Arrive early to mark your maps…

@black_elk said in Working on a New Map 40/41: Seeking Suggestions:

perhaps with some map making type tutorials in the same way that Pact of Steel 2 taught how to create an xml and such

:+1:

I think you’re asking a lot of the right questions: how to add more variety, how to make the game more truly global in scope, how to create advantages for the Allies without overcorrecting. I’m not sure how well you’ve thought through some of the specific changes that you’re recommending.

Moving the British ships from Gibraltar to east Africa does nice things for a British naval presence in the Indian Ocean, but it makes it way too easy for Germany to win the Battle of the Atlantic – Germany can now routinely take out all of Britain’s ships in the Atlantic on the first turn without taking too many risks. This means that Germany can totally evacuate France on turn 1 and probably also on turn 2, which gives Germany a big advantage against Russia.

The Sea Lion threat is probably exaggerated – sure, if you spend 100% of your economy on ships and planes for India, then London could be in trouble, but it’s pretty easy to build, say, 4 infantry in London and still have enough cash left over to place a variety of units in India. Britain starts with 43 IPCs, and London’s not that hard to garrison.

Meanwhile, Japan’s ability to take India or use it as a base to threaten Russia is almost entirely gone. One of the key threats the Japanese have in OOB Anniversary 1941 is building a factory in Indochina on turn 1, capturing Burma turn 1, and then threatening to build a factory in Burma on turn 2. If Japan pulls this off, then it doesn’t matter if Britain has a factory in India, because Japan is still outproducing Britain 4:3, and Japan will wind up with all 3 factories, which can then churn out infantry and tanks to head for Stalingrad. On the other hand, the only way Britain can prevent Japan from pulling this off is by sacrificing its entire starting force of troops from India and Persia, which is expensive and leaves Egypt vulnerable to the Italians.

In your version, Burma is only worth 1 IPC, so there’s very little point in having Japan build a factory there. Japan can’t take Bengal until at least turn 2, and the UK starts with a factory in India, so even if Japan gets a factory in Indochina right away and an eventual factory in Bengal, that’s very unlikely to be enough to deal with the forces Britain will have been accumulating in India proper. The Indian factory is almost 100% safe against anything short of a massive naval invasion – but that naval invasion is much harder to pull off assuming even a modest USA presence in the Pacific, because Britain now has two extra warships in the Indian Ocean, plus a starting factory there.

I think the dance of attacks and counter-attacks you outline in West Africa is entertaining, but unrealistic in terms of strategy – if you’re playing to win, then nobody cares enough about French West Africa to bother sending a transport there. Allied transports are much better off going to Morocco or Gibraltar, and Axis transports are much better off going to Gibraltar or Egypt.

Finally, I don’t think an Indian factory is likely to have any effect on the war on China – it’s 3 moves away from the nearest Chinese territory, and likely 4 or even 5 moves away from the Chinese front lines by the time forces actually arrive.

What all of these admittedly nitpicky corrections add up to is a sense that your changes won’t actually deliver that much variety. You get a different scenario with your changes, but it will always be the same different scenario: Germany wipes out the British Atlantic fleet and then charges hard for Moscow while Britain easily holds London and India and stalemates Japan. The USA can choose to either knock out a weakened Tokyo (and try to get to Tokyo before Germany gets to Moscow) or rush toward Paris and Rome (to try to set up a stable beachhead on the Western Front before Germany gets to Moscow). Other than the USA’s single choice of whether to go to the Atlantic or the Pacific, nobody has any interesting grand strategy decisions to make. Italy has to fight for Egypt, Germany has to fight for Moscow, Russia has to fight for Moscow, Japan has to fight just to hold onto a decent income, and Britain has to defend London, Egypt, and India. The details will vary from game to game based on tactics and dice, but I predict you’ll see a lot of the same general campaigns over and over again.

You may be interested in this earlier thread about splitting India and splitting the Indian Ocean:
https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=41826.0

Fair enough! And thanks very much for the writeup. If anyone tries this again, consider adding:

2 German subs in SZ 10 (Greenland)
2 German subs in SZ 12 (west of Morocco)
1 Japanese carrier with 1 Japanese fighter in SZ 62 (east of Tokyo)

Thanks! I mostly agree with your comment about per-dice research efficiency; the only reason I didn’t include additional penalties for triple-stacking your scientists is for the sake of simplicity. If you want to play with a -3 penalty, or (even better) a -4 penalty that rounds up to a -3 penalty if you roll three 1’s, then go right ahead!

Giving each Axis nation 3 tokens and each Allied nation 2 tokens tends to give the Axis an early edge in research (they will manage their first couple of breakthroughs earlier than the Allies will), but then the Allies will start to catch up and then overtake the Axis later in the war, because the Axis scientists (on average) will be more “crowded” and will take more stacking penalties.

You could bump Radar to 14 pts. or even to 16 pts. if you really want to, but there are limited opportunities to make full use of the potential synergy. E.g., suppose Germany is using a “Dark Skies” approach to ward off Allied fleets with its enormous Nazi bomber squadrons. Britain might want both Radar and Anti-Aircraft Cruisers to help protect its fleet. Russia, on the other hand, only needs Radar – they’re not going to build any cruisers. Similarly, Russia doesn’t have much use for Jet Fighters, since if it’s suffering from a strategic bombing campaign, it won’t be able to afford much in the way of extra fighters. There’s also the concern that “Heavy Bombers” has always been an overpowered technology in every version of Axis & Allies that had tech. I tried to err in the opposite direction by making the anti-aircraft techs roughly as powerful as the aircraft-enhancement techs!

