New Custom Map Project

Another thing to think about while redistributing the territory values is to make the VC worth more. You could strike a good balance, and eliminate some of the NO’s that are awarded for taking them. Add 2-3 IPCs to each VC and you probably don’t need to list half of the German and Japanese NO’s.

Thanks for the input GeneralHandGrenade and Wild Bill.  As I mentioned, the tables which I posted above are primarily meant to stimulate discussion.  I designed them mainly by looking at the Global 1940 map rather than at the Global 1940 rules – so at best they may need adjustments to adapt them to actual play considerations, and at worst they may prove to be either unworkable (mechanically) or tough to sell (which is a point that was mentioned by Wild Bill).  Which is fine; I developed the tables because I knew that this little project would be a fun problem-solving exercise, which it did indeed turn out to be.  If the results are in any way useful to A&A players, either as they are or in modified forms, then all the better.

Regarding the shift of Soviet IPCs to the European side of the game map, there seems to be some overlap between the comments from GHG and Bill.  If I understand the comments correctly, both GHG and Bill feel that putting too many of the redeployed IPCs into Soviet territories which are open to rapid capture by Germany would work too much for Germany and against the USSR.  Their proposed solution, as I understand it, would be to keep some of those redeployed IPCs in Russia/Moscow and in a couple of other places mentioned in the original table, but to put the others to the east of Moscow (though still to the west of the 0-IPC north-south barrier formed by Urals, Novosibirsk and Kazakhstan).  There would actually be a historical justification for this, given that the Soviets moved many of their factories eastward to put them out of German reach.  On the Global 1940 map, Nenetsia, Vologda and Samara are well positoned to fulfill that function.  Archangel could also be thrown in for good measure; as I recall, it was a busy port city during WWII.

Bill’s paragraph about China brings up an interesting possibility.  The tables as originally designed use the IPC-redeployment method exclusively for the Soviet Union and the dual-value 1/0 IPC method exclusively for China, but Bill’s paragraph indicates that a blended approach might be better.  The two techniques could certainly be blended.  In the Soviet Union’s case, some of the territories between Moscow and the Pacific Ocean could be given a dual value of 1/0 (rather that their existing value of 1 or the value of 0 proposed in the tables); that would be quite easy to do.

China is a more tricky case because it has fewer territories to play with than the USSR, and its territory configuration is awkward.  One of the things that surprised me when I started studying the map for the project was to see that China (as configured on the game map) offers Japan a faster route to Moscow that the eastern Soviet Union does: a 6-territory route as opposed to an 8-territory route.  Keeping all of the China-controlled Chinese territories at 1 IPC provides no deterrent to Japan.  Dropping all of them to 0 IPC is an effective deterrent to Japan, but it robs China of its income.  Dropping some of them to 0 and redeploying those IPCs to other Chinese territories is (I think) problematic for the same reason that GHG and Bill cited in relation to the USSR: given that China is so cramped, those redeployed IPCs have few places to go, and those places are potentially open to rapid capture by Japan.  But I’d certainly be happy to see a proposal for an alternate table that would resolve this problem.

What about expanding South America so that it can become a viable theater of war? It feels like so much of that part of the map is wasted.

Perhaps more segmentation in IndoChina and the CBI theatre? I always feel that the fight in that area goes too quickly.

I don’t like how the latest HBG map deals with North Africa. I think there needs to be a separate Tripoli half-circle. However, I think the A&A Global 1940 map deals with North Africa fairly well overall.

I think that the Japanese path through China being shorter is because when they were developing the map they expected more Chinese resistance, but then they gave the Japanese over 20 planes (closer to 30 planes in the original).

Part of the problem is that historically there were many natural barriers (mountains and deserts) that aren’t represented in the game. The mountain ranges along the Chinese/Russian border would have made invading Russia through China nearly impossible even if they did roll over the Chinese. Besides being a long and treacherous route, it would have been pretty predictable and easier to defend the mountain passes.

I’m not advocating for an impassible Chinese back door, but I would like to see the impassible Himalayas extended along the Chinese/Kazakhstan border. This would make defending Russia easier IMO forcing the Japanese to go between the new Kaz Mt range and Mongolia. It would also take the Japanese an extra turn to get to Stalingrad too (Kaz is a big territory).  An impassable Ural Mt range has also been discussed for the same purpose (fewer territories to defend along Russia’s back side) .

