How many Japanese Tanker classes for SHIV?

[AG124]

I decided to start a different type of poll, as merchant ships will continue to be important in the Pacific Theatre.

I would personally like to see four Japanese tanker classes in SHIV.
- One class of those 906 grt coastal tankers.
- One class of small tankers around 3-5,000 grt.
- One class of larger tankers around 7-8,000 grt.
- One class of extra-large tankers around 13-15,000 grt

In SHI, there were only two classes of tanker - the 906 grt coastal tankers, and a huge 18,100 ton class. There was also a ~5,000 ton Converted Factory Ship, but I thought that selection was unsatisfactory.

[CCIP]

You know what? To hell with more tanker classes in general - we need more commercial ship classes, period!

One cool feature that the devs could potentially make is a system which could randomize the ships more - say, by randomizing some items of the superstructure to make it look like you're popping a different ship each time :hmm:

[AG124]

Yes we do, particularly troop transports. There has never been a modern (i.e.post AOD subsim with satisfactory troopships:

AOD - Only two classes, both of which were identical (except one was longer and had two funnels).

SHI - Only one class, although very good looking.

SHII - Only two classes - Passenger Liner and Troop Transport. At least they were good models by SHII standards.

SHIII - Same as SHII, but the passenger liner looks like something from the 1950s.

I was also really disappionted by the tanker classes in SHII, and the Fast Transport looked like a modern cargo vessel. The Slow Cargo looked too boxy and modern, at least the bridge, but the Small Cargo was good (it is actually identical to the SHIII Small Merchant if you look closely, only less detailed of course). Freighter selection was better in AOD, SHI, and SHIII (although in SHIII we got too many mass-produced wartime freighters - generic vessels should have been used in place of the C2 and C3).

CCIP, I like your randomized parts idea, but I don't know if it would be workable. Also, it would interfere with the recognition book images. I don't think we can hope for something on that level. I would just hope for a better overall selection myself.

[CCIP]

At the least, I think there needs to be a good cross-section by eras and sizes for cargo ships - even by decade from, say, 1900 to 1940s. It's a little bit irritating seeing the same C2s and C3s as the only medium-large merchants in SHIII, I would really appreciate some older merchants there.

Four classes of tankers is more or less what we got once we had the Coastal Tanker modded into SHIII. I personally would add at least a couple of variations (even if they're knockoffs from the same basic models) on small and medium tankers in the game. They really shouldn't be terribly difficult to kitbash for the devs.

Well, all wishful thinking, but I honestly hope that this time the devs don't spare effort on commercial ships too much. I honestly don't mind if they simply re-use the SHIII kit to put together more rough (SHIII-level) but varied models.

[AG124]

The Coastal Merchant and Small Merchant and even the Tugboat (and maybe the Small Coastal Vessel) could be modified to appear Japanese, but Troop Transports and Tankers would have to be built from scratch obviously. I like the way you are thinking though....:hmm:

[iambecomelife]

IMO the more the merrier. My only concern is that there aren't too many classes of large tankers (between, say, 9000-14000 grt) since that would skew randomly-generated encounters and inflate the average skipper's tonnage. Like the Scandinavians the Japanese tended to produce beautifully streamlined tankers, especially during the 30's and 40's - it would be a real treat to see them in SHIV.

Regarding older subsims, I have always liked the AOD merchant models and tonnage system, which were innovative for their time. SH2 was hit or miss; the T-2 was excellent, and the generic tanker OK. I couldn't stand the fast cargo-why on earth would you put the bridge behind the funnel? The slow cargo was OK but not a good stand-in for medium freighters of the era because of the big superstructure (like passenger ships).

The vessel feature randomization idea is excellent - it would add tremendously to replay value. With a little work there could be rules inserted so that all the features would look appropriate - for instance, tall, thin funnels and sparse bridgework on older ships, shorter smokestacks on modern motor vessels, and so forth.

Unfortunately based on the screenshots SHIV seems to focus for the most part on "exciting" vessels like battleships and heavy cruisers. This isn't appropriate b/c even in the Pacific the main goal was to starve the home islands into submission, not to hunt down individual fleet units. In fact, by the end of the war many of Japan's largest warships were essentially worthless b/c of poor crew training, accumulated battle damage, and (especially in the case of carriers) inadequate aircraft. OTOH, the larger merchant vessels from Japan's major shipping lines (Daido, NYK Line, Yama****a Line) were worth their weight in gold THROUGHOUT the war.

IIRC there are to be 70 combat units in all for the game (air and sea). Considering all the planes and warships that need to be included, I fear we're going to end up with a small, repetitive sampling of merchant ships. AOD's over a decade old and we're still stuck with "Big Merchant, Average Merchant, Little Merchant". In fact SH3 was a step backward from AOD in that there was no tonnage randomization for generic ships.

Anyway, enough whining from me. Hopefully it will be easy for SHIV modders to add new classes.