I just played my third game of AA50-41, using the current info, and without the National Objectives, the set up seems to heavily favor KGF. I’m not sure we can get away with having them as optional.
What sort of patterns are you guys seeing?
Oh also, for those of you who are playing with the NOs, how many are seeing G go after Karelia in the first round?
Right now I like 8 inf and 1 bomber for Germany.
Hit the British Battleship in sz 2 with the Subs, Bomber and Norway fighter for a clean kill.
Baltic sub and 1 fighter to UK destroyer in sz 6 (with inf and art to back Norway or NW Europe). 1 Fighter to strafe Baltic or W. Poland (land NW. Europe to cover sz 8 ), 1 to strafe/take Ukraine (land in Bulgaria to back the Afrika Corps/Egypt round 2.) 1 tank and 1 inf from France to Libya. Most of the Armor can be used to secure France and Northwest Europe, since the major counter push against Russia doesn’t need to happen for another round anyway. AA gun, 3 inf, 2 tanks, 2 fighters in NW. Europe; 3 inf, 2 tanks in France. This basically scuttles the Baltic fleet, but provides a very strong incentive for the British to trade what remains of their own surface fleet, giving the Italians more breathing room. I think with that much air in range (the bomber and fighters at Norway/Northwest Europe, and the new Bomber in G), you might be able to force the Brits into a naval save, rather than risking a counter strike from the Luftwaffe in the second round, or bomber Blitz on London.
Not 100% on this one yet, but it feels pretty good right now. The Eastern Front seems like a rather different sort of game than what we saw in Revised, since G is so short on fodder, and Russia has no punch in the first round. Going to be like a 2 or 3 round build up before the war kicks into high gear. Even if our info isn’t 100%, I like what I’m seeing so far. This game should be a lot of fun for the first 6-8 months here.
Will be interesting to see what everyone else comes up with. :)
Assuming the current set up is accurate, I like this buy for Japan: 1 transport, 2 inf, 1 art and 1 tank
Airstrike on the British India fleet (2 fighters, to land on carrier in sz 37) as well as the US Battleship at pearl (4 fighters to land in sz 62). The Cruiser and Battleship to knock out the US fleet at Philippines. 1 inf from Carolines to Borneo with the naked transport, 2 inf from Carolines to East Indies with the destroyer to cover. 1 inf +1 inf from Okinawa/Japan, and 1 inf + 1 tank from Iwo/Japan to either Manchuria or Bury, depending on what the Russians do.
On the mainland you only really need to hit 2 Chinese spaces in the first round to screw them out of the third inf unit, so I favor Fukien and Suiyuan or Hupeh since they allow you to land the Formosa fighter in French Indo China, and the Manchuria fighter either in Kiangsu or FIC depending on how the attacks go.
Assuming reasonable luck, that should leave Japan with 2 transports (plus the new one for a total of 3) along with 2 carriers and 3-4 fighters in sz 62 (or you can land one in Manchuria if extra defense is needed), and 1 carrier and 1-2 fighters in sz 37. With no immediate threats in the next round, you have the option to expand in whichever direction seems the most advantageous (depending on what the US decides to do.) If the UK goes IC in India, it shoud be fairly easy to take by round 3 or 4, if not then you can hit the Russians instead, or continue to push across the South Pacific, provided the USA doesn’t stay and fight. Either way you’re poised to pick up 2 NO’s by the end of the second round.
I think Norway is going to be much more important to Germany under this set up, than it was in Revised. If the AA50-41 info is correct, I’m going to be sinking that British battleship every game, and moving a good portion of the air defense from France to Norway, at least for the first round. Seems way too easy a kill to pass up, and at least that will shut down any immediate threat to Scandinavia, while still covering Russia and the critical sea zones around the UK/North sea. The situation on the eastern front seems a bit slower on the uptake, especially with no Russian air, so I think its probably best to concentrate on England first.
Right now I’m liking the 8 inf 1 bomber buy for G, since they have very little infantry fodder at the outset. At least according to the current info/set up. Maybe even two rounds worth, before seriously pushing with the armor.
