Matrix Games Forums

July 20th, 2021 - v1.00.03

Added extra conditions to supply Axis forces in Australia
Change USA 1941 CV reinforcements come in 12/21/1941
Fixed specialty selection bug
Added more port restrictions for the Axis
Change removed loops
Change USA oil moved to the mountains from Los Angeles
Fixed UNSCREWED landing craft costs for armor and armies
Fixed out of supply air unit supplying by air transport
Fixed 2nd double right click naval move bug
Fixed flying air over neutral countries
Fixed supply truck use showing on opponent turn during hotseat game
Fixed night mission move when carriers in port
Fixed intercept from ports with invisible fleets
Fixed land units repairing and upgrading while in a fleet
Fixed fleet sorting errors with minors
Added invisible fleets starting the turn next to an enemy fleet become visible (this is to prevent game issues)
Fixed support mode triangle toggle
Fixed transport loss when hitting land or air unit in a fleet
Added land conversion when surrendering
Added Japanese size 1 port garrison events
Added Japanese homeland defense events
Fixed garrisioning split armies cost
Added raider retreat rule. If a fleet at sea in raider mode is in a non-ocean hex it will retreat from the hex if next to an enemy fleet
Fixed shattering unit flags due to combat
Fixed beachhead supply not allowed from port
Fixed minor country naval group adding shipyards
Fixed undo bug when 2 units were in a fleet
Added current rules book PDF link to help screen
Fixed 1945 naval air tech in main scenarios +1 defense
Fixed occasional naval sorting error
Added merchantMarine=value for $ModifyCountry
Added hotkey mapping to help screen under hotkeys
Change garrisoning a unit returns half the PPs of making it a garrison
Change garrisoned units +2 anti-tank
Fixed transport fleet with magical sub sinking POWERS
Fixed air group damage vs subs
Change chance to increase detection level of fleet for missed search 40% -> 75%
Fixed CV intercepting at range in heavy rain
Fixed merging smaller unit with specialty into other unit keeping specialty
Change lowered Japanese starting transports by 30(1941) and 40(1942) scenarios

Excellent thank you.
Surprised to see the garrison PP rule. Assume it means that you can’t keep flipping them as small bank accounts.
Raider retreat rule will be interesting too.

It’ll be a good base to explore further quantitative balance changes. I’m mainly worried about sub spam.

And you got your hotkeys. "?" -> Hotkeys -> Mapping

Christmas in July! Early by 5 days though [:D]

Thank you for the update.

Can't help but fix things.

Were all oiler reinforcements removed for Japan?

Edit: the raider change has made it ridiculously hard to actually attack blockading raiders, especially subs, as they will retreat to a ocean hex and then be untargetable. This means sub blockade is effectively immune to surface fleets. It may be better to just either house rule or disable the landing zone hex for owning player navies. Alternatively, give one hex islands, especially the ones out in the Pacific with no artistic considerations, 6 bordering hexes as beach hexes.

Not following your suggestion. Specify some more. The retreated units do max out their fleet ID levels BTW when this happens.

ORIGINAL: AlvaroSousa

Not following your suggestion. Specify some more. The retreated units do max out their fleet ID levels BTW when this happens.

Yes, but subs can't be attacked because they retreat to an ocean hex.

So you have subs in raider blockading a port/island. Your destroyers sail out to attack them using 1 action point on the way. The blockading subs then fall back and are now impossible for the surface fleet to engage with their remaining action point. Air is the only way to damage subs in raider mode now even in coastal hexes.

I'd strongly suggest making full blockades only effective in fleet mode, raider is the cause of most exploit type stuff left in the game now in my opinion.

Let me lay it out with an example:

'42 Allies blockade Fiji & the two small islands with 5 sub groups total. Japan has 10 airgroups in the Solomons, but they can neither fly the planes in due to the new bug or land planes due to the ports being blockaded. The subs can't be attacked by air or by surface fleets because the air literally cannot get in now. Surface fleets will displace blockading subs into ocean hexes, which makes them invulnerable.

The thing with blockades is that they're set on the attacking player's turn. The attacking player can "check" for blockade runners due to the new displacement rules before blockading, and there are many more islands than Japanese carriers, so a blockade can be held up almost indefinitely with almost no risk in 1.03.

