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I hope this post is allowed. I'm not sure why I just found WITP:AE, but I'm incredibly glad that I did. I've spent the last two weeks searching the fantastic wealth of knowledge on this forum and I estimate I'm currently about 75% complete with my DEC 8 set up following the excel based guide. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone on here that has shared their knowledge and hard work with WITP:AE over the last 16 or so years. I successfully installed the game, got seabee up and running, have the combat reporter and tracker set up, mods installed, etc.

I'm very much looking forward to the first couple turns in this game!

Thanks again

You now have a life long friend in WitPAE.

altemosejd wrote: Wed Mar 05, 2025 8:21 pm I hope this post is allowed. I'm not sure why I just found WITP:AE, but I'm incredibly glad that I did. I've spent the last two weeks searching the fantastic wealth of knowledge on this forum and I estimate I'm currently about 75% complete with my DEC 8 set up following the excel based guide. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone on here that has shared their knowledge and hard work with WITP:AE over the last 16 or so years. I successfully installed the game, got seabee up and running, have the combat reporter and tracker set up, mods installed, etc.

I'm very much looking forward to the first couple turns in this game!

Thanks again

Have you read the AAR's? there are some good one's. But yeah, I've been playing WITP and WITPAE for a long time and it's the best thing I've done in a while. I'm not even sure that what I'm typing makes sense....GP

and at times no other life, welcome aboard....

I'm glad you mentioned AARs. I've read a few on the forum and even pulled a couple real AARs from units I ran across during the setup. Think that's why I'm so engrossed with this game - I enjoy the big historical engagements but I moreso enjoy what happened before and after to get to that point. The ones on the forum here have been fantastic, especially as I learn more.

Thanks for the welcome messages!

If you haven't done so, play the Coral Sea scenario from both sides and then the Guadalcanal scenario from both sides. Play as often as you need to so you can learn from those scenarios without being overwhelmed as you would be in a campaign game.

RangerJoe wrote: Thu Mar 06, 2025 1:13 am If you haven't done so, play the Coral Sea scenario from both sides and then the Guadalcanal scenario from both sides. Play as often as you need to so you can learn from those scenarios without being overwhelmed as you would be in a campaign game.

I started a Coral Sea scenario from the allied side but after the first turn it tried to override one of the "admin" save slots 1-3 I think. I panicked a bit but my full campaign save was alright. Is that normal? I'd love to start a small scenario prior to kicking off the campaign but man I'd be heartbroken at this point if i lost this first turn set up.

Lightbulb edit - I think it's time I back those save files up just in case, that way i'm good to go if something happens.

I always save starting from slot 004 upwards.

Slot 002 is game's autosave, and I always leave slot 003 empty, just as a visual buffer.

Yaab wrote: Thu Mar 06, 2025 1:24 pm I always save starting from slot 004 upwards.

Slot 002 is game's autosave, and I always leave slot 003 empty, just as a visual buffer.

There are also two slots [000 & 001] used for Pre-Turn and Post-Turn saves.

altemosejd wrote: Thu Mar 06, 2025 1:15 pm

RangerJoe wrote: Thu Mar 06, 2025 1:13 am If you haven't done so, play the Coral Sea scenario from both sides and then the Guadalcanal scenario from both sides. Play as often as you need to so you can learn from those scenarios without being overwhelmed as you would be in a campaign game.

I started a Coral Sea scenario from the allied side but after the first turn it tried to override one of the "admin" save slots 1-3 I think. I panicked a bit but my full campaign save was alright. Is that normal? I'd love to start a small scenario prior to kicking off the campaign but man I'd be heartbroken at this point if i lost this first turn set up.

Lightbulb edit - I think it's time I back those save files up just in case, that way i'm good to go if something happens.

