VC House Rules II

[theduke]

Notice that the rules for max inf in captured VCs are the same for all nations.

Notice that now there aren’t special restrictions for Japan mainland territories. There is only one exception that’s the same for Russia, Germany and Japan. I think this flows better into the game than just having that special restriction for Japan.

Notice that now all nations start with 2 ICs (evens out the playing field). I think leaving off initial ICs and only usingthose pieces for purchased ICs will save space on the board.

Here is a big change that I want to introduce… How about instead of using Victory Cites we use Victory Territories? That way we don’t need to draw in new specific cities. Also, saying Guadalcanal is a city isn’t right, but it should be a victory point of some sort. Victory Territories saves a lot of possible confusion. Besides why have cities when you don’t need them? Cities seem to be just one more thing needlessly cluttering the board.

[theduke]

The Baghdad city can be changed to another city around Africa/Middle East. The extra 1 inf/turn in whatever territory we choose will give UK are much more realistic fighting chance in that region. The 3 total VCPs in the Africa/Middle East instead of the 1 VCP greatly improves importance of Africa.

The 2 extra Japanese minor VCs in the Pacific islands now make a US Pacific campaign very appealing. Finally, a reason to see a Pacific war! I like the idea of making the cities in Solomon Islands and New Guinea to add incentive for the US player to take the same island hopping path that was taken in WWII and give incentive for UK to use Austalia to try to help take these VCs.

Now Japan can build 4 mainland inf per turn and China can build 3, and India 2, and Russia 1. Factoring in the initial IC in Manchuria it should be a very interesting and more historically accurate battle in Asia. (4 Axis inf/turn plus initial IC plus air support vs. 6 Allied infantry/turn).

[Imperious Leader]

How about instead of using Victory Cites we use Victory Territories? That way we don’t need to draw in new specific cities.

I think thats too far of a departure from the game. Cities was the original intent of the design, which are in territories. I can easily make the map so that it can be played regular or with these special rules as i can change the color on all additional cities so it works for both games. I want to express the great pleasure it is to work with you on this… your ideas are truely marvelous!

BTW kursk would be a great VC as well for germany, another idea was to look into the idea of nation specific victory conditions. consider the following:

Nation specific victory conditions:

Germany:

1.  Control these VC–germany is master of europe

Moscow (5)–Russia
Stalingrad (3)–Caucasus
Leningrad (2)–Karelia
Archangel (1)–Archangel
Berlin (5)–Germany
Rome (3)–S. Europe
Paris (2)–W. Europe
Kiev (2)–Ukraine
Warsaw (1)–E. Europe
Oslo (1)–Norway
Tripoli (1)–Libya
Cairo (1)—Anglo-Egypt
Baghdad (1)–Trans-Jordan (Opinions of this as VC?)
Cape Town (1)–South Africa (Opinions of this as VC?)
London (5)–UK

if germany owns these after a complete cycle of player turns, then Germany wins outright. total of 34 VC points.

Russia: Control these VC–the Soviet Union extends communism to the world.

Moscow (5)–Russia
Stalingrad (3)–Caucasus
Leningrad (2)–Karelia
Novosibirsk (2)–Novosibirsk
Archangel (1)–Archangel
Almaty (1)–Kazakh (Opinions of this as VC?)
Vladivostok (1)–Buryatia
Berlin (5)–Germany
Kiev (2)–Ukraine
Warsaw (1)–E. Europe
Changchun (3)–Manchuria

this is a total of 26 VC to capture.

United Kingdom:
Rome (3)–S. Europe
London (5)–UK
Toronto (3)–E. Canada
Calcutta (2)–India
Sydney (2)–Australia
Cairo (1)—Anglo-Egypt
Baghdad (1)–Trans-Jordan (Opinions of this as VC?)
Cape Town (1)–South Africa (Opinions of this as VC?)
Oslo (1)–Norway
Tripoli (1)–Libya
Singapore (2)–FIC

