CHS questions, comments & feedback

[Halsey]

Thanks Tristan.
These have been the only threads I've been posting to lately.

If changes are going to be made it needs to affect BOTH sides!

Irrelevant is correct. It's the supply expenditure required to increase base size that's important. Anything added that sucks up the over abundance of supply in this game is a good thing.[;)]

Reduce airfields/ports. Make both sides have to build. The ability to grab big bases and put them to your own use in a couple of days is nonsense.

Why isn't there a demolition roll for ALL facilities at a base when it's captured?

I particularly like the way eng units keep rebuilding facilities so the enemy can capture them intact.
Where did this game mechanic come from? Where's the historical basis for this one?[:D]

[Lemurs!]

Don, everyone,

I realize the problems with large bombers etc.
Twits like Frag try to blame the CHS but the problem is the game system itself. Having said that i feel that the size/aircraft capacity system works well within this system. I am less worried about this than most people seem to be.

The only change i would make in this system would be to halve the air capacity of atoll bases as i think that would add some accuracy and i am surprised they did not do this at start since it would be easy to code.

The B29 will remain at 14000 capacity. The various B17s i am unsure where to leave them. It is true that a B17 could lift 8000 lbs but early in the war 1-2000lbs was very common.

The E's and F's seemed to carry the largest bomb load and then the G's went down due to added weight.

With the small units with a few engineers... I cannot justify adding engineers to them so i am going to set up a test to see if they are additive. I hope they are.

Mike

[Andrew Brown]

ORIGINAL: Bradley7735
The only way to slow down construction is to either reduce the number of engineers in all LCU's or put the sps to 0 (sps of 0 makes it 10 times longer for construction).

I have sometimes wondered whether it would be a good idea to reduce the number of engineering squads in units. To cut the rate of contruction this could be done across the board, with the number of engineering squads and vehicles cut by 50% for ALL units, Allied and Japanese. TOE would be cut by 50% as well. To balance the load cost reduction, the LoadCost value for these two device types would have to be doubled from 20 to 40.

I don't really know whether this is a practical idea or not. It would affect other things as well, such as facility repair and combat (hmmm - that might be a benifit as well if fort reduction is slowed down), but it might be worth considering. If it was practical, I would prefer doing this to wholesale drastic reductions in bse SPS values.

Also, in the CHS (as well as in my own scenarios) we have been reviewing, and in most cases reducing, base sizes and SPS values in a number of places already, chiefly Australia, NZ, the Pacific islands and Alaska. There is scope to review these values further but that takes time and effort. Some people are still working on this I think, but all contributions would be most welcome.

[Bombur]

Yeah, I know that anyone can base 2000 aircraft from a level 6 airbase. They can do it from a level 1 airbase as well. But, my point is that either player can do this. Japan or Allies. If you make everything smaller, you cause allied aircraft to incur additional ops loss rate (too small an airfield). I'm pretty sure that all factors being the same, none of Japan's aircraft have problems operating from a level 4 airfield (betties don't have additional ops losses) The same can't be said for the allies. They need level 5 or 7 airbases to field their aircraft.

-On the other hand, limiting the size of airfields poses additional troubles to the Japanese as they will find much more difficult to develop their airfields to level 4.

Lowering the SPS of airbases doesn't fix the 2000 airplane problem. The only thing accomplished is that allies have more ops losses.

-Thus making the game more realistic

I would prefer a slolution that affected both sides equally. Unfortunately, a slolution like that would probably require code changes. (making a cap on aircraft at a base, like it works for carriers. Or making AV support based on engines, not planes. Or eliminating the 250 AV rule. Or something like that.

-All these ideas are good, but, as we only have the editor, we can combine some solutions.
1-Limiting the airfield size (I´m personally for a max SPS of 3)
2-Reducing the bombload for all aircraft (thus allowing B-17´s to fly from size 4 bases and B-29´s from size 5). Look to the fact that 2 compensates one to some extent
3-Reduce a lot the number of aircraft support crews (for both sides), thus creating lots of difficulties to repair planes

[Mr.Frag]

You also dramatically cut the ops losses by reducing the load of the aircraft and shifting it into a situation where it is now flying from a non-size restricted base.

Too bad you guys don't think about what you do but people like Mike are just too smart for us commoners [8|]

[Don Bowen]

ORIGINAL: Don Bowen

ORIGINAL: Oleg Mastruko

July 26, 1942 The Imperial Japanese Navy submarine I-16 reconoiters the doings on Diego Garcia. In the preceeding month she had sunk four merchantmen south of the Chagos (3,889-ton Yugoslav SUSAK at 15-42S 40-58E, 4,847-ton Greek AGHIOS GEORGIOS IV at 16-12S 41-00E, 3,748-ton Yugoslav SUPETAR at 21-49S 35-50E, and 5,243-ton Swedish EKNAREN at 17-00S 40-00E). After her visit to DG, she cruises to Penang, and then back to Japan.

