Posts made by dinosaur

I think the UK has to be patient and let the Japanese step in it.  In the early turns the UK player may want to get as many boots on the ground as possible.  If they don’t attack Japan then they can enjoy one NO (+5 IPC) for holding Hong Kong and Malaya, they can work toward their second NO for holding the four islands (Java, Sumatra, Borneo & Celebes), and they can position themselves to help China keep the Burma road open after Japan makes the first move.  Unfortunately, UK can not help China keep the road open before turn number three, but after Japan’s second turn you should be able to turn on the heat.  It doesn’t matter if Japan attacks you after their second turn or third turn; the US gets the same money.  It only matters if they attack on their first or second turn.

Likewise, I think the ANZAC forces need to do the same thing.  Be patient and let Japan step in it.  But boots and get them on your islands.  Especially for ANZAC, it is probably much more efficient to buy infantry than artillery and tanks and stuff.  ANZACs big problem is they need a lot of transports to do anything and transports can’t be used a cannon fodder in this game.  Therefore, they will need DDs and SSs.

If possible, I think it would be understandable to bait Japan with a DD or an unprotected bomber or something.  As long as the US loses less than 40IPCs in the bait, they are fine cause they will get a net +.

Japan needs to do two things on their third turn if possible (assuming they didn’t fall into taking the bait), they need to take the Philippines and try and take Hawaii if possible.  This will deny the US the most income.  Next they need to take one island from the UK group and one from the ANZAC group.  This will reduce the combined income of the Allies by 20 IPCs.  Japan should be able to close the Burma road and take Hong Kong too.  Now the Allies have lost 30 IPCs.  Things look very balanced at this point.  The Allies have to work together to stop Japan from many more gains.

I think we need to be patient before we all start jumping on the Japan bandwagon.  First off, I think a lot of folks are bringing too much baggage to this game, trying to play it the way they played the original AAP or the way they play Revised or something.  For my part, I started by looking at the victory conditions.  As long as the Allies hold 3 victory cities they are still in the game.  In the earlier AAP, the Allies had to get moving or japan would overrun India or win on VPs.  I think US can wait a little to gather a competent navy before throwing itself on the Japanese.

Next I looked at the NOs.  I suspect playing well requires you to maximize your income from the NOs while denying income to your opponent(s).  The NOs do have a tendancy to force you into a particular line of play which follow some historical timeline.  I hope that making the most of the NOs will allow ANZAC to make a difference, but who knows?

Third, I think these new rules regarding submarines, destroyers and convoy zones will create a new angle on the economic model inside the game.  We can’t sub-stall anymore.  Now we have to “destroyer-stall.”  But Destroyers cost 8 IPCs.  And we can’t use trannys as cannon fodder anymore.  I think there will be a lot of revelations in how certain objectives may be obtained.  Look at the game as a marathon and not a sprint.  Maximize the income from NOs and learn how to use the new units and tactics this game introduces.  And if all else fails, we’ll come up with the Mother-of-all-House-Rules!

Merry Christmas guys!

Roger,

I am playing a study game just to get a feel for the rules and the lay of the land in this new version.  Just as in AA-Guadalcanal, you have to forget what you think you know and read the rules and play a few games to get things straight.

In this game I moved two infantry from Malaya to Borneo, moved the other tran to India and moved most of India forces to Burma after a strong Japanese opening against China (no Japanese losses).  Now the three UK warships are next to Malaya to block Japan hoping to buy time to get more infantry from India onto those four islands for the NO bonus.

I think your idea is interesting because Japan did bring the heat to China and they need some help quick.  Even with Szechwan having 10 infantry and the Flying Tigers, Japan could capture it next turn.  The Burma Road is already closed and Chinas income is down to 8 IPC.  I am looking at releiving China using the land route through Burma, but you may have a good solution too.  It does look a little expensive to me to buy an air base at this point and I am using the money to put boots on the ground.  Let us know how it turns out.

Did I miss something in the errata?

It seems strange to me the UK and the ANZAC forces both start with infantry on Malaya.  Are they holding a strategic conference to decide Pacific theatre war plans?

Krieghund, I agree with this understanding of the rules.  I am also quite impressed with the way subs have been given a new look in this game.  I’ll save my other opinions for a different thread.

I paint my pieces.  Since I have other copies of A&A games I can paint some Japanese fighters J-Navy Green with a red stripe near the tail and red dots on the wings and call them Tac Bombers.  Later, I plan to pick up a set of 1:700 Jap navy bomber planes from the hobby store and paint them.  I will use my painted bombers as the Navy planes and use the provided bombers for land Tac Bombers.  I know this solution doesn’t work for many other people.  I’m just throwing it out there for folks to consider.

Similarly, I like the idea of getting my hands on some Monopoly hotels and painting them to be my minor ICs.

I agree with everyone that not having enough Tac Bombers for the game at the start it a gross oversite.  Let’s hear it for FMG.

Merry Christmas fellows.

