However I believe you may have overlooked daily resource allotments I gave to Japan.
EDIT: Which it seems you have discovered.
ORIGINAL: Local Yokel
I have been looking into this mod from the perspective of the Japanese player. There’s much about which to be enthusiastic, in particular the additional stress that should be imposed upon the Japanese mercantile marine by increased resource-hauling requirements. Particularly intriguing is the reduction in the rail capacity between China and Manchukuo/Korea, and it will be interesting to see the extent to which this inhibits the gravitation of all surplus mainland resources to Port Arthur/Dairen. My guess is that if this works it will lead to surplus Chinese resources under Japanese control finding their way to Shanghai instead. In one sense this may actually assist the Japanese, because it will spread the resource loading operations over two ports rather than one. This seems likely to mitigate the ‘frictional’ effects upon loading ops that concentrating them on a single port (Port Arthur) may well produce. OTOH, it would compel the Japanese to defend two shipping routes across the Yellow Sea rather than one.
Of much greater concern to me is the impact of some of the changes upon the sustainability of the Japanese economy.
Back in August 2009 I dumped the stock scenario 1 economic inputs/outputs into a database and used this to construct a model of what the Japanese economy required in order to function in its ‘at start’ condition, and the extent to which its deficiencies could be remedied by conquest – particularly in the SRA. I posted the details in this thread. I’ve now adapted the spreadsheet model to carry out a similar exercise for this mod., and the image below sets out the results.
I didn’t have to hand the facilities to repeat the database dump exercise on which my original model was based, so the data shown in the new model may well be incomplete. For example, I know that I’ve left out of account the substantial fuel stocks at Truk, but assumed that these would be used for fleet ops rather than covering heavy industry’s needs. In the ‘Potential Conquests’ section I am aware that I have left out of the reckoning some resource centres, notably those on Nauru and Ocean. I do not expect the omissions to make a radical difference to my conclusions, and so far as I can tell the figures set out a broadly accurate picture of raw materials available to Japan at the game’s start or susceptible to early capture. Unlike my first model, I disregarded the scope for significant captures of oil/fuel/resource stockpiles in the SRA, as this merely adds to existing stockpiles and is a matter of pure chance.
Irrespective of scenario, any assessment of oil and fuel needs is complicated by the need for fuel for ships. The Japanese player will always have to conduct a balancing exercise between what’s required for shipping and what’s required by industry, and for this reason I funked making any comparisons between stock and Treespider’s mod in this respect. However, analysis of the balance between resources available and resources required is much more straightforward, and in this mod. it is a source for concern.
In stock scenario 1, Honshu has to make good a daily shortfall of 112,500 resource points if all industry is to run (both heavy and light). A significant part of that shortfall is readily to hand in the other home islands, so that the daily resource deficit for metropolitan Japan abates to 46,200 points. Most of this deficit can be covered by resource imports from the ‘at start’ Empire territory, further reducing it to just 5,100 points.
But then one must take account of resources stockpiled by the Japanese prior to the outbreak of war. If no resources are imported from the remainder of the ‘at start’ Empire, these stockpiles give the home islands’ economy a ‘reach’ of only 121 days, assuming all home island resource centres also continue full uninterrupted production. However, the availability of most of the resource shortfall in other Empire territory means that, assuming uninterrupted resource production throughout the Empire and efficient shipping of its surplus to Japan, the Empire’s resource reach, taking stockpiles into account, is a healthy 1,426 days: very close to 4 years or up to the end of 1945.
In Treespider’s mod. the resource picture is uncomfortably different. Honshu and Shikoku have a combined daily resource deficit of 168,455 points if all industry is to run. Kyushu has gone from resource surplus to a deficit of 1,260 points per day. Only Hokkaido continues to produce a respectable resource surplus of 42,990 points. Overall, metropolitan Japan has to make good a daily resource deficit of 127,415 points. In this mod, however, aid from other ‘at start’ Empire territory falls far short of making up this deficit. The ‘All Empire’ daily resource output of 305,375 points is still 60,175 points short of what is required: this is THE big difference between this mod. and stock.
