Concerns and Balance Problems with 42.2

@Cmdr:

I would be concerned in allowing the UK to can open like that for the Americans.

What if the turn order ended:  USA >> Italy >> Germany (Germany being first in the turn order)?

That at least permits Italy to blitz some tanks from N. Italy into Denmark to save Germany’s arse at the last minute.

London is at risk, Calcutta is at risk, Moscow is at risk… Why shouldn’t Berlin and Rome be at risk?

@barney:

wow
I thought I could just read this and not have to think :)

Sounds way cool. I wonder how it will effect naval battles? In a good way I’m thinking
Yea I 'm gonna try it :)

Well I just read the whole thing! And yea sounds better.
Have you played any games yet?

I playtested this last one:
@Baron:

So, I tried with a better success this much more stable (and simpler) values for Fighter and Tactical on defense and only Tactical Bomber get bonus on attack for specific situations:

FIGHTER
Attack 2, same in SBR
Defense 2 or 3, same in SBR
Move 4
Cost 7
1 hit
Air combat unit, Fighter as an Air Superiority aircraft:
All hits are allocated to aircraft units first, if any available.

Combined Arms Bonus:
Gives +1 Attack to any Tactical Bomber paired 1:1 with.

Fighter as part of an extended Air Defense System:
Up to 3 Fighter units receive +1 Defense if protecting a territory with an operational Air Base, (or 1 Fg for a Victory City if playing 1942.2)

TACTICAL BOMBER
Attack 2 or 3 or 4, SBR @1
Defense 3
Move 4
Cost 8
1 hit
Combined Arms bonus, Tactical Bomber as a less vulnerable “Dive” or “Torpedo” Bomber when escorted by Fighter:
**_Gain +1 Attack, when paired 1:1 with a Fighter .

Air Supremacy Bonus, Tactical Bomber as a “Dive Bomber”:
Gain +1 Attack when no ennemy’s aircraft is present.
These two bonuses can be added to raise up to Attack @4.
With these other units:

STRATEGIC BOMBER
Attack 4,  SBR @1
Defense 1
Move 6
1 hit
Cost 10

Strategical Bombing Raid (SBR*): Attack @1
SBR damage: 1D6+2 on Industrial Complex, Air Base or Naval Base

Fighter: Attack 2 Defense 2 or 3
Tactical Bomber: Attack 1 Defense 0
Strategic Bomber: Attack 1 Defense 0

DEFENSIVE MANEUVERS allowed for all 3 types of aircraft:

Aerial Retreat for attacking planes (all aircrafts can retreat while letting ground units pursuing battle),

Limited Aerial Withdrawal of 1 space in a friendly territory after first combat round for defending planes up to 2 StBs or 2 TcBs or 2 Fgs.

a limited landing in a just conquered territory: 2 planes (either Fighter or Tactical Bomber), as long as it can provide 1 extra movement point for this special landing.

FLEET CARRIER G40
Attack 0
Defense 2
Move 2
Cost 16
2 hits
Hold up to 3 planes : 3 Fgs / or 2 Fgs and 1 TcB / or 1 Fg and 2 TcBs / or 3 TcBs.
A damaged Aircraft Carrier still allowed flight operation for 1 plane unit.

FLEET CARRIER 1942.2
Attack 1
Defense 2
Move 2
Cost 14
1 hit
Hold up to 3 planes : 3 Fgs / or 2 Fgs and 1 TcB / or 1 Fg and 2 TcBs / or 3 TcBs.

ESCORT CARRIER
Attack 0
Defense 1
Move 2
Cost 9
1 hit
Hold 1 plane : 1 Fg OR 1 TcB.
ASV: Anti-Sub Vessel, same as Destroyer against Submarine.

CRUISER
Attack 3
Defense 3
Move 2
Cost 10
1 hit
1 Shore Bombardment @3.

BATTLESHIP
Attack 4
Defense 4
Move 2
Cost 18
2 hits
1 Shore Bombardment @4.

On a battlecalc, these values gives similar odds of survival to a full Carrier with 3 TcBs against itself when 1 CV and 2 Fgs attacks 1 CV and 2 Fgs. You get similar odds about 1 CV, 1 Fg, 1 TcB against itself compared to 1 CV 2 TcBs and 1 Fg against itself (as far as I can put similar numbers in the calc).

The idea is that a full Carrier is better on defense than offense.
So, to keep this principle in line, TacB has been put to a single defense value of 3.
It is slightly higher than Fighter (keeping @2), but remember that Fighters always hit planes first.

The 3-planes carrier provides more units in a SZ and Fgs A2 D2 C7 can be a good fodder instead of loosing a costlier Carrier with the same defense @2.
So during combat rounds, usually owner’s will keep Carriers and sacrifice Fighters and it doesn’t change the defense factor.
That’s the main difference with OOB Naval Combat, often Carriers with lower Def @2 are sacrifice earlier because of the high defense value of Fighters (D4).

Also, 3-planes Carrier gives more strategy and flexibility on which units (Fg or TcB) you prefer to put on board.
All 3 cheaper Fighters (A2 D2 C7) but with lesser odds A6 D6 C21.
All 3 costlier TcBs (A2-3-4 D3 C8) better on defense but not good against an opponent defending with planes (A6 D9 C24).
The mix of both Fg and TcB is far better in combat 1 Fg & 2 TcBs or 2 Fgs & 1 TcB.

I also like to put small 1 plane-Escort Carrier (A1 D1 C9) (bought from HBG) in the roster.
Their relative strength toward 3-planes Fleet Carrier is better historically depicted.
In fact, a single Escort Carrier can carry around 27-33 planes while a Fleet Carrier is around 90-100 planes.

