Best posts made by Chris_Henry

Thanks for the feedback Argothair. Best way to make things matter is to bounce ideas off each other!

Sorry in advance, I meant to/should have been more clear in my original post on a few of your questions.

@Argothair:

1. What does it mean for the Free French to have “a government set up in London?” Can they build units there? If Germany occupies London, do they loot the Free French treasury? With 4 IPCs / turn in London, will any new Free French recruited during the game typically do anything other than garrison London? It seems like it’s hardly worth a pair of British transports and an escort to get, e.g., 2 French inf + 2 French art into the action, because they can’t attack jointly with the British, but on the other hand if you save up for a French transport and French escort, then you’re talking turn 10+ before the Free French start landing troops on the front lines.

Should have been more clear on the Free French. Yes, I meant that they would be able to build units from London. I think it would be fair to also have Germany loot their treasury in the fall of London as well. You’re right, 4 IPC’s a turn isn’t much. But if you wait two turns, get 8 IPC’s and build a transport, it’s only one move to French West Africa with the naval base, from where you could further support the Allied effort in Africa. It’s not much, but the way I see it those 4 IPC’s wouldn’t be used otherwise unless taken by the Axis and retaken by the Allies. Couple extra infantry or mec, etc. once every couple of turns couple potentially help in the defense of Egypt, or at least help blunt a potential breakthrough of Italians if they take Egypt.

@Argothair:

2. What happens to the French navy?

I meant to answer this above, maybe I forgot. The French navy in SZ 93 would become Vichy, the destroyer in SZ 72 and the navy in the Channel stay Free French (thought the channel navy is probably dead).

@Argothair:

3. What happens if Germany (or Italy) invades and conquers Southern France before invading Normandy, or, for that matter, before invading Paris?

This was the question I thought would come up. To make Southern France the Vichy capital it could be similar to the liberation of Paris by the Allies. Once Paris falls to the Axis, the earlier mentioned Vichy territories revert back to Vichy control if they were in Axis hands before. So they could take Southern France if they wanted, but it would fall back to Vichy. This one could certainly be tweaked, but could work.

@Argothair:

4. Even if the Vichy troops stay loyal 50% of the time, i.e., on a roll of 3 or less, why would Germany bother to build them? Wouldn’t Germany be just as happy leaving southern France empty?

This can be answered two ways I think. 1) The French player controls both Free French and Vichy forces, Vichy can’t do anything anyways, and France just needs to do what makes the most sense for the defense of French territory, or both sides could decide together what is fair to build. 2) You let the German player decide, and you’re right, they could decide to not use the money, but then that’s still 9 IPC’s (7 if we just assumed Japan takes French Indo China) a turn that won’t get used for anything at all. Germany could decide that’s the best course of action, or take the gamble that the units will fight for them.

@Argothair:

5. Do you really want to make it impossible for Hitler to invade France before the Allies land in Morocco? What if the Allies ignore north Africa – is Germany just stuck with a whole bunch of neutralish French territory on his doorstep for the entire game?

I must have worded that wrong. I didn’t mean the Hitler couldn’t invade France. They still take Paris and Normandy G1, but after that and there’s a Vichy government the rest is generally an ally. This is very true that the Allies could just bypass North Africa and you’re right, Germany would be stuck with neutrals. But that money still wouldn’t be used against them any way at least. We could add that once the Allies attempt any landing in Europe the Axis can have the right to decide to attack Vichy territories or not. If they want the money badly enough at that point they’ll do it. Or if they like the security of North Africa being untouched they can do that.

@Argothair:

6. Have you tested the impact of Vichy on Sea Lion? Does Germany wind up with noticeably more troops in Normandy that can be used to invade London on G2/G3, or is Sea Lion still balanced?

We admittedly don’t have a ton of Sea Lion attempts in our games, but have tried it. True, a few less German troops have died by not taking Southern France (if any). But you’re also taking 7/9 IPC’s away from the Axis treasury each turn that would maybe normally be spent building two INF a turn to help defend on the eastern front while Sea Lion is attempted. Add in the 4 IPC’s of the Free French in London, and there’s an extra Allied INF a turn in London to help defend as well. Seems like kind of a wash to me, though would have to be tested more to see.