Thats 22 VC to win

Japan:
Tokyo (5)—Japan
Changchun (3)–Manchuria
Shanghai (2)–Kwangtung
Singapore (2)–FIC
Manila (1)—Philippines
Guadalcanal (1)–Solomon Islands (Not actually a city. Opinions as VC?)
Milne Bay (1)–New Guinea (Opinions of this as VC? Again, not a city should the VC be Alotau?)
Calcutta (2)–India
Sydney (2)–Australia
Chongqing (2)–China
Ãœrümqi (1)–Sinkiang (This is just a VC so there can be 1 more Chinese infantry per turn. I don’t know what city to choose.)
Honolulu (1)–Hawaii
Anchorage (1)–Alaska (Opinions

thats 24 VC to win

US:
Washington (5)–E. US
Los Angeles (3)–W. US
Chicago (2)–C. US
Chongqing (2)–China
Ãœrümqi (1)–Sinkiang (This is just a VC so there can be 1 more Chinese infantry per turn. I don’t know what city to choose.)
Honolulu (1)–Hawaii
Anchorage (1)–Alaska (Opinions on this VC? How about Sao Paulo instead so 1 inf/turn represents Brazil’s contribution in the war?)
Paris (2)–W. Europe
Manila (1)—Philippines
Guadalcanal (1)–Solomon Islands (Not actually a city. Opinions as VC?)
Milne Bay (1)–New Guinea (Opinions of this as VC? Again, not a city should the VC be Alotau?)
Shanghai (2)–Kwangtung
Tokyo (5)—Japan

thats a total of  27 vc

Im sure some tinkering may have to occur… and in the event that say UK takes an objective from the US player ( example: Paris, then US can can count 1/2 the points rounded UP into the total… so to make up the deficit the US player would need to take one additional VC city with a value of at least one point.

The other thing this does is end Japan attacking the soviets… they can still do this but it wont help them really win… because their victory is now historical based. Also US player will have to focus more on japan and Japan will do the same. this will promote the large scale naval battles that we really dont get in the pacific. Island hopping campaign will now come forward. Germany can win the game on her own w/o japans help and its possible for the allies tom win as a team, but realistically its now possible for only one player of the three to actually win the game outright… this installs a VERY important function into the game, because really the allies fought for themselves as much as each other… UK didnt want the Soviets to get to far into western europe, USA didnt want the Soviets to far into china, Russia didnt want the allies to take berlin… and NOW the Axis can play “spoiler” just like the germans did in the war (well late in the war to be sure) by throwing everything against the Russians, while allowing the americans to clean up western europe.
I think this will evolutionize the game and throw out all those strategy ideas with an entirely new set of guidlines… This would be a great gift to players who want something new inthe game.

the axis need 28 additional VC points to win vs. the allies need 30 additional VC points to win

germany 15-34=19
USSR 15-26=11
UK 15-22=7
USA 15-27=12
Japan 15-24=9

19+9=28 axis    11+7+12=30 allies… i can tweek this a bit so its 29 vs 29= balance.

[Imperious Leader]

Also as a result it will become clear that some nations are harder to play, but also have more pieces and income in which to do it… I think Japan and uk should be changed to 8 each (currently at 7 and 9, thus Japan will need one less VC to win with)

[theduke]

Thanks for the compliments. I try to have all the house rules I propose go through a rigorous set of calculations to make sure that the strategic implications of those rules will drive the game towards actual historical events, while always keeping the effect on game balance in the back of my mind. There’s a ton of computations going on in the background that people never get to see. I honestly feel that that these set of house rules will improve the game tremendously when people actually end up giving them a chance. BTW, did you see that Larry himself took a look at the old VC house rules that I posted in his house rules forum? Larry hasn’t posted in that house rules forum in over a year! Who knows, maybe some of these ideas could even find themself in Axis and Allies Advanced?

I thought about having Kursk as a VC in W. Russia instead of Warsaw. The Battle of Kursk was definitely an important one, but it’s a very small city and doesn’t have much importance outside of that historical battle. I know, so then why include Guadalcanal as a VC? Well, we need to have 2 more minor VC on Pacific islands and I want those 2 VCs to drive the US to follow a similar path to the one they actually used in WWII.

