Why are there no Chinese bases further than Sining?

[BlackVoid]

I do not think map edges are any problem.

West Coast - not possible to take by Japan
India - very hard to do, if allied player is prepared
NZ - too far for Japan and probaly not worth, Japan already threatens supply lines to Oz by taking Noumea. And taking NZ would close supply from US anyway (in real life too).

House rules or self restriction by Japan for these objectives would mean that allied players can just empty these areas and move all forces someplace else. If there is no threat of a japanese landing in India, all troops from India can be moved to Burma. Same with west coast, NZ, OZ. If there is no credible threat against these points, then the allies have an even greater advantage.

Russia - allies should be able to move. Until then, very unfair strategy to attack here.

China - its in the game, Japan has tons of troops here, I am very surprised that the developers thought ANY player would do nothing here. The benefit of having all those troops for something else is just too great. If its a stalemate, better remove the whole thing, maybe except for the coast where Japan can have production and base forces.

I also think the game should be about different strategies. If one theater is broken, then better not put it in at all. It is already bad enough with Russia... War and strategy is about deploying your troops the best way possible. Make good choices, find the weakest point of the enemy.

[moses]

You ever think that perhaps the players who simply want to play a free for all without regards to history might be the ones broken and not the game itself?

Now this is just ridiculus. You have a whole chunk of map with lots of units and air forces and then if we we do the obvious logical things with these forces "we" are broken. No one is doing anything gamey. I have 20 divisions in China so I mass them at Changsa and boom it falls and it turns out that I burned almost no supply and taken almost no casualties. So I march my army to another city and it falls in the same way. Soon all of China is conquered and you say its my fault for playing ahistorically.

[BlackVoid]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

If the Yanks and Brits really considered Japan that much of a threat, don't you think that Japan would have taken Priority over Germany? Remember, Germany had already lost the Battle of Britain so they were not going any further.

Hmm.... If Russia falls, germans would be all over the place, probably taking Egypt, Iraq and probably even Britain.

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag
This is a war game, not a strategy game.

War is about strategy (on this level). If there is no strategy then it is not a wargame. RTS games have no strategy or very little. This game is all about strategy already (even without China and India).

[WiTP_Dude]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

Could you be a little more dramatic with your posts? They are just not quite there yet! [:D]

Yes, if you insist. [:D]

You ever think that perhaps the players who simply want to play a free for all without regards to history might be the ones broken and not the game itself?

No, I don't. The game should reflect the historical situation. If it doesn't, that isn't any player's fault. It just means the game hasn't been perfected yet.

Japan went to war for one reason: Oil to prevent the complete collapse of their economy

Yes, Japan went to war with the Western Powers in December 1941 for that purpose. That doesn't explain why they took Indo-China from the French though because that occured before the embargo. They were looking to expand their influence and power over all of Asia in the long run. This is the clear long-term goal of Japan, to be the foremost power in the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia. Of course the United States and other countries didn't want this to happen so war was inevitable.

Overlooking that and pretending otherwise due to that "I must win at all costs" mentality is really rather pointless. This is a war game, not a strategy game. I think sometimes people forget that at times.

The point of a war is to win at all costs, especially this war. Otherwise Japan is going to get firebombed back to the stone age. Why would any Japanese player want that to happen?

Now you all paid for the game and that entitles you to play the game as you see fit. If you want to completely ignore history, feel free. Just don't expect the history buffs to sit back and agree with things like conquering China.

It doesn't take much in the game to secure the oil and a few islands in the Pacific. There is still plenty left to conquer Asia. The history buffs are right; it shouldn't be too easy to conquer China.

If the Yanks and Brits really considered Japan that much of a threat, don't you think that Japan would have taken Priority over Germany? Remember, Germany had already lost the Battle of Britain so they were not going any further.

I agree.

I'm sure we can adjust the VP around so the fall of China & India still doesn't win the game ... then what will you do? Go back and fight for the Pacific? [:)]

Again, I don't see the difficulty of doing the Pacific thing. Grab all those empty bases in New Guinea and the Solomons. Grab Tarawa. Mission accomplished by February 1942. Not too difficult and you still have several dozen brigades and divisions doing nothing...

[moses]

Real easy to fix Asia. 1.) Make casualties in the combat reports match actual killed squads in the units. 2.) Everytime an artillery piece fires burn off a supply pt. (Might also help if bombardment attacks are adjusted up into the realm of plausability).

Now I can still take China if I want but I'll end up losing a 100,000 or so troops and burn a bunch of the supply pool.