Hopefully those answers make sense. But again, the input is appreciated. The crux of it is that there’s an 11 IPC/turn swing (+4 to the Allies, -7 to the Axis), as well as the unknown of what Vichy units might do when presented with combat.

Nope, the rule is that Militia can move 1 within Soviet Home Country. So they could not move to attack anything outside of the USSR original territories.

@mrgoatcheese

Expanding on what GHG said here. The Home Country does not expand. It is only their original territories connected by land to their capital.

Russian Militia may move/attack within any original USSR territories once at war with a major power. They may never move/attack anyone outside of any of their existing original territories.

That is definitively the official rule, as they’ve been asked that question before!

I agree with that. I actually never liked that all the DEI money went straight to the Commonwealth (assuming the attack on the Netherlands thrusts the UK into war right away, that is). This makes a lot more sense to me too.

@ABWorsham4 I haven’t used it in any games as of yet! I think there’s a couple reasons for it.

1. Literally I think we almost forget it can be done at times haha.
2. I think our group gets so involved with what needs to happen in Europe/the Atlantic, that it’s just not thought about a lot to do.

I think it should be explored more though. I hadn’t really considered a surface ship, as you have done, but submarines for sure. If it’s possible to get to the Pacific and convoy allied shipping there (if Japan isn’t at war yet, at least), I think it could be really smart.

Germany could be helping Japan without Japan even being at war yet. If Germany is at war with the West (UK/France), then they’re also at war with FEC and ANZAC, and maybe even the Netherlands (though probably not smart if Japan isn’t fighting yet). They could convoy precious IPP from the FEC and/or ANZAC, making things difficult for the Pacific powers to buy in preparations for war with Japan. I know the FEC especially might feel it if they have to build a destroyer or two to go on convoy patrol when they may well need those extra forces on land.

I haven’t played with this expansion at all, but using the Gruppe Monsun Expansion would certainly make this a better idea too.

@Caesar-Seriona I think you need to re-read the rule, it does not say you can only send to one nation. What the rule states is that, when you do Lend Lease to a nation, you can send that nation one unit or up to half that nations income. But you can do that same process multiple times.

Language from the book here:

7.8 Lend-Lease: During the Production Phase nations may lend money (IPPs) or military
equipment to other Major and Minor Powers.
Requirements: A nation can lend-lease to a nation under the following conditions:
(a) The receiving nation is at war with a Major Power or,
(b) A special circumstance (e.g. Spanish Civil War) allows a
nation to lend-lease.
A nation may not lend-lease to itself or to Aligned minors (since
they are technically also part of that nation). Britain cannot lendlease to the FEC or ANZAC.
Declaration: A player must announce his intention to lend-lease at
the start of the turn. You may lend either;
(a) Up to half the receiving nation’s current income in IPPs (not
counting bonus income), rounding fractions up. Or,
(b) One military unit. Such a unit must be produced at a factory in the Home Nation
specifically for the purpose of lending. You may not lend-lease units already on the
board.

It does not specify that you can only Lend Lease to a single nation. So that might help clear it up a bit. The USA can Lend Lease to China, USSR, UK, and Free France all in the same turn if it wants to, for example.

I guess I still don’t follow the logic on allowing Free France a free reign to take out Vichy though. I’m not saying the money from Vichy makes or breaks Germany winning, but it just doesn’t make any sense to allow the Allies to just take all the territory essentially for free while Germany can’t do anything about it. But we may have to just agree to disagree on that one. :grinning:

Seattle, WA! Typically play with my brother and dad, hard to find a lot of time with all our work schedules (and now my wife is pregnant too). Love to bust it out though when we can!

Yeah, the only way to do this, without using any expansions, is for France to build a naval base on French Somaliland. There’s a railroad connecting French Somaliland and Abyssinia already in the game, so an added naval base there would allow this.

