There’s no official answer that I know of. A&A is such an abstracted game that, in one sense, it would be meaningless to say that game unit X corresponds to real-world military (or naval) formation Y. Given the scope of A&A Global 1940, however, the various unit types on the map would roughly correspond to large formations if we were to assume that the allocation of units in the rules corresponds to real WWII numbers. As an example, Germany’s invasion of the USSR was carried out with over 150 divisions – so from that perspective, the small number of sculpts on the actual board could at best only correspond to army groups. At that level, it shouldn’t even be possible to differentiate between the components of the army groups, nor even of their consitutent armies or corps; the highest-level tank formations in WWII were, I think, armoured divisions and (one level further down) tank brigades. So one way to look at the game would be to imagine that we’re not actually seeing the military formations themselves, but rather a patchwork picture showing some of the elements of those formations, with some of these elements being high-level ones and others being lower-level ones (like tank brigades).
Trucks, Tiger Tanks, and Me 262 for A&A Europe
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I recently was given a copy of AA battle of the bulge and noticed the tigers and the trucks, as well as the jet. I quickly incorporated a house rule into AAE where the German player can purchase Tiger Tanks(tanks from battle of the bulge spinoff) as well as Panthers(older tank). Tigers would cost seven ipc’s and would attack at 4, but still defend at just two. Also, Tigers couldn’t be produced until turn six, representing the production time in late 1942. The jet would cost the German player 15 ipc’s, and could be produced by turn 12. ME 262’s attack power would be 4 or less, and its defense would be five or less. Obviously their production is limited. In terms of trucks, however, an unfair advantage would be given to an already potent German invasion force if trucks were incorporated into the game, moving axis units closer to the front would doom Russia. Any thoughts, comments…ideas?
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I dont have BotB, but now I’m curious after hearing about the new figures…
I think game turns are 3 months (plus A&A Europe games dont last more than, say, 10 turns) so I wouldn’t bother with the turn limits. Keep it simple.
Tigers were very heavily armoured, I’d be inclined to either give them 3 attack, 3 defense or give them 2 hits like Battleships.
The Jets tech in the original A&A granted defense 5 to Fighters…though I guess a +1 on offense is OK too.
Trucks…I guess you’d treat them like Transports right…can carry 1 Inf or 1 Artillery upto 2 spaces, and they themselves are a 0 Attack, 1 Defense unit. The question is, how much do they cost? At 3 points, how many would Germany buy? Probably not more than 3 or 4 right?
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I had thought of the two hit idea, either way the tigers would have some advantage that would have to be reflected with the price. I like the two hit, attack and defend at three. Movement two spaces; cost of eight ipc’s.
I was thinking of maybe giving the axis and the allies pre-set truck amounts. Germany starts with one truck in tunisia, One in france, two in germany, one in poland, and one in Northern Italy. Russia has two in Moscow, one in Stalingrad, One in Siberia, and one in Russia. Britian has two in britian, one in canada, and one in egypt. U.S. has two in u.s. Tucks can move three spaces carrying one ground unit. Trucks can be targeted in battle, but it takes a roll of one to destroy (trucks arent placed on battle board). Once destroyed the country who lost the truck gets a new one in their capital at the end of their next turn. Any trucks that are captured when a territory is lost are turned over to the capturing country for use (change its color). -
I dont have BotB, but now I’m curious after hearing about the new figures…
The “Tigers” are actually a new mold of Panthers, and the “jets” are actually ME 109Gs. Both of these will appear in the new Anniversary game.
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Very nice molds indeed…
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I recently was given a copy of AA battle of the bulge and noticed the tigers and the trucks, as well as the jet. I quickly incorporated a house rule into AAE where the German player can purchase Tiger Tanks(tanks from battle of the bulge spinoff) as well as Panthers(older tank). Tigers would cost seven ipc’s and would attack at 4, but still defend at just two. Also, Tigers couldn’t be produced until turn six, representing the production time in late 1942. The jet would cost the German player 15 ipc’s, and could be produced by turn 12. ME 262’s attack power would be 4 or less, and its defense would be five or less. Obviously their production is limited. In terms of trucks, however, an unfair advantage would be given to an already potent German invasion force if trucks were incorporated into the game, moving axis units closer to the front would doom Russia. Any thoughts, comments…ideas?
Germany had no surplus trucks during the war. They were either committed to the Armored units or to supply lines. The infantry divisions were having their limited number of trucks takened from them starting in 1940 to make up for losses in the mechanized troops. By 1944, you had fast mechanized divisions and foot infantry divisions dependent on horse-drawned wagons for their transport. By 1944 as well, the Germans were running into severe fuel shortages, compounded in August of 1944 when the Russians overran the Romanian oil fields. The US was the only country in WW2 with surplus truck production, and supplied most of the Allies transport. By 1944, it was possible for a standard US infantry division to carry all of its troops by truck.
Historical Note: The life expentancy of the engines on the ME-262 was between 15 and 25 hours, following which they needed to be replaced. This represented between 2 and 4 weeks of usage. The life expentancy before complete overhaul of the early Allied jets was 185 hours. The life expentancy of conventional reciprocating aircraft engines before complete overhaul was between 600 and 1200 hours, depending on the engine. The major exception to this was the Wright R-3350 on the B-29 which needed overhauling after about 300 hours or 20 missions to Japan from the Marianas. Keeping a steady supply of spare engines and spare parts for the B-29 was a major logistics effort.
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This last post pushed it over the edge.
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