Posts made by aardvarkpepper

Perhaps the “Sealion” tag should not apply to this thread. "Sealion"normally refers to a credible invasion threat against London before Russia falls.

Thread ought to mention it’s a Total Victory scenario (it is, isn’t it?).

I expect Japan should not build an IC on Alaska, Germany should not build an IC on France. Rather, I’d say the IPCs should normally be used for units.

1. Alaska: What does Japan get out of an IC? 15 IPCs puts up to two units on Alaska; contrast to 14 IPC for two transports, one offloading from Japan to Buryatia, another offloading from Buryatia to Alaska each turn - and transports have the advantage of being able to redirect to Western US or other points.

Yes, you gain the ability to push pure tanks, or fighters, or do a response-build to navy. But all those issues should already be taken care of; Japan should have destroyer and air cover already in range against Western US’s sea zone; a committed defense of Alaska really isn’t much use if Japan’s not also threatening pressure - that is, an IC’s theoretical benefits are unlikely to apply in practice.

In practice, transports are better - more flexible and more likely to be useful in the normal range of situations. That’s provided you control the Pacific and have destroyers and air in range to hunt any US Pacific builds but if you’re trying to develop serious pressure on Alaska that should be a given.

2. France: Again, Axis get better build response options, but again Axis ought to be brute-forcing things along anyways, then I’d expect Germany and/or Japan to be brute-forcing a destroyer/carrier fleet, not building an IC on France.

Again it’s theory versus practice. Theoretically maybe you could say you’re going to produce six units on France for an instant fleet that the Allies can’t counter. But the Allies get a warning signal when the IC goes up, and the IC itself costs 15. Then what? You’re still limited on income; if you drop two carriers two fighters two destroyers for an “instant fleet” that’s 64 IPC, Germany just doesn’t really have the income to make a France IC consistently worth its cost. Even if Germany looted Moscow and has some Africa income, the benefit of the France IC is still questionable. But even then, again, say G7 drops IC, UK7 drops a load of submarines northwest of London, and along with air threatens any new Germany navy buy. What I’m getting at is the German IC isn’t “clever”, it doesn’t really offer any new options unless the Allies players are bad - otherwise Germany still needs to get protected destroyers and air to hunt Allied subs out of the Atlantic (so those subs can’t act as cheap fodder for Allied air), and even then, Germany has to both survive off France, and survive again pushing towards East Canada. There’s just no way to be “clever” about it if the Allies player is on the ball; Axis will have to brute force it, and if it’s a question of brute force then Axis should spend less on ICs that don’t fight, and more on units that do.

Far as dozens of transports to move in on US East - I’d say that’s not my expectation, again, even in a Total Victory game. Germany protects two transport fleet that post off East Canada and France; empty transports move to France, pick up units that walked over from Germany/Italy, then dump to East Canada. The same fleet also is an invasion threat against London, and if East Canada isn’t squashed consistently, the same forces threaten East US. Meanwhile Japan is dumping to Alaska and pushing West Canada, from where it threatens West US and trades Central US; together Germany and Japan just bleed US out in trades (assuming Africa/Australia etc are Axis). So you won’t really need dozens of Atlantic transports to push on US East; you’re dumping to East Canada anyways. A dozen, sure, but multiple dozens ought not to be necessary considering Japan pushing from the west.

Don had to put up with a lot of BS. Still does, apparently.

http://donsessays.freeservers.com/essay1.htm

"BUT FIRST…HERE ARE SOME CONCEPTS TO CHALLENGE YOURSELF WITH:

I will first ask you to not to negatively challenge the statements mentioned forthcoming, which I naturally accept as verbatim for all of my upcoming described strategical play. I’m also going to be asking you to suspend any skepticism or any immediate disbelief for now, for the purposes of this essay and all subsequent essays, so that you, the reader, may learn a little more of the depth involved in planning tactical strategy in Axis and Allies."

That doesn’t come off as “braggadocios smugness” to me. It’s simple fact that most communities aren’t welcoming of new ideas. Whether it’s the Copernican system, Newtonian physics, or whatever new system, new ideas are always attacked and ridiculed. Obviously Don had already had his share of detractors if he thought it necessary to preface his essays addressing such.

