Resize of air groups?

[Mandai]

I justed started as japanese using the latest beta version. Using the CS at hiroshima i can resize the jakes and petes based on the CS. However, when i move another float plane unit to resize on the CS, it is not allowed anymore. So look like newer versions of WITPAE will close this resize loop hole.

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: Mandai

I justed started as japanese using the latest beta version. Using the CS at hiroshima i can resize the jakes and petes based on the CS. However, when i move another float plane unit to resize on the CS, it is not allowed anymore. So look like newer versions of WITPAE will close this resize loop hole.

Groups can resize. It's not a loophole. It's designed that way.

If a group won't resize it's usually because either it has a time sensitive auto-resize inherent to the group or it is not a complete group (there is a fragment somewhere else).

It could also be that your settings are correct to resize. I'd have to see a screenshot to possibly help.

[Lokasenna]

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: Mandai

I justed started as japanese using the latest beta version. Using the CS at hiroshima i can resize the jakes and petes based on the CS. However, when i move another float plane unit to resize on the CS, it is not allowed anymore. So look like newer versions of WITPAE will close this resize loop hole.

Groups can resize. It's not a loophole. It's designed that way.

If a group won't resize it's usually because either it has a time sensitive auto-resize inherent to the group or it is not a complete group (there is a fragment somewhere else).

It could also be that your settings are correct to resize. I'd have to see a screenshot to possibly help.

And there are a few that just don't have the resize option at all.

[Kull]

ORIGINAL: Anthropoid

*sigh* it is a shame this is all so arcane. Not to say that the Japanese player should have an unrealistic ability to generate legions of super pilots, nor be destined to experience exactly the sort of pilot shortage Japan experienced in 1944 . . . Modeling historical opportunities and constraints in a way that allows the player to accurately and reasonably assess his/her assets and to then analyze what actions he/she might take to implement any given plan for long-term personnel development is what the game should do.

I've seen it posted here before that the real constraint on Japan wasn't numbers of aircraft but AV-gas to run all those missions and support all the training. The HI hit on pilot training and supply consumption by training units is a substitute of sorts, but certainly not enough to hinder a really aggressive expansion and training program by the Japanese. If we knew beyond a doubt that it was completely impossible for the Japanese to have focused attention on generating more AV-gas (and thus the unexpanded unit sizes in the air OOB were the true all-war maximum), then I'd probably be more inclined to tone down my normal air unit expansion activities. Absent that, I assume it could be done and just ramp up the training (and the ASW patrols!)

[IdahoNYer]

ORIGINAL: obvert



Groups can resize. It's not a loophole. It's designed that way.

Obvert - I understand resizing is in the design - my question is why? I think the intent is to allow players to modify a carriers load out - such as Ryujo's.

I don't think it was in the designer's intent to allow a player to create 86 plane Zero groups, or 90 plane Marine squadrons...but the game does allow it.

[InfiniteMonkey]

I view this game is one big "what if?" We are playing a simulation, not acting in an historical play. If we wanted to relive WW2, we could go watch documentaries or read the Nimitz Graybook (okay, I admit it, I've got it bookmarked and have been reading, but...)

The problem is, the game gives you what you got historically as Japan. It assumes the events in the Pacific theater whether they occur in game or not. It assumes decisions made in WW2 are made in game. If I have the planes, and I have the pilots, I have the ground crews, and I have the supply... why, exactly, am I not allowed to fly them?

The production, research, political points, etc. systems implemented in game are not ideal for playing the kind of what if game we play, but they are not bad. Maybe the cost of building and supplying and training and flying and fighting those air groups should be modeled differently. In the meantime, limiting the Japanese side to historical OOB's automatically imposes limits that might not have been there historically.

We have a sandbox, let's play! After all, everything we do in this game is fiction.

