How do I BUILD new Units ?

[Adolf Galland]

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

WitP-AE is not an "arcade" or "fantasy" game like Hearts of Iron or Pacific Storm and the like where you can build your own Army, Navy and Air Forces.

In the standard AE scenarios you get the historic "Order of battle" with the ships, air groups and land units that did exist in real life - but not more than that.

As the Japanese player you have a limited control over the production, i.e. you can increase the output of plane and tank factories and speed-up the construction of ships, or stop factories and halt ship construction (the economy is relatively complicated - oil and resources being converted into fuel, supplies and heavy indistry points, which in turn can be used to expand a multitude of different factories and shipyards).

This will allow you to keep the existing air and ground units up to strength and to fill-out units in the reinforcement pipeline - but you cannot create new units at your discretion.

In this regard AE is more a historic simulation than a game.

However, there are "what if" scenarios available which give both side many more toys to play with, for example ships and planes which IRL did exist only on the drawing boards.

Still, you cannot create new "what if" toys, every unit available is there by scenario design.

For a good Japanese player who has his war economy and resource import / oil import under control, this is unrealistic.

The Japanese in the ww2 barely managed to transport their resources to Japan. But if this is a Japanese player in the large scale, this is hardly appreciated by the game.

Modern weapons could indeed be produced in large quantities in Japan and distributed to Japanese divisions. Only this was not due to a lack of resources. And many supply ships are also not at the destination.
For a japan which is played according to historical model and can hardly import resources the historical direction can be correct. But nevertheless not for a Japan what its resources from asien without large problems can skim.


AE is far from perfect and can be significantly improved.

[SheperdN7]

ORIGINAL: Adolf Galland

AE is far from perfect and can be significantly improved.

You are so right!! It is no longer a 10/10 for me... 9.9/10 now

[Canoerebel]

We Were Soldiers Once...and Young is the finest work of history I've ever read. 95% of nearly 1,000 comments on Amazon.com agree, giving the book 5 or 4 stars. Only 1% gave the book one star, meaning that there will always be people that see things differently. One critic of the book writes: "General Moore is throwing a lot of information at you and it relates the personal recollections of different participants...It is easy to get lost with who is speaking." Okay, the person isn't familiar with military jargon and how to keep straight units on a field of battle, so he or she didn't like the book. But for those of us able to follow the action....Wow!

Same thing with AE. There is a percentage of people who do not like micromanagement or complexity or abstraction or imperfection or hex-based games or strategy or the Pacific theater. So they exercise their prerogative not to buy the game. The odd thing is that some of them insist that we have to see things their way and, if we don't, that something's wrong with us. Very strange. (On the General forum today or yesterday, one AE critic commented that those of us who enjoy the game have "drunk the Kool Aid.")

[stuman]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

We Were Soldiers Once...and Young is the finest work of history I've ever read. 95% of nearly 1,000 comments on Amazon.com agree, giving the book 5 or 4 stars. Only 1% gave the book one star, meaning that there will always be people that see things differently. One critic of the book writes: "General Moore is throwing a lot of information at you and it relates the personal recollections of different participants...It is easy to get lost with who is speaking." Okay, the person isn't familiar with military jargon and how to keep straight units on a field of battle, so he or she didn't like the book. But for those of us able to follow the action....Wow!

Same thing with AE. There is a percentage of people who do not like micromanagement or complexity or abstraction or imperfection or hex-based games or strategy or the Pacific theater. So they exercise their prerogative not to buy the game. The odd thing is that some of them insist that we have to see things their way and, if we don't, that something's wrong with us. Very strange. (On the General forum today or yesterday, one AE critic commented that those of us who enjoy the game have "drunk the Kool Aid.")

Well said.

[Chris21wen]

ORIGINAL: Anachro


You cannot manipulate the introduction of additional land forces. You have your reinforcement and withdrawal schedule. That's it. What you can do, however, is use political points to buyout restricted units from China, Manchuria, or the Home Islands (or elsewhere) to be used freely wherever you need them. For example, taking an infantry division initially confined to the Soviet border and buying it out so you can use it in the South Pacific.

As the allies, you can also buyout restricted units on the west coast to be used in your campaigns against Japan.

You will find that restricted units cannot be loaded onto ships nor can they fly to bases that are not under the same command. They can however use land transport. For this reason restricted units in Asia can move anywhere in Asia but it is generally thought of as gamey. To move any restricted unit out of it's area to another (say China to India or vica virca) you should pay political points to do so.

