Global 1940 & 1943 Expansions Game Reports

@barnee

Yeah I don’t know how to do the stats with all the multis and the learning games but at least I can document them in the list of all games 😀

@general-spengler Very interesting. I think having conscripts cost only $1 and be totally unable to attack is both a little sleepy and tends to give too much of an advantage to the defenders.

What about conscripts that cost $2, move 1, defend at 1 each, and attack at 1 as a stack? In other words, no matter how many conscripts you have in an attack, they all collectively only roll one die per round of battle, which only hits if the die is a 1.

This should naturally discourage players from building too many conscripts, since a stack of 5 conscripts is less cost-efficient than a single conscript.

You could also limit production of conscripts to 1 per factory and/or recruiting center per round. So if you have both a factory and a recruiting center in the same territory, you could buy up to 2 conscripts there per turn. If you have only a factory or only a recruitment center, then you could only buy 1 conscript per turn in that territory.

No the AAA’s ability to reduce aircraft attack power does not stack, but having two AAAs will allow you to reduce the attack value of up to 6 aircraft.  Also, the controlling player (attacker) chooses SBR casualties.

From our limited experience, one fighter usually isn’t enough to deter a SBR.  Remember that there are no longer any AA shots on attacking planes during a SBR so fighters are the only thing the defender has to inflict damage on the attacker.  If he chooses not to intercept due to escorts, the attacker will inflict bombing damage with no losses.  Escorts were used more to take hits from the defending fighters so the bombers would continue to do damage.  A territory defended by an AA gun and a stack of fighters is a hard target and usually not cost effective to bomb unless you have a massive air force.  Germany needs to use it’s full airforce if it wants to SBR England effectively.  Russia needs to actually build fighters or ask for allied fighters if it wants to defend it’s factories.

We could increase the max damage a facility could take to increase the potential damage of a SBR.  We’ll have to play more games with this to see how changes things.

@knp, 3D6 heavies have never been popular. Back in the early nineties we played off and on with them. It’s one of those things where if you have them, you love them if you don’t, well life is hell. I like the 2D6 and seems like most players can live with them especially on the Global scale and sheer number of units on the board.

Personally I liked it better when SBR came out of the player’s bank. People really hate that one and democracy usually rules most of the time when you have a regular group. I understand why people hated that one, however I liked it. It’s one of the things I like about disrupting convoys.

Honestly I love HBG, you can now add a lot of stuff to the game especially when it comes to tech. SPA and TDs are a must.

Anyway your thoughts on mech blitzing and both dice counting for heavies was spot on.

@CWO:

@ossel:

If using my “Operation Valkyrie” scenario (http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=30059.0), all SS units are arrested if a zone chooses to comply with the order, and are removed from play until the scenario is resolved. If a zone stays loyal or converts back to loyal, the units are moved back onto the map.

What I’m wondering about this rule is: exactly who would arrest the Waffen SS?  The police?  By 1944, the police forces in Germany were pretty much under the control of the Nazi Party, if not actual branches of the SS and the Gestapo.  The Wehrmacht?  Since the Waffen SS are elite military units, I’m not sure why they’d quietly lay down their arms and agree to be arrested by the regular army without a fight, especially following the assassination of Hitler by high-ranking army officers.

This is why in my Operation Valkyrie rule, there is a caveat that each zone can decide whether to comply with the order. In the actual event, the Wehrmacht did indeed manage to neutralize the SS in some areas. From wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1944_Adolf_Hitler_assassination_attempt):

Meanwhile, Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel, military governor of occupied France, managed to disarm the SD and SS, and captured most of their leadership. …. City Commandant, and conspirator, General Paul von Hase ordered the Wachbataillon Großdeutschland, under the command of Major Otto Ernst Remer, to secure the Wilhelmstraße and arrest Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. In Vienna, Prague, and many other places troops occupied Nazi Party offices and arrested Gauleiters and SS officers.

If you read my rule, it states that if the assassination is successful, the remaining SS units will absolutely fight those allied with the responsible army officers.

@Imperious:

OK.
Cruisers when they shoot and roll a 1 can force the defender to remove a plane
Cruisers move 3 spaces even if they didn’t come out of port.
Now they are worth the extra 2 IPC.

@Young:

@variance:

Another idea has been that each cruiser would only fire an AA shot at 1 attacking plane.

This is better than 3 shots per ship IMO.

So our Cruisers combine those ideas and get:
1-An attack and a defense @3 + 1 bombard @3,
2-A first round AA @1 against 1 attacking aircraft,
3-Cruisers when they shoot, either on attack or defense, and roll a 1 can force the attacker/defender to remove a plane.

In the game I played, the AA has more of a psychological impact than a real effect.
Indeed, it never destroyed any aircraft. And thus, neither by the AA and even by the “1” roll which force the defender to destroy an aircraft.

But UK bought 3 cruisers, instead of any BB, against German Luftwaffe.

Thanks everybody, those suggestions makes cruiser a more interesting unit that worth buying.

However, it can be a real nuisance for Germany but it may also help protect the Baltic fleet against UK aircrafts: at least, it slightly upgrade the Baltic fleet to better defend against attacking UK planes.

Thanks for that report, I will comment on your post in detail when I have more time. I agree with your opinion and I have changed the US NO to include the West Indies. Cheers.

The new map is an uneasy compromise, with some tts values reflecting oil wealth, others not.

Personally I prefer adding industrial base and mineral resources together to create a single economic index, but the separate oil values have been tried:

http://www.basesproduced.com/aaa.html

The big problem is that the Allies always have more than enough oil, the Axis hardly ever enough.  Forcing the Axis to take oil centres to keep going makes their moves very predictable.