IPC distribution: how would you feel about a map like this?

[Guest]

I, for one, would be dead set against boosting ANY Pacific island group to 2, and I am not thrilled with giving most of them even one.  In my house rules for A&A Pacific, I take away the IPC for the Ryukyu and Bonin Islands and give them to Japan.  I do give one IPC to New Caledonia because of its nickel production, and to offset having the Dutch as a separate player with the Dutch East Indies to draw on, and boost New Zealand to 2 IPC for the same reason.  As for sea zones generating income, I like the idea, but putting it into practice is another thing.

Take the Gulf of Mexico for an example.  Since offshore oil production was already taking place prior to WW2, you could easily justify an IPC value of 2 or 3, in conjunction with the fishing resources and commercial trade.  However, does a German submarine in the Gulf give the Germans the IPC value, or does it simply deny the US the IPC?  Giving the Germans the IPC is ludicrous on the face of it, but denying the US the IPC because a sub is present seems a bit much.  Same thing could hold true for the Sea of Japan, the Mediterranean, the Black Sea, and the Baltic Sea.  The best option is either use the convoy set-up from A&A Pacific and Europe, or go with specific recipient of the IPC with the requirement that to deny the IPC production to the recipient, a surface warship has to be present.

@Subotai:

It’s quite obvious that the reason why KGF is the most used strat is because US must build expensive units which will gain little money if US decides to go after Jap  in the pacific. SZ worth ipc is an option, also making ipc a virtual value which not only represents industrial power, mostly in western/eastern Europe before and during WW2, but ipc value also does to a certain degree already represent political power and strategic important factors, like Norway is worth 3 ipc in AAR, China+Sink is worth 4 ipc… now that is fun for me as I’m Norwegian, but then the whole ipc element should be reconsidered when making different mods, or other A&A variants.

As for getting more combat in the Pacific, Subotai is correct.  Building a navy from scratch is expensive, and if the US really had to start from scratch in WW2, the Pacific would not have seen near the combat that it did.  However, the US did not start from scratch.  You want more combat in the Pacific, then give the US the fleet that it actually had in 1941/42.  Based on the scaling for the Axis navies, give the US 3 Carriers with 2 fighters each, 3 Battleships, at least 6 or more destroyers, and 2 submarines.  For A&A50, add 3 or 4 cruisers.  Then give the US the ability to build 2 transport automatically every turn to represent the enormous merchant shipbuilding effort of the US.  The US Navy was built to fight a war in the Pacific, and was larger than the Japanese Navy, although from the game, you would be hard pressed to realize that.  The British Royal Navy should have more ships as well.  Both navies should be larger than the Japanese Navy.  If you do not give the US and UK more ships, then quit complaining about not having any combat in the Pacific.  Given the way the game is structured, with drastically reduced US and UK navies, and severely reduced US production, that is what you are going to get.

As for spreading IPC all over the map, I am not exactly in favor of that either.  I would prefer to see them concentrated more, or in the case of Manchuria and Korea, see them broken up with each having separate IPC values.  Another option would be to give certain areas two IPC values, one for the Allies and one for the Axis.  The Allies did quite well without Borneo, Malaya, and the Dutch East Indies, but they were absolutely vital to Japan.  Make them more valuable to Japan, so that Japan goes for them first.  As compensation, boost the IPC value in the Allied home territories of the US and the UK, or boost the value of Australia.

[italiansarecoming]

WRONGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!@timerover51:

I, for one, would be dead set against boosting ANY Pacific island group to 2, and I am not thrilled with giving most of them even one.  In my house rules for A&A Pacific, I take away the IPC for the Ryukyu and Bonin Islands and give them to Japan.  I do give one IPC to New Caledonia because of its nickel production, and to offset having the Dutch as a separate player with the Dutch East Indies to draw on, and boost New Zealand to 2 IPC for the same reason.  As for sea zones generating income, I like the idea, but putting it into practice is another thing.

