Topics created by Black_Elk

If each victory city is given an IC by default that is 9 additional factories.

Japan at 2 in Kiangsu
America at 2 in Philippines (to Japan in the first round) and 1 in Hawaii (target for Japan)
Britain at 2 in Australia, 1 in Kwangtung (to Japan in the first round), 3 in India (target for Japan) 3 in Eastern Canada
Germany at 6 in France, 3 in Poland (targets for UK/US and UK/US/Russia respectively?)

So far that’s 14 starting production to Axis (if you count what Japan can take in the first round), and 10 to Allies.

That’s 18 factories just on the VCs alone, but you’d still have what, like another 5 factories left over to try and balance against that?

The most significant change from the introduction of the 9 VC factories suggested above seems to be in India and France. But these might be fun in developing a KJF game, or for German Atlantic/Med action. Poland could allow for more aggressive move against Russia, whereas France allows for more aggressive moves against England or Africa. The next biggest change, perhaps even more significant, would be the situation around Japan.

If the Japanese starting factories were concentrated on Kiangsu (VC Shanghai), Kwangtung (VC Hong Kong) and Philippines (VC Manila), Japan’s whole orientation is shifted towards the American thrust. These make sound IC choices over Manchuria, East Indies and Borneo. Those last 3 are all rich in IPCs already, representing the raw materials, but focusing the actual production facilities on Kiangsu, Kwangtung and Philippines is probably more interesting for gameplay, and makes sense historically. Philippines was targeted because of the large bases there. Hong Kong was also targeted as a base of potential British resistance to Japanese designs on the Pacific, and Kiangsu represents all the major areas of activity in the Chinese war since 1937. So it makes sense for Japan to have these territories in their immediate objectives, and also to mark their importance with factory units. This combined with the target VC factories in Hawaii, India, and Australia, and you instantly have a game that is geared much more towards Pacific conflict.

The question from there is where to put any remaining factories. I count 23 total factory sculpts in my box. You guys have the same or is it 24 and I just misplaced one? :)

Anyway, starting VC factories seem like the way to do it, then fix the remaining production where it does the most good on balance. I think you have to fix the production at some number and then not allow additional production to be purchased for this to succeed. Otherwise you end up with that dreaded factory in East Indies that makes the Japanese defense so easy to lock down and allows for a broad launch across the whole bottom of the board. This distribution of factories at VCs would remove the Japanese tank drop factory in Manchuria, but would still allow similar production, just spread out across territories that are somewhat more challenging to defend. Kiangsu, Kwangtung, and Philippines would require more fleet actions and forward coverage to use. They create interesting power projection points, but without allowing such massive drops into south asia. I think it would be superior for the gameplay, over the traditional locations for additional Japanese production, and it forces recognition of all the VCs. Highlights VCs in terms of the actual gameplay, and not just as some extra aside. I think it might work

With the remaining 5 ICs, I suggest the 3 Russian territories Archangel, Kazakh, or Novosibirsk just for the blocking potential mentioned above, and to give the Russians some light early flexibility in the placement of infantry, artillery or tanks.) The other factories I suggest going to Egypt and Alaska, to counterbalance against the starting production advantage of Germany, and the production that can potentially be seized by Japan. Egypt gives another Axis target that Britain must defend (splitting their purchases across a longer line, but also giving them the potential to project earlier), while Alaska can serve as a target of opportunity for Japan, or as a potential spring board the Americans. An alternative to Egypt might be South Africa, if Allies prove to weak to hold the line, or if there are in fact a total of 24 sculpts rather than 23 you could do both haha.

With 18 down on all VCs where would you put the extra sculpts still remaining?

For this to work, I think it makes sense for China to be under normal US control, to prevent the weirdness of starting factories in Chinese territories. To me this has long been the most sound fix for the China problem anyway, to just consider them US controlled like on all previous gameboards. In fact I think I will make a separate post on the China subject right now.

OK I started a legit thread, so we can plan exactly how this should work.
http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=33665.msg1286598#msg1286598

I think it might make more sense to just return Australia to a single territory rather than two.