[pavel01]

ORIGINAL: Adolf Galland

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

WitP-AE is not an "arcade" or "fantasy" game like Hearts of Iron or Pacific Storm and the like where you can build your own Army, Navy and Air Forces.

In the standard AE scenarios you get the historic "Order of battle" with the ships, air groups and land units that did exist in real life - but not more than that.

As the Japanese player you have a limited control over the production, i.e. you can increase the output of plane and tank factories and speed-up the construction of ships, or stop factories and halt ship construction (the economy is relatively complicated - oil and resources being converted into fuel, supplies and heavy indistry points, which in turn can be used to expand a multitude of different factories and shipyards).

This will allow you to keep the existing air and ground units up to strength and to fill-out units in the reinforcement pipeline - but you cannot create new units at your discretion.

In this regard AE is more a historic simulation than a game.

However, there are "what if" scenarios available which give both side many more toys to play with, for example ships and planes which IRL did exist only on the drawing boards.

Still, you cannot create new "what if" toys, every unit available is there by scenario design.

For a good Japanese player who has his war economy and resource import / oil import under control, this is unrealistic.

The Japanese in the ww2 barely managed to transport their resources to Japan. But if this is a Japanese player in the large scale, this is hardly appreciated by the game.

Modern weapons could indeed be produced in large quantities in Japan and distributed to Japanese divisions. Only this was not due to a lack of resources. And many supply ships are also not at the destination.
For a japan which is played according to historical model and can hardly import resources the historical direction can be correct. But nevertheless not for a Japan what its resources from asien without large problems can skim.


AE is far from perfect and can be significantly improved.

Well, the way I see it, is that while Realism in a game like War in the Pacific is certainly vital, the whole point of playing the game is to try "make a difference" in the War's outcome...

If the Japanese "must" be doomed to fail, and there is no chance for a player to make changes "other" then the historical ones to try change the course of the War, what would be the point of playing ?

So, while the "conditions" at the start of the war should be the Historical ones, I think, that given the available resources back then players "should be given" enough flexibility to re-allocate those resources so as to make choices different to the Historical ones and see whether, perhaps, those different choices "might" have produced a different War outcome as compared to the Historical one.

So, if, for example a Japanese player wanted to invest in infrastructures early on, so as to increase their Industry output and Airplanes, Ships and Vehicles production as well as soldiers, I think that there should be this ability.

Why couldn't, for example, have Japan heavily invested in Submarines rather then Airplanes and used them to "cut off" Supplies for good for the Allied in the Pacific even perhaps to the point of making an invasion of Hawaii possible ?

As of now, though, it is not possible to increase production nor manifacture of a given item, not even at the expense of another....

[pavel01]

ORIGINAL: Chris H

ORIGINAL: Anachro


You cannot manipulate the introduction of additional land forces. You have your reinforcement and withdrawal schedule. That's it. What you can do, however, is use political points to buyout restricted units from China, Manchuria, or the Home Islands (or elsewhere) to be used freely wherever you need them. For example, taking an infantry division initially confined to the Soviet border and buying it out so you can use it in the South Pacific.

As the allies, you can also buyout restricted units on the west coast to be used in your campaigns against Japan.

You will find that restricted units cannot be loaded onto ships nor can they fly to bases that are not under the same command. They can however use land transport. For this reason restricted units in Asia can move anywhere in Asia but it is generally thought of as gamey. To move any restricted unit out of it's area to another (say China to India or vica virca) you should pay political points to do so.

Still, being able to use those restricted units in Asia can "free up" Japanese units to be moved to the islands....

Japan, to my viewing, has a serious manpower problem with so many Bases to control and so few soldiers to do it....

[Chris21wen]

ORIGINAL: pavel01

ORIGINAL: Chris H

ORIGINAL: Anachro


You cannot manipulate the introduction of additional land forces. You have your reinforcement and withdrawal schedule. That's it. What you can do, however, is use political points to buyout restricted units from China, Manchuria, or the Home Islands (or elsewhere) to be used freely wherever you need them. For example, taking an infantry division initially confined to the Soviet border and buying it out so you can use it in the South Pacific.

As the allies, you can also buyout restricted units on the west coast to be used in your campaigns against Japan.

You will find that restricted units cannot be loaded onto ships nor can they fly to bases that are not under the same command. They can however use land transport. For this reason restricted units in Asia can move anywhere in Asia but it is generally thought of as gamey. To move any restricted unit out of it's area to another (say China to India or vica virca) you should pay political points to do so.

