Matrix Games Forums

First of all, let me say that I love this game in all its iterations. I have played them all, beginning with Uncommon Valor (although I passed on War Plan Orange). I’m currently involved in a PBEM using DBB-B with stacking limits, and it is the best version so far, IMHO. (This is the latest facet of my fascination with the war in the Pacific during WW II, beginning with the S&T “USN” game for all you REAL old-timers.)

The main thing that continues to bug me is supply: even with DBB, it is too easy to keep everything in supply. Usage is low enough that a there are plenty of ships to haul the required supply (admission: I haven’t tried DBB-C, which I know tries to address this). I am the Allies, it is late spring 1942, and I have plenty of supply pretty much everywhere (except, of course, in China). No need for “Operation Shoestring” here.

My thought: it takes effort to maintain facilities—ports, airfields, fortifications. Some level of effort is necessary even if the facilities are not being actively used; and the larger the facility, the more effort will be required. This effort could be represented by supply usage—that is, for each level of port, airfield, and forts in a hex, a certain amount of supply would be used each day, regardless of whether or not units were present (and if they were, such units would continue to need their own supply, of course). If such supply were not available, then the facility would begin to take damage, and would eventually (through the damage) become unusable due to lack of maintenance.

Now for the things I am clueless about:
• I have no idea what the right amount of supply usage might be.
• I have no idea whether the game engine could be made to support this.
• I haven’t thought through all the potential implications.
• There might have to be some special allowance for China (where supplies are scarce).

Having said all that, I’d be interested in any reactions from those of you who are much more familiar with the inner workings of the game (if you would care to comment). Thanks in advance.

--Dave

ORIGINAL: DaveConn

First of all, let me say that I love this game in all its iterations. I have played them all, beginning with Uncommon Valor (although I passed on War Plan Orange). I’m currently involved in a PBEM using DBB-B with stacking limits, and it is the best version so far, IMHO. (This is the latest facet of my fascination with the war in the Pacific during WW II, beginning with the S&T “USN” game for all you REAL old-timers.)

The main thing that continues to bug me is supply: even with DBB, it is too easy to keep everything in supply. Usage is low enough that a there are plenty of ships to haul the required supply (admission: I haven’t tried DBB-C, which I know tries to address this). I am the Allies, it is late spring 1942, and I have plenty of supply pretty much everywhere (except, of course, in China). No need for “Operation Shoestring” here.

Having said all that, I’d be interested in any reactions from those of you who are much more familiar with the inner workings of the game (if you would care to comment). Thanks in advance.

--Dave

Bugs me too. That was the whole point to DBB-C. Campaign games just can't model the supply imperitives. It's a deep and wide campaign and includes a gazillion ships that a little weasel player will use to invade Ney York. Pfffft, nobody worth plying.

I have been making small map, short time, scenarios that obviate that nonsense. If people wish to see what the Pacific War was about, in its incipient form, check it out. For AE grogs.

ORIGINAL: Symon

ORIGINAL: DaveConn

First of all, let me say that I love this game in all its iterations. I have played them all, beginning with Uncommon Valor (although I passed on War Plan Orange). I’m currently involved in a PBEM using DBB-B with stacking limits, and it is the best version so far, IMHO. (This is the latest facet of my fascination with the war in the Pacific during WW II, beginning with the S&T “USN” game for all you REAL old-timers.)

The main thing that continues to bug me is supply: even with DBB, it is too easy to keep everything in supply. Usage is low enough that a there are plenty of ships to haul the required supply (admission: I haven’t tried DBB-C, which I know tries to address this). I am the Allies, it is late spring 1942, and I have plenty of supply pretty much everywhere (except, of course, in China). No need for “Operation Shoestring” here.

Having said all that, I’d be interested in any reactions from those of you who are much more familiar with the inner workings of the game (if you would care to comment). Thanks in advance.

--Dave

Bugs me too. That was the whole point to DBB-C. Campaign games just can't model the supply imperitives. It's a deep and wide campaign and includes a gazillion ships that a little weasel player will use to invade Ney York. Pfffft, nobody worth plying.

I have been making small map, short time, scenarios that obviate that nonsense. If people wish to see what the Pacific War was about, in its incipient form, check it out. For AE grogs.

I haven't really played for quite some time, but I recall someone, somewhere, someplace and I (may have been WITP) used to start most of the US industry in various stages of damage and set them repairing to eat up supply (was it 1000 per turn, I don't remember). With the US gearing up for war, so to speak, it left much fewer supplies available to ship.

Also, I have heard many times that spoilage is to low. Who can increase the percentage or eliminate the base level that it ceases?

