Best posts made by DoManMacgee

@djensen swap out zombies for revised (since you had zombies there as a joke anyway)? IMO it’s distinct enough from 42SE to warrant consideration

Just reaffirming that I am one of the folks interested in playing this hypothetical classic tournament.

“It Depends” is the best answer I can give you.

If we’re talking strictly OOB, no bids, Anniversary is the more balanced game any way you split it.

However, far more work has gone into developing G40 into its current state than has gone into AA50. AA50 is balanced by the community simply by adding bids for the Allies (varying by scenario and whether you play with NOs turned on/off). G40 is balanced by the community by developing entirely new rulesets and altering entire mechanics to create what is essentially a completely different game to what you buy in a store. Despite these efforts, the Axis still are seen as having a massive advantage in G40, and most ways to play AA50 see the Axis in a similarly dominant position, with the Allies needing large bids to compete.

NOTE: Take what I said above about G40 with a grain of salt though, I don’t play G40 competitively. However, most members of the community would probably agree with me. Just because a game is more or less balanced than another does not speak to the amount of fun you can have playing said game. G40 is the most popular version of A&A for a reason.

In my opinion, if you want a balanced scenario, play the 41 Scenario of AA50 without National Objectives. This should give a fair challenge to both sides, as the Axis need to make the most of their massively superior starting forces to narrow the absolutely massive gap in production between the two sides (Axis: 58 (G: 31, J: 17, I: 10) Vs. Allies: 113 + “7” (R: 30, B: 43, A: 40, C : “7” (recall AA50’s odd rules for placing new Chinese Units))). The Axis might have twice the starting punch of the Allies, but without NOs its going to take quite a bit for them to make up the 50+ IPC difference (that’s ~25 IPC of territory they need to capture).

@Martin @gamerman01
I have no preference in whatever system is used as long as the baseline format is not Best of 1/Single Elimination. If there is an end-of-season bracket that is single-elim to determine a champion that is fine. If the final standing is just based on overall placement after all league games are played (with no playoff) that is also fine.

I forget what the appropriate Board for Tournament AARs is so apologies in advance. @Panther just move this wherever it needs to go. I don’t mind.

Intro Junk - Feel free to skip to the next section if you just want the game information.
I had the opportunity to go to Gen Con this year to play in their AA50 tournament (dubbed the “”“World Championship”“” by Renegade, even if such a grandiose title is a bit absurd IMO). It was a very nice experience as I haven’t been to a IRL convention since 2023 (and haven’t performed well at one since 2018, when my local convention stopped hosting A&A Events). The players I met were polite/good sports, even when the dice started going sideways as they tend to do. As with the AARs I once did for the Revised Tournaments I performed decently at in the past, this post is going to be a series of AARs breaking down the various games I played with a decent amount of detail.

This is also an attempt to preemptively explain/defend my own strategies/decision making process for my games in the event that other coverage of this tournament misrepresents them.

DISCLAIMER: This is purely meant to be a review of the games I played for data collection and/or reflection purposes. No harm or insult is intended. If you were one of my opponents and something I said here rubs you the wrong way DM me (or post here) and I’ll edit this post to accommodate.

Tournament Format/other notes - Feel free to skip if you just want the game data.
The tournament ruleset was (roughly) as follows (a more comprehensive rules list can be found on the TO’s website: https://headlesshorseman2.com/gen-con.html):

-Game: AA50
-Scenario: 1942
-Intercepts: On
-Dardanelles: Open
-Tech: Off
-NOs: Off

-Battle Calculators: Not allowed, but you are allowed to write-out battle forecasts by-hand and attempt to reason out the odds for yourself.

-Time Limit: ~5:30 in theory, but in practice varied greatly. Players were expected to self-police how many rounds would be played. Games only end at the end of a full round (i.e. USA/China’s turn). Games can never end in the middle of a round, even if the 5:30 time limit technically expired. Generally, this means that games are expected to last 6 turns, but this is not a guarantee, as you will see in this report and in other coverage of this event (particularly the final, which I understand only lasted 5 turns).

-Entry Cap: 32 entrants, but technically up to 64 players can enter. Players are highly encouraged (but not required) to form 2-person teams. Players who elect to play alone may be highly encouraged by the tournament staff to partner with another single player to form an impromptu team for the sake of creating an even number of participants.

