Don’t forget, Germany can grant permission (or deny it) to pass through that straight. So, go ahead and ask! I’ve had games where the German player permitted it, either for a laugh or ignorance, doesn’t matter. There is no reason that I can think of that they should let the sub/russians out, but they can, so why not ask for fun and see what they say?
I don’t think you can ask permission if you’re at war with them, right?
Funny, there actually was an airbase on Malta in Alpha +2 (as well as an air base on Gibraltar!). I believe they were both removed for balance reasons. While it would fit definitely be at home from an authenticity and thematic standpoint, I can’t fault Larry for taking them away to improve the actual quality of the game overall.
Authenticity goes out the window when in every single A&A game (including 1914), the Germans can eliminate the entire British Home Fleet.
@Hunter:
I would also like to point out that 6 Infantry and 1 Fighter is the standard UK 1 buy.
Why would this be better sealion defense than 9 infantry?
It’s not, but it does produce a unit that can do more than turtle.
Concern:
USA sends units to Moscow via Trans-Siberia railway.
To counter, Japan occupies Soviet Far East, violating treaty and forfeiting 5 morale.
Thus, treaty is worthless unless US/UK units not permitted in Russian tt.
Can’t the Japanese navy block that?
It seems unfair for the Axis to get a mulligan for bad rolls but not the Allies. If you lose the Paris battle, you should concede the game.
What are the Russian mass assaults and aggressive commies strats? And what are the orange cloud and blood waters Japanese strats?
They just sent out a rulebook draft in the newsletter today.
I think it was $45 for a while now, since I bought it about a week ago. However, when I go to check out, it’s reduced to $31, so definitely a good deal.
Hmm, 46^2+24^2 is greater than 35^2+32^2, so the Anniversary board has a longer diagonal length, which is normally used to measure screen sizes.
@CWO:
@SS:
Will just have to see what new map looks like first.
True. The WotC announcement sounds as if the map is unchanged: it mentions an “Updated A&A rulebook, with errata and rules clarifications” and it mentions “4 new sculpts”, but the other elements listed don’t refer to any changes. All it says about the map board is “Game board (24 x 46 inches), the largest Axis & Allies board”, which is the same size as the original. I assume that the phrase “the largest Axis & Allies board” should be interpreted to mean “the largest single-game Axis & Allies board” because the double-game Global map is larger.
Is the Anniversary board bigger than the individual E40 and P40 boards?
@Imperious:
Axis and Allies is pretty much put on a shelf for the foreseeable future. Thats why WOTC put out all those games in one year ( 1941, 1942.2, 1940 2nd), to complete contractual obligations with Larry.
Pretty sure in 10 years they will make some nostalgia version of AA, but forget 3rd edition this and that.
D-Day was really not a new edition ( well just rehash out a few more copies since they nearly sold out… type of thing). Perhaps 1940 may be released in a new print edition, but don’t expect new ideas,rules,etc
Wait, was there a DDay reprint?
So the first demo was yesterday. Does anyone have news from that?
I know you’re tying to imply that the RAF was crippled by saying it was outnumbered so heavily, but then the fact that it won the Battle of Britain anyway actually makes my point. After it, the RAF and USAAF played about equal roles in the destruction of the Luftwaffe (the Red Air Force had a minimal impact on the Luftwaffe).
UK is a bit of a monster in BM, unlike the cripple it was in the war and is in OOB.
Eh, the UK was pretty powerful in the war. It only looks like a cripple if you ignore navies and air forces and only focus on armies.
I’m on the East Coast for grad school.
Hmm, so do you think the Axis still have an advantage in Balanced Mod?
It seems the Balanced Mod mainly helps the Allies by giving them more income from NO’s, so what are good strategies the Allies can use to take advantage of this extra money?
I actually run through a mock battle in my head where both sides get average hit.
Total the attack strengths of the units (on one side)
Divide by 6
This will give you the average or expected number of hits for each side. Apply the hits, and repeat this process with the remaining units until the battle is decided. This is a little rough, but it will tell you which side is favoured and how much you can expect that side to survive with. This is particularly important if you are trying to calculate the result of successive allied attacks against a single defender.
Sometimes you have to round. 6 tanks + 7 Infantry have a total combat strength of 25. This averages 4.167 hits. For simplicity, just take the attack strength of 24 (4 hits), and add the remainder to that side’s combat strength on the next round.
You can take some short cuts. If the total combat strengths are close, but one side has considerably more units (hot points), the advantage goes to the larger army. Likewise if combat strength and army size are similar the force with big and small pieces will beat the force with all average pieces. But if you want a sense of what survives, it’s better to play the whole battle through.
It might seem like a lot of work - especially if you like drinking the beers or smoking the pretzels. But it goes pretty fast once you get used to it.
One possibility when you have a fractional number of expected hits is to round down for your units and to round up for the opposing units, to give a more conservative estimate of whether you can win the battle with a certain number of units left.
I have solved the case of the homogeneous battle, where every unit on each side has the same hit probability. I found closed forms for the length of the battle in number of combat rounds and for the number of units left on the winning side. I typed it up in LaTeX to make the math look prettier. I have attacked a pdf.
Interesting read. I/we’ve been estimating battles based on comparing 3 factors listed in order of importance.
- number of units
- power
- ‘skew’, the concept that you can throw away low-power-units (infantry) while the defender has to sacrifice high-power-units (infantry).
This was heavily influenced by an old article on these forums by HolKann, and still the way I determine whether to attack/defend/retreat (http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=19854.0). Interesting difference between your ideas is that HolKann claims the number of units is more important than the power; while your calculations show metapower is a multiplication of power and the number of units so they are symmetrically important.
Hmm, well in the case of 3x attacking inf vs 2x defending tanks, OP’s calculation would give the attacker a metapower of 9x^2 against 12x^2 for the defender, and the calculator gives 99% chance to the defender. This supports OP’s model over HolKann’s.
To further prove the model, at least in the case where every unit on each side has the same power, assume the attacker has x units of power i, and the defender has y units of power j. On the first round of battle, the attacker will kill xi/6 defending units, and the defender will kill yj/6 attacking units. If one side loses a greater proportion of its units than the other side, they will clearly lose the battle (on average), so the equilibrium, when the battle has a 50-50 chance, is when (xi/6)/y=(yj/6)/x, or when ix^2=jy^2. Note that ix^2 and jy^2 are the metapowers of each side, respectively.
I’m working on calculating the number of rounds of battle and remaining attacking units assuming the attacker has more metapower. I’ll try to post that tomorrow.