War in the Pacific: Admiral's Edition...what's stopping you?

[mikeck]

Ok, I might have salvaged this.  Through no proper planning on my part, I serendipitously happened to have a ton of APs in Sydney, coinciding with a huge Australian army.  Since the Marines were bellyaching I decided to go with the Aussies.

They're loaded up onto an Amphibious task force now and headed to Lunga.  The only real concerning part is that my CV TFs are going to start running low on fuel soon.  I'm desperately hoping they'll have just enough to get the landing done, and then I can start cycling them through Sydney and ports south for replenishment. 

It's going to be close...

lol

For the record I don't think there was ever ANY military person from ANY arm of the military that I met that didn't bellyache. It's part of your training!

Why do you think they call them Grunts?  Or why do you think they are called infantry, which comes from the word "infant"?

Les enfants

Cops (2 things cops hate are change and the way things are now), nurses and teachers give it a good effort, but no one bitches better than soldiers.

[jejo68]

If you can find a good PBEM opponent who doesn't bail, disappear or slow in returning game turns (not easy to find), the game can be rather fun.  I played one guy for about a year and a half.  Mostly doing one turn every day.  Sometimes 3 or 4 on the weekend. 

Really puts you in the boots of the real commanders.  You quickly see that the Pacific War was just as much about logistics as it was about combat.   

Atilla60 and I are still going strong on our campaign now for the 5th year  :), so yeah its timeconsuming

[JudgeDredd]

Man alive! I just keep hitting wall after wall after wall.

So in my Guadalcanal scenario, I'm setup (by the designer) with a TF that cannot dock at Noumea. So...I want to load troops right? Send them to Lunga right? Well, I have to dock. So I remove AK's and DD's and undock the TF that's already docked (1 tanker picking up fuel).

So then I dock my Amphib Tf and Select Load Troops - only the only unit to show up is the HQ South Pacific...NONE of the other units on the base.

They are all set to SoPac Rear Area, Op Mode is set to combat and their combat column is set to defend. I can't seem to change that. I did change their Target to Lunga (it was Noumea) but that didn't change anything.

I think someone mentioned the interface here and I was pleased to see that he had a tooltip telling me why I couldn't dock. But clearly the interface is lacking in giving info. I mean - wouldn't it be MUCH better to let me select Load Troops, show me the troops and either a) tell me why I can't load them or b) Let me select them to be loaded and do all the small necessaries to get them loaded?

aaaargh. I can see why no-one bought this off me when I was trying to sell it!

[JudgeDredd]

It could be they are in reserve and not available for this scenario. If that's the case, I wish they weren't there.

[Herman Hum]

So then I dock my Amphib Tf and Select Load Troops - only the only unit to show up is the HQ South Pacific...NONE of the other units on the base.

They are all set to SoPac Rear Area, Op Mode is set to combat and their combat column is set to defend. I can't seem to change that. I did change their Target to Lunga (it was Noumea) but that didn't change anything.

These other units (that do not appear) belong to Restricted HQs.  Therefore, they must first be 'bought out' (transferred) with a payment of Political Points to a non-restricted HQ before they can be loaded upon ships.

[Atilla60]

It could be they are in reserve and not available for this scenario. If that's the case, I wish they weren't there.

Hi Judge

All the troops at Nouma are restricted (R), except the SouthPac HQ.
Restricted units can't be loaded on TFs.

Open the LCU (Land Combat Unit) overview (click the button with the flag - left side menu).
The list shows all LCUs, note that there's a "(R)" after their names.

Like Herman Hum said, you'll have to reassign them to a unrestricted HQ.
Which, by the way, is a costly affair (Political Points wise).

[JudgeDredd]

And I can't do - so it's as I thought - I can't use these units in the Guadalcanal campaign - presumably because of it's limited scope. So I've spent an absolute shed load of time trying to work out how to get ships docked so I can move troops that aren't actually in play

lol

Thanks HH and Atilla60

I think I'll go back to WitE. As sterile as the interface is for that, at least you can click a unit and move it or attack with it. You don't have to do a whole lot of figuring out (though I'll likely lose without knowing all the nuances)

[Herman Hum]

And I can't do - so it's as I thought - I can't use these units in the Guadalcanal campaign - presumably because of it's limited scope. So I've spent an absolute shed load of time trying to work out how to get ships docked so I can move troops that aren't actually in play

You are mistaken.  Those forces are meant for use in the Guadalcanal scenario.  You simply have not accumulated sufficient Political Points to purchase them.  You start with only a few hundred points and get about 50 additional points daily.  Some of those units need over 1000 points to acquire.  By the end of the scenario, you should be able to buy every Restricted (R) unit in the scenario and have access to it.