There’s a reason that Don’s essays are still making the rounds decades on; if nothing else, Don put out the first series treating Axis and Allies as a discipline.

Meanwhile, what of detractors? Where are they? What have they done? You see a few nasty comments here and there, but rather than attacking Don’s methodology, detractors attacked his “attitude”!

(edit - I’m more talking about detractors over the years.)

Frankly I don’t think you have a right to judge Don. And if you want to make a point of being a professional writer, you need to do a LOT more editing, for goodness sake. “wordy and imprecise” indeed.

@The_Good_Captain said in Don Rae's Essays: edited for readability:

Finally, in my opinion, the most fatal flaw was that the essays left no room for growth. In other words, these essays are presented as containing ALL the answers to your Axis and Allies questions.

-The Good Captain

http://donsessays.freeservers.com/essay1.htm

"BUY TANKS ONLY AFTER YOU HAVE ESTABLISHED SOLID INFANTRY BORDERS ON YOUR LAND-BASED FRONTS, no matter WHICH player you are, Axis or Allies.

There is only one exception (that I know of) to this rule…The British player who has a factory in India"

Clearly Don KNOWS that he isn’t the be all and end all, that’s why he writes “that I know of”. And really, any writing should be read with the understanding that the writing is limited by the writer’s understanding. If one must assume, does it make sense to assume a writer is omniscient, or NOT omniscient? Must writers also constantly say the sky is blue and grass is green, that sort of thing?

And really, what IS Don to do? You criticize Don for going on at length when you go on at length. Okay. You criticize Don for dealing with haters when you are a hater. Debatable but let’s go with that. But here you’re making a flat assertion that’s countered with a quote from Don’s very first essay in the series. So - what? Should Don have prefaced everything with a disclaimer, making his writing even more wordy? (But you’re saying wordy is bad). Or should Don NOT have prefaced everything, then he’s arrogant or something for not putting on the disclaimer?

If I were reading a really tightly written response, then I could say . . . well okay, maybe this The_Good_Captain fella actually does have a handle on a superior writing style, so let’s just go with that. But that’s not what I get. There’s so much text about how Don was bad this and Don was bad that and how Don needed to be edited . . .

@The_Good_Captain said in Don Rae's Essays: edited for readability:

What follows is a compilation of all the essays for which I have acted as editor. The original was (still is) filled with grammatical and punctuation errors
. . .
As a disclaimer, I have corrected all misspellings and punctuation errors

Tsk!

@The_Good_Captain said in Don Rae's Essays: edited for readability:

In other words, these essays are presented as containing ALL the answers to your Axis and Allies questions.

Because they were written to be simple. Because they were written for Classic.

To use an analogy if you have a 2018 Toyota Camry and you go to a mechanic and they start telling you about how to shoe a horse, and they insist on going on about it, then you do understand that’s not good practice right? Or even if the mechanic IS talking about your SPECIFIC issue, if they’re going on and on and on about metals and corrosion and salt and driving hours and storage - you don’t WANT the technical details, again, you do understand that’s not good practice right?

So with Don, if he’s not getting into the mathematics, what of it? Don’s essays were pretty much the founding documents for Axis and Allies as a discipline; even THESE days what Don said about players being skeptical and building strategies around false assumptions STILL applies, I don’t know that you can even imagine how things were before. If Don just gave simple practical tips and didn’t get into the mathematics, can you blame him? I certainly don’t.

And if Don didn’t get into contingencies that would have applied to different versions, again, what of it? Don’s essays were for Classic or whatever, a lot of the applications in, say, Global or 1942 Second Edition simply didn’t apply because the mobilization rules were different - as were the UNITS and COSTS and FUNDAMENTAL RULES. It’s not right to criticize Don’s essays for not covering situations from Global or 1942 Second Edition because his writings weren’t meant to address those in the first place.

And incidentally there is an upper limit to Axis and Allies skill. Below is an excerpt from my third “basics” series guide for 1942 Second Edition / 1942 Online (writing still in progress). Note I earlier defined “board state” as a conceptually different board position.

