Production: A Simple Approach

[Greg Wilmoth]

At the risk of over-simplifying things, I think the changes in the production aspects of the game ought to be limited to a structured decision process similar to what is used in Pacific War to prompt the player to upgrade aircraft squadrons. For example, when shipyard capacity allows, the Japanese player should be asked, “Do you want to convert the Chitose and Chiyoda to CVLs?”

I think the design and production of weapons would be a fascinating game, but it would be big enough to be a game in its own right if done properly. A few years ago, before they went out of business, Crusader Studios planned a game called Greyhounds of the Sea. The idea was to play out the Anglo-German Naval rivalry before and through WWI. The game started in the 1890s, and players had to design and plan their fleets. They made their decisions on what to buy and build from battleships to submarines. A key factor was they didn’t know when war would break out. Build immediately, and your ships might be obsolete. Wait for better technology, and you might be unprepared. It’s a shame the game was never done.

Using structured decisions, and limiting them to historical options, would keep the production part of the game manageable. The player would work at the margins rather than try and handle the whole task.

For ships and navies, I’ve complied the following list of “key” decisions. I invite comments on these and any others I may have missed.

US Navy:
1. Rebuilding older battleships of the Nevada, Pennsylvania, California and Maryland classes. This could be done from Dec 41 on, and could be done in conjunction with battle damage repairs.
2. Conversion of up to nine Cleveland class light cruisers to Independence carriers. Could be done from March 42 on. Most of the cruiser names were transferred to later ships that were not cancelled, so they would be available.
3. Cancelling one or more Montana class battleships in favor of Midway class carriers. This could be done from Jul 43 on. Player would get either the Midway or Montana in Sep 45. The Ohio (or another one) could come in place of the F.D.R., if the game lasts that long.
4. Rebuilding the CV Ranger to modern standards. This was proposed, but the price was delaying one Essex class CV because of drydock space. The Ranger was not used in the Pacific because its layout made rapid air operations difficult. If rebuilt to reflect later experience, it could have been used in the Pacific, and possibly sooner than an Essex class CV built from keel up.

IJN:
1. Unless the game begins before Dec 41, the conversions resulting in CVLs Shoho, Zuiho, Hiyo, Junyo, and Ryuho need not be included. Nor need the conversions of Kitakami and Oi to torpedo cruisers be included.
2. Chitose and/or Chiyoda from seaplane tenders to CVLs. Permitted from Dec 42 on.
3. Completion of Shinano as battleship or carrier. Permitted from Jul 42 on.
4. Conversion of Ise and Hyuga to hybrid battleship/carriers. Permitted from Mar 43 on.
5. Conversion of CL Isuzu to anti-aircraft cruiser. Permitted beginning 1944. Perhaps other Nagara class CLs could or should be included

For air forces I would keep the same basic production system but add the models that could have been produced in quantity to give players more choices. I also would change rules to reflect the fierce interservice rivalry between the IJN and IJA and the lack of a higher decision making authority. The initial production dates are subject to variation.

Japanese:
1. No Japanese factory producing IJN aircraft may be converted to producing IJA aircraft, and vice versa.
2. No IJN air units may be converted to IJA aircraft and vice versa.
3. Kawasaki Ki-60. IJA heavy fighter. Available at same time as Kawasaki Ki-61 (Tony).
4. Kawasaki Ki-100. IJA high performance fighter. Available beginning Mar 45.
5. Kayaba Ka-1. IJA autogyro. Inexpensive, short range anti-submarine patrol aircraft. Available from Dec 41 on.
6. Kyushu Q1W (Lorna). IJN twin engine anti-submarine patrol aircraft. Available beginning Mar 44.
7. Kyushu J7W. IJN single engine fighter with canard configuration. Available beginning Aug 45.
8. Mitsubishi A7M (Sam). IJN single engine carrier based fighter. Available beginning sometime in 1945, depending on priority, earthquakes, US bombing, etc.
9. Nakajima G8N (Rita). IJN four engined bomber. Available beginning sometime in 1945, depending on US bombing.
10. Aichi H9A. IJN twin engined flying boat. Shorter ranged less expensive alternative to Mavis and Emily. Available beginning Dec 41.
11. Nakajima/Showa Navy Type 0 Transport (Tabby). License built version of Douglas L2D/DC-3. Available beginning Dec 41.

