Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: Nikademus

ORIGINAL: Yamato hugger


WitP wasnt designed to be based on history. It was designed as a game to be fun and exciting to play. This is the reason bomb hits were increased (but damage reduced) for 1 example. Its "more exciting".

As a member of the original beta team for WitP, i can assure you our goal was a game based on history. That doesn't mean that in the end it wasn't still a "game." As others have pointed out over the years, if one wants a military quality simulator that the USN naval war college could put it's seal of approval on.......then they need to go to the military which has the finances and the hardware to maybe pull it off. I don't recall any decision to increase bomb hits because it was "more exciting" but there were alot of complaints and suggestions over the years......more than i could ever recall.

All in all, i don't think 2b3 did a half bad job.....but then again maybe i'm biased.....having been on the original team. [:)]

Based on what Captain Hughes says, you don't want to go to the military. Their simulations are even more opaque and produce even weirder results than stock WitP!

ORIGINAL: Nikademus

ORIGINAL: Yamato hugger


WitP wasnt designed to be based on history. It was designed as a game to be fun and exciting to play. This is the reason bomb hits were increased (but damage reduced) for 1 example. Its "more exciting".

As a member of the original beta team for WitP, i can assure you our goal was a game based on history. That doesn't mean that in the end it wasn't still a "game." As others have pointed out over the years, if one wants a military quality simulator that the USN naval war college could put it's seal of approval on.......then they need to go to the military which has the finances and the hardware to maybe pull it off. I don't recall any decision to increase bomb hits because it was "more exciting" but there were alot of complaints and suggestions over the years......more than i could ever recall.

All in all, i don't think 2b3 did a half bad job.....but then again maybe i'm biased.....having been on the original team. [:)]

In term of simulation, WitP is not a perfect game. As player of both side, i often cursed against what seems to me a "in allied favor unbearable bias".[:@]
But the game is "moddable", we can do nearly everything we want with and it remains for me (and i think for many readers here) the most realistic, playable and wonderful game i ever played.
And the less expensive as after WitP and PBEM, there is no need for me to buy an other game.[:D]

And i think (hope) it will be the same for AE.

So, American guys, continue to make so incredible game, we enjoy it.[&o]

In my game vs. AI, I'm up to January. 1943 and the Allies are defending Gili Gili from Japanese strikes out Rabaul.  The Allies are typically putting up a CAP of about 15 Kittyhawk I, 12 F4F-4, and 40-60 P-38G against strikes that are typically 20 - 30 A6M3 escorting 50 to 80 Betty's.  In the first couple of rounds the Allies had a 3:1 favorable loss ratio (against strikes that were more like 60 A6M3 and 100+ Betty's) with the lower durability Kittyhawks and Wildcats taking most of the losses. Now the Japanese morale is lower, the strike strength is down, and I'm sure the number of experienced pilots is reduced.  The recent rounds have been at excess of 10:1 loss ratio's favoring the Allies.  The P-38's are getting damaged, but making it back home.   Most of the Allies are have average experience in the low 70s.  One green P-38 group just arrived with experience in the mid 50s. 
 
This sort of thing seems common against AI where I would expect a human player to pause and regroup or reinforce or switch to attack a different nearby target, for example Port Moresby.  I know the result is ahistorical but this is what is coming out of the engine.   
 
I fully agree with the meme of WitP as a history-based game.  To pick back up on the thread of the software of how units fight it seems to me there are at least four degrees of freedom. 
 
1)  The hardware capabilities programmed in for the various aircraft
2)  The software capabilities as simulated by experience, fatigue, and morale (which explicitly omits doctrine unless one wants to argue that this is subsumed in experience) and leadership
3)  The strategic decisions that under playe control (what units are where with which missions and effort levels)
4)  The tactical decisions and algorithms that are hidden inside the engine the resolves the combat. 
 
Adjusting a few numbers on the hardware seems a less plausible explaination for the results that the difference in strategic decision making (human vs. AI).  There's also the difference between the original combat described at the head of the thread and much more lopsided result I outlined above.