Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

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Telumar
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Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Telumar »

Bug or feature...?[:'(]

I wonder noone has mentioned this yet. Without being adjacent to a supply point in a coastal hex or being in a harbour (which is connected with the supply net) naval units do not receive supply (or only minimal supply, 1 or 2 points a turn) with the new supply rules. This was different with the old supply rules where re-supplying while at sea was possible.

While it's far more realistic (there is no supply depot in the Atlantic..) it could break all kinds of scenarios which have no harbour or no SP in a coastal hex. Road to Rimini comes to mind.

Also it should be mentioned in the What's New briefing.

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Curtis Lemay
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Curtis Lemay »

ORIGINAL: Telumar

Bug or feature...?[:'(]

I wonder noone has mentioned this yet. Without being adjacent to a supply point in a coastal hex or being in a harbour (which is connected with the supply net) naval units do not receive supply (or only minimal supply, 1 or 2 points a turn) with the new supply rules. This was different with the old supply rules where re-supplying while at sea was possible.

While it's far more realistic (there is no supply depot in the Atlantic..) it could break all kinds of scenarios which have no harbour or no SP in a coastal hex. Road to Rimini comes to mind.

Also it should be mentioned in the What's New briefing.


This is a bug. Good catch.
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ColinWright
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by ColinWright »

ORIGINAL: Telumar

Bug or feature...?[:'(]


...While it's far more realistic (there is no supply depot in the Atlantic..) it could break all kinds of scenarios which have no harbour or no SP in a coastal hex. Road to Rimini comes to mind.

Also it should be mentioned in the What's New briefing.


If you don't have supply reaching an anchorage on the sea in question, your ships won't get supply. If you do, they will (or did) get full supply anywhere in the sea.

...or so I recall. And I think I tested it.
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ColinWright
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by ColinWright »

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

ORIGINAL: Telumar

Bug or feature...?[:'(]

I wonder noone has mentioned this yet. Without being adjacent to a supply point in a coastal hex or being in a harbour (which is connected with the supply net) naval units do not receive supply (or only minimal supply, 1 or 2 points a turn) with the new supply rules. This was different with the old supply rules where re-supplying while at sea was possible.

While it's far more realistic (there is no supply depot in the Atlantic..) it could break all kinds of scenarios which have no harbour or no SP in a coastal hex. Road to Rimini comes to mind.

Also it should be mentioned in the What's New briefing.


This is a bug. Good catch.


I'd vote for at least considering leaving the 'bug' in. As it is, ships can just keep pounding away without ever returning to port. That might work for the USN in late 1944/1945, but as a rule, it's pretty far off.

S+43 in Seelowe. Once again, the Kriegsmarine closes in to shore to support the German drive along the South Coast. It's been six weeks since they saw port. The magazines, you see, refill themselves at sea -- or is it that vast fleet train the Germans have?

Normally, in most navies in most places, ships sortie from a port, conduct their bombardment, and return. That's the way it worked for the Germans, Italians, Royal Navy in the Mediterranean, and I think, the Japanese.

One could probably even discover that it wasn't until late in the war that the US developed the ability to keep and resupply a large fleet at sea for a prolonged period. Given a choice between that and heading back to Pearl/Truk/Alexandria, the ships should have to go back.

...and, if people really do want to be able to resupply at sea, it's perfectly possible to make a sea hex land, put in the supply point, and then make it sea again.

The supply will still be there. It wouldn't work for that all-of-the-Pacific monster, but it would work for Okinawa.
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Erik2
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Erik2 »

I agree with Colin. Havin infinite supply while out on the open sea is more of a bug.

What I have done is laying a railway from the port and one hex into deep water. Set the supply level to something meaningful depending on the port size. Create a house rule that ships may only base on this quay hex. I think this works better than the all-or-nothing supply. I also put a number in the new port hex limiting the number of vessels destroyer or larger that may reside there. This also fixes the ships-in-port-are-immune-to-air-attacks. Works really good in Weserübung where the German Stukas and British Swordfish/Albacores/Skuas now have a fair change of sinking ships in port.

