The PERFECT WAR Mod

[DOCUP]

Nice work guys.

[John 3rd]

It is truly forward movement.

[ny59giants]

Add Recon Zeros at start in a Chutai or two (9 planes each that can divide into 3 x 3). Range can depend on if she keeps her guns or gets rid of them similar to the American Wildcats recon that increases range or is the similar.

[oldman45]

Fatr, I am not so sure you could ramp up US aircraft production. The US was building them as fast as they could, not to mention they had to build the factory's while they were ramping up.

[kfsgo]

ORIGINAL: oldman45

Fatr, I am not so sure you could ramp up US aircraft production. The US was building them as fast as they could, not to mention they had to build the factory's while they were ramping up.

An altered Mediterranean is going to reorient things significantly as regards aircraft (for the US and CW both) even if you don't touch production (which is pushing it a bit, I think):

- You're going to see much less pressure on shorter-range aircraft in the 1941-1942 period; there is not a need to fight convoys through Malta to such an extent, and offensively you're range-limited; even from Malta you're not getting much further than Sicily with Spitfire, P-40 etc. So, there's less demand for these types until the invasion of Italy takes place (after which they'll probably be somewhat higher than historical for a while, since the Italian AF hasn't burnt itself out);

- You're going to see greater demands on longer-ranged aircraft in that period; Italy is going to be a much more viable strategic bombing target - Tunis to Milan and London to Milan are about the same distance, but the former can be done without flying over France and through the Alps (in many cases aircraft ceilings were lower than mountain peaks - brr) - much safer. So, while that's ongoing you still have a drain for the Med. More so, maybe - if Crete is held by the Allies, which seems plausible, you may see a drive to hit Bulgaria, Romania etc from there. Another drain...

- Pressure on the Soviet Union will likely be greater than historical. Germany threw away a fairly limited force in Libya but also a more significant one in Tunisia; some of them will be taken up in France, keeping an eye on the Italians, expanding garrisons in Greece etc but ultimately you will have more goons heading eastwards. So, there's liable to be greater demand for 'stuff' from that quarter; ideally American 'stuff', being built more along 'bash it with a hammer and it'll probably work' lines.

- Maintenance of France in the war maintains the French merchant fleet; that's fairly small relative to the size of the pre-war French economy, but it's still 'big', and a net economic gain - remember that the US particularly was extremely shipping-constrained in the leadup to and early part of its participation in WWII - as is maintenance of the French Empire and its raw material output. It also keeps the MN in the war, of course - that's going to have repercussions in the Atlantic, with the U-Boat crunch being less painful and all of the consequences which follow from that.

- The two critical words - "breathing room". The war is really relatively quiet, except in Russia; that allows decisions to be taken with less of a spectre of immediate need hanging over them.

Taking a step back, your opening for 1941-1942 isn't really the US - which is mobilisation-limited and really constrained by working-up more so than raw production - it's being able to displace UK/Aus/NZ forces that are nominally in the Med or still at home. I wouldn't like to make any concrete proposals until I've run the numbers on aircraft availability at present (and I still need to finish China before I do that - I have Ideas, though...) but that's the direction I'd see things moving.

[FatR]

On the issue of Japanese aircraft speed.

1)Historical part. As a preface, I'm not a big fan of counting precise speed numbers. Max speed squeezed out in optimal conditions and often on a specially fine-tuned airframe does not tell the whole picture at best and can be outright misleading at worst (for a Pacific-neutral example - MiG-1/MiG-3). Unless one does research in depth, evaluation by those who operated planes in the field (with opinions from both sides when possible and taking things like survivor bias into account) and combat results, when there is enough data on outcomes of individual clashes, are preferable. I'm focusing on speed here only because in the game max speed is a vital statistic, possibly the most vital in the air combat calculations.

It is also not news, that commonly accepted performance figures can wildly deviate from reality, because of unaccounted for difference in testing methods and other factors. As another neutral example, max roaspeed of Pz.III is almost always stated as 40 km/h... except that its normal driving speed on an road. When tested for maximum speed in USSR, a captured early Pz.III demonstrated about 68 km/h, outracing every pre-war Soviet tank. In case of aircraft even stuff like painting on the day of trials might impact the results.

