W-I-P: Storm Over the Pacifc

august 29 2014 update

i took a little time off from civilopedia stuff and started a game as Japan.

nothing really glorious to report. gameplay is smooth, i guess. turn times are quick, even in DEBUG. the US AI does not do what the history books said they did...but this is to be expected to a certain degree.

of course, i wanted the US AI to launch the initial attack in the Battle of the Coral Sea. they did, sort of. but not a full-on onslaught. they went after one of my two carrier stacks in the Coral Sea, knocked a few ships to red-lines. but nothing sunk.

the US sent piles of capital ships to the Aleutians to bombard my holdings there (2 island locations). not sure i want to risk sending out my capital ships to engage them since they'll have a pretty significant advantage. i could use some dive bombers and torpedo bombers to make some hay. but it's risky. so i've kept my capital ships back, for now at least.

the US AI tried a few times to run some marines up to land on guadalcanal. i sunk 3 or 4 of them. they eventually got 1 TR through and did an amphibious assault against the city tile. all lives lost for the Yanks (6 units). i did block the landing tile for them...so they were forced to assault from their TR.

no re-creation of Midway, either, i'm afraid. it's wishful thinking...i know :) but it's still worth keeping an eye on.

air battles have been pretty good, i must admit. lots of interceptors in the solomans and in china too.

china has been a tough nut to crack. i took my first chinese city in the last turn i player. iirc, i have about 12 or 13 turns in so far. i used some medium and light bombers for a few turns leading up to the ground assault and also some arty pieces and even a few spa's. i managed to redline all three defenders and took it without any casualties.

as one would imagine, lots of naval action on the map. i have been able to use some subs to sink some isolated US ships. some of the Japanese cruisers are pretty strong for being smaller ships. i am being cautious with the Japanese naval assets b/c they are difficult to replace, at least the capital ships. i was admittedly a little more aggressive when i played as the US.

not sure how many turns i'll roll through with Japan. but at some point, i need to try to 'finish' the scenario, even in alpha or beta mode. i want to see how the victory point parameters shape up. by that i mean i want to see how attainable is will be for Japan to rack up the necessary VPs to win. i got my first batch of 'raw material' units in the last turn or so (from the oil imp's). i tiered out these imp's and they are only for the core strat resources : oil, iron, coal, aluminum. and it became clear to me that the Japanese player will have to eyeball all the shipping routes to get the RMs back to Tokyo. in a nutshell, it will be all RMs from the dutch east indies to SE Asia via TR. then from Hanoi, most likely, by TR over to Hong Kong, and then frop southern China, up through Manchuria, and down into Korea and over to Japan. SE Asia RMs will take same route. in sum, no a whole lot of open water to travel in TRs. iirc, i can get 1 turn 'drop-offs' in noted cities and then load the RMs onto new TRs and onto the next destination. tedious, for sure. but no way for the US AI to catch me out in the open waters. blockading my ports may be a problem. but let'em try it :devil:

for some weird reason, Australia's 'king' unit in New Guinea likes to 'wander' and it made its way over to my side of the island, unescorted of course. i red-lined it and then killed it. gonna have to look at this some...i don't want these units wandering...but i don't want them to be completely static. so i'll have to look at the settings some more.

a long range goal of mine for alpha testing is to see how well the US AI tries to take the 'strategic garrison' locations on the map. its first effort in guadalcanal was just okay. so we shall see.
 
El Justo... Check the King Units in the Editor. Uncheck Explore if it is checked and note if "King Unit" is flagged under AI Strategies or just under Unit Abilities. If Only Flagged under Unit Abilities, the AI Will Use King Units the same as Regular Units on the Map. They still Defend last though. Generally, if "King Unit" is Flagged Under AI Strategies, the AI tends to keep them inside the City.
...In the Scenario Properties, is the US set to be at constant War with Japan?
 
Good to hear that this is still progressing and going well. I'll probably have a play through when it is done, given a great interest in the Pacific War over the last few years.

All the best,

Simon
 
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