Roads near Lae, New Guinea (routes)

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el cid again
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Roads near Lae, New Guinea (routes)

Post by el cid again »


Roads near Lae, New Guinea: The Lae-Wau Road (98/125 SW, 98/126 NE) becomes Secondary Road in Monsoon, 1944. The Reinhold Road (98/126 SW, 99/127 NE) becomes Secondary Road in Winter, 1944.


el cid again
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Bulldog New Guinea

Post by el cid again »

Bulldog is at Hex 97/127, one hex due East (in AE Map terms) of the Terapo Mission. There should be a river
connection between the two hexes, and Bulldog is a minor port (undeveloped in 1941). The Rheinhold Road runs
from it to Wau. This was a remarkable engineering feat. I am surprised, given the Australian interest in AE
and history, that neither Bulldog nor the road are included in AE.
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Yaab
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RE: Bulldog New Guinea

Post by Yaab »

I guess the devs tried to get the naval and air aspects right (and they did), and other things took the backseat.
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JeffroK
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RE: Bulldog New Guinea

Post by JeffroK »

Bulldog, 90 miles upriver a port???
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Yaab
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RE: Bulldog New Guinea

Post by Yaab »

It would seem so, yes.

http://www.ww2incolor.com/forum/archive ... -5610.html

"A sandbar lies across the Lakekamu mouth, so the Matafele stood off in the rolling seas of the gulf, blew its siren and awaited pinnaces, whaleboats and flimsy outrigger canoes. All humans and cargo precariously transferred, they were rowed several kilometres up river to the Catholic mission station at Terapo.

Here, everything was once again transferred, this time into traditional single-hulled canoes, dug out with axe and adze from giant hardwood trees. Each could carry several tonnes. A powerful outboard had been ingeniously attached, with a spare motor lying inboard for emergencies, which were frequent. These monsters covered the stretch from Terapo to Bulldog. This might take from two to four days, depending on the mood of the great stream, with its strong and changeable currents and thickets of snags
. By day, rounding the bends, one saw crocodiles sliding by squadrons into the water, disturbed in their basking by the noise of the outboard: it was not a good place to capsize or fall overboard. Just before sunset we tied up to the bank and sheltered under rough thatched hutches. When it rained, which it usually did, it was not easy to start a fire to cook a meal. "

el cid again
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RE: Roads near Lae, New Guinea (routes)

Post by el cid again »

At one point, the senior programmer said "you get the data right, I will get the code right." Regretfully,
that effort has ended. But my policy always was get the data right for every location, and for every unit.
If only to record it for use later in time. Someday we may be allowed to modify the code ourselves. Or someone
may build a better product: it is never wrong to have the correct data.

But it IS possible to do a great deal with the data. In RHS, we tried to facilitate troop movement and supply flow
by variable communications infrastructure. These change seasonally, and also with construction (or rarely with
deconstruction). Some of these features help the India-Burma situation. For one thing, the "one infrastructure for
the whole game" idea of stock vastly overstates the road net in 1941. RHS has removed those roads. You get them
later in time, after they were built. The same applies to the rail network. [The Bengal and Assam starts with no
bridge across the Bhramaputra and as minor gage. Only the US Army changes that later.]

Perhaps the biggest distortion is hard code attempting to supply China from India. There appears to be a route
(more or less the Burma Road) along which fantastic amounts of Allied supply appear by "magic." This is not good
no matter your point of view. [If Japan is going to capture the area, do you want them to capture all those
supplies?] One mitigating factor in the RHS system is more realistic supply requirements for all units. Units
have added logistic tails - not so much because they support operations very much - but so that the supply demand
of a unit is proportionate to reality. This is somewhat counter-intuitive: a pack unit has the greatest logistic
requirement (to feed the animals and porters), but the least firepower (it only has light artillery at best); a
draft unit (the normal case for Japan) is in the middle, with significantly higher logistic cost to "feed" than
a motorized unit, but significantly less firepower than a motorized unit has. Motorized units have the least
logistic demand, but the greatest firepower. Doing this universally greatly increases the need to feed supplies
everywhere, and the need for ships to feed them. You should find even in India and Burma that you do better (and
have more control over where you stockpile supplies) if you use river navigation: automatic supply is not good
enough at least for major operations.