I also experimented a Fg unit attacking @1 with First strike and defending @2 but the very low value of 1 and specific First Strike ability similar to subs was slowing down the battle process.
That’s why I prefer the A2 D2 C7 Fighter.
(Combat values wich are also similar to 1914 planes. From a A&A game franchise consistency POV.)
In each combat round, you start by rolling both attacking and defending Fighters, then picking up casualties on planes.
After, you continue with regular combat unit rolls.

One historical objections I made to myself was about that Fighters were better defending than attacking.
I answered it by giving a special +1 defense bonus to 3 Fighters when an operational Air Base is present.
This could figure the alertness of interceptors and all the Radar and Survey system against incoming planes.
Also, defenders can also have AAA unit on their side to increase the casualty rates of attacking aircrafts.
That’s why I think it can still be acceptable from an historical POV.
(Also, don’t forget how G40 OOB SBR rules doesn’t care about it, giving all planes a roll @1.)

TacBs Attack 2-3-4 Defense 3 values were more dictated by the defensive capacity required for Carriers to keep the similar balance of their OOB counterpart.

Strategic Bomber are lowered to 10 IPCs and it is required because of the dangerousness of attacking defending Fighters. Each round they could shot it down, no matter the number of ground units for fodder.

Finally, Cruiser and Battleship’s cost are reduced by 2 IPCs, 10 and 18 IPCs to level them against a more dangerous Fleet Carrier at full strength and cheaper planes.
To fully compete with this new carrier (which is a bit better than the regular OOB), it is now a must from the Battlecalc POV that Battleship and Cruiser need a reduced cost of 2 IPCs :
Cruiser A3 D3 M2 should cost 10 IPCs while Battleship A4 D4 M2, 2 hits should cost 18 IPCs.
So, Cruiser will be at the same cost than Strategic bomber (A4 D1 M6 C10),
and the Battleship (18 IPCs) still compete against the Cruiser (10 IPCs) + Destroyer (8 IPCs) combo.

Example: 12 Fgs gives A2 D2 C7, are too powerful against 7 A3 D3 C12 Cruiser.
Overall %*: A. survives: 94.8% D. survives: 4.7% No one survives: 0.5%

10 Fgs gives A2 D2 C7, are within acceptable margin against 7 A3 D3 C10 Cruiser.
Overall %*: A. survives: 75.2% D. survives: 23.2% No one survives: 1.6%

All in all, the additional money made from this savings will be needed to replace for the increased rate of aircrafts casualties.

From my little experienced with 3-planes Carriers, it works well.

Also, if you really want to increase aircrafts combat interactions in contested land territory, you should allow attacker to land a single Fg or TcB, or even up to 2 aircrafts in a just conquered territory.
(I ruled that an additional movement point to land in this zone is required.)
Otherwise, your game would mostly relied on AAA to defend against attacking planes.

I will post something on AAA issue in another thread more sooner than later.
For now, just know that I put them at 3 IPCs to get the maximum incentive to buy them.

Hope you will try and enjoy it.

One little physical inconvenient about a fully loaded Carriers unit with 3 TcBs is that there is not much place on the sculpt to put them in a row.
To overcome the lack of room for this bigger sculpt, is to put a chip on a Carrier below a TcB sculpt for additional units.
On the brighter side, any mix with a smaller Fg sculpt fit well on top of a Carrier._**

@Black_Elk:

This thread has too much good information to let it sit for an entire year without comment.
:-D

Right now my group doesn’t play with escort/intercept rules, because it just doesn’t seem worth the risk to the fighters (in either role). So when the rules are in effect it mainly serves to discourage bombing altogether.

With altered abilites, like the ones suggested here, I might be more inclined to play the Escort/intercept game.

I think you probably need 3 things to bring Air into balance:
a.  an improved SBR mechanic.

b. Better Anti-Aircraft Artillery units Abilities. Like one that can move in combat, with a normal attack defense value of 1, in addition to a one time opening shot vs air, or something along those lines.

c. Some form of naval AA-fire.

I think you have touched on all the essentials here. And have brought up the others before. In addition to working out a dogfight system. The stats in thread are compelling and demonstrate how the first aspect “improved sbr” might be approached.

Nice work, as always

Thank you very much.
I forgot this thread, I will probably use some stats into my Summary thread under construction about various SBRs.

Nonetheless, it needs full focus to really weight all the aspects of SBR with all these numbers.
I can easily understand you need to be in a certain “vibe” to read this kind of posts, hence it was quite dusty.

Besides, I agree on your analysis of these 3 points a, b, c. They need to be coordinate to get a better game.
I made a lot of posts on these points over months.
Need to find the good angle to get a fresh start on these.

sounds very promising!

Anzac, in reality, could only defend itself versus an eventually over-extended Japan pushing south. 6 IPCs will build just enough Inf to survive. I dont recall Anzac invading anywhere except into New Guinea whereas Canada at 11 IPCs could build Inf & Transports to do what it actually did, re-inforce United Kingdom bedises have its own beach & army on D Day. Boring maybe but definitely more realistic to what happened & a mark of a good simulation is to be as realistic as possible. The designers put a Canadian emblem on the board - too bad they didn`t distinguish the Canadian forces that should be on the board (like the Anzac) & possibly provide some control markers, as well.

That is a pretty cool rule.

@Imperious:

+++++ Then i feel we should use the same pattern in AARHE to fit with LHTR. The language should be similiar so as not to confuse. Please modifiy this throughout the text.

Ok.

The diplomacy modifier of -3 was too much and leads to many neutrals converting too fast.

Yeah I can imagine.
Thats hitting on 4 or less, which is 66%.
Allies has 4 dices per turn.

It makes more sense now that I it’s been fully explained. One of the challenges here would be protecting E. U. S. from a sudden German attack, but it would probably be easy enough to destroy any German transports.