players won't trash their position a
third of the way through the war trying for some silly and meaningless "victory
condition" which doesn't exist. Isandlawana didn't win the war for the Zulu's, and
the Japanese player shouldn't go looking for anything "automatic" either. Grab
your victories when the chance arises, and duck as many "lumps" as you can, while
you can. That is how the Japanese Player is going to have to approach the "long
game". If that isn't your style, then don't try it. Take a shot at MOGAMI or someone
who does see the facination of the Japanese position as the Allies. You can have
fun bludgening your way across the Pacific..., and he'll have fun trying to trip you up.

[brisd]

I understand the point Mogami is making about the burden of victory is on the Allied player. But I have a further question: is there an automatic victory condition for the Japanese player ala PacWar? In that game, if the Empire 'runs wild' for all of 42 and 43 and has kicked the Allies butt, then does the game end as in PacWar (2:1 VP ratio)???

[mogami]

Hi, Yes there is an auto victory condition for Japan. It is the exact same ratio as the Allies. The problem of course that by trying for auto victory the Japanese are going to have to take really large risks. To take risk against an enemy waiting for you to stick your neck out too far.........

[Mr.Frag]

Victory Conditions as they sit right now:

Auto Victory (Decisive Victory) occurs if either side gets 4 times the VPs of their opponent in 1943, 3 times the VPs of their opponent in 1944 or 2 times the VPs of their opponents in 1945 or later.

If the game ends in an Allied auto victory after August 1945, the Allies will only get a Marginal Victory.

Otherwise, victory is similar but slightly different than UV (1.75 to 1 or greater ratio of your score to opponents score is a Decisive Victory and 1.25 to 1 or greater is a marginal, less than 1.25 to 1 is a draw).

However, if a scenario ends after August 1945 not by an Auto Victory, then the level of victory moves 2 levels in favor of the Japanese moving left to right in order: Allied Decisive, Allied Marginal, Draw, Japanese Marginal, Japanese Decisive.

As you can see, due to the shifting nature of the rules, the Allies must win the war before August '45 and be careful to ensure that the points total never shifts far enough in Japan's favour.

From a player standpoint, anyone playing Japan who manages to prevent a Allied Decisive victory in my eyes won the game.

[Mike Scholl]

ANY type of "Auto Victory" is a mistake to my way of thinking. It's an encourage-
ment for players to act in an ahistoric manner chasing the illusion that the other
side will quit under the right circumstances. And that's just wrong. A Japanese
Government with a sense of realsim would have given up after the Marianas were
lost. Instead they began telling themselves that some new effort was going to pro-
vide the "decisive victory" they were praying for. The truth is there were no "deci-
sive victories" in the Pacific, just a grinding war of attrition. Midway gets a lot of
credit for being decisive, but if the US had suffered a major defeat there does any-
one really think the outcome of the war would have been different? It was going
to end in Tokyo Bay sooner or later. Reversing Midway might give a chance for a
Japanese "player victory" by dragging the war into 1946; but the outcome is not
in doubt.

[mogami]

Hi, Auto victory is a WITP victory condition. It has nothing to do with the possible outcomes of WWII.

(Dream on if anyone thinks 4x VP in 1943 is going to be easy.)

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: Mogami

Hi, Auto victory is a WITP victory condition. It has nothing to do with the possible outcomes of WWII.

(Dream on if anyone thinks 4x VP in 1943 is going to be easy.)

You are probably right about it not being easy, but I still think it is a bad idea in
that it will lead players to look for some "artificial" means of victory instead of
the real thing. I'm probably "stuck with it" as so many players like this sort of
thing. But I keep thinking back to an article I read about the old SPI game of
Austerlitz in which a player reccommended "winning" as the Allies by running off
the map before the French could kill enough of your units to defeat you---and he
was serious! This is an egregious example to be sure, but it's the kind of thing
"victory points" and "victory conditions" can lead to. I don't want my opponants
"counting points", I want then playing the commander of the opposing forces.

[brisd]

Exactly - Autovictory shows that the player in question has played significantly better than history, which is the whole point of the game. Thanks Mr Frag for the details. And I agree that going for the autowin early by Japanese player is wishful thinking against most Allied players, more likely reserved for vs AI games. Of course I am assuming all this from comments from designers/playtesters as I've not seen the game in any form and am using my UV game experiences as well. I do agree that Japan should have sued for peace after Saipan was captured and the B29 raids started as they were in a hopeless position that could only get worse and did. But they didn't and we are simulating the whole war, just not the 41-44 timeframe. Reading accounts of the war, many Allied participants expected to have to conquer Japan island by island and drag the war well into 1946. The atomic bombs saved untold numbers of allied and Japanese lives (plus the USSR declaring war was just as significant in ending the war).

[mogami]

Hi, I think there needs to be an "out" for a game that otherwise would be very boring. Short of just quitting. If your opponent has 4x your victory points he is mopping the deck with you. There are players who would still return turns often enough to avoid the game being considered dead but still be making no effort to reverse the condition. Hoping you will grow tired and offer them a release. (The chess player in an impossible positon that plays on hoping you will run out of time rather then resign)
Since the Japanese are always going to be in a bad position after 1943 the VP are one means of shorting the game. The Japanese have to both stick around and stay above the loss ratio that awards an Allied auto victory. (2x in 1945)
The auto victory is much more feasable for the allies in 1945 then for Japan in 1943.
The Japanese will be very lucky to come near 2-1 ratios from 44 to 46 so they will need to live off the early war success to offset the late war disaster. Any Allied player who has 3x the VP in 1944 is simply crushing the Japanese.
It would be interesting if someone could using WITP victory points come up with what the actual ratios were for various time periods.
May 42, Dec 43, Dec 44, Aug 45

[Mr.Frag]

Mike, I completely disagree with you about Auto-Victory. I look at it as exactly the reverse of what you see it as. It acts as a braking control to prevent people from doing seriously stupid things that just would not have happened.