One of the friends of my grandfather was on Susak. He survived the sinking and spent the war as POW on Sumatra, building the "death railway" there with rest of the Allied POWs. There is a story about this crazy project (trans-Sumatra railroad) along with surviving POW sketches somewhere on the net.

My grandfather, who was in Yugo merchant marine at the time, traveled over U-Boot infested Atlantic few times in 1940, then went off the ship in New York and spent the war working at some shipyard in Brooklyn, making Libery ships. After the war he came back to Yugoslavia.

Now, since CHS is ruled by Allied fanboy club, anyway, I guess Ron gave me the argument to demand inclusion of several Yugo merchants in British service in CHS database [:D][:D].

O.

If you can get me data on the ships I will put them it.

Signed... Allied Fan Boy.

If you can get me data on the ships I will put them it.

[Tristanjohn]

ORIGINAL: Bombur

Lowering the SPS of airbases doesn't fix the 2000 airplane problem. The only thing accomplished is that allies have more ops losses.

-Thus making the game more realistic

What are you trying to say here?

[Bombur]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

You also dramatically cut the ops losses by reducing the load of the aircraft and shifting it into a situation where it is now flying from a non-size restricted base.

Too bad you guys don't think about what you do but people like Mike are just too smart for us commoners [8|]

-That´s no doubt a collateral effect, but it´s more than worth the reduced effectiveness of heavy (and medium) bombers and imposition of some extra penalty for stacking lots of aircraft in one base, not to mention the fact the logistics system was tightened due to the increased amount of supplies necessary to improve airfields. Don´t forget that we are working inside the limits allowed by the editor. If we didn´t have the 250 cap for aircraft support, this system would work even better.

[Bombur]

What are you trying to say here?

-Don´t we agree that both sides should have higher operational losses? But I concede it wasn´t a particularly smart statement. Just forget it[:D]

[Tristanjohn]

ORIGINAL: Bombur

What are you trying to say here?

-Don´t we agree that both sides should have higher operational losses? But I concede it wasn´t a particularly smart statement. Just forget it[:D]

It sounded as if you might be asking only for increased Allied operational losses. Were you?

[Bombur]

It sounded as if you might be asking only for increased Allied operational losses. Were you?

-Yes, it sounded like that, but it was not my intention, I would like to see them increased for both sides. Unfortunately I cannot figure out how to increase operational losses in the editor (as Mr. Frag pointed, I could be even reducing them), so my experiments are directed only to decrease effectiveness of bombers (for both sides), make logistics harder and increase the penalty for overcrowded airfields.

[Mike Scholl]

Japanese operational losses were MUCH higher than Allied. During several periods of the "China Incident" the Jap Died of Disease
losses were higher than their Killed in Action losses. Same was true in many areas of the South Pacific. The Japanese Military's
attitude towards Medical care was in general that suffering and deprivation toughened the troops. Maintainence also got short
shrift. Both were a result of the emphasis on combat and the need to economise to get the most from a small base of support.

[Tristanjohn]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

Japanese operational losses were MUCH higher than Allied. During several periods of the "China Incident" the Jap Died of Disease
losses were higher than their Killed in Action losses. Same was true in many areas of the South Pacific. The Japanese Military's
attitude towards Medical care was in general that suffering and deprivation toughened the troops. Maintainence also got short
shrift. Both were a result of the emphasis on combat and the need to economise to get the most from a small base of support.

That would be my reading of it, too, though due to poor Japanese record keeping we don't have the data to prove this. It's apparently the case (at least from what I've seen reported) that operational losses in the game are but a fraction of what they were historically. I'd guess it's also the case that the one-size-fits-all approach to malarial attrition and so on does not do the land-combat model any favors, with the Japanese (again) not receiving a hard enough hit, but again, I don't have the data to prove this.

[Bombur]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

Japanese operational losses were MUCH higher than Allied. During several periods of the "China Incident" the Jap Died of Disease
losses were higher than their Killed in Action losses. Same was true in many areas of the South Pacific. The Japanese Military's
attitude towards Medical care was in general that suffering and deprivation toughened the troops. Maintainence also got short
shrift. Both were a result of the emphasis on combat and the need to economise to get the most from a small base of support.

-You´re correct for troops losses. When we come to planes losses, it must be noticed that non combat losses were responsible by 60% of total losses for both sides, however, as Japanese total losses, as relative to overall production was higher, then operational losses as % of total production were also higher.

[bstarr]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

Japanese operational losses were MUCH higher than Allied. During several periods of the "China Incident" the Jap Died of Disease
losses were higher than their Killed in Action losses. Same was true in many areas of the South Pacific. The Japanese Military's
attitude towards Medical care was in general that suffering and deprivation toughened the troops. Maintainence also got short
shrift. Both were a result of the emphasis on combat and the need to economise to get the most from a small base of support.