What buys are you guys looking at for Germany?
I just don’t see what possible move you could make in the first round with Germany or Japan that would deter an allied player from going after Germany, if that’s what they want to do. Even if you’re sending all your Jap fighters to Berlin and bouncing around the globe like a straight pro with the Emperor… Even if you bid a sub in sz 8, or do some crazy naval build scheme with G, I just don’t see what you can do to take the initiative away from the Allies like that. I’m skeptical, and will likely remain so until someone actual explains this Axis ploy that forces the KJF game.
I’m all ears.
:)
What type of email account to do you have? If you want I can send you a gmail invite. Most of the regulars use gmail to communicate for A&A related stuff, and to play PBEM (since it organizes all the dice rolls into conversations, making them easier to check or delete in blocks.)
When you save a game it should have the extension .tsvg
so autosave.tsvg or Elk-v-Jen-Germany1.tsvg
something like that
Then you just place that file in the ‘saved games’ folder of your tripleA directory. When you launch the game (PBEM) you click the tab that says ‘load saved game’ and then choose the file you want to use. When you’re finished rolling you save out the file, usually with the current player/round listed, and send it back to your opponent.
When your opponent sends you an email with a save, you might have to right click and ‘save target as’ (and then send it to the saved games folder of TripleA) so that the file doesn’t open with a different program. That sometimes happens with the xml files anyway. But usually the email exchange is pretty easy to set up.
If you want I can help you troubleshoot it and get a quick game going. Just let me know
jasonwclark AT gmail.com AT=@
:?
Well I don’t see why my attitude (condescending or otherwise) should have any influence on the game set up. Its not like my bad attitude is going to determine whether a basic strategy is optimal or not.
I might not be a noted KJF player, but I certainly enjoy a good pacific game as much as the next guy. I’m sure I’ve played just as many KJF games as you have, and I’m familiar with the standard openings. If you want to convince me that I’m totally mistaken in my assessment of KGF v KJF/CJF, then you’re going to have to do a little better than just telling me my statements are ‘absolutely untrue’. Why should I trust your judgment? Where are the arguments and counter points?
:)
Most of the statements I made are old news by now, and accepted as the conventional wisdom by many of the best players around. Now that doesn’t mean you can’t play an effective KJF game, or that if you play a KJF game that you’re not a skilled player. It might be the more entertaining of the two basic strategies, but among the most cutthroat of expert players, it simply cannot compete with the straight up KGF game.
The axis can indeed determine whether the allies go KGF or KJF.
How?
Seriously, you’re going to have to back that up with something, if you expect it to have any traction with me. :)
I apologize if my tone seems curt or condescending, that’s not what I was going for; but also try to appreciate that I’m not exactly green with this thing either. I’ve been playing Revised A&A to death for 4 years now, against some of the best players in the world. I’m talking about cats like AllWeNeedIsLove (who I credit with developing the first serious, publicly discussed KJF strategy) and other Revised luminaries, who teased out many of the KJF openings, which others have since adopted. I know all about landing the Bomber in Novosibirsk, and the fighter to Bury or Pearl. I know about sending the carrier to block at Philippines, and when to bounce back to Africa instead. I understand when its wise to buy an IC and when it isn’t, and what the Russians have to do in order to make either situation work out properly. I’ve seen the KJF endgame many many times, and I’ve also seen how it differs from the KGF endgame. I’m not just talking out of my a** when I make blanket statements like the ones quoted above, they come from a lot experience and serious consideration.
Believe me man, I get what you’re trying to say in response here, and I really do wish that there was a KJF game as strong as the triple team on Germany (that would make me very happy), but I just don’t believe that there is, at least not in the standard Revised set up. If you adopt a KJF gameplan, you are taking on more risks than you would by adopting a KGF gameplan. That’s why I say its the weaker strategy; not because weaker players are the ones using it (some of the most skilled players I know, have worked very hard for a long time to develop competitive KJF strats) but because those guys also realize that the KGF game is dominant for a reason.