There are also a few "tricks" thrown in. A concept from the old (pre AE) WITP was the "supply sink." This is mainly
associated with certain major cities in RHS for AE. It renders capturing a major city a nightmare (as, indeed,
it should be - urban combat is probably the worst of all). But the biggest of these do create political demands
on commanders. [Historically, the Allies failed to allocate enough shipping to feed India, creating starvation to
such an extent, the Raj was no longer tolerable to many Indians who otherwise might have gone along with it.]
India can be a source of resources to send other places, it should not be a source of unlimited operational supply.

The problem of supply is far worse than it seems to 1941 players: the game must be able to feed the armies (and air
forces and fleets) of 1944 - which are several times larger. AE tends to give you more supply than is available
in 1941 and not nearly enough for 1944. Someone suggested, and RHS adopted, the idea of growing supply sources.
Further, players can invest in growing industry to produce supplies in certain places. If you can do this and hold
on to those places, it will pay dividends in the shipping you don't need to move them to that area later in the war.
The devil is in the details, and it will never be perfectly solved from all points of view. But we were able to
greatly complicate the supply problems for players in many places, and create a need for ships, large and small,
to move them (or the resources, fuel and oil which permit them to be generated). This is particularly acute for
Japan - fail to move resources and oil - and the economy will shut down. Those large stockpiles are not really
large enough - and serious impacts on production of aircraft, armaments and ships will occur within months if one
ignores this. Whole cities industries will shut down. Japanese railroads and roads cannot move the huge numbers
needed - just as in real life - shipping must be used. And players cannot "get rid of" reinforcements: they are
going to show up and demand to be fed too. If you don't need something, figure out where it can be fed automatically -
or it will draw down supplies in places that impact your front line operations.

There is a gigantic problem between India and Burma. There is no railroad. There in no major road. The only
secondary road is to Prome. There are two (or seasonally three) long trails. Now the Burma Road will upgrade
eventually. But these limitations are severe enough to impact major operations early in the war. [Later on,
there will be vastly more troops to feed.] You should find that river shipping is vital to success. [This
is unusually complicated in RHS because the upper Irrawaddy becomes UNNAVIGABLE in the wet season - there is
so much water it forces one into canyon walls above Mandalay. In other seasons, one can use the upper river,
but not in Monsoon.] In India, the Bhramaputra-Ganges river network is properly the most important logistical
system in the area - more important than railroads are - IF you use it. It is also the fastest way to move
units. In real life, it was even worse: it took six weeks to make it to Assam from Calcutta by rail (until
the US Army reorganized the RR, upgraded it, and built a bridge across the Bhramaputra). We have most
of this - but our long minor gage RR is still able to move troops in a week or so - much better than it was
in 1941/1942.



US87891
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RE: Bulldog New Guinea

Post by US87891 »

ORIGINAL: Yaab
I guess the devs tried to get the naval and air aspects right (and they did), and other things took the backseat.
Hello,
Yes. Something always has to get the back seat. However, two or three years ago Babes put this into their small map scenario for Cartwheel/Galvanic. There was a series of posts on it describing how it was done and why. Search for 'black cat' more than 1 year ago. It is in the Cartwheel/Galvanic thread. It can be easily added to other mods. Full instructions provided.
Matt
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JeffroK
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RE: Bulldog New Guinea

Post by JeffroK »

ORIGINAL: Yaab

It would seem so, yes.

http://www.ww2incolor.com/forum/archive ... -5610.html

"A sandbar lies across the Lakekamu mouth, so the Matafele stood off in the rolling seas of the gulf, blew its siren and awaited pinnaces, whaleboats and flimsy outrigger canoes. All humans and cargo precariously transferred, they were rowed several kilometres up river to the Catholic mission station at Terapo.

Here, everything was once again transferred, this time into traditional single-hulled canoes, dug out with axe and adze from giant hardwood trees. Each could carry several tonnes. A powerful outboard had been ingeniously attached, with a spare motor lying inboard for emergencies, which were frequent. These monsters covered the stretch from Terapo to Bulldog. This might take from two to four days, depending on the mood of the great stream, with its strong and changeable currents and thickets of snags
. By day, rounding the bends, one saw crocodiles sliding by squadrons into the water, disturbed in their basking by the noise of the outboard: it was not a good place to capsize or fall overboard. Just before sunset we tied up to the bank and sheltered under rough thatched hutches. When it rained, which it usually did, it was not easy to start a fire to cook a meal. "

Are you saying that anywhere you can land a log canoe you have a port??
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Yaab
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RE: Bulldog New Guinea

Post by Yaab »

ORIGINAL: JeffroK

ORIGINAL: Yaab

It would seem so, yes.

http://www.ww2incolor.com/forum/archive ... -5610.html

"A sandbar lies across the Lakekamu mouth, so the Matafele stood off in the rolling seas of the gulf, blew its siren and awaited pinnaces, whaleboats and flimsy outrigger canoes. All humans and cargo precariously transferred, they were rowed several kilometres up river to the Catholic mission station at Terapo.

