Posts made by HolKann

@Imperious:

ok its fixed.

here is final:

http://www.mediafire.com/?0jj2zyunrwm

SZ 55 still is bordering to Wca, whilst on the pics of boardgamegeek, it isn’t. If you’d like your map turned into an ABattleMap module, I’ll need a smaller layered fileformat to work with, preferably .pdn.

Hmm, if I remember correctly, Gibraltar was connected to Z12 too, which is not so in 1942.

@Imperious:

http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=15088.msg474998#msg474998

i scanned the set up sheets

Yeah, I know, I used them, many thanks!

@Imperious:

http://www.mediafire.com/?tutmnjlvr4j

map file from July 25th post.

I seem unable to download it now, but last time I checked, your map was flawed:
-baltic states were not yet joined with Eeu
-SZ 55 bordering to Wca
-some other stuff, can’t recall

With Unit Gather Zone 8 I mean both its mouseover text and appropriate “flag” are missing.
'nyway, if you find any bugs, let me know so I can fix them  8-)

Woot, the AA42 module is finished (though suggestions to map coloring etc. will still be considered), and it’s added to the AModulesPack. Have fun!

@P@nther:

Sure, I just thought the AAR modules to be an easy startup for AA42 modules. But using AA50-modules would be very comfortable, but a lot of work, because there is so much more to change.
The 42-map is close to AAR, the units are more to AA50 (except Italy and China). The charts of AA50 (Unit stats, “Bank”, Fleetmarker-Zones) will definitely be of good use! Tech is not required, as it is not part of AA42 (except house rules of course).

The greatest problem will be the map to start with, as the AAR-map that comes with ABattlemap .79f is buggy. The AA50 map may be too difficult to alter, I don’t know.

:-)

The most difficult work for the modules will probably be making a good map. After that, I (or someone else who knows how to) can make the .sek and .map files for the modules (without the bugs present in AAR). After that, just add the AA50 units and probably the AA50 tech, bank, fleet zone, VC counter etc. to the map and it will be (almost) finished. Hmm, maybe IL’s map 1942 map could be a good start…

The reason why I think tech should be involved in the modules is because it’s simply too easy: the only reason not to include it would be because it’s not in the official rules  :?

[about Egypt:] Other than adding an addition UK unit (infantry I guess) I don’t know what to tell you.

Ooo, there is a solution :D

Solution… Place 2 more Chinese (in either scenarios) infantry on Yunnan. Make em really pay!

…writing this down…

I can’t really argue with a bunch of good players, however. If they say cruisers are a good purchase at 11 and I say they are “an ok purchase” at 12… ok I hear ya.

Hmm, are you saying cruisers are a good purchase at 11?

I don’t always agree with this assumption, however.

Damn, you aren’t :( Let’s see why…

I’d like to give you some insights on how I see it. I look at the over all cost in IPCs for each unit’s ability to score a hit on the enemy. A sub costing 6 and having a combined attack and defense total of 3 (2 on attack plus 1 on defense) cost me 2 IPCs for each opportunity to hit my opponent. That’s funny, that’s the same price-per-opportunity to kill something as a destroyer has… They cost 8 and have a combat value of 4. (8/by4=2). Cruisers at 12 and divided by 6 (3/3) is also 2. A battleships with its price tag of 20 has a cost per potential hit at 2.5. Of course a battleship has two lives so its cost really is 1.25 IPCs per hit opportunity. Good deal! But it cost so damned many IPCs. In defense of the lover priced cruiser, I’d like to point out that it has the same cost/kill ability as a destroyer or a sub. So why pick on the cruiser. Yeah, I know DDs have a that special anti-sub thing and subs have their own special points of (I want to say: confusion) value. But a cruiser has a 50% chance of scoring a hit during a bombardment (its special ability). In any case, I assigned a value of 12 to the cruiser perhaps it should have been an 11. I could not always use this simple formula when assigning values to these various units. I also had to take into consideration my perception of what was fun but yet made the most sense. Kind of subjective don’t you think. Look at the bomber or the carrier for example. They have a cost of 2.4 and 2.33 per kill ability.