-Tournament Format: “Single Elimination, but after the first round some losers are allowed to advance to the second round via random selection in order to make the number of players in the second round a Power of Two (i.e. 4, 8, 16, 32, etc.)”. This is to ensure that no player/team ever receives a bye.

This year, 2 teams were “revived”, meaning the total number of participants was 28 Teams (2 solo players + 26 teams = 54 entrants, a very large turnout for an A&A event to be sure).

These two above points were personal sour spots given the tournament’s official designation as the “World Championship” for F2F play. Past conventions I attended were purely 1v1 and used Swiss style preliminaries to determine the top 4 players for the playoff. This I would argue was a better format given the luck factor A&A is notorious for (doubly so given that the ~6 turn time limit will force many medium/large scale battles to be taken at ~60-70% odds, as there is not enough time for either side to build sufficient forces to take ~99% decisive victories unless one side played extremely poorly). If single elimination must be used as the format for whatever reason, I would at least advocate that the “advancing losers” be chosen via VC count (as in, a team that lost a 9/9 tie has priority to advance over a team that lost a 12/5 blowout or an outright concession).

That being said, the TO should be the one with final decision-making authority, as he runs tournaments for almost every edition of A&A in-print alongside the “world championship”, so I imagine at least some of these seemingly-questionable decisions are made as time-saving measures more than anything else. Additionally, Renegade are the ones who created the “World Championship” designation, rather than the TO, so keep that in mind.

The match schedule was as follows:
-Day 1: Round 1 @ 4PM Eastern
-Day 2: Round 2 @ 4PM Eastern
-Day 3: Quarterfinal @ 9AM Eastern, Semifinal @4PM Eastern
-Day 4: Final @ 9AM Eastern

The requirement to play two games on day 3 (and the requirement to wake up early for the first one after a late night on day 2) made for an interesting experience, as it took a physical toll on the players involved. This will become evident in the report, as both sides in the semifinal make a fair number of mistakes to the point where, as the chess saying goes, “the winner was the one who made the second-to-last mistake.”

Now, with all of that out of the way, the actual game reports:
(1/6)

@PainState While I agree that you can’t just go slapping rules from one game to another haphazardly, it’s a bit disingenuous to disqualify all discussion of the idea. People have house-rule’d G40 to hell and back over the years. There’s no reason why examining the ideas presented by another game can’t be beneficial to communities that want to spice up their game.

This is a bit off-topic, but while I disagree with the concept of limited turns for a WW2 Game (neither side in that conflict would have accepted a truce, especially not the Allies or the Nazis), I do enjoy the extra dynamic of “racing against the clock” that it adds to games. Face-to-Face Tournaments for Axis and Allies games impose a time-limit, which usually roughly equates to 5-6 full rounds. This results in strategies being employed by both sides that are noticeably different than “standard” play you’d see in an online league where games continue indefinitely. IMO, the time limit works great and ensures that more unique or “gimmicky” strategies have the potential to be viable.

Interested to hear more about WiF’s end-of-turn mechanic, if you don’t mind. I haven’t played that game before so I’m interested to hear your take.

EDIT: Typos.

NOTE: Thank the Lord for the new Forum Software. My session timed out while writing this and I was horrified to think I had lost my entire post. Fortunately, the new Forum Software is smart enough to save a draft of your post for you.

I have my own thoughts on the strategies others have posted about, but first and foremost Happy New Year to everyone.

Sorry it took a while, but I was able to sit down over the holiday and give AAZ another look. This is the third and final part of my overview of this game, where I’ll be taking a look at how the game plays without Zombies, compare it to AA41, review the “1939 setup” from the back of the instruction manual, and give my final impressions on AAZ and what it brings to the series as a whole.

I was not able to round up my playgroup for a game without the “Desperate Measures” features of the Zombie Cards, nor was I able to test out my proposed House Rules from my last post (only use the Zombie Cards for UK/US-owned territories). I apologize for this and I’ll try to test these out in the future at some point.