[h1]Analyzing the “Infinite”[/h1]
In practice, Axis and Allies does not have infinite possible board states. Only a few lines of play are likely to achieve a good result from the starting position, the possible outcomes of each of those lines of play have a limited range of good responses, and so on. The range of possibilities is further constrained by 1) a static map (e.g. optimal logistics route for cheap US land units to reach Europe is always East Canada to Finland/Norway) and 2) a ruleset that lends itself with the map to players needing to invest sunk costs in planned lines of play that cannot be re-invested easily into other lines of play. Lines of play merge back together, converging and diverging roughly coinciding with control / loss of control of theaters.

https://avalonhill.wizards.com/rules

Note there are rules AND errata. And yes, the rulebook is poorly written.

1. Yes. Russia can attack West Russia using forces from Russia, Karelia, and Caucasus. Further, units from one territory may attack multiple territories. E.g. Russia may attack West Russia AND Caucasus on its first turn, using its tank from Russia to hit Ukraine, and its other units from Russia to hit West Russia.

2. No and yes. The question implies attackers come from a single territory / sea zone. The actual rule is land or sea units retreat to an eligible adjacent territory / sea zone that one of the attackers came from. Also the question implies an attacker decides to withdraw “because the combat isn’t going well” but attacking with intent to retreat is commonly done to preserve units against an opponent counter.

Suppose Germany controlled West Russia but had no German units there, that Germany had a stack of units on Ukraine, USSR had a stack of infantry on Caucasus. USSR tanks on Russia could blitz through West Russia to hit Ukraine along with the Caucasus infantry, then USSR forces could all withdraw to West Russia OR all withdraw to Caucasus. They must all withdraw to a single territory.

Sometimes retreat is not possible e.g. if sea units all start in a contested sea zone and don’t move (sometimes they can’t) out then in again. Then there’s no adjacent sea zone that any sea unit came from, so there’s no eligible retreat zone.

3. Loading onto a transport does not “consume the unit’s non-combat move for the turn”. That is not how it works at all. A transport can load a unit AND unload it the same turn. Reference page 31 of the rulebook.

4. Reference page 15 of the rulebook. You cannot retreat seaborne units. You can retreat other units. Yes, you can declare a retreat; in that case the seaborne units fight on.

5. Yes, infinite defending transports are automatically destroyed by a single attacking unit.

6. No, flying across a sea zone with a named island doesn’t count as 2 movements at all. Taking off from an aircraft carrier . . . . look. An island is a territory, a sea zone is a sea zone. If a fighter starts on an island, it’s on the territory; if the fighter wants to move from the island into the sea zone around the island that requires 1 movement.

If a fighter starts on a carrier, it’s on the sea zone; moving to an ADJACENT sea zone requires 1 movement.

If a fighter is flying across a sea zone with an island, it uses 1 movement to move into the sea zone, and another movement to fly into the next sea zone, the same as any sea zone without an island. If a fighter’s not landing or taking off from an island, the island does nothing.

7. Already answered

8. You can get units of opposing powers in a single sea zone when a power builds sea/air units in a sea zone that already has enemy units in it. Sea units may ignore enemy submarines / transports (with some limitations, like if unloading their own transports). Your question is “these are the only instances when they can exist in the same sea zone” - was that a reference to a retreat (which could also happen) or what was it? Literally don’t understand.

9. There’s an OPTIONAL RULE that allows fighters to defend against industrial bombing, I think. I don’t use it so I forget. AAA does nothing against industrial bombing. Industrial COMPLEXES have built-in antiaircraft defenses; those are the only thing that defend against industrial bombing.

10. I suppose you’re trying to use some optional rule with the 4 or lower thing, but I’m just going to ignore that. If bomber survives - NOT THE ANTIAIRCRAFT ARTILLERY BECAUSE THOSE HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT - but the industrial complex’s antiaircraft fire - then it rolls a dice, and whatever the result is is recorded as damage against that industrial complex, up to twice the value of the territory the IC is on. So if you bomb Karelia and roll a 6 for damage, you can only apply 4 damage as Karelia’s worth 2, and double 2 is 4. Excess damage is lost.