I have tried games before testing the idea of splitting islands across sea zones (basically a reverse definition) it has the effect of making bombardments more significant, and fleets less likely to engage on attack (they tend to camp defend  relying instead on amphibious.) Splitting islands also increases fighter movement in a somewhat overpowered way, so you have to be careful. I think with an interesting starting unit placement you can accomplish a lot. Australia as a single territory would have greater reach for any fighters landed there, and the scale of the territory warrants it a bit more then solomons.

I think the best approach is to tilt Japan slightly counter clockwise at the southern tip of the island to make more room for ships. And then put the alignment for the smaller islands based of the relative distance between Australia Hawaii and the three major island territories (East Indies, Borneo, and Philippines). I will play up the focus on the key islands (though some of those chains were involved Palau and the Marianas and such. On the whole though I think the stepping stones out of W. USA would be the most interesting way to change the Pacific dynamic. Force both players to defend their coastlines instead of drop south so easily with everything.

Will redraft it sometime on Tuesday when I get a break from work.

Have a nice memorial day

The only way I see to keep the defense against planes manifesto is to provide
the 1 AA roll per cruiser.

Cruiser
Attack 3
Defend 2
Move 2
Shore bombard  3
Special 1 defensive AA first shot @1 against up to 1 plane/per cruiser unit.
Cost 10

In such situation as above,
if Cruiser A3 D2 is added into the mix, 2 units (A6 D4) for example:
Attack 13 Defense 14, 5 units.

A. survives: 22.1% D. survives: 75.6% No one survives: 2.3%

http://calc.axisandallies.org/?mustland=0&abortratio=0&saveunits=0&strafeunits=0&AA=on&aInf=&aArt=&aArm=&aFig=2&aBom=&aTra=&aSub=&aDes=&aCru=2&aCar=1&aBat=&adBat=&dInf=&dArt=&dArm=&dFig=2&dBom=&dTra=&dSub=&dDes=2&dCru=&dCar=1&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=

That way, Cruiser is clearly not better than Destroyer against incoming Submarines.
But you still get a better Anti-Aircrafts platform while keeping his single offensive roll of Shore bombardment.

This can be balance with a 17-18 IPCs 2 hits Battleship.

The 40th anniversary ed of Risk was glorious.  All the little touches like the velvety bags and nice weighty pieces did not go unappreciated. I bust it out on special occassions. :)
I was always very fond of the 1993 board, colors and deck design. The throw back wooden box is nice in its way too, with the generic blocks and tinier map. I sometimes use it with people who’ve never played. But I never got into the modern boards or redesigns. For me the 1812 look fit the board best so those are my go to’s.

For the future of the franchise it’s hard to say, with the rights and who owns what, but I am definitely intrigued by War Room. Axis and Allis is a strong name, so it would be nice to see it continued with input from the designer, but a War Room game that had a similar dynamic to the gameplay, and I’d happily jump ship. Or call it War Room: Allies and Axis heheh, for the left jab. Whatever it’s called I’ll surely buy it and play.

Eager to hear more about the rules and concepts he’s planning.

My friends and I used to feel Axis is strongly favored but after a few games I no longer able to beat my friend  consistently using Axis… :x… perhaps I don’t know how to use Axis well enough…

@Black_Elk:

OK I have updated the link per request, to provide a Low/Medium scale production mod for 1942.2 as well, using ideas outlined in this thread.

http://tripleadev.1671093.n2.nabble.com/High-production-mod-for-1942-second-edition-tp7585507.html

Any thoughts?

I believe Russia at 30 is definitely workable. As a starting income it is much better than 24. A solid 30 ipcs allows for a purchase of 10 inf, or 4 inf 3 tanks, or 4 inf 2 art 1 fighter, or 6 inf 1 bomber etc. To get Russia up to 30, you don’t have to mod the start values nearly as much. Though I do suggest, if trying this out, that we just bring the values of the valueless territories to 1, since this activates the Pacific and gets away from the idea of even needing spaces at zero for this game to still work fine. :)

I propose the following, for all Axis and Allies games going forward: If a territory is not worth 1 ipc, then don’t put it on the map! If it is important enough to be on the map, then it is important enough for a single ipc. If not, it should simply be collapsed into another territory.

I really agree with you on this.
A zero IPC territory have no interest in itself, unless someone put a big fleet with Transports around in a prep-step for an invasion of a more important territory, besides this, it is a deserted area. And if any player have to choose between a zero and a 1 IPC before going further, he will prefer to fight for something instead of nothing.