Now, returning to the Pacific, there are solid reasons to believe that maximum speeds for Japanese aircraft, as stated by Francillion and copied everywhere else, are systematically underrated. Which is vital, because speed differences that were barely noticeable IRL might mean alot in AE. For example, look at the analysis of A6M2's performance:
http://www.j-aircraft.com/research/rdun ... rmance.htm
It might hint at one of the possible causes of this underrating - providing figures for the military power equivalent, rather than for war emergency power equivalent. For other aircraft, other reasons might exist (for example, Ki-84 underwent an engine update without a change in model designation during the war, so data for 1943 prototype tests is not likely to be valid for late war).

Talking about George, if you look at p.64 of "Genda's Blade", you can see that American wartime estimates credited N1K1-J with 407 mph. See also:
http://www.j-aircraft.org/smf/index.php?topic=11204.15

Considering that F6F has noticeably worse power loading and is not that smooth aerodynamically too, this makes sense. This is what I was using as a benchmark.


2)Game part.

In terms of AE mechanics I find Hellcat not the deathmachine it was in reality, but a poor relative in the family of the third-generation Allied fighters. That because its relatively poor speed is not compensated by maneurability or survivability (again, compared to other Allied fighters) and, again, the game values speed perhaps too much. I tried to fix that in the last version of Scen 70, so comments from John, who plays it and should be in the Hellcat age by now and should have some experience about them, are much appreciated.

However, this out of the way, I see validity in your complaint, kfsgo. If Allies totally cannot rely on fighters weaker than Corsair/Lightning (both of which have reliability problems throughout 1943), which might be the case with George's stats like I proposed above, and only have qualitative superiority with Thunderbolt (which probably will be available 2-3 months after Shiden, and in lesser numbers), they will be in quite a difficult situation in 1943. So, after such a long post explaining my motives, I have to admit, that in general you are right, and at least N1K1-J needs toning down by about 15-20 mph, others probably by 10.

[kfsgo]

ORIGINAL: FatR

On the issue of Japanese aircraft speed.

1)Historical part. As a preface, I'm not a big fan of counting precise speed numbers. Max speed squeezed out in optimal conditions and often on a specially fine-tuned airframe does not tell the whole picture at best and can be outright misleading at worst (for a Pacific-neutral example - MiG-1/MiG-3). Unless one does research in depth, evaluation by those who operated planes in the field (with opinions from both sides when possible and taking things like survivor bias into account) and combat results, when there is enough data on outcomes of individual clashes, are preferable. I'm focusing on speed here only because in the game max speed is a vital statistic, possibly the most vital in the air combat calculations.

It is also not news, that commonly accepted performance figures can wildly deviate from reality, because of unaccounted for difference in testing methods and other factors. As another neutral example, max roaspeed of Pz.III is almost always stated as 40 km/h... except that its normal driving speed on an road. When tested for maximum speed in USSR, a captured early Pz.III demonstrated about 68 km/h, outracing every pre-war Soviet tank. In case of aircraft even stuff like painting on the day of trials might impact the results.

Now, returning to the Pacific, there are solid reasons to believe that maximum speeds for Japanese aircraft, as stated by Francillion and copied everywhere else, are systematically underrated. Which is vital, because speed differences that were barely noticeable IRL might mean alot in AE. For example, look at the analysis of A6M2's performance:
http://www.j-aircraft.com/research/rdun ... rmance.htm
It might hint at one of the possible causes of this underrating - providing figures for the military power equivalent, rather than for war emergency power equivalent. For other aircraft, other reasons might exist (for example, Ki-84 underwent an engine update without a change in model designation during the war, so data for 1943 prototype tests is not likely to be valid for late war).

Talking about George, if you look at p.64 of "Genda's Blade", you can see that American wartime estimates credited N1K1-J with 407 mph. See also:
http://www.j-aircraft.org/smf/index.php?topic=11204.15

Considering that F6F has noticeably worse power loading and is not that smooth aerodynamically too, this makes sense. This is what I was using as a benchmark.


2)Game part.

In terms of AE mechanics I find Hellcat not the deathmachine it was in reality, but a poor relative in the family of the third-generation Allied fighters. That because its relatively poor speed is not compensated by maneurability or survivability (again, compared to other Allied fighters) and, again, the game values speed perhaps too much. I tried to fix that in the last version of Scen 70, so comments from John, who plays it and should be in the Hellcat age by now and should have some experience about them, are much appreciated.