As you already know, the decision to include which VCs isn’t just based on history but also has to be based on its implications on game strategy. Having a VC in the Solomons will be good not only historically but also because US is able to take them on turn 1. It’s position creates an interesting dilemma for both Japan and the US in the Pacific early on. That’s why I think Guadalcanal should be a VC. So what about Kursk? If it’s a VC, then Russia will probably end up trading for it. It will probably end up being the VC most traded throughout the game. What will end up happening is the single Battle of Kursk will be fought over and over in the game (not very realistic). Also, I don’t know if it’s a good idea realistically to ever allow Germany to build another infantry per turn that far into the front. Also, I think we need a VC in E. Europe because if we don’t have one then we have a strange unrealistic gap effect where Germany can build 2 in the Ukraine and 1 in Karelia and 5 in Germany but none in between the Germany and the other two. I want the distribution of Germany infantry to be a little more uniform over Europe and the Warsaw VC does that.

This is what I suggest we could do; when we are done with adding in all the other rules we can playtest it and see what the balance is like. If the Axis are too powerful then we can move the Warsaw VC to Kursk. This will weaken the Axis by making it harder for the Axis to have that city at the end of the game.

A good alternative can always be to substitute the Tripoli VC with Kursk. Germany will never be able to put an infantry in Tripoli anyway since it’s not connected to Germany but the city there gives UK a VCP reward for winning the African front. I’m fine with trading Tripoli for Kursk. What do you think? I’m also thinking about trading Anchorage VC for Sao Paulo. Brazil needs to have 1 infantry/turn present on the board IMO. We also need to figure out if the VC in Egypt is going to be Cairo or El Alamein. Cairo because it’s largest city in all of Africa or El Alamein because of it’s historical significance, just like Kursk?

I like your idea about National Victory Conditions. They will be a good addition for the Optional Rules section. Including London for German victory seems like the Germans got it rough, even with their relative awesome strength. We’ll have to run some numbers on it before we come up with the final draft.

To settle the Paris issue between the UK and US you could say that the UK needs to include either Rome or Paris for victory and say the same for the US. That way 1 nation can take 1 of the cities and the other nation can just take the other and both Western Allies aren’t stepping on each other’s toes.

We could look into having a set of different National Minor Victory Conditions as well. Like, Germany controls the Atlantic, or Germany controls all of the Middle East, or Russia controls the Ukraine for 1 full turn, or the UK kicks the Germans out of Africa, or the US controls Hawaii , China and 2 Japanese minor VCs, etc…

[theduke]

I see your point about not going to Victory Territories. Although cities aren’t needed, I think they do provide a nice history lesson for several people and for some reason do make the game more fun.

About the map your designing… can we also make Midway Island run though the border of SZ 57? This will make it so Midway is actually midway across the Pacific and can be used on both Japan and W. US for bombing, thus increasing it’s strategic value. Can we also make Gibraltar run through the border of SZ 12? This will also increase it’s value and allow for us to call that a strait in which Gibraltar control passage through the Med.

What do you think about combining Belo. and W. Russia to be 1 territory? I never liked the strategic implications in the game of those being separate territories. To keep Germany at 40 IPCs we can make the new Belo. territory worth 3 and make the Balkans worth 4. After all, why are the East Indies worth 4?.. becuase of oil! The same should apply for the Balkans.

What do you think about making Karelia worth 3? This would make an IC purchase there cheap enough to be worth considering as well as giving Russia 25 IPCs to start. This would be incentive for Russia to build an rtl in the first round instead of the boring 8 infantry. It would also make the city more important and strengthen Germany since they will have it for most of the game.

There are other changes that I wanted to make to the map too, but they can only be made if we can get sub interdiction to be very effective. I think I’ve made some really good sub interdiction rules that would allow the following changes without giving the Allies too much advantage:
All nations have income that are multiples of 5…
Russia=25 (Add 1 to Karelia)
Germany=40
UK=35 (Add 1 to Australia, 2 to Burma (new territory), 1 to W. Canada and 1 to either Trans-Jondan or Persia… probably Persia)
Japan=30
USA=45 (Add 1 to China, 1 to Greenland and 1 to Mexico)

I know this adds 9 IPCs to the Allies, but sub interdiction should more than balance this out. I feel that these additoins to the following territories need to be made for both realism and strategic purposes.