U.S.A.
1. Consolidated PB2Y Coronado. Four engined flying boat. Available beginning Dec 41.
2. Consolidated B-32 Dominator. Four engined heavy bomber. Available beginning Jan 45.
3. Convair (Consolidated) B-36 Peacemaker. Six engined super-heavy bomber. Available beginning Aug 45, depending on priority. Urgency of development declined as US forces advanced and captured new bases and problems with B-29 were solved.
4. Curtiss C-46 Commando. Twin engined transport. Available beginning Dec 41.
5. Douglas C-54 Skymaster. Four engined transport. Available beginning Mar 42.
6. Grumman F8F-1 Bearcat. Single engined carrier based fighter. Available beginning Feb 45.
7. Lockheed P-80A Shooting Star. Single engined jet fighter. Available beginning Feb 45.
8. Martin PBM Mariner. Twin engined flying boat. Available Dec 41.
9. North American P-82 Twin Mustang. Twin engined fighter. Available Aug 45.

For those who are interested in exploring games on production, I recommend:

Malfador Machinations: Space Empires III. While set outer space in the future, this game has an extensive technology tree for R&D and allows players to design their own spaceships. I approached them about doing a carrier design game, but they said they were too busy working on Space Empires IV. That game has been recently released by Shrapnel Games, but I haven’t studied it enough to comment on it. A demo is downloadable at http://malfador.com

Fritz Bronner’s Liftoff! (boardgame by Task Force Games) and its computer derivative Buzz Aldrin’s Race Into Space (BARIS) (by Interplay). These games require players to purchase launcher and payload programs and then spend money on R&D to improve their safety factors. A random factor during launch and spaceflight determines whether they work and consequently mission success. BARIS can be found at http://www.theunderdogs.org

Domark’s Flight Sim Toolkit. This product has a editor for aircraft characteristics inolving tradeoffs. Might provide some leads for allowing players to design their own aircraft, or at least project flight characteristics of proposed aircraft. Look for it at http://www.theunderdogs.org

Again, comments are welcome.

[Greg Wilmoth]

If you really want to dig into the problems of production, read:
Buying Aircraft: Material Procurement for the Army Air Forces, by I. B. Holley (Washington DC: GPO, 1964, 1989).
It's a Special Study in the United States Army in World War II series (the Green Books) by the Center of Military History, US Army. Holley is a respected historian who also wrote Ideas and Weapons. He breaks the aircraft industry down into four parts: airframe maufacturers, engine manufacturers, subcontractors (wartime only), and vendors or suppliers (ready made items). He examines the actual historical problem of expansion of existing plants versus conversion of other industries to aircraft production. The appendicies have full production figures for all USAAF aircraft by types. There is more general information for naval aircraft production. If you want to do a game on production, this is the book to read first.
null

[Talorgan]

Greg:

Why restrict things to the quasi-historical?

Why not allow eg ALL the Cleveland class to be converted? It would surely have been TECHNICALLY possible.

Why not bring in projected, thought-about and even downright hypothetical designs? Let dockyard capacity be the real restrictor.

To know, as you start a game in 1941, that the Japs will complete 2 Yamato's as BBs and one as a carrier by date X in shipyards Y & Z is not realistic. The real commanders had only sketchy ideas of what the other side was up to. Players should be in the same position.

[Greg Wilmoth]

Originally posted by Talorgan:
Greg:

Why restrict things to the quasi-historical?

Well, the idea was to keep it simple. A good game is like a good novel or good history book. The decision to exclude is as important as the decision to include.

Why not allow eg ALL the Cleveland class to be converted? It would surely have been TECHNICALLY possible.

Nearly anything is possible "technically." But are you trying to model a game about military production or military operations? And how realistic do you want to make it?

Why not bring in projected, thought-about and even downright hypothetical designs? Let dockyard capacity be the real restrictor.