What if the Japanese capture the SRA resource centres intact? My figures suggest that the relief afforded to the Japanese economy is marginal. The daily resource surplus additionally available from ‘probable’ SRA conquests is a niggardly 7,840 extra points, reducing the daily deficit to 52,335 resource points. Omitted extra resources from Nauru and Ocean will improve the picture, but not much.
So the Japanese must look again to their pre-war resource stockpiling. Unfortunately this will afford them little comfort. Assuming the same conditions as in stock, the combination of full resource production plus stockpiled resources enables the whole of the ‘at start’ Empire to keep its industry going full bore for 121 days – coincidentally the same as the ‘reach’ of the Home Islands alone in stock. If the meagre additional surpluses becoming available from SRA conquests are factored in, that reach is extended to 139 days – just over 4.5 months as compared with about 4 years in stock!
Another factor to note is that in this mod. supply generation by industry is appreciably less efficient than in stock: 18,680 units per day by the ‘at start’ Empire as against 24,230 in stock. I may have overlooked some supply generation other than by industry, but the point remains that, with only 77% of the industry-generated supply output available from stock, the mod. may well pose big problems for the Japanese player seeking to repair Japanese industry.
A further point to note is that my figures simply reflect the state of the Japanese economy at the start of the game. They allow for no alteration in the amount of heavy industry that may become necessary as a result of changes on the production side that increase demand for HI points, e.g. the expansion of the aircraft/aero engine industry that is more or less obligatory if the Japanese player is to remain competitive. Since in reality there wasn’t much scope for substantial further enlargement of Japanese industry after the war started (and attempts to expand wartime steel production in particular were relatively unsuccessful), it may be right to restrict the Japanese player’s capacity to do so, and force upon him the choice of how he is to re-allocate the slices of his heavy industry ‘pie’. Still, the current figures for this mod. seem to offer the enterprising player little scope even for marginal enlargement of his industrial output and may prevent it altogether, particularly if the reduction in generated supply is such as to prevent repairs to damaged factories.
My figures suggest to me that at some date from May 1942 onwards the Japanese player is going to be confronted with some insoluble economic problems, irrespective of how fortunate and complete his conquests in the SRA may have been. Even if he is efficiently shipping to Japan such resource surpluses as are available, he will be faced with a decision on what part of his industry to shut down, simply because the cushion afforded by his resource stockpiles will have been exhausted. Since daily imports and local resource generation will not then suffice to keep all his industry going, the game engine will take over making decisions on his behalf about what parts of his industry remain in production if he does not do so himself. What this means is that some light industry or some heavy industry output will HAVE to stop (or some combination of both). Produce less supply or produce fewer tanks/planes/ships: not a nice choice to make.
The exact timing of this crisis will depend on what fortune the Japanese had in capturing resource stockpiles in the SRA that can be shipped back to Japan. However, given the meagre output rate of resource centres in the SRA, it doesn’t seem likely that captured stockpiles will have anything but a marginal effect in postponement of the day of reckoning. Look at resource stocks held in Allied bases at game start: within the probable area of early Japanese conquest, the biggest accumulation is a mere 3,000 points at Hong Kong.
I have no quarrel with the argument that Japan should be appropriately economically constrained so far as this is in line with her historical economic vulnerability and the extent to which the Allies successfully interdict materiel delivery to her industry. However, I’ve made the point elsewhere that with certain important exceptions (petroleum products, bauxite and possibly rubber), the Japanese Empire was reasonably self sufficient in resources at the war’s outbreak. If this premise is accepted, then it doesn’t seem right that Japan should have to face the resources crunch that seems to be foreshadowed by my figures, and the way to correct it seems to be by further enlargement of resource production capacity in ‘at start’ Empire territory.
I’m really pleased to see the attempt being made to stress the Japanese merchant fleet more realistically, but I think this may have been achieved at a cost too high for the Japanese player in other respects.