Anyway, I ran through AAZ without applying any of the Zombie Rules, and I what I found turned out to be the exact opposite of the scenario I described in my previous post. Here’s a general overview of my observations:

• The Eastern Front devolves into the typical West Russia Stack game you’d expect from a Revised/42SE game, mostly because no zombies = no attrition. No surprises there. However, the lack of a “Belorussia” territory between Eastern Europe and West Russia makes East Europe into the main German stacking point instead of Ukraine, which greatly strengthens their position by shortening their supply line.

• Due to the way the SZs in the Pacific/Indian Ocean are positioned, UK can drive the Germans out of Africa B1 with minimal losses (by using the FTR from India + loaded TTs from Australia and India. The FTR is only necessary if Germany suffered minimal losses in taking Egypt).

• Without zombies to hamper their advance, Japan is able to steamroll mainland China with minimal issues. They tend to stall out in Southeast Asia though, due to their weak start in FIC + having to spend the first 1-2 turns clearing out the UK Pacific Fleet. This gives the British enough time to establish themselves in India and the USN enough time to match the IJN’s strength.

• No AA Guns helps the Axis in assaults on key Allied positions (India, West Russia, etc.). By time the Allies are attacking strong Axis positions the lack of AA guns doesn’t matter as much as they should have an overwhelming advantage when they go on the offensive.

• Overall, with no zombies bogging down their forces, Germany can steamroll the Soviets because the amount of TANKs they start with is simply insurmountable. They force the Soviets to retreat their stack to Moscow G1 by moving every available TANK to East Europe, and after that point they can just stack Ukraine to finish the game (Caucasus can only produce two units per turn, which is too few to stave off a German push around G3/G4). German loses its entire fleet at the end of round 1, but they inflict so much damage on the RN that by time they build a fleet capable of landing in Europe the game is already over.

• Japan doesn’t amount to much, but they can clear out China J2 and force the Soviets into a position where they’re forced to either clear out the INF-IC in Szechwan or allow Japan to start building INF there each turn, neither of which are sustainable options.

• It’s amazing how much the game balance fundamentally changes if Zombies are removed, in my opinion. Honestly the game is more even with the Zombies left in. Without Zombies Allies probably need 6-9 IPC of bid to either bolster Russia’s start or to give the UK an extra DD to force Germany to commit all 3 Subs to clearing the main fleet (the one with the BB).

So any way you split it, this game is not a balanced one. Additionally, taking away the Zombies completely kills the Fun-Factor this game has vs. the rest of the franchise with nothing to show for it. Not the news I was hoping to give you all on this front…

Anyway, let’s talk a bit about some more general points this setup has, Zombies or not:

• Germany’s starting fleet has a whopping 0 TTs in the Baltic. This makes Sealion virtually impossible unless the German player is willing to commit almost all of their starting income to it.

• That being said, Germany can attempt to bolster its starting Baltic Battleship by keeping it out of the G1 attacks and building a CV on G1. This echoes a popular strategy in Revised where Germany builds a Carrier G1 to delay the UK’s uncontested landings in Europe for a turn or two. Whether this strategy has any merit Vs. opting to wipe out both starting fleets I can’t say for sure, but it’s worth looking into further. Note that going this route means sacrificing most of Germany’s land build G1, but Germany’s start has such a material advantage over the Soviet’s that I don’t think one lost round is necessarily crippling.

• As I’ve mentioned previously, the starting Submarines + the small Italian Fleet Germany starts with are enough to kill basically the entire UK Naval Setup on the Atlantic Side. The trade-off is that the US/UK can clear this out by the end of round 1. However, much like in G40 and 42SE, the near-total loss of the Royal Navy cripples the UK and delays any serious threat to Germany by at least 3-4 turns. Not a big deal when Zombies slow down the German advance, but without Zombies Germany is partying in Moscow before the Western Allies can manage anything significant.

• Unless the Allies go for a 100% KGF, the USN will overtake the IJN in about 2 turns. That’s not a lot of time for Japan to establish itself, and without the ability to build ICs, Japan will have an extremely difficult time gaining income once their initial land units are killed off. This is less of an issue without Zombies due to the lack of Attrition Rolls.

• I don’t understand why players are not allowed to purchase ICs. In my opinion, this streamlines the game to the point of making the strategies for each country painfully linear. Yes, the Japanese Tank Drive to Moscow is not historically feasible, but neither is 70% of the other nonsense that happens in this game. Without being able to build ICs, Japan is forced to play the naval game, which they will lose every time. Without being able to build ICs, Britain is forced to defend a difficult position in India/Australia without even having the option of declining in favor of a full-on KGF because of the threat Japanese control of the Indian IC presents to Russia’s back-door.

