Tjoek's 1940 Global Map file and setup charts (Updated May 30th 2018)

@Tjoek this is incredible. Printing this out as I type. Now to find a sheet of 36x78in plexiglass…

@vodot said in Tjoek's 1940 Global Map file (Updated May 30th 2018):

@Tjoek this is incredible. Printing this out as I type. Now to find a sheet of 36x78in plexiglass…

In case this info helps, here’s how I obtained the 36" x 96" sheet of plastic that my customized table (which has an extended-width version of the Global 1940 map board) needed. I found a local plastics company whose merchandise lines were described on their website, and I determined that the best option was a material called non-glare Acrylite P-99; the company had various sizes in stock, and one of them was originally sized by the manufacturer at 48" x 96" x 1/16" thickness. The 96" length was already correct, so all the plastics company had to do for me was to cut the sheet to the correct width. They then shipped it to me by delivery truck, rolled up into a tube about two feet in diameter with a sheet of cardboard wrapped around it to protect it. They even included the slice they had removed. They only charged me ten bucks for the custom cutting, and they did a nice job; the sheet went straight onto the table without needing any work on my part, other than my peeling away the manufacturer’s thin temporary film which protects the acrylic from scratching during storage and shipment.

@Tjoek It looks awesome. I have access to fancy plotters at work, and I did this on a 36" roll of heavyweight photo paper with a satin finish on maximum quality. It took half an hour, and it is a thing of beauty. I’ll try to get some pics at home.

@CWO-Marc said in Tjoek's 1940 Global Map file (Updated May 30th 2018):

@vodot said in Tjoek's 1940 Global Map file (Updated May 30th 2018):

@Tjoek this is incredible. Printing this out as I type. Now to find a sheet of 36x78in plexiglass…

In case this info helps, here’s how I obtained the 36" x 96" sheet of plastic that my customized table (which has an extended-width version of the Global 1940 map board) needed. I found a local plastics company whose merchandise lines were described on their website, and I determined that the best option was a material called non-glare Acrylite P-99; the company had various sizes in stock, and one of them was originally sized by the manufacturer at 48" x 96" x 1/16" thickness. The 96" length was already correct, so all the plastics company had to do for me was to cut the sheet to the correct width. They then shipped it to me by delivery truck, rolled up into a tube about two feet in diameter with a sheet of cardboard wrapped around it to protect it. They even included the slice they had removed. They only charged me ten bucks for the custom cutting, and they did a nice job; the sheet went straight onto the table without needing any work on my part, other than my peeling away the manufacturer’s thin temporary film which protects the acrylic from scratching during storage and shipment.

Thanks for the tip @CWO-Marc- I actually have 48x48" polycarbonate sheets available to me as well (#engineeringrocks), so I’ll probably pop a couple sheets on the bandsaw and call it good. I’m ok with a physical seam at the Europe/Pacific divide :) I have a teak table that should work as a platform; now I just need a big plywood sheet to set the map on. Maybe one day I’ll have a table to rival some of you crazies with bunkers?

I mean, the pictures are not going to look as nice as the print, and I don’t have a surface yet or the plexiglass cut to size to cover it. I’ll try to get something out in the next few days, though.

@Tjoek Some pics below. They’ve been through Google photos compression and aren’t the raws, but the map still looks great. It is virtually impossible to overstate how clean it is in person. I decided to kill two birds with one stone and also demo some of my custom 3D printed pieces on the map as well- please forgive the shameless cross-promotion :) As I mentioned above, I did this on a 36" HP T850 plotter on heavyweight satin photo paper, on maximum quality, at a feed speed of about 3"/min.

Congrats for your work!

Hi @Tjoek, I hope you don’t mind but I’d like to use your map for this 1940 tracker I’m building. I can see how long you’ve spent cleaning this up, so I would like to add you to the credits if that’s okay.

I think I might have taken some of the tokens you cleaned up already while bulding my prototype. I think they popped up in google image searches, I hope you don’t mind. I plan on sharing freely with the community in a seperate thread once it’s more polished.

Here’s a link with a picture of the board : https://storage.googleapis.com/aa-calkit4me/index.html

And here’s a preview with you image :

As you can see, I’ll need to insert the IPC tracker at the top again (I think it adds a nice touch) and realign a few icons, but you get the gist. I think it would look much nicer.

Thanks in advance,

Kev

Actually, here’s an updated version of the link. The former is no longer active.

https://aa-g40.k2m.ca/

@Tjoek Great to hear from you!

We started with an Excel document and formulas a few years ago… then a little VBA later. Now, I’m just fooling around with basic HTML/JavaScript/CSS. I’m (of course) using GitHub and I decided to deploy to Firebase to keep it free. I’m just geeking out because I love to play a couple of times a year with my friends!

I’m adding a purchase planner now. Next, I want to add game stats and a battle odds calculator. I haven’t shared it anywhere but here so far. I’m still trying to polish a few things and make it “whole” before I share more widely.

I’d love to see your implementation as well. What technologies are you using? Do you have any recommendations?

@Tjoek Good to know we’re not alone in our VBA madness.

Yeah, I could see myself building it for 1942, but honestly I thought 1940 was likely the most complicated to track for now, with objectives and research. Plus, the way I designed it, I think it would require a good amount of effort to switch to a different version.

Don’t worry about porting it if you don’t already share it. If you have an image or video to get the gist, I would appreciate it though.

Also, if you happen to have a tip jar or patreon, let me know. I could add a link to it under support when I share it, and I’ll definitely chip in myself. Your map took some serious work and it’s a gift to the community.

@Tjoek Hey! Thanks for the link, will do.

No, my app doesn’t do multiplayer. In fact, it’s a static website with no backend right now. I don’t really see the need to make it MP, unless there’s real demand. For now, it will remain a digital tracker for a 1940 Global in-person game.

I found it especially useful with some of my buddies who had never played before and for us, who play 1-2 times a year. The few questions and issues I’m trying to tackle with this app (without referencing the book every 2 minutes) are the following :

When can each country enter the war again?
Which ship is the cruiser and which is the destroyer? (I’m adding HD images/country)
Which territories specifically do I need for that objective, and where are they?
Preparing options for purchases while waiting for one’s turn
Calculating odds for a particular encounter
Reminding us about convoys and troop-related objectives (Egypt, sz125, etc.)
Which factories are different from the Pacific/Europe default games? And when do they change?
Comparing one game’s scores by turn with another (stats and a graphic), etc.

I don’t know if there are any other issues or nice-to-haves that the community would want, but those are the ones I could think of during in-person play.

I don’t think I want to recreate Triple-A, though…
Currently it’s not really useful on mobile either, but I plan to make it mobile-friendly. For now, we play with a big screen running the app, next to the table. A couple of people update it as we go and use it to plan their moves.

can you make a 1942.2 map file, OOB?