I think that would make a neat game, but way beyond the scope of WITP. To realistically model warship production, you'd have to handle (or ignore) a host of variables. Joel Davidson's book "The Unsinkable Fleet: The Politics of US Navy Expansion in WWII" hits on some of these. He says the main limit on US battleship construction was the capacity to make the special armor plate they required. That capacity couldn't be expanded before 1948. They also competed with the US Army for steel, a battle which they generally won in the first years of the war with the argument that tanks and guns were worthless if there wasn't a Navy to see them safely overseas. But the other big problem was manpower. By the end of 1944 the shortage was so acute Navy Headquarters proposed retiring older warships and transferring the men to newer ones. The Pacific Fleet balked at tampering with a winning team. Norman Friedman in "British Carrier Aviation" says the British had an armor plate problem too. They bought armor for an Illustrious class carrier from the Czechs! Do you really want to get down in the weeds on all these decisions? But you do want to be realistic, right?

To know, as you start a game in 1941, that the Japs will complete 2 Yamato's as BBs and one as a carrier by date X in shipyards Y & Z is not realistic. The real commanders had only sketchy ideas of what the other side was up to. Players should be in the same position.

Ah, that's very true. But our players also know how the war was fought and who won, don't they? And they know ahead of time that the Germans won't win in Europe, and the atomic bomb will work. You've hit on the classic problem of historical game designers: is the player limited to the knowledge (and decisions) available to the historical actors at the proper time and place, or is he like a time-traveller going back in time with full knowledge of the future? (Many people consider the latter to be more fun because they can "get it right.")

If you really want the players to have little or no knowledge about what the other one is up to, then you need a 4X game like Space Empires 4, only set on a single planet with mid-20th century techology. Instead of designing space ships, you would design battleships and carriers. It could be done, and I think it would be fun, but it wouldn't be WITP.

[ April 23, 2001: Message edited by: Greg Wilmoth ]

[ April 23, 2001: Message edited by: Greg Wilmoth ]

[Talorgan]

Cheers Greg! You've hit a few nails on the head.

Obviously your first concern has to be to produce the historical game within set parameters. Any plans to allow the engine to be put to more hypothetical use at a later date?

[Greg Wilmoth]

Well, WITP isn’t my game. I’m just making suggestions, the same as you.

I did E-mail the designers of Space Empires 3, Malfador Machinations, and asked them if they would consider doing a game on the naval developments and construction in the interwar era. They replied they were too busy getting Space Empires 4 ready. They were looking for a distributor to help them break out of the direct sale shareware business and into the major leagues of computer games.

If you do want to explore some of the possibilities, I’d recommend reading a couple of books by Norman Friedman: Battleship Design and Development 1905-1945, and Carrier Air Power. Chapter 1 of Carrier Air Power is entitled “Elements of Compromise,” and it gives you an idea of how different design features trade off in terms of tonnage. Chapter 2 of Battleship Design, entitled “The Squeeze” is even more explicit. Friedman talks about “the 60% rule,” a rule of thumb battleship designers used. It held that the guns, armor, and propulsion systems together added up to 60% of the displacement. Any increase in one of the three was at the expense of the other two.

These books could be the starting point for formulas to allow players to design their own warships. Again, I think that would complicate WITP beyond playability, but it could be part of a neat game focused on naval construction.

A couple of years ago I took a course at Johns Hopkins University called Understanding Military Technology. We had a class exercise where we sat as the U.S. Navy’s General Board in 1931 to decide how to spend the remaining U.S. tonnage for aircraft carriers under the Naval Treaties. We had to decide, based on the original testimony, how many carriers with what characteristics to build. I wrote the experience up in an article that appeared in Strategy & Tactics magazine earlier this year, #204. Anyone can get the exercise from Johns Hopkins for $4.00, including postage. If you’re interested, check out the website of their Center for Strategic Education:
http://www.sais-jhu.edu/cse/products/index.html

[Sabre21]

