The Chinese are toast!

[david12345]

Quick update, Chinese just surrendered in another game, late 1941. Down to last capital in a second game, same time period.

[Catacol Highlander]

Afternoon all

OK - I have a number of games of Gold on the go. China is out or on the way out in all but one by mid 1942 - in that one I am managing to stop the Japanese Army in the north. However played properly China can certainly survive until Pearl, even if she is on her last legs at that point.

My feeling overall is that it should stay as it is. Currently I assume that all players, myself included, who are putting China to bed are doing it with substantial mpp investment in infantry, motorisation tech, inf tech and very importantly Tac Air units and tech. If all this is done then I think China SHOULD fall. If she holds on under all this weight of investment then there is something wrong.

The pay off for the allies is that, under the weight of that investment, Japan wont be able to build a fleet big enough to stand toe to toe with the USN. That is as it should be. It becomes a strategic choice.

Therefore leave China as she is, or only adjust upwards very gently at best in terms of mpp acquisition.

[SeaMonkey]

Totally agree with Al, I haven't got to the 1.01 patch, but I'm sure the adjustments made will make the Chinese theater more theoretically reliable. The Chinese weakness in the north is where the Allied player should concentrate the bulk of his efforts with the Changsha dam in the south.

[lhughes41]

My experience so far supports Catacol's though my experience is more limited. That is I think China is doing pretty right right now. She can put up a very good fight but she is doomed if Japan throws everything at her (mostly). But it still takes a long time to drag her down against a good opponent and that means a strategic cost.

[Strategiclayabout]

I think I'm shifting that way too. If you play cautiously, using chinese "bonus" of reforming units, you can survive.

[sand digger]

I would like to propose an alternative solution to the problem of China v Japan which is actually based on the true situation in WW2.

The Japanese army was very much superior to the Chinese in the way of equipment. For example the majority of Chinese units had little or no artillery. However the Japanese units as portrayed in the standard game are too numerous. The real situation was that the Japanese could pretty well force their way to any location that they wished, as demonstrated during the Ichi-Go offensive, but they could not hold onto the areas they conquered as the countryside remained hostile and they did not have sufficient troops to garrison new areas that they could potentially conquer.

The Japanese Army has 14 Corps and 18 Armies which is equivalent to 50 Corps sized units as well as 16 special force units and garrisons. The German Army has 20 Corps and 14 Armies equivalent to 48 Corps sized units and only 5 special forces and garrisons. In practice the German army was numerically 10 - 20% larger than that of Japan as well as being much better equipped.

Thus my solution would be to reduce the size of the IJA by about 15% but have each of its units maintain a clear qualitative advantage over an equivalent Chinese unit. For the Chinese I would make their units cheaper to build or rebuild on the basis that they are manpower heavy but equipment light but make the cost of upgrading their infantry tech quite high as they are really starting from -1 in terms of equipment.

This might need some fine tuning to give a balanced game but would better reflect the real problems both China and Japan faced.

.....................

Regards

Mike

Agree. As always in wargames things like balance should be achieved by historically realistic means, not by artificial means.

[Amadeus]

Agree. As always in wargames things like balance should be achieved by historically realistic means, not by artificial means.

I disagree in that case that gaming matters has to come first. Always and any time. Historical means are nice to have but I wanna play a game. I don't want to repeat history. That is my opinion.

Coming back to the new Chinabug. My tournament mirrorgame against Peter now shows the problem. Peters Axis is thru my Axis not. Peters Japan now conquer Russia and my russians could not counter. My Japs are stopped cause some Japanes axistroops I appointed somewhere else early 1941.

[mcaryf1]

Just a quick response to Amadeus' comment above:

I disagree in that case that gaming matters has to come first. Always and any time. Historical means are nice to have but I wanna play a game. I don't want to repeat history. That is my opinion.

Clearly we all have our own reasons for playing wargames. Personally I prefer to start from a position that matches broadly a historic deployment of troops and capabilities and then I enjoy determining whether different decisions might have lead to different outcomes. Thus my motivation is not to repeat history but to see what other possibilities existed. Clearly after a certain point in time the broad outcomes of WW2 were inevitable and then for me the interest is whether the inevitable can be delayed so my victory conditions would have a time element.

There is a big reality/scale problem in trying to produce a game which covers all the theatres of WW2 because, for example, a Nationalist Chinese Army was lucky if it had 65,000 men and almost certainly no artillery whilst a Soviet or German one would be around 200,000 with lots of artillery and A/T capability. The Japanese force capabilities in the China theatre are similarly overstated in the standard scenario. The Japanese had as many as 900,000 "Chinese" troops fighting with them which inflated their apparent numbers but these Chinese troops tended to change sides whenever appropriate for their well being. SC does not have an easy mechanism for representing individual units doing that so a "historic" scenario is pretty hard to produce. However, my earlier post was intended to point out that if the scenario designer allocates fewer units by using more historic numbers and capabilities then you can still get a balanced game (the reality was balanced in China) but it would be different to the standard one. Whether it would be more fun or interesting to play is a matter of personal opinion.