But yes, this of course would take two turns to complete, and is too late by that point.

@Boardgame-Medic I’m shocked the USSR would waste the unit on lend leasing down there. Propping up Abyssinia does nothing for the Comintern war goals, and units are so precious for them early in a game!

I think this rule was just put in there to add “potential flavor” to the Abyssinia war in the event Italy messes up and doesn’t take them out turn 1. But any Italian player really should never let that happen!

@GeneralHandGrenade Thanks GHG, as always, for the clarification! I figured that was probably the case, but didn’t feel I had the ability to say definitively!

@Broken-Mortar I agree, that would seem like a lot for them to get!

Interesting takes from you both. This could lose focus, but I do like historical discussion :)

I think you both have valid points on the historical aspects vs. game play realities.

Britain’s and France’s alliance, at least in the form we know it as it concerns WWII, stemmed in 1938-1939 after the Munich Conference. The alliance was really geared towards stemming German/Italian expansions in Europe. I don’t think Japan/Asia was really much of a thought or concern. That probably stems from a number of things, a couple being a contemporary belief in Japanese/Asian inferiority (even with Japanese military success in the recent past), as well as being largely unaware that Japan would eventually harbor the ill will to fight the Allies. They didn’t join the Axis until 1940, remember.

That’s all to say that I agree with GHG, in a historical context, that Britain and France were more concerned about issues closer to home.

All that said, from a gaming perspective, I do agree with Dran here. In a hypothetical reality where Japan preemptively assaulted the British Empire in Hong Kong, Malay, Burma, India, etc., I think it’s very obvious France would have gone on high alert, fully realizing their Indochinese colonies might all of a sudden be in jeopardy. We of course cannot know this, since Indochina was occupied after a Vichy government took control. But I think reason dictates there would have been a heightening of fears in the French Empire.

In that regard, it would have been nicer to have seen a bit more of a peacetime income increase for a situation like this, I agree. But at least there is that +1 IPP for Japan attacking a Neutral UK.

@insaneHoshi Good point on Militia as well! All those and my own points are just to show that there are certainly other things you can do to reinforce areas. Another example for India would be, if you’re feeling really pressured, the South Africa factory is a transport away from shipping more reinforcements to India if you need/want it.

My point was that there are times where you need to “think outside the box” on what you can do to help yourself and/or to hurt the enemy. There’s certainly ways to do it!

My other suggestion would be to maybe add different expansions to your game that might have more of an anti-Axis slant to them. I’ve always felt the Partisans Expansion, as an example, probably “hurts” the Axis more than the Allies or Comintern, since they’re the ones occupying a lot of territory for large parts of a game. That might help “rebalance” in your eyes and games too.

@GuamSolo to answer your question from my perspective, I’ve seen some help to the Soviets, but I would say it depends on circumstance and theater. If I’m the Allies, or particularly the Americans, I’ll send units to the USSR earlier in a game and/or if the USSR really looks in trouble. It hurts the Allies more to have the Comintern defeated quickly/early. An Allied player should want the Axis and the Comintern to bog each other down as much as possible. This will take resources away from building up or focusing in the West, but would also in most circumstances be blocking a lot of VC’s from being attained by either side. I’d say the last quarter of a game I wouldn’t consider it. At that point I think a lot of things are drawn in the sand, and your couple extra units won’t make or break a Soviet victory/survival. But that’s also circumstantial as well I’m sure!

@insaneHoshi good points all around. I wasn’t think big picture when you said that. Of course others would have to be at war to Lend Lease. So yeah, that makes it a different situation anyways. Still though, just goes to show there are a plethora of possibilities!

Interesting thoughts. I feel like everything above is why I think it’s actually a pretty good rule where both sides have benefits and detractions to signing or not signing.

To the point above about Eastern Poland. If the Pact isn’t signed, what’s to say that the German player doesn’t wait to use it’s Lightning War ability until it’s ready to swallow all of Poland in one turn? I think there are enough ways around that to make any British buildup avoidable.

