Japan Map

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Froonp

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.

Railroad corrections, definitely; even when they cross straits, probably.

I am not so sure about revising the Japanese ports and cities from WIFFE. Tha addiitonal cities we added in the USSR and China were driven primarily by problems keeping units in supply, and to a lesser degree, providing the Chinese with some better defensive hexes. I do not see a comparable situation in Japan.

[SemperAugustus]

How about the Maizuru port (i.e. port in the Kyoto hex on the Japan sea coast)? It was a major military port and naval yard in Japan (along with Sasebo, Yokozuka and Kure).

[composer99]

I don't have my WiF:FE maps on hand, but if memory serves, there is no invadable clear hex in Japan (at least not in the south) where there is not also a city. The US will have a great deal less trouble getting ashore in Japan with the new scale for this and for other reasons. I think that some added cities here and there will be necessary to help the Japanese defence (or at least hinder the Allied onslaught). They will not have any other impact on the game, after all. Finally, we have decided to add cities to help both the Chinese and Soviet defence in the expanded Asia-Pacific areas. Sauce for the gander, sauce for the goose.
 
As for shifting factories around, my first thought would be not to do it, but then again, usually by the time the US gets air units in range to strat bomb Japan it usually doesn't need to do it (having mostly dealt with the Japanese convoys by then). Besides, spreading the factories around will make it harder for Japan to adequately cover them.

[lomyrin]

In the context of not changing from the WiFFE game any more than absolutely necessary, the differences caused by the game scale in the Pacific areas do suggest some changes to maintain some sort of equilibrium with activity, invasion, and fighting problems in MWiF that are different from those in WiFFE.
 
To that extent I would support a few additional cities in Japan. I would not like to see the Tokyo major port relocated even if it makes historical sense.
 
Lars

[sajbalk]

The only reason that Japan needs more cities is for its own defense against an earlier US invasion. There will not be enough land units to cover the coasts, as in WiFFE. Thus MWiF needs a few more cities both to ensure assault attacks (once the armored marines get in the game) and the extra notional (often increased via shore bomb. or ground support).

As to moving factories -- sure, why not. The total will remain the same but we are now allwoing 4 hexes or so in place of the 1.

The citires, however, are the bigger concern.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: SemperAugustus

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

Following you advice, and looking at the Collier 1944 Atlas, I modified Japan as follow :
- More rails (except in Shikoku, where there are less rails).
- Osaka moved (still placed at the sea area boundaries intersections).
- Kure added (city + major port).
- Yokohama added (city + major port).

For the rails, its true that there are a lot of rails in WWII Japan, and I'm even sure that there are not enough in the north of Honshu.

For the added cities, I think that it is OK to add them because they help making these area "city dense" as they are in WiF FE, though not as city dense (in WiF FE, there is 1 city per hex on the southern shores of Honshu).

For the added ports that go with those cities, I made them major ports, because it does not add feature to Japan. If you think they should be minor, please tell me.

It looks like this (South part)

[Froonp]

Northern Japan looks like this :
Opinions ?

[lomyrin]

Looks good to me.
 
Lars

[Shannon V. OKeets]

I trust the forum readers more familiar with Japan geography than I, will review these changes closely.

I have only 3 comments.
1 - the straits south of Yokohama doesn't make much sense. Should there be even more straits connections thereabouts?
2 - the rail line west of Kyoto should be lowered within the hex (position 6 or 18).
3 - the rail line SE of Nagasaki should be centered (poistion 25).

You did mean Kobe instead of Kure, didn't you?

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

I trust the forum readers more familiar with Japan geography than I, will review these changes closely.

I have only 3 comments.
1 - the straits south of Yokohama doesn't make much sense. Should there be even more straits connections thereabouts?
2 - the rail line west of Kyoto should be lowered within the hex (position 6 or 18).
3 - the rail line SE of Nagasaki should be centered (poistion 25).

You did mean Kobe instead of Kure, didn't you?

For the straits, I think they make sense, given the modernized Japan and the high level of the transportatin system.

For the ports I've added (Yokohama and Kobe), I'm tempted to make the Minor ports after all (from a game point of view, to give them less interest, especially to the allies), but I have no historical material to back this up. What are the opinions of the people who know Japan better than me ?

I'm also tempted to make Kagoshima (mountain hex SE of Nagasaki) a minor port. Opinions ?