However, this out of the way, I see validity in your complaint, kfsgo. If Allies totally cannot rely on fighters weaker than Corsair/Lightning (both of which have reliability problems throughout 1943), which might be the case with George's stats like I proposed above, and only have qualitative superiority with Thunderbolt (which probably will be available 2-3 months after Shiden, and in lesser numbers), they will be in quite a difficult situation in 1943. So, after such a long post explaining my motives, I have to admit, that in general you are right, and at least N1K1-J needs toning down by about 15-20 mph, others probably by 10.

Yeah, I just get snickety since I spend too much time messing around in IL-2, really (so the MiG-3 comment resonates...christ, that thing's painful), and so that colours the way I look at the things themselves perhaps more than WITP does. Of course, IL-2 being what it is you're a) at the whim of whatever weirdo modder edited the aircraft this week and b) sort of left thinking "woah, there's a fighter you can get over 350mph? that's a first...". So, it's not proof of anything, just somewhere to start. I mean, ultimately, I'm not a pilot - any argument I make on the precise details of this or that aircraft feature are basically from a fairly ignorant starting point, and I try to remain mindful of that when talking about this stuff.

That said, I would guess that issue, fundamentally, is that although we have variable maneuverability for particular altitudes we don't (as far as I know) have variable maneuverability for particular speeds. To go back to the IL-2 thing - one of the most hilarious things you can do in IL-2 is get a P-40 going fast; whatever faults it may have maneuverability-wise when slow at sea level it's a fantastic aircraft to toss around at high speed, and you can run rings around the contemporary Japanese stable in that situation as their elevator and aileron control go to pieces once you get them going fast - all that emphasis on light weight has consequences, in the end; probably similar principles would apply when considering the "poor" performance of the Wildcat in-game. I would suspect this to be an issue persisting through the N1K (2.5t) vs. F6F (4t+); your forum report suggests aileron dropoff on N1K around 360mph, which I would guess (without any proof) is lower than would be experienced on F6F. So, I guess the question becomes - do you want higher speeds, or higher maneuverability; you can have one or the other, with one eye on the way the game models aircraft, but not really both.

[oldman45]

IL-2 is my favorite flying game. One of my favorite memories was the first time I got stuck in a flat spin while flying the P-39... back to the thread. [;)]

[MateDow]

ORIGINAL: FatR
If you pay attention, in 1941-42 Japanese fighter aircraft actually are a bit worse in the current proposal. Instead of Tojo JFBs will have high-SR Tony, Zeros will have either inferior speed or inferior range to vanilla A6M2. Only in 1943 and later improvements will be felt, and even then, nothing will be nearly as good as Allied top performers.

Anyway, I'm not going into a detailed study of Allied planes to see which of them could reasonably be accelerated. I think, that increasing production numbers (in addition to the option of expanding on-map production) is warranted, though.

I think that a case could be made for accelerating the B-36A, with bad reliability, in this alternative timeframe. If we look at the fact that the Japanese player will likely be holding large chunks of the central Pacific, the US will be encouraged to find a plane that can hit the Home Islands from Hawaii.

Historically, they were downgraded in priority when it became obvious that there were going to be bases within B-29 range. Without this possibility, and I think that you are going to see this in a majority of games, the US would have dedicated the engineering talent to bring the aircraft out on its original time schedule. This would have the first aircraft leaving factories in mid to late 1945.

[FatR]

I tried to get into Il-2, but looks like I just don't have patience to get any good at it.

An interesting note on B-36, MateDow.

I think I'm not ready to make a proposal on end-war fighters yet. Will return to them after doing everything else.

[kfsgo]

ORIGINAL: MateDow

I think that a case could be made for accelerating the B-36A, with bad reliability, in this alternative timeframe. If we look at the fact that the Japanese player will likely be holding large chunks of the central Pacific, the US will be encouraged to find a plane that can hit the Home Islands from Hawaii.

Historically, they were downgraded in priority when it became obvious that there were going to be bases within B-29 range. Without this possibility, and I think that you are going to see this in a majority of games, the US would have dedicated the engineering talent to bring the aircraft out on its original time schedule. This would have the first aircraft leaving factories in mid to late 1945.

Not sure I agree with the theory; while the Pacific might (how big a 'might'?) be a less profitable avenue for their employment, China will almost certainly be a better proposition than it was - not 'good' necessarily, supply being what it is, but better - particularly in the 1941-1943 period, which is when the decisions on 1945-46's aircraft are being made. That said - I could see bringing them in around the end of 1945 as a 'this happened if the war went really, really weirdly' theoretical dodge (along with some other stuff - B-42, Skyraider, Phantom, Sea Fury etc)

[kfsgo]

On the subject of China...