• INF-ICs (the ICs in China and India that can only build INF) are a marvelous addition to the game that should be included in future releases as not only features of the setup but as a cheaper alternative to a full-priced IC. Imagine being able to spend something like 6-7 IPC to build an INF-IC in a territory you want to defend, but simultaneously don’t want to risk becoming a strong point of the enemy. I’m thinking of ideas like giving the UK the option to produce INF in India to stall Japan’s advance without the downsides of wasting 15 IPC and handing Japan a staging point to build Tanks from. The INF-IC is a perfect middle ground between leaving a territory in the hands of the starting units and investing 15 ICs in what is essentially a double-edged sword. Something like a double-edged knife, I guess?

• Switching the “Purchase Units” phase to the end of the turn is a change I welcome, but question the value of. I appreciate the ability to better-tailor your buy to account for some of your rolls going poorly in a major battle, as it lowers the barrier-to-entry for new players to compete on a higher level. However, was such a drastic change to the core rules really necessary for a 35-year-old series? My play group and I had to catch ourselves several times buying units at the wrong time, and we’ve only been playing since ~2007. I can’t imagine how hard it must be for people who have been playing since the 80s/90s to adjust to the new timing.

Anyway, the last major point I want to touch on is that this game, in my opinion, is heavily based on 1941 to the point where I’d go out on a limb and say that this is what WOTC did:

1. They started with just having 1941 and trying to add Zombies to it.

2. They realized immediately that:
   A: The starting incomes are way too low in 41, so no country would be able to deal with the Zombies.
   B: There are far too many INF in the 41 OOB setup compared to other units, which only furthers issue A above.

3. To remedy this, they bumped up the IPC value of (almost) every territory in the game, while retaining mostly the same map apart from some minor changes (which I covered in my first post but I’ll briefly go over again below). These changes mostly serve to tweak the balance of 41 while also accounting for the switchover to the Zombie rules. Below is my comparison of the 41 OOB Setup Vs. AAZ’s OOB Setup, by-country:

• USSR: Almost no changes, but 1 INF in Moscow is swapped out for an ART and 2 INF were moved from Moscow to Urals. This weakens the initial Soviet push but gives them more flexibility in their opening (allows a bigger stack in Siberia or a beefier Sinkiang).

• Germany: “East Europe” has been split into “East Europe” and “Balkans”. This makes attacking Europe more time-consuming in a late-game scenario, and splits the initial German units between more territories. The Wehrmacht on the front lines in Russia have had their strength reduced (mostly INF cuts, INF swapped out for ART, and one less TANK in West Russia. All of these changes were likely intended to reduce the number of Zombies that would pile up after R1 and G1). To compensate, Germany has had several TANKs added to their overall setup (North Africa, West Europe, Germany), along with an extra SUB which makes G1 an absolute nightmare for the UK.

• UK: The Carrier near Gibraltar has been swapped out for a DD, and the FTR that was on it has been relocated to Gibraltar proper. This spares the FTR from the G1 onslaught unless Germany goes out of its way to eliminate it (at the cost of letting the Egyptians live, bad trade-off IMO). Their Pacific Fleet has been given an extra DD, which allows it to stand against Japan for ~1 more turn (or simply betters the odds of wiping the DD/SUB off FIC). The Atlantic Fleet got an extra DD, but that’s not enough to save the Royal Navy from being obliterated G1. India can now only produce INF, which indirectly weakens Japan by preventing them from mass-producing TANKs once they capture the IC.

• Japan: Navy 100% identical to the 41 setup. This, coupled with the buffs to the US Pacific Fleet and UK Pacific Fleet, makes life difficult for the IJN, as I’ve elaborated on previously. The only other change for Japan is an extra ART in Manchuria, which helps the J1 push but not much else (it doesn’t even help the J1 push if Zombies are in-play, as the Soviets can sacrifice the Siberians to drown Manchuria in Zombies).

