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If I wasn't working on the road all winter I'd be printing them out already and trying my own free test of them with the cardboard pieces. Unifying the scale will make the Pacific theater fresh and interesting, though more tricky and dangerous for the Japanese. The war in China becomes a game of manuever and the Japanese player soon really begins to understand what Command Conflict is (no optional rule necesary) as the IJA and the IJN both want to pick the impulse choice.

ORIGINAL: Gendarme
True, but if there is enough demand for the option to print sections of map, and if it's not too much trouble for the developers to do, then why not? Like I've said, that is something I'd throw down extra $$ for. Or even $$$.

Especially since we must still use the paper Wif for our fix until MatrixWif is ready. I'll still get Matrix Wif when it finally comes out. Shoot, I'd pre-order it if I could get those maps.

Table space is no concern for me. Maybe sections of the Atlantic and Pacific can be left out as on the current paper Wif maps. But otherwise, bring it on.

Some players are blowing up and wall-mounting their maps. We have ways...

But I know this is all daydreaming, and I won't take up any more space other than to say again, the work being done on Matrix Wif looks outstanding so far, and is only making us more eager to play it.

Anthony DeChristopher

I was talking to my brother-in-law today (he lives in Philadelphia) and he has a printer friend who does "canvas wraps" for buses. Basically they take a JPG file (or something similar) and print it out on a large 'canvas' that can then be wrapped around a bus - for advertising, I assume.

So I have given this a little extra thought and have the following questions:

1 - Is there interest in a full map? Because of the grain of the hexgrid, my earlier estimates were off. More precise calculations yield a height of 134 inches (11 feet 2 inches) and a width of 18 feet (even). Trimming the top 15 hexes keeps all of Scandinavia and Iceland and reduces the height to 10 feet 4 inches. For these calculations I am using the same size hexes as used in the WIF FE maps.

2 - The whole map could be drawn at reduced size per hex. The aspect ratio should be maintained, so, for example, 1/4 size would be 9 feet wide by 5 feet 2 inches high. Not playable, but more likely displayable.

3 - Printing segments. For example, the bottom of South America is the bottom of the map. But the rest of the lower portion of the map is ocean. I'm not sure how to decide on which segments would be best/desireable. All of Europe and Africa, surely. Most of Asia (excluding some of Siberia) and all of Australia and New Zealand. All (or almost all) of the Pacific Islands? America done at reduced scale? From the top of Scandinavia to the southern tip of Africa is 9 feet at WIF FE scale hexes.

I think the most demand would be for the active parts of the Asia/Pacific Maps, say all of WiFFE "Asia" and the west half of "Pacific"; following that would be Scandinavia and perhaps Africa. Alternatively Asia/Pacific could also effectively be squared off from roughly Khabarovsk-Darwin-Christmas Island-Calcutta-Novosibirsk. I guess some folks would want Europe east and west in the new color schemes. A few would want America, or maybe the complete Eurasian land-mass from Vigo to Vladivostok + Japan. I am talking about playable sizes. That is all I would want, just the parts needed for ftf play. I do play WiF in a complete basement and would have room for that, but would never want to set up so many empty areas. Reduced scales wouldn't appeal to me at all though.

If a series of large continental maps and one or more smaller scale but still large sea-area maps were included in the box, or were otherwise available to those who are interested, this would be good. Even a 5' 2" x 9' map would be good. Just having the map would be useful in locating areas in MWiF without having to look at a really reduced on-screen map on which text may not be visible or legible. Paper maps have the advantage in that they can be reduced around 4 times compared to a monitor image and still remain legible (72 DPI on-screen vs 300 DPI printed). Why would anyone want to play on a paper map if they have a computerised WiF anyway? (Silly me! Of course someone is going to want to play on the paper maps...)

Being able to print areas of the map - complete with units and other variable layers if desired - would also be good. Not many people would be able to print these without tiling and reduced zoom, though. Still, good for producing evidence for bragging.

ORIGINAL: trees

ORIGINAL: Froonp

ORIGINAL: trees
the end-game in Japan will certainly end quicker now

Why ?

The Japanese army is small and Japan just got bigger. It will be easier to get on-shore and there are more hex-sides for the Japanese factory cities, so more force can be applied against them.

Like te rest of the non european map play balance will be affected with the new scale. The attacker will benefit greatly by this, I think Japan will play quite differently and an operation olympics will be much easier to perform.

Operation Olympics?

I suppose he meant Olympic.

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

Operation Olympics?

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

Operation Olympics?

Link to maps of Operation Downfall: Land operations against the mainland of Japan (From the US Military Academy: Atlases).

Step 1: Operation Oympic

Step 2: Opeation Coronet

If this is a sort of call-to-arms of the amount of interest a map like this would have, count me in. My gaming group would love to have MWiF scaled maps to use when playing WiFFE. I know for sure that if a bundle of maps like that became available for purchase, we would get *at least* two sets.

I don't have my paper WiF map to hand, but shouldn't Kagoshima be a major port?

ORIGINAL: Earl Uhtred

I don't have my paper WiF map to hand, but shouldn't Kagoshima be a major port?

Where is Kagoshima ?