Likewise, to the points on Romania, let’s not forget that Romania’s military is no so unsubstantial. Frankly, if I’m the German player, and the Pact isn’t signed, and I see the USSR preparing for and then attacking Romania, I’m seriously considering waiting for the USSR to waste their troops attacking Romania and then declaring war on my next turn. The USSR isn’t that strong earlier in a game without more IPP. This obviously depends on how a game is going, but I think there’s a lot of room again for a German player to anticipate this move and lay in waiting to exploit the loss of Soviet units in Romania before sending a counterattack.

If the goal for the USSR is to have a bit of money and avoid a front against Finland, why not just ignore Finland then? Sure, you sacrifice 1 IPP with a signed Pact. But you still have 1 IPP for East Poland and 1 IPP for the Baltic states, not to mention the 3 IPP for signing the Pact, for a total of 5 IPP (not including the free tech roll), as well as keeping Finland neutral. If you don’t sign, you get 3 IPP for taking Romania, maybe 1 IPP for the Baltic States, and 3 IPP for Finland if you take it all, for a total of 7 IPP. If you add the free tech roll, this comes out as a wash IPP-wise, but you’ve also now expended IPP on troops lost in your invasions of Finland, Romania, and the Baltics. But yes it is noted the 5 IPP that the German’s get each turn as well if it’s signed.

Even then, the USSR player may not even get the 1 IPP for the Baltic States, as if they take Lithuania, wouldn’t that trigger the Allied ability to declare war on the USSR, as Lithuania is a Neutral Power that doesn’t border the USSR? Maybe that rule has been errata’d, I seem to remember a discussion on that very thing somewhere on the boards before, but can’t remember what the decision was.

I guess I just see a lot of upside to signing the Pact, though can also see reason’s why you might not want to. I think it probably has to come down to situationally in each game. It frankly probably depends on what German troop placement looks like, and if the USSR player thinks they can correctly guess what Germany’s next moves will be.

I’d have to agree with @Didier_de_Dax in basically every way. From point out that Germany gets the IPP, to Vichy’s recruitment rolls, and Germany’s ability to Lend Lease.

I think the most important point he makes that the potential alignment of Vichy France is essentially Case Anton. Case Anton wasn’t really planned for unless the Allies attacked Vichy French territory and/or Vichy collapse seemed imminent from other events. So allowing Germany to preemptively attack Vichy is actually what would seem wrong to me.

Similarly to your point on reinforcing Southern France, it would also seem unfair to allow the Germans to just lay in wait for whenever an allied attack might come. But if you’re worried about it, have a reserve force on hand in Paris? And again, don’t forget you can Lend Lease to them.

But the point was also made that Germany does not have to create Vichy in the first place! So if you want to attack them, don’t create in the first place.

-Vichy gets a free recruitment roll of “2” each turn (as long as Vichy posses Corsica and Southern France, its capital) until he is aligned with germany (when the allies or commintern declare war on Vichy, if they are also at war with germany, something that should happen every games).

I maybe disagree with the bolded text from @Didier_de_Dax though, but please debate me if you disagree! Why do you think the Allies and/or Comintern should attack Vichy every game? In my mind, the Allies might be better off allowing the French internal conflict to play out for as long as possible. I’d personally rather not allow Germany the ability to posses/use the Vichy units by forcing alignment by Allied attack. Sure, if Vichy colonies have been liberated and all that’s really left are Vichy home country then maybe, but to me the internal conflict benefits the Allies more!

@gen-manstein Haha you’re probably right. I like to think it’s just taking on way too many projects at once. My guess is it’s somewhere in the middle. But true that in the end it is a business trying to make money, and the best way to do that is to pump out products at the cost of some QC’ing.

Fortunately, v3 only added territories, so we didn’t have to worry about merging multiple setup units into one.

And most of the new territories are easily distinct, even without lines (which we went in and marked up later).