Still, being able to use those restricted units in Asia can "free up" Japanese units to be moved to the islands....

Japan, to my viewing, has a serious manpower problem with so many Bases to control and so few soldiers to do it....

Anarcho used the term buying out. I was clarifying.

Paying PPs allows you to do that. Not paying PPs is considered gamey especially in a PBEM and house rules will apply. What you do against the AI is up to you.

Japan has manpower problem, resource problem and many another problem. That's part of the enjoyment/masochism of playing them.

[crsutton]

ORIGINAL: pavel01

ORIGINAL: crsutton

ORIGINAL: mullk

you don't. you can rebuild lost air and ground units but that's it. you have to use what you have. Their is no way to rebuild any kind of lost ship including barges and midget subs. Your total supply of subs and barges is in the ship availability screen in your intel report. ground and air units are rebuilt in their respective destroyed screen in the intel report as well.

Mullk is mostly correct here. You cannot rebuild a land unit that was scheduled to withdraw sometime later in the game. (Not sure about air units) And, some ground units, mostly from minor Allies, can't be recreated either. But otherwise almost all American, Commonwealth, and Chinese units can be rebuilt from scratch if you have the devices and squads in the pools.

American, Commonwealth, and Chinese units ? Not Japanese ?

Or, if I disband (is that the same as withdraw ?) some Japanese existing units to the "Pool" then I can use them to create some "other" units ?

For example, say that I want more engineers, can I disband (withdraw ?) some land combat units to the Pool and then use that Pool to create those more engineers which I want ?

Neither side can use the pools to create new units. Only to fill out depleted units or rebuild destroyed units that can be rebuilt. I typically disband brigades to get more squads. They will come back in a few months if you click "yes" when you are asked. However, they come back with nothing in them so you have to use your pools to rebuild. If you are fighting a hard war, you will find that you really can't rebuild a whole lot of units. American units are fairly easy but Commonwealth units are very hard due to the poor supply of squads and devices.

[adarbrauner]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Same thing with AE. There is a percentage of people who do not like micromanagement or complexity or abstraction or imperfection or hex-based games or strategy or the Pacific theater. So they exercise their prerogative not to buy the game. The odd thing is that some of them insist that we have to see things their way and, if we don't, that something's wrong with us. Very strange. (On the General forum today or yesterday, one AE critic commented that those of us who enjoy the game have "drunk the Kool Aid.")

Fear for Change; a corollary of xenofoby (please don't get irate or hot, not the intention)
p.s., hex based is fine for me, but if there was a way to significantly reduce their scale inland, I'd be very happy.

Just throwing in here an idea I have been cultivating, the option to open an ad hoc "land battle screen" or map (editable?), focused on single important locations to start with; my dream would be to see a bigger scale Guadalcanal or Kohima battlefield;

Also, off topic here but still, what the virtue of the "Pursuing" feature, could you explain please? What should it be meant to simulate or emulate?

[HansBolter]

Pursuit is valuable when you know you will overwhelm an enemy and force a retreat and want to continue pounding that force.

The retreat function allows ground units to 'magically' move far further and faster than they usually can under most circumstances.

This leaves the winner sitting in the original battle hex facing possibly many turns of delay in getting to the hex the loser retreated to.

Units set to Pursuit will get a jump on movement toward the retreat hex.

Where this works best is with motorized units on major roads as they can move one full hex in one turn and thus the free pursuit move may get them to the retreat hex immediately, allowing a follow up attack the next turn rather than several turns later as it does for leg units.

[BBfanboy]

The caveat to what HansB said: don't set a few fast units in pursuit mode (Reserve-pursuit) if they will be following the defeated enemy into a hex with other strong enemy forces in it! Been there - done that ...[8|]

[rustysi]

Japan, to my viewing, has a serious manpower problem with so many Bases to control and so few soldiers to do it....

Welcome to the reality faced by Japan.

[rustysi]

Just throwing in here an idea I have been cultivating, the option to open an ad hoc "land battle screen" or map (editable?), focused on single important locations to start with; my dream would be to see a bigger scale Guadalcanal or Kohima battlefield;

Not gonna happen. Besides the game (campaign) takes years to play. How much more time do you wish to add to it by adding a land battle component such as the one you're suggesting? Not to mention the coding that would be involved. In addition I doubt the current game engine could handle it. It is what it is, which is great by the way. If the game weren't I would've be on my way to another years ago. Take it as it is and enjoy the ride.