Hmm, nice reasoning. BUT dear Larry Harris, you’re forgetting the most important value of a unit! In your view, a unit’s price is determined by “kill ability” and “special ability”. These are indeed 2 major factors, but you’re forgetting the most important one: “hit taking ability”. Let’s calculate that for each naval unit shall we? sub: 1 hit for 6 IPC’s = ~0.15 DD’s: 1/8= ~0.13 Cru: 1/12= ~0.8 BB: 2/20= ~0.1 (excluding the autorepair after each battle) Loaded carrier: 3/34= ~0.9. Well now, guess who’s coming out at the bottom, also having (imho) the worst “special ability” of all. It’s big plus should be the “kill ability”, so 11 for a Cru would still make it not so good a deal. Imho, 10 would be very defendable, subs would still be bought, DD’s would still be bought to counter subs and for cheap hits, and the cru would simply be good value for the money; yer basic sea unit taking over the role of core fleet unit, from the DD who isn’t made for this role in the first place! Sorry mr. Harris, but the logic you’re using to refute cheaper cruisers is wrong/incomplete, please consider to rethink this…

So summarized: 1 inf extra in Egy, 2 in Yun, and a Cru of 11 (or 10?!). Please mr. Harris, make this the official LHTR for AA50, so I can convince my friends to play with these more balanced rules. Otherwise those shiny new Cruisers in AA 1942 will stay in the box too much  :|

1. Two changes: CUS and a frozen Perry Channel
2. The rules are (completely?) AA50
3. I do think there is need for special charts in the AA42 module, because one can simply use the tech charts of AA50. And tbh, I think this will be done a lot.
4. Dunnow, we’ll see about that
5. see 2.

I think it is a good idea to make new modules for AA42. There are too many changes to work around using only AAR modules (don’t forget the cru’s!), besides the point that AAR has some bugs of its own. If anyone can come up with a good map, I’ll be more than happy to turn it into ABattleMap modules ;)

@P@nther:

Would you please provide the updated map.pdn?
That would be great.

:-)

It’s in the first post, just scroll way down :D

Allright, exams are almost over, and suddenly I have some spare time to fill in, so it was time for a little update on the AA50 modules. Things changed:
1. removed a DD but added a Cru to SZ1 in the '42 setup.
2. changed “Ottowa” to “Ottawa”
3. replaced P@nther’s '42 Map.bmp with the newer version in the ABattlePack.

I hope I didn’t make any mistakes, and that all the hyperlinks point to the right files (it gets confusing with all these files). If someone spots an error or a mistake, plz report in this thread, it will (eventually ;) ) be fixed!

@crispyHaole:

I see my error, thanks! 41 is AOK but 42 (because i used the same bmp which was meant for only 41) has ger/jpn pieces swapped. I liked and used Holkan’s file (on p12 of this thread). I really like that color scheme with p@nthers map. seems very clear to me. Holkan do u have that same toolpieces.bmp(.jpg) for 42?

Why yes, they are in the ABattlePack, under ToolPieces>'42>HolKann’s Toolpieces.bmp

Ottawa is mis-spelled  as Ottowa  I am canadian so I noticed

Sry for this :lol: I’ll put it on a todo-list.

Anyway the NO box’s could be put in a nation’s capital?  So new players don’t have to play where’s waldo whilst looking for them? (very greatful they are explained at the top of the screen )

Lol again :lol:. I understand it might be pretty confusing at first, but the placement of the NO-boxes won’t be changed because of 1. compatibility 2. even next to the capital they will be confusing. Now the lay-out als explains what the NO is about (for instance the one in the Mediterranean).

Last but not least, I’m really confused here about all these modules, and stuff, big pieces, tool piece’s, pale and not so pale maps that look EXACTLY the same :S (really miss the darker one :*( )  Can someone sticky or edit in the URL’s for whatever current module’s there are or whatever so that I can download things and know WTF they are and how to install them, to get the dark map back, and try new Bigger pieces etc ?