[Imperious Leader]

To settle the Paris issue between the UK and US you could say that the UK needs to include either Rome or Paris for victory and say the same for the US. That way 1 nation can take 1 of the cities and the other nation can just take the other and both Western Allies aren’t stepping on each other’s toes.

We could look into having a set of different National Minor Victory Conditions as well. Like, Germany controls the Atlantic, or Germany controls all of the Middle East, or Russia controls the Ukraine for 1 full turn, or the UK kicks the Germans out of Africa, or the US controls Hawaii , China and 2 Japanese minor VCs, etc…

1. I think US taking Paris, while UK taking Rome ( which is closer to montys african campaign) fall within each spere of influence. As you know the western allies get half credit on each other when either “takes” the others Victory territory…so if UK takes paris, then USA still can claim 1/2 credit. Now the US player will have to make up a VC points to win… this is what makes ther game fun… because now the allies are kinda fighting for themselves as well as the team. This dynamic was last explored in Fortress America and its really a fun to play and historically accurate way to look at the war. Of course much tinkering may have to occur, but the germ of this idea is awesome IMO.

2. On the second idea on minor VC conditions would make for too short a game. My original intention was to have 3 forms of victory: decisive, substantial, and marginal each with VC set within a 1-2 count range… so for example Japan needs 11 for decisive, 9 for substantial and 7 for marginal.

[theduke]

How about we keep Germany at 40 IPCs starting out by just combining Belo. and W. Russia into Belo. and still make it worth 2 IPCs, but then making the territory of Germany worth 12 IPCs? This might be useful when changing around techs, if we decide to go with my plan for techs. More on this later.

I think the addition of Burma will make it harder for the India and FIC unit placements to effect each other, which is probably good. We can create starting unit placments be such that Japan can fairly easily take Burma on turn 1 to simulate it falling in early 1942. Also, the territory gives me an interesting idea for a Burma road NA.

Maybe we could make US even worth 50 IPCs, instead of 45. The extra 5 could be 4 more for C. US and 1 more for Panama. Depending on how good sub interdiction is we’ll decide later if we can make US that strong and have it balance out.

What is your impression so far on all the map changes I proposed in the last 2 posts?

[theduke]

I just wanted to add something else about my idea of fighters in combat needing to count the combat as 1 move… Now it makes it a lot harder for Germany to take Egypt in G1. Fighters can’t be used on G1 in Egypt, making the African front even better for UK and thus more realistic. I never liked how Egypt was taken before UK could even strategize what to do there on their first turn.

Don’t worry, the idea of Germany not doing well in Africa shouldn’t cause balance issues once we come up with some other rules that will make the Axis much stronger.

[Imperious Leader]

About the map your designing… can we also make Midway Island run though the border of SZ 57? This will make it so Midway is actually midway across the Pacific and can be used on both Japan and W. US for bombing, thus increasing it’s strategic value. Can we also make Gibraltar run through the border of SZ 12? This will also increase it’s value and allow for us to call that a strait in which Gibraltar control passage through the Med.

The map is allready made… i can easily make any changes…On the idea about Midway. i dont think its a good idea to change the map other than add some additional VC of a different color. the map should be offered to promote the project, but also to give people who play regular revised a larger map. The additional colored VC can be easily ignored, but its really hard to ignore the fact that WE changed the location of Midway… Also, from a historical basis it was not possible for any planes to take off from this point and bomb say japan. A closer island should be used… and their are other canidates for this… I would be strongly in favor not to “move” any territories, but more inclined to add say a few islands ( in a different shade) so its easy to know whether they are from the basic game or the varient. Ill look at the map closely and get back with you.

also changing the values is along the same lines as above…

However… their is another way… If you would permit a second map to be commissioned but including Italy and all the additional map changes you wanted… I would be very willing to do this… possibly it could be what “phase II” would entail including convoy boxes etc… you like?

