Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: Mogami

Hi, TJ I'll change my screen name to Bruckner if you change yours to Hanslick.

How about you change your handle to Mudd, while I go out in search of an appropriate Superman icon?

Hi, When Burma fell India began a famine. India imported most of its required food from Burma. Japan in WITP gets doodlysquat

Japan gets alot of precious metals from Burma.....they drop out of the skies daily from twin engined bombers... [;)]

Hi, Everyone seems to think Japan's problems began in 1942. They were fine till late 1944.
Their main problem was never "we don't have squat" it was "we can't move squat where we need it"
It's fuel/oil that matters not supply.

ORIGINAL: Mogami

But to be historically correct most of the food Japan consumes (military units and civilian in real life) was imported from the SRA and it rarely gets it in WITP

Right. And that is represented in the game by shipping resources from SRA to Japan. Does anyone really load up supply in the SRA and ship it to Japan to be used there? (maybe people do, I don't know) If they do, then some of my complaining is unjustified. I'm assuming no one loads supply from the edges of the empire and ships it to Osaka.

Now, if supply demands in Japan (civilian supply) were quite large, I'd stop bitching. The player would need to ship supply to japan and most of it would come from SRA.

How many supply points are produced in SRA each day? (assuming an undamaged SRA). Is it something like 3,000? (I don't know off the top of my head). if so, then that's 90,000 supply per month. How many units can be fed and equipped from 90,000 supply per month? It's quit a lot. I don't think any of my bases has a demand that high. Yes, combat ops makes units consume more supply. But, you can drive a pretty significant offensive or defensive on that much supply. All without having to convert magnesium into bullets.

They were, because it wasn't until 44 that Japan lost the ability to match/counter allied air power. In the stock game, Frontier Indian bases can be built up fairly quickly to major bomber bases and then watch out.

In my current PBEM game i was able to hold off the inevitable allied air offensive till late 42 with some clever pre-emptive strikes. Now i'm in 3/43 and every day one or more of my airbases save for Rangoon (out of fighter escort range) gets pummeled by 100+ bombers. I built up a minimum of 5 level 4 air bases there so that my opponent couldn't suppress them all at the same time. They are empty right now but could support the return of the JAAF if he invades.

Hi, No, one part of it is represented by shipping resources to Japan the other part is material that is produced in the SRA and does not require being ran through Japans Heavy Industry to be used. The SRA in fact provided most of this type material consumed by Japan in WWII. In WITP Japan is getting robbed of this type production.

In order to use supply
1. There must be more the basic required by the base.
2. To replace TOE/Aircraft there must be 20k+
3. To replace TOE/Aircraft unit must be in range of HQ
4. Only a portion of excess of 20k can be used to replace TOE/Aircraft

spoilage in SRA prevents most of the above during period SRA is being taken by Japan

There were existing in SRA in Dec 1941 oil refineries. Japan herself had the capacity to refine 35million barrels per year. Her requirements for refined oil did not exceed 30million barrels per year. She was unable to import the required oil first because the SRA was not producing it till 1943 and later because she had lost the tankers to transport it. In WITP the first condition is quite common (SRA is damaged) the second is only a result of play and most of those present have never gotten that far. Brady has the SRA completly isolated in 9/43 as a result Japanese production of equipment is very limited. (takes months to fill out a 27 fighter daitai even though aircraft production of that model is 300+ per month)

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

So Ron ... just to be clear, you would be completely happy about the supply issue if one simple change was made?

Supply only can be produced in hexes that have HI. (ie: nix the little bit that is created as a spillover at the resource centers?)

You want the same for fuel? (ie: no spun off fuel in Oil only hexes?)