Here's a first draft of China Mk. II. I took the opportunity to work from a clean slate, so the new-look Chinese Army (bearing no connection to reality except in commanders and scale - this is sort-of-broadly what all the foreign advisors over the years suggested doing, so I guess we can pretend someone waved a wand and got it implemented) is made up of:

- 9 War Areas
- 30 Group Armies

That's less than in stock; the Chinese are going to have some command...issues. Or should, anyway.

containing 178 divisions:

- 12 'modernized' KMT Divs; German-trained or "German-trained". Nominally 318av (3816 total) per division and extremely generous (by Chinese standards) allotments of artillery, engineers etc. Mobile.

- 18 'Chinese' KMT Divs. Nominally 267av per division (4806 total), relatively generous allotments of equipment. These reflect units that are not 'modernized' but are directly loyal to the KMT and therefore get second pick of any equipment going around.

The modernized Divs have relatively low morale but are reasonably competent; they've been put through the grinder against the Japanese and know what they're doing but are rather tired of doing it. The unmodernized divs are less competent, but morale is a little better. In theory they were all "modernized" in 1939; two years of war have undone that to a great extent. IDs 1st Div - 35th Div. Mobile.

- 37 'Warlord' Divs. Nominally 263av per division (9731), less equipment except where the local potentate has access to his own supply. These represent units loyal to the government...via intermediaries. Some of the time. If the bribe's right or there's someone with a gun to their heads. You get the idea. Experience varies, but morale is broadly in the gutter. IDs 36-150. Mobile.

- 53 'Provincial' Divs. Nominally 257av per division (13621), minimal equipment. Very inexperienced, morale is 'ok' by Chinese standards. At this point you start to get mobility issues; they're initially static, and a certain amount of political force has to be exerted on the part of the central govt to get these guys to leave their home areas unless they're attacked. IDs 150-300.

- 40 'Militia' Divs. Nominally 208av per division (8320), maybe a couple of machine guns if they're lucky. Completely incompetent and would rather be at home. Immobile unless attacked. IDs 300-400

- 20 Cavalry Divs. Nominally 110av (2200). Decent equipment, morale and experience are situational. Mobile.IDs 400-500.

- 6 Communist Divs. Nominally 258av (1548). 8th Route Army out of Yenan is expanded to 4 and New Fourth Army along the Yangtze gains two. Inexperienced, but morale is very high. Mobile. IDs 500-600.

- 7 Separate AT Regiments with 10-36 guns each.
- 2 Separate Artillery Brigades with a 122 and a 105/75 Regiment each.
- 1 Separate Heavy Artillery Regiment with 8 122 guns.
- 8 Separate Medium Artillery Regiments with 8-16 75/105 guns.
- 4 Separate Mortar Regiments with 24-48 82mm mortars.
- 1 Separate AA Regiment with 12 guns.

IDs 600-700.

- 11 Heavy AF Base Forces with 4-8 AA guns and 36 Av. Support.
- 19 Light AF Base Forces with 0-2 AA guns and 12 Av. Support.

IDs 700-800.

- Port Fortresses at Changsha, Hankow, Canton, Chungking and Nanchang with 2-5 4/5in and 2-6 6pdr CD guns, along with enough naval support to enable loading of guns of that size.
- 10 other River Fortresses with 0-4 3in and 0-4 6pdr CD guns. Enough to harrass motor launches or unescorted freighters, but shouldn't do much to warships.

- X number of construction labour units. Haven't done these yet. IDs 800-900.

In total the Chinese army can theoretically put about 44000av in the field in that configuration. In stock that number is about 38000, so theoretically it's a larger force. Of course, quite a lot of it is static. Haven't run the numbers on artillery yet, should be similar. Going back to stock, the 'active' Chinese army at start is around 24000av; I'm aiming to have ~28000 active here.

Issues:

- Commanders are mostly not assigned yet.

- Most units are at their full TOE strength. That's going to change, I just haven't gotten around to it yet; as you go down the political food chain you'll see less armed soldiers and more unarmed ones (ie, 'support'). Numbers in the field should be fairly universal - the problem isn't manpower, it's actually arming the troops.

- Haven't sorted out everyone's political restrictions fully yet; conceptually, KMT Divs will be free to change to an unrestricted command (at full price - no more 25% switches) enabling combat in India, Burma etc, while other Chinese troops are locked to China.