• USA: “Szechwan” split into “Szechwan” and “Yunnan”, net change in the area is one extra ART. Szechwan can now produce 1 INF per-turn. This doesn’t do much without Zombies, but with Zombies it effectively allows the US to dump 1 Zombie on Japan’s advancing troops per-round. This adds up quickly and will ensure that Japan’s land forces die out long before they reach the Russian border. The SUB on the US West Coast has been replaced with a DD, and the SUB was moved to the Solomon Islands SZ. As mentioned previously, this allows the USN to very quickly overtake the IJN and strain their supply lines (since Japan can only really produce land units in Japan proper, and must ferry them to the mainland via TT).

Lastly, we have the 1939 Setup, a glorified tutorial. As it hasn’t been covered by any posts on this site, I’d like to review it briefly here.

Play is limited to the following territories:
SZ5 (Baltic), Norway-Finland, Karelia, Archangel, Moscow, Caucasus, West Russia, Ukraine, East Europe, Balkans, South Europe, Germany, West Europe.

This means that UK Proper, the USA, Africa, Japan/China, and most SZs are out-of-play.

The objective of the scenario is for Germany to reach 20 IPC value by turn 6. If they cannot attain this objective, the USSR wins. There are British units on the map, representing Neutral Countries. However, the UK does not take a turn. These units merely exist to die to Germany and Russia, but will fight back when attacked.

Anyway, here’s the setup:
Germany - 7 IPC
Germany (4) - 7 INF/3 ART/3 TANK/2 FTR/BOMB
Italy (3) - 3 INF/2 ART/2 TANK
SZ5 - 1 TT/1DD

USSR - 10 IPC
Moscow (4) - 3 INF/TANK/FTR
Caucasus (2) - 2 INF/ART
Archangel (2) - 2 INF
Karelia (2) - 2 INF

UK - 14 IPC
France (4) - 2 INF/TANK/FTR
Norway/Finland (2) - 2 INF
East Europe (2) - 2 INF/ART
Balkans (2) - INF/ART
West Russia (2) - INF
Ukraine (2) - INF

This scenario is a joke, so I didn’t really sink much time into it. I’m pretty sure Germany just wins outright by the following:
G1: Build INF/ART, they go to Italy to hit Balkans G2. Crush France/EE. Be sure to stay after combat and eliminate all Zombies. End with 13 Income.

R1: Either 2 TANK for fast-move of 2 INF/ART for a longer game. They take West Russia + Ukraine. They probably kill all Zombies as well. If they’re feeling lucky they can try taking out the Baltic Fleet to lock Germany out of Norway-Findland. End with 14 Income.

G2: Build 2 TANK/INF, all in Germany. Take Balkans and probably Karelia + Norway-Finland (may not be able to take it if Russia killed the Baltic Fleet R1). End with 17-19 Income. Rest either stacks EE or dead-zones it by over-committing to the Balkans fight.

R2: Not sure what they can do here, really. I guess the can try poking at EE if it was lightly defended, or strafing Karelia to flood Germany with Zombies.

G3: Germany probably wins this turn by mopping up Norway/Finland and/or taking one of Ukraine/West Russia/Karelia. I’d have to play it out to be sure, though.

All in all the “1939 Scenario” is a disappointment. I like what they went for with the concept of “holding Germany to a certain IPC level”, but I wish they had at least added Japan/UK/US to the scenario to represent the 2nd Sino-Japanese War and the early tension in the Pacific. It could have been a useful tutorial on the Naval Mechanics.

If you actually read all this, way to go.
If you actually all 3 parts, You Da Bes.
If you only read 2/3 parts for some reason, you’re kind of strange but way to go anyway.

Only thing that’s weird is that the way the Devs programmed OOL means that Bombers will die last in combat. Seems a bit weird to me.

Other than that, LET’S GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

@taamvan Fair enough. My group can’t stomach the idea of devoting an entire day (or multiple days if the game is in a stalemate) to G40, so we mostly stick with the “medium-scale” games (Revised, AA50, 42SE, etc.).

I imagine that in my group Zombies will lose its novelty and then die out. A similar thing happened for us when 1914 came out.

This was fun last time (AAZ), so I’ll throw my hat in the ring again:

• How hard was it to get WOTC’s blessings.

• Was Larry involved in any capacity?

• Will there be online tournaments?

• Is the setup the OOB setup or the LHTR (from ~ last year. The one with the Bomber in Ukraine, etc.)

