Micromanagement...A beast??

[m10bob]

When I first started playing WITP I sure thought close management of my units was something very un-necessary, the game seemed daunting enough, but over time my feelings about this have changed.
WITP is a lot larger than a game of chess, and will take much longer to complete a single campaign, (let alone the entire Pacific War from '41 till '45-6..)
My time is already limited (due to real-life constraints so the time I invest for ME(!) must be as much fun and about ME(!) as is possible.
When my units go into battle, or supplies sail off across thousands of miles of broad watery expanse, I expect them to be as much a reflection of my actual wishes as possible, and less a "friendly throw of the die".
If I fail to send enough food and munitions to my Aussie squads in New Guinea, or failed to provide adequate air cover over my beaches, I want the results to be more closely representative of something I caused to happen, than to have some simple explanation of being trounced by "an AI bonus", or a numerical "working as it should" explanation.
Maybe a single turn will take an hour or 2, instead of 10-20 minutes, it is just a matter of how much I want to invest in MY(!) plans for conquest, in this game, which after all, represents a war fought over maybe a fourth of the entire globe?
If we wanted beer and pretzels, we might be better served playing chess after all, or something close.

To me, the intensification of details going into AE should satisfy the thirst of the most vaunted grognard, for minutiae, and still offer the option of less micro-management for those still intimidated, (at first).

[Yamato hugger]

Well as for the time factor, thats up to you really. If you turn on all the messages and set the delay up to watch each bomber section drop and observe their results it can (and usually does) take over an hour just to watch the replay. Doing your part of the turn itself of course depends entirely on you.

If you play like I do, and turn off the animations (the combat reports give far more info than the WitP reports do) and set all the delays down to the minimum (I keep messages at .5 secs really) you can run a replay in under 5 mins.

As for micro-management in a lot of ways it is going to be worse. You have choices you CAN make as far as your aircraft using drop tanks for example. You must take into consideration port size when you load out a supply convoy. Bunches of things you didnt have to even think about in WitP. But, this is actually up to you how "into it" you want to get. Ships WILL unload at smaller ports, it will just take longer. Your aircraft dont have to use drop tanks (for those that can). And so on. The game will work just fine without diving deep into the myriad of new stuff.

In some respects the micro-management is reduced. Units dont require massive shipping space anymore so the numbers of ships in typical supply or transport TFs is reduced. There are a lot less air units in the game (overall) than in WitP. One problem with WitP was that once a unit was in the game, it was in the game. No way out so when the AVG becomes part of the USAAF (14th FG if I recall correctly) in WitP you have BOTH units where as in AE the AVG goes away to form the other unit. Same with regiments in the game that belong to divisions. In WitP in a lot of cases you not only get the regiment, but you also get the division that the regiment is in. So therefore in AE the allied player has a lot less maneuver units to use initially.

Some people arent going to like AE because of the detail. You have to decide what works for you.

[helldiver]

Greetings.
 
      I enjoy complexity for its own sake. I am a devotee of WW II history. WitP has given me the chance to indulge both of these avocations in spades. The enhanced choices and options in AE look wonderful so far. Most of all, the improvements to the AI promise an opportunity to enjoy this exercise in intellectual complexity against an  even more realistic and challenging backdrop. I want all of the choices possible. I want to balance them in my aging but still nimble mind. Bring it on.
 
Regards,
Helldiver

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: Yamato hugger

If you play like I do, and turn off the animations (the combat reports give far more info than the WitP reports do) and set all the delays down to the minimum (I keep messages at .5 secs really) you can run a replay in under 5 mins.

A related question: I haven't played PBM yet - waiting for AE to start that. I play with animations OFF and delays set to minimum. Playing a PBM in AE, will I be able to set the replay OFF and just go with the reports, or is the replay required for PBM?

[Yamato hugger]

The replay generates the reports. No you cant shut it off completely. But as I said, you can shut the animations off and set the message delays to zero.

[Charbroiled]

I like to have the animations on, but only for the land combat so that I can see what LCU's of the enemy I am up against.

It would be nice if you could choose which animations (air, naval, land) you wanted to see....or included which LCU were involved in land combat in the combat report.

[Grotius]

If you turn off the animations altogether, does that affect the likelihood of the sync bug occurring in PBEM (in either WITP or AE)? I know that hitting ESC to bypass selected animations raises the risk; but how about turning them off altogether?

Me, I like watching the animations. They add to the immersion and fun, for me.

[kaleun]

Can't you just get the combat report from your opponent (If you are playing the allied side) and play off that?
I love doing that as allies, I only watch the replay when enemy capital ships are hit (to guess at the damage)

[jwilkerson]

ORIGINAL: kaleun

Can't you just get the combat report from your opponent (If you are playing the allied side) and play off that?
...

Absolutely!
Get the ops report too if wanna keep track of the searches.

[Bogo Mil]

I think it is impossible to turn combat replay off for one player. The setting seems to be fixed in the savegame. Once I (Japanese) had turned it off by accident, and Drew Black didn't have a replay, too. He did not manage to turn it on for him. Next turn i reactivated the replay for me, and everything worked fine again.

Without watching the replay, you'll miss some information (e.g. from where enemy bombers are attacking).

[Kaletsch2007]

ORIGINAL: Bogo Mil

Without watching the replay, you'll miss some information (e.g. from where enemy bombers are attacking).

Which, IMO, should not be possible anyway. Fine with me, if it tells you the direction, but not the actual base. That would be not possible IRL, if the base is far out enough.
How would you exactly know, if the Bettys, bombing the airfield of Calcutta, come from Rangoon or Mandalay ?

[TheTomDude]

ORIGINAL: Charbroiled

I like to have the animations on, but only for the land combat so that I can see what LCU's of the enemy I am up against.

It would be nice if you could choose which animations (air, naval, land) you wanted to see....or included which LCU were involved in land combat in the combat report.

Good question (was it a question [&:]) which interests me too. Will this be possible in AE?

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: Bogo Mil

I think it is impossible to turn combat replay off for one player. The setting seems to be fixed in the savegame. Once I (Japanese) had turned it off by accident, and Drew Black didn't have a replay, too. He did not manage to turn it on for him. Next turn i reactivated the replay for me, and everything worked fine again.

Without watching the replay, you'll miss some information (e.g. from where enemy bombers are attacking).

In AE, are the delays settable by each player or will the Allied player be stuck with the delays used by the Japanese player?

[Yamato hugger]

The UI is pretty much unchanged. A couple of features added in the start up options.