That’s why we always seem so grumpy and opinionated whenever the issue comes up again, because this really is a critical problem (the pacific imbalance I mean), and something that desperately needs to be corrected. That’s why I speak with such forceful language on the subject, because as far as I’m concerned, the jury is already out on this one. To suggest that the KJF game is truly on par with the triple team of G, is just misleading, and it does little to encourage the designers to fix the underlying problem. See what I mean?
Again, I’m sorry if I come off sounding brash or stubborn sometimes. It’s really not my style to denegrate a player’s abilities (if you ever play a game with me, I think you’ll find I’m rather easy going) and I try to make more constructive contributions than destructive ones, when I weigh in on an issue like this. I just sometimes get frustrated, that more people don’t understand why Joe is so frustrated, because to me it seems very clear at this point.
That’s all I wanted to convey really.
I’ll go crawl back under my rock now.
Insert Quote
Well, for one, the system refuses to open anyone’s file sent to me, it just reports it as corrupt and closes down.
That sounds rather weird. Is this a problem just with playing via the forums? Most of my games are in Real Time, or to a lesser extent in PBEM. If you can log into the lobby though, I can host a live game for us to play. I can’t imagine in that case why we’d need to ever open or send any files back and forth. For the corrupt files, I’m not really sure what would be causing that. Perhaps someone else in the lobby will have more tech know how than me though, and be able to provide some insight to help you fix the problem.
For another, I want to see the entire map on the screen without scrolling.
I’d also like to have the power to put my pieces in the territory where I want them, not have them shuffled seemingly at random as I move units into and out of the territory. (I like infantry, artillery, armor, fighters, bombers and at sea, fighters, carriers, battleships, destroyers, submarines, transports with transported equipment to the starboard side of the transports.)
Mmmm I see what you mean.
I’m rather the same way with the units, especially on the real game board. I like to have the pieces all organized and facing the right direction. Aesthetically, I think tripleA is something of a disappointment in that regard (because the unit locations are all preset in the placement picker utility.) It has something to do with the code, that I don’t really understand, but the end result is that there is only a certain number of possible locations for the units and they switch to and from them depending on how many there are in a space. If the units spill over into a neighboring territory then there is a little black line to show where they really are, but I agree, its not the sweetest looking thing in the world.
The user interface is also a little cumbersome, with right clicking to scroll, and the text being hard to read when you zoom out to the see the full map. It is possible to zoom out to the full map under the game options, it just doesn’t look as clean. I’m not sure what we can do about that at this point, but I can tell you Zero Pilot and I have been pushing for a sweeter looking map from day one. Its possible ComradeKev will be able to help us implement some new ideas though, so I’m hopeful that something might actually get done this time. We don’t have a shift drag thing, but there is a control click to select a stack of units (or single left click for individual units.) Sometimes it can get a bit unwieldy, but its not as bad as it seems at first.
IPCs, techs, VCs, and TUV (total unit value) is all tracked in the stats window below the minimap. I’ll be the first to tell you its not the greatest looking, but I believe all the critical information is there. What sort of tracker would you like to see exactly?
And while we are in the process of making TripleA worth using, let’s add support for national advantages and maybe even AAR:Enhanced though at the moment, National Advantages and LHTR 2.0 National Advantages would be leaps forward so significant it would make the moon landings seem as significant as finding a hot dog at a baseball game.
But that’s just one girl’s opinion on the matter.
Totally
National Advantages are something I would also like to see. Right now we do have some flexibility in this area using the Edit Mode, but I know its not the best solution. Still, the engine is much improved from the versions that were out even 6 months ago. I’m hopeful that renewed interest following the release of AA50, will spark some new development. Now would be the time to post suggestions on the dev boards I think. Since Kev seems to be pretty receptive to a lot of the ideas floating around right now.
Just let me know if you ever want to take another crack at it. Its probably not comparable PBEM, or PBF, but for the Real Time game with a quick set up I think its still a pretty useful little application.
