World in Flames is the computer version of Australian Design Group classic board game. World In Flames is a highly detailed game covering the both Europe and Pacific Theaters of Operations during World War II. If you want grand strategy this game is for you.
New topic: Has there been any discussion of the navigability of the Yangtze? We know from the Yangtse Incident that warships routinely went upstream at least as far as Nanking, and I suspect could have gone to Hankow. Apart from the fact that the Yangtze was (and is) a major obstacle to any army, comparable to the Amazon, the reason I ask is ...
I have been cataloguing what the resource hexes were actually producing, and there are two stark anomalies in China. First, nothing of any significance came from 1 SW of Suchow (a tiny coalfield). Secondly, China is missing the massive Tayeh iron mines which should be 1 SE, or better at the top-right of 2 SE, of Wuhan. These mines were the source of the bulk of the iron ore exported from Classical China during the occupation.
If the Yangtze were shown as navigable as far as Lake Poyang, then we could shift the incorrect Suchow resource to 2 SE Wuhan and that iron could be taken straight out to sea, as was done historically. This also has the great benefit of giving the KMT a target worth launching an offensive to capture, and giving some meaning to the battles around Changsha.
For the navigability of the Yangzi for ocean going vessels: No problem from Shanghai to at least Hankow. From then on steam driven or "traditional" river boats were used to Sichuan. AFIR after Ichang it became more difficult (3 gorges etc.). Around 1900 there was an inofficial contest between international ship lines to go to Sichuan by steam boat.
For redoing the placement of ressources I would need to check out I few things. Not sure when. Not sure Patrice will like too many changes.
Perhaps we can perfect the map. One the other hand even then it still will be a representation and an interpretation and not perfect reality.
Pescadores: There should be a port here. It was a significant Japanese naval base. "'A second force (Rear-Adm Hara) with the cruiser Natori, the destroyers Fumitsuki, Satsuki, Nagatsuki, Minatsuki, Harukaze and Hatakaze, three minsweepers, nine submarine-chasers and six transports, sets out on 7 Dec from Mako (Pescadores) and lands 2000 troops of an advanced detachment of the 14th Army near Aparri on the N coast of Luzon early on 10 Dec".
I haven't seen a map of the Kuriles, but I presume you have included a port at Hitokappu (I think the island's name was Etorofu), from where the Pearl Harbor strike force set off.
Location of resources in China: I have had this nagging sense of unease about the effect of changing the scale in China, and I have finally been able to pin it down. The relationship which needs to be retained is the distance of a Japanese-held resource from the KMT front-line.
At the start of WiF FE, two resources, the ones either side of Taiyuan, start the game in the front-line and so, in theory at least, could be captured by the KMT or CCP with a single lucky attack. In MWiF, one is now two hexes away, the other three. It seems to me that the prospect of China conceivably denying Japan one or two resources is what makes an Allied Burma Road gift to the KMT justifiable. With all resources now behind the lines, this justification disappears ... and/or the Japanese player does not feel immediately pressured.
I realise now that it was the desire to correct this and get at least one Japanese resource into the front-line which was the subconscious motive for suggesting the Taiyeh iron mines be included. At the moment, I don't see that there is any target hurtful to Japan that the Chinese player can realistically hope to capture.
In 1939 neither the KMT nor the CCP have the strength to attack Japan and seize resources in WiF:FE, even if the resources are on the front line. The Japanese have nothing to fear from China in WiF:FE until 43 at the earliest - and that is only if you are playing with Limited Overseas Supply and the Americans have been rather lucky. There is a resource that the Chinese can stop from being shipped with their ZoCs from the start of the game until the Japanese clear out the threatening hex.
Otherwise, the Chinese have little they can do until about 1944, when they will have superiority in numbers of land units and probably air superiority in the theatre as well.
In MWiF, the larger scale of the map tends to give Japan an advantage in maneouvrability early in the game, and the Chinese are probably asking to get isolated and destoyed in detail if they deploy to ZoC resources at the start.
However, turnabout is fair play, and the Chinese can turn around and really stick it to Japan (which in 43-44 is hurting for land units to fill lines) on the new map scale in the second half of the game, especially since the slow Chinese can move around without disorganizing after a single hex.