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Telumar
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Telumar »

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

ORIGINAL: Telumar

Bug or feature...?[:'(]

I wonder noone has mentioned this yet. Without being adjacent to a supply point in a coastal hex or being in a harbour (which is connected with the supply net) naval units do not receive supply (or only minimal supply, 1 or 2 points a turn) with the new supply rules. This was different with the old supply rules where re-supplying while at sea was possible.

While it's far more realistic (there is no supply depot in the Atlantic..) it could break all kinds of scenarios which have no harbour or no SP in a coastal hex. Road to Rimini comes to mind.

Also it should be mentioned in the What's New briefing.


This is a bug. Good catch.


I'd vote for at least considering leaving the 'bug' in. As it is, ships can just keep pounding away without ever returning to port. That might work for the USN in late 1944/1945, but as a rule, it's pretty far off.

S+43 in Seelowe. Once again, the Kriegsmarine closes in to shore to support the German drive along the South Coast. It's been six weeks since they saw port. The magazines, you see, refill themselves at sea -- or is it that vast fleet train the Germans have?

Normally, in most navies in most places, ships sortie from a port, conduct their bombardment, and return. That's the way it worked for the Germans, Italians, Royal Navy in the Mediterranean, and I think, the Japanese.

One could probably even discover that it wasn't until late in the war that the US developed the ability to keep and resupply a large fleet at sea for a prolonged period. Given a choice between that and heading back to Pearl/Truk/Alexandria, the ships should have to go back.

...and, if people really do want to be able to resupply at sea, it's perfectly possible to make a sea hex land, put in the supply point, and then make it sea again.

The supply will still be there. It wouldn't work for that all-of-the-Pacific monster, but it would work for Okinawa.

Yes, that's my thoughts, too. Hence the thread title, "bug or feature?".
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Curtis Lemay
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Curtis Lemay »

It has to work like before or it will break a hundred existing scenarios.

Maybe it can be a designer option for next time.
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ColinWright
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by ColinWright »

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

It has to work like before or it will break a hundred existing scenarios.

Maybe it can be a designer option for next time.

I'd like to see a list of the 'hundred.'

You have an argument here, but it's not a terribly good one.

First, the length of that list of scenarios that will be 'broken' is uncertain but probably not very long. Some of the affected would actually be improved. To take one example that comes to mind, perhaps surface warships are useful to the Japanese in Luzon 1942. Well, that thing's almost unwinnable for the Fil-Americans in the first place. If the Japanese are handicapped, it's just been improved.

Secondly, it's obviously a severe handicap to any forward progress if we are forever prevented from making changes that affect previous scenarios.

Third, changes have previously been made that obviously did seriously affect many more scenarios than this would. The sudden multiplying of the power of flak by one hundred. The radical diminution of early turn-ending. Even something like the player one/player two balancing. All these are features that were taken as givens when most of the scenarios were designed, and in some cases, the design rested on these features.

You have 'broken' previously existing scenarios -- certainly as thoroughly as this would 'break' any. So there's no point in trying to protect your virginity. That was lost long ago.

The only real question is whether you should take this man home with you tonight too. I think you should.

(sometimes these metaphors just get started. I can't help it.)
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ogar
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by ogar »

Just my two cents,

I think many scenarios using naval supply do have anchorages/supply points as Erik detailed. It's the scenarios that do not have this planned in -- and Rimini and Cherbourg are 2 examples I know that do not have this feaure -- I think it's fair to alert designers and potential players to the side effect. They can either mod the scenario or play under old supply or live with the side effect, but at least they know.

I agree with Colin that this side effect does improve the realism of the naval support (and I started by complaining to Tel that naval supply in Anzio was not as good as before [TOAW 3.2] - and right I was; this 3.4 version is more challenging.)

I do not think that there are lots of scenarios with naval units without a naval supply point, so I vote for not fixing the new supply rules, but rather alerting designers and players to how it works.
Erik2
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Erik2 »

Just about everone of my scenarios have a naval component that will be broken if this is 'fixed'.
Please keep the current behaviour until there is a designer option.