What do you think about combining Belo. and W. Russia to be 1 territory? I never liked the strategic implications in the game of those being separate territories. To keep Germany at 40 IPCs we can make the new Belo. territory worth 3 and make the Balkans worth 4. After all, why are the East Indies worth 4?.. becuase of oil! The same should apply for the Balkans.

This again would be great on the Phase II map project. I also want the concept of oil to be the focus on both axis and to some extent the Soviets and UK. The ideas from axis and allies europe are a good starting point for this…

What do you think about making Karelia worth 3? This would make an IC purchase there cheap enough to be worth considering as well as giving Russia 25 IPCs to start. This would be incentive for Russia to build an rtl in the first round instead of the boring 8 infantry. It would also make the city more important and strengthen Germany since they will have it for most of the game.

There are other changes that I wanted to make to the map too, but they can only be made if we can get sub interdiction to be very effective. I think I’ve made some really good sub interdiction rules that would allow the following changes without giving the Allies too much advantage:
All nations have income that are multiples of 5…
Russia=25 (Add 1 to Karelia)
Germany=40

UK=35 (Add 1 to Australia, 2 to Burma (new territory), 1 to W. Canada and 1 to either Trans-Jondan or Persia… probably Persia)
Japan=30
USA=45 (Add 1 to China, 1 to Greenland and 1 to Mexico)

---

On this idea i was wondering why the change needs to reflect this 5 IPC thing… is it to reflect only the new values of your proposed territories or is their some other mechanism at work? Or is it some aesthitic thing with numbers being rounded up or down?

Again i think this idea is phase II material, and if it falls in this catagory Italy should be included as the 6th player alsong with the additional territories, neutrals, etc. right>?

[theduke]

IMO the mult. of 5 IPC thing is just for simplicity in the begininning so fewer bills are needed and they are easier values to remember for players that don’t play very often. It’s not a big deal but it’s one of those things that just makes the game slightly less intimidating for newbies, etc… Why have Russia start out at 24 when they can just start with 25? Russia was stronger historically than they are represented in the game anyway. Same with the US.

There is only one problem I have with postponing these changes to the starting incomes. I think I can come up with a set of interdiction rules that I think balances out the game from the super high Allied economy of 25+35+50=105 or a set of rules to counter a lesser Allied economy of 24+30+42=96, but not both at the same time. If we have phase 1 with the same IPC values (96)then we’ll have to hold off on sub interdiction until phase 2 as well since they have to be introduced together for balance purposes.

Should we have phase 1 without interdiction and without realistic Allied economy and without a new map? That might work out OK for balance purposes if we can come up with a few more additional rules to improve the Axis’ chances. Should we shoot for that?

I know Midway is too far to realistically bomb either IC, but since it can already be used to bomb W. US in the game, it should also be able to bomb Japan in the game. We could change the rules for movement so neither can be bombed, but I don’t know how to do that since it’s the same distance in the game from UK to Germany. If we reduce bomber movement so bombers can’t go from Midway to W. US and back again then the UK/US bombers also won’t be able to bomb Germany. I say just let bombers move 6 so bombers can do the Midway bombing run and call it only a minor sacrifice of realism for the greater good of simplicity.

[Imperious Leader]

Should we have phase 1 without interdiction and without realistic Allied economy and without a new map?

This can be accomplished with the revised map ( e.g interdiction with the idea of placing an undisclosed Lend lease amount as the tranny moves to Archangel, or Persia. The lend lease payment is written as follows: SZ 19 tranny = 5 Lend lease points for russia, or SZ 10 tranny has 10 Lend lease points for UK. The german player has no knowledge of what is coming over, so hell make an effort to attack whatever comes over. Phase II can include actual convoy boxes and further extentions of this.

[theduke]

What do you think of the ‘fighter combat=1 fighter move’ rule and the ‘fighters on carriers have to land on carriers’ rule?

There are a lot of different ways to incorporate interdiction. Let’s settle on all the other rules we’ll use for phase 1 and then come up with a set of interdiction rules that will balance up the game. What other rules are there?
-defender retreats?
-techs?
-NAs?
-strategic bombing?
is there anything else that we need for phase 1? I don’t think we need much else but I want to hear your thoughts.