Is support directly related to noncombat (ie malarial) loses in the game? If so, a reduction in the number of support devices in Japanese LCUs and perhaps an increase in those available to the allies might be a partial fix.

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: Don Bowen

I'm really not qualified to answer this question - I am completely ignorant about Chinese land forces.

WIth a little thought I am not too sure about a major revision - issues with game balance and using up all remaining Land Unit slots.

I'd love to hear other's opinions...

The problem in China is how the games land combat routines work, so trying to recreate an historical OOB will only counter-balance things in favor of China instead of Japan as it is now. What we need to do is strive to create the historical reality of China instead.

By this I mean make China very tough for Japan to attack but at the same time make their ability to counter-attack Japan very limited. China had about twice as many men under arms as the game now represents, so adding more defensive power isn’t outside the realm of reason in my opinion. Most of these men were controlled by individual warlords so were not available for deployment outside their home provinces. The problem is how to represent these men without allowing them to advance willy nilly all over the map.

I’ve suggested this before; why not create large static fort units in each Chinese base location? These would mainly be equipped with squads and support personnel as China had very few modern arms other than rifles and the amount of large caliber guns, vehicles, engineers, etc represented in the current units is about right. Most of these fort units would be very low experience level troops (say 20-25) with only about half the support needed intrinsic to the units themselves. That way the player would need to commit plenty of mobile forces and HQ’s to make sure the extra troops fought well in any threatened bases. If it’s a matter of free unit spaces, why not add them to the current base forces on map and then make those static units? You’d need to move a base force into Nanning though as it lacks one I believe.

Currently CHS has 69 - 382 squad Inf Corps, 18 – 186 squad Inf Divs and 4 – 273 squad Cav Corps. So it would not be outside the realm of reality to add an additional 30,798 squads to these static units. With 22 bases controlled by China, that would be 1400 squads per static unit per base.

I might even suggest reducing all on map Corps (each represents 2 divisions now) to divisions and adding their second division and equipment to the static units (if done I’d raise exp. up to 30-35). This would bump the static units to 2100 squads with 1 divisions worth of heavy equipment. That would ensure China could not mount massive offensives, but leave them enough mobile firepower to counter Japanese attempts to surround the static fort units.

Jim

P.S. I noticed all the Chinese divisions that are attached to SEAC in WitP are now under China Command. Is that intentional or an oversight? China sent those divisions into Burma by late February early March; I doubt the allies will have enough PP to do that by that time frame with 9 divisions.

[Lemurs!]

Part of the command change for the Chinese units is how they are used in game. Chiang never let the divisions go very far into Burma and never allowed the 6 divisions to get so far into Burma that they had any Japanese between them and home.

It was summer '42 before divisions were sent into India for training.

I know this will not be perfect, but we are trying to get more of the required flavor.

With the changes to the land combat system i doubt if we are going to see many rampaging Japanese attacks any longer, but if this does make the Chinese to restricted we may make two of the units SEAC again.

Mike

[Derfel]

The Dornier 24-K2 is in CHS equipped with 18in Mk XII torpedoes.
In real life it was to be equipped with 1500 KG bombs.

Also I haven't seen any combatreports where it used anything other than bombs

A good TOE (including positions) is here:
http://www.geocities.com/dutcheastindies/Dutch_OOB.html

Martin Harder

[akdreemer]

ORIGINAL: Lemurs!

Part of the command change for the Chinese units is how they are used in game. Chiang never let the divisions go very far into Burma and never allowed the 6 divisions to get so far into Burma that they had any Japanese between them and home.

It was summer '42 before divisions were sent into India for training.

I know this will not be perfect, but we are trying to get more of the required flavor.

With the changes to the land combat system i doubt if we are going to see many rampaging Japanese attacks any longer, but if this does make the Chinese to restricted we may make two of the units SEAC again.

Mike

Hmm, I am reading book 5 of Churchill's "The Second World War" (makes good bed reading in the evening for putting one's self to sleep). According to Churchill when Chinese Divisions were offered to the British in Burma early on they were refused because it was felt that the extra tropps would be too much a burden on the British supply lines and that there was some questions as to their overall quality. But Chiang also wanting a tight lease on his units also sounds about right.

In some ways I do not pay much attention as the Allies to China, usally put it on computer control, although I usally snag some of the divisions adjacent to Burma as soon as I can get them.

[Lemurs!]

And remember that Chiang spoke for effect; he spoke for the microphones.
Just because he offered something doesn't mean it was going to happen. As Stillwell found out.

In '43 when the Chinese started training in India remember that the Chinese did not send equiped, ready to fight troops.
Chiang sent starving peasants with no equipment and no officers.
Basically it was a way to feed a few tens of thousands of Chinese for free and to snatch some quality American equipment.

They were not troops until Stillwell turned them into troops.

Mike