First Thoughts on Z

[thetwo]

Hi Bill,

You've done fine work on Z. This is an outstanding scenario. The design is thorough and well thought out. Historically, it is the best of all the "cover" designs for any of the SC releases. I'm impressed with how solid this feels from both sides without having to increase the difficulty. Well done!

After my first pass, I have two sets of comments.

1. As has been noted by others, the US production queue might be over the top. It is not a-historical, however. If anything, it is understated. The problem is that an Allied player can become so casual with his losses that aircraft carriers become throw away items. There were times in SC2 when I wished for a casualty counter (for the Soviets) and in this case one would be needed for the US and its Allies. The US had two weaknesses that are not usually addressed. Hypersensitivity to high casualties and a shortage of cash.

The US casualty rate for WWII was low overall, but escalated rapidly in the last three years of the war. The national sensitivity to casualties might not have been felt until the total number of casualties doubled the historical total, but racking them up willy-nilly seems a bit much.

By 1945, the US had been funding the entire war effort of the rest of the world. I don't even remember how many bond drives had been held by the end of 1944 and the well was just about dry. That was why the Iwo Jima flag raising picture and the Marine participants were hyped so much in 1945; more bond money was desperately needed. (Obviously, this can't be included in the scenario. I threw this in in the interests of completeness.)

2. Russia enters the war against Japan at a strange time. This seems to be almost a conceptual holdover from SC2.

Stalin and his Soviet Union had two "main adversaries," the United States and the United Kingdom. By the mid-1930's his intelligence services had well penetrated the inner workings of both governments and their scientific establishments. The German invasion of the Soviet Union was dangerous, but did not change his focus. In fact, it offered him the opportunities to bend his main adversaries to his will, gain territories in Europe, expand his influence, and prepare for the next round of conflict with the US and UK.

How did the Far East fit into his calculations?

A. He liked how the Japanese had the US so obsessed with China, a backwater. Stalin was not averse to expanding his influence or his borders in the region, but he was not going to risk a war with Japan or distract Japan from a war with the US. Japan, like Germany, was a foil with which he could keep the US and UK distracted.

B. The historical seizure of territory by Stalin when the collapse of Japan was imminent was in character. He did not distract Japan while it viable. He grabbed off land that he could take with minimum risk, and he created more headaches for the United States.

C. In the game, I've seen the Soviet Union jump into the war with non-historical, un-Stalinlike haste. He didn't care what happened in China, even if Mao was completely overrun. (Stalin had executed many foreign Communists. Mao could be replaced.) He didn't care what happened to Japan, as long as it was chewing up the United States and Great Britain. And I can't fathom why, in game terms, he would invade, when Japan was winning on all fronts and had managed a stalemate at sea.

Stalin was a manipulator. His favorite position was to sit behind his borders, building his war machine, suppressing internal dissent, while egging others on outside his borders. He was not a risk taker.

Even when Japan was on the verge of immediate and total collapse his one historical act of aggression in the Far East was happened on his terms, timing, and goals.

/ /

In game terms, the use of Soviet research and MPP to supply and support Chinese Communist forces keeps the Soviets from being wall flowers. The same could be done with the US, but your solution works. If Soviet Union were more historical there might be more emphasis on building and pushing the Communist Chinese forces, rather than building Soviet troop levels.

Current scripts for Manchukuo garrisons, including the increase in 1944 seem appropriate in scale and timing.

As for the units no longer needed to push offensives in China when both Chinas surrender, Japan faces a paradox. Surely some might be freed to assist a last, late push into India, or to defend against a British counter attack, but then other requirements and limitations will affect their usefulness.

- A quarter to a third will be needed to help police the conquered Chinese territories, including possibly one headquarters. The pace of guerrilla pop-ups can pick up and keep things interesting if too many units are pulled out.

- Some units, again with headquarters, might be used to attempt counter-attacks on islands or island groups, if the IJN has enough control of the seas and air space to keep these experienced troops safe.