[JudgeDredd]

My bad. I presumed the Guadalcanal scenario was sufficiently short that I wouldn't accumulate enough PP

[Herman Hum]

I, too, was surprised at the length of the scenario especially since the description says it runs from about August 4, 1942 - Feb 7, 1943.  However, the scenario does not actually end until April 30, 1943.  IMHO, it is virtually impossible for the Allies to lose this scenario.

[SgtRock]

I love the concept but to me with other things to do in life even remotely playing this game in any sensible way is an impossibility.

It's been said many times, WITP/AE isn't a game, its a second career. You could likely get a degree from the military war college in less time than completing a couple of WITP/AE games! ;D

[Boggit]

whats stopping me???

not being retired mostly.

I am retired and even I won't devote the time necessary to play that monster. I'm getting old and life's too short to spend so much of it on one game.

I have the WitP version, and whilst it's fun, I really have do have to agree with Greybriar. So many games, so little time.... ::)

[MengJiao]

I love the concept but to me with other things to do in life even remotely playing this game in any sensible way is an impossibility.

It's been said many times, WITP/AE isn't a game, its a second career. You could likely get a degree from the military war college in less time than completing a couple of WITP/AE games! ;D

  I find the game intriguing at all levels.  I've taken a break for a bit, but now I'm heading back in.  I'm doing a few things to cut my time investment:

1) not being the Japanese (trying to get their economy to work and trying to get pilots trained and so on, isn't easy)
2) Not designing my own scenarios and ships and planes
3) But since I'm the allies in May '42, I added some gratuitous French and British ships and fighter squadrons so I have something to do while the Japs try to continue to run amok (paradoxically WitPAE is a game where having a few more planes and squadrons to loose can actually speed up the game).

[sandman2575]

For me, the biggest stumbling block with WitP:AE isn't the amount of detail and information per se.  It's that the game doesn't do nearly enough to help you organize and keep track of the information, and more importantly, keep track of *your long term plans*. 

This is fundamentally a flaw of the user interface. For me, no matter how intriguing WitP is, no matter how well it recreates the challenges (above all logistical challenges) of the PTO, the full campaign is simply unplayable. "3rd Party applications" like WitP-Tracker and WitP-Staff attempt to make things more manageable, and they succeed to some extent. But the fact that the functionality they provide isn't integrated into the game itself is a serious problem.

I can't think of another (relatively) recent PC game that forced me to work out so much of what I wanted to do with pen and paper.  Frankly, that just shouldn't be the case. The stuff I had to keep track of in notebooks -- which at bottom amounted to "Getting specific units and material from Point A to Point B so that I can build up for an eventual attack on Point C" -- was pretty basic stuff. Not easily organized stuff -- and there's the rub -- but basic stuff in order to carry out operations in the pacific.  The fact that the game does almost nothing to help you organizationally is why I can only ever get to about Spring '42 before I call it quits.   

[Herman Hum]

I can't think of another (relatively) recent PC game that forced me to work out so much of what I wanted to do with pen and paper.  Frankly, that just shouldn't be the case. The stuff I had to keep track of in notebooks -- which at bottom amounted to "Getting specific units and material from Point A to Point B so that I can build up for an eventual attack on Point C" -- was pretty basic stuff. Not easily organized stuff -- and there's the rub -- but basic stuff in order to carry out operations in the pacific.  The fact that the game does almost nothing to help you organizationally is why I can only ever get to about Spring '42 before I call it quits.   

A fundamental and primary logic of using computers to play wargames instead of boards is (supposedly) allowing the machine to handle all the details and minutiae.  Unfortunately, when a game forces a player to use the same amount of pencil and paper tracking (or more), it fails from the outset.  All the support programs like WitP Tracker are basic features and functions that desperately need to be incorporated into the game.