The darker one is still downloadable, use this direct link (note that this is the same file as attached to the first post of this threadg). Now, remove the “.jpg” extension, then unzip and finally overwrite AA50.gim and AA51.gim in your ABattlaMap folder. Good luck!

Adlertag, you’re my hero!

First post updated with the new map and pieces, let’s hope a lot of people like them ;)

@P@nther:

Will you include your “final” pdn-file? That would be great :-)

No, but you can always find it here.

@TimTheEnchanter:

It uses a combination of gaussian blur and a technique called Alpha masking.  If you don’t have the alpha mask plugin, get it.  It is way cool.

…

Wow, tnx for the minitutorial, I’m learning new techniques :)

Allright, made 2 modules with matching toolpieces: renamed some abbreviations (seems I do care :roll: ), made Chi a bit more yellowish, fixed some pixels at the bottom and side of the map, and matched the toolpieces with the according pale colors.  What do you guys think of it?

@P@nther:

Here are the BigPieces that are of the same colours as Tim’s ToolPieces:
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?tnthot2udjz
(7zip-format, 3.12 KB)
…

I tried them, but the color scheme seems too bright and I don’t like the Chinese colors, sry… :oops:
It’s no good to let this work go to waste though, so they’ll be added in the ABattlePack for sure :)

@TimTheEnchanter:

One concession I had to make was removing the faces from the southern indian ocean sea zones - they were just too hard to work with as I was changing colors.  Anyway, my question is:  who was the dude on the far right?

I can get you the base pictures if you like, but I didn’t do a good job with those faces, so I don’t bother if they disappeared. The one on the right was Italo Balbo, the Italian commander in North-Africa ;)

Got a question: how did you do that “fading” of the borders of a territory with paint.net?

Hey P@nther, here (=attached to post) is the papyrus font, just remove “.jpg” as usual, and put it in C:\Windows\Fonts and all your programs should recognise it. Hopefully it works (haven’t got time to test it right now).

@Emperor:

If you ever do another update, can I request that you increase the size of Egypt, it gets really crowded there.  :-D

I already did with the last update, and after that I promised compatibility would’nt be affected again. At most, I might take some pixels from the Red sea, East-Med and the Sahara, but if I go any further => compatibility :( We’ll see…

@Tim
Wooow! :-o Amazing, I like it very much a whole bunch lot! Though we’ll keep differing about the toolpieces, your map is simply superb. I was going to update the current map with the none-white territory namings I got in this thread and maybe the map cmdrJennifer might have come up with, but she’ll have to do an awesome job to get it as good as you did. Thanks a lot for sharing this with us :) Though I’d go for the “pale” instead of “very pale” (I have trouble discerning Ita/Ger on my bright laptop screen). Also, I’ll stick to the official “real life” board for territory naming conventions (Len or Kar, I’ll look it up one day). Abbreviations don’t bother me much though ;)

Ofcourse, this calls for some color adjusted toolpieces/bigpieces, which is a small effort compared to the great map you created. Expect an updated first post soon  8-)

…

(“garish”, pff, at least the Italians weren’t colored Russia-brown ;) )

papyrus.ttf.jpg

@rockrobinoff:

What a good poker player takes satisfaction in is the knowledge that they made good descisions, and the result is beside the point. Why not apply the same attitude to A&A?

Hmm, interesting. I do like knowing I made good decisions be it in poker, chess or A&A. That’s indeed why I play all these games (though I’m not going to risk a lot of money with poker ;) ). However, when playing chess, I’m absolutely sure that making good decisions will win/draw me the game against an equal player. In poker I know that making good decisions will also win/draw (as in: not loose a lot in an evening) me the game. In A&A however, this is not the case. You can play a whole night of A&A, only to see all your good decisions smashed by 1 lousy AA. And there’s no way of saying “Allright, I lost because of bad luck, let’s play another one quickly and forget about this” like you can in poker. Which is why, for me, I try to enjoy every game by playing LL, simply because the risk of ruining a game / an evening by crazy dice is non-existent.

