I should also add that for a “bid”, we give the US “improved shipyards” and that seems to balance things out.
"East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion
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This’ll be my last post on this topic out of time constraints. I love the back and forth, but I don’t see anything here that is new or otherwise convinces me that the game is balanced or that it favors the USSR.
At this point, I don’t see there being any daylight made between us on game theory (which is fine with me). This is the main reason I don’t really like to write essays. I just don’t have the time, and minds generally don’t get changed via this method in my experience.
You have a point, but you’re also completely discounting the fact that NATO can only really act at 1/3rd efficiency with those units.
I did not discount this, but I didn’t share every detail of the valuation so it’s totally forgivable. My valuation does not include infantry from either side because there’s almost EXACTLY the same amount for each side at the end of R1. NATO has more stuff in every category at the end of the Soviet opener except tanks - it has way more stuff in every category at the end of the actual round once everyone has had a turn. Further, to be fair with regards to TUV, we’d have to count NATOs first round of purchases in the valuation. This essentially nearly doubles the TUV gulf. I didn’t mention this in the initial post.
Fruity pebbles is a phenomenon that exists to some extent in every version of axis and allies. This is extremely challenging for AnA players to handle on a good day. The response is to understand you only need to be winning in one area of the map and holding everywhere else to win the game. There are finer details, but this is the general concept. In E&W, its hold in India, hold in Europe and kick in the back door as the USA in Kamchatka. After the first two to three turns, the economy is balanced as you point out, but NATO has 200 TUV over the Russians (not including the Navy) and the Russians should be contained with their demise coming on their east front via USA. This is the best way to “see” the imbalance. There is a loss of kinetic energy as the Russians as the economy balances and then the USA is piercing through.
I could (and might) run the same valuation for Anniversary and Classic to have something to compare it to so this is better understood but I don’t know. Takes time to lay out and I’d rather be playing. I’m unchanged. NATO should win 6/7 games at least. If that’s not happening, there was some extreme dice event or NATO was mishandled. But I leave my mind open to being changed over the board. If something can be demonstrated repeatedly, I absolutely will abandon this position after investigating why/what was so misleading - but experience tells me that is unlikely.
If the game ends up being balanced or less in favor of NATO, I believe it will come from increasing the risk profile of the soviet opener to an… unreliable but at least threatening chance of success as @Ragnell804 did. But you’ll still need very good dice.
OR
…get to the Fusion bomb asap. This is the “heavy bombers” of East and West. Maybe through some combination of spies and tech, the soviets can make up the massive TUV advantage by blowing away pieces in a truly economical way.
As a side note: the NATO “at start” nuke is very impactful in the ways that are considered secondary. Removing 5 Russian infantry might be a letdown, but when you do this to the SFE industrial complex on the turn you land in Kamchatka, you ensure the Russian counterattack is less likely to succeed because they’re down five infantry and can’t move their fighters due to EMP. Finally, on the Russian turn, because the IPC value has been reduced, the Russians can only add two Russian infantries instead of four.
This typically forces the Russian player into a horrific choice. Abandon the territory leaving the fighters to be destroyed because they couldn’t move. Or fight a losing battle in SFE and die with the fighters albeit at higher NATO cost. If NATO is using the nuke in some other way, imo - it’s being used inefficiently. Full stop. The NATO nuke is for the critical territory of SFE timed when landing in Kamchatka.
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…and for anyone that reads down this far. I have nothing but respect for @The-Janus because he is an actual player of AnA. He’s the only reason I even knew about or play this wonderful version of the game.
And as you pointed out offline, I agree with you 100% - the meta for this game is not written in stone yet. What I am saying is from the dozen or so games I’ve played against two different opponents. My standard is to try to log at least 30 complete games against at least five or six different opponents to have that completely fleshed out.
I speak only from what I feel are ‘early strong indications’. But my experience with AnA: Europe has shown me that you can have someone come along who thinks differently and rock the boat (if not tip it over) with regards to strategy. In that version, it wasn’t until about 20 or so games in when it became apparent that threatening Sealion in basically every game appears to be more competitive than not doing it.
This was not at all apparent or intuitive until someone put their money where there mouth was and demonstrated it. That is an example of the ‘early meta’ being altered in a significant if not critical way.
I love the game but have an unequaled respect for the players. Everything here is said with kindness and an embracing of the adage “i could be wrong”. If I could put “imo” at the beginning and end of every sentence, I would. Text is a difficult format to express thoughts of this gravity imo. There is no mic drop. I’ll converse - just not so much the large essays bc it takes away from game time for me.