Each damage on an IC prevents it from mobilizing a unit on that territory. So if you have a Karelia IC with 4 damage on it, you can’t mobilize anything there; same if it has 3 damage or 2 damage. If you had 1 damage on, you could mobilize 1 unit there.

11. No. If there’s a battle in the sea zone, there’s no bombardment, period. Doesn’t matter if enemy transports were there and you wanted to destroy them with a fighter, if there’s any battle in the sea zone, no bombardment, period.

I know the rulebook is poorly written, but try going through it a few times.

maybe try GIMP

1. Change combat phase so first battle doesn’t auto-start
2. Add “go back” from before any dice are rolled in combat phase to purchase phase
3. Add “go back” from end turn (after mobilization) to beginning of noncombat.

@Nosho said in Locked submarines:

And as soon as one of us selects a defence profile with the subs not submerging, the other will be able to see that he can move his sub out of the combat zone during the combat phase, and therefore should not move it, as he’s getting better odds at attacking than the defender. Pretty funny glitch. I’m submerging bye!

1. That movement happens during the combat movement phase, not combat phase.
2. You can check what defensive profile your opponent has set up?

@Kakarrot1138 You do know about selecting the sea zone during combat movement phase and toggling the sea zone to friendly / hostile?

I think there might be a submarine-specific issue that triggers separately that prevents legal movement; I sent a ticket in to the devs months ago. Don’t know if it’s resolved. I do know I played a game maybe a week ago in which glitch seemed to work, but maybe it’s just because opponent was bad.

Forming 1942 Second Edition and 1942 Online research/testing group for strategy/tactics. Writeups to be published as guides in time. Games will be played on TripleA v5 and 1942 Online and TripleA v5 (Larry Harris Tournament Setup) without bids.

Applicants must be comfortable with discussion of mathematics and exact details and are expected to contribute meaningfully. This is not a group for casual players, nor is it a group for players that want to develop “secret” lines of play.

Forming 1942 Second Edition and 1942 Online research/testing group for strategy/tactics. Writeups to be published as guides in time. Games will be played on TripleA v5 and 1942 Online and TripleA v5 (Larry Harris Tournament Setup) without bids.

Applicants must be comfortable with discussion of mathematics and exact details and are expected to contribute meaningfully. This is not a group for casual players, nor is it a group for players that want to develop “secret” lines of play.

@Midnight_Reaper said in Guides:

What third guide, you only list two…

-Midnight_Reaper

Will release third guide when it’s finished.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1837406041

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2246697776

Third guide is a basics strategy guide, breaks down strategy by nation, work in progress

Yes. BTW there’s errata for the game. Honolulu (Hawaiian Islands) is a VC; Axis need 9 VC to win, Allies need 10 VC.

Nice video. Had the piece and type counts for each nation, a United States of America dime to show scale on pieces on the piece closeups, edited so the presentation’s pretty sharp, doesn’t waste any viewer time.

Few comments:

1. There’s errata and clarifications at

https://media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/ah/AA_1942_2nd_Edition_FAQ.pdf

2. The rulebook looks nice but is terribly organized. (The .pdf I’m looking at anyways).

3. Four Russian battleships is probably way more than anyone ever needs, and two German and two UK carriers could be on the light side in some games. Same can be said for a lot of other pieces, too much or too little. Time was when I’d buy two sets of any Axis and Allies release to make sure I had enough pieces. Usually ran short on Japanese infantry; I think this version requires 15 of 20 for initial setup, then once you start pushing Asia and/or splitting to Africa, Australia, Alaska, well. I suppose I’d feel weird if I didn’t run short on Japanese infantry in an Axis and Allies game though, so eh.

These days I guess historicalboardgaming.com has official pieces so I don’t even have to buy two board game sets. Also has paper money which is nice. Haven’t ordered from them personally though.

4. Plastic bags and a single box of the small dice as shown are really the minimum, good thing you mentioned picking those up. No way do you want a bunch of loose pieces banging around in the box, that’s just a nightmare to sort through, and trying to roll for a hundred unit battle with just six dice, ugh.