Take the Gulf of Mexico for an example.  Since offshore oil production was already taking place prior to WW2, you could easily justify an IPC value of 2 or 3, in conjunction with the fishing resources and commercial trade.  However, does a German submarine in the Gulf give the Germans the IPC value, or does it simply deny the US the IPC?  Giving the Germans the IPC is ludicrous on the face of it, but denying the US the IPC because a sub is present seems a bit much.  Same thing could hold true for the Sea of Japan, the Mediterranean, the Black Sea, and the Baltic Sea.  The best option is either use the convoy set-up from A&A Pacific and Europe, or go with specific recipient of the IPC with the requirement that to deny the IPC production to the recipient, a surface warship has to be present.

@Subotai:

It’s quite obvious that the reason why KGF is the most used strat is because US must build expensive units which will gain little money if US decides to go after Jap  in the pacific. SZ worth ipc is an option, also making ipc a virtual value which not only represents industrial power, mostly in western/eastern Europe before and during WW2, but ipc value also does to a certain degree already represent political power and strategic important factors, like Norway is worth 3 ipc in AAR, China+Sink is worth 4 ipc… now that is fun for me as I’m Norwegian, but then the whole ipc element should be reconsidered when making different mods, or other A&A variants.

As for getting more combat in the Pacific, Subotai is correct.  Building a navy from scratch is expensive, and if the US really had to start from scratch in WW2, the Pacific would not have seen near the combat that it did.  However, the US did not start from scratch.  You want more combat in the Pacific, then give the US the fleet that it actually had in 1941/42.  Based on the scaling for the Axis navies, give the US 3 Carriers with 2 fighters each, 3 Battleships, at least 6 or more destroyers, and 2 submarines.  For A&A50, add 3 or 4 cruisers.  Then give the US the ability to build 2 transport automatically every turn to represent the enormous merchant shipbuilding effort of the US.  The US Navy was built to fight a war in the Pacific, and was larger than the Japanese Navy, although from the game, you would be hard pressed to realize that.  The British Royal Navy should have more ships as well.  Both navies should be larger than the Japanese Navy.  If you do not give the US and UK more ships, then quit complaining about not having any combat in the Pacific.  Given the way the game is structured, with drastically reduced US and UK navies, and severely reduced US production, that is what you are going to get.

As for spreading IPC all over the map, I am not exactly in favor of that either.  I would prefer to see them concentrated more, or in the case of Manchuria and Korea, see them broken up with each having separate IPC values.  Another option would be to give certain areas two IPC values, one for the Allies and one for the Axis.  The Allies did quite well without Borneo, Malaya, and the Dutch East Indies, but they were absolutely vital to Japan.  Make them more valuable to Japan, so that Japan goes for them first.  As compensation, boost the IPC value in the Allied home territories of the US and the UK, or boost the value of Australia.

That whole thing is wrong most part factories is a good idea for soem countries. but japanese navy was bigger then the usas and the only reason why they won  was because of gambles and luck dice rollls please remeber allies won with luck

[Black_Elk]

I, for one, would be dead set against boosting ANY Pacific island group to 2, and I am not thrilled with giving most of them even one

Why?

(sorry had to)  :-D

Seriously though, you can’t sit there and honestly tell me that the numbers in A&A correlate to real world industry in any meaningful way. If they do, then who can point to where the actual numbers are coming from?

Its totally arbitrary for the most part, but the only time anyone raises an eyebrow is when the South Pacific comes up. Take the Unites States for instance, we jumped the total value of North America by almost 1/3 in Revised by including the Central USA space. But what did we get for it in terms of gameplay? Nothing basically. I don’t understand it at all…

The distribution of “game resources” (IPCs) is what determines the course of the game. It doesn’t matter how big the US navy is, if there’s no advantage to invading the Caroline Islands then its never going to happen. Only a fool or a show off tries to take Wake in A&ARevised for example. Its just ridiculous in my view. Why even bother putting a territory on the map, if you’re not going to give it a value? I just can’t see why anyone would be dead set against doing something about this problem. It has persisted through 3 versions of the game now, and every time people complain that there is not enough action in the Pacific. If it happens again in AA50 I’ll be disappointed, but I can’t say I’ll be surprised. Additional Japanese income in contested areas would help, additional Allied income in contested areas would help even more.

