Matrix Games Forums

(ha not a whinge)

of building anything substantial after about mid '44..?

OK my thoughts are ships (Navy and Merchant) are expensive in terms of HI compared to aircraft... after about mid '44 the Naval situation is going to be bad or very bad and pretty much nothing i build will help that much. Escorts maybe. So why not just stop as much as possible to save HI and put it towards aircraft?

ORIGINAL: PresterJohn

(ha not a whinge)

of building anything substantial after about mid '44..?

OK my thoughts are ships (Navy and Merchant) are expensive in terms of HI compared to aircraft... after about mid '44 the Naval situation is going to be bad or very bad and pretty much nothing i build will help that much. Escorts maybe. So why not just stop as much as possible to save HI and put it towards aircraft?

They did.

ORIGINAL: PresterJohn

(ha not a whinge)

of building anything substantial after about mid '44..?

OK my thoughts are ships (Navy and Merchant) are expensive in terms of HI compared to aircraft... after about mid '44 the Naval situation is going to be bad or very bad and pretty much nothing i build will help that much. Escorts maybe. So why not just stop as much as possible to save HI and put it towards aircraft?

Super Es definitely. [:D] And maybe DDs.

Idiot me...

ORIGINAL: Puhis

ORIGINAL: PresterJohn

(ha not a whinge)

of building anything substantial after about mid '44..?

OK my thoughts are ships (Navy and Merchant) are expensive in terms of HI compared to aircraft... after about mid '44 the Naval situation is going to be bad or very bad and pretty much nothing i build will help that much. Escorts maybe. So why not just stop as much as possible to save HI and put it towards aircraft?

Super Es definitely. [:D] And maybe DDs.

shhh, don't mention the war!

Personally as Japan, I shut off production of ALL AKs and APs (as well as AS, AG, ect) from the start of the game. I use these saved points to accelerate CVEs. Anything I cant accelerate to get prior to 1 Jan 44 is also shut off except as you say, escorts. In some cases I convert merch shipyards to naval yards.

I figure anything built after 1 Jan 44 is just points for the allies as are any merchies. I continue to build tankers to replace losses, and I accelerate AOs.

Having served up a reverse Midway, I think that would perhaps be unwise...

It kinda depends on what happens in the future, but from my point of view, it seems to me that you only get so many rolls of the dice as Allies. Not even the Allies have unlimited numbers of CVs. And having made one stinkingly bad roll, one or two more of those would be the end of the war probably.

So I would hardly label the IJN as useless in the late war!

I accelerate all CV's (except for Shinano, she's halted) because as EUbanana says: you don't know what will happen. If you start accelerating right away, you might just have some extra CV"s in place to delay the inevetable a bit. Besides, a CV with depth charge racks seems like a good idea to me
 
 
 
 

ORIGINAL: d0mbo
(except for Shinano, she's halted)

Whats so bad about Shinano? She's more or less an Illustrious class, no?

May not be an optimal design, but I'd not turn down another one of those if offered. [;)]

I think stopping naval production too early (i.e., before Japan is cut off from fuel) is unwise. Particularly if you manage to destroy USN's carrier fleet or/and battleline in 1942[8D]. Credible naval assets will serve as an effective deterrent even when IJN can't confront Allies head-on and win anymore. Merchant production might be stopped earlier, if there are enough of them anyway.

ORIGINAL: EUBanana

Whats so bad about Shinano? She's more or less an Illustrious class, no?

May not be an optimal design, but I'd not turn down another one of those if offered. [;)]

Cost. IIRC, Shinano costs almost as much as four Unryus. Now, in Scen 2 Shinano is a Taiho-class carrier, so she's worth building and even accelerating thete.

She's not necesserily bad, it's more the fact that I either halt shinano and some RO boats, to accelerate (more) useful ships or you can build shinano, but not accelerate the ships i want earlier. You can't do both without investing heavily in navy shipyards.

ORIGINAL: EUBanana

ORIGINAL: d0mbo
(except for Shinano, she's halted)

Whats so bad about Shinano? She's more or less an Illustrious class, no?

May not be an optimal design, but I'd not turn down another one of those if offered. [;)]

200,000 HI points. [:D]

She'll get turned on when all the other uses for naval shipyards are done.

I don't mess with the xAK/AP production until I see what my losses are in my operations. Then tweak to replace your losses and have enough to keep your economy going with some to spare (because the subs are going to be there).

Shinano cost 246,000 HI, or 6800 Single engined aircraft
An Unryu class CV translates to 1000 Single engined aircraft
A destroyer translates to 40-50 Single engined aircraft
An RO Sub 187 Single engined aircraft
Standard-A Cargo about 100 Single engined aircraft

Twin engined cost double single engined.

Thats a lot of aircraft you can build to throw at the allies. Pilot numbers should not a problem

Unryus are worth it, as are DDs. The others.....well, you can only build so many aircraft, so any left over HI should be used at that point in the game.

With minimal fanfare and sacrifice, I've managed to bank 1.27 million HI in my ongoing PBEM game (Just about to enter January 1943). I've certainly not starved myself of planes or production.

Would 1/6 of my reserve HI be worth it to produce another decent CV? Yeah, probably. I'd rather do that than produce thousands of 1942 era Japanese fighters.

ORIGINAL: PresterJohn

Shinano cost 246,000 HI, or 6800 Single engined aircraft
An Unryu class CV translates to 1000 Single engined aircraft
A destroyer translates to 40-50 Single engined aircraft
An RO Sub 187 Single engined aircraft
Standard-A Cargo about 100 Single engined aircraft

Twin engined cost double single engined.

Thats a lot of aircraft you can build to throw at the allies. Pilot numbers should not a problem

Rob and Lenny might not want to read this:

In order to build 6800 additional aircraft over and above what you would build while maintaining naval construction, you would have to expand factories even more than you already do; which would use a lot of supply. 6800 single engine a/c are 567/mo. Pilot replacements may not be a problem but to add that many pilots to the mix, I suspect they would end up being very very inexperienced and die in their first fight- since you can add aircraft but you cannot add more air units to expand training.

That said, the best thing I can say about Shinano is that it arrives with very good pilots. The pilots might be worth more than the ship at that stage of the war.

Like Mynok, I intend to halt Shinano until my Naval yard capacity is no longer being heavily used. Amassing HI should also not be a problem even with accelerating other ships like the Unryus and Taiho. It is 9/42 in my furthest PBEM and I am currently banking 330k HI/mo and expect to have ~1.5 million on 1/1/43.

ORIGINAL: offenseman

Pilot replacements may not be a problem but to add that many pilots to the mix, I suspect they would end up being very very inexperienced and die in their first fight- since you can add aircraft but you cannot add more air units to expand training.

There are ways around this [;)]

I doubt there are ways to find an additional 500 pilots a month who are experienced enough to go toe to toe with the Allies reinforcements after say, 1/43.  Different methods of unit expansion and training efforts can mitigate that to some extent but not that much.  Some of those methods of unit expansion are gamey and in my PBEMs would not be allowed for that reason.