This is a late reply, but I would definitely like to see the following done to make supply generation make more sense, if it were possible:

• Remove the supply generation from resource centres as you say. Use a definition of resources as raw materials for industry, that must be shipped to a HI centre to be used, and place them accordingly (many are placed according to that rationale now, such as Toboali).
• Make manpower centres generate a modest amount of supply, to represent the capacity of local populations to generate basic supply (and even light ammunition) needs. It may also be a good idea to ensure that a manpower centre cannot generate supply in this fashion if it is isolated (i.e. surrounded by enemy units).
• When a base containing manpower is captured, it will only generate supply at a reduced rate, say 50%, in the same way that it generates manpower at a reduced rate (10%)

This would result in supply being generated from two locations - HI (large amounts) and manpower (smaller amounts).

As for fuel from oil centres - since the Japanese did use oil from the SRA without refining it, I don't have such a problem with it.

I realise that these suggestions would require code changes.

Andrew

(Edited for the usual array of spelling mistakes)

The SRA produces:

Supply 4,900
Fuel 1,500
Oil 9,000

Right. You're just happily playing the game. Let's not make any waves.

No I'm just living in the real world where Gary Grisby and all the mods don't jump to my every command. I also don't believe that just because I write a long post where I insult everyone that they are going to rebuild this game from scratch just the way I want.

The only chance of getting a desired change made is to engage in reasonable discussion about plausable options. Simply saying that 'you're game is garbage now fix it the way I tell you' is not going to meet with much success.

Hi, If WITP in it's present state was changed to reflect every thing TJ writes he would be posting what was wrong with it. Unless GG and JB were removed from involvement.

ORIGINAL: Mogami

Hi, If WITP in it's present state was changed to reflect every thing TJ writes he would be posting what was wrong with it. Unless GG and JB were removed from involvement.

I'd doubt he would agree that you had performed the changes correctly. If WITP was produced by such morons then what are the odds that they could execute his more advanced design.[:D]

ORIGINAL: Skyros

The SRA produces:

Supply 4,900
Fuel 1,500
Oil 9,000

4,900 per day?

Do you happen to have these numbers for Japan occupied China, Formosa and Japan proper? I'm guessing that this is about 20% of all of Japan's supply production once their expansion is done. (maybe I'm wrong again.) I think Admiral Laurent posted the stats for Japan a while back. I think Japan proper produces 15k supply per day? Add in another 5k from other areas (China, Formosa, ??). That's about 25k supply made per day and 20% is PRODUCED directly in the SRA.

Please understand that my complaint is not that Japan is "swimming" in supply. I may have unintentionally implied that, but that is not what I'm trying to communicate. I'm complaining about the fact that Japan's merchant fleet is not used in the historic manner because there is less need to ship stuff out of the SRA and then ship it back to the SRA. Now imagine if Brady's wooden hulled fleat (hee hee) were added? You'd have just that many more ships to not use historically.

Mogami, I'm pretty sure I've read that you take 100 AK's and park them in Port Arthur. Why is that? Because they are shipping civilian supply, right? Well, the US subs can't sink them when they sit in port doing nothing. they are also not using up fuel and repair facilities. (I apologize if I remember this wrong.)

for the record, I agree with AB's post above. I don't think that SRA should produce zero supply. just not the amount that it currently does. Most should be produced in Japan.

Hi, No I park the AK to prove that the number of AK has nothing to do with pace of game. I also don't use AK to conduct landings. The only units that ever load on to an AK are those that are cargo type (Tank,Arty)
I only use the 1.5k AP for landings.

Unless you've gotten to 1943 you have not went far enough to judge WITP's supply system or production system. Japan began the war with enough to run those to mid 1942.
Japan can burn her starting fuel up sooner but she can't burn up her starting resource/oil before then. And yes Japanese players should have enough supply produced in SRA to transport it out of SRA. It is rare that this occurs. (most SRA produced supply is used inside the SRA but this use is post conquest. The SRA supply in my experiance does not move to influance combat outside SRA. It might get hauled to Bangkok. There are HI centers inside the SRA Singapore/bangkok,Siagon. There should be at least 1 very minor one in Batavia.

Starting in 1939 the Dutch attempted to make the DEI totally self sufficent. They accelerated this effort after 1940. In the end it was the Japanese who reaped the benifit. (all the small holdings had been combined and made more efficent but it was the Japanese who got the results of 2 years of Dutch efforts.)