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macgregor
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by macgregor »

Perhaps I could add a different question that could be covered by the thread title which is, how are amphibious invasions supplied? They seem to get supplied for a turn or two. Is that a glitch?
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by ColinWright »

ORIGINAL: macgregor

Perhaps I could add a different question that could be covered by the thread title which is, how are amphibious invasions supplied? They seem to get supplied for a turn or two. Is that a glitch?

Glitch or no, I'd be interested to hear the results of a rigorous test.

I can't say I'm for or against it either way -- I'd just like to know which way it is, and then, too, is it going to stay that way?

...or is it going to get 'fixed' after I've allowed for/taken advantage of the effect?

Night and fog...it would be good if all proposed changes were listed for comment. Sometimes it seems like these things are just done, and then we all have to live with them. Like flak was the way it was, then it was 'fixed' and I modded all the weapons to compensate for the 'fix' (aircraft getting blown out of the sky in completely ahistorical numbers and Bob insisting it was just fine), and then the 'fix' gets 'fixed' and I have to go and unmod all the weapons again -- and did I miss any?

Point really is, that at every stage of the process, I found myself commenting after the fact. It was always a fait accompli.
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Telumar
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Telumar »

As for the amphibious invasions, I suppose you mean such invasion where the designer didn't put a supply point on the beach/coast - the units are supplied the turn they land. Next turn they're unsupplied. No glitch, no bug, normal behaviour.

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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by macgregor »

ORIGINAL: Telumar

As for the amphibious invasions, I suppose you mean such invasion where the designer didn't put a supply point on the beach/coast - the units are supplied the turn they land. Next turn they're unsupplied. No glitch, no bug, normal behaviour.
So what you're saying then, is that even if units can invade a hex that is not a port by remaining for a turn, any rationale has been eliminated by the fact that unless the designer has made every coastal hex a supply point, which I rightfully haven't seen, forget naval warfare, even something as simple as picking a spot for a beachead(most of you 'geniuses' may need to look it up -a clue -it's military) is still after so many years, totally unrealistic in TOAW. And people want to know why I get so angry. So while Ralph was busy changing the supply, still luxuriously optional, HE DIDN'T BOTHER FIXING THE SUPPLY! DOH!!!

I'm a guitar teacher. I'd love to justify my failures by saying 'well my job isn't really to teach them guitar, merely to expose them to good guitar playing' but I don't. I accept that with certain people I have failed. These people who gratuitously retort that getting supply right for invasions is not part of the mission it's a bunch of bull and they know it.
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Telumar
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Telumar »

There's nothing that prevents you from putting a supply point on every costal hex of any potential invasion site in any scenario you feel where this should be added. You can also set variable supply levels. With the event engine these supply levels even could be tied to the occupation of several (or none etc pp) nearby ports which would make supplying nearby invasion sites easier, depending certainly on port capacities. I would say this is an improvement over the old system. Nothing is perfect though and i clearly see the shortcomings of the system in modelling other aspects as well as the non-availability of real mobile supply points.
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by ColinWright »

ORIGINAL: macgregor
ORIGINAL: Telumar

As for the amphibious invasions, I suppose you mean such invasion where the designer didn't put a supply point on the beach/coast - the units are supplied the turn they land. Next turn they're unsupplied. No glitch, no bug, normal behaviour.
So what you're saying then, is that even if units can invade a hex that is not a port by remaining for a turn, any rationale has been eliminated by the fact that unless the designer has made every coastal hex a supply point, which I rightfully haven't seen, forget naval warfare, even something as simple as picking a spot for a beachead(most of you 'geniuses' may need to look it up -a clue -it's military) is still after so many years, totally unrealistic in TOAW. And people want to know why I get so angry. So while Ralph was busy changing the supply, still luxuriously optional, HE DIDN'T BOTHER FIXING THE SUPPLY! DOH!!!

I'm a guitar teacher. I'd love to justify my failures by saying 'well my job isn't really to teach them guitar, merely to expose them to good guitar playing' but I don't. I accept that with certain people I have failed. These people who gratuitously retort that getting supply right for invasions is not part of the mission it's a bunch of bull and they know it.

You can run 'sea-roads' to the beaches. These will provide a modicum of supply -- so long as the player is in a position to keep enemy naval units from squatting on the hexes.

Add major river hexes offshore and a blown bridge that ferry units can allow supply to transit over, and you're getting somewhere. You would be well-advised to confine your landings to locations where you can protect the ferry units. Like it's early 1944. Anzio will work -- not Venice.

I'm kinda with Telumar here. I don't hold with LeMayesque obscuratism, but the system will never be perfect. It can't.* So you come up with workarounds and press for whatever improvements seem to have the best utility/difficulty quotient.

There's little or no point in just finding shortcomings and pointing them out. That's easy. Specify what your solution would be. Consider the programming problems and the possible unintended consequences.

*the only perfect simulation was the original event. And aside from the expense, that would be hard to manage. That's why a military commander in real life controls maybe three subordinate formations -- not two hundred. There's a whole lot of detail that gets skipped, abstracted, and summarized. That's fine -- and we all want that -- but that inevitably creates error. Not all hills are the same -- whatever TOAW may say.
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Telumar
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by Telumar »

ORIGINAL: ColinWright

Add major river hexes offshore and a blown bridge that ferry units can allow supply to transit over, and you're getting somewhere.

Ummm... this doesn't work anymore with the new supply rules. Ralph said he would "fix" this in the next patch. Now as i write... reminds me of your anti-air problem you wrote about earlier this day... something gets fixed or improved but unintentionally breaks other things..
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by macgregor »

Yes but a supply point on every coastal hex is essentially trading one unreality for another. Sea-roads are as static as beach supply points. I think it comes down to Ralph having to create a sea-supply model, something I believe someone said they were working on, though I'm quite loathe to assume at this point.

Perhaps best would be just to have supplies represented as a unit that while itself may be unsupplied, provides supplies for others until it reaches a certain point.



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ColinWright
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by ColinWright »

ORIGINAL: Telumar
ORIGINAL: ColinWright

Add major river hexes offshore and a blown bridge that ferry units can allow supply to transit over, and you're getting somewhere.

Ummm... this doesn't work anymore with the new supply rules. Ralph said he would "fix" this in the next patch. Now as i write... reminds me of your anti-air problem you wrote about earlier this day... something gets fixed or improved but unintentionally breaks other things..

Well, hopefully it works if one opts for the old rules.
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ColinWright
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RE: Naval (re)supply and new supply rules

Post by ColinWright »

ORIGINAL: macgregor

Yes but a supply point on every coastal hex is essentially trading one unreality for another. Sea-roads are as static as beach supply points. I think it comes down to Ralph having to create a sea-supply model, something I believe someone said they were working on, though I'm quite loathe to assume at this point.

Perhaps best would be just to have supplies represented as a unit that while itself may be unsupplied, provides supplies for others until it reaches a certain point.



"Lovely plumage."

I certainly don't see sea roads as ideal -- just the best thing going at the moment (if they're still going).

I think a proper sea supply system would be enormously difficult. What makes it possible for the US to supply troops in Australia in 1942 but not in the Phillipines? Very hard to model...

Really, what would need to be resolved first is what changes are going to be made in general. Like, what will be the specifics of the quantity-based system it's finally been admitted we're going to have to go to? When air/sea war is reformed to something more closely approximating reality, how will that work?

Only then could we decide how to handle supply by sea. Discrete units being literally shipped in? A volume dependent on the total sea lift available and the specific balance of sea and air power at the port?

Discrete units aren't actually as unreasonable as they might seem. The Marines were dumped on Guadacanal with so much stuff and then the fleet sailed away. Rommel's fate very often hung on specific tankers making it into port. Ditto for Malta. Once we get a volume-based supply system, it should be possible to have a unit that literally represents so many tons of supplies and gets eaten up as the units drawing on it do their thing. Many, many details to consider -- but given volume-based supply in the first place, it doesn't seem too unworkable.
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