Regards

Mike

[Amadeus]

...if the scenario designer allocates fewer units by using more historic numbers and capabilities then you can still get a balanced game ...

Hey Mike, when I play a balanced game the designer has a good chance that I like it. If the game is historical correct but not balanced I will like it not.

The China/Japan theather in "World at war" must become more balanced. And it would be nice if the historical strengths and weaknesses are visible. But this is no must to me.

[mcaryf1]

Hi Amadeus

I guess it also depends what is meant by balanced. The China theatre was historically balanced in that neither side could totally defeat the other without outside intervention which eventually arrived in the form of the Red Army. If you want either the Chinese or the Japanese to be able to defeat each other on their own then you have to start playing around with their real historical capabilities.

Initially the US Government had hopes that Chinese forces would eventually defeat the Japanese using US weapons and US training but they eventually came to understand that this was not going to happen. However, they did realise that substantial Japanese resources could be tied up in China with relatively modest US commitments and this was their most effective strategy whilst they were winning in the Pacific.

Unfortunately the final US strategy of encouraging the Soviets to participate in the Chinese conflict was a huge political error as the Soviets used weapons captured from the Japanese to equip Mao Tse Tung who was thus able to defeat the US partner Chiang Kai Shek. If I was looking for a historic variant I might like to set a victory condition that the US and Nationalist Chinese should try to defeat the Japanese in mainland China before a certain date which might represent when the Red Army would be ready to intervene.

Regards

Mike

[david12345]

I got china about to surrender in another game. Don't see how people can defend the reality that China will surrender every time against equal opponents if the Japanese player pushes. What's more, the Japanese emerge with a bunch of highly experienced units and go romping through India or Russia (most likely both). Ok, we don't want to be tied down to what happened historically, but come on, who here thinks that is realistic?

Look at the available army/SF builds for Japan, way out of proportion when compared with a country like Germany that had a vastly larger army.

For those of you who say it is a choice to invest heavily in China, I would say that unless you just messing around, any other avenue is so much less efficient as to be relegated to experimental strategies.

If I take out china, I have removed a major enemy that is right on my doorstep, opened eastern Russia to attack by highly experienced units, etc. Why do anything else? The money you spend on one carrier can equip several armies - not a good tradeoff. That's why the game has scripted fleet units, because they are such an inefficient expenditure.

I have a mirror game going with the house rule that Japanese cannot build units with motorization or upgrade existing units with motorization. This gives them a few units to keep them dangerous, but we hope it will keep them from running wild.

[Strategiclayabout]

Hello China ,

- Even if Japan goes heavy in China, you can delay the outcome (location of fortresses you build is a key point) by falling back, narrowing the front, avoiding casualties, getting infantry tech...

- You can also try to get USA on your side earlier with some diplo chits (as UK but China can have a shot to it depending on the situation). Having USA on its back in october or september 1941 can be a pain for Japan, especially if it foils an ongoing Pearl Harbor attempt.

[sand digger]

The point I was trying to make in agreeing with Mike is that balance should be achieved by applying historically accurate means as a first priority. It does not necessarily follow from that that playability will suffer, if it does then alternative means of achieving balance should be used. But only as a last resort.

Mike's suggestion for achieving balance is historically accurate and looks like it would achieve it without harming playability. Personally I find that playing a war game that is historically accurate adds an extra dimension to it, if the rate of resupply or casualties for example is considerably unrealistic then for me playability by itself becomes meaningless.

SC is a war game based on historical events after all, not some contrived conflict that never happened.

[lhughes41]

David raises a good point about whether really there is any viable alternative strategy to going after China as Japan. Anyone willing to defend a winning strategy for Japan based on just 'holding' in china and spending $$ elsewhere?

Anyone succeeded with that?

[Strategiclayabout]

Just my opinion :

- I don't think it's good to just "hold" China. You have to pound them at least for the first 10 turns and reduce the front. The main question is if it is interesting to go all the way to Urumchi and beyond.

- With no rail line, defensive terrain tiles, narrow front and supply issues between Urumchi and Lanchow it takes some time to finish China (unless Tchang or Mao screwed up things big time).

- A short defensive line around Lanchow can free up a good chunk of japanese land units early. Enough to create a 1941 invasion force for Australia, India or even USA.

You also have to think about an USSR bold move, Stalin doesn't need many units to create a lot of trouble for Japan and russian can operate units with more ease.

[lhughes41]

So have you tried that?

[Strategiclayabout]

Yes, in one game I tried but my Barbarossa was successful and the game was ended before I can use my japanese fleet to storm the Pacific so I can't say it's conclusive.