Here, everything was once again transferred, this time into traditional single-hulled canoes, dug out with axe and adze from giant hardwood trees. Each could carry several tonnes. A powerful outboard had been ingeniously attached, with a spare motor lying inboard for emergencies, which were frequent. These monsters covered the stretch from Terapo to Bulldog. This might take from two to four days, depending on the mood of the great stream, with its strong and changeable currents and thickets of snags
. By day, rounding the bends, one saw crocodiles sliding by squadrons into the water, disturbed in their basking by the noise of the outboard: it was not a good place to capsize or fall overboard. Just before sunset we tied up to the bank and sheltered under rough thatched hutches. When it rained, which it usually did, it was not easy to start a fire to cook a meal. "

Are you saying that anywhere you can land a log canoe you have a port??


Tough call. Probably access to the port could be blocked by a reef hexside so only ship/barges under 100 tonnes can reach it? I am not a modder, I am just throwing ideas.
el cid again
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RE: Bulldog New Guinea

Post by el cid again »

ORIGINAL: JeffroK
Are you saying that anywhere you can land a log canoe you have a port??
[/quote]

I do NOT say that. In RHS we actually do have a different way to model low capacity movement
of troops and supplies and resources on inland waterways - but these do not permit what happened
at Bulldog. In some areas (notably in SE Asia and China and some parts of India) traditional
craft really mattered. In the appropriate seasons (wet seasons in most cases) these are modeled
by trails crossing river hexsides. They allow the trickle and slow movement of significant LCU
along the rivers.

The River to Bulldog is quite different. It is at least as wide as a football field and 12 meters
deep on average. It is, however, moving a lot of silt, and not easy to see in either: one yacht ran
aground and fount it was two feet from the main channel because of an unmarked sand bar deposited since
the last time the channel had been charted. There is, in fact, usually a sandbar off the mouth -
although there also usually is a way (or two or three) to get past it. There has never been a major
economic justification to keep it clear - but when there was a military one - various means were used
to deal with it. I live in a port with major silting problems (Anchorage, Alaska - so named because
traditionally ships had to anchor out - there was no suitable way to build docks - yet today we have
docks, and even cruise ships can use them - because we pay for dredging to clear the ever silting
channels).

AE does have a way to restrict the size of ships. Not as much as I would prefer, but I decided to simulate
the entrance to this particular river on New Guinea using a "shallow draft" hexside. This at least denies
the ports (Terapo Mission and Bulldog IF you build it up - it is a 0 port to start) being used for any major ships.
The way I did it combines with blocked hexsides to simulate the sandbar - there is in effect only one channel -
creating a tactically dangerous situation if an enemy submarine is around. It does not have to cover three possible
hexsides - two of them won't work. It is a compromise and I admit - "shallow draft" - as applied both to the hexside
and to the river hexsides - is not as restrictive as it ought to be. But it is a reasonable compromise.
Far more reasonable than you cannot run a major supply route up to Wau. IF you could not, they would not have built
a road for that purpose at great effort.
el cid again
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RE: Bulldog New Guinea

Post by el cid again »

ORIGINAL: JeffroK



Are you saying that anywhere you can land a log canoe you have a port??



After working on a different problem (in Canada), I have added a special
rule (marked on the map as well as in the House Rules) for the river ports
of Terapo Mission and Bulldog: no vessels over 300 tons may enter the
river system. This value comes from a different rule for the strange
situation at Fort Smith - but it is about the right value. While I find
references to small ships (including large yachts) making this river passage -
big ships never do. In theory a 12 meter deep, 100 meter wide river should
pass a large ship - but the sandbars offshore and along the river - all
uncharged - are a real problem. Familiar with this problem because I live
in a place with similar volcanic sands - my city is named Anchorage because
it used to be impractical to make it a port - even though today it is a
major port for large cruise ships as well as cargo ships. It costs a lot of
money to dredge the sand, and that would not be done in wartime conditions
near the enemy. Small vessels were always able to land or load cargo and
people, and work their way off if they ran aground. This is a reasonable
compromise more restrictive than just depending on the "shallow draft" hexside.
However, that hexside also makes it impossible to "cheat" with a large vessel.

Note that the stock interpretation of Terapo - and all mods I know of - permit
ANY size ship to go there. We don't.
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