It's fine and good if your purpose is to re-create WWII as it occured. Like you mentioned, we all know who won and why. People must remember that this is a game. Some like to re-create what actually happened, fine...but I already know the outcome..it's kinda like reading the last chapter of a new book first...it's spoils the story. From the Japanese perspective, the only way to possibly win is to be able to alter production types..like producing more carriers than BB's, increase production by re-allocating resources, increase the number of available pilots, change submarine tactics, increase ant-sub assets, improve radar earlier, improve electronic warfare capability...the list goes on....but most of these have nothing to do with taking territory or combat..it's about those production decisions at the gov't level. If all the game incorporates is a historical outlook upon the war, the Japanese can not win. Even if they sunk every BB at Pearl, even if Midway did not occur, the war may have lasted a little longer, but the end result would have been the same. Remembering that this is a game, there must be Victory Conditions so that either side has a chance to win, but if it's based historically, the resolve of the US was nothing short of complete capitulation of the Japanese. I have already seen the last chapter of that book, I know the end result. By looking at what if's must include the ability to change production...ships, planes...all of it.

Sabre21

[Major Tom]

Having the player control 100% of production will result in almost exactly the same problem. Instead of having a balanced fleet, the IJN and Allied player will just pump out as many CV, CVL and CVE's that they can, knowing what we currently know.

The question of what this game is, is it going to be a historical wargame, or, an empire builder. Historical wargames do not go into the R&D that an Empire Builder does. You fight generally with historical units and equipment offered. There should be choices, but, not absolute control.

[Greg Wilmoth]

Originally posted by Sabre21:
It's fine and good if your purpose is to re-create WWII as it occured. Like you mentioned, we all know who won and why. People must remember that this is a game. Some like to re-create what actually happened, fine...but I already know the outcome..it's kinda like reading the last chapter of a new book first...it's spoils the story.

I’m sympathetic. I remember the SPI boardgames in the 1970s that were so historically deterministic that you had to fight the battles the same way, never mind having a different outcome.

From the Japanese perspective, the only way to possibly win is to be able to alter production types..like producing more carriers than BB's, increase production by re-allocating resources, increase the number of available pilots, change submarine tactics, increase ant-sub assets, improve radar earlier, improve electronic warfare capability...the list goes on....but most of these have nothing to do with taking territory or combat..it's about those production decisions at the gov't level. If all the game incorporates is a historical outlook upon the war, the Japanese can not win.

That depends on what you mean by “winning.” Even if you change all that, the Japanese still cannot win, if by winning you mean dictating terms in the White House, to use Adm. Yamamoto’s phrase. But the Japanese can still win on points, as they can in Pacific War, or the boardgame Victory in the Pacific.

At a more basic level, I don’t think historical realism automatically means historical determinism. You described a historically realistic strategy for the Japanese to use their resources to improve their military performance. I’m fascinated by military innovation, and I think it would be a neat game. But I think a fun game also has to be playable, and that’s why I proposed a simpler approach. I realize WITP is going to be a monster game, but even when computerized, a monster game can easily get too complicated to be playable.

Even if they sunk every BB at Pearl, even if Midway did not occur, the war may have lasted a little longer, but the end result would have been the same. Remembering that this is a game, there must be Victory Conditions so that either side has a chance to win, but if it's based historically, the resolve of the US was nothing short of complete capitulation of the Japanese. I have already seen the last chapter of that book, I know the end result. By looking at what if's must include the ability to change production...ships, planes...all of it.

I don’t know how changing Japanese production is going to change US resolve.

Here’s a “what if” for you that I think is as realistic as the production alternatives you propose. Suppose in December 1941, instead of attacking Pearl Harbor and launching a general offensive throughout Southeast Asia, the Japanese merely occupied Dutch Borneo to obtain the oil the US, Britain and Holland had embargoed. Without a direct attack on US forces, would the US have gone to war to defend Holland’s colonial empire? After all, only a year before Roosevelt had counseled the French to give in to the Japanese occupation of northern Indochina. And even if the US went to war, would it have been a limited war for limited aims? Would that mean a different level of US resolve? Think about how you’d put that into the game.

[Talorgan]

The other way to give the Japanese a chance would be to expand the scope of the game to include the other Axis powers. Victory over Japan and Italy might always have been a foregone conclusion but the if they had fought long and hard enough they might have bought enough time for Germany to develope nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them!