[Alfred]

ORIGINAL: InfiniteMonkey

I view this game is one big "what if?" We are playing a simulation, not acting in an historical play. If we wanted to relive WW2, we could go watch documentaries or read the Nimitz Graybook (okay, I admit it, I've got it bookmarked and have been reading, but...)

The problem is, the game gives you what you got historically as Japan. It assumes the events in the Pacific theater whether they occur in game or not. It assumes decisions made in WW2 are made in game. If I have the planes, and I have the pilots, I have the ground crews, and I have the supply... why, exactly, am I not allowed to fly them?

The production, research, political points, etc. systems implemented in game are not ideal for playing the kind of what if game we play, but they are not bad. Maybe the cost of building and supplying and training and flying and fighting those air groups should be modeled differently. In the meantime, limiting the Japanese side to historical OOB's automatically imposes limits that might not have been there historically.

We have a sandbox, let's play! After all, everything we do in this game is fiction.

AE is not a sandbox.

AE was never designed to be a sandbox. It was not coded to be a sandbox.

If AE were truly a sandbox, every Japanese player would be defeated by 1 February 1942.

Alfred

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Kull

ORIGINAL: Anthropoid

*sigh* it is a shame this is all so arcane. Not to say that the Japanese player should have an unrealistic ability to generate legions of super pilots, nor be destined to experience exactly the sort of pilot shortage Japan experienced in 1944 . . . Modeling historical opportunities and constraints in a way that allows the player to accurately and reasonably assess his/her assets and to then analyze what actions he/she might take to implement any given plan for long-term personnel development is what the game should do.

I've seen it posted here before that the real constraint on Japan wasn't numbers of aircraft but AV-gas to run all those missions and support all the training. The HI hit on pilot training and supply consumption by training units is a substitute of sorts, but certainly not enough to hinder a really aggressive expansion and training program by the Japanese. If we knew beyond a doubt that it was completely impossible for the Japanese to have focused attention on generating more AV-gas (and thus the unexpanded unit sizes in the air OOB were the true all-war maximum), then I'd probably be more inclined to tone down my normal air unit expansion activities. Absent that, I assume it could be done and just ramp up the training (and the ASW patrols!)

This point about av-gas is the reason all of the discussions of Japan's air efforts break down at the starting line. All the debate about air ASW, about strat bombing in China, about huge 300+-plane CAPs on atolls are predicated on supply being used to fly and not petroleum. And supply in the game can be made in LI centers thousands of miles from the nearest POL source, or delivered in xAKLs at little VP risk.

Japan's air effort collapsed because the USN, particularly subs, targeted tankers from mid-1944 onward. And were successful. The pilot training effort was hampered by lack of av gas long before that summer, however. As you say, the game attempts to inject Fuel into the equation second-hand through the HI "pilot tax", but it's not high enough to prevent huge air armadas into 1945, nor, on the other side of the coin, does it correlate to actual training effort. The tax is imposed whether the pilots sit in barracks or fly.

This issue spills over into night bombing as well, but that's another can of worms.

[Alfred]

Bullwinkle58,,
 
It is even worse than you mention.
 
Air units can fully train their pilots even when there is zero supply at the base, let alone no "avgas".  Or even if there is not a single plane in the unit.
 
Alfred

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Alfred

Bullwinkle58,,

It is even worse than you mention.

Air units can fully train their pilots even when there is zero supply at the base, let alone no "avgas".  Or even if there is not a single plane in the unit.

Alfred

Well, books, paper, pencils. [8D]

The Japan Man is a superman after all . . .

[Lokasenna]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: Alfred

Bullwinkle58,,

It is even worse than you mention.

Air units can fully train their pilots even when there is zero supply at the base, let alone no "avgas".  Or even if there is not a single plane in the unit.

Alfred

Well, books, paper, pencils. [8D]

The Japan Man is a superman after all . . .

Hey now. I'm pretty sure that if I were a rookie pilot starting at skill levels in the 10s-20s, I could improve my skills at least somewhat through book learning. I know, I know...