Here is a suggestion. Make a separate "Save" folder, name it "Campaign Save" and then move your campaign save to that folder. Then it is safe. Once you try the scenarios and understand the concepts there, then you can copy your campaign save and return it to the regular save folder - maybe after deleting all of the saves there. Then you can always restart the campaign as needed but with a caveat and a warning, the "AI" scripts will always be the same for that campaign.

So if you want to try different AI strategies, you would have to save all of the AI scripts in another folder, then bring them back one at a time. Just delete the AI script that you just used before you bring in another script. They may start out pretty much the same but the AI may have different objectives, aggression, and so on for the different AI scripts.

Perfect, thank you both for the info! I ended up backing up all of the current campaign saves last night. Made it thru the Luzon base, aircraft, and TF set up. Those sub patrols took a minute. I'm going to kick off the scenario tonight and get an idea of how much more I have to learn!

altemosejd wrote: Fri Mar 07, 2025 1:37 pm Perfect, thank you both for the info! I ended up backing up all of the current campaign saves last night. Made it thru the Luzon base, aircraft, and TF set up. Those sub patrols took a minute. I'm going to kick off the scenario tonight and get an idea of how much more I have to learn!

It's ok to restart a few times. I restarted a bunch of times when I started learning WitP. When I started AE the restarts were also numerous....GP

Welcome aboard !

Here are a couple of AARs to read with some advice:

Coral Sea

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 3&t=361051

Guadalcanal

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... p?t=361982

I'm going to be reading both before i bite this off in a few minutes!

On a completely unrelated note, if you don't mind, what's the typical turn by turn look like for ya'll? I'd estimate I've spent about 11 sessions (conservatively about 20 hours total) just setting up this first turn. Is there ever a point where you just call it and move on to the next day? I'm sure I'll get more efficient as I continue, just wondering if there's a more "focused" method once you have the bulk of the allied bases set up.

A lot if things don't really need to be accomplished immediately for either side. But it will go faster once you understand how some things work, what is important, and possibly more important is knowing what is not that important that it needs to be done immediately. It also depends upon the side since Japan has the industry to set up and is on a very important time table for its conquests, especially with the invasion bonus that ends after some months.

I played the Coral Sea scenario friday night & a bit yesterday. Those turns helped start to develop some muscle memory as far as what my turn tasks look like. Started in on the guadalcanal scenario a bit last night as well. That went.. not nearly as smooth. Need to dig into land based combat more. Also need to figure out a better way to manage my carriers - I successfully chewed up the counterattacking force at Tulagi but then my carriers all pulled out to Numeau. Forgot to change their home port info. I am getting better at thinking about logistics tho. And boy, do you need to go in with a plan. All good lessons learned!

I may bite off a bit of an AAR myself on my Coral Sea playthrough. Have it written but want to condense it quite a bit. I was watching the Big Ten wrestling tournament yesterday and all I could think about was how to lumber the Yorktown back to port for repairs, I got bit bad by this game lol.

Well, now you know why it is suggested to try the Coral Sea and then the Guadalcanal scenarios before trying a campaign game. It is better to learn a few things from each scenario than try a campaign scenario first and trying to figure out how to do everything right away.

It is much harder with the Japanese due to the Industry considerations as well as getting the initial expansion done without getting bogged down.

Welcome to the game. On the Allied side, you can do some tasks weekly or maybe even monthly, such as managing pilot training, optimizing your repair yards (i.e. shifting ships between "shipyard" and "pier side"), making sure your convoys are running properly, moving ships, aircraft and ground units from their arrival points, etc. I'm also at the point where I minimize all parameters in the combat replay to make it go as fast as possible and do something else as the turn plays out. I wouldn't do that until you have a reasonable idea of how combat works, though. To me there's a sweet spot where I get maybe 90-95% efficiency but save a lot of time.

In mid-game I've been able to do 10-minute turns. When you or your opponent are conducting a major operation it can take a while longer.

Cheers,
CB

I have some strategic/tactical advice for Grand Campaign as Allies here:

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 3#p2422753

Some of it is outdated, but principles are still good.