Civilian population should also eat up those goodies. Isn't there someway to jimmy a fix to include that?

Just my thoughts.

Buck

Some quick ideas to address the "abundant supply and shipping issue" - HI and Refineries not producing supplies, increasing ressource point production/consumption in order to increase shipping requirements, industries starting damaged, lowering base sizes, reducing ENG unit abilities (DBB has various ENG devices, some of which just "eat supplies" without constructing anything), setting supply caps to slow the flow and adding dot bases with supply caps on transport grid, adding more "eaters" (e.g. more units incl. civilians, "Brass&REMF" device not doing anything but eating supplies), decreasing availability of shipping through additional upgrades with increased shipyard and time requirements, to name things that can be done with the editor.

Would love to see a maintenance requirement for bases - this should require supplies and ENG units, i.e. base installations should deteriorate and Eng units would be needed to repair the damage.

Another thing that cannot be done with the editor: Ships should require supplies not just for ammo replenishing - crews want to eat as well.

I haven't really played for quite some time, but I recall someone, somewhere, someplace and I (may have been WITP) used to start most of the US industry in various stages of damage and set them repairing to eat up supply (was it 1000 per turn, I don't remember). With the US gearing up for war, so to speak, it left much fewer supplies available to ship.

It was the IJ 25th Army at Singapore that very nearly ran out of ammunition in the course of its assault on that island which was perhaps the most carefully planned and best supplied effort the IJ made during the whole war. It was the IJ 15th Army that launched its 1944 offensive into India predicated on capturing the Allied supplies there. Perhaps the Marines had fish-heads and rice at first but it was the IJ 17th Army who coined the term "Starvation Island" to describe Guadalcanal.

That the Allies suffered from supply shortages at times is not in dispute.

But the conquest of China, solely from a logistics perspective should be completely impossible for the IJ Player. Sorry but horse drawn carts are utterly inadequate to provide even gasoline and ammunition to IJA units more than 100 miles from a railroad or navigable river. Conquering China works in this game.

Japan's Merchant Marine STARTED the war short of hulls by over a million tons. Then things got worse even though its losses were modest over the first 6 months of the war. By mid-1942 Japan had an insuperable logistical problem supplying even two reinforced division equivalents forward of Rabaul (Guadalcanal & New Guinea) while simultaneously supporting/supplying the air units at Rabaul to support them.

I mentioned in some other thread that the motorized support of the Allies should be better than just a liability to the Allied Player. The failure of the Japanese to motorize their logistics organization should be a problem for them. It should be limited in range and units having mostly unmotorized support should suffer rapidly increasing supply forwarding penalties as they move away from railroads/navigable rivers. Allied units lacking motorized support would suffer the same problems(Chinese especially). (Almost seems like it would keep the Chinese in check too since that also is a problem with the simulation value of the game).

It seems to me that there ought to be some very easy ways to mod relative shortage of supply, just reduce the daily alotments that show up at bases for the Allies and the amount of supply output of the DEI for the Japs as well as the starting stockpiles for both sides. That should take care of the issue pretty easily. Of course there is the matter of beta testing to make sure the changes work out right.

Well, if you decrase the stockpiles, alotments and output, the Allies may run into supply shortages later in the war.

That is exactly the opposite of what happened IRL and what we want for the game - Allied shoestring conditions in the beginning turning into abundance by 1944.

Problem with daily alotments and (Allied) supply production is that the numbers are fixed and factories cannot be increased. Without any Japanese moves, the amount of Allied supplies produced on Dec. 7th 1941 would be the same than produced on VJ Day. With Japanese moves, the Allied supply production will actually drop. But with all the units the Allies receive in the course of the game, the supply demand will increase many times.

So, since the supply alotment/production is fixed, I assume the supply stockpiles, alotments and production on day 1 are much higher than they were IRL in order to compensate for the losses of production facilities in the first part of the war and to have ample reserves for the ever-increasing supply demand later. Of course no player leaves available supplies behind "for later use", esp. when there is an abundance of shipping available.

Possible "fix" is to start with Allied supply production facilities partly damaged and a decrease of the alotments to a point which yields enough supplies to keep the factories repairing and a slight surplus. Of course this too would require a lot of beta testing to get things "right". Several forumites have experimented with this approach and there have been earlier discussions on the forum about this - search for "econ mod" if interested.

I would turn the free supply into LI requiring shipment of resources off map by the allied player. This will occupy hulls, burn some fuel while on map and maybe require the allies to fight for some of the resource locations. Resources on CONUS could be reduced to facilitate this transportation.