I am sure that in the fullness of time, computer games involving the grand strategy of all of WW II will happen. Who knows, War in the Pacific might be the first module of such a game.

Alternatively, what about "variants"? Remember those chance events in board games?

These might relate to events in Europe and require the Allied player to redeploy forces away from the Pacific.

[Dunedain]

Interesting discussion. I understand the desire to see if one can
make things turn out differently, make the war less predictable and so on.
This is one of the reasons I am so in favor of having a historical
alternative campaign option in WitP.

This would involve the Washington Naval Treaty having never been
signed. Battleship production would have gone ahead full steam.
This would be tremendous fun. Huge fleets of cruisers and battleships ruling
the seas and dominating the war effort. With the option to begin carrier
production later in the war. But the first few years would be dominated
by capital ship surface actions. One of the posters on this forum
first suggested this and I think it's a great idea. And it would be easy
to implement, just remove the carriers and bump up the number and type
of cruiser and battleship classes for the starting war condition.
And all of a sudden you have a whole new twist to the pacific war.
One with lots of fresh possibilities and strategies.


Greg: Please give us some examples of the sort of heavy ships (and numbers
of ships) that the U.S. and Japan had planned to construct and would have
had they not had any artificial restraints on them. If you have that sort
of info. available, I imagine we could see a rather fascinating list.

[TIMJOT]

Here’s a “what if” for you that I think is as realistic as the production alternatives you propose. Suppose in December 1941, instead of attacking Pearl Harbor and launching a general offensive throughout Southeast Asia, the Japanese merely occupied Dutch Borneo to obtain the oil the US, Britain and Holland had embargoed. Without a direct attack on US forces, would the US have gone to war to defend Holland’s colonial empire? After all, only a year before Roosevelt had counseled the French to give in to the Japanese occupation of northern Indochina. And even if the US went to war, would it have been a limited war for limited aims? Would that mean a different level of US resolve? Think about how you’d put that into the game.

FYI; There is an active discussion on this very same " WHAT IF ", over at the ART OF WAR GAMEING FORUM, under the thread
WI NO PEARL HARBOR

[Major Tom]

Without a Washington treaty battleships would be larger, around 40-50 000t, and carriers would be smaller. Without the modification of battlecruisers into Carriers the major navies of the world would have built much smaller carriers. Both Japan, US and England planned smaller carriers until the Washington treaty killed their battleship programme (Hermes, Eagle, original Shokaku). With all of those large hulls sitting around they decided to make use of them.

Without the treaty the IJN would be larger, but they would not have super weapons. With no restrictions on numbers they would not have to focus on quality. Large Destroyers, and super Cruisers would be replaced by larger numbers of smaller vessels.

The IJN planned the following...

4 Amagi BC's (Akagi)
2 Kaga BB's
2 Kii BB's

Plus numerous other vessels.

The US...

1 more Colorado
4 South Dakota (enlarged Colorado's)
4-6 Lexingtons

Gun calibur's for Battleships would be around 18", and Battlecruisers 16". Armour would be thicker, and speed would be less. Aircraft would still be powerful, but carriers would be less potent due to their smaller size.

There would be more battleship admirals and fewer aircraft admirals in the respective fleets.

[Greg Wilmoth]

Originally posted by Dunedain:
Greg: Please give us some examples of the sort of heavy ships (and numbers
of ships) that the U.S. and Japan had planned to construct and would have
had they not had any artificial restraints on them. If you have that sort
of info. available, I imagine we could see a rather fascinating list.

Major Tom has done a good job of that. The British were also working up some new ships. The 1921 battlecruiser design with 16 inch guns would have been a class of four ships with the "I" names of older battlecruisers (Invincible, Indomitable, etc). They could have been followed by the "Saint Andrew" class battleships (four) with 18 inch guns.

If you're interested in battleships slugging it out, I suggest you download Action Stations from The Underdogs. http://www.theunderdogs.org/
The graphics are crude, but it's the most detailed WWII surface warfare simulation I've ever seen. The designer, Alan Zimm, is a retired US Navy commander who now works for the Advanced Physics Lab at Johns Hopkins. He used info from the US Naval War College games of the 1920s and 30s in it.