If I felt like the numbers were accurate and consistant to begin with, then maybe I could buy the argument for leaving things alone, but Larry has already proven that this is not really the case by making alterations to the IPC values of existing territories and by adding new territories out of the old ones. I’m already blown away about territories at 5 ipcs. Here I was thinking all this time, that there was some logic to keeping all the territories at 2 and 3 ipcs. But then Revised came out, and we starting throwing 4s into the mix, and switching other things around.

At this point, I can no longer recognize any meaningful pattern or underlying framework to the distribution scheme. Certainly nothing worth hanging onto just for dogmatic purposes. Having the Pacific islands at 0 or 1 ipc, sucks for the gameplay. Its been tested and proven twice now, and pretty much everyone is in agreement that there is a serious problem with the Pacific theater both in Classic and Revised A&A. To me the problem and the solution seem so obvious, just fix the territory values and you’ll fix the game.

[Imperious Leader]

Most of the islands except Midway should be at 1

Manchuria should be more Iron and pig ore for Japan

Romania should be at 3 IPC ( polesti oil)

Caucasus perhaps +1

add malta to map. It was important

Azores possible as well.

French indo china should be +1 for singapore or at least a VC candidate

IPC for neutrals

[Black_Elk]

See here’s the rub though…

In the real war the acquisition of industrialized territories did not have the same kind of relevance to the patterns of conflict as they do in the board game. The strategic significance of Midway or Wake in a military sense, completely trumped any discussion of their latent industry. I mean, we’re talking about guano fertilizer and coaling stations here for industry significance, compared to airbases, and communications hubs, and the prestige elements that all factored into their total ‘value’ during the actual War. The game doesn’t really account for this (well ok National Objectives are going to try) but I mean, the strategic significance of these territories is not going to play a factor in determining the IPC distribution. It should though, because the IPC scheme is what rules this game. Its the only resource we have to work with, and I think it should represent “value” in a more wholistic way. IPCs are the easiest thing to explain, and the most basic way to indicate overall value on the game board.

I wish they had been called Strategic-Industrial Production Certificates or something similarly broad, so that we could use them more effectively. I see no inherent value to the IPC scheme from an educational standpoint, if doesn’t also encourage some reasonably historical patterns of conflict. Where is Nimitz in A&A Revised? Its like he never even existed for most players. No one is going to start island hopping unless the islands are worth something, and 1 ipc is just chump change for most people. They’ll maybe take it on an opportunity kill, but nobody is going to launch into a major Pacific campaign for a bunch of islands at 1 or 0 IPCs. If they were worth 2 it would change the gameplay completely. Especially with Australia at 3

In the real War it came down to more than just industry, but in this game industry is the only measure. It seems unbalanced to me, and it produces a fundamentally ahistorical style of gameplay (at least among people who are out to win.) I know that you can achieve an excellent game if both players commit to the Pacific, but that doesn’t happen when people are going for the jugular. If we tweaked the IPCs up, then we would draw this part of the board into play, even for experts.

All I’m saying is, its only 2 ipcs
What’s 2 ipcs from a gameplay standpoint?
What’s 2 ipcs really from the educational standpoint?

Isn’t it better to have the kids fighting over spaces like Iwo Jima and Okinawa, and actually remembering the names because they’re now worth something in gameplay terms? Because the alternative I see is people just ignoring the islands altogether (and the Pacific theater in general), like they’ve been doing for a while now.

[Guest]

@italiansarecoming:

WRONGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!
That whole thing is wrong most part factories is a good idea for soem countries. but japanese navy was bigger then the usas and the only reason why they won  was because of gambles and luck dice rollls please remeber allies won with luck

I am not sure where you get the idea that the Japanese Navy was larger than the US, except that is what the game shows.  The actual basic numbers follow.  Once the war started, the Japanese completed only 3 major warships, the battleships Yamato and Musashi and the carrier Taiho, and converted the large liners Junyo and Hiyo to serve as fleet carriers.  The 5 light cruisers completed were small and only carried six 6" guns, compared to the US Cleveland Class with twelve 6" and the Baltimore Class heavy cruisers with nine 8" guns, plus twelve 5" AA guns on all of the Cleveland and Baltimore class ships.  The Shinano, sister ship to the Yamato and Musashi, was being converted to a carrier following the losses at Midway, but was sunk by US submarine attack prior to completion.

