Reluctant Admiral Feedback

[Brady]

When we were testing I recall this being the subject of much debate, and their were many many ships not included in the that were built during the war for Japan, of course most of the woden hulled merchant fleat is totaly absent, amounting to over a million tons of shipping, but a great many steel hulled ships were left out as well.

Part of the problem of course is that their size was smallish, even the steel hulled ships would of amounted to literly hundereds of more ships in game and they would of been dificult to manage to be shure.

In game terms what this means of course is that while the number of hunters is more or less the same, Allied subs and aircraft being very acurately represented, the number of targets for them has been greatly reduced.

................

Below is a passage from The Japanese Merchant Marine in WW2, in the Chapter "Rumbling Down the Way's" I don not regreatable have a compleat listing of all the ships built withen the following classes, though I hope to aquire a source with more specific data withen the month... (Edit- I did get this book, Ugly Ducklings it coveres the War time built standaradised merchants.)

p.164:

"In late 1942, therefore , the Navy General Staff ordered a magor reorganization of the industry. The Authorities first implemented an upgrading of the shipbuilding facilities inspection system. Coal steal and other related industries also received more carefull quality controle and study. The formost change howeaver was the navys assumption of Jurisdiction over all shipbuilding plans and scheduals (except for woden hull construction) from the ministery of communications. This authority passed to the technical buero of the Navy Ministery, which accordingly opened a special section for merchant ship management and expanding its powers to include materials allocations among shipyards. As in the past , the goverement held the real authority and left execution to a private agency, the industrial equipment corporation. But with the Navy directly involved, the harried communications ministrys administration of the shipbuilding program gave way to direction that was more streamlined, organised, and forcefull.
The impact was immediate and dratmatic. Most private idustries began to experance decreased allocations as the navy funneled more resources into merchant shipbuilding. At a glance the monthly yen input figures will readly confirm this. In the fifteen months up to and including October 1942, the average monthly input to shipbuilding was just under 25 Million yen. But for the Next 15 months the average was 82,385,000 yen, including the wartime pinicle of 162,278,000 yen reached in January 1944. Monthly input did not drop bellow the 150 million yen mark untill very late in the year."

Thier is an acomping chart and it indacates that not till November/Dec is thier an apricable drop.

"The navy used some of this mony and material to expand facilities in old yards and to build several new and efficient specilised shipyars, but the majority of resources went into merchant ship construction. This accounts in large meashure for the fine preformance of the shipbuilding industry in 1943 and 1944, when it grew from the 10th to third largest employer among all manufacturing types, behind only Aircraft and Ordance production. Power consumption withen the industry had nearly doubled by then too.
Their were howeaver some other factors worthy of of partial credit for the unexpectedly high wartime productivity of Japans shipyards. Heading the list was the standization of various merchant ship designs. With an eye toward the obvious advantages of componet interchangeability, simpler construction, and incerased efficiency through repetition, several yards had already developed their own standard specifications for various hip types before the war. Early in 1942 the ministry of Communications studied some of these designes and made minior modifactions, and accepted a dozen of them as national standards. When the Navy ministrys technical beauro assumed authority for the industry soon after, it eliminated five of the standard types, added two otehrs, and substantialy reworked the remaining designs to simplify construction.
The standard designs included five freighter types (A,B,C,D, and E) ranging from 530 to 6,400 tons, three tankers (TS,TM and TL) of from 1,000 to 10,000 tons, and a 5,400-ton ore carrier (Type K). All nine varities crused at 10 Knots or more (the TL could steam efficiently at over 16 Knots0 and had maximum speads of about 3 knots higher. A transport (Type M) and a railroad car fery (W), and another freighter (F) were among the original standard types but the Ministry of comunications never awarded any contracts for them.

"Their can be no question that standarization stimulated tonnage production beyond what would have otherwise been achieved. The standard 6,600 ton cargo vessel, for example , averaged ninety days from keel laying to outfitting in 1942. But during the course of the war, the Japanese yards turned out 121 of these vessels, and so the delevery times droped impresively, one yard even managed to finish one in 36 days. It is imposable to calculate how many extra merchant men that the standardization allowed the Japanese to turn out, but since standard ship types acoounted for three out of ever four wartime tons launched and all new tonnage after 1943, undoubtedly the gain was substantial."

For example the book quotes that nearly 400 Type E tankers were built during this time frame(aprox 870 tons, they could be sunk with one torpedo).

It should be noted that many of the above types were not built with double bottoms and transverse bulkheads, and some had engine relability issues, Typicaly the Private sector made use of the standard types, and the Military almost always used the prewar types.

.................

Thier is also a lot of confushion over what the term Civilian Controle constituted for the Japanese:

p. 38 The Japanese merchant marine in WW2:

"Providing Japanese estimates of the nations shipping needs were accurate, adaquate maritime transport existed for all these roles. At the time of pearl harbor, the merchant fleet amounted to 6.4 million tons. There were in adation, approximatly 1.2 million tons of wodden vessels as well.