If you were to introduce more terrain then you could also make some territories mountainous, but passable. Mountain territories could offer better defense (+1 to defending inf?), can’t blitz a Mt territory and mech/tanks can’t NCM 2 spaces through a mountain territory etc…some of the Russian Pac territories could be mountainous to slow down a Japanese mechanized force, or set up Russian inf to defend better.

@Black_Elk:

I think there are a number of ways we could approach the Russian backdoor problem, but my gripe with the IPC system at large, is more foundational. I would like to see a situation where we can use them as generic “carrots” to encourage historical play patterns, without having to worry about how that connects (or fails to connect) to things like natural resources or population or whatever.

I wonder if this concept could be expressed by the simple expedient of having “IPC” stand for “Income and Progress Credit” rather than “Industrial Production Certificate” or “Industrial Production Credit.”  “Income and Progress Credit” would convey the idea that IPCs represent a combination of two things: actual income (meaning the economic value of the territories which a player owns), plus credits awarded for the more abstract notion of “progress made by the player in the accomplishment of strategically valuable tasks” (a notion already built into the rules that give a player IPCs for achieving certain national objectives).

For G40 2nd edition game for China I would go with  :

Szechwan - 1 icp
Yunnan -     1 icp
Hunan -      1 icp
Kwangsi     1 icp  Japan gives back to China.

Keep Szechwan for Burma road. If Burma road is open China gets 1 art per turn.
China will also receive 3 inf per turn per owning the 3 other territories.

If Burma road closes, they can not build art.

For each territory China loses of the 3, their build reduces 1 inf for every territory they lose.

Let’s say China has all 4 territories end of turn 1. Their build would be 3 inf and 1 art.
China has Burma road still but lost Kwangsi, then they would get to build 2 inf and 1 art for turn 2.

In my other G40 game (Deaths Map )  I have Hong Kong with own territory so I will give 1 icp for Kwangtung and use the same rules as above.

Also will put in CWO’s other Russia (+6) and Island (Allies +8 Japan +6 ) suggestions too.

@CWO:

@Black_Elk:

I think there are a number of ways we could approach the Russian backdoor problem, but my gripe with the IPC system at large, is more foundational. I would like to see a situation where we can use them as generic “carrots” to encourage historical play patterns, without having to worry about how that connects (or fails to connect) to things like natural resources or population or whatever.

I wonder if this concept could be expressed by the simple expedient of having “IPC” stand for “Income and Progress Credit” rather than “Industrial Production Certificate” or “Industrial Production Credit.”  “Income and Progress Credit” would convey the idea that IPCs represent a combination of two things: actual income (meaning the economic value of the territories which a player owns), plus credits awarded for the more abstract notion of “progress made by the player in the accomplishment of strategically valuable tasks” (a notion already built into the rules that give a player IPCs for achieving certain national objectives).

Yes! Absolutely!

I have been searching for a suitably generic reworking of that acronym. Tried a few other formulations, but nothing that fits quite that well.

“Income and Progress Credit” it is! IPC

I’ve been having some discussions with SS by personal message about his above proposal, to revise and expand upon certain points.  Here’s my understanding of the basic points for his revised China proposals, with a few additonal suggestions from me thrown in.  I focused just on a few basic points about China, leaving out some other sections of the proposal from SS (like the part about the Burma Road).  I didn’t leave them out because I’m against them, I just left them out because I’m undecided about whether they are desirable or not, and because they’re outside the scope of the issue that I was originally focussing on, which was the whole road-to-Moscow-via-China issue.

Without going into all the details, SS and I concured on taking out the sentence from his original proposal that says “For each territory China loses of the 3, their build reduces 1 inf for every territory they lose.”  The new concept is that China receives 4 free infantry at every round of play (representing the equivalent of 12 IPC) pretty much regardless of what its occupation situation on the map is.  Otherwise, China would easily have its income (or income equivalent) demolished: most of its territories are worth 0 in the proposal from SS, and the four that are worth 1 are too easily open to Japanese capture.

I said “pretty much regardless” rather than “regardless” because I’m proposing one revision to the new concept: the condition that China must hold at least 1 Chinese territory somewhere on the map to get its four free 4 infantry per round.  There are two reasons for this.  First, the Chinese infantry sculpts have to go somewhere (in terms of unit placement).  Second, this gives Japan an incentive to try to conquer all of China; without such an incentive, Japan would have no reason to invest the required resources to attempt it.

One element I’ve added is an attempted rationalization for China getting free infantry even when it holds no territories; the concept of China getting free infantry is fine to me, but I just wanted to provide a plausible explanation for it rather than these troops just appearing out of thin air.