I’m with you on the bonus staying pretty simple. There’s enough going on in Axis and Allies attached to the VC and worded as an objective bonus. Kind of primes players for the concept of an NO generally, if they like to move on to other games like AA50 or the 1940 games, so I like that aspect from a teaching perspective.

Its interesting you mention adding set factories to 1941. After AA50 I became very interested in the idea of just setting up a board with all the factories already in place, and removing the factory as a purchasable unit from that game. 1941 does the job for you in a way, by eliminating the unit from the roster, which makes the game a lot more straightforward. Especially for new players, its just one less thing you have to worry about (where to buy a factory, and how to exploit production etc.) When we first started trying to adapt 1941, we played a number of set factory games.

First idea was to just give each power 1 additional factory, but set in a place that would make sense for the period, but also be relatively balanced/entertaining.

We put it up to choice between a few different factory options for each power…

So for the Russians the question is between Archangel and Karelia?
Archangel factory has a potential upside for Allies in that it’s one space further from the immediate eastern front, but the downside is that its closer to Moscow if Axis control, and also closer to Japan via Urals. Still contested out of sz 4. Karelia provides some interest in that it gives G another early target, and an early foothold that it can use in sz 5 or sz 4. This draws more attention off Caucasus, but I think ultimately Karelia goes to Axis advantage, since Germany can get the drop on it so quickly. Archangel gets another round.

For the Germans: Italy seemed the obvious choice on balance and for the history.

For the British: Egypt, South Africa, or Canada? Its kind of a tough call here too, but the consensus view seemed to be that Egypt was simply too overpowered, and made the med too “do or die.” South Africa also felt a little overpowered, but did have a kind of classic charm to it, reminding me of many games in Classic where the UK would use that strat. On balance though Canada is a lot safer for Allies. It has a less dramatic impact on the opening round, and can be very helpful in rebuilding the royal navy after Germany sweeps it up. UK is under a lot of pressure already with production split up various places. The British are more likely to be torn between purchases if you put it in Canada, which has a kind of novelty.

For the Japanese: Manchuria. Manchuria is the only candidate really from the history, for what the Japanese had going in Chosen and the resources from Manchukuo. This gives Japan 6 production, on par with the other powers and able to match W.US production into the pacific. Basically Japan is less nerfed if they can hold it. The problem here though is the scripted attack on Manchuria on R1. This is the favored play for KJF already, but putting a factory in Manchuria just puts a big target on it. I’m not sure its necessarily a problem because it kind of reminds one of Zhukov in early days, albeit anachronous hehe. Japan can usually retake the territory on J1, so its not much of a problem and takes the first round production boost out. Just sets off an early pacific fight basically, encouraging Russia to send the fighter to China and try the Japan crush gambit.

For the Americans: Szechwan, Philippines, or Hawaii?
I favor Hawaii for the history, and on balance. Philippines is more a gift to Japan. Szechwan in like a built in burma road bonus, but throws off the china balance more dramatically if taken. Hawaii is kind of out of the way, but it returns an American advantage in Pacific production 7 vs 6 Japanese production. Its a target to split Japan off focus on India and Moscow, so I like that aspect.

Basically you could let each player choose if you want to show them the advantages or overpowering exploits of production in different places. Or teach how cliff hangers can tilt to be all one sides over places like Egypt and Szech and Karelia. One additional factory to each player 3 Allies vs 2 Axis, is fairly straightforward. But then you basically revert it to a fixed production type game. It has the advantage of restricting and focusing everybody equally by the inclusion of new production elements.

1941 is a fun board to play around with because it’s set up is so fast and relatively simple play time, provided you include Artillery. The artillery unit is essential for this map to be fun :)

Or how about this as another possibility. Instead of the Bid, Allies can move 1 factory to a new location.

For example, Russia could move the Karelia factory to Vologda. UK could move the factory from India to Eastern Canada, or Egypt, or South Africa.

Might work as well, for producing new strategies without breaking the first round battles.

Yep, that’s why both destroyers have to be sunk. If the transports in sz 11 survive its ok, the attack on London is still a go, but in sz 10 you really need to kill the destroyer and the transport (so UK can’t bring the Canadian tank to defend the capital.)

It’s a pretty tall order.