Japanese Navy in December, 1941, major ships:  10 battleships, with 2 building and later completed; 6 large carriers, 3 light carriers, 1 training carrier, with 1 large carrier building and 2 large passengers liners being converted with all later completed; 17 small light cruisers and 18 heavy (8") cruisers, with 5 light cruisers building and later completed.

US Navy in December, 1941, major ships:  17 battleships, with 8 building and later completed; 7 large carriers and 1 escort carrier, with 5 large and 5 light carriers building and completed, along with a large number of additional fleet carriers, light carriers, and escort carriers later completed;  10 older light cruisers, 18 heavy (8") cruisers and 9 large light (6") cruisers ( equal is displacement to 2 of the older Japanese light cruisers), with 4 AA light cruisers, 9 light cruisers and 4 heavy cruisers building and later completed, along with a large number of additional cruisers, included 2 ships regarded as battlecruisers.

With respect to detroyers, the US had considerably more at the start of the war, and the advantage increased rapidly for the US.  In submarines, numbers were roughly equal, with the US again building far more during the war than the Japanese.  In destroyer escorts, escort carriers, attack transports, amphibious warfare vessels, there is simply no comparison between the US and Japan.  All of this data can be found in Conway’s All the World’s Fighting Ships 1922-1946, as standard reference on WW2 naval vessels and construction.  Note, I am not even adding the enormous number of Liberty and Victory ships built by the US during the war, which basically replaced all of the merchant ships lost during the war.

I did not add the British Navy to the list, but it was also larger than the actual Japanese Navy, but was otherwise occupied with Germany and Italy.  For the sake of game balance, the US and UK fleets are drastically reduced, along with US production.  If the fleet reduction did not take place, and the US production was not drastically reduced, the only question for the Axis would be how long do they stave off destruction.

[Imperious Leader]

Hes talking about the Pacific Theater only. The American forces in the Atlantic were engaged in supporting the coming war against Germany and protecting its assets on the other side. In terms of just quantity, timerover is correct but in terms of pilot quality which was crucial in the first period of the war Japan was supreme. The starting setup in the game in both cases is reflective of the period before Midway.

Japanese carrier forces were better at the start of the war. After Dec 7th Japanese battleships were stronger than Americans. The other stuff is a washout until after the first year when we caught up.

Also, you cant count various stages of building. Thats not a starting fleet which he is eluding too.

http://pacific.valka.cz/forces/admin4112.htm

[Imperious Leader]

Order of Battle:

Japan:
CV=10,BB=10,CA=36,DD=113,SS=63

USA:
CV=8, BB =17, CA=36, DD=171, SS=112

[italiansarecoming]

I’m only talking about pacific but if pacific and atlantic added together i beleive that they wer even i am againts it also i ahev not played the 2004 1 but saw a video of it and japans navy is big but for a good reason.

[Black_Elk]

Eye halve a spelling chequer
It came with my pea sea
It plainly marques four my revue
Miss steaks eye kin knot sea.

Eye strike a key and type a word
And weight four it two say
Weather eye am wrong oar write
It shows me strait a weigh.

As soon as a mist ache is maid
It nose bee fore two long
And eye can put the error rite
Its rare lea ever wrong.

Eye have run this poem threw it
I am shore your pleased two no
Its letter perfect awl the weigh
My chequer tolled me sew.

That one was just for you Italiansarecoming  :-D

On a more serious note though, this discussion about Navies, while fascinating, is still beside the point.
I mean, you don’t honestly think that the unit numbers in the game, have anything to do with the real world numbers do you? If so, again I would ask, who can’t point to where the numbers are coming from?

They are hazzy abstractions, just like the IPC values are hazzy abstractions, and the problem right now, is that the abstracted numbers we’ve been using have failed to produce a two front war.

Who cares about all the other stuff if we can’t even get a two front war going? What difference does it make if the IPC and unit ratios are accurate to Nth degree, if that’s just going to produce an unbalanced game?
You see what I’m driving at here…

Believe me, I’m just as in favor of historical realism as the next guy, but I think we’ve been approaching the issue in a backwards sort of way. You have to start with the gameplay, and understand what players are actual doing with these rules and conditions we’ve set up, before you can even begin to ask questions like “are the numbers accurate to the real world?” The first priority has to be given to the gameplay mechanics, and setting them up in such a way that the Japanese and Americans actually have a reason to fight over the Pacific. If you don’t do that first, then relative accuracy with all the other stuff is pretty much pointless, because the basic game still won’t look anything like the real War.