Hi, Unless the Allied player is the cause then Japan should have excess supply and production.

1. Deny access to areas that produce supply/oil/fuel/resource
2. Prevent transport of above to and from areas.

reducing the available amount is doing the work for the Allied player. It really makes no sense to suggest Japan has too many AK and then reduce the cargos for them.
So what if Toboali produced 500,000 supply per day it's pretty useless there unless Japan turned that base into a major center and then Toboali should become a major target for the Allied player. The Allied player wants Japanese AK at sea moving goods and material not laid up doing nothing. (Well if you control entrance and egress to SRA then you don't care if Ak are laid up doing nothing because it means Japan is going without)

However size 1/1 bases can only store 17k supply before it spoils so if Toboali was producing 500,0000 supply per day 483,000 of it would be wasted. (You do know that a base is limited to how much supply can be there correct? If you unloaded a TF full with 999,999 supply there when you were done Toboali would have 17k supply.
When it is fully developed it can hold 90k or there abouts.

If you unloaded 999,999 supply onto a size 0/0 base you would have less then 3k when you were finished. The notion these size bases are of any use in conquest of SRA is incorrect.

Ahhhh I see we are "she said - he said" again. Makes for good reading.[:D]

ORIGINAL: Titanwarrior89

Ahhhh I see we are "she said - he said" again. Makes for good reading.[:D]

Shhhh, don't let on, they might quit. The ceaseless banter about things that will not change is highly amusing. Almost as cool as when the cat gets ahold of something living.

We don't need Superman, we need Duck Dodgers from the 24 1/2 century!

ORIGINAL: Bradley7735

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag
The way you talk about the amount of supply in the SRA, you'd think it was taking 100 ship convoys to haul it all away. [:D]

The amount of supply in the SRA is vast. Tobali alone produces enough supply to keep at least 5 divisions in great condition. So, you have tons and tons of war materiel being produced right next to the front lines. Now all you need is one ship to load supply from Tobali and offload in Singapore or Rangoon.

First, one ship will never do it. Maybe you haven't played Japan, but Toboali is a size 1 port. That means supply loads at a rate of 200 per day and resources load at a rate of 400 per day. Just to keep up with 900 supply per day means you have to have a minimum of 5 AK loading. Taking Singapore as your example, if I off load there, the transit time is probably 8 days round trip, and unloading will take me 3 days for a 3.5k AK. Load time (18 days) + transit time (8 days) + unload time (3 days) means that your optimal number of AK's between Toboali and Singapore would be 9 x 3.5k AK's plus escorts for supply alone. Note that during the entire load time, the AK's are in a size 1 port, so no torpedo nets and subject to sub attacks. It just about demands commitment of an ASW TF to safely retrieve the supply. If you increase the port size (which requires supplies and engineers builidng on an SPS 1 port, so expensive in terms of both), you can cut load times down to 6 days and load in safety. In that case, continuous TF's could operate every 17 days, meaning 5 or 6 3.5k AK's would be required. This would take a long time after capture to achieve though, since a size 2 port built onn an SPS of 1 takes a long time unless you are willing to commit large numbers of engineers (which are in short supply and needed elsewhere). Resources are a little better because they load faster, but load time would still be 9 days in the base case, requiring 6 or 7 3.5 k AK's.

Now, as for that being right next to the frontlines, by the time I can load supply from Toboali, my troops will be dead. I ship in supply because even with supply producing in the SRA, loading it, moving it, and unloading it takes too long. I ship it in behind my invasion forces from Japan, Saigon, etc. By the time you can use it to your significant advantage in combat operations, the combat operations are over.

I am past the SRA capture stage, and right now, every drop of supply being produced at Toboali is being sent to Palembang, to repair oil centers there. It is supporting no LCU's. Occasional shipments of supply from outside the SRA need to be sent to Palembang because despite the "vast" supply at Toboali, it doesn't produce enough supply to repair even Palembang by itself. Now, as for repairing Brunei, Miri, Balikpapan, Batavia, Soerbaja... Every resource in Toboali is being transported to the home islands, where it is being converted into supply and fuel to the extent that I have oil to do so. (Which given the state of the oil center at Palembang is not enough to run Japan's industry).

