Minor Threat's Alpha+3.9 (Global 1940) COMPLETE! Setup Charts

@panther Oh, sorry I misunderstood you. It was just my error. I didn’t know about or see that category. Again, I’m sorry.

Hi ltparrot73

In the customizations forum are heaps of community made files.

For instance see https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=39696.0

10 to 14 hours.

Alpha 3 is an evolution of what originally started as a setup change to address imbalances in the Pac1940 game.

The original setup change addressed Pac 40 only, and was called Alpha, and was meant to be used in Pac alone as well as Global.  Imbalances noted in Global began to influence the alpha revisions, going from Alpha, Alpha +, Alpha + 2, etc.  As these changes were made to address global, there was still a desire to use these modifications for the theater specific games, but this was not a playtesting priority (most people has transitioned to Global only as their primary game - alpha began before Europe 1940 was released).  As the theater games became less of a playtesting priority, the national objectives were revised, and this is probably the primary driver of theater imbalances at this point (particularly US objectives in the pacific theater & Russian objectives in Europe theater).

I would recommend using the Alpha 3 setup and rule changes.  I would recommend using OOB national objectives until official objectives that apply to the theater games are released.  Alternatively, use national objectives from Alpha 3 for all countries but US (use OOB for those) in theater specific games.

The one hanging option that’s been noted many times for the Europe theater is that the Siberian reinforcements should be abandoned and instead Russia ALWAYS collects 9 additional IPCs each turn that represent the eastern provinces not shown in the Europe theater.

@Frontovik:

@JeffM:

@Young:

In hind sight, do you think the UK should have attacked the Italians fleet in the same manner, or would you attack the Destroyer and Transport with an all out amphibious assault on Libya or Tobruk?. That way, you could get odds and scramble planes from Malta in a defense effort during an Italy 1 attack.

Yes, I think that moving everything to Malta and then launching an amphibious assault on Torbruk would be the best bet.  I think that you either need to put the UK Alexandria/ Egypt forces on the offensive right away or have them fall back… otherwise, I see them getting destroyed on I2 unless you sacrifice the UK fleet and block SZ 98.

If you attacked Tobruk, you could pick up the Inf and Art from Egypt, have the mech (in Egypt) move through Alexandria, and have all of the ground forces in Alexandria join the fight, you would have:

UK:  3 INF, 2 ART, 1 Tank, 1 Tac Bomber, 1 Fighter (if you bring the one from Malta)

Italy:  3 INF, 1 ART, 1 Mech, 1 Tank

can’t italy ravish the british navy then, killing remaining brits in africa later through landings on tobruk, egypt and moving out of uncaptured ethiopia (to iraq?) ?

Yes, but the English can rebuild them very fast while the Italians cannot.

No.  The only way an Allied power other than UK or ANZAC can gain control of them is to recapture them from the Axis.

@Pelanderfunk:

I don’t know what the official name is, but I looked around the internet for a long time before I broke down and made my own.  You can get “croupier sticks”, which are what the croupier uses to collect the dice in craps, but it doesn’t really have that “war room” feel to it.

I just bought some wooden dowels and balsa strips from a craft store, then I cut the strips into rectangles and wood-glued them to the ends of the dowels.

Yeah I was thinking of doing the same.

SHARED THIS ON LARRY’S SITE ALREADY, JUST WANTED TO SHARE THOUGHTS HERE ALSO:

Ok Larry,

Me and an official playtester of yours here in Michigan (his name is mentioned in the rulebook for Europe 40) played Global with the new setup given with all the aircraft taken away and such. Here was a short summary of what happened:

On the Europe side:

Germany played pretty predictably, sinking most of the UK navy, taking France and the Eastern European pro-allied and pro-axis neutrals with Italy. They continued to build on their air force to keep the UK from building ships right away. Began to stack some ground units as well. Italy expanded into Africa and shored the Middle East slowly controlling the Med.

UK responded by NOT attcking the Italian navy and pulling back the rest of the navy it had left until it could come back to England with a strong navy that included the US. UK took the Pro-allied Brazil and shucked the troops to Africa to help the SAfrican force which slowly pushed the Italians back up to Egypt turning the tide in Africa.

Russia stedily built a force consisting of infantry spiced with some tanks, artillery, tacs and mechs. Stacking behind some dead zones and waiting for the declaration of war.

US spent about 70-80% of its cash in the Pacific since it could not even approach Africa/Europe before a state of war.

Now for the Pacific side:

India with little cash built mostly infantry and stacked. Combined navy near India and activated the Persian troops to bring back and help defend India. In Global, India has a little more help from some extra troops west and a few ships, including one French destroyer to help defend. Also, it can fall back with its stack to West India if needed.

ANZAC naval base is much needed and I am glad it is there- balances nicely.

China was stonger, but does what it normally does and stacks at Yunnan to wait to wear down Japs. China units are really used as a delaying tactic for the India crush.

Japan didn’t see an advantage to the India crush in J1 but felt that the initiative came to them in J2. They didn’t want to wait until J3 because they felt the Allies would have established a long-term defense of India. So with that the Japs declared war on J2 taking back the Dutch East Indies and unleashing the fury. Japan built transports J1 and J2 and built more planes to replace the ones missing from the new setup in J2.

Now even though both Japs and Allies have the same amount of planes removed, Japan can build them faster and move them closer to the action (India). US could also build their planes back but it takes them longer to get them to the battle scene (India). Brit India and ANZAC can’t build much of an airforce because of the typhoon of Jap units coming fast, so India stacks and ANZAC tries to distract and/or try to send some units.

Japan can make the US wait longer to send ships and planes down to ANZAC by using its navy as a shield. I as Allies, I made tactical blunder ruining my chance to meet the Jap onslaught of India from behind through Australia. However, if not for this the setup seems very balanced and gave some options to both sides.

A hot topic question will be “what to do with the Russian inf on the Pacific side??”
It is very frustrating for the Russians, if you attack immediately, Japan will bring the heat to wipe them out with now China and Russia give large concessions to Japan $$$. If you stack and sit. Japan has to garrison Manchu with a small force but continues to spearhead to India. I figure as the Russians, you have to attack with the 18 inf at some point. The hard part is when. Timing is everything in this decision.

With US entering the war at turn 2, the US began to throw a good amount of cash to the European side, mainly because of the blunder in the Pacific- India would not last long now- 2-3 more rounds. I recovered nicely putting pressure on the French coast quickly until I made another tactical error involving Gibraltar- arrggh!!!- new rules and new map takes a little while getting used to.  :-(

Besides these 2 blunders, I thought the Global game was pretty fair and balanced with a slight edge to the Allies. I definitely think the Allies are a little easier to play because that sides is spilt into 6 sub parts (countries) that are easy to prepare while you are waiting for the Axis to finish. The Axis with so many more units in the beginning, take longer and you have to be very efficient both in the short-term and the long-term planning.

Anyway that was are anaylsis so I hope it helps.  :-)