Synthetic Plants Needs Changing

[scroggin]

But you still may have to produce unneeded synthetic rubber in order to get needed synthetic oil !

You are right but thats probably only going to be siam and japan if they conquer siam. Perhaps it would be better to have synthetic plants that produce whatever you are short of oil or rubber. But that doesnt allow for the fact that most countries used oil to produce synthetic rubber.

 

[Cowsnipe]

There was no oil production in Libya until the 1950s. But there was some exploratory work done just before the war looking for oil, that had to be cut short when the area became a battleground. So any NF for is an ahistoric choice, but very plausible.

Can you provide a source that there was oil in Manchuria that could be extracted during the period please. In English.

Manchuria is home of the Daqing oilfield, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daqing_Oil_Field , which today still is the 4th most productive oil field in the world. Sadly the Japanese at the time lacked the technology to extract oil from this field, due to the depths of the deposits laying at 900m - 1200m below the ground, however the US had. If they had discovered the fields in the early 30's, US companies might have been willing to work the fields.

Manchuria is also home of the lesser known Fuyu Oilfield, http://www.cnpc.com.cn/en/operatediol/201405/d9e1c457a0bc4ebba2374904c316e850.shtml , which sits at a more reasonable ~300m - 500m depth and would easily have been exploited if it had been discovered. It's nothing like the Daqing field, but would easily support all of Japans needs for 2 decades at the time.

 

[mursolini]

Yes they were underpowered because they were not comparable, it was always better to build civilian IC trade then it was to build synthetics.

Civilian IC is more flexible then Synthetics and that's a huge advantage (also they give +8 resources on a trade) so reducing Synthetics production would make them really bad to build. That was what my original response was about, it was suggested that the resources they provide should be reduced and that would make Synthetics something you would only ever build if you were truly desperate.

I disagree. Yes, civilian industry is better. It should be better, to force countries to compete for resources that are on the map! If synthetics are comparable, why would anyone expand?
Germany&Japan&Italy have zero incentive to expand in the scenario. The game shouldn`t mirror HOI3 in this regard, where Germany, Japan, Italy could just sit on their hands, and gain 200-300% increase of IC because USA&SU and GB and France would happily trade all the resources they need.

Germany and Japan should be desperate for Oil as soon as they start hostilities. From 1939 till 1945(or, till they get to large oil fields), is their time when synthetics are the only additional source of oil. Considering USA and SU oil production, it is almost mandatory for Axis to build synthetics if they want to match Allied capacity to build tanks, planes and ships.

You didn`t provide me with the answer, what is the use of civilian IC, if you can`t trade resources that you need for it? Is it still better than synthetics in the scenario?