I had invested heavily in carriers (had 10) and air units.

Anyway, people should try, it's no fun to always go for the same strategy .

[Skrivebordsgeneralen]

Yes, the Chinese are toast. The real question is what it means in terms of gameplay.

In my ongoing game, my losses have been so high that I didn't manage to buy my first inf tech chit before mid-1940. And I'm playing very carefully.

Their last city should fall by mid-42, maybe even earlier. At any rate sufficient for the Japanese to shift the bulk of their forces to India or Russia for a 42 offensive.

I have never seen the Japanese go for anything else than an all out offensive - with good reason and very predictable results.

The question is whether this land-based Japanese strategy is necessary for an axis victory. As it stands, the alternative is to let the Chinese grow strong - and the Japanese will eventually have to spend more fending them of than they would have spent subduing them.

In terms of gameplay the result is that Japan will invariably go for Russia or India after China. This in turn forces the US to focus on building a relief army to be sent to India or Africa - since that is where they can apply counter-pressure as quickly as possible. If the US goes for the Pacific, the Japanese can afford to pretty much ignore them for a long time at minimal cost - while the axis will be winning the war on other theaters.

Fortifications in the north are badly needed. Taking away Japanese motorization is another option now that we have forced march.

In order to provide Japan with some incentive to try out alternative strategies more needs to be done however - decreasing the attack value of the Chinese and providing the Japanese with fortifications is one option.

WIF has a system of "limited war" in China where the Chinese get few mpps, but the Japanese are restricted in the number of attacks they can carry out each turn - unless they want to face the consequences of a substantial US-entry penalty. But I suppose implementing such a system would require a lot in terms of programming.

Ah - I guess we will never get rid of these kind of dilemmas

[david12345]

update: of the 5 games I have going, China has fallen in every one by mid 41. Can't wait for the patch!

[coe]

Ok so I'm playing against the AI at the moment and it's mid 1942 and I'm still slugging it out (as Axis against China). I just took Sian and Chungking but that fort at the top is still holding out... what's the secret to taking out china by 1941? You still have to invest in research and sea, naval landing units etc. to battle the U.S. and take over Indonesia later on?

Are many of you doing the hit with one unit then move the unit away and then move another unit into that space and attack (which I think is kind of gamey)?

[david12345]

Ok so I'm playing against the AI at the moment and it's mid 1942 and I'm still slugging it out (as Axis against China). I just took Sian and Chungking but that fort at the top is still holding out... what's the secret to taking out china by 1941? You still have to invest in research and sea, naval landing units etc. to battle the U.S. and take over Indonesia later on?

Are many of you doing the hit with one unit then move the unit away and then move another unit into that space and attack (which I think is kind of gamey)?

i'm no expert, but here are a couple tips.

put 2 chits in inf weapons right away, sell one back when it hits. this is crucial. upgradeall sf (special force) and armies when you get it.

build all your sf, send them to china

build garrisons and corps to cover manchuria and free up those units.

upgrade all armies and sf to motorization.

leave the forts alone, you don't need to take them.

i take the northern route.

try to allow the units with the most exp to get the finishing kills, thus giving them more exp.

use weak units and air to unentrench the chinese before attacking with your experianced units.

long range air level 2 helps

if you think it will be a long battle, a bomber or two to pound the chinese resources can be worth the money.

if you see the chinese have inf weapons, park units next to all his to keep him from upgrading

this may sound like it is ignoring the USA, but if you do it right, you will take out china, get a bunch of money, and all those units will have a bunch of experiance when they meet the allies.

hope this helps.

[SeaMonkey]

I'd like to see a slower tech system like Al uses, 0.5 CTV enhancement per level and no more than two research chits per category at one time. One other change is get rid of motorization as a technology, it's a function of the motor pool allocation, and have a limited build for motorized/mech units(the new unit you build from the start) that contain the integral ability to move further.

Only the UK(CW) and USA had a totally motorized force, the USSR had a semi-motorized condition due to trucks from LL. A limited motorized feature would do wonders for this China syndrome.

[coe]

yeah but the Japanese were pretty good at marching! maybe there should be like a fitness rating... y'know like a city slickers type of army and then a country boys type one.

[coe]

actually... shouldn't mobility go down as supply goes down (e.g. starving or no fuel)

[SeaMonkey]

Marching and carrying a rifle is one thing, but dragging around infantry weapons like howitzers, guns, mortars, ammo using four legged animals in difficult terrain on the scale of army and corps level is a different thing. Don't forget the disease and weather also. Perhaps an increase in IW(read heavy weapons) tech should see a likewise reduction in AP & FM unless the unit receiving the upgrade is fully motorized.

Light infantry in the form of SF, I can go with, but their attack CTVs should reflect the mobility.