While the new map scale presents opportunities for a more historically accurate Chinese campaign, a lot of how it works in MWiF (units, factories, the CCP "military", the ahistorical moving frontline vs. the historical stalemate, big KMT airforce) is based on WiF:FE, and here my impression is that Harry Rowland and the WiF:FE design team have deliberately opted for a less historical Chinese campaign for the sake of a more playable (and most importantly, a more fun) China.
In 1939 neither the KMT nor the CCP have the strength to attack Japan and seize resources in WiF:FE, even if the resources are on the front line. The Japanese have nothing to fear from China in WiF:FE until 43 at the earliest - and that is only if you are playing with Limited Overseas Supply and the Americans have been rather lucky. There is a resource that the Chinese can stop from being shipped with their ZoCs from the start of the game until the Japanese clear out the threatening hex.
Otherwise, the Chinese have little they can do until about 1944, when they will have superiority in numbers of land units and probably air superiority in the theatre as well.
In MWiF, the larger scale of the map tends to give Japan an advantage in maneouvrability early in the game, and the Chinese are probably asking to get isolated and destoyed in detail if they deploy to ZoC resources at the start.
However, turnabout is fair play, and the Chinese can turn around and really stick it to Japan (which in 43-44 is hurting for land units to fill lines) on the new map scale in the second half of the game, especially since the slow Chinese can move around without disorganizing after a single hex.
While the new map scale presents opportunities for a more historically accurate Chinese campaign, a lot of how it works in MWiF (units, factories, the CCP "military", the ahistorical moving frontline vs. the historical stalemate, big KMT airforce) is based on WiF:FE, and here my impression is that Harry Rowland and the WiF:FE design team have deliberately opted for a less historical Chinese campaign for the sake of a more playable (and most importantly, a more fun) China.
The one comment from Harry that sticks in my mind, is that WIF players always attack, while historically, the powers that be did mostly not atttack in China (true for both sides).
That they could have attacked at lot more is likely. And the whole premise of WIF is to provide the ability to see "what if". So, when you put together the possibility of attacking, with war gamers' 'natural' bloodlust, you get a vastly ahistorical war in China. Some optional rules attempt to address this (e.g., Chinese attack weakness, restrictions on Warlords), but without imposing a virtual straitjacket of rules on players, a historical reenactment in China is unlikely.
Location of resources in China: I have had this nagging sense of unease about the effect of changing the scale in China, and I have finally been able to pin it down. The relationship which needs to be retained is the distance of a Japanese-held resource from the KMT front-line.
At the start of WiF FE, two resources, the ones either side of Taiyuan, start the game in the front-line and so, in theory at least, could be captured by the KMT or CCP with a single lucky attack. In MWiF, one is now two hexes away, the other three. It seems to me that the prospect of China conceivably denying Japan one or two resources is what makes an Allied Burma Road gift to the KMT justifiable. With all resources now behind the lines, this justification disappears ... and/or the Japanese player does not feel immediately pressured.
I realise now that it was the desire to correct this and get at least one Japanese resource into the front-line which was the subconscious motive for suggesting the Taiyeh iron mines be included. At the moment, I don't see that there is any target hurtful to Japan that the Chinese player can realistically hope to capture.
The resources in China were nearly untouched from CWiF, so come from the early days of the design of CWiF, in which Harry participated. We only made sure that each resource had the same possibility for the Japanese to be brought back to home. We did not consider the possibility of the Chinese to take these resources back, which is nearly non existent in WiF FE until at least 43-44. By this date in MWiF, I think that the Chinese will be able to do harm to the Japanese, and even get back some resources.
I don't really want to change that, as there are a lot of natural resources in China and you might be able to place some at various places.
Some data and a short reflexion on factories and resources in China. But don't expect an easy answer. I prefer to lay out some facts for discussion how/if to implement.
Resources and factories in China proper (without Manchuria and Formosa):
As far I can see on the MWIF map there are 14 factories (4 of them red) and 11 Ressources
Ressources:
1 (3 hexes E of Paotow)
1 (3 hexes NE of Chengchow)
1 Sian
1 (2 hexes NW of Lanchow)
1 (SW of Suchow)
1 Chengtu
2 Chungking
1 (SW of Changsha)
1 (2 hexes SW of Kweilin)
1 Kunming
Hope, I didn’t leave out something.