Is it possible for Michaelm to increase the terrain cost of supply to reduce the distances that can be supplied? I am not an expert on this but it seems extreme how far you can supply units through jungle/rough terrain. Or maybe the wastage could be increased.

Just a few thoughts.

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

Well, if you decrase the stockpiles, alotments and output, the Allies may run into supply shortages later in the war.

That is exactly the opposite of what happened IRL and what we want for the game - Allied shoestring conditions in the beginning turning into abundance by 1944.

Problem with daily alotments and (Allied) supply production is that the numbers are fixed and factories cannot be increased. Without any Japanese moves, the amount of Allied supplies produced on Dec. 7th 1941 would be the same than produced on VJ Day. With Japanese moves, the Allied supply production will actually drop. But with all the units the Allies receive in the course of the game, the supply demand will increase many times.

So, since the supply alotment/production is fixed, I assume the supply stockpiles, alotments and production on day 1 are much higher than they were IRL in order to compensate for the losses of production facilities in the first part of the war and to have ample reserves for the ever-increasing supply demand later. Of course no player leaves available supplies behind "for later use", esp. when there is an abundance of shipping available.

Possible "fix" is to start with Allied supply production facilities partly damaged and a decrease of the alotments to a point which yields enough supplies to keep the factories repairing and a slight surplus. Of course this too would require a lot of beta testing to get things "right". Several forumites have experimented with this approach and there have been earlier discussions on the forum about this - search for "econ mod" if interested.

I see what you are saying. A possible fix or way around this might be to create "convoys" to disband for supplies later in the war for the Allies.

Yes, I have thought about convoys as well. But this would use a lot of location slots - and in my mod I have no location slots left for the Allies because I have added many additional units...

ORIGINAL: spence

I haven't really played for quite some time, but I recall someone, somewhere, someplace and I (may have been WITP) used to start most of the US industry in various stages of damage and set them repairing to eat up supply (was it 1000 per turn, I don't remember). With the US gearing up for war, so to speak, it left much fewer supplies available to ship.

It was the IJ 25th Army at Singapore that very nearly ran out of ammunition in the course of its assault on that island which was perhaps the most carefully planned and best supplied effort the IJ made during the whole war. It was the IJ 15th Army that launched its 1944 offensive into India predicated on capturing the Allied supplies there. Perhaps the Marines had fish-heads and rice at first but it was the IJ 17th Army who coined the term "Starvation Island" to describe Guadalcanal.

That the Allies suffered from supply shortages at times is not in dispute.

But the conquest of China, solely from a logistics perspective should be completely impossible for the IJ Player. Sorry but horse drawn carts are utterly inadequate to provide even gasoline and ammunition to IJA units more than 100 miles from a railroad or navigable river. Conquering China works in this game.

Japan's Merchant Marine STARTED the war short of hulls by over a million tons. Then things got worse even though its losses were modest over the first 6 months of the war. By mid-1942 Japan had an insuperable logistical problem supplying even two reinforced division equivalents forward of Rabaul (Guadalcanal & New Guinea) while simultaneously supporting/supplying the air units at Rabaul to support them.

I mentioned in some other thread that the motorized support of the Allies should be better than just a liability to the Allied Player. The failure of the Japanese to motorize their logistics organization should be a problem for them. It should be limited in range and units having mostly unmotorized support should suffer rapidly increasing supply forwarding penalties as they move away from railroads/navigable rivers. Allied units lacking motorized support would suffer the same problems(Chinese especially). (Almost seems like it would keep the Chinese in check too since that also is a problem with the simulation value of the game).

Spence. Thank you for pointing out that it was the JAPANESE who truly suffered from supply problems. After the first few months, ALLIED supply problems were more a matter of distribution than availability, but the Japs started the war with logistics problems which got nothing but worse in all aspects as the war progressed.

Sure, of course the Japanese side needs tweaking as well. But this does not change the fact that Allied players have "too much" in the first months of the game.

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

Sure, of course the Japanese side needs tweaking as well. But this does not change the fact that Allied players have "too much" in the first months of the game.

Just adding some perspective. And, in fact, the Allies have too little supply in the Philippines. MacArthur totally failed to bring his supply into Bataan per Plan Orange, leaving enough sitting around to feed the Japanese for the whole campaign. Yet he still managed to hold out for 5 months. Try getting that result in the game. Yes, there are places where the Allies have too much supply availability in the first couple of months. But in a game where the Japanese are given enough supply to invade India and Australia (both pretty much pipedreams in real life), this discussion on limiting supply seemed to be concentrating on molehills and ignoring the mountains.