The components of the proposal are therefore:

• All the original Chinese territories in Global 1940 which start out the game occupied by Japan keep the IPC value stated for them on the map.

• All the original Chinese territories in Global 1940 which start out the game occupied by Japan remain that way, except for Kwangsi, which becomes a Chinese-held territory.

• The Chinese-held territories of Szechwan, Yunnan, Hunan and Kwangsi retain their IPC value of 1.  All other territories which are Chinese-held at the start of the game have a revised IPC value of 0.

• As long as China holds a minimum of 1 Chinese territory anywhere on the map, China receives 4 free infantry at every round of play.  These represent soldiers who are recruited from China’s vast population reserves.

I assume having Kwangsi starting as a Chinese held territory has authentic flavor so that’s ok in my book. I will say that it changes some of the Japanese strats though because Kwangsi is often a J1 landing spot for the Japanese airforce. They would still be able to take it J1, and build AB/NB J2 for a possible J3 hit on India though.

I like reducing most of the Chinese territories to 0 with exception of the 3 territories you have listed (plus Kwangsi) taking 9 IPCs out of China. I’m ok with the Chinese getting 4 inf per turn instead of holding IPCs and buying units (more of an AA50 theme). I would however have it be that China receives 1 inf per territory they hold up to 4 inf max per turn (these would be the territories that the Chinese start the game with). If they fall to 3 territories they get 3 inf, 2 ter-2 inf, 1 ter-1inf, 0 ter-no inf. I would also give China 1 free inf for every Chinese territory liberated from Japan that China holds when it’s turn starts (Chinese territory occupied by Japan at the start of the game).  This is a bit more in line to China’s buying abilities in G40 IMO.

To simulate the Burma road bonus:

If the Burma Road is open at the end of China’s turn they get one free inf to place with the rest of thier units (they would normally get 6 IPC’). So if the Burma road is open, or they open it on their turn China could potentially get 5 units to mobilize depending on how many territories they hold (or more if they also have liberated some original Japanese occupied territories).

If the Burma road is open when China starts it’s turn, when they get their free units, they can swap up to 2 inf for art. These would still be placed at the end of their turn.

I agree, was my suggestion but maybe not your Burma road sugg, but still give them 1 art per turn for open Burma road

I gave China 1 inf per Japan territory value they controlled. 1 icp value = 1 inf  2 icp = 2 inf and so on. This was done in my game test in the above thread Other Variants.

This is what the Pacific looks like after 2 turns in our game with changing Russian, China and the island values.

Another pic

These changes were done on Death Heads G40 map.
As you can see Japan controls the Russian Far East and pretty much of China and now there on there way to get the Dutch Islands.
Japan starts with Saigon so they can build a factory there and place up to 6 pieces of ground or ships { no need for naval base in this game }. Saigon also has a victory city so it can build double of what the territory is worth.
If anybody wants a list of the territory value changes let me know . I’ll post later today
As you can see there will be more and bigger battles in the Pacific for Japan with U.K. With US support and maybe an India push on ground.

There’s a nice ground force in Calcutta.

Right now Russia can’t send any troops East on railway do to German push.
So Japan is pretty much Asian free of a threat until US has some kind of landing and/or India ground push with US/UK ship threat.
With this new territory value changes to setup seems the Pacific is going to be different and more fun playing more. Will see. Hopin to play a few more test turns this weekend.

I’m just posting this for anybody that may want to see how it affects and has some different changing moves.

I don’t see why you couldn’t try this in the G40 2ed OOB game.

These pics are from the Pacific after 4 turns.

2nd pic

As you can see CWO, Japan is more or less stationed in Saigon and the Philippines protecting there money islands they have control of after 4 turns.
Also they seem to be buying a few more bombers due to there range from airbases in Saigon and the Philippines.

This setup does change the game for Japan and the allies. Right now it is making UK spend more money in the Pacific as far as more ships.
It also has made the US buy more in Europe due to UK has no control in Africa and not spending any money in Europe side. The US right now is doing Operation Torch for support in Africa but may shift to London with troops. With the UK Pacific ship buy support, its seems to give US a little more room to focus some troops else where.

UK is not split up as for as the money goes. They start with 75 icps and can buy anywhere. If this was a split economy ( UK, Canada,  FEC, and Anzac ) it would probably make the US buy all in the Pacific because UK Pacific side would be in a world of hurt with Japan focusing everything down by thee islands.

Just thought you like to see how it was going with the territory value changes and moves.