A few facts and figures about Chinese war economy:
In the 1930s Chinas share (without Formosa) of global output ammounted to:
0,5 % of iron ore (2 Mio to. per annum) The most important iron mines seemed to be Pinghsiang (1 hex SE of Changsha), the areas of Nanking, Wuhan and Taiyuan, the Mouth of Yellow river (Northern Route), and the coastal hex East of Peking
1,6% of coal (25,7 Mio to. p.a.) Most of Chinese coal is not in deep mines but in extensive shallow fields. The provinces with the highest number of big coal fields were: Shensi (11), Shantung and Liaoning (6 each), Anhui (3)
0,00008% of petroleum
Practically all iron and coaking coal for heavy industry purposes was imported.
(Source: Tang leang-Li, The Reconstruction of China, Shanghai 1935, pp. 50-52, Map 2.)
In the 1930’s and 1940’s Chinas’ most important raw material exports were
tungsten (37,7% of world production, used for machine tools, armour plates armour piercing shells)
antimony (22% of world production, used as lead hardener)
cotton (10% of world production)
(Source Oxford companion of WW2, pp 1063.)
In the 1930s The KMT regime under Chiang tried to prepare for the coming war with Japan. With German help (Seeckt, Falkenhausen, IG Farben, Junkers), it tried to transform itself into a technocratic development dictatorship. It started to plan and build up a huge ressource and defence bureaucracy and centralized heavy industry in the Hinterland (mainly Hunan, Kiangsi, less in Szechwan). The German advisors esp. pressed for a Chinese industry for small infantry weapons, in case all the exports would stop due to Japanese possession of coastal China.
(Source: Fu Pao-jen Military advisors and German assistance for Chinese Industrialization, in B. martin (ed) The german advisory group in China, Freiburg 1981.)
After the war started in 1937, 639 factories (110.000 tons) and some 43.000 skilled workers were moved to the hinterland, including 230 machine making plants and the equipment of the arsenals in Wuhan and Shanghai. Big problem was: Where’s the hinterland? Thus Free China established a improvised refugee industry, which makes the SU industry exodus look like a perfect planned and executed maneuver.
The Free Chinese hinterland was economical underdeveloped to say the least. Before the war only 4% of the industrial capital went to Szechwan. Till 1938 the regime lost 63% of its tax income but the expeditures rose 33%.
Free China held only 10% of the industrial output of China (including Manchuria). Its production peak was in 1943 (but only 12% of the prewar output of China proper).
In 1944, it produced 49.000 kilowatts (Occupied China: 642.000 kilowatts, Manchuria 600.000 kw).
In 1944 the Kansu Petroleum production and refining Administration was by far the most important oil producer in China. It produced 20 Mio. gallons crude Petroleum (7 Mio. gallons gas, diesel, kerosene) using innovative native technology. In 1943 642.000 gallons were refined from vegetable oil and from trees.
In 1943 Free China produced 10.000 to. of steel (10% of the prewar output).
The numbers for tungsten are 16.000 to (1937) and 9.000 to (1943).
(Source William C. Kirby, The Chinese War economy, in Hsiung/Levine: China’s Bitter Victory, London 1992.)
Bottom line:
It’s not so easy to model the refugee economy in wartime China, mainly for 3 reasons:
1. MWIF uses a static map with fixed ressources and factories.
2. Resources and factories are hex-bound. This fits good to the centralized economy of the industrialized world of WW2, but less good to the decentralized realities for “underdeveloped” China (dispersed industry, coal fields).
3. Under wartime circumstances, not few so called Maps about war time China tended to still represent the prewar situation (lots of heavy Industry in Shanghai and Canton).
Wosung, your economic data is really good stuff! I too have been assembling data for the whole Pacific area, but I'll start a new thread for that tomorrow.
In the meantime, I wanted to ask opinions about the resource 1SW Suchow. I see that until 3 June 2006 it was 1NE Nanking, and it was moved to its new position when the rail-line was moved.