- Garrison requirements for China are still not finalised (though higher across the board, and more distributed, with several new bases). Probably need a few runs through a live game to get them 'right', but the reqs for bases controlled by the Chinese particularly will depend on how big the Chinese army ends up being in the end.

- There is still some work to do on the collaborationist Chinese forces, which I intend to expand a little further.

- All Chinese bases have at least a minimal (1t/day) supply allotment; won't fix the issues with supply at bases, but should help. May need tweaking if China ends up oversupplied.

- There is an NKVD detachment around Urumqi and more Russians around the northwestern frontier. With higher tensions between Russia and Japan (and the fact that any Japanese advance that far would be considered menacing by the USSR) they've been "invited" to make themselves at home. Obviously, they're static unless the USSR enters the war. I haven't tested whether them being there will cause issues regarding Soviet activation yet, so they may be removed if it does.

- There are changes to aircraft, ships, devices etc; they're just me fiddling, so ignore'em.

So - comments, thoughts, insults - fire away. Worst-case scenario we can just go back to the stock setup...

[John 3rd]

WOW. Sorry. Have had a busy weekend and just had a chance to read this. Have you been able to put this onto an actual map yet?

Conceptually I love the ideas, thinking, and design. In reality...I have no clue. Thus, this could be FUN!

Keep on going Sir.

[Treetop64]

Interesting how you're developing Chinese forces. It would also be interesting to see if any political restrictions could be introduced that limits the player from forming a coordinated, multi-War Area, Chinese "super army".  I say this because, in reality, many Chinese warlords were nearly as occupied in plotting to wipe each other out as they were in ejecting the Japanese from China.  Also, many warlords were content in defending only their own segmented, semi-autonomous part of China.

[kfsgo]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

WOW. Sorry. Have had a busy weekend and just had a chance to read this. Have you been able to put this onto an actual map yet?

Conceptually I love the ideas, thinking, and design. In reality...I have no clue. Thus, this could be FUN!

Keep on going Sir.

That is on the map - it's an example scenario.

Interesting how you're developing Chinese forces. It would also be interesting to see if any political restrictions could be introduced that limits the player from forming a coordinated, multi-War Area, Chinese "super army". I say this because, in reality, many Chinese warlords were nearly as occupied in plotting to wipe each other out as they were in ejecting the Japanese from China. Also, many warlords were content in defending only their own segmented, semi-autonomous part of China.

Er, yes, that's why so much of it starts (and quite a lot of it will remain, unless attacked) static. Can't go too far with it or else the Japanese can over-flex the Chinese, but that that's what I've tried to do.

[John 3rd]

Reminds me of Brian's (Big B) Scenarios in WitP. The static troops are outstanding. How much does Japan want to free-up by moving into China? Hmmm...

[kfsgo]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

Reminds me of Brian's (Big B) Scenarios in WitP. The static troops are outstanding. How much does Japan want to free-up by moving into China? Hmmm...

That's the idea. Conceptually - and I don't think it's quite there yet; at the moment the Japanese are probably somewhat over-garrison-requiremented - the situation I want to create is that the Japanese are free to pull troops out of China...but if they do that, they'll be exchanging gains elsewhere for entrenching the Chinese, possibly permanently; at the same time, the Chinese shouldn't be conducting mass offensives because the logistical system isn't there - the armed troops exist, and the supplies exist, but uniting the two at the right place and time is not really practical for WWII China in this situation without external assistance (ie 50,000 or however many 3ton trucks). It's the same reason why removing the Dutch from Java to go die on Sumatra or Timor or wherever is out there; yes, you can move all the stuff, but once it's there there's no actual mechanism for distribution - the depot systems etc are all centered on [Java/X Chinese province] with local personnel.

[John 3rd]

I like the analogy. Seems pretty solid work to me.

Are you going to add anything more of the Chinese who sided with Japan?

FatR: How are you coming with things? Haven't seen you chime in for a bit.

[FatR]

In case you haven't got my email response John - I'll be busy until the next week. I think the general shape of Japanese 1E fighter park is clear (although I'll still welcome any critism), the next stop is 2E fighters.

[kfsgo]

A look at what China looks like at the moment (huge, sorry), since I haven't yet:



Dashed lines are:

Railways to be restored in black;
River navigability in yellow;
Approx. Japanese front 7/12/1941 in red

Still very WIP, so things could change...