- A major cross-Pacific amphibious assault might be tried, but without massive superiority at sea, these irreplaceable troops will be lost.

- An invasion of the Soviet Union would be silly.

So the paradox is that even with the surrender of China, those troops don't translate into the military power that can be easily projected into other theaters of the war. Especially the military power Japan most needs, sea power.

I've provided this discussion to illustrate that forcing a Soviet Union activation isn't all that necessary, in order to keep the Japanese occupied. It would tie up some MPP, but a competent Allied player should have been able to do that without Soviet interference. The Soviet role is as a hovering presence, enough to divert some Japanese resources, but not enough to joggle their collective elbow should be sufficient. (And giving the Soviets more units than SC2 did for the Soviet Western Front facing the Germans is overkill and unrealistic, at least before redeployment from Europe.)

So the question comes down to whether the Soviet sledgehammer must be used because it is there or can they be more historical.

/ /

Here are some possibilities.

- Remove scripts for Soviet activation that do not specifically deal with Manchukuo garrisons.

- Remove scripts for Soviet troop transfers from the West unless tied specifically to Yalta. These would not have made sense. If Stalin had to weaken himself at what was, to him, the critical point in Europe, he would not even consider it.

- Scale Soviet unit availability in the Far East to a more appropriate level until after the European war is completed and the Yalta deadline for action looms.

- Keep the Soviet goals, if a Manchukuo driven activation occurred, reasonable. The Soviets would not have gone for a knockout against Japan or for a conquest of China. A seizure of Manchukuo, on the the other hand, and perhaps the Korean peninsula would have been possible if the forces on-hand were capable of making the necessary gains without reinforcement.

- A likely military scenario in Manchukuo (in an early activation event) would probably have gone something like the following. The Soviets realize the Japanese have significantly reduced their garrisons, Stalin finally decides to see what the situation on the ground is by authorizing a limited offensive, a probing attack in one location (Kiamusze for example). If the Japanese seem weak enough, he might authorize a larger attempt to snatch one important local center (Harbin maybe). Nothing much at one time. He would not have wanted to get in over his head and find himself in a situation that would compel him to divert his attention and resources from what was most important. If it looked like the Japanese might get too committed to driving him back, he might even have apologized and agreed to ceasefire in place. He still wanted Japan fighting Americans. Once the collapse of Japan was imminent, if Japan ultimately lost, he might try to go for a few more local gains depending on where his forces were at the time, but without risk.

- The above scenario would only come into play if Manchukuo garrisons fell below mandatory minimums. Keeping Soviet troop levels low would make this possible even for the Allied AI.

- Now, I think that if he managed to get Harbin cheap and easy, we could accept that his appetite would have been whetted and he'd decide that all of Manchukuo would be his. I can't really see him going for China. He had no interest in beating up on the Japanese. At that point, a smart Japanese player/AI would try to reach a negotiated settlement with the Soviets securing a border between Manchuria and Korea. Stalin might go for this to keep Japan in the war longer or he might just go with greed. At that point, it would be a coin toss. Still, Stalin would be acting to minimize his risk and keep Japan in the war against the US.

/ /

The Soviet Far East campaign involved the attack on Manchuria, part of Korea, part of the Kuril Islands, and the southern half of Sakhalin Island. Stalin fulfilled the commitment made in Yalta to attack within 90 days of the surrender in Europe. He kept the southern half of Sakhalin Island and the Kuril Islands that he seized. That he gave up Manchuria and Northern Korea can be considered something of a miracle, although it laid the groundwork for much of how how the next sixty years of history played out. Manchuria became the base of operations for the Communist Chinese and North Korea became the bastion of totalitarian idiocy it remains to this day. All the legacy of Stalin's offensive.

If Stalin or his military leaders in the Far East had applied the lessons learned in the West, about logistics support for ongoing armored offensives, there was every possibility that all of Korea would have been Communist. Further, if Emperor Hirohito had not surrendered when he did, a delay of a few weeks might have permitted a Soviet invasion of Hokkaido resulting in a North Japan to add to the Cold War's miseries.