I hope very much that Patrice will be incorporating the Yellow River as per Post 552 (without the old northern course), as I do think that green map is very persuasive. But a new awkwardness is that 1SW Suchow is going to be on the wrong side of the river.
I do think it is important that the Japanese resources in China be spread out, so that late in the game Japan cannot shorten its perimeter without paying some resource penalty. As things stand, the course of the new Yellow River will give Japan a fall-back position late in the game with all resources within the protective cordon.
I mentioned in an earlier post that the great Tayeh iron mines are missing, and while I appreciate that the original resource location cannot be tampered with too much, I would like to see that resource as close to Nanking, even in Nanking, as possible. (Well okay I'd like to see it southwest of Nanking, but I know I'm not going to get that...!)
ORIGINAL: marcuswatney Pescadores: There should be a port here. It was a significant Japanese naval base. "'A second force (Rear-Adm Hara) with the cruiser Natori, the destroyers Fumitsuki, Satsuki, Nagatsuki, Minatsuki, Harukaze and Hatakaze, three minsweepers, nine submarine-chasers and six transports, sets out on 7 Dec from Mako (Pescadores) and lands 2000 troops of an advanced detachment of the 14th Army near Aparri on the N coast of Luzon early on 10 Dec".
Well, I'm not sure it is significant enought to warrant a port. Maybe another sheltered gathering area ?
It is totaly unnecessary to change the Pescadores Islands because there is already a major port in the sea zone.
If you change the Pescadores Islands you have to upgrade Palau Island.
"Operation M" (The Attack on the Philippines December 1941). The Japanese 3 Fleet Philippine Seizure Force was made up of 4 Surprise Attack forces, the Close Cover Force, and the South Philippines Support Force. The 1st Surprise Attack force departed Formosa for landings at Aparri and Lingayen. Consisting of the Natori (CL), 6 destroyers, a seaplane tender, and 6 transports. The 2nd Surprise Attack force departed the Formosa for landings at Vigan and Caba. Consisting of the Naka (CL), 7 destroyers, and 6 transports. in the Philippines. The 3rd Surprise Attack force departed Formosa for landings at the Batan Islands (not to be confused with the Bataan peninsula). Consisting of a destroyer and several small craft.
The Legaspi or Fourth Surprise Attack Force departed the Palau Islands for landings at Davao, Legaspi, and Jolo in the Philippines. Consisting of the Nagara (CL), 4 destroyers, and 7 transports.
The Close Cover Force departed the Palau Islands to provide surface cover for the landings in the Philippines. Consisting of the Nachi (CA), Myoko (CA), Haguro (CA), Jintsu (CL), and 8 destroyers.
The South Philippines Support Force departed the Palau Islands to provide air cover for the landings in the Southern Philippines. Consisting of the Ryûjô (CVL), the seaplane carriers Chitose and Mizuho, and a destroyer.
But please also consider the Pescadores (Mako), which I think were more than a gathering point. I believe they were used regularly throughout the war as a naval base, like Truk. I suspect the Japanese developed the Pescadores to keep military preparations secret from the enquiring eyes of the indigenous Chinese people of Formosa.
Also, the naval base on Hainan from where the invasion force set off was at the south end of the island, and called Samah.
Well, these places (Mako in Pescadores, and Samah in Hainan) are not found when searched on Wikipedia (Samah is found when Googled, but not many times). I doubt they are as important as Truk was. Moreover, there is each time a minor port in the adjacent hex, that I believe can be assumed to represent that port that you ask.
Could someone please post the names, locations and allegiance of all warlords, please? I caught a glimpse of a list in one post, and thought I saw a ghost.
Here is the rerouting of the Yellow River to its natural southern course. One small touch up to the graphics is needed NE of Chengchow. Graphics by Patrice.
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Here is the rerouting of the Yellow River to its natural southern course. One small touch up to the graphics is needed NE of Chengchow. Graphics by Patrice.
Indeed, I left the start of the old flowing on purpose. This show that it was here previously, and as it is the same hexside as the one flowing southeast it adds no river hexside.
it does give the impression of a double-river hexside...
My problem with the stub end of the pre-1938 Yellow River is that it is both unique in the game and not obvious as to what it means. More importantly, it is using the river color/graphic which has a very precise, and important, meaning for game play.
