Vehicles and armament production

[le Jason]

I still can´t figure aut, what direct effect the increasing production for vehicles and armament has.
Does that mean, that I my ground units get more guns and vehicles? Or does it mean that I get new tank units (which I do not belive, as the arriving schedule is fixed)?

[MadmanRick]

Jason,
I *think* (although I am by no means positive) that increasing your vehicle and armament production, will simply allow you to replace your losses quicker. It may also allow your combat units to become combat ready quicker, as these items are needed to "fill out" newly arrived LCU's. I do not believe that increasing the production of vehicles and armaments will allow you to get "new" tank units. as according to the manual "except for most HQ units and some Chinese units ground units are not replaced when destroyed". So therefore you are limited to the units which are in the database.

Rick

[Xargun]

ORIGINAL: le Jason

I still can´t figure aut, what direct effect the increasing production for vehicles and armament has.
Does that mean, that I my ground units get more guns and vehicles? Or does it mean that I get new tank units (which I do not belive, as the arriving schedule is fixed)?

There are no new units in the game. Every unit is scheduled to arrive at a certain point and this cannot be changed. What happens is the following...

A new unit is scheduled to arrive today.. The computer checks you stocks on hand (squads, guns, tanks, etc...). If you have enough the unit comes into the game at 100% strength and the items are subtracted from your pools... If you do not have enough of any one item the unit comes into the game at 1/3 strength and no items are subtracted from the pool. Thus if you want your new units to be ready to deploy right away you need to have a lot of extras in your pool..

Also, the computer spends your vehicle and armamnet points each turn to construct items that your units (being built and on map) need. It then puts them into the pool to be used by the units. This is the only way to reinforce a unit that has taken heavy losses in combat. Without a good supply of replacements your land units will become depleted and worthless.

Remember... Units need a lot of supply to recieve replacements and HQs will speed up the rate they recieve them as well. Also remember items in the pool cannot be bombed or destroyed (as far as I know) by any type of enemy attack - so if you have tons of items in your pools and the allies are bombing you they can only stop you from making more - not destroy what you already have. If you store enough in the pools it might allow you to fight longer than normal..

Also, it seems that in order for the computer to make an item (IJA Squad, NLF Squad, etc....) either a new unit must be close to completion that needs it, or a unit on the map must be missing some and have replacements on.. Otherwise it will not make any of that item.

Xargun

[olivier_slith]

How much time does it take for a unit to arrive at full stregth once it starts arriving?

[Xargun]

ORIGINAL: dhennin

How much time does it take for a unit to arrive at full stregth once it starts arriving?

Not sure what you mean.. If a unit is to arrive on Dec 18, 41 it will arrive on that date in the base specified... It will either arrive at full strength or at 1/3.. Once the date is set in the game it will arrive on the day specified.

Xargun

[AmiralLaurent]

It is my impression and experience that the Japanese industry is unable to provide even the new units in 1941 with arms and they arrive with not 1/3 of the strenght but rather 1/8 of it...

Example: 125th IJA Base Force, arrives in Tokyo on Dec 17th or 18th

It has only 1 75mm gun (out of 4), 1 40mm AA (of 4), 1 13mm AA (of 4), 7 avaition support squad (out of 30), 12 support squad (out of 100), 2 engineers (out of ten), the sound detector (out of 1) and zero IJA infantry squads (out of 40)

I have stopped all replacements for ground units before the start of the game and have only opened them for units of the Southern Area engaged in battles, but the armaments stock is depleted in less than two weeks... even by trying to expanding it at once.

Another example: the 21st Special Base Force, arrives in Palau on Dec 15-16th (8 days delay at start)

Here, 25% of troops are available.

Has anybody else noticed that ?

[esteban]

Yes, probably one of the first things you need to do as the Japanese is to radically expand your armaments industry. I mean by 300-400%, up from 501 points at the start to close to 1500-2000 points. Maybe even higher. There are several small armament factories in Japan, around Kyoto and Tokyo, that are good to expand. There are also a two 75 point factories in Seoul and Mukden that you can expand, if you want to move production to places where it is easier to get resources to.

Also, you need to expand your vehicle production. If you look at your armored units, you will notice that many of them start at 50%-60% strength. Some of the divisions have armored and mech units too, but I do not know if these elements are understrength or not. I haven't figured out how much you need to expand your vehicle industry by, but I would say that at least a 50% expansion is required. Vehicle production is pretty much all on Honshu, as I recall, around Tokyo and Kyoto.

