[1914] Railroads and Industrial complexes

@monsieurmurdoch I am not sure how these house rules would interplay with 40 since the scope of warfare was so different. Hospitals and ambulance customization could. I hope you can find a 1914 game. Keep an eye out. And, I do have some plans for barb wire, trenches, etc. Thanks for the feedback!

US War Time Economy:  To show a wishy-washy attitude of the US towards the war in Europe, change the 20 IPC value of USA to a variable amount.  With the US’s involvement inevitable due to continued provocation from Germany on US interests, the calculation will also increase each turn. The variable calculation is; 8 + Tn + 2d6, where Tn = turn #.  At point where US enters the war, the latest calculated IPC count of US will be fixed to USA going forward. (US can hold until after turn 4 to declare war in an effort to possibly improve the IPC value).

I just assumed railway movement was considered in the movement. Those are pretty large distances to cover and it was still the era of steam, not bullet trains.

German armor, especially heavies mostly moved by rail since long road marches were hard on equipment.

It is a good point regarding different scales of rail though. Perhaps a movement penalty where armor can only move 1 on foreign soil (excluding Africa). That reflects rail movement.

Personally, I think blitzing is too powerful anyway. Maybe for mech inf as a fast moving scout, but not armor later in the war.

Yes, Blitzkrieg in France, but that was lightly armored fast moving tanks that wouldn’t survive once T-34s were on the battlefields. Bad roads, long distances and formidable opponents cut that out. US was bogged down in Normandy fight through hedgerows and ran into problems after since French rail was decimated in bombing.

But how would you know how many IPC Ottomans would have if you didn’t do any study on the economic capabilities of the other nations relating to 31 IPC? How would you know how many infantry they would have in each area if you didn’t study where they even had armies in 1914?

You need to just draw a map with territory borders that allows good player options and is realistic. Don’t redo 1914, that’s garbage. This is redesign, not use what you got

This is not checkers my friend.

Ever tried this?

My bad, I somehow got Vladivostok and kamkatcha confused. But yes, just rearrange railroad to its ACTUAL spot. Sorry again.

Is there a link to boardgamegeek where these files are now located?!?!
Thanks!

Think of every tt with an IPC value as having an infantry “depot”. The limit raised per turn based on the IPC value is reasonable.

But in the long term (and I’m thinking in particular of WWI) the number of men of fighting age available in any area is limited. WWI would not have gone on indefinitely; each side would simply have run out of men. Furthermore, the more you try to recruit in a particular area, the quality of troops raised decreases, and resistance to conscription grows.

Also consider depots as infantry training centres; a unit recruited there receives basic training, say the equivalent of a 1-1 infantry unit.

Leave it there another turn and it improves to a 1-2 unit, or you might use the turn to train it as storm troopers, paratroopers etc. You have to decide on the value of properly trained units against the immediate need for troops at the front, even if they’re just raw recruits to soak up hits.

A further refinement is to indicate the nationality of a depot; some nationalities will fight for more than one side, for example Romanian units might be raised by Germany or Russia depending on who controls Bucharest.

Units starting the game can be assumed to be fully trained, those raised from scratch start as raw. You can even consider some casualties to be wounded, and needing to be sent back to the depots for recuperation.