I’ve been setting up for two basic trials. One with regular Canzac (Canada + Anzac) and one with South Africa included in the Commonwealth.
I find that when using the 1st ed Pac map combined for Global then I prefer the former (using the Butternut Canadians purely for aesthetic definition) because the Canadian roundels are already in place. Like Knp I dont like seperating them off, because I think global has too many factions already. When using the 2nd ed maps I am already chipping out all of Canada with Anzac roundels anyway, so 2 down in South Africa and S.W. Africa doesn’t seem too difficult.
I’ll admit to a preference for cleaner starting numbers. 35 seems cleaner than 38, and 20 seems cleaner than 17. Purely from the standpoint of starting cash hand! haha. But it’s harder to say which is best stragically for balance. Canzac SA seems better for spamming ground, but UK SA seems better from a naval and transport launch perspective.
My buddy and I are also quite fond of replacing all units to match the roundel (whatever the territory spread chosen), so we are definitely considering the possibilities of French units in England changing to Brit, and Anzac in Malaya and Egypt changing to Brit. We both find Co-Located starting units annoying as it is requires more space with multinationals co-locating at the outset. That’s an optional aside, but might be helpful for UK balance if needed.
Still under consideration for us is whether to replace ships in adjacent sea zones for Canzac, or to leave the ships UK.
My main interest in g40 is also to find a way to play Halifax without NOs, (or using only generic objectives), which may play a factor in whether we end up deciding to go Canzac or UK for South Africa.
Just at a glance spamming Canzac infantry in SA in the first round looks like it could be rather effective in locking down the continent in subsequent rounds. I do rather agree with Roc that when SA is an option then production in Canada itself becomes somewhat irrelevant. Not sure whether I like this or not though. Sure it helps Allies control Africa, but it kind of makes commonwealth more of a one trick deal.
We are also considering other tweaks to the standard Halifax, such as retaining a Capital in Sydney to see if it can function as a bait for Japan, and incentive for US Pacific engagement.
In its most basic form we read the Halifax set up as a
Unified UK/UK pacific with 3 tiered Industrial Complexes (at the values outlined in this thread)… But with the final part of the set up, which specific territories to make Commonwealth, we are leaving things open to interpretation.
Canzac or AfriCanzac? :-D
Seems like an open question still.
I favor Canzac for Simplicity, but I’m intrigued by the potential of that 3rd front too. As of now I lean toward regular Canzac just for ease of set up and to see if they can work in the Atlantic (or if the money just always gets dumped in the Pac.) I suspect that UK in SA will be our first trials, but if we go AfriCanzac and it doesn’t bust the set up to hard, might check it out in our next game with battle bonus and VC bonus instead of NO to see how that effects things. Our general rule for VCs gives a +5 at collect income for control, which has the potential to make Canzac more effective Atlantic since they could get up to 10 extra instead of 5 for the standard NO. I’m hopefully we might strike a good balance with the VC bonus since I’ve long hoped for a game on this map without the need for National Objectives, but that remains to be seen. Still whatever the spread ends up being I already know I prefer it to OOB, just for the production and UK stuff!
Also another aside but Midway is playing on my TV right now, and CWO Marcs call on the war room was dead on (whichever thread he mentioned that in) makes me hungry for battle in the pacific. Canzac Pacific game with or without SA will surely be improved by these rules and that excites me as much as the Atlantic and African prospects.
Should be fun!