:)
Its all gravy :-D
You know he’s talking about AA50 here, right? Not saying he’s right or wrong, just trying to clarify.
Perhaps I latched onto something that wasn’t really there. But I agree with most of what Joe said, so I wanted to lend some extra weight to his arguments. It seemed to me that Funcioneta was bringing Japan into the discussion, as some sort of counter point to the things Joe said, which I don’t understand at all. I know he started out talking about AA50, but the conversation appeared to drift back to the big dilema, which we’ve been dealing with since Revised/Classic. We don’t even know for sure what AA50 is going to look like yet, so I’m not sure whether we can trust anything having to do with strategy at this point. Japan has no relevance to the KGF game in Revised though, that’s the whole point, and the reason for all our frustrations.
I don’t believe that there is an effective counter to the KGF opening in Revised, and I’ll be surprised if we hear anything new on the subject at this late stage. By all means though, do enlighten us. What is this counter to the KGF game that you haven’t finished polishing yet?
:-)
If we’re talking about AA50, then that’s a different story. Are we even sure that abattlemap is 100%? I noticed that Larry has not yet responded to Blue’s post about the 41 set up. Maybe its true what Funcioneta suggested elsewhere, that the current speculations based on the Gen Con photos are not accurate.
ps. I’m no stranger to internet sarcasm myself, and I sometimes come off the same way. I almost never take it personally though, especially when its a game we’re talking about. Hence the excessive use of smilies
:-D
pps.
You and your edits. :-P
I’m constantly editing. Haven’t you noticed that yet?
I usually post first and then edit for grammar/clarity. I try to not to make any substantive changes after someone responds, but I think I was still editing while you were posting. Bad habit, but its the way I operate.
Sorry for the confusion
You misunderstood my post, I was asking that guy what his “counter” to KGF is, not what KGF is :-P
My bad. When you said “before playing CJ”, I read the emphasis incorrectly. I thought you were speaking to him rather than Funcioneta. Seems 03321’s criticism about careful reading tonight is more on point than I wanted to admit. I should have payed more attention to who was asking the question. :wink:
I wonder if the release date was extended because something we posted here may have been overlooked by play testing requiring a change in the setup?
That would be really encouraging actually. I would happily accept a delay on the release, if they’re really using this as an opportunity to fix something that is busted with the rules/setup.
I think you should re-read his posts and try again.
:|
I read it the first time man.
I don’t usually spend 15 minutes typing a response to a post without first considering what it says.
I think there is not much chance for allies even playing a traditional axis strat against KGF. Japan is simply too powerful in a KGF strat, playing Japan traditional or innovative. I think the only slim chance allies have of win is building fleet at California
You are playing a rather different game than the rest of us, if you think that the only chance the Allies have of winning the game is to build a fleet at California. Sorry, it just makes it hard for me to follow the rest of what you’re saying when I hear suggestions like that.
I think my score in league this year is 9-4, 10 with allies (all of them KJF, score 8 wins, 2 loses if I’m not wrong). In fact, I’m worst at face to face, there is less time to think.
In Revised, I’ll simply don’t let you make a KGF. I have discovered a counter for KGF in Revised a couple of weeks ago.
The point I tried to make is that it is always up to the Allies to determine which kind of game is played (KGF/KJF). There is simply nothing you can do to change this as the Axis player. I find it hard to believe that Funcioneta, or anyone else for that matter, has hit upon on a Japanese strategy in the last two weeks, that has somehow eluded the rest of us for the past 4 years now.
So what’s this strategy? If you don’t want it public before playing CJ, can you just PM it to me? I’m curious
The strategy Joe refers to is common knowledge. We all call it the “KGF” game for general reference, because there are a number of different variations on the same basic concept. All of them involve ignoring Japan (within reason), and concentrating all attention on Moscow/Berlin. Its the easiest way to win as the Allies, and impossible to counter as the Axis without either considerable luck in the first round, or a pre-placement bid. That’s why almost everyone gives the Axis player at least 8 ipcs to make things fair.