Other useful things - separate chips (often the board game runs short), different colored dice (so you can roll attacking carriers, subs, destroyers, fighters, and bombers all at the same time, say), and cheap fishing tackle boxes - wee cheap ones with removable inserts (so you can fit the larger miniatures).

I expect probably you know all that and didn’t want the video to be overcomplicated. Still thought I’d mention 'em just in case.

@Brian-Cannon said in Crazy game: Should be titled when the dice reward stupid behavior, expect it.:

https://imgur.com/a/ljg5bRR

https://imgur.com/a/xy1HU7y

These screenshots show the US7 combat move and US2 purchase phases, respectively.

If you want to make a point of players having crazy luck, you should make a screenshot of the COMBAT PHASE showing what attacked, what was destroyed, and what survived, for that attack specifically.

BTW Black Elk wrote about Allied air power to “the center” and mass Allied strat bombing years ago on the 1942 Second Edition forums.

@DoManMacgee said in Crazy game: Should be titled when the dice reward stupid behavior, expect it.:

Sounds like people just used an Allied variant of the “Dark Skies” strategy that Germany likes to use in G40 lol. Once Air Stacks hit critical mass they get pretty nasty but you should be able to use keep tight stacks of land units to deter it.

I’ve read other of DoManMacgee’s posts and consider them good; I think he wrote another good one here. If you want more comments, searching for “Dark Skies” may be useful, and tight stacks of land are what you use.

@Brian-Cannon said in Crazy game: Should be titled when the dice reward stupid behavior, expect it.:

I lost count on the number of times he sent 3 Bombers and a fighter or two at a stack of 3 infantry and didnt lose a thing. He had absolutely no fear of sending in naked fleets of air at ground units and it paid off for him the entire game.

Nah, tight stacks or whatever you call it isn’t 3 infantry against 3 bombers and a fighter. Against such a force, eight infantry would be about right.

If you want to ask “how is that even possible” - some depends on dice results, sure, but there IS an Axis strategy that pushes these large stacks. Ask if you want more details.

Returning to 3 bombers and a fighter attacking 3 infantry - look at the numbers.

http://calc.axisandallies.org/?mustland=0&abortratio=0&saveunits=0&strafeunits=0&aInf=&aArt=&aArm=&aFig=1&aBom=3&aTra=&aSub=&aDes=&aCru=&aCar=&aBat=&adBat=&dInf=3&dArt=&dArm=&dFig=&dBom=&dTra=&dSub=&dDes=&dCru=&dCar=&dBat=&ddBat=&ool_att=Bat-Inf-Art-AArt-Arm-Sub-SSub-Des-Fig-JFig-Cru-Bom-HBom-Car-dBat-Tra&ool_def=Bat-Inf-Art-AArt-Arm-Bom-HBom-Sub-SSub-Des-Car-Cru-Fig-JFig-dBat-Tra&battle=Run&rounds=&reps=10000&luck=pure&ruleset=AA1942&territory=&round=1&pbem=

23.52% 3 bombers 1 fighter
40.75% 3 bombers
25.7% 2 bombers
7.55% 1 bomber
0.9% no survivors
1.24% 1 infantry
0.29% 2 infantry
0.04% 3 infantry

As you can see, it’s expected the mass air attack survives. The median is one fighter lost, but 23.52% of no losses is hardly outside the range of reasonable possibility.

Having it happen multiple times in a game - suppose you’re digging for the 35.73% of 2 bombers or worse for the attacker resulting. You figure your opponent’s number has got to come up eventually, but you’re balancing that against 23.52% for best-case for the attacker, or 64.27% for best or second-best case for the attacker.

Considering 64.27% as “success” for the attacker over five trials, the probability of all five trials succeeding is just under 11%. Unlikely, sure - but not necessarily stupid.

Basic Axis and Allies is infantry chains. What the most effective transport routes are, how to maintain effective lines of reinforcement, and so forth. When you play Axis and Allies at that basic level, if you have one player that understands infantry chains and another that doesn’t, the player that understands infantry chains wins.