[Sinjen]

My vehicle pool is doing far better than armaments. I have like 5 or 6 base forces waiting to be brought up to strength. I use all my armament points each turn. so far I have increased my armaments to almost 700. I can see I will need to continue expanding both for the foreseeable future.

[Culiacan Mexico]

ORIGINAL: esteban
Yes, probably one of the first things you need to do as the Japanese is to radically expand your armaments industry. I mean by 300-400%, up from 501 points at the start to close to 1500-2000 points. Maybe even higher...

[X(] Doesn’t each point of Armament Industry require 6 Heavy Industry points to produce one armament point? Can such and expansion be supported?

501 Armament points costs 3006 HI
2000 Armament point costs 12,000 HI

[mogami]

Your learning Bucko. The Japanese are not an industrial Giant that can equip units over night. Some of the units require time to fill out. You may need to use units that are not at 100 percent TOE. You can't suffer needless loss and then make it all better so the unit can do it again the next day.

[esteban]

ORIGINAL: Culiacan Mexico

ORIGINAL: esteban
Yes, probably one of the first things you need to do as the Japanese is to radically expand your armaments industry. I mean by 300-400%, up from 501 points at the start to close to 1500-2000 points. Maybe even higher...

[X(] Doesn’t each point of Armament Industry require 6 Heavy Industry points to produce one armament point? Can such and expansion be supported?

501 Armament points costs 3006 HI
2000 Armament point costs 12,000 HI

Japan starts with a surplus of about 2500 heavy industry per day at the start of the game. Generally, between what you can capture in Rangoon, Singapore, Hong Kong, Changsha, and maybe Yunan, you can get a few hundred more. So that pretty much takes care of the initial expansion. Your air production doesn't so much increase as change, as you move production from some of your transports, and planes like Nates, to models that you need more of, like Kates, Zeroes, some more R&D for certain models, and maybe another Nell/Betty factory. Also, you run out of pilots before planes. You can use an expansion of the Japanese naval shipyards early on as well, but only about 80 points or so, as far as I can tell from my not-to-exacting observation of the yard build list. That only uses about 240 HI points per day.

So there is a fair amount of room for expansion of the existing industry before you hit your first wall, lack of more HI. After the first wall, comes the second wall, of capturing enough resources and oil before your stockpile draws down. After that, comes the third wall, which is being able to produce and ship enough resources to expand your HI further. Then the fourth wall, being able to preserve your resource/industrial base from Allied attack as best as possible.

However, the armaments industry is the single biggest shortfall in the Japanese production system. Japan produces about 6 manpower points for every armament point she starts with. Some of that manpower will be needed for industrial expansion and vehicle production, but I would guess at least 2/3 of it can be used for armaments. Thats where I get the 400% expansion from. I have done a 200%+ expansion so far in the games I have played versus the AI, but I have not played any of those games past mid-1942.

Unfortunately, the disparity between manpower and vehicles and armaments is such that pretty much any manpower points that go into your manpower pool, and are not nearly immediately kitted out with a vehicle or armaments, are just going to sit there for the rest of the war. It would be nice if you could turn off some of the manpower centers, but you can't.

I have done a couple of the 44/45 scenarios as Japan for 6-8 months too, but in those cases, the at-start situation is not conducive to a lot of industrial expansion. By then, most of the fatal mistakes have been made, and it is just a question of being able to hold an island or two or preserve a city or two that couldn't be saved historically.

[FirstPappy]

What does the computer do when it plays for the Jap side? If it doesn't do any of those things you suggested then it would be at a significant disadvantage. It would seem to me that if I wanted to play against the AI as the Allies, my best chance for a reasonable game against the AI would be Scenarios 13 and 14 (May42 & Aug42).

[esteban]

I don't know what the AI does. I am not one of those people who when they play the AI, they swap sides every now and then, just to look at when the AI is up to, and then immediately swap back so they can go pummel the AI even more.

I will say that I think that the AI does a better job of playing the Allies than the Japanese, but even so, but mostly because it is easier to break the Japanese AI (not get the Japanese AI to respond to an invasion of Wake or the Marshalls) than to break the Allied AI.

[AmiralLaurent]

ORIGINAL: Mogami

Your learning Bucko. The Japanese are not an industrial Giant that can equip units over night. Some of the units require time to fill out. You may need to use units that are not at 100 percent TOE. You can't suffer needless loss and then make it all better so the unit can do it again the next day.

It' not that some of the units require time to fill out. It is that all unist arriving after some days in the war will require to fill out and they will not be able to do so because new units arrive and you have to double your HI production to only create armements points for them, not even speaking of losses you may suffer elsewhere. And you can't double your HI production because there are not enough oil available on the map....

