I would hope that when I do point something out this will not offend anyone. My only purpose of playing this PBEM is to test the CHS mod in an effort to try to make it a better scenario. I have no stake in this project other than that, no ax to grind, etc. Okay? [:)]
To start off, my ART folder is loaded with the beautiful work done by Ian (The Elf) on the planes. Just love to get my hands on good graphics, and these certainly are that. He's put a lot of work into this project and I for one appreciate it immensely. Good show!
(Why doesn't this board have a simple smiley that's clapping its hands? We could use one of those.)
Here's my short list thus far after making the Japanese first-turn move.
AD-3161 starts the game in the port of Ominato with no fuel. (Actually it has a few points of fuel, but is deeply in the red.) I presume that's a typo. Most, if not all, of the AGs on the board start with no fuel as well. That might be intended or not. Better, I think, to just suppose all ships start the war with full fuel loads, no?
The port of Akita starts the game with no oil, no resources, zero supply and not a drop of fuel. I presume this is another oversight to one degree or another and should be tended to.
As far as I could tell all float planes for the Japanese, both on ships and those in ports, start the game with their morale in the 60s and a little bit of fatigue. I can deal with the fatigue when its at a level of 14 or such, but I have to believe the morale levels are simply those ported directly over from the more or less thoughtless stock scenarios provided by Matrix. Would someone please correct this, both for the Japanese and Allied sides? If you want to simulate pre-war "doldrums" for the Allies then maybe it would be okay to rate them a little lower in morale, but I have to believe most, if not all, of the Japanese units sitting in the home islands, and sprinkled here and there at different bases waiting for the actual 7/8 December invasions to begin, have rather high morale, not morale in the 60s.
Same same with Japanese planes off carriers, both the fast carriers and the lights. Why should we model Japanese Claude carrier pilots as having morale in the 70s at the start of the war? These people were fanatics and whatever MORALE is supposed to model within the game, it ought to be set up into the (high) 90s for the Japanese naval aviation units to begin the game.
Re disposition of Japanese assets to begin the scenario: I'm no expert in this area, but I do have some questions.
The APs in Sendai would, for example, be better off placed in Ominato. They have no use at Sendai. Why would the Japanese so dispose of their naval assets? It might well be that this represents historical placement of these ships, but if so where is this information available? Again, I haven't studied it, I'm just curious as to why I find various stuff spread over the map as I do. My poin tis if I were the Japanese back in 1941 and I was planning a major war initiative I would have my stuff where it actually needed to be on the penultimate day. At the very least. Afterall, they had all sorts of time to plan this out carefully, down to the smallest detail. Some mistakes must have been made, perhaps many mistakes, but I don't know.
There's an incredible amount of of AK shipping in Palau to start the game. What does that represent? Did a convoy just recently drop off supplies at that port? If so, why isn't the port so stocked with supply points? The number of AKs present there does not correspond to the amount of supplies in Palau, which I believe is just 20-some thousand, but correct me if I'm wrong, as I'm doing this on the wing from memory.
Also, the NLFs posted at Palau (and other places) are not completely ready to go, but have troop points in brackets. What does that represent? Do we know that these units had only a certain degree of readiness? Or are we guessing? What's going on. Just curious again.
Re the map:
I note that Noumea starts off as a 6(6) port and 3(2) airfield base. I thought this issue had been ironed out and it was agreed that Noumea ought to be downgraded with respect to its port size. I know I read that somewhere, and I think I read it directly from Andrew on one of his map threads. In any event, starting Noumea out as a 6-level port is just plain in error, and I'd strongly argue it never had the capacity, even after the Army went in there and sorted things out, to become a 9-level port. [8D]
Whether or not one would want to rate that base as having a 6 potential for its airfield build is another matter. I think there was plenty of space in the area and surrounding islands for airfields, and for all I know the Allies might have "actually" (in game terms) built it up to around an 8 or 9, but I'm just guessing there. Has anyone done the research on Noumea airfield-wise to do a reasonable comparative analysis of this question?
Ratings of units:
I've caught one error for sure. The British (French, originally) Martlets are rated as having 4x .50s. This is a mistake. They were rigged with 6x. This was a hot issue in the USN when the first F4F-4s were delivered. I won't go into all the details here, but I will offer my thoughts and research I've done on the matter if anyone requests. Meanwhile, this an OOB mistake.
Isn't this OOB done by Lemur? Didn't I read that somewhere? I know this issue is the same in Lermur's scenario 15 mod, with minor changes as to the naming of the British versions of the Wildcats from his scenario 15 to the CHS OOB. Was all of this merely copied dutifully over from the stcok database?
In an nutshell, the British Wildcat F4F-4B, or Martlet IV, came with 6x .50 Cals. Eventually the General Motors Wildcat versions (FM-1s and -2s) were built with just 4x, but as far as I know the British maintained their 6x scheme as long as it was available. That gun configuration was a British special request of Grumman to begin with, with the Bureau of Aeronautics accepting it as a compromise when Grumman informed them that this would make it easier to mass produce the Wildcat--just one model to worry about, you see. As it turned out, no one bothered to inform the USN as this discussion unfolded!
For reasons of both reduced weight to the plane and increased duration of burst (the 4x configuration allowed the packaging of more ammunition per gun) the Navy pilots much preferred the original F4F-3 scheme of things, and as I note above when GM got into the act this is the configuration they went back to.
Note: The 4x configuration allowed 450 rounds per gun, which equated into 34 seconds of fire. The 6x configuration came with only 240 rounds per gun, and this allowed just 18 seconds of fire. It was felt by USN carrier pilots that the original scheme of 4x .50s was much superior. That put out plenty of lead weight to splash Zeros, their main opponent at the time, and of course gave them almost twice the duration of burst. It was a simple call. Why the British went for the 6x configuration is anyone's guess, but that was their problem and their doctrine at work. It might have been felt that the relatively better-built Axis planes in Europe (as compared to Japanese planes at that time) required the "heavier" firepower of the 6x .50s all firing at once, but I tend to doubt if this represented wisdom. In any event, the new 6x .50s configuration posed a serious problem for the American carrier pilots in the Pacific. That they managed to find a way to work around it says a mouthful about their training and ability to adapt.
There's other stuff to consider with these Britsh/American models of the Wildcat. Different engines were used.
For instance, the Pratt & Whitney Twin Wasp (1830-76) 14-cylinder was used in the Martlett II versus the Wright Cyclone R-1820-40B nine-cyclinder radial with single-stage supercharger in the Martlet IV, which gave the same horsepower (1200) but with less weight. Meanwhile, the American F4F-4 (same as the F4F-3) used the Pratt & Whitney R-1830-86 engine w/two-stage supercharger. The gross weight of the latter plane rose to some 7896 pounds when you threw in 144 gallons of fuel and 1440 rounds of ammo. This was much heavier than, say, the 7512-pound package of the Martlet II, with a not-so-surprising drop in performance. Yet a comparison in the game of their handling characteristics does not reflect these differences.
I haven't gone through each and every plane in the database to make notes. I did notice the 4x/6x .50 mistake straight off, however, and so gave the Wildcats a closer look. My guess is there are similar mistakes in there if anyone cared to study it.