Kagoshima is in the southern part of Kyushu on the western side of Kagoshima Bay

ORIGINAL: SemperAugustus

Kagoshima is in the southern part of Kyushu on the western side of Kagoshima Bay

I found it on real maps, but not on WiF maps nor MWF maps. I guess it is out of the game.
On the WiF FE maps, Kagoshima is on the same hex than Nagasaki, that's why it is not there. There can't be 2 ports in the same hex.

Do you think that Kagoshima warrants to be on the map because of its portuary installations ?
Anyway, it can't be of more than Minor port Status, as if it had warranted a major port status, ADG would have made NAgasai a major port instead.

Depends really on what criteria you wish to use for inclusion of ports, there are plenty of ports in Japan.
Currently Maizuru is not on the map, it perhaps should be added first

Personally I'd like to se way more cities in Japan, there's only like 7 there now.
As far as I know we haven't had a serious thread on new Japanese cities yet?

More cities would helt the defence of Japan and nothing much else, which would be realistic.
Also, the japanese factories should probably be spread out into more cities?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Japanese_cities_by_population

If we limit ourselves to towns population greater than 200k (there were 40-50 towns bigger than 100 in Japan at this time):

Kawasaki is between Tokyo and Yokohama
Sasebo and Nagasaki would be same hex
Yawata (no city rights until 1977 though) and Kyoto same hex
Kure and Kobe same hex
Fukuoka and Kitakyushu are the same place essentially

(pop in thousands)
City c1940 c1935
Fukuoka 306.8 291.2
Hakodate 203.9 207.5
Hiroshima 344 310.1
Kawasaki 300.7
Kitakyushu 581.7
Kobe 967.2 912.2
Kure 238.2 231.3
Kyoto 1089.7 1080.6
Nagasaki 252.6 211.7
Nagoya 1328.1 1082.8
Osaka 3252.3 2989.9
Sapporo 206.1
Sasebo 206
Sendai 238.3 223.6
Shizuoka 212.2 200.7
Tokyo 6778.8 5875.7
Yawata 261.3 208.6
Yokohama 968.1 704.3

Full list of pop more than 100k (in either 1940 or 1935)
Amagasaki
Fukuoka
Fuse
Gifu
Hakodate
Hamamatsu
Himeji
Hiroshima
Kagoshima
Kanazawa
Kawasaki
Kitakyushu
Kobe
Kochi
Kofu
Kokura
Kumamoto
Kure
Kyoto
Matsuyama
Moji
Muroran
Nagasaki
Nagoya
Niigata
Nishinomiya
Okayama
Omuta
Osaka
Otaru
Sakai
Sapporo
Sasebo
Sendai
Shimonoseki
Shizuoka
Takamatsu
Tokushima
Tokyo
Toyama
Toyohashi
Ube
Wakayama
Yawata
Yokohama
Yokosuka

If you wanted to rearrange the map you could make the following changes:
Add Yokohama (hex SW of Tokyo, port moved to Yokohama),
Add Shizuoka (hex E of Nagoya)
Move Osaka to hex SE of current position
Add Kobe to current Osaka postion (port would remain in hex)

Railroad is also a bit strange in places (arguably I think most of Japan would have rail).
The main line to Sendai should probably be hex NW of Tokyo, next hex NW . You'll probably need to check your atlases for this...

Looking at a 1920s map (it was a lot denser by 1930s):
Railroad in Kyushu:
from Kagoshima to Miyasaki
Kagoshima to Fukuoka and Nagasaki (along the coast)
Fukuoka to Oita (along the coast)
(basically all hexes except for the green hex in SE part of Kyushu)

Railroad in Shikoku
Tokushima to hex NW of Tokushima
Even in modern Japan the railroad doesn't look like the on on the map...

Hokkaido
Railroad from hex NE of Sapporo, SE hex , E hex, Nemuro
From hex w of Nemuro (i.e. same hex as the other railroad) a railroad runs NW, NE

Railroad Honshu (partial info don't have time for everything)
Main line runs from Shimonoseki to Osaka (as on map)
Second line runs from hex NW of Hiroshima to Niigata along the Japan sea coast
Connections between these two -
hex west of current Osaka to hex NW of Osaka
Current Osaka to NW to same hex
another one running in hexes NE of Nagoya all the way to hex SW of Niigata

ORIGINAL: Incy

Personally I'd like to se way more cities in Japan, there's only like 7 there now.
As far as I know we haven't had a serious thread on new Japanese cities yet?

More cities would helt the defence of Japan and nothing much else, which would be realistic.
Also, the japanese factories should probably be spread out into more cities?

As for adding cities and / or ports in Japan, why not, what do the others think about this ?
As for spreading the Japanese factories, I prefer not to do this, as this would change the strategic bombardement "target" aspect of Japan, but, why not too ?

What are the others' opinions ?

As for the railways that SemperAugustus described in poset #58, I fully agree with him (after also looking yesterday at the 1944 Collier Atlas) that the railways are not very well depicted.

I will make the changes as he describes, and also checking on the atlas.

Also, do you think that the STRAITS hexsides between the southen Japanese home islands should also have railways that allow rail moves between islands ? I already added one between Fukuoka and Hiroshima, but was wondering for all others.

If you wanted to rearrange the map you could make the following changes:
Add Yokohama (hex SW of Tokyo, port moved to Yokohama),
Add Shizuoka (hex E of Nagoya)
Move Osaka to hex SE of current position
Add Kobe to current Osaka postion (port would remain in hex)

Not having a major port in Tokyo is a problem for me.