• If the setup was the OOB, is bidding or some similar system included to account for the massive imbalance towards the Axis?

• If the setup is neither OOB or LHTR, what is it?

• When is the bloody Early Access starting? It’s been like 10 days since the announcement.

• Are there plans to adapt other versions (Classic, Revised, Anniversary, Global, Zombies, 1914, etc.) a la TripleA? TripleA has no support for 1914 and Zombies so I’d kill to be able to play either of those against AI or online.

I’m at work at the moment, so I assume the Early Access is still not out.

Is there an alternative method to access the game at the moment, or is it invite-only (for folks like djensen and whoever else the Developers have given access to)?

I am aware of GW36-39, but thanks anyway. While I’m a fan of that line I’m looking for something a tad more basic (less reliant on tech, optional rules, etc.). You know, something that can be played in a day instead of a weekend.

I wasn’t aware of de Gaulle’s ruleset though. That’s some interesting stuff, there.

I doubt this community would take it well if they went after TripleA lol. That’d be essentially taking an ax to all of our leagues.

Taking the time to reply to this because it’s a well thought out reply to what I originally commented and goes into other areas I see as great opportunities for this new, digital edition of A&A.

@Black_Elk said in Grand Plans, 3rd Edition?:

1940 was the last scenario to offer something substantially new in a while.

IMO Zombies and 1914 both brought a lot of new things to the table, but the community despised the whole “Zombie” thing and never really gave it a chance. I’m not sure why 1914 wasn’t well-received but I’d probably agree with you that the non-WW2 setting means the game loses one of its core audiences immediately (WW2 buffs).

Agreed that 42/42SE are just poor man’s revised clones. At least 42SE tried to be different by changing the map, but really that just resulted in making one of the worst-balanced games in the franchise.

I don’t see any reason though why we couldn’t take a board on the scale of 1942.2 or AA50, and have that as a more universal starter board that can be built into something more impressive with expansion materials. Or even with a starter board closer in scale to Global, but modular so that you can stage in the complexity.

I agree with this 200%. I think this where the most potential lies with the new online platform. They can add new maps and tweak the IPC values, borders, etc. of existing ones to improve balance in a way that simply isn’t possible with a physical board game.

When you combine the Europe and Pacific boards you end up with a map that has like 4 times as many game tiles as Classic or 1942.2. To me having more game tiles (a bunch of additional tt and sz) doesn’t really necessitate all the baseline rules complexity we see in 1940. What I mean is that you could surely find a way to make a more limited and much faster 5-6 man total war scenario, still with a larger game map more on the scale of global, and it wouldn’t be that much harder to learn than 1942.2 is currently.

Agreed on basically all of this. The trend I’ve seen with other playgroups’ House Rules is that they add more rules/units/etc. to the existing G40 Baseline. The others in my playgroup can barely keep up with the baseline rules of something like AA50, so G40 is simply too overwhelming for them (even though it’s not really that complex compared to “”“real”“” war games).

Again though, I think that whole franchise model would be way way easier to develop if it was done digitally in tandem. Again so that everyone can be on the same page, and the testing and feedback, and dissemination of new materials would be easier to coordinate.

I didn’t quote the rest of your post because, to me, this is the meat of it. The logistical nightmare of creating a “starter edition” and releasing different expansions for said “starter” edition is easily solved by using a digital platform instead. TripleA works because of basically this principle. There’s just the core A&A Rules Engine and the capability to add custom maps/scenarios. In the hands of a professional developer with (presumably) WoTC’s Blessings, it should be (relatively) easy for them to eventually get every edition of A&A made available on this new platform and create new maps/scenarios as needed. Community mod support would be nice but is probably just a pipe dream.

@Panther We seem to be on slightly different wavelengths, but ultimately hoping for the same thing.

I program for a living (although nowhere near the video game industry) so I understand how difficult/time-consuming dealing with technical challenges/implementing rules can be. I don’t expect to have all the functionality that’s been developed piecemeal in TripleA over several years available immediately. I’m just hoping that Beamdog doesn’t stop after 42SE.

This is a huge opportunity for A&A to have a wider audience/appeal. It would be a shame if the only version of A&A the wider gaming community knew was 42SE, that’s all.