This would make island combat more realistic as well.

[WiTP_Dude]

A more "bloody" combat and bombardment routine has been discussed for months but it doesn't appear likely that it will be added. Also there are draw backs, like making the Chinese even weaker since their artillery is subpar and they have little supply as it is without having to expend extra on bombardments.

Others have discussed making the odds of succesful victory in combat higher, like 4-1 or even 10-1. Again, there are drawbacks to this as well.

[Andy Mac]

I think we need to wait and see the results of a few PBEM games under 1.4 before jumping to conclusions.

I think the consensus is that its possibly a tad to easy under 1.3 to conquer China either by concentration or other reasons. (I am not conviced it is as I have only lost China in one game)

More forts
some free supply
more units
better xp at start

are all things that can be done to fix it if its still broken I have yet to be convinced it is.

Re India I want my opponents to attack India having read wobb v pzb I will never overcommit to Burma and be caught again.

India is perfectly secure IF the allied player plays defensively and sensibly only if the allies reinforce Burma or Malaya or strip India bare does it become anything but a nasty pit fight for the Japanese. The Japanese end up fighting the weakest allied power but making it fight on its terms defensively with space to trade for time allowing it to use its short range fighters and bombers to bleed a Japanese offensive.

Please please attack me here !!!!

Russia only seen one AAR attacking russia and never had it done to me so I withhold comment on this one.

Andy

[Mr.Frag]

A more "bloody" combat and bombardment routine has been discussed for months but it doesn't appear likely that it will be added.

Actually, you have that one completely backwards ... combat has been made less bloody as it was happening too fast. Making it bloody'er would just result in total conquest even faster.

[WiTP_Dude]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

Actually, you have that one completely backwards ... combat has been made less bloody as it was happening too fast. Making it bloody'er would just result in total conquest even faster.

Well you have a point, but the problem comes when the losing defender takes a lot of losses while the winning attacker is still nearly at 100% effectiveness.

[Mr.Frag]

It doesn't take much in the game to secure the oil and a few islands in the Pacific.

It doesn't take much to secure them? I'm sure the Allies might disagree with you on that point. If it was so easy, this thread would be about Oz instead of China [:D]

[moses]

No. Currently, defender takes most casualties while he is retreating. Attacker takes negligible casualties. Adding casualties during non-decisive combat shifts the ratio of losses in favor of the defender. You can remove the negative effects of this change on the defender simply by making retreats a little less bloody.

The goal should be that a major offensive by Japan in China, Russia, India, Burma, should cost SOMETHING. As is it can be done virtually for free. This is the root cause of all the problems in these theaters. Victory is so cheap that there is no reason not to conduct the campaign.

[WiTP_Dude]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

It doesn't take much to secure them? I'm sure the Allies might disagree with you on that point. If it was so easy, this thread would be about Oz instead of China [:D]

Not a good argument as to why ground combat doesn't work.

[WiTP_Dude]

ORIGINAL: moses

The goal should be that a major offensive by Japan in China, Russia, India, Burma, should cost SOMETHING. As is it can be done virtually for free. This is the root cause of all the problems in these theaters. Victory is so cheap that there is no reason not to conduct the campaign.

I guess there is a difference of opinion as to what this game actually covers. According to the two Matrix moderators, these theaters basically aren't really in play. Mogami limits himself to staying east of the railroad in China nor does he attack India or Siberia. A simple solution to this problem if you are only interested in the Pacific and Indian oceans. If you actually want to fight in these areas, you have to just accept that the results will be ahistorical.

[Mr.Frag]

Not a good argument as to why ground combat doesn't work.

Theres your basic problem ... China is not about ground combat. We all know Japan could pretty much take what she wanted at that point in time. That's never in dispute. The issue is that there really wasn't any point to doing so. All it did was strip manpower that was required elsewhere.

The problem seems to be that Japan is getting rewarded for what amounts to a waste of time. I understand your arguement about "well, i have all these troops here, and I can" perfectly well. That basically tells me that there is too much supply available. You should be sitting back scratching your head and saying to yourself ... I can't go any further or China will clean my clock because I have no supply left.

[ChezDaJez]

Japan went to war for one reason: Oil to prevent the complete collapse of their economy

That's true... in part.

The United States and her allies were pressing Japan to leave China. Japan wouldn't so we imposed an embargo. It was this embargo that resulted in the loss of resources and caused Japan to go to war with the US. Prior to that she could get all the oil and resources she needed.