To Funcioneta- No offense, but I don’t think your gaming experiences are representative of the norm. Japan rarely has any control over which strategy the Allies adopt, and certainly nothing that can halt a concerted KGF strat. If you’re seeing more KJF games than KGF, I suspect that you’re just not playing against very skilled opponents. Either that, or they’re just so bored of ‘business as usual’, that they are intentionally adopting the weaker strat just for the change of pace.
To Constantinople- Everyone here understands and appreciates that the game is a lot of fun to play with newbies, and people who have not yet learned how to break the set up. That’s not a problem as far as I’m concerned, because the game will always be essentially the same/entertaining for the uninitiated. The problem is with those of us who have played this game to death, worked through all the major strategies, and understand how the underlying mechanics work. Among that crowd, once you’ve been shown how to exploit the set up, you will understand why KGF turns the game on its head. The reason why we get frustrated is because the same basic problems have been with this game since Classic: and, everytime a new version comes out, we make the same sort of recommendations, only to be ignored again. There are core issues with the Classic and Revised games that are not being addressed in AA50. At least not according to the information we have right now. Its a bummer for people who have remained loyal fans of the game for all these years, because the issues have been discussed at length by different people from different groups, and given enough time they all end up arriving at the same conclusion: basically that the game does not do enough to encourage a fight in the Pacific.
As a casual player, you might not have seen before just how busted the Revised game can be using the Out of Box rules, but, once you’ve seen the optimal openings, its hard forget them. It might not be an issue in your players group, but for many of us, this horse has been beat to death a hundred times over already. Something major needs to be done (either with the unit set up, or the IPC distribution, or the rules for Victory/Capitals) and its not clear at this point whether the AA50 game is going to deliver. Joe’s views are fairly typical for those of us who went through this process when Revised was first released. If we seem skeptical now its just because many of the issues we raised then still have not been taken care of.
I think its pretty reliable, maybe not as straight forward, but I think it grows on you the more you use it. I wouldn’t hold out much hope for a decent AI, but its pretty easy these days to hook up with other opponents in the lobby. What were the issues you were having? Maybe I can help
jasonwclark AT gmail DOT com
where AT=@ and DOT= .
:)
Or keep an eye out for “Triplelk” in the lobby.
Would be fun to get in some multiplayer games with the people over here. I could camp out there and help you guys work through some the issues.
I don’t see the point of having any territory at zero IPCs.
If its on the map, it should be worth at least 1
Well why don’t we just draft a proposal to Larry, and then have everyone sign it?
At least that way he’d have something to show the guys at Hasbro, and be able to say “OK this is what my hard core fans say they want.” At least it would be a start.
:)
I agree to a certain extent with Nuclear, that the game is best played with the raw recruits. But from a design standpoint, you want to keep the base players happy first and foremost. Revised Out of the Box is only broken among those of us who know what we’re doing. I’m sure the newbies will be perfectly happy buying Factories in France, rolling for Tech, or building a Russian navy. Thats all fine, but those are not the people you want “playtesting” the game. For playtesting you need experts; people who will understand how to break the game.
That’s the only way you’re going to catch these problems before the box hits the shelves, and the best possible way for us to get the job done is to play online in real time. Its considerably faster and easier to do than with any other method of play. Hell, I played 3 games tonight already, against 3 different people. You just can’t do that face to face. Maybe in a tournament you could pull it off, but those are hard to organize, less consistent, and also there’s also no guarantee that the best players are even going to show up. Right now, the best players in the world are playing online, in PBEM games, or in Real Time, with the assistance of the computer. All that marketing stuff you guys want to do - selling the individual pieces and game packs etc. - all that will be 10 times easier to organize, once you have all those people gaming together in one central location.
The PC/Console game is the first step, then you do the board. Doing it the other way around, you reap none of the benefits and inherit all of the problems. Its also more expensive and confusing, requiring you have to put out amendments to the rules, or institute a bid, or put some other kind of band aid on the problem. Better to deal with all these issues before you start handing the board out to a gang of total neophytes…
That’s not playtesting, or playbalancing, that’s just playing the game. You might be able to lull some useful information out of it from a market survey perspective, but its not going to help you shore up problems with the basic game mechanics. For that you need people on the team who actually know what they’re doing.