We got ours today.  Can’t play it before Christmas cause its goin under the tree.  I can see when FMG gets his pieces we are going to make the granddaddy of all House Rules for this game.  I love the huge board.  Now I just need some quality pieces.  Merry Christmas, guys.

And a very Merry Christmas to you my friend.  2010 will be the year of the FMG!

@Brain:

The real solution would be for FMG to make the games we love.

My thoughts exactly.

I am giving a Pac40 to my son at Christmas.  I assume we will use pieces from our other A&A games until I paint some of these.  I am quite sad to hear of the errors though.  I am sure I have enough paper IPCs to play without worrying about the chips, but I think the chips instead of money is a good idea.  Do they have enough money chips?

I am going to buy a set of FMG pieces, so the shortage of specific pieces is just a temporary annoyance.  I do think WOTC is playing us.  This is such a shame.  How long before a “correct” rulebook is avaliable here?  And then how long before a printable map?

This question is even more difficult to answer because the situation was different for different nations.  The Russians were able to fight a defensive war and learn from their mistakes when they took the initiative.  The US had to learn on the job in Africa, but then had to fight an enemy that was on his own turf defending (which is usually a 3:1 advantage).  The British also were pretty green when things started and had to fight on someone else’s turf.  The Germans learned on the job early against modest opposition, and was able to fight for most of the war in a delaying operation on their own turf (or captured turf).  However, the Germans had to deal with the “underground.”  I’m no WWII scholar, but I’d have to say the Germans were the best trained going into WWII.  Another difficult question comes from the fact that the Germans often had the better equipment (e.g. Panther vs. Sherman).  Even with inferior equipment the US had some great victories in armor battles.

Frimmel,

You make a good point about being able to rapid deploy a cruiser for the difference.  The difference of less than half an IPC can be misunderstood though.  The problem is that there is a good possibility that one side or the other will be wiped out (or effectively wiped out as happens when both DD get damaged, or one killed and one damaged, or of course, both killed).  There is a 4/36 chance both DD will “leave the board” against one CA, an 8/36 chance one DD is killed and an 8/36 chance one DD leaves the board.  There is a 12/36 chance the CA will be killed, and another 8/36 that the CA will leave the board.  So there is a (20/36 x 20/36 = 400/1296 = 31%) chance both sides will feel some loss of IPCs and have ships leave the board.  The more I look at the game, the more I conclude it is a series of big gambles.  That may capture the feel of the campaign for the real command decisions.  I still have a lot of matchups to work out.  The problem is that many of these won’t come up in a game.  It is the battle that includes a BB on each side, 3+ CA on each side and 4+ DD on each side, possibly with TRNs too, and lots of fighters that will be killed.

I like the kangaroo and I’m not offended that it wasn’t used during the war.

I do want to see ANZAC pieces in a new color with matching dice.  Is there an Aussie color close to the color of the British pieces?  The color does need to be reasonably distinguishable from the Brits though.  White doesn’t do it for me.

I have other thoughts on the Aussies, but I can’t bring myself to risk hijacking the thread.

Thanks for your good work on these projects FMG.

Here is a set of results.  I intend to edit this post a few times as I add more situations.  Check back every week or so.  Negative numbers are bad for the force shown in the second column.  D=destroyer, C=cruiser, B=battleship, f=fighter

0.00  D vs. D
0.61  D vs. C
2.85  D vs. B
0.94  D vs. DD
0.37  Df vs. D
0.76  Df vs. C
3.33  Df vs. B
2.09  Df vs. DD
-0.44 Dff vs. D
-0.36 Dff vs. C
-0.44 DD vs. C
2.65 DD vs. B
-1.69 DDD vs. D
-1.48 DDD vs. C
1.96 DDD vs. B
-0.40 DDD vs. CD
0.13 DDD vs.CC

I remember twenty or thirty pages ago he said something about am Army Group marker similar to a task force marker for land units.

I am very pleased with the developments of the FMG project, but I hope we don’t make the project too cumbersome with the recent scope creep.  I am certain FMG will give us the most they can as quickly as possible.  Lets make sure he sells enough to keep the project going to the end.  Talk to your friends that play, both face-to-face and online.

Yes, I am taking resilience into account.  Although can you ever really quantify the damage of having a cruiser sent back to the base card to take three turns to get back into the action?  On turn 4 in most games a damaged ship is as good as a kill.  When I award points for a damaged ship, I just give it the 2 IPCs it takes to repair it.  BTW, I am also taking into account the position on the battlebox for hits.  For example, when rolling four dice against three DDs there is a quirk in the damage chart.
1, 1, 2, 2 is a kill for all three ships, but
2, 1, 2, 1 is a kill for two ships and one damaged
Also, when the three DDs are rolling three dice at the CAs you can get the following possibilities:
2, 1, 2 is a kill for both cruisers, but
2, 2, 1 is one kill and one damaged cruiser
Things like this make it a very cumbersome calculation.