So why did they invade China then? To gain more resources and territory to enhance their "Greater Co-Prosperity Sphere" or whatever they called it. They didn't believe the West would interfere... and we didn't for a long time.

China was the basis, directly and indirectly, for the entire war in the Pacific. That it became a stalemate there was due to certain strategic decisions on both sides. Japan had the capability to win the war in China but they chose not to as they turned their attention removing the embargo through force.

IMO, the game does a decent job of modeling naval and air combat. But it has been noted many times that the land combat model does not reflect reality. That isn't the fault of the gamer, rather the fault of the designer that attempted to impart an artificial limitation. The theory seemed to be that if a realistic land combat model wasn't incorporated, then the gamer wouldn't want to use it.

Steve

[Tom Hunter]

I am only up to February 1942 in my PBEM game but I see no sign of China going away. I have already encircled my opponent once (my other game has a quiet China house rule) he broke out but I am working on it again. Yenan has close to 100k troops and many units at 100%, there is a major battle going on at Wuchow that is gradually turning the Chinese army into battle hardened veterans.

I have units all over the rail line, the net effect is that Japan moves North South on foot just like the Chinese.

I don't know what i am doing but I do bombard or deliberate attack just about every turn. So far lots of people are dead and things look fine.

I read a lot about China falling but I really don't understand why. Blackwatch and I are both new to the game but I am a veteran grognard and he is beating me up pretty well so the guy is obviously no slouch.

Is the problem with China the Chinese ob or is it lack of effort by the allied players?

[Zeta16]

ORIGINAL: ChezDaJez



China was the basis, directly and indirectly, for the entire war in the Pacific. That it became a stalemate there was due to certain strategic decisions on both sides. Japan had the capability to win the war in China but they chose not to as they turned their attention removing the embargo through force.


Steve

If they could win why didn't they win before 12/41. In reading books about Japan before the war with the west the emporer keep asking why they had not meet their (Army) goals in China yet. The army kept saying they needed more time and resources (men and such) to fight. The books also in way says that they were after oil and such in the SRA, but the army saw these new battles as a way to save face.

I just do see how Japan could defeat china, when they tried as hard as they could for a few years and could not do it.

[mogami]

Hi, The US embargo was a result of Japans going into Indo China
The Japanese went into Indo China to cut off outside aid getting to China
The Japanese needed to cut off outside aid to China because as long as it kept coming the Chinese would not agree to let Japan stay in China.
The Japanese needed the Chinese to agree to peace because they were unable to defeat them.

I am not against Japanese players trying to defeat China.
What I oppose is where they make the plan to push the Chinese off the map and then redeploy units. The more of China Japan takes the more troops will be needed just to hold it. Japan had 1,000,000 troops in China in Dec 1941. If they take all of China they will need another 1,000,000 to occupy it.
Since the game does not recreate this I don't do it.
I'm not as opposed as I sound to Japan taking cities for points. I oppose the notion that even the most favorable outcome in China will free up units or in any way aid Japan in winning the Pacific War against the USA. Plans that base success on this are in my opinion exploiting the game. It might be our fault (designers and testers) that this is possible but now at least you know we don't advocate such a course when playing the game.

In the end, if you enjoy it and are having fun doing it then by all means go for it. I'm more interested in your knowing the actual history then in how you play a game.

[moses]

Here's an interesting fact form my game with WITP_Dude to add to the discusion:

I now have 14 divisions in Chungking as Japan. These are for the most part units which took Changsa in Dec. Attacked down the rail line fighting repeated actions against the chinese forces. They finally made it to wuchow where the fought a protracted battle for that city. Then they redeploed back toward the river crossing near changsa, went off road for a while to flank the enemy positions and finally defeated the Chinese force there. They march north from here to Chungking and have been fighting there for 4 or 5 days. It is late april 1942.

I just checked their status. All are within a squad or two of MTOE strength. My worst division has 13 disrupted squads!!!

Really I'm not trying to make people mad but this is a problem in my opinion. I think it should be possible to defeat China and I think that once you do so you should be able to benifit from such a victory. But after such a protracted campaign my troops should be at the point of utter exhaustion. Really at some point prior to my troops reaching Chungking, it should have been neccessary for me to pause for at least a week or two in order to regain disruption, morale, replace squads, or something. But I have moved pretty much non-stop with no ill-effects.

[Mr.Frag]

But I have moved pretty much non-stop with no ill-effects.

Yep, as I said, that shows you have far too much supply available to keep replacements coming in as fast as you can loose them. As I asked before, is this based on 1.3 or 1.4 scenario as they are quite different.