[Peter Stauffenberg]

ORIGINAL: Froonp

Maybe it's possible to add the Japanese city of Kitakyushu. It's located in
the clear hex east of Fukuoka. That gives the Japanese a better chance of defending
this clear hex. Kitakyushu is a major city with a population today of more than
1 million inhabitants. I guess it's also an important port.

I also support adding the minor port of Kagoshima in the mountain hex SE of
Nagasaki.

Kobe was one of the major Japanese industrial cities. Is it possible to move maybe
1 factory from Osaka (3 now) to Kobe?

The same applies to Yokohama. Is it possible to move 1 factory from Tokyo to
Yokohama?

I don't think either of these changes go against the original WIFFE map. It showed
Japan using the Asian map scale. Using the European map scale the WIFFE city
of Tokyo is represented by both Yokohama and Tokyo. So it's only natural the
factories are split into both hexes too. The same applies to Kobe / Osaka.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Borger Borgersen
Maybe it's possible to add the Japanese city of Kitakyushu. It's located in
the clear hex east of Fukuoka. That gives the Japanese a better chance of defending
this clear hex. Kitakyushu is a major city with a population today of more than
1 million inhabitants. I guess it's also an important port.

I also support adding the minor port of Kagoshima in the mountain hex SE of
Nagasaki.

Kobe was one of the major Japanese industrial cities. Is it possible to move maybe
1 factory from Osaka (3 now) to Kobe?

The same applies to Yokohama. Is it possible to move 1 factory from Tokyo to
Yokohama?

I don't think either of these changes go against the original WIFFE map. It showed
Japan using the Asian map scale. Using the European map scale the WIFFE city
of Tokyo is represented by both Yokohama and Tokyo. So it's only natural the
factories are split into both hexes too. The same applies to Kobe / Osaka.

I'm reluctant to change the factories in Tokyo, because it is the capital of Japan.

I added Kagoshima as a minor port, but no more cities. I already have added 2 (out of 8 originaly), I think this is already good. Those I added in the center of Japan are added because of the high density of cities there, and to higher the defensive capacity of this critic part of Japan. I'm reluctant to add more elswhere.

I saw that the list of 100k+ population is larger than what is shown on this map, but maybe the ADG chose 200k for the Japanese cities, because Japanese cities were quite brittle at that time (mostly built of wood), but I may be wrong, this is just a personal thought.

[Froonp]

I added some rails to the north of Honshu, and I think this is accurate now.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

I agree with Borger: (1) adding Kitakyushu and (2) moving a Tokyo factory to Yokohama.

Comparing the WIF FE map to the current MWIF and considering the conquest of Japan, the placement of the factories is very important. Conquest requires capturing all the factory hexes in the home country.

WIFFE
- 7 factory hexes: 4 in forest, 2 in clear and 1 in mountain.
- 6 of the factories are concentrated into one area where the Japanese player can use units defending one factory hex to counterattack an adjacent factory hex.
- reinforcements can be placed in the 6 continuous factory/city hexes and defensive units rearranged to optimize strength levels in each hex.
- there are no clear hexes to invade in Japan, except for the 2 city/factory hexes. Almost all non-city hexes are mountains, making invasion very difficult.

MWIF
- 8 factory hexes: 1 in forest, 4 in clear, and 3 in mountain (ground strikes are much easier).
- 4 of the factory hexes are in a concentrated group, while 4 are isolated. Mutual support is drastically reduced.
- redeploying units between reinforcement arrival locations (i.e., cities) and factory hexes is much harder. An invader has several places where he can split the defenders and take them out piecemeal.
- 7 new clear terrain hexes to invade, 6 of these are adjacent to factory hexes.

So, while the individual factory hexes have become harder to take (more mountains) the places to start the invasion are numerous. I don't see how Japan can cover all the invasion hexes with units (they use to be able to do that with 7 units). The increased opportunity for succesful ground strikes and the inability of the defender to rearrange units between factory hexes is of tremendous help to the invader.

Adding a city and splitting a factory off from Tokyo will make the invader's task a little harder. Purely from a gaming point of view, adding a city to the clear hex east of Hiroshima looks reasonable.

These proposed changes still leave the invader with a better position to start an invasion, but adds somewhat to his task once he gets ashore.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
I agree with Borger: (1) adding Kitakyushu and (2) moving a Tokyo factory to Yokohama.