Oh wow, I don’t know if I realized there wasn’t any setup changes. Well that’s nice then. I didn’t know if the added London city territory, for example, would cause you to have to decide what units would be placed there or in the lower England territory. Pretty convenient there.

We also assumed that every territory has a minor port, because ill be dammed if i have to set all those up.

Hahaha that’s pretty good. Honestly, one of my reservations in V3 was the different dockyard/shipyard/ports. There’s so much on there now and a lot to remember. But a great houserule to just give everything a minor port for ease!

I think most of the terrain features are there in v2. I think we skipped on jungles and desert however as they are missing IIRC.

Got it, that makes sense too then. My biggest reason for wanting the new map is specifically because of the Jungle and Desert terrain, but if it wasn’t for you guys then no point on that front!

I think it might include minor things like

• Is Iraq Connected to the Ocean?
• Is Burma Connected to China (via passable terrain)
• Is Western Australia Mountainous from the sea (Rondel to Rondel terrain tracing doesn’t work for amphibious assaults).
• Do we really need minor ports?
• Updated Rondels
• Here would be my dream, built in battle boards on the north and south sides of the map. Get their image for the battleboard, set the opacity to 50% and set it to the bottom and top.

Certainly what I would call minor as well, and is what I hope it would be too! But I think you and Manstein are right, I should get V3, and if I want V4 later that cost isn’t enough to make me not get it!

The battleboard would be neat, but I’m like Manstein overall, we just use them on the sides. But I get the convenience of having them printed!

And @GEN-MANSTEIN, what an incredible table. We don’t have the space for this as of now, but I think we all are hoping to get there sometime!

@athawulf So you’re saying you don’t think you could use the Buffer Zone Territories as part of Worldwide Communism then if Buffer Zone wasn’t attained, correct? Sorry, I read your message funny, so just wanted to be sure we’re on the same page.

I can certainly see that. I think the rule should say for Worldwide Communism "and are not potentially scored as part of another Soviet Victory condition. Just saying scored definitely can imply what @JbuckBuddy was saying, but adding that word “potentially” takes away all doubt, at least to me it does.

And that makes sense, because I think you could argue that a Soviet player might intentionally not take a Buffer Zone territory in order to get more victory objectives via Worldwide Communism. At least I would. Just don’t take Estonia or something like that, then take all the rest to get multiple Worldwide Communism victory objectives. So it makes sense to me that you couldn’t do this by restricting the rule to mean just as you say.

Anyways, just my two cents. I think that word “potentially” makes a world of difference in rules clarification here.

To piggyback a bit on what @Trig just said, the screening force rule was an added part to V3, that is useful. But not with the same initial force.

As he said, you can have a force in a sea zone, Force A, and split that force in two, Force A1 and A2. You can then combat move Force A1 into a sea zone to engage Force Z. At the same combat movement phase, you can also declare that Force A2 is is going to move past the sea zone of Forces A1 and Z combat to engage in an amphibious assault elsewhere. Obviously, this move can only happen if Force A1 defeats Z in combat. If they lose, Force A2 has to stay put and cannot follow through on the amphibious assault.

It’s a way to stop a single destroyer from blocking an entire fleet. I tend to like the rule. But yeah, it requires you to decide ahead of time how to split that initial force between what is going to attack the screen, and what will move past it.

It’s not unlike having to chose which ships engage in a sea combat in a sea zone where you are also hoping to amphibiously assault. You need to split the naval forces between what kills the defending ships. and what you want to have engage in the amphibious assault via shore bombardment.

I hope that all makes sense.

@gen-manstein

Ya plus u still have to repair so
Much of factory before u could even build.

This is why I’m not too concerned about allowing them to be moved. If it’s really worth it to you to move a damaged factory, using your rail movements, and to still have to repair it later? More power to you I suppose.

But I like your rule/idea/concept of realizing that keeping factories damaged and thus unable to move will weaken Soviet abilities to defend Stalingrad, or another stronghold, later on if Moscow were to fall. It certainly adds a different dynamic to the strategies both sides would take!