Posts made by Flashman

Thanks for the link; Flashy can now go to work.

One or two early observations:

It has Stalingrad and Volgograd, two names for the same city.

Papua is still spelled Papau

I too hate those circles, and have even deleted same from my AAE maps.  That Tobruk territory just looks silly, and should be part of Cyrenaica.

Does it have a specific date?  If it’s the traditional one, French West Africa and Madagascar should be Vichy, Italian East Africa British occupied.  Same for December 1941, which I’m guessing is the date from the Asian line up (apparently taken from AAP).

Full review here:

http://www.harrisgamedesign.com/bb/viewtopic.php?p=16251#16251

@Imperious:

Dude that game has lots of issues. Typos, run on sentences, etc… Its basically the milton bradley map with a couple of territories split in half.

You mentioned once that Xeno asked you to work on the next version.  Will that involve a clean slate to start with a real map, or is it just a case of tarting up their current version?
For example do you have license to put Moscow in Europe, which is pretty fundamental to how the game plays.  And to what extent is the map dependent on the rules; if capturing Moscow is all important you might HAVE to put the Russian capital in Siberia.

Same here, but I really wanted to review the very latest version.

You just KNOW a map isn’t finished when Austria is called Roumania…

Wait 'till you see my latest version…any day soon.

Sorry, but I can’t manage to download a readable version.  I’ll just have to wait for a decent scan to be posted before passing detailed comment.

Anyway I’ve reviewed the earlier version but will update if the new map corrects these errors.

http://www.harrisgamedesign.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=1443&start=16

Build an Indochina tank factor; take out Sinkiang to stop US factory; forget Siberia; either 1-pile everything into India then drive through Persia to Caucasus or 2-drive through Kazakh to Caucasus.

Is this the map everybody is referring to?

http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/7113/axisandalliesglobalwarmqc2.jpg

If so, it’s badly in need of the Flashman treatment…

If there’s a link to a more accurate version I’ll refrain from further comment until I’ve seen it.  Bangladesh indeed.

I can’t vote 'cause the Global War map photo refuses to load.  If you can point me the way of a useable map scan I’ll cast my vote.

All I can find is this:

http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/7113/axisandalliesglobalwarmqc2.jpg

which I assume has been superceeded by a much more accurate version, but what is the latest?

1. Just pile as much materiel into Caucasus as you can as quickly as you can.

That is all.

Except the Nazis had salted all their capitol away in Swiss bank accounts.

Or do you believe that when Berlin was captured there was a big safe in the Chancelor’s office with “German Capitol; do not spend until next turn” printed on it?

Exactly my view.

http://boards.avalonhill.com/showthread.php?t=2736&highlight=poor+russia

In my version each of the Allies starts with a 50 IPC income.  The downside for Russia is the Xenophonia rule preventing the Western Allies from reinforcing the Eastern Front.

@ezto:

AA severly butchers the economy of Russia and bolsters the Japanese and German. In reality Russia could outproduce Germany in any point of the war and Japan could have never moved past mainland China.

You did no see, sir.  What I’m meaning is that if you capture the “Capital” (city) then you get the “Capitol” (money) as well, understanding?

In my version the oil tanker is the only new unit added.  Well, apart from Radar installations and Rocket pieces.

But then one key rule I introduce is that all ships must refuel every turn, tying them to friendly land areas.  With tankers it becomes possible to carry out long range naval operations, but the pieces themselves are expensive and have no combat value.

I’m not convinced that cruisers are anything more than a piece for the sake of having a 3-3 ship, with destroyers becoming 2-2, but we’ll see what LH has come up with in Guadalcanal.  Eventually.

The problem with cost reduction is that you might create naval cannon fodder units bought in vast quantaties just to soak up hits.  A ship costing 4 IPCs and having no combat value would probably be a good buy.

Spelling is dependent on context, as in A&A standard rules if you capture the Capital you also get to capture the Capitol.  Do you see?

Mmmm, that old capture the capitol thing.

Seem to remember Napoleon capturing Moscow, and much good did it do HIM.

I tend to think that the Germans would have been overwhelmed by sheer numbers sooner or later anyway.  Stalin might have been tempted to do a deal, but sitting in the Kremlin Hitler would not have been interested.

As Ezto said by conducting the war in the way they did the Germans gave the Russian people no choice BUT to fight them, even if it meant supporting Stalin.

One factor many people overlook is that a Japanese transport, unlike an IC, can be sunk.  And if the Allies are on the ball, they will place bombers in range to do just this.  An all-transport Japanese strategy then absorbs costly warships to defend the transports.

I personally prefer an Indochina tank factory and a strong push into the decisive India/Persia/Caucasus area where the game is usually won or lost.  From here you can still cover Manchuria and Sinkiang and give the Allies something to worry about other than your transports which can now round up stray infantry unharassed.  You might have to surrender a few IPCs in Siberia but getting the most materiel into the decisive area in a constant stream from r2 is the key to victory.

Now fair thing to Jeff he was right about Thailand which changed it’s name from Siam on June 24th 1939 and as I understand it the map starts 1st september 1939 correct?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thailand

Also, Baluchistan is NOT Pakistan, but just one of several provinces which were merged into Pakistan in 1947.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan

Of course I have other issues with the names, like “West Africa” in the central Sahara.  But never let it be said i don’t give credit where it’s due.

Please feel free to copy the map.  Have in mind it’s designed with several hundred nations in the game, so possibilities are there for many of them. On the Eurobrit site are a couple of earlier versions with fewer territories, along with some rules I’ve forgotten!  I started with adding Sicily and took it from there…

Lew has just posted more details on Barbaria including playtest and nations list which I’ll have to get round to comparing with my own.

I’d be interested to see what you’ve done with HOTW.

Did some stuff with this myself a couple of years back, including this map:

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/file/19372/Map2.gif

Also have a large “nations” database and rules suggestions if you’d care to knock heads.

You may also be interested in “Barbaria”, a game being developed by Lew “Britannia” Pulsipher covering Dark Age Europe in the same vein.  You can see details by joining Lew’s Eurobrit Yahoo group:

http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/eurobrit/

But this effectively breaks the xenophobia rule.

I prefer a Soviet sphere of influence which is no-go for the Western Allies.  Using the War Game map as a reference this would include all Soviet brown territories and all those territories bordering them by direct land routes.*  Only if USSR is out of the game can the other Allies go here.

Otherwise Russia is virtually encouraged to abandon areas to the Germans in the hope that the West will liberate them and take over their defence, which puts us right back in AAR territory.  Also, it seems harsh that a Soviet unit, attacked by Germany with nowhere to retreat but into UK occupied Russian areas, cannot do so.  At the very least the Soviet should not collect income for liberated territory until it regains control, but even here it means ALL allies emptying the area for the hand over, so perhaps a round of coexistence is acceptable after liberation.

• possible exception Norway.  Can’t quite make it out on the map, but Norway and USSR should not have a land border.

Whatever route you go down, the biggest difficulty with NAT/Xenophobia rules is this:

Suppose the Germans have occupied Leningrad and are threatening Moscow.  Xenophobes or not, it is clearly in the Soviet’s interests that the Western Allies invade German held Leningrad to take the pressure off the Russians defence of Moscow.  But if they do so are they violating the Xenophobia rule by entering Soviet home territory?

If not (they are “liberating” it), what is to stop them sitting there and building a stack of infantry just like they normally do in defiance of the Xenophbia rules?  The Soviets forfeit the right to build units there, but still collect income and can concentrate on other battles.