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@The_Good_Captain said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
As a side note: the NATO “at start” nuke is very impactful in the ways that are considered secondary. Removing 5 Russian infantry might be a letdown, but when you do this to the SFE industrial complex on the turn you land in Kamchatka, you ensure the Russian counterattack is less likely to succeed because they’re down five infantry and can’t move their fighters due to EMP. Finally, on the Russian turn, because the IPC value has been reduced, the Russians can only add two Russian infantries instead of four.
This typically forces the Russian player into a horrific choice. Abandon the territory leaving the fighters to be destroyed because they couldn’t move. Or fight a losing battle in SFE and die with the fighters albeit at higher NATO cost. If NATO is using the nuke in some other way, imo - it’s being used inefficiently. Full stop. The NATO nuke is for the critical territory of SFE timed when landing in Kamchatka.
As a matter of tactics, I wonder if there’s a scenario in which the Soviets can afford to abandon Eastern Siberia, and rely on counter-attacking? I know in my early days of playing, China seemed extremely fickle, and always seemed to turn away from the USSR, leaving North Korea exposed and with the Soviets unable to hide in their territory.
Really I think in order to hold off the Americans, they actually need to have a big enough force in both Eastern Siberia and Kamchatka, and to at least control South Korea (even if they can’t hold off the US from landing there) while having the Chinese in, defending the North. Most US players are hesitant to attack North Korea militarily, because if the Soviets can retake it, the Chinese just move right back in at the end of their turn. That means still needing to have a strong counter-attacking force either in Eastern Siberia or Manchuria… but maybe that makes it slightly more workable?
That all being said, I don’t know where these hypothetical Soviet reinforcements would be coming from, in time for rd3. As tempting as it is to not place a ton in the east for the first round or so (while the US navy is all tangled up) I’m getting the sense that the Soviets kind of have to.
I do enjoy discussing strategy and tactics, but I’ll try to keep my posts shorter going forward. I don’t write huge walls of text to drown anyone else out, I just actually enjoy writing :)
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@The-Janus write away! I still enjoy the read but might have shorter or more infrequent responses.
Yeah, dead zoning as you mention is / would /should be interesting for the soviets in that section of the battlefield.
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@The_Good_Captain I have been following this discussion with interest as I work on my East & West mod for TripleA. It is basically working, but I am using the Big World map rather than the East & West map. I have started the process of creating a new map.
I also noticed that the best of use of Nukes is to hit the counterattack force, when I playing against the AI.
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@The_Good_Captain I have been following this discussion with interest as I work on my East & West mod for TripleA. It is basically working, but I am using the Big World map rather than the East & West map. I have started the process of creating a new map.
I also noticed that the best of use of Nukes is to hit the counterattack force, when I playing against the AI.
Which side is nuking who and where? Be advised, you cannot attack a territory on the same turn that territory was nuked.
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@The_Good_Captain said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@The_Good_Captain I have been following this discussion with interest as I work on my East & West mod for TripleA. It is basically working, but I am using the Big World map rather than the East & West map. I have started the process of creating a new map.
I also noticed that the best of use of Nukes is to hit the counterattack force, when I playing against the AI.
Which side is nuking who and where? Be advised, you cannot attack a territory on the same turn that territory was nuked.
I have no way of enforcing in TripleA that you can’t nuke and conventionally attack. The best I can achieve is that conventional forces can’t fire in the first round.
As a player, on any side, I find nuking counterattack forces is best. This is true for other mods with similar rules like The Grand War.
The AI in TripleA does not generally buy nukes. When it has them, it generally tries to inflict the maximum PU loss, rather than integrating the attack with other tactics.
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
I find nuking counterattack forces is best
General observation, but it seems like hitting the backline with nukes while hitting the frontline with conventional forces is the way to gradually wear the enemy down.
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How does Mexico connect to the sea zones to its east? Is there a separate small sea zone that connects to Mexico & Western United States or does connect to sea zones off the Eastern United States and/or containing the West Indies?
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@The-Janus yikes…I can’t tell.
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@The_Good_Captain said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@The-Janus yikes…I can’t tell.
I will extend the boundary for the sea zone to the East to Mexico.
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@The_Good_Captain said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@The-Janus yikes…I can’t tell.
I will extend the boundary for the sea zone to the East to Mexico.
Agree
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