- Control- This is probably the more important issue in this discussion. They don’t want that much input from the outside.
Larry brought in a select group of us to do some preliminary playtesting and Hasbro/WotC wasn’t totally down with that. In the end it still happened, but then our part was over and the playtesting focus shifted to the people at WotC.
Which means that things were changed by them after we were done. Some for the better, some not.
It all boils down to control. They have and they like it that way.
Here’s the problem as I see it: There’s just no way that a small group of playtesters, even an expert group of highly informed and experienced playtesters, is going to be able to tease out all the flaws in a set up. The reason has everything to do with the fact that players mimic each others strategies, and piggy back on each other’s games. This is especially during the preliminary phases of playtesting.
I’m fairly sure I can imagine what the process is like: Larry probably has certain notions about the way the game should be played and ties to design the set up accordingly, but then the players spot a weakness in the set up, and start doing something different, that he didn’t anticipate. Eventually someone breaks the set up (ie discovers the optimal opening/counter opening) but before there’s time to fix it, the game is already slated to be shipped out.
That’s the problem with conducting all this playtesting Face to Face: its just inefficient and takes way too long. Even PBEM testing would be faster, but I feel like we could do so much more if we had a official computer translation of the board. You could still keep the control at the highest levels, but at least do a serious public Beta test, before you send it to the presses. I gaurantee you, in like 3 weeks after its release, someone out there will on a strategy to break the set up. Then we’ll have to institute a standard bid (like we always do) and try and correct for the imbalance. We could do all this before the game is even released though, if the suits would just get behind us on this one. I’m really surprised that there hasn’t been more emphasis on the PC end of things, especially since half of the people buying the new stuff next month, probably only learned about A&A via the Hasbro CD game. I mean, if it wasn’t for that thing, we probably wouldn’t even have a Revised game to play.
The future is online. A&A needs to snap to it, and start making the most of the new format.
As soon as you put ships in the Baltic, a smart allied player will just stack London immediately and prepare to back it with the US.
I don’t see how anyone gets ‘Sea Lioned’, except on the cheap shot Tech roll. Unless your opponent seriously drops the ball, or doesn’t know what they’re doing to begin with, its extremely difficult to take out the UK in the second round. Damn near impossible in the third. Its not the kind of thing you can really plan a strategy around, though if you’re discrete about your naval build up, you might be able to catch someone off guard once in a blue moon. The problem is, if you bid a transport in sz 5 and make a heavy transport build on G1, then the Allied player has to be a complete moron not to realize what he’s up against. If you play it smooth, you might be able to keep a carrier alive into the 3rd round, but then you’re playing a whole psych game with your opponent. Building ships as G is more of a rookie play, so you almost have to convince the other guy that you don’t really know what you’re doing, in order to slip the naval build by them. There’s a reason why the more experienced players focus on the Luftwaffe or Tanks though. Ships tie you down and have to be defended, and more often than not, you’re fighters just end up at the bottom of the sea along with any carriers you might have bought. Also, when Russia is indomitable on the Eastern Front, its much harder for the Japs to press the attack, which almost neutralizes the added pressure you’re placing on the UK.
I don’t know, I’m not going to say I’ve never seen it happen, but usually if someone manages to snatch London, its because of some oversight in the allied defenses that is exploited, more than any grand strategic planning by the German player.
Another possibility (and I don’t really recommend this, but I have seen it done) is to save your cash with Germany so that you can spend 80+ ipcs at once. A save-move will always draw suspicion from the Allied player, but it sometimes gives you a few more options than you’d have with a more prolonged build up. And if it doesn’t work out, you can always just drop a massive tank stack at the last minute, instead of committing to a navy. Again though, saving is not something I would usually recommend for the Axis, because the clock is always ticking.
:)
We need to make the computer game first, then playtest the rules under the new format, before committing them to the physical gameboard.