[Imperious Leader]

Well  i have allways advocated fixing the carrier based fighters vs. land based… Ill post additional ideas tonight.

[theduke]

I went back the the first post of this topic and changed Tripoli to Kursk and Baghdad to Damascus and Anchorage to Sao Paulo. I still don’t know what I’m going to do about a minor VC in western China even though for game purposes there needs to be 1. When we make the new map in phase 2 we can make another territory so there are 3 green (US occupied) territories in China instead of 2. This will allow China to hold out better, prolong the Chinese/Japanese War, allow US to start out with more IPCs (I’m hoping to get them around 55-60 IPCs total), and make it so theminor city doesn’t have to be in Sinkiang.

This is going to be a lot harder making a set of rules to go with the old AAR map and then another set of rules for phase 2 to keep the game just as balanced.

[Imperious Leader]

I like the idea of more china territories along with certain rules… Limited attacks against china… say one per turn or requiring Japan to garrison them or China gets a free Infantry?  Id say making 2 more territories in china, Also possibly cut France into 2 spaces. Germany as well …west and east

[theduke]

I haven’t given much thought to adding new territories in Europe since bad things might happen if you’re not careful with the territory positions. For example, if the Western Allies can amphibious assault in either the low countries or France then that means Germany has worry about defending both those territories instead of just placing units in the one territory of W. Europe. More territories can make it really hard for Germany and Germany already has it tough defending just W. Europe. We can talk about this more after we settle the other issues.

I don’t think we’ll need special rules helping China out. The 3 inf per turn US can put there should be enough.

[theduke]

What do you think of the fighter ideas from before?

I’m also thinking of changing around the starting IPC values to the following for phase 2 (or phase 3?):
(Based on GDP paper from Mark Harrison so 1 IPC equals approx. 10 billion 1990 International Dollars)

Russia=25 (see above posts)
Germany=45 (IPC distribution of territories decided later)
UK=35 (see above posts)
Japan=20 (FIC, Kwang. and Manchuria only worth 2 each, E. Indies and Philippines only worth 2 each, Borneo worth 1 and Okinawa worth 0)
US=as high as I can get it… probably end up around 60 since I can’t get it around 120 IPCs
Italy=15 (Italy worth 10, Greece/Albania worth 3, Algeria and Libya worth 1 each) … problem with Italy though. Italy can’t have 7 VCs! I don’t even like Italy as capital VC because only 3 inf/per turn should be in Italy. Italy would mean all nations can’t start with 7 VCs. I don’t think Italy can be added for the good of the game. Maybe make Italy as some kind of weird NA for Germany or just some kind of weird optional rule. Maybe make all other map modifications and include Italy in phase 3?

*1 IPC would then equal approx. 10 billion 1990 International Dollars

[Imperious Leader]

I have this book coming in about 2-5 days… I ordered it from amazon about 2 weeks ago. I used Adlertags post to figure out some IP numbers… but id like to get the book just to make sure the figures are correct. THe rule i want for was divide numbers by 6. which gives UK 45 IP and Germany 65 in 1939… I will quickly read the boom and post everything for you. Lets postpone this question till then.  In the mean time naval, air and land combat for phase 1 and 2.

In general naval combat with surface ships is seperate from sub combat, air combat with either naval or land should be seperate if other defending planes are in the battle. Once one side loses planes then air attacks on naval/ land should be pretty devistating. Land forces should not be able to hit planes, and ships should have lower values against planes. Some planes should not be able to attack subs w/o a destroyer ( ASW) > I think artillery should get one “barrage” attack on the first round. Also on sea i think BB should get a preemtive strike each round. IN general i think navy should go down in price.

[theduke]

Wouldn’t the IPC values reflect 1942, not 1939?

I think it’s OK to allow ground troops to hit planes once all other units are killed, like it is in the box rules. I don’t think we need to introduce new rules that say, for example, fighters have to bug out once all their supporting ground troops are killed. If the fighters didn’t have to ever retreat and couldn’t get hit then they would just stay and slowly pick off the enemy ground units without penalty.