As for me, I'll take my my alternate history scenarios with less predictable technology. I'll go for the ZVCV, a 10 million cubic foot airship the US Navy's Bureau of Aeronautics designed in the 1930s that would carry nine dive bombers. Roosevelt killed it along with the rest of the Navy's rigid airship program.

[Dunedain]

Hey Greg, thanks for responding. Sounds like some really cool ships
we could have in a no-Washington-Treaty option. I have had Action Stations
for a long time, was one of the first wargames I bought for the PC.
It is the best capital ship combat sim there is.

But I'd like to see what would happen with these sort of ships dominating
the combat in the pacific for the first few years. Unfortunately,
Action Stations only covers tactical combat. I want to be able to move
many fleets of these ships around and fight a war with them. WitP
is ideally suited to this and it would be easy to implement and would
provide an interesting option for us big gun fans, as well as those who
like alternate history scenarios.

And it would be easier to do than adding giant zeppelins to WitP.

And a big thanks to Major Tom for that great list of ships. I certainly
hope we will get to add those ships to our fleets with this cool campaign
option.

[ May 14, 2001: Message edited by: Dunedain ]

[RevRick]

Hi, guys!

Greg has touched on one of my favorite games in "Action Stations?" Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a dinged up Washington closing on a smoke screen (from a burning ship) and find the Yamato coming out it blind as a bullbat but full of fight? That happened in one of Zimm's scenarios - and it wasn't pretty for either side.

IIRC, he had a Non Washington Treaty game in which the U.S. had built another class of ships which was evidently under consideration as an expansion on the South Dakota's - but this time with 15 18" guns. Now talk about your basic headache. I've never seen any information on this theoretical monster, but with the propensity for ships to grow, someone might have as easily proposed that as the German bureau proposed the H-20.

With regard to building. Why not follow the games namesake - have a certain number of points each month to build whatever you wanted, within reason. Knowing that the IJN subs are going to be acting differently under AI control - DE's will become a necessity. Merchant shipping is always needed. CV's can only be built at a certain rate and a certain number per cycle started, and you sure better keep the number of CA's, CL's, and DD's up to escort the birdfarms. And that is just the naval construction side. How about the number of divisions, regiments, battalions, CB's, Engineers/Baseforces/Support bases which need to be built up for the trek across the Pacific?

[Greg Wilmoth]

Originally posted by RevRick:
Hi, guys!
With regard to building. Why not follow the games namesake - have a certain number of points each month to build whatever you wanted, within reason. Knowing that the IJN subs are going to be acting differently under AI control - DE's will become a necessity. Merchant shipping is always needed. CV's can only be built at a certain rate and a certain number per cycle started, and you sure better keep the number of CA's, CL's, and DD's up to escort the birdfarms. And that is just the naval construction side. How about the number of divisions, regiments, battalions, CB's, Engineers/Baseforces/Support bases which need to be built up for the trek across the Pacific?

Your idea has the virtue of simplicity: build whatever you want--within reason. Ah, but the devil is in the details, eh Reverend? Just what would be reasonable? I remember an article by Alan Zimm in a long defunct wargame magazine where he explained why he never put a warship design module in Action Stations. He knew somebody would be foolish enough to try to put a 14 inch gun on a destroyer.

When you say "namesake," I gather you are talking about the old SPI monster game. Can you tell me more about how it handled production?


[ May 17, 2001: Message edited by: Greg Wilmoth ]

[norsemanjs]

It's been a very long time since I've posted anything but this sparked some renewed interest and brought back some fond memories.

SPI's War in the Pacific was certainly one of the first really big pacific wargames. If my memory serves me correctly. The production was broken down into nearly monthly cycles, 13/yr I believe. THey allowed you to build indivdual capitol ships, cv, bb, ca, cl, claa and groups of dd's de's merchant ships and such. The length of time to get capitol ships was very great of course.

The air groups were ordered in blocks of air types, carrier blocks for example had a mixture of carrier style fighters, dive bombers and torpedoe bombers. The exact breakdown depended on the year the units came into service. carrier blocks also took longer to reach completion due to longer training time.