It will save time and money in the long run, and the games will be much easier to playtest. Doing it the other way around makes no sense to me. You’ll always get in way more games playing on the computer than you ever could face to face. Most of the people using tripleA and abattlemap were able to break the Revised game within just a few months of its release. People on these boards and others (Joe et al) were able to spot problems with the set up almost immediately.
The best way to improve the design and create the strongest game possible, is to have open Beta Tests. And the only way you can do that is with an online game. I think this is the most important step for the A&A community to make. We need a PC or Console game to organize around, and then playtesting would be a breeze. Larry could set up the conditions, run it through a test, and then consider the feedback all before a single mold has to be cast. You could take pre-orders through the site, much like we have set up here. I think it would be the best thing for the franchise, but you have to open it up a little. Give players more control, set things up like they do over at the Vault http://nwvault.ign.com/ or similar sites for games like Total War, or AoE. No reason why we shouldn’t be able to set up something similar for Axis and Allies.
Its fine Italiansarecoming, just try to be a little more thoughtful when responding to threads in the future. Like, before adding a one line response to a thread, first think: “Is this really going to contribute to the discussion at hand?” and then if it doesn’t, consider not responding, or responding via a private message instead. Its fine this time, just remember that the forums are for everyone and they get easily cluttered. Instead of weighing in on 8-10 topics each time you log in, just respond to the top 2 or 3 threads that are the most interesting to you. Try for a full paragraph, and remember to double check it before posting, that way your thoughts will come across with more clarity.
:)
None of that has to do with the current topic of discussion though. Here, let me quote myself from the previous page, just to get us back on track…
:-D
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’m a pretty laid back player, not nearly as cutthroat as others in my gaming group, so I’ll be a little more flexible with tech rules than some people I know. For example, my house rule OOB is No Tech until round 4 or later, which preserves technology advances more as a feature of the endgame (either for the coup de grace, or as a desperation move to attempt some kind of recovery for the underdog.) Still, its very rare to see tech rolls happening with experienced players, because most of us recognize that rolling for tech essentially breaks the game.
The problem with Tech strategies is that, if you fail to roll properly, then the game is usually over right there; and even if you do succeed, the effect is often the same, forcing a rapid conclusion to the game. So I feel, if you’re rolling for tech in the first three rounds of play, its like a slap in the face to your opponent. Sort of like saying “I don’t care enough about this game to take it seriously, so here’s a wild gamble to make sure it ends sooner rather than later.”
I have a similar attitude towards the purchase of new Bombers: they’re a slap in the face to your enemy. Its like saying “Hey, I don’t respect you’re abilities as an opponent, so I’m just going to blow these 15 ipcs on another bomber, since I know you won’t be able to counter it properly anyways.”
Tech rolls and SBR strategies are more likely to push the game in an unhappy direction, where one person leaves feeling bitter and probably less inclined to play against you next time. You’re better off treating your opponent the same way you’d want to be treated (e.g. not exploited on account of some broken gameplay mechanic) and not only will you find that your games are more entertaining, but you’ll also learn more about the underlying patterns in the process.
:)
Rolling for Heavies under the ‘Out of Box’ rules in order to cripple Germany with bombing runs is just weak sauce gameplay. It’s lame in the same way that rolling for Long Range Aircraft with Germany in the first round in order to take London is lame. It’s a cheap shot win.
The Out of Box Technologies in Revised are totally broken if left unmodified, we all know this already and even the designer admitted it when he put out special tournament rules to address the problem. That’s all I meant went I said no ‘serious’ players are going to respect such a strategy. The only way to play the game with the OOB rules, is to play it without technology advances.
I would still council against bomber purchases, even in LHTR rules though. It might work on occasion, but losing a bomber to AA fire sucks it hard. All it takes is a single 1, and you’re screwed. I think you’re always better off with 5 inf, or some tanks, or a transport, or a fighter. Only strat bomb when you can’t find something else to do with your bombers. You will win more games than you lose, and those games will also be more satisfying for both players.
:)