If you’re doing basic attacks, an infantry costs 3 IPCs, defending has 1/3 chance of destroying an air unit, cheapest air (fighter) costs 10 IPC, so expected 3.33 IPC (more than the value of the infantry) on defense. It’s just expected that you go plus.

But intermediate Axis and Allies involves thinking about multiple dice, threat multiplication, timings, and other things. As seen with that link to aacalc, often you can get surprisingly cost-effective results.

Think about it like this. With infantry chains with UK/US, say you build destroyers in case of enemy sub builds and for defense fodder, carriers, fighters, and transports. Only with that infrastructure can you move in infantry. By the time you move in that infantry, your opponent’s already been doing whatever they’ve been up to, so you have to play catchup. And maybe you won’t win that way.

With mass air, you don’t need anything but the air themselves. Escorts and transports are slow and hard to protect, but air is very fast. Your opponent may not have been able to harden targets early on, then any gains you make from added speed are often leveraged into additional income for you and less for your opponent. And you can reposition between different theaters at speed too. (Off topic, but bears mentioning German mass air against KGF can threaten both sea and land targets, it’s a big part of that strategy).

So think again about 3 bombers 1 fighter against 3 infantry. The median result is fighter lost, 3 infantry lost. Air loses net on the IPC exchange, but just by a bit. The timing against a strong Axis anti-transport-based KGF is US3 to Finland/Norway. But US3 air hits at about the same time, at higher strength, and is not limited to those targets. They can hit closer to the action, against targets in the interior of Europe, emptying enemy territories may let Russia take control of those territories for income - and Russian income is best of all Allied income. If US wants to reposition its units to hit Axis targets in Africa, transports just can’t get the job done well at all, only being able to reach French West Africa then slowly trundle through Africa. Air can hit points in Africa while still threatening targets in Europe, then return and hit Europe the next turn while still threatening points in Africa.

So - was your opponent really engaging in stupid behavior? Perhaps not. Lucky, sure, and willing to press his/her luck, sure. But mass air of itself isn’t necessarily an indicator of poor play.

@Brian-Cannon said in I do not see any difference as far as a change in dice rolls in this season.:

Look at the post by Julius in 1942 online. Season 3 patch notes. The tenor of the response by the Devs seems to say they felt like they had issued a fix.

If you mean the “Season 3 Launch: Patch Notes + Development Letter” at the first link in the first post of

https://steamcommunity.com/app/898920/eventcomments/2845669419703730459/

They never did say they issued a fix.

In “DICE & AXIS & ALLIES” they said they heard and understood players saying the randomness of the dice didn’t feel right. They said they were working on a stabilized dice option. They did NOT say the dice were “fixed”.

In “A DEEPER DIVE ON DICE” they . . . uff. Well, they never did say they issued a fix there either.

@Eqqman said in I do not see any difference as far as a change in dice rolls in this season.:

@Brian-Cannon said in I do not see any difference as far as a change in dice rolls in this season.:

Devs said they were reverting to a model they had used previously…

Yes, so if you didn’t like it before, it will be the same since there are no changes yet to ranked play dice. The nature of the headline of your post implies you thought things might be different for some reason.

It is reasonable to think things might be different.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/898920/eventcomments/2845669419703730459/

Follow the first link in the first post. You’ll see they reference that they claimed to have changed PRNGs on previous months. If someone says they didn’t see a difference in dice, that’s just an observation. Brian Cannon didn’t mention anything about stabilized dice in the OP; it was you that brought that up. Perhaps the poster’s concerns are different to what you think they are.

@Krieghund Thanks. I’ll cite the “Defenseless Transports” on page 17 (for me), when making the case to the 1942 Online developers. Appreciate your taking the time to input, and especially the specific reference - most helpful.

I’m just as pleased that the AAA can shoot down the fighter before the fighter can get any automatic destruction effect. Simultaneous shoot-downs is weird.

Also thanks @Witt of course.

@Krieghund

I’m looking at a .pdf of “Axis and Allies Rulebook 1942 Second Edition”. The unit rules start on 24. I looked on page 24 but didn’t see anything relevant to AAA there. I found some rules on page 25. Could be we’re looking at different versions. Anyways I reproduced the quotes below.