Japan wasn't an industrial giant but in the game, plane production is OK, ship production is a little too small to deliver all ships planned but armament production are unable to cope with the simpliest demands... For me there is here a simulation problem...

Also you produce far too much useless manpower, more than 2000 manpower more than your armament production. One point is used for every factory expansion, so you can expand 2000 factories each day... seriously, the whole expansion of the Japanese industry during the war will only cost you 2 or 3 days of manpower, all the rest will just use ressources to go in a pool. Why ?

If an armament factories produce 4, 5 or 6 armaments points per factories points (as manpower center do), things will be OK and Japan will be able to support part of its army (in Dec 1941, new units need 60000 points, and upgrades of otheru nit will cost 10000-15000 points). And manpower production will be useful.

Right now is like producing 3000 planes airframes each day and only 600 engines....

What I see in my IJN games is that Japanese units will see most of their losses not replaced and will see no new unit replace them. At a scale that is totally unhistorical in 1942.

[Spooky]

Do we have some kind of historical data for the Japanese armament & vehicle production in 1942 ?

It should help us to understand if it is a mistake in the computation process (1 armament factory should produce 4, 5 or 6 armament point instead of 1) or if the Japanese industry was really that weak at the beginning at the war ...

[Tanaka]

ORIGINAL: Pappy

What does the computer do when it plays for the Jap side? If it doesn't do any of those things you suggested then it would be at a significant disadvantage. It would seem to me that if I wanted to play against the AI as the Allies, my best chance for a reasonable game against the AI would be Scenarios 13 and 14 (May42 & Aug42).

i asked this before and they said the AI doesnt do anything. so yes add this to the AI gets screwed list.

[Xargun]

My question concerning armaments is this: After you upgrade older weapons for newer designs (japanese replace 37mm AT Guns with 47mm AT Guns... But now I have several thousand 37mm AT Guns sitting in my pool doing nothing.. Are these recycled like aircraft are ? If not, they should either be recycled, or allowed to be used to outfit units with the lesser weapons - better a 37mm AT Gun than no AT Gun..

ANd I agree with the Manpower deal. Its early Feb 42 in my game and I just topped 180,000 manpower in my pool. My armament pool is just over 10,000 something is off a bit here.. The only units I have that are filling out nice (anywhere on the map) are my Tank Regiments and my Base Forces.. Everyone else seems to not be recieving replacements no matter where they are.

Xargun

[mogami]

Hi, I am in late Feb 42 my manpower is 51764 (I used 807 last turn)
my armament production is 4810 (I used 674 last turn)

I built 765 airframes and 1647 engines.
184 Vehicles.

My manpower totals for war to date are 51764 in pool and 365716 used total
Arms 4810 in pool 64070 used total
Vehicles 408 in pool 13014 used total

As far as I can tell my units are growing. The base forces and SNLF arrived in great number and required a few weeks to gain TOE to where they could be used. (Units do not grow unless there is that 20k supply in the hex. Your pools might be overflowing but the units don't grow.
Japanese ground units arrive as newly raised. They are not full strength. It takes a monster economy to produce combat/support units in just 24 hours. Most units require months not days or weeks but Japan in thsi game has yet to alter any of my prewar operations for want of units. Many baseforce have been sent to newly captured bases. (when a unit arrives in Tokyo at 12 or 22 percent TOE I still assign it an objective. As it fills out it also gains readiness that it will put to use training and adding to the defense value once I move it to it's base. In the same convoy I send enough supply to insure the base has over 20k (so the unit can finish growing)

Empire wide I have 2,154,759 supply points and 3,554,182 fuel points. (I believe this exceeds my prewar starting totals)

The date is 2/26/42 can we get some players near this date to post the status of their game so we can try to understand where the differance are coming from?

I've built all the SNLF that start in China to 100 percent plus many of the Brigades there. My Tank Regts are all near 100 percent (The ones that begin in Taan) All the SNLF that have arrived are full and most of the baseforces. (I have 6 or 7 still growing)

[esteban]

ORIGINAL: Mogami

Hi, I am in late Feb 42 my manpower is 51764 (I used 807 last turn)
my armament production is 4810 (I used 674 last turn)

I built 765 airframes and 1647 engines.
184 Vehicles.

My manpower totals for war to date are 51764 in pool and 365716 used total
Arms 4810 in pool 64070 used total
Vehicles 408 in pool 13014 used total

Mogami:

How many armament/tank factories do you have?

[mogami]

186 Vehicle 682 Arms