I don't recall exactly what the land units were like but I seem to recall that you had to ramp production of land units up. You couldn't just build 5 divisions of infantry one month. You had to gradually increase your production. (I may be remembering production from War in the East/West here).

I was trying to track down my old rule book from WITP but couldn't find it (yet). If I run across it I'll let you know.

I wouldn't mind seeing a bit more detailed version of the old computer game High Commands production. It was nice and simple with some good strategic nuances. By the way I don't mean copy their system but it can give you some ideas.

I still really like the way old WITP handled airstrikes on task forces. Rings of ships with aircraft coming in on vectors to hit the TF's center. This also allowed you to model how the japanese later in the war would try to take out the pickets in order to get into the TF centers.

Norseman

[RevRick]

Norseman has the idea down.

A set number of points for production of all types on a regular basis - SPI used four week turns in a cycle with a production segment in each cycle. There was a set number of points, which increased gradually from 12/41 on, and even began to decrease after mid 44. From those points the gamer selected what to build. Each ship costs a number of points and took a certain number of cycles to build. I think a CV took 26 cycles, a DD took nine cycles, subs (IIRC) took 3. The airpoints were handled a little roughly, but that could also be smoothed out, and land units were built. Every construction was built from the earliest numbered unit in each type. But, it took design out of the picture. All you had was the next available DD, etc. I will try to find my copy of the Game - I still have it and take it out to look at it once in a while - takes up a lot of room, much more than a parsonage has room for - but has a lot of information on various unit strengths etc, inculding the fact that most US and Commonwealth division were much "heavier" than the Japanese army division were - both in impact on the field and in transportation costs...
Hopefully, I'll have time to look for it tomorrow in our study, but I wouldn't count on it - have to work on sermons.

God Bless;
Rev. Rick

[Greg Wilmoth]

War in the Pacific sounds like it has lots to offer in the way of a relatively simple production process. It appears to challenge the player to plan carefully and “guess right” as to balancing forces for future needs.

Did you know that Alan Zimm (designer of Action Stations) was planning a carrier game at one time? It was to be called Fleet Commander, and Zimm discussed it in an article in long-gone Wargamers Monthly back in 1995. (Wargamers Monthly: The Forum of Computer Wargaming, 12 Metric Road, Iowa City, IA 52240; Alan Zimm, “Getting Carried Away, PC Flattops and Fleet Commander,” Volume 4, Number 4, April 1995, page 3.)

According to the article, Fleet Commander was to be a follow-on to Action Stations but covering WWII carrier combat. His purpose was to create a simulation so accurate players could learn valuable lessons from it. He considered the current carrier wargames to be full of “egregious errors.” As an example, he went into a detailed discussion of the problems of conducting an aerial search at different altitudes and the impact Japanese doctrine on reporting and forwarding sighting reports had on the Battle of Midway. (Secrecy and surprise valued over timeliness and accuracy.) He also discussed numerous other aspects of WWII carrier operations in the Pacific which he said had not been considered in games up until then. Suffice it to say, the same level of detail and complexity that went into Action Stations was planned for Fleet Commander.

Technological surprise was to be an important feature of Fleet Commander. He noted the “perfect intelligence” players usually have in a game does not correspond to reality. To quote from the article:

“As a game option, Fleet Commander will allow players to “invest in technologies – aircraft engines, airframes, gunner, torpedoes and lots more. Depending upon the investment, your Bureau of Aeronautics might provide you with a Zero in 1938 instead of 1941, or a Zero with different performance specifications, or maybe an Me-109 or an Oscar. You might also invest in intelligence systems for battlefield use and intelligence workers to give you advance notice of the performance of enemy systems! The point is that players will have the option not to know the exact performance of the enemy systems, which preserves the possibility of technological surprise.”

Unfortunately, the game never surfaced. In an earlier Letter to the Editor (Wargamers Monthly, Volume 3, Number 11, November 1994), Zimm expounded at length on the obstacles and frustrations of trying to develop and market a computer wargame. This, of course, was based on his experience with Action Stations. I had some contact with him a couple of years ago by E-mail. He was finishing up his PhD and short of time, but he did say he would like to finish Fleet Commander some day. Maybe we’ll see it yet.