It terminates a game that has stepped outside the bounds of reality.

As Mogami pointed out, the odds on Japan somehow getting 40,000+ VP to the USA's 10,000 in 1943 is literally impossible. I have seen running the game farther then most folks (because I have a P4 3.2GHz box) about a 2.1:1 in favour of Japan due to troop losses in 43. Thats one hell of a way from 4:1.

[mogami]

Hi, Actually I think a player would need something like 6,000 to 1,500 in 1943. 9000 to 3,000 in 1944. 12,000 to 6,000 in 1945/46.
The starting VP are Japanese 1004 points controlling 146 bases
Allies 1855 controlling 300 bases.
The value of the USA West coast bases is 144 points.
India north of Impal is 160 points (totals are to the allies they are worth much more to Japanese but they will never be Japanese unless the Allied player is a total zero and deserving of losing as soon as possible so the Japanese player can use his time in a new game against a more deserving player.)

The SRA is worth around 1k points to the Japanese less then half that to the Allies.
Score after SRA taken (approx)
Japanese 2k Allies 1.2k Japanese would need to inflict 2.8k in material loss without lossing anything and then maintain this advantage through all of 1942 to win 4.8k to 1.2k in 1943.

Auto victory is much more a means of ending a game that is going to the Allies then it is a hope for Japanese player. Any Allied player that has 4x in 1943 will win the war long before Aug 1945 and there is little (read nothing) the Japanese player will be able to do about it. He has already lost. 3 times in 1944 means the same thing. As Japan I would hope to have close to 1-1 in 1943 (actually I hope to have close to 2-1 at start of 1943 and use this edge in fighting my delaying actions the rest of the way. )

[Joel Billings]

Mogami has done an nice analysis but unfortunately he didn't realize that the VPs for the bases are just placeholder for now and will change before we are done.

[Damien Thorn]

My thanks to those who have taken the time to explain this topic in such a reasonable manner.

I look at the whole victory point thing based on my past experience with PacWar and UV. In PacWar it was 2-1 and quite doable in 1942. If you didn't win in 1942 then you weren't going to win. I think the same is true in WitP; if the Japanese don't win in 1942 they most likely aren't going to win. I don't think 4-1 is possible at the beginning of 1943, but I realize this will probably be changed during beta testing and balancing.

In UV it is very possible for Japan to actually "Win the War", so to speak, by capturing Noumea. I know no such thing will be possible in WitP but many UV players (myself included) have probably been spoiled by "winning the war" as Japan. So, you can see the perspective some of us come to the table with.

I still would like to see a decent chacne for Japan to force a US capitulation in 42 or 43 but I don't know if it will be possible with just victory point ratios. Maybe there should be different victory point rations for each side- with the Japanese required odds getting easier the later the war goes and the Allied ones getting harder. Let me summarize on the chart below:

Year Japanese VP ratio required for victory Allied VP ratio required for victory
1943 3-1 1-2 (have half of Japan's score)
1944 2-1 2-1
1945 1-1 (even is good enough to win) 3-1
1946 1-2 4-1

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

It terminates a game that has stepped outside the bounds of reality.

I don't want my games "terminated." When I play a campaign game, I want to play the campaign. I want my opponent to play the game to the conclusion point or not at all.

As far as the "bounds of reality" are concerned, all you have to do is browse these forums to see how far outside those bounds a lot of people want to be. Further, who is the arbiter of "reality?"

I ask that "automatic victory" be made optional if included at all.

[mdiehl]

A merchant ship loaded with diesel and fertilizer detonated in the locks would appear to have done the job. Based on pre-war exercises the US Navy feared an attack on the canal, albeit of more conventional nature.

It would have been a good thing to do, but the real delay imposed by for example the complete destruction of the lochs at any given point would have been to shut down the canal for three months. It is a fairly trivial task to reroute a section of a major canal for a short interval. It basically just entails moving a lot of dirt. By 1940 the US was much better at moving giant quantities of dirt than when the canal was originally constructed.

Still, a three month delay is more helpful than no delay at all.

[pasternakski]

...theah's somethin' vewwy scwewy goin on awound heah ... hehehehehehehehehe

[mdiehl]

OWWWwww. That wascawwy wabbit!

I agree with your remark about auto victory. It should be an optional rule if it exists at all.

[mogami]

Hi, The Panama canal is not a ditch like the Suez Canal. In Panama most of the distance is the man made lake with the locks only used to raise a ship up to the lake and then down to the ocean. If it were possible and I wanted to close the canal I wouldn't worry about the locks per say. I'd try to let the water in the lake out.

[stljeffbb]

Concerning the Panama Canal.....could not the WitP editor be used to simulate this?

I seem to remember someone asking if the French-Thai war from 1940 could be simulated and the answer to this question was yes IIRC. I'm assuming one can change the arrival date of ships into the Pacific....one could just elongate the time it would take the ships to arrive at San Fran (or wherever the US WitP arrival place is) by weeks or months. I'm also assuming that there will be the ability to have a random event flag (like in say The Operational Art of War), and that "mishaps" could happen to ships coming from the US east coast......delayed by storms, even damaged or sunk by German U-Boats off of eastern South America. This would make things very interesting. I have to admit, I'm not sure where the majority of US shipping was made off hand.....Norfolk? What facilities if any were making, say, Essex class CVs on the west coast? I'll have to check my Jane's manual for that info.

Jeff

(The closet smiley I could find to represent Mogami's "spank" comment from earlier post)