As for the post-Yalta Soviet Far East campaigns, the following might be viable.

- Soviet trigger would be both the date, August 9, 1945, and the Allies possessing Manila, at minimum. If the Western Allies are not winning, there is no point in having Stalin commit. This would place a realistic limiting motivation on the Soviets and the Americans.

- In Scripts, Activation_1, change Flag for surrenders of China and Australia to 0. The surrenders of those two countries was unlikely to have an effect on Russia's war entry.

- In Scripts, Activation_3, change Flag for both 1944 Soviet activation increases to 0. Also change the activation date for the 1945 script to 1945/08/01 to get a historical activation. For the same script, change the Trigger to 100 and both the min and max activation percents to 100.

- In Scripts, Unit, change both "USSR Deploys Veterans From The War With Germany" scripts so that their activation dates and failsafe dates read 1945/07/01.

- A decision event will probably be needed to tie Activation_3 script and both deployment scripts (from Germany) into a Yalta event. This would allow them to be tied to Allied territorial gains in the Pacific, Manila most importantly. The decision event script is below.

{

#NAME= Soviet Help in Far East

#POPUP= The White House %NPresident Roosevelt %N%NOur progress in the Pacific has provided the opportunity to invite General Secretary Stalin to break his non-aggression pact with Japan and invade in the Far East. Stalin has indicated that he might be willing to invade Manchuria and other Japanese held areas ninety days after the war in Europe ends. Do you want Stalin's help in defeating Japan?

#IMAGE=

#SOUND=

#FLAG= 1

#TYPE= 0

#AI= 0

#LEVEL= 0

;Set global variable condition to always trigger (dummy value)

#GV= 1[1,100]

;Set link value to always trigger (dummy value)

#LINK= 0[0]

#COUNTRY_ID= 3

#TRIGGER= 100

#DISPLAY_ORDER= 0

;Set decision value

#DECISION= 6

;Set AI acceptance %

#AI_RESPONSE= 80

#AI_RESPONSE_POPUP= President Roosevelt Asks Stalin to Invade Manchuria

#DATE= 1945/02/11

;Set friendly position (Manila):

#FRIENDLY_POSITION= 56,39

;Set variable conditions:

;1st Line - US politically aligned with Allies and not surrendered

#VARIABLE_CONDITION= 3 [2] [100] [0]

;Dummy condition position (always satisfied)

#CONDITION_POSITION= 0,0 [0,0] [0,0] [0] [0]

}

- In both the Activation_3 script and the two redeployment form Germany scripts, the Link line would need to read #LINK= 6[1].

These changes would put the Soviet Union on a historical footing for the invasion.

As for how to create the scripts for a tentative earlier offensive, I don't know. The game is set up more for all or nothing. Even if it were possible, it might well be too much effort for too little return.

I am in the process of playtesting this set of modifications now.

Again Bill, thanks for a great main scenario.

[Bill101]

Hi thetwo

I'm glad you're enjoying the game! It was a lot of fun making it too.

Thanks for your thoughts here. Funnily enough, both the things you've mentioned are ones I'm currently taking another look at, so while I make no promises, I'll certainly give your suggestions a good read.

Bill

[xwormwood]

@thetwo

Great post, excellent!

@Bill101

Keep up the good work!

[Clarke]

I can't agree that a pending economic crises loomed that would dictate the prosecution of the war by the U. S. be curtailed in any way whatsoever.

The bond drives were still spectacularly successful and in fact the U. S, treasury received over 85 million dollars in January of 46 from the sale of 'E' series bonds dubbed victory bonds. That is about a billion dollars of todays money according to the consumer price index and the war was already over.

The U. S. had cash in circulation for either bonds or taxes because employment was near 100% and due to rationing and shortages there weren't enough goods or services to spend it on.