The alternative to all this, is what you might call the “Late game” Sea Lion. Where you try to slowly build up a surface fleet without drawing too much attention, and then drop a bunch of transports all at once, to exploit a weakly defended London. But there is no real consistent strategy for how that can be accomplished, since so much will have changed by the time you get into later rounds.

I’ve been reading these posts with great interest. I wanted to share the results of my first solitaire game. Hopefully, I can find a couple people at the local game store who want to play this simpler version.

I played w/ USA at 15 ipc. I just made Hawaii and Alaska worth zero. I figured there was a mistake somewhere, but I hadn’t read the official changes announced by Krieg before I played. But, I did immediately include artillery in this game. It seemed glaringly apparent that Russia, at least, needed that option. It helped, because Germany had to march their artillery from Berlin. I played hundreds of games on GTO and used many of the opening moves for A/A Revised in my solitaire game. Here were the opening moves:

R1 - Attacked W. Russia w/ 5 inf and the fighter. 1 inf from Kar, 2 from Arch, 2 from Moscow. Russia did pretty good, wiped out the Germans, and ended up w/ 3 inf occupying W. Russia. If Germany had rolled well, I would’ve retreated to Moscow. I then abandoned Caucasus, because there was no way to hold it without losing all of Russia’s tanks and the plane to a German attack. Attacking UKR on R1 just seemed like a disaster waiting to happen. I also moved all 3 inf from Siberia west to help counterattack Cauc, or to go where needed. Letting Japan wipe out those 3 guys on J1 just seemed like a waste.

G1 - Sunk the USA trans w/ sub. Sunk UK carrier and fighter with 1 fighter, dd, and sub. DD and sub sunk. Sunk UK BB and sub w/ BB, sub, and 1 fighter. BB and plane survived. Amphib’d Egypt w/ 2 inf, tank from N. Africa, 1 fig, 1 bomber. Ended up w/ tank in Egypt. Landed planes in N. Africa. Took Cauc w/ 1 inf. Hit W. Russia w/ 6 inf and 4 tanks. Taking Egypt was huge. Killing that UK tank helped Japan. Holding W. Russia strong kept Russia from retaking Cauc.

UK1 - Retook Egypt w/ India fighter, bomber from London, 1 inf from Australia, 1 inf from India. DD and sub went with the 2 trans to Egypt. 1 inf from India fell back to Middle East. India was abandoned.

J1 - Amphib’d Szechwan w/ 3 inf, 1 tank, 4 figs, and bomber. Used BB bombardment, but didn’t know that isn’t part of this game. No losses. Took India w/ 1 inf. Took NW China w/ 2 inf from Manch, since Russia retreated. Took E. Indies w/ 1 inf, trans, and carrier. DD and trans attacked UK fleet off Egypt. Lost both ships. Moved carrier to E. Indies w/ 1 fig. (My mistake. Should have left the trans to its fate.) UK destroyed them on UK2 (Desperate attack, due to situation, UK lost both ships too).

US1 - Moved fleet to Alaska along w/ 1 inf and 1 tank. Built dd and trans in Atlantic. (Lost DD on G2, but got the sub.)

The game then ground out. I turtled Moscow. Russia dead zoned W. Russia w/ Germany, which worked well w/ the artillery. But Russia was slowly worn down. At one point, 3 UK figs and 2 USA figs were in Moscow, but had to use US figs in naval battle outside Tokyo on US3, because US sacrificed trans on US2 to take Manchuria w/ inf and tank. Japan wiped out US troops in Manch on J3. USA and Japan wrecked each others fleets on US3, but USA BB survived. It took several turns for UK and US to get troops on the ground in Europe. German airforce stayed in Cauc for several turns, until they had to fly west. Japan’s army slowly got ground down fighting UK in Asia and a USA amphib in Central China, because all money was spent trying to rebuild fleet to sink US BB. Germany took India to stomp out the UK. Eventually, German BB sunk US BB outside Tokyo. Desperate 1 BB on 1 Axis attack that sealed the Allies’ fate. Moscow fell to Germany the same turn from a massive attack on Moscow.

In the end, I saw that the Axis would win, but it would take a few more turns to build up for Sea Lion. I think the Allies had a decent chance of winning after Japan’s navy was gone, but German BB put an end to that dream. It was fun. I’ll update on game #2, as I incorporate the new setup revisions and give the USA 17 ipcs. The last comment I wish to make is this: artillery, artillery, artillery. Hopefully, the designers will include this in the game. It’s not that complicated to use them.