In 1.02, the late game already devolves to sub spam. With a few turns played in 1.03, I can predict that the changes and bugs will only increase this meta.

So why don't players just sit in the landing zone?

I might have to exclude subs from blockading port supply. Small steps.

ORIGINAL: AlvaroSousa

So why don't players just sit in the landing zone?

I might have to exclude subs from blockading port supply. Small steps.

I think reversing the change and looking for an alternative fix as suggested above would be easier than creating more exceptions.
If you remember, the reason for the change was hidden fleets blocking landing zones.

I'm not sure landing zones are strictly needed. Gibraltar in WPE is understandable, as it's cramped. In the Pacific, though, you can just make 2-6 of the surrounding hexes into beaches, and this would solve the problem almost immediately. The only extra capability that this allows over single landing zones, as far as I can tell, is allowing multiple counters to land, which doesn't seem like a big deal. Allies want to blow 90 landing craft to take Guam? Go for it.

Landing zones are effectively a beach hex.

I will wait for some more responses.

ORIGINAL: AlvaroSousa

Landing zones are effectively a beach hex.

I will wait for some more responses.

Sure, surround them with all landing zones. I tried to do it in the editor but don't quite understand the layers for tiles. Either way, this would fix the original exploit (blocking singular landing zones with hidden fleets) and nullify the need for the new raider rule.

Could it be changed so blockades can only be made by units in Fleet mode which would make them more vulnerable to enemy attacks unless they first get control of the sea area around them. Also, 100% spotted.

Maybe handle subs a little differently. They have to be in Fleet mode and are vulnerable to attack by air and naval when in Fleet mode regardless of what hex type they are in. This would put subs back into convoy raider as their primary mission and only surface combat mode if they switch to fleet and actually try to attack the enemy.

I know Japanese sub doctrine, unlike US doctrine, emphasized using subs against capital ships, but in practice they were to few and to short ranged to be effective at that. Which was a real win for the US and their very vulnerable supply ships. In practice the Japanese subs were to busy running supplies to their island garrisons to do much offensively.

The problem with fleet mode blockades is that the enemy just zooms in and zooms out with a full stack and destroys whatever you have through interdiction. Upping the blockade requirement to 4-5 ships while allowing fleet mode under 1.02 rules should work better.

For blockading units my thoughts were...

They should be stuck in fleet mode...sorry but they are not trying to hide.

BUT they should NOT be intercepting an enemy fleet.


Then again maybe they should...keep in mind they are sitting there trying to intercept supply ships.
Suddenly they receive reports of ships coming in...are they supply? Are they attack? Won't know until you go investigate...WHOOPS it is the Yamato and 10 supporting cruisers...I guess sucks to be 3 DDs...

I find the very idea of the islands being blockaded as a bit gamey solution to the lack of supplies being cut off because lack of control of the seas around it. I don't think either side ever took a island or port by blockade like it happens in the game. The US might bring in a whole lot of ships and blow/bomb the hell out of the island but they never sat outside with a fleet for six weeks while the garrison starved to death.

All the blockade rule is doing is setting up a very artificial way for first the Japanese and later the US to take islands that have garrisons by not having to land invasions.

It should be eliminated. If either side needs some artificial fix to make them capable of taking an Island it would be better to build it into the Amphibious Warfare specialty or make battleships and air give a bigger bonus to the the Marine landings.

Right now it is just creating very artificial tactics. It is so easy to starve an island that probably the best tactic for both sides is to withdraw every unit on an island that isn't a victory hex as soon as the other side has the capacity to put three ships outside the island. For the first six months the Japanese can do this any where they want too whether there is a fleet rule or not. Kido Butai will make it possible. In 43 for the same reason the US will be taking every island they want to take until the run out of three ship groups.

No blockading means no reason to use ships, unfortunately. They'll just be hiding. Also, KB doesn't actually guarantee a lot until now. You can run blockades as the Allies because IJN doesn't have recon on single hex islands. Only with 1.03 can the Allies not actually lift blockades.

A quantitative nerf would probably be enough. I've been pushing 5/2 for large/small island blockades. I will run a test game AAR with that soon. Alternatively, units could have 4 supply max so that this tactic is less strong.