Want to buy a new car with all your dough? Sorry, no cars being manufactured for the duration. Want to buy tires for your beater? Sorry, rubber is all going to the war effort. Tractors, silk and nylon stockings, meat, gasoline, copper; even for pennies; all unavailable or tightly rationed along with many other things. The national speed limit was 35 MPH to conserve fuel.

It was a different world, but you could buy bonds which America did. And if they stopped buying them the government could have stopped financing the war with debt and raised revenue with increased taxes as Truman did in Korea. The money was there.

[Blashy]

I really like your take on the Soviets thetwo.

The more I play the more I find that USSR might have pretty much remained neutral until the very end or basically when US/UK Victory was assured and USSR would have joined simply to get some strategic lands.

When I look at their historic interests in that area they seem quite minimal.

So you might be on to something here.

[Retributar]

'thetwo'..."WoW!!!"...what a historical dissection of the subject-matter!. I was unaware of a good deal of it!,...and from what knowledge i do have of these historical figure's & event's,...what you allude to seem's to make a lot of sense!. Let's keep this kind of research & analysis ongoing,...as it will tweak up this game into a superstar!.

At the same time,...what 'Clarke' mention's about the U.S. being for all intent's and purpose's...as far as being immune from being broke,...or short of cash to finance the 'War-Effort!'...is something im not well versed in,...but!,...he may very-well be right!.

So!,...i guess,...upon further reflection,...'The Powers That Be!',...will likely make somekind of determination as to how the game evolve's based on your information!. The more 'Historically-Correct' the game is!,...the more valuable it is!.

[thetwo]

Clarke,

I was not saying that there was a shortage of money, per se. My intent was that, in combination with the length of the war and the increase in casualties in 1944, the American public was growing war weary. Hence the reference to Iwo Jima and the bond drive centered around the flag raisers.

As anxiety at home increased, worries about the future increased. Memories of the post-war years, after the Great War, inflation particularly, were hard to shake.

The bond drives were successful, but became harder in late '44 and early '45. When victory became assured the ease of raising money again increased.

Fortunately Roosevelt had strong opinions and good reasons both during and for post-war planning purposes for not engaging in just printing massive amounts of extra money and stuck with it.

I believe that we experienced a misunderstanding of content and intent.

[Clarke]

TheTwo

Ah yes, I see. I did misinterpret your intent. At any rate I probably made too much of it as that point wasn't really the crux of your very interesting post.

What is the game issue with Stalin exactly? I am at December of 1944 as the allies in my first game and the Soviets have not intervened other than to bankroll Mao.

I read recently that Stalin made and kept a commitment at Yalta to Truman and Churchill to attack Japan within three months of the end of the war in Europe. Are the AI Russians jumping in before July 1945?

[thetwo]

In the game, as it stands now, Stalin can intervene early, quite early with an invasion of Manchuria. Interesting stressor for Japan, but it mars what is a very solid effort on Bill's part to provide a historical scenario.

Thanks for understanding. I put so much effort into getting the Russia part of the post correct, that I didn't craft the US part right.

[Blashy]

I would not say it is a question of overkill (as Colin I states in our AAR), but a question of would it have been the reality? I think not in 1944, the Russians were pushing into Germany and seeing all those extra troops arrive in PTO seems out of place. I think they would arrive IF Japan were to move INTO Russian territory, those troops should arrive AFTER the Germany surrender.

Basically I am agreeing with thetwo's post, a thorough explanation.

[SeaMonkey]

Excellent post 2. Agreed, but perhaps Stalin's psyche is a subject for later discussion (I have a somewhat different evaluation), ie paranoid schizophrenic, dictators usually are.

The real crux of my post is for the obvious future rendition of Global SC and that is a plea for a National Morale value. The NM will be very important to the overall victory conditions in conjunction with the diplomatic leanings and resource possessions of various other belligerents.

Seems my request is appropriate for this thread in light of 2's orientation of USA homeland sentiments, which I agree with.