Re: Field Marshal Games Pieces Project Discussion thread

@CrazyIvan TYVM for your input…

Part Five:

Errata & Optional Rules: Discussion

Upon reviewing the rules a bit, naturally the ones that stick out and cause problems are the ones that don’t pertain to RISK’s core combat mechanics.

Indonesia

Let’s say the USSR attacks the Arab League: Indonesia is supposed to stay neutral in this case, but can NATO still influence them, somehow? Does WE have to be the one to do it, or could it be UK? The ‘quick and dirty’ solution would just be to reverse the rule treating Indonesia as a separate entity, and say that the territory sides with NATO, if the Arab League is attacked by the USSR. Since they are aligned with WE, their troops should be replaced with WE (blue) troops, if/when this happens.

An obvious optional rule in this situation might be that Arab League territories join WE but Indonesia joins the UK; chalk this up to representing Singapore, Malaya, etc. or just with the continent of Australia being aligned with UK, in this game.

The alternate solution is to clarify the rule to be “an attack on Indonesia is not treated as an attack on the Arab League, but an attack on the Arab League DOES count as an attack on Indonesia.” I think this probably most closely reflects the intention of the mechanics.

Possibly a better (albeit more complicated) solution would be to allow NATO to use their influence roll towards their affiliated neutral alliance OR towards Indonesia. If they successfully influence Indonesia, they would replace Indonesia’s troops with their own. This treats Indonesia more like a “minor neutral” such as they would be in E&W; the reason I don’t like this is that it creates a new set of rules around a single territory, instead of just conforming to the existing/general rules.

Since the USSR has the option to ATTACK Indonesia, they can always gain the territory that way; this rule would simply address the fact that NATO does not have such a mechanism to gain the territory.

Influence

Since the opening-game balance is presupposed around the OAS being at +1 to US and China being at +1 to the USSR, the obvious optional rule to include would be one not allowing diplomacy until the 2nd round of play. This would reflect the mechanical realities in E&W, of everybody starting the game with no spies in play (barring the USSR spending their “round zero” mobilization cash on spies.)

The rule limiting NATO to influencing only their affiliated neutral could also be changed… Although it might have to be limited to “once you’re already receiving +2 from them” to prevent dogpiling.
The intention of the limitation is to keep the game simple and fast; it’s also meant to avoid some of the pitfalls of E&W’s system, whereby there’s really only one correct choice, so just hammer that option as early and often as possible.

Nukes vs. Capitols

An interesting thing with the mechanic of nuclear weapons being added to a RISK game, is that it creates the possibility of a territory being cleared of armies. Since armies are used to denote territory ownership (serving the function performed by control markers, in A&A-type games) it stands to reason that a territory with no armies on it is controlled by no one. But what if the territory has a capitol on it?

This is an interesting thing, because the existence of a capitol implies ownership of the territory, corresponding to a specific faction, without there being troops in the territory (i.e. which would be the normal way to denote ownership of the territory.)

Obviously, a territory with a city but no armies is not controlled by anyone; this makes targeting cities with nukes more appealing, since it doubles the loss in “income” – similar to how targeting Industrial Complexes with nukes in E&W effectively doubles the reduction in infantry production, on that territory.

So the questions seem to be:

Can you place troops on your capitol, if there are currently no troops there? Do you get credit for “controlling” your capitol, if there are no troops in its territory? Does your capitol allow you to get credit for “controlling” the territory it resides in (including the bonus for a city)?

I think my answers to these would be: yes, maybe, and no (respectively.)

If a nuke wipes all of the armies off of a territory without a capitol, my general assumption was that this works the same as if a nuke in E&W reduced the IPC value of the territory to zero – meaning it cannot produce any infantry. The question then is, do capitols provide some immunity to this? Does not providing this immunity make nuking capitols (exclusively) too powerful in the overall meta? Again, these would have to be born out with more playtesting.

@Freddy:

Hey Tigerman,
I don’t think the scope of the game has to be any bigger than D-Day. I just want something that has a more tactical aspect, but still A&A. I felt BOTB got a little too “Not A&A.” I don’t want to learn a whole new game! Thanks, I would totally buy a Historical Board Gaming Theatre game!
Freddy

I agree BotB didn’t seem A&A much at all

I just went and bought 5 or 6 boxes of each set so that I’d have enough units to use all the same pose.

The unit sculpts are far superior to what is in the games.

Plus with the variety that are in each box I was able to use different sculpts for the different units.  ie. Infantry, heavy Inf., Marines, Paratroopers, Engineers, Alpine, Snipers.

@Gargantua:

Or an American invasion map. The UK and Russia both lost to the axis powers. While fighting some smaller battles in Africa and the middle east, they now focus on taking over the Americas. With the only ally to be Argentina on the Americas mainland, they now face a coalition of the remaining American powers with the United States, Canada and Brazil as the most important ones.

COOL

A what if the Americans stayed out of the war, and the axis won scenario.

I like it.

It can even include a tech race for the bomb.

Sounds like Fortress America in 1940s

@knp7765:

Hey 12doze12,
Here is a little sample pic I took when I first made some of these roundels.  I was using the smaller image roundels at the time.

Those look really good in the map but they are a bit weird compared to the other nation roundels maybe because of the color

Ok, it would be cool to see them on the board.