The Civilain slice of the pie:

" Coal transportation would occupy 1.8 million tons, while the movement of Aragrcutural products and suplies (450,000)and steal making materials(300,000) would absord the rest."

p.34

"Japanese farmers grew about 80% of what it took to fead the home islands"

"Japan imported about 3 million tons of Husked grains,other food stuff's, fertilizers,and livestock."

The Japanese ecenomy also ran on caol, not oil.

p.33 "Coal imports exceaded 2 million tons per month at the time of Pearl harbor"

"40 million tons of coal were produced anualy" Withen Japan proper.

"Manchuria and China suplied the bulk of the heavy Indistrual coal"


So as you can see the Civialan controeld shiping acounted for the movement of the suplys that fueled the empires war machine, the Military ships were largerly and soly ocupied with the movement and sustaining of troops in the field.

Tankers almost soly suplied the Militarys neads, and thusly should be almost interly considered as Military:

"Every year of the war the nation would use from 4 to 4.5 million tons and the Military would account for the bulk of this total"

[Andrew Brown]

ORIGINAL: treespider

Been lurking for quite some time and haven't fired up AE for quite a bit due to some spousal health issues...however the past few posts are great and informative.

Good to hear from you again Treespider, and I also hope those health issues get resolved soon.

One point that you guys may be overlooking is the fact that the resources necessary to be transported to Japan are IIRC still not up to the "real-life" levels.... During development a decision was made to "scale" back the resources necessary to be transported to "keep the game from breaking". The levels are far more restrictive in AE than in WitP however they are still not "real-life".

Indeed. The Japanese were given a boost in the game by scaling back the amount of material needed to be shipped to the home islands, compared to real life. From the information you compiled, the real figure amounts to about 50,000 tons (points) per day. In the game we originally set it to about 48,000, but it was reduced to about 42-44,000 or so (from memory - I'll have to check that later).

One reason for reducing the figure was to account for any ships "missing" from the database. Of course not every single merchant ship was going to be in the data, especially the small ones, so the reduced figures account for part of that.

Another thing to keep in mind is that one of the things that accounts for the small ships not represented is the "free" transport between adjacent ports. This is especially so for the main Japanese islands. All transport between them, except for Hokkaido, is "invisible" with no ships required - in effect it accounts for a portion of the "missing" small Japanese cargo ships.

So if more Japanese cargo ships were added it would make sense to increase the resource requirements for the Japanese home islands.

Andrew

[John 3rd]

Thanks Andrew. I remember some of what has been discussed here in other Threads. Appreciate you guys who did a bunch of the work on AE jumping in and contributing to the discussion.

FatR, BK, and Michael: Are you guys OK with letting JWE shift the LCUs?

Am wanting to settle one thing before we jump into another!

It makes sense to me, as Andrew has just pointed out, that if the developers reduced the economic requirements as a way to eliminate a portion of the smaller ships then if we INCLUDE some of them we will need to compensate. Makes me a little nervous going down this road...

Should also ask if we any artwork for Red Lancer? His planesides were quite nice for the Mod and I wonder if there are any others that need to be done?

[bigred]

FatR
Transport Tycoon of the Pacific

Interesting Quotes.

A.Brown
Another thing to keep in mind is that one of the things that accounts for the small ships not represented is the "free" transport between adjacent ports. This is especially so for the main Japanese islands. All transport between them, except for Hokkaido, is "invisible" with no ships required - in effect it accounts for a portion of the "missing" small Japanese cargo ships.

John 3rd
Makes me a little nervous going down this road...

[bigred]

edit

[John 3rd]

Alright. Now that the AK/TK discussion has shifted to its own Thread we can get back to the business of RA 3.0.

JWE has kindly offered to take the files and update them to his Mod's level. This is a pleasant and decent act to share the work of their Mod. Additionally, he will take care of 'fixing' the ASW routine as we have discussed.

If all this happens we will then be back to Square One with Japanese LCUs. Luckily, as stated earlier, I have notes for the changes we originally made at the beginning. It is my intention to wait and look at the changes made by John and then add a few vehicles and engineers to the Japanese Naval LCUs. This will provide some but limited help for base construction. By the sounds of things we shall be looking at a rough 50% reduction in base-building speed.

Think will help with all that FatR had to say with his concerns stated earlier.

[BigBadWolf]

50% from the current numbers in mod or in stock? If from mod, sure, there are too many Japanese bulldozers around, In my game, it's January 4th and Rabaul is already lvl 7 AF and lvl 5 port) but if from stock, I really don't see how Japan can achiever even historical expansion.

[JWE]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd
Alright. Now that the AK/TK discussion has shifted to its own Thread we can get back to the business of RA 3.0.

JWE has kindly offered to take the files and update them to his Mod's level. This is a pleasant and decent act to share the work of their Mod. Additionally, he will take care of 'fixing' the ASW routine as we have discussed.

If all this happens we will then be back to Square One with Japanese LCUs. Luckily, as stated earlier, I have notes for the changes we originally made at the beginning. It is my intention to wait and look at the changes made by John and then add a few vehicles and engineers to the Japanese Naval LCUs. This will provide some but limited help for base construction. By the sounds of things we shall be looking at a rough 50% reduction in base-building speed.

Think will help with all that FatR had to say with his concerns stated earlier.