@JuliusBorisovBeamdog That’s similar enough to what was done in AAC, the “Russia can’t attack on their first turn” rule. Basically, it gave Germany a turn to get their valuable Tanks and their irreplaceable FTR out of their indefensible positions in Russia. This change gives Germany a stronger initial force, which snowballs, as it takes Russia/UK longer to kill Germany, which in turn gives Japan more time to gobble up IPCs on their side of the map.

For 42SE, giving the Allies a turn to not die saves:

• The USSR IC in Karelia, which means it could be a feasible point to hold for a few rounds.

• The entire UK Fleet, which speeds up the UK/US’s deployment to Europe/Russia/Africa.

• The US Atlantic Fleet, as some German openings favor sending a sub or two after the US East Coast on G1.

• The US Pacific Fleet, as no J1 attack on it is possible.

• The US FTR in China, which can be redeployed to either help the Soviets or link up with the Pacific Fleet.

Great idea. Hope to see it implemented in-game.

@JuliusBorisovBeamdog
Changing the OOL on a turn-by-turn basis is a huge improvement. Naval Battles and Capital Defenses in particular can sometimes warrant unusual decisions for OOL. For example, some players may want to lose Bombers ASAP during a Life-or-Death Capital Defense, and you may want to lose Fighters before Carriers (or vice versa) in some naval battles Vs. others.

Thanks for putting in the extra effort on this one. You may want to post this information in another thread, or make a new one to share the news. I’m pretty sure the fixed OOL was a point of contention for others (I didn’t really care one way or the other, but I appreciate the extra effort).

I always forget that we have Mr. TripleA himself ( @redrum ) here. It’s like having royalty among commoners. You really deserve more credit for keeping the A&A community alive for all these years via TripleA.

@Black_Elk Your point about discussion being buried in the steam community forums is a major part of why I’ve been copy/pasting my opinions/feedback here and on Steam. This forum has a smaller but more dedicated userbase, and recent posts bubble up to the top of the board, so the Beamdog Folks can see what I posted more easily.

Also holding out for the QoL updates that you mentioned, but I’m trying to stay on the optimistic side of things, since it’s still Early Access and Beamdog seems to be having enough trouble making the base game playable right now. Not much of a point in yelling about LL and chat features and replays when there’s still issues with the core A&A gameplay.

EDIT: Can’t access the Steam Community from work but I’m assuming there’s a new QoL update coming, @JuliusBorisovBeamdog ?

@JuliusBorisovBeamdog You guys have been really on top of things with the patches/hot-fixes and I just wanted to let you know that it’s appreciated.

Haven’t had a chance to do another really thorough write-up on changes I’d like to see so I’ll just reiterate my main gripe that hasn’t been fixed yet AFAIK (that can be addressed in a realistic amount of time):

• Between battles in combat and game phases, the map tends to zoom in to maximum. I wish it wouldn’t do this (and just keep whatever zoom level the player is currently using) because I have to spend time zooming back out repeatedly during a turn. I get that most people probably like seeing the little units on the map, but I prefer looking at things from afar so I can see the big picture at all times.

It might just be a placebo, but I’ve noticed that, during combat move, the units seem to better indicate where they’re going. I don’t know if I’ve just gotten used to the UI or if a fix was made. If a fix was made, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Side-note: Currently 3-0. 2-0 as Allies, 1-0 as Axis. Currently in another game where that was supposed to be 3-player, but my teammate got kicked for not making his play so now it’s a 1v1. Probably going to win that one too because Axis are bonkers.

@Black_Elk I don’t think Beamdog is shooting for capturing the hearts and minds of the competitive crowd, though. TripleA already sort of has the market cornered on that thanks to having almost every map (Please give me a 1914 map, I’m begging you) in the franchise available + Play-by-Forum integration with this website. Can’t really beat that, especially when you have a battle Calc packaged with the game.

I think they’re going for a more casual audience, hence the focus on style (UI, asynchronous play, WW2-aesthetic art, etc.) over substance (multiple maps available, ranked ladder, competent AI, etc.). Still not an excuse for having multiple maps available to play on. I’m surprised WotC/Hasbro aren’t gunning for more maps to be added (even something scummy like 99 cent DLC for maps or whatever), since I doubt they’re selling new copies of the older games these days.