ORIGINAL: mike scholl 1

ORIGINAL: spence

I haven't really played for quite some time, but I recall someone, somewhere, someplace and I (may have been WITP) used to start most of the US industry in various stages of damage and set them repairing to eat up supply (was it 1000 per turn, I don't remember). With the US gearing up for war, so to speak, it left much fewer supplies available to ship.

It was the IJ 25th Army at Singapore that very nearly ran out of ammunition in the course of its assault on that island which was perhaps the most carefully planned and best supplied effort the IJ made during the whole war. It was the IJ 15th Army that launched its 1944 offensive into India predicated on capturing the Allied supplies there. Perhaps the Marines had fish-heads and rice at first but it was the IJ 17th Army who coined the term "Starvation Island" to describe Guadalcanal.

That the Allies suffered from supply shortages at times is not in dispute.

But the conquest of China, solely from a logistics perspective should be completely impossible for the IJ Player. Sorry but horse drawn carts are utterly inadequate to provide even gasoline and ammunition to IJA units more than 100 miles from a railroad or navigable river. Conquering China works in this game.

Japan's Merchant Marine STARTED the war short of hulls by over a million tons. Then things got worse even though its losses were modest over the first 6 months of the war. By mid-1942 Japan had an insuperable logistical problem supplying even two reinforced division equivalents forward of Rabaul (Guadalcanal & New Guinea) while simultaneously supporting/supplying the air units at Rabaul to support them.

I mentioned in some other thread that the motorized support of the Allies should be better than just a liability to the Allied Player. The failure of the Japanese to motorize their logistics organization should be a problem for them. It should be limited in range and units having mostly unmotorized support should suffer rapidly increasing supply forwarding penalties as they move away from railroads/navigable rivers. Allied units lacking motorized support would suffer the same problems(Chinese especially). (Almost seems like it would keep the Chinese in check too since that also is a problem with the simulation value of the game).

Spence. Thank you for pointing out that it was the JAPANESE who truly suffered from supply problems. After the first few months, ALLIED supply problems were more a matter of distribution than availability, but the Japs started the war with logistics problems which got nothing but worse in all aspects as the war progressed.

While everything said here is perfectly true - what is omitted may mean it is also misleading.

RE Shipping and Japan: Japan captured a third of a million tons of shipping in the first few months of the war.
This isn't in the game - and I see no way to add it without putting the same ship on both sides most of the time.
Before the war, Japan imported and exported globally - and much of that was on foreign bottoms. Before the
war began, all Japanese flagged ships were recalled to home waters (which RN used to estimate the war would
begin when it really did begin - based solely on the date all ships would be home). After the war started,
Japan only had to ship locally - rendering shipping much more efficient than sailing to San Francisco or London.
Much of Japan's "shortage" of shipping was because of poor allocation: The Army, Navy and Merchant Marine all
had separate ship management institutions that did not cooperate often (the US was almost as bad, with the same
three institutions, but better cooperation sometimes - still the average cargo ship at Noumea had to wait 5
months to load!) The challenge is can you manage more efficiently? Can you avoid the temptation to use ships
for invasion support instead of the economy (or maybe can you have returning ships come back with resources)?

RE: Land logistics: Japan had a classic 20th century military, like all the great powers except the UK and USA
did. German and French and Russian and other countries had vast numbers of horse (or mule) drawn vehicles. Even
the US First Cavalry Division went to North Africa horsed - which meant it needed a lot more shipping support than
other divisions. As well, in PTO the US tended to STRIP divisions of their support vehicles - supporting them
mainly by shipping. It was SOP to hire many local bearers - there are pictures of lines going out of sight. It
was not only Japan that used primitive means of transport. Japan managed what it had poorly - but need not have
done that badly. Early planning called for linking Indochina and North China by rail - but nothing was done
about it prior to Ichi Go. Railroads were the main land logistical support mechanisms of the world since the
19th century. Failure to capture the port railheads in France after D Day was a major problem - only the US
had the trucks to attempt a Red Ball Express - and it was barely adequate.

RE: What had to be? In some ways, and in some areas, Japan was better organized (see aircraft production
relative to its industrial base and compare with Germany). Japan actually did have standardized merchant ships -
although many were not build to such standards. It did have pre war plans (and even perfected designs) for
sub chasers and escort ships - but didn't mass produce them early enough. Nor did it organize the Grand Escort
Command soon enough or allocate sufficient assets to it. In my view, if you are going to force every historical
decision on the players, they are better off reading history than playing. If you want to let them have a go
at organizing things, then let them have the options Japan really had, even if it didn't take advantage of them
fully.