(1) I don't know where SemperAugustus got his figures for Japanese cities in 1935 & 1940, but Wikipedia says that "The city of Kitakyushu was founded on February 10, 1963 and was designated on April 1, 1963 by government ordinance. It resulted from the amalgamation of five cities, Moji, Kokura, Tobata, Yahata and Wakamatsu, centred around the ancient feudal city of Kokura."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitakyushu)

So I prefer moving Fukuoka (300k in 1944) in the clear hex (which is its right position anyway), making that clear hex forest (which is warranted by the land cover I believe), move the sea boundary so that Fukuoka sayst the only one on 2 sea area, and put Sasebo (133k in 1944) a new city plus minor port where Fukuoka was.

(2) OK for that.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
Adding a city and splitting a factory off from Tokyo will make the invader's task a little harder. Purely from a gaming point of view, adding a city to the clear hex east of Hiroshima looks reasonable.

Kitakyushu is in the clear hex 1 hex east of Fukuoka (not Hiroshima).

Look at this link for the city sizes of Japan from 1890 till today:
http://www.demographia.com/db-jp-city1940.htm

Take a special look of the text for Kitakyushu. It says: Kitakyusha is the result of a 1963 consolidation of Kokura, Moji, Tobata, Wakamatsu and Yawata. So maybe we can use the city name of Kokura for the MWIF map.

Kokura was actually one of the first 2 cities destined to be nuked by the Americans. Kokura was on the list instead of Nagasaki. But because the weather was overcast there the airplane moved to Nagasaki instead.

Look here for the details about Kokura:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kokura

Info about Kitakyushu:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitaky%C5%ABsh%C5%AB

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Froonp

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
I agree with Borger: (1) adding Kitakyushu and (2) moving a Tokyo factory to Yokohama.

(1) I don't know where SemperAugustus got his figures for Japanese cities in 1935 & 1940, but Wikipedia says that "The city of Kitakyushu was founded on February 10, 1963 and was designated on April 1, 1963 by government ordinance. It resulted from the amalgamation of five cities, Moji, Kokura, Tobata, Yahata and Wakamatsu, centred around the ancient feudal city of Kokura."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitakyushu)

So I prefer moving Fukuoka (300k in 1944) in the clear hex (which is its right position anyway), making that clear hex forest (which is warranted by the land cover I believe), move the sea boundary so that Fukuoka sayst the only one on 2 sea area, and put Sasebo (133k in 1944) a new city plus minor port where Fukuoka was.

(2) OK for that.

Borger Borgersen said :

Take a special look of the text for Kitakyushu. It says: Kitakyusha is the result of a 1963 consolidation of Kokura, Moji, Tobata, Wakamatsu and Yawata. So maybe we can use the city name of Kokura for the MWIF map.

Kokura was actually one of the first 2 cities destined to be nuked by the Americans. Kokura was on the list instead of Nagasaki. But because the weather was overcast there the airplane moved to Nagasaki instead.

Look here for the details about Kokura:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kokura

Kokura population in 1944 was 88k. So I prefer having Fukuoka as the city of this hex.

This is how it looks now :

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Ok.

How about placing Kagoshima in position 5 (17) instead of 6 (18)?

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

Ok.

How about placing Kagoshima in position 5 (17) instead of 6 (18)?

Normaly, its real position would be between this and the hex to the SE. Position 18 is already off. Position 5 or 17 would have the railway avoid the sea, but the port would not be in the right position.

In fact, there is something that you could add to the map possibilities : The ability to make the rail pass through another place than the city or port that is in the hex. It would be usefull in this hex, in Messina (Sicily), Brest (France) and many other places where the port symbol is not at the right place, for the sake of having the rail not beeing at sea.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Froonp

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

Ok.

How about placing Kagoshima in position 5 (17) instead of 6 (18)?

Normaly, its real position would be between this and the hex to the SE. Position 18 is already off. Position 5 or 17 would have the railway avoid the sea, but the port would not be in the right position.

In fact, there is something that you could add to the map possibilities : The ability to make the rail pass through another place than the city or port that is in the hex. It would be usefull in this hex, in Messina (Sicily), Brest (France) and many other places where the port symbol is not at the right place, for the sake of having the rail not beeing at sea.

Having the port symbol (or the city symbol) not realistically positioned in a hex is of less concern to me than having the rail lines avoid the water. We often place the port symbol so a sea area boundary points directly to the port, regardless of what is 'realistic'. Also, when a city is a port, only one of the symbols is 'correctly' placed.

As for providing even finer control over where the rail lines run within a hex, the pain exceeds the gain.