ORIGINAL: Bradley7735
IRL, you'd need a ship to load resources, haul it all the way through sub infested waters to japan (consuming fuel and escorts on the way), wait for said resources to produce real life war materiel, then finally load it up and take the long trip back to Singapore to deliver said war materiel. (going back through sub waters and using fuel and escorts.)

I don't haul supply to the HI, but I do haul resources and oil (raw materials). Finished product from Toboali (food, etc.) is 100% being sent to repair oil facilities and will likely do so for over a year. Supplies from other locations (Tarakan, Balikpapan, Batavia, Soerbaja, and Kendari) are either sustaining their own troops and repairing oil centers. Despite that, I have shipped in plenty of supply from the Home Islands to keep supply levels up. If I were conducting combat ops with the troops, I would have to ship in more supply than I already do, but no less than 8 TF's (roughly 1 per month) of supply have been shipped into the SRA (ranging in size from 63K to 119k apiece) I did ship one TF out recently from Balikpapan, Tarakan, and Kendari, but much of the supply I moved had been transported into the SRA while I was securing the SRA.

ORIGINAL: Bradley7735
The amount of supply that is produced outside of Japan, US, Aus and India is staggering and unrealistic. It would be better if resource centers produced zero supply and HI produced twice as much.

I do agree to some extent the way oil centers produce fuel. It's not as much as the resource/supply thing, and fuel is fuel is fuel. (works in all ships the same way.)

Nope. Much of what was produced in the SRA was food. When you get right down to it, the only thing you really need to keep your troops is food. Granted, bullets for training, etc. are necessary to maintain readiness, but readiness training supply requirements are lower than combat supply requirements. Food, Water, Air, Clothing, Shelter. Get them that and the troops can be maintained. Combat effectiveness may require a bit more in the way of industrialized supply, but frankly, I can't see how that isn't represented by the supply I ship in as is. The supply present in the SRA represents the ability of the SRA to provide troops with food, and also represents the SRA's ability to provide some limited forms of industrial support.

Unless the SRA is left bare, or the SRA is captured with Oil and resources 100 percent intact, I can't see how there is a problem, because those two conditions mean supply produced there will be used for non-combat purposes anyway. If the Japanese player uses the supply for something else, but has damaged oil centers etc, then rejoice. It will be a short war once he runs out of oil. On the other hand, if the Allied player executes a Brave Sir Robin defense, and evacs engineers and lets me have it undamaged, then it isn't a mistake that I have extra supply. Keep in mind that 70 percent of the production of oil in the SRA was restored after a year. If I get that 70 percent from day 1, I build a petroleum reserve that keeps the Japanese industry and the Japanese navy operating far longer than it did. I get to transport that reserve to the Home Islands with fewer subs to haunt my passage there. The subs that are there are shooting blanks. That isn't the games fault and it is not fantasy. It is the fault of the Allied player that ran from the SRA without defending it.

ORIGINAL: Bradley7735


Do you happen to have these numbers for Japan occupied China, Formosa and Japan proper?

Japan
Supply from Resources - 6510
Supply from HI - 9090


Formosa
Supply from Resources - 330
Supply from HI - 480


China & Manchuria
Supply from Resources - 3930
Supply from HI - 3340

THese numbers come from Ressources.xls by AdmiralLaurent

ORIGINAL: Rob322

ORIGINAL: Titanwarrior89

Ahhhh I see we are "she said - he said" again. Makes for good reading.[:D]

Shhhh, don't let on, they might quit. The ceaseless banter about things that will not change is highly amusing. Almost as cool as when the cat gets ahold of something living.

We don't need Superman, we need Duck Dodgers from the 24 1/2 century!

I might agree, but I'm having to put sunscreen on just to watch and everytime I try to toast a marshmellow it vaporizes (taking the metal skewer with it).