Buck is correct. At the suggestion of a Forum member who lives in Anchorage, where I do, but whom I have
never met in person, I put this into RHS in WITP days - and it remains to this day. Allied supply grows
over time because the industry at the map edge (mostly) repairs over time and produces more. This is
so we can start with 1941 values but increase them sufficient to feed 1944 levels of units. The devil
is in the details, as usual - and one can always do better; getting every location right requires a lot
of research; getting consumption right requires making land units and base forces larger, with appropriate
support elements - so they consume enough relative to their nature (units are not just infantry, artillery
and armor with a constant ratio of support: draft units need more supply than motorized ones; pack units
need more than draft do - and both need more lift to load on a ship than motorized units do as well).
But - yep - one can start with smaller amounts of supply in 1941 IF you let it grow to feed the reinforcements
which will come later. I am surprised this idea - which I didn't think of but implemented - is not more
widely used.

ORIGINAL: Buck Beach

ORIGINAL: Symon

ORIGINAL: DaveConn

First of all, let me say that I love this game in all its iterations. I have played them all, beginning with Uncommon Valor (although I passed on War Plan Orange). I’m currently involved in a PBEM using DBB-B with stacking limits, and it is the best version so far, IMHO. (This is the latest facet of my fascination with the war in the Pacific during WW II, beginning with the S&T “USN” game for all you REAL old-timers.)

The main thing that continues to bug me is supply: even with DBB, it is too easy to keep everything in supply. Usage is low enough that a there are plenty of ships to haul the required supply (admission: I haven’t tried DBB-C, which I know tries to address this). I am the Allies, it is late spring 1942, and I have plenty of supply pretty much everywhere (except, of course, in China). No need for “Operation Shoestring” here.

Having said all that, I’d be interested in any reactions from those of you who are much more familiar with the inner workings of the game (if you would care to comment). Thanks in advance.

--Dave

Bugs me too. That was the whole point to DBB-C. Campaign games just can't model the supply imperitives. It's a deep and wide campaign and includes a gazillion ships that a little weasel player will use to invade Ney York. Pfffft, nobody worth plying.

I have been making small map, short time, scenarios that obviate that nonsense. If people wish to see what the Pacific War was about, in its incipient form, check it out. For AE grogs.

I haven't really played for quite some time, but I recall someone, somewhere, someplace and I (may have been WITP) used to start most of the US industry in various stages of damage and set them repairing to eat up supply (was it 1000 per turn, I don't remember). With the US gearing up for war, so to speak, it left much fewer supplies available to ship.

Also, I have heard many times that spoilage is to low. Who can increase the percentage or eliminate the base level that it ceases?

Civilian population should also eat up those goodies. Isn't there someway to jimmy a fix to include that?

Just my thoughts.

Buck

Logged in as: el cid again

In one of the few scholarly histories of the British role in the theater (Grave of a Dozen Schemes),
a professional historian expresses the view that Britain could have been knocked out of the war on
the occasion of the Indian Ocean Raid of the Kiddo Butai. It seems troops were on ships at sea bound
for Burma that could have landed on Ceylon. India was also virtually under occupation - for one thing
people were starving because of a strategic decision not to allocate shipping to feed the place -
for another the entire (then unified) Congress Party had been jailed rather than accept its proposal
for political support during the war in exchange for independence afterwards (unthinkable to the
Governor General, never mind that is what happened). It may not have been a pipe dream to knock
Britain out of the Pacific War after all. Australia is different - but if you build a mod with realistic
supply consumption by units - I think you will find the AE engine will NOT permit an effective invasion
of AUS except against an incompetent opponent. Even if they get there they cannot be supported enough
to be combat effective long enough to capture any of the major cities.

ORIGINAL: mike scholl 1

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

Sure, of course the Japanese side needs tweaking as well. But this does not change the fact that Allied players have "too much" in the first months of the game.

Just adding some perspective. And, in fact, the Allies have too little supply in the Philippines. MacArthur totally failed to bring his supply into Bataan per Plan Orange, leaving enough sitting around to feed the Japanese for the whole campaign. Yet he still managed to hold out for 5 months. Try getting that result in the game. Yes, there are places where the Allies have too much supply availability in the first couple of months. But in a game where the Japanese are given enough supply to invade India and Australia (both pretty much pipedreams in real life), this discussion on limiting supply seemed to be concentrating on molehills and ignoring the mountains.

ORIGINAL: el cid again
Buck is correct. At the suggestion of a Forum member who lives in Anchorage,

I'm in Fairbanks - we should have an Alaskan WitP Convention!