Poll: The Most Important Naval/Air Starting Pieces

Thanks for the fast reply! I just want to ask, what version are these rules for? I could have sworn I have the Spring: 1942 (not the 2nd edition), but the rules in my book say on page 8:
“Sea zones are either friendly (contain friendly units) or hostile (contain enemy units). They are never neutral. An unoccupied sea zone is friendly to everyone.”
It then goes on to talk about neutral territories… It makes no reference to “surface warships…” Am I asking my question in the wrong version of the game? Is this the Spring: 1942 2nd edition?
Thanks so much!  :-D

EDIT: I just looked up on amazon, and by process of what the box looks like deduced that the version of the game we have is A&A Revised Edition… So I will post my question there instead. Thanks so much anyway!!

@Granada:

@special:

Edit: that’s an odd situation, and a lot of American IC’s…

Well, the fact it is an odd situation made me to start this discussion.  :wink:

I have built all these ICs making myself ready for a long fight, and being able to produce units where I really need them. I think I had a good chance to develop a real pressure on FIC/japan, but as we left it I have not really checked.

Well, odd or not, it is indeed a good base to work from. Within reach of many targets, able to build alot fast. And plenty of subs to avoid Axis naval builds.

In this situation (and even more after u took Africa), controlling the seas means winning the game (in the long run)

@jiman79:

Even with a decent R1 west russia battle, you can pretty much stack Karelia every time, unless USSR also buys 3 arm. Do you consider 3inf 3 arm as the superior R1 buy?

Yup. Another one I’ve seen and tried is 4 arm, 1 art. That one really makes Germany think twice about moving stacks forward (or buying planes on G1) :)

@DougR:

Another difference: the lower cost of bombers combined with the defenseless transports. If Allies go KFG then Japan should buy 1 bomber each turn and send it to Europe in two turns (using conquered Egypt or Trans-Jordan). A large japanese airforce in Europe can make it really hard for the Allies, because Japan plays between UK and US and can take advantage of any openings left after the UK fleet has moved.

You know, I had to laugh at this.  I had posted the subject of limits on cooperation b/w the Western Allies and Russia.  Being the history nerd that I am, it never would have occurred to me to send Japanese bombers to Germany (and now that I know, I still couldn’t get myself to do it)!

Historically it might make no sense for this to happen (although there were examples of German/Italian subs/surface raiders operating on the Pacific and Indian oceans) but the game isn’t meant to be a faithful representation of WW2 (if so the starting production levels would be grossly unbalanced towards the Alllies).

You may choose to play it so and create your own house rules to approximate it as close to reality as possible but with out of the box rules there’s nothing to stop you or your opponents to do so.

Yes.  However, in this particular example there would be no need for them to do so, since with the bomber unable to hit them any longer the battle would be effectively over.

good deal, that’s the way we played it, but the way the printing actually worked out overlapping it coulda helped the German defense of the Med, as would have that UK sz3 thing to protect Karelia.
thanks Krieg.

Please don’t misunderstand me, I think the no promotion, no hype approach is at minimum myopic. I’m just speculating about why they might be taking the approach at all.

Somone mentioned to me why the big glut of game fairs quickly died back to just Origins and Gen Con was that the game companies were expending serious coin to reach very few new eye balls.

It just seems to me that would apply here to a degree. The return on investment of marketing A&A board games does not, in the company’s opinion, warrant the exercise. I see no other rationale for not marketing the games more strongly.