There is an “Improved Artillery” tech in some of the OOB versions of Axis & Allies, and I’ve never seen anyone buy it, except maybe Russia, who really does have to count every dollar and might not be able to afford enough artillery to fully power its infantry stacks. It is really challenging to fully exploit the advantage of 2:1 artillery support is that it’s really hard to maintain the desired ratio. E.g. if I have a stack of 10 infantry and 5 artillery, then after one round of combat, I probably have something like 2 infantry and 5 artillery, and the extra artillery support becomes moot. It stays moot on defense, too, when those artillery try to hold the ground they just captured. But if I have a stack of 20 infantry and 5 artillery instead, then my army is hugely inefficient – even with 2:1 artillery support, I’m only generating 40 pips of punch on 25 units, so I’m going to give you multiple rounds of combat in which to score hits and wear down my army.

You get the same problem in reverse if you want to only boost the artillery’s native attack power. With a stack of, e.g., 8 infantry and 3 artillery, the tech would only give you +3 pips of punch – it’s just not very exciting. You could try attacking with a stack of all artillery, e.g., 10 artillery for $40, but that just seems weird and un-thematic.

Anyway, let me know if you try out the rules, with or without some modifications! I’d be curious to see how they work in live play. I’m defending my rules so you have the benefit of my opinions, but they’re just opinions, and ultimately the house rules are there for everyone to enjoy however they like…if you think you’ll have more fun tweaking the costs or nerfing a couple of the techs, then go with what seems fun! :-)

as we are learning now, 1940 is an easier year to set up, because the Axis and Allies are a little more clearley defined

Try using ANZAC pieces to represent France on the AA 50th board

France gets ….

France, Morocco Algeria, French West Africa, French Central Africa, Madagascar, and French Indochina.
A french infantry in Trans-Jordan to represent Syria, and a french canadian infantry too.

If paris falls on the first turn then at the end of the victorious nations turn (Germany or Italy) do the following. Roll a die, any French units AND/or territories (that do not contain other allied units) convert to axis units if they are the able to be reached from france by any route in the number of game spaces shown on the die. If other allied land units are present (UK) then those french units remain free french. French naval vessels are scuttled IF they convert and vessels of any other nation are present (including the allies)

On a roll of a 1 Germany gets the French Mediteranin fleet (Destroyer and Transport) and the french atlantic fleet (if the uk player took its units there as casualties and only french vessles remained after combat)
On a roll of a 2 they also get Morocco Algeria
On a roll of a 3 they cant claim any more units because there are no elegible units 3 game spaces away from france
On a roll of a 4 french west africa converts to the axis, syrian french do not convert because there are UK units there.
On a roll of a 5 french equatorial africa also converts
On a roll of a 6 Madagascar also converts.

Ok Here it goes
@Black_Elk:

On a more serious note though, this discussion about Navies, while fascinating, is still beside the point.
I mean, you don’t honestly think that the unit numbers in the game, have anything to do with the real world numbers do you? If so, again I would ask, who can’t point to where the numbers are coming from?

They are hazzy abstractions, just like the IPC values are hazzy abstractions, and the problem right now, is that the abstracted numbers we’ve been using have failed to produce a two front war.

Who cares about all the other stuff if we can’t even get a two front war going? What difference does it make if the IPC and unit ratios are accurate to Nth degree, if that’s just going to produce an unbalanced game?
You see what I’m driving at here…

Believe me, I’m just as in favor of historical realism as the next guy, but I think we’ve been approaching the issue in a backwards sort of way. You have to start with the gameplay, and understand what players are actual doing with these rules and conditions we’ve set up, before you can even begin to ask questions like “are the numbers accurate to the real world?” The first priority has to be given to the gameplay mechanics, and setting them up in such a way that the Japanese and Americans actually have a reason to fight over the Pacific. If you don’t do that first, then relative accuracy with all the other stuff is pretty much pointless, because the basic game still won’t look anything like the real War.

Any thoughts?

I totally agree with this because there should be a reason to fight in the pacific (for both sides) I think if making each island 1 and isladns that get taken often 2 then there would be a reason for japan to defend them and usa to attack them.
Anyways many of the game is historical but some things had to change for unblanced reasons so that way the axis have a chance that gives them a shot.  Though i beleive that the numbers in the game are very accurate to how the real war went except the german army had more tanks and the russian army had more infantry.  The part of how U.S.A. and Great Britian, are both pretty weak is because it is the truth great britian was on its knees and the u.s.a army was not even a real army (no offence it was not made for offensive just defensive)

Yeah I recall seeing some photos somewhere on the internet.

Someone traced a real map.
Painted it on a huge piece of wood. A0 or A-1.  :mrgreen:

I agree, Adding more rules doesn’t make the game more ballenced or acurate usualy it just makes it longer, but sometimes I am in the mood or a realy long game :wink: