WitP/AE now on SALE

**Currahee** · 01-26-2011, 07:56 AM,

The game has decent graphics for a strategy game, but it's not what you'd call "highly visual". For ships, and aircraft, you see smoke/fire during the animations; in the case of ships, it's somewhat more detailed, with several levels of smoke/fire; and a graphic "sinking" when she goes down. And a satisfying "crunch" & explosion when torpedos & bombs hit. But once the animation phase is over (assuming you turn animations "on", which I like to do), the game "counters" are Task Forces (TF's), not individual ships, and you have to access the TF screen to check ship damage. When you access a particular ship there's a small "pictograph" showing the ship, and smoking if it's damaged 10% or more, but for real info on the actual damage, you have to look at the ship data screen, and check out the individual guns/systems. Damage can be rather specific; it may be to the powerplant, and affect speed; or specific guns or turrets, launch tubes, etc may be knocked out. Some systems and larger caliber guns can only be repaired at larger ports, or in shipyards. Damage control & firefighting can be affected by damage. Some simple repairs, primarily controlling flooding and fire, may be accomplished underway, but generally you'll split off the badly damaged ships, and head them for the nearest port, to control fire and flooding; and once that's done, on to a bigger port, to fix the structural (flotation) and system damage.

I've not looked for screenshots other than on the Matrix site.

**Compass Rose** · 01-27-2011, 07:07 AM,

How does the save game feature work. Can you save and quit at any time, or are you at the mercy of the game?

Are you forced to micro manage every little thing, like in Hearts of Iron? I hope not, because that is what turned me off from that game.

Thanks

**Currahee** · 01-27-2011, 11:01 AM,

You can save any time, and continue later; except when you're watching the "combat resolution movie replay". But that doesn't take long; once that's over, and you start your move, you can save any time, and any number of times.

There is a lot of micro-management, and you can avoid some of it, but not all. You can automate shipments of supplies and fuel to needy bases; and you can let the computer pick commanders for TF's, send replacements (both ground elements, and aircraft) to units with vacancies, automatically upgrade to newer equipment, and handle pilot replacements; or, you can step in and micro-manage those, but the computer does a pretty good job. For example, if you have a critical squadron that's not getting replacement aircraft because you have so few replacements in the pool, you may need to go in and set some of the not-so-critical squadrons to "no replacements". But really, that happens rarely. Oh, and the computer can handle all your submarine ops.

But what you absolutely cannot get away from, and cannot afford to ignore, is loading your assault units onto transports, picking their destinations, making sure they will have surface escort and air cover going in, making sure the necessary naval auxiliary ships are where you need them, diciding where to base your bombers, giving detailed orders to your combat TF's, making repair-priority decisions for damaged warships, setting patrol routes for your anti-sub forces, setting search vectors for search aircraft (altho it's easy enough to search 360 degrees, it's usually better to concentrate on a narrower vector); and many other things.

So AE is definitely not a game you can set on "computer assist" for 20 turns, and expect to survive. With practice, you can get a standard-scenario move down to 30 minutes, and a mega-game scenario move down to an hour (except maybe for the first move, if you're the attacker; those always take longer). You'll develop a little mental checklist you go through, so you don't forget anything. Or, write it down! But remember, and this is really important, not everything has to be done every turn (as in TOAW). What I mean by that is, most of your orders take multiple moves to carry out; say you organize and set a bombardment TF to go bombard Truk; well, it does it, and then sails home, without any need for more input, unless you want to change its orders; so basically you don't worry about that TF for a couple of weeks; supply and fuel TF's unload themselves without being told; and then return home, unless you've set them to go elsewhere. Aircraft will keep on flying their vectors and attack orders until you change them... So although there's a LOT of micromanagement, it's not tedious, or repetitive, and if you've played several well-thought-out turns, your side will literally play itself for awhile, unless you're just an inveterate meddler. You can coast for 4 or 5 turns, but 10 or more would be pushing your luck; because it's war, things change, your opponent has a mind of his own, and some of your standing orders will have to be changed, TF's redirected, newly arrived units embarked for the South Pacific, etc.

You can opt the Chinese theater out of the game completely; but if it's included, it takes a little time, but not much, nothing like a big TOAW land war.

**Compass Rose** · 01-27-2011, 11:06 AM,

Thanks a bunch Currahee for all of that info. Boy, there sure is alot going on in that game! Sounds very interesting!

enigma6584 · 01-31-2011, 03:54 PM,

Here is a small AAR just started a bit back by a guy who does a real nice job. Go through and read it. You get a good sense of gameplay. Also, check out the other AARs, there are a ton of them by so many people playing PBEM. I read many of them for a couple of months and decided to take the plunge.

WitP-AE After Action Report

I've been playing the AI for now, learning the game but will start my first PBEM in a month. It is a phenominal game which will stay on my hard-drive for years to come.

**Currahee** · 01-31-2011, 10:41 PM,

Nice post...

**Compass Rose** · 02-01-2011, 01:12 AM,

(01-31-2011, 03:54 PM)enigma6584 Wrote: Here is a small AAR just started a bit back by a guy who does a real nice job. Go through and read it. You get a good sense of gameplay. Also, check out the other AARs, there are a ton of them by so many people playing PBEM. I read many of them for a couple of months and decided to take the plunge.

WitP-AE After Action Report

I've been playing the AI for now, learning the game but will start my first PBEM in a month. It is a phenominal game which will stay on my hard-drive for years to come.

Thanks for the AAR Link. Alot of time went into it and those pictures are the kind of thing I was hoping to find.

When you play, on average, how long does it take you to do your turn?

enigma6584 · (This post was last modified: 02-01-2011, 02:16 AM by enigma6584.)

Right now I'm playing the AI on the Guadacanal scenario. I like to go over all the data presented to me, for example looking at my squadrons, getting training for my pilots etc. It takes me a while to go over ship and land unit profiles in order to understand what all the data is telling me so I may be a bit slower than most. I go through the radio intercepts carefully and the operational reports and that is a lot of data. Probably right now...a game turn takes me 25 minutes setting everything up and then another 3-5 watching the action shots. Now again that is me being a bit slow and careful and this is just one small scenario and not the full campaign.

Never-the-less, if you are the type who loves deep detail and analyzing to the tenth degree, you will love this game.

Here is a most recent review of the game over at SimHQ. It was just posted online last night. It gives you both the pros and cons.

WitP-AE Game Review-SimHQ

Personally, I have not noticed any of the cons, game is just too deep to really notice any.

**Compass Rose** · 02-01-2011, 02:24 AM,

Can the radio intercepts contain false or misleading information?

Mike Abberton · 02-02-2011, 12:08 AM,

To the best of my knowledge, SigInt cannot be false or misleading. But some of it is ambiguous and to be truly useful would take some "post-processing".

For example, you might get SigInt like "Radio Transmissions detected at XXX, YYY." By itself, that's isn't really useful at face value. But if you got multiple Radio Transmissions in an area of sea hexes over a few days, it might be an indication of enemy activity. You might even get a feel for direction and speed if you get the right info. BUT, that's a lot of work, and I don't think too many but that much into the game.

There was a user-made utility for the original WitP that tracked and analyzed SigInt info, but I am not sure if any of the WitP-AE user utilities do that.

Mike