"If a territory containing AAA units and no combat units is attacked,
the AAA units are automatically destroyed.
(snip)
For each “1” rolled, the attacker chooses one air unit as a casualty. These casualties are removed immediately, and will not participate in the remainder of the battle. This AAA attack is made immediately before normal combat occurs in the territory containing the AAA unit. "

Intuitively, I would agree with what you and Witt wrote. It’s how I thought it worked until a few days ago. But thanks to a post on Steam, I ended up looking up the literal rule and I was surprised. Please review the premises and reasoning below.

I consider “is attacked” and “attacks” the same action. Instead of “is attacked” I could write “when a unit attacks the AAA”. Instead of “can fire only at an air unit when that unit attacks”, I could write “when a territory an AAA is in is attacked”. (If you disagree please let me know).

If that IS correct - I don’t see any wording resolving the timing of the two effects. Nor do I see any blanket rule for automatic destruction that states it happens before or after.

If the trigger is “attacks”, I’m okay with that happening before the first round of combat. The rule defines it that way, so why not. But I’m saying the automatic destruction also properly happens before the first round of combat.

Automatic destruction isn’t normal combat. It’s a separate effect.

I think I read said something about automatic destruction effects being implemented to save on needless rolling - maybe on the Larry Harris forum. I don’t have the reference handy. But even if that’s the INTENT of the rule - it’s intuitive, it makes sense - it’s not what the literal rules say.

OR is there some official text somewhere (rulebook or errata) that Iiterally states that automatic destruction effects are supposed to only save on needless dice rolling? If there is, would you happen to have a reference?

I went up and down the 2nd edition rulebook and the errata, found nothing official.

The question is - what’s the OFFICIAL ruling? If it’s a matter of INTENT - that’s another matter.

Thanks!

@Witt said in 1 fighter vs 1 AAA - what happens?:

@aardvarkpepper the AAA fires first . If it hits , it survives. If it fails to roll a 1, then Combat begins and the Ft kills it automatically, as the AAA has no defence roll.

That’s what I thought up until about a week ago when a question came up in another forum and I looked it up. A literal reading of the rules is the AAA and fighter CAN destroy each other because of the “automatically destroyed” special rule.

What I’m asking is if anyone knows of a specific official rules reference that I missed.

This is a 1942 2nd edition question - but the RESOLUTION affects 1942 Online, which is why I want the literal and correct rule. Julius Borosov recently wrote that the AAA gets destroyed and never even fires on the fighter.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/898920/discussions/0/2845669419715663297/

Well, even if we do get a pretty strong consensus on how the 1942.2 board game works, the developers of 1942 Online may still well not change anything, but I still want to know for my own reference for when I play on TripleA or IRL or whatever.

Reading through the rules and errata, I think what should happen with 1 fighter attacking 1 AAA with no other units involved is:

AAA fires 1 shot at attacking fighter. Regardless of whether the fighter is destroyed or not, the AAA dies.

So it’s possible for the fighter and the AAA to both be destroyed. The fighter never needs to roll dice to see if it hits. Even if there were two AAA on a territory (and nothing else), the fighter could be shot down yet destroy both.

I don’t say I like it; it’s counter-intuitive (in any other situation an air unit shot down by AAA can’t do anything), but it’s due to the automatic destruction effect.

I think I read an old post on Larry Harris forums somewhere about automatic destruction - but it isn’t an official ruling (it’s not in the errata) and WotC doesn’t resolve rules questions.

Yes, I expect normally you wouldn’t have a lone AAA on a territory. The question is if you did, is that how it resolves? Is there some part in the rulebook that I missed, and if so, what’s the specific reference and page?

Page 25 “No Combat Value: It can, however, be taken as a casualty. If a territory containing AAA units and no combat units is attacked,
the AAA units are automatically destroyed. AAA units may never attack.
Air Defense: An Antiaircraft artillery (AAA) unit can fire only at an air unit when that unit attacks the territory containing
that AAA unit. AAA units fire only once, before the first round of combat”

(It all happens when “is attacked” and “attacks”. Since there’s no additional wording regarding the timing of effects, I see it as simultaneous, with the effect described above.)