[Imperious Leader]

Yea Italian fix your spelling errors before posting.

[italiansarecoming]

OK Ok! I am sorry (not really) if you noticed from my 1st posts they were horrible at least you can see less mistakes! It is all good now though i still make common errors that i will still make in the “near future”

[Black_Elk]

Its fine Italiansarecoming, just try to be a little more thoughtful when responding to threads in the future. Like, before adding a one line response to a thread, first think: “Is this really going to contribute to the discussion at hand?” and then if it doesn’t, consider not responding, or responding via a private message instead. Its fine this time, just remember that the forums are for everyone and they get easily cluttered. Instead of weighing in on 8-10 topics each time you log in, just respond to the top 2 or 3 threads that are the most interesting to you. Try for a full paragraph, and remember to double check it before posting, that way your thoughts will come across with more clarity.
:)

None of that has to do with the current topic of discussion though. Here, let me quote myself from the previous page, just to get us back on track…
:-D

On a more serious note though, this discussion about Navies, while fascinating, is still beside the point.
I mean, you don’t honestly think that the unit numbers in the game, have anything to do with the real world numbers do you? If so, again I would ask, who can’t point to where the numbers are coming from?

They are hazzy abstractions, just like the IPC values are hazzy abstractions, and the problem right now, is that the abstracted numbers we’ve been using have failed to produce a two front war.

Who cares about all the other stuff if we can’t even get a two front war going? What difference does it make if the IPC and unit ratios are accurate to Nth degree, if that’s just going to produce an unbalanced game?
You see what I’m driving at here…

Believe me, I’m just as in favor of historical realism as the next guy, but I think we’ve been approaching the issue in a backwards sort of way. You have to start with the gameplay, and understand what players are actual doing with these rules and conditions we’ve set up, before you can even begin to ask questions like “are the numbers accurate to the real world?” The first priority has to be given to the gameplay mechanics, and setting them up in such a way that the Japanese and Americans actually have a reason to fight over the Pacific. If you don’t do that first, then relative accuracy with all the other stuff is pretty much pointless, because the basic game still won’t look anything like the real War.

Any thoughts?

[italiansarecoming]

Ok Here it goes
@Black_Elk:

On a more serious note though, this discussion about Navies, while fascinating, is still beside the point.
I mean, you don’t honestly think that the unit numbers in the game, have anything to do with the real world numbers do you? If so, again I would ask, who can’t point to where the numbers are coming from?

They are hazzy abstractions, just like the IPC values are hazzy abstractions, and the problem right now, is that the abstracted numbers we’ve been using have failed to produce a two front war.

Who cares about all the other stuff if we can’t even get a two front war going? What difference does it make if the IPC and unit ratios are accurate to Nth degree, if that’s just going to produce an unbalanced game?
You see what I’m driving at here…

Believe me, I’m just as in favor of historical realism as the next guy, but I think we’ve been approaching the issue in a backwards sort of way. You have to start with the gameplay, and understand what players are actual doing with these rules and conditions we’ve set up, before you can even begin to ask questions like “are the numbers accurate to the real world?” The first priority has to be given to the gameplay mechanics, and setting them up in such a way that the Japanese and Americans actually have a reason to fight over the Pacific. If you don’t do that first, then relative accuracy with all the other stuff is pretty much pointless, because the basic game still won’t look anything like the real War.

Any thoughts?

I totally agree with this because there should be a reason to fight in the pacific (for both sides) I think if making each island 1 and isladns that get taken often 2 then there would be a reason for japan to defend them and usa to attack them.
Anyways many of the game is historical but some things had to change for unblanced reasons so that way the axis have a chance that gives them a shot.  Though i beleive that the numbers in the game are very accurate to how the real war went except the german army had more tanks and the russian army had more infantry.  The part of how U.S.A. and Great Britian, are both pretty weak is because it is the truth great britian was on its knees and the u.s.a army was not even a real army (no offence it was not made for offensive just defensive)