Oh thank goodness! because that was really starting to melt my brain when I read it.
All is right in the universe again, thanks guys :)

Max Fighter buy on India is an interesting idea. I’ve had two more games since my posts the other day and will consolidate my experiences in the other thread I started. I did a KGF and a KJF both with slightly more success than my ‘traditional’ strategies.

I play with the same guy constantly so I think sometimes it puts me in a bubble in terms of seeing variations in Axis strategy. For instance, he’s never even tried Sea Lion.

The attack on SZ 37 typically succeeds with anywhere from a Cruiser + Fighter left, to Fighter only, to mutual destruction. A failure that leaves his Battleship, and I’d be tempted to surrender Round 1. Not something I’m proud of, but, Allied Round 1 is a precarious thing and adverse results with Russia or UK Naval efforts near India to me are unrecoverable. At least against this guy.

What he does Round 1 with Japan is he parks his transports in SZ 61, staging for a Round 3 or Round 4 take, out of range of Fighters on India. India has to follow the traditional retreat from Burma Round 1. So the 3 fighters, while providing defense power, will offer little in the way of threat to his Navy. I guess it’s nice that they can get to Russia next round, but, I can have Fighters in W. Russia in a single round from UK and that’s usually where I need them most anyway.

I should also add he is a very conservative player - he will never attack without overwhelming odds, whereas I’ll gamble routinely. So there’d never be a situation where he lands on India, my fighters survive, and hit his Navy. He simply wouldn’t attack if there were a chance of that. Similarly, his surviving transport in SZ 61 will be immediately reinforced and remain so, negating a Bomber zerg raid….

More thoughts about Allied fleets against this particular player in my other thread. Unless you’re talking about an Allied Fleet as in, INDIA building a naval fleet?

I will say, as to the rest, that there is a clear Russia Round 1 sequence of attacks that you mentioned in the other thread that absolutely must succeed, and also, Russia can’t lose West Russia for at least 4 rounds, offering plenty of time to convey Fighters over from UK, stop in W Russia , and continue on down to India. On balance, I’m not sure it changes things all that much to put the UK fighters there so early, since W. Russia shouldn’t seriously be threatened enough early on for it to matter. To compensate for 3 fighters round 1 India, you’d need a heavy ground force buy India round 2, especially if you’ve transported troops away to reinforce Africa etc…

Anyway let me lay out a few things in the other thread that may shed light on how I better managed India in both recent games…

I believe this thread below maybe looking for some ideas here and concept such as “double dipping”.
So I bumped it to reactive this TT income bonus thread.
Re: House rule proposal
http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=38261.msg1563914#msg1563914

Yes Black Elk there needs to be a polished, turn-key, easily-played and down loaded version of A&A fully endorsed by Larry Harris and Avalon Hill. It would bring in thousands if not millions of players into A&A. Go to and brick and mortar game store and they almost snicker at the mention of A&A and yet we have a huge but almost unknown community. A game as polished and "store-bought’ as the Hasbro version or like a Facebook or Google Play App game would bring A&A into the next century. I like to think someone is listening.

How about America gets the ability to launch bombers from aircraft carriers. (They cannot land on the carriers, but they can launch from them.)

This ability is only available in the Pacific and if at any time the American fleet is stronger in the atlantic than in the pacific, it is lost for the duration of the game. (Fighters are air assets, not naval assets, even on aircraft carriers.)

so the game should go for how many rounds? 6, 7, 8?

i think 7 or 8

The only buying bombers with Uk and such is pretty evil for Germany and Italy espescially if you throw in Heavy Bombers and long-range aircraft it gets worse but Radar and Aircraft carriers would help defeat the bomber menece.

imho if japan hits india j2 ,  he can easily set up a southern front against russia. much faster from here, than through china or up north :D much faster than wus attack. can pop out 5 units each turn at burma/india at j4. he doesnt need to defend theeseIC’s against chinese cannonfodder so 25 ipc each round go rolling to caucasus from then on, leaving japan enough for pacific/china

how fast can uk/us set up serious invasion of france/ italy ?

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)

Great , black_elk, I’ll start giving you + karma’s, soon you will be a legend