Don't think it will be as bad as you might think. Looked at stock and it should be straight forward to dink with the engineers. What I suggest is adding one new 'squad' type, called Engineering Labor perhaps, to the Devices. Has no Eng function, small firepower, no AV, same as a Type 252 Eng, but can't build anything either. Then find the 252 devices, cut them in half, and add the half back in as an Eng Labor device. One benefit is load cost don't change, AV don't change, Support don't change, nothing much changes except Eng 'function' is halved. Other benefit is if half turns out to be too much or too little, it's a straight forward adjustment to 75% or 30% or whatever, just adjust the proportions of Engineers to Laborers.

I can turn this pretty quick, so it shouldn't hold you up for long if you want to proceed. Let me know.

Ciao. John

[John 3rd]

JWE--Can you email me your address? I'll send the files in a Zip!

[John 3rd]

Nevermind. I found your PM from last week and your email was there. Files have been sent. The current RA working folder is now entitled RA 3.02 using Scenario 69's slot.

[JWE]

Got it. On it. J

[FatR]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

Thanks Andrew. I remember some of what has been discussed here in other Threads. Appreciate you guys who did a bunch of the work on AE jumping in and contributing to the discussion.

FatR, BK, and Michael: Are you guys OK with letting JWE shift the LCUs?

You mean the 50% reduction you've picked (from the mod level, for Japanese, I assumed, after both JWE's and yours work is finished). Well, I do not mind this.

[FatR]

ORIGINAL: BigBadWolf

50% from the current numbers in mod or in stock? If from mod, sure, there are too many Japanese bulldozers around, In my game, it's January 4th and Rabaul is already lvl 7 AF and lvl 5 port) but if from stock, I really don't see how Japan can achiever even historical expansion.

I think you're underestimating stock quite a bit. As far as I know, Scen 2 does not specifically add construction units (you get a bit more engineers as a part of infantry formations), and the construction is still fast, fast enough to really support advance through base-scarce regions, if you focus.

[John 3rd]

As I see it, the change would be roughly 50% across-the-board from Scenario 1. With that as a starting point we then make the changes for RA reflecting everything we've settled on over the last year. It WILL be slower but the Japanese will not be AS SLOW as the Babes Mods due to the slight changes within the IJN Land-Based Units.

JWE's idea about changing and/or adding non-Engineers and Vehicles (like conscript workers) is interesting to think about.

[JWE]

Hi John,

ASW stuff is done, coming to an email near you shortly. Tweaks to the Device file, Class file, Ship file; full boogie changelog included. Thought I would do it this way in case you wanted to keep it separate from the Eng changes. You know, use one, not the other, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Eng stuff will be solely to the Locations file and one (perhaps two) additions to the Device file. Real easy to keep the two things apart if that's what you need to do. The additions to the Device file are in otherwise unused slots, so they won't doo-doo any voo-doo if you want to defer using the changed Locations. So:

ASW is new Device, Class, Ship.
Engs is new Locations.
None, Either, or Both.

Sweet, yeah? Gosh, I love it when a plan comes together.

[JWE]

Ok, so there I was doing the 'Snoopy' dance when the brick wall hit me right on the nose. I was thinking of the Eng reduction in terms of the Japanese, only.

I don't think this is too harsh, because I was thinking of applying the reductions to only the Type=10 Engineer/Base Force Units and leaving the 'combat'-type LCUs alone. So far as the Allies go, I think we cut Eng capability by about 20%, but replaced a lot of that with 'stevedores' having 'Shore Party' flags set. Some small percentage of the Japanese Engineers that were lost, were also replaced by 'Shore Party' capable devices.

I understand you guys don't use the 'Shore Party' switch. Cool. That makes the Japanese reduction to 50% a bit more definitive.

Given that, and the fact you don't use 'Shore party' alternatives, how about tweaking down the Eng component of Allied Type=10 Engineer/Base Force Units by 20% to compensate?

[John 3rd]

That all sounds OK to me.

[John 3rd]

Got your email but am stranded at work for the next 5-7 hours so I cannot look at it until then.

[John 3rd]

Today is a 'working on RA morning' and the first development is Sulu Sea joining the team to do some cosmetic changes to the scenario. This is the note I just emailed him:

You are hereby “contracted” into RA Sir!

I would love to see all the screens changed with new art and pictures. The only one I want to keep in the Mod is the painting of Yamamoto since he is the center of our changes. Beyond that—HAVE FUN! I don’t have anything specific in mind. You could use paintings, photos, whatever.

Am going to Post this onto the RA Thread. Please comment there so everyone on the team can contribute.

Will also send the current RA Scenario (70) that has the intro as well as current art and the RA 3.0 file that is under development. It has none of the 70 art since its listed as Scen 69 as we work on it.

[John 3rd]

Have decided to copy the old RA Folder of AE and created a new one so the newest version cannot be confused with previous RA copies/variants.

Am excited about adding a new book to my research library. Bought Jentschura's Warships of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1869-1945. It cost a pretty penny but the tome lists EVERY warship built, designs and specs, a small service history, and names of ships planned but not constructed. Very COOL!