One more thing, before I said that when you add airpower to both sides of a 3-DD vs a-CA battle the DDs start to become strong.  I suspect it takes quite a bit of air power to make that happen.  The problem is that both sides start getting lots of AA dice when fighters are added to both sides.  Adding two fighters to both sides in a 3-DD vs 2-CA battle gives the DDs 7-AA dice and the CAs get 6-AA dice.  In most battles there wouldn’t be any air left to change the sea battle.

I’ve only computed a dozen or so including:

1 DD  vs  1 DD
1 DD  vs  1 CA
1 DD  vs  1 BB
1 DD & 1 Ftr  vs  1 DD
1 DD & 1 Ftr  vs  1 CA
1 DD & 1 Ftr  vs  1 BB
1 DD & 2 Ftr  vs  1 DD
1 DD & 2 Ftr  vs  1 CA
1 DD & 2 Ftr  vs  1 BB
2 DD  vs  1 DD
2 DD  vs  1 CA
2 DD  vs  1 BB
2 DD & 1 Ftr  vs  Something?
3 DD  vs  1 DD
3 DD  vs  1 CA
3 DD  vs  1 BB
3 DD  vs  1 CA & 1 DD
3 DD  vs  2 CA

Well, that’s 18 matchups so far.  Anyway, I expect to make a big post about it in about a week.  It started as a curiosity about whether 3 DDs (15 IPCs) were better than 2 CAs (14 IPCs).  It turns out that in a head to head matchup the 2 CAs are worth less than half an IPC more than the 3 DDs, but it is only because of the neglect of including air power.  While adding 1 Ftr to each side might still leave the CAs ahead, I suspect adding two or more Ftrs will give the DD force an edge.  One very surprising note is that while or course one DD vs one DD is even, if you add one Ftr to one DD, the other side gets the advantage in IPCs.  This is because the short sided team gets an opportunity to kill 8 IPCs but the heavy side only gets a chance to kill 5 IPCs and the short sided DD gets to shoot at the Ftr first.

Anyway, I am enjoying the exercise.

A long while ago we had a debate about the power of air units.  During the debate I performed an analysis of the power of air units used against some number of transports and destroyers.  Since all ships have an AA capability of 1, there was no need to consider whether the ships were destroyers or cruisers.  Battleships would change things a bit because of the “free hit.”  But the analysis gave us enough to draw a few conclusions.  Recently I played a game of Guadalcanal and I wondered about the true effectiveness of cruisers vs destroyers and/or battleships.  I decided to break out the pencil and paper and do an analysis.  I will post some answers when I have a few cases worked out.

BTW, when it comes to ships only, 2 cruisers (14 IPC) are better than 3 destroyers (15 IPC).  When you add air, that changes.  One Battleship is better than 3 destroyers too.

I have been playing a game of GC to the death.  It is a kind of casual thing.  It appears the game will take much longer.  We have certainly not played anything close to an optimum strategy on either side.  Let me explain how the battle is going.

I am the Japanese player.  In turn one both sides played an expected opening move.  The US went all out to get their three islands, and the Jap player pulled back to defend their three islands.  The Jap player built an airfield on New Georgia and the US player built an airfield on GC giving them two.  A few US troops were on GC, only two were on Malaita but most were on Santa Isabel.  The Jap forces were fairly equally split on New Gerogia and Choiseul, with nothing on Bougainville.

After this, the US player has reinforced Santa Isabel and the fleet in the slot on H.  The Jap player has built all 5 airfields and placed a large fleet on F with a smaller fleet on B to provide air cover for transports.  The Jap player keeps 3 transports on the base card, and three in F and three in B.  This gives them plenty of opportunity to resupply both islands.  Because the US player has not bought supply tokens, they have more ships.  But they can’t bring the ships against the Japanese because they would have to endure many artillery guns on bothe the Jap islands and fear too many losses.

I believe the US player had a chance early to jump from Santa Isabel to New Georgia using sea zone I.  But the two sides are too equal for that to be anything more than a gamble now.  Meanwhile, the Japanese player has sniped a couple US targets, twice attacking Santa Isabel by air.

In general the game has become a stalemate because both sides have three islands the income is equal.  Now the game is just dragging on as a staring contest.

As the Japanese player, I am planning to attack Santa Isabel and drive the US off.  I suspect I will suffer enormous losses, but the US will also.  My hope is the losses will be fairly equal, but I will get control and the income from the extra island.  The 8 point shift in income will probably provide a permanent advantage if it lasts for three turns.

Bob, aren’t you being a bit presumptuous here?

I think that FMG will be pleased to look at this possibility if he makes money on the other project.

Someone’s falling down on the job.

You need to check out what is going on with the FMG A&A pieces.  He is preparing to release a set of Italian pieces.  Then he plans to release the other natioins as funds become available from the sale of the earlier sets.  His sets will come with some unusual pieces such as a new aircraft piece representing dive bombers.  Later he will consider a wider range of new pieces and other projects.  Check out his dice for a Christmas present.  Look in the Variants section for the sticky thread about the FMG project.