It’s the human brain: nobody likes to loose undeserved, and the best way to remove this feeling is by simply playing another game and trying to win again (though a 10 year course on Zen might help too :roll:), which unfortunately is impossible in A&A.

(on a sidenote: playing competitively is also a reason to go LL, but that’s besides the “casual game” you’re talking about)

@rockrobinoff:

One last time: LL is a different game. Its not Axis and Allies.

Most of your analysis makes sense, except you are simply biased. Why would risk management be the aspect that defines A&A? Imho, it is not. To me, A&A is defined by its strategic character, giving you the feeling like you are a WW2 general trying to outwit the enemy. The method of getting battles resolved is simply less important to me. I would even be fine with a no luck system since this would not take away the strategic aspect of the game. If you really think risk management is the “soul” of A&A, go poker.

@U-505:

It changes the nature of the strategy because you can pinpoint exactly how many units each battle will need to take a territory or successfully strafe an opponents stack.

Change the word “strategy” by “tactics” and I’ll agree. The strategies in LL are EXACTLY the same as in ADS. Only some tactical tricks are not.

@rockrobinoff:

Or, you can stretch it. The player is forced to way the pros and cons of both plays. In LL, it is dumbed down.

The problem is that “stretching it” is the optimal way of playing A&A…

Btw, did you ever try LL?

I’m a LL-player, and (for the most part) I agree with Jen about what she’s saying about LL. I would like to make a remark though:

CmdrJennifer is right when she says the odds change in LL. That’s true, since one cannot take away extreme dice rolls without changing some battle odds. What people should keep in mind though, is that this only affects a small portion of the game. The soul of this game isn’t gambling with dice, it’s about inventing neat strategies and outsmarting your opponent. And that’s a thing LL has anxiously preserved: the gameplay of A&A isn’t changed when playing LL. It’s not because a few tactical jokes or short term moves tend to be more predictive, the course and feel of an A&A game is changed. Ofcourse, there are those who like the occasional heroic victory against all odds (and the pathetic defeat when everything looked great), but for everyone else, there’s LL, preserving people from teeth grinding and head smashing, offering instead a smile on a resigning player’s face, since he knew his opponent simply had a better plan.

To summarize, LL doesn’t change the game drastically, and imho it makes it much better. Anyone who’s up for a game of A&A Anniversary-LL can pm me (or better, DY, since he’s got more spare time than I do ;) ).

Allright, bypassing the house rules discussions (especially the 1 DD vs 1 sub nonsense):

Imho, it is possible to let Germany go U-Boat + air in AA41 with NO’s. Just spend about 20 IPC’s (leaving 20-30 going to Russia, including the ftrs/bmrs you bought with the first 20 IPC’s) each turn (= 3 subs, 2 subs 1 bmr/ftr and sooner or later 1 IC in France), which will get you:

1. a safe mediterranean. (if the British fleet gets in, it might never get out  :evil:)
with NO’s, this means 5/10 extra for Ita, 5 (either Gib or Egy will be axis) less for UK. Also, having that fun sidekick of Italy producing at about 20 each turn, makes for no worries to defend France, so those guys can go fight commies in the east.

2. a safe Baltic
making both Nwy and Swe much more easy to hold, and eliminating UK landing squads in Leningrad, Poland or Germany. So this also allows for more troops to the east.

3. Britain will have to keep up fleet-wise
which results in less British landing in Africa/Russia, thus again strengthening Italy and also weakening Russia.

But alas, this is all theory. Has anyone actually tried it though, because it’s pretty easy both inventing and rejecting a killer strategy in theory. To quote H. Simpson: “In theory communism works.”

But whoever said that subs don’t get you IPC’s are wrong. If they didn’t who would ever buy them? And in all the games I’ve played, they’re the single most used naval unit.

@ithkrall:

As Im painting the set I am thinking about taking 2 german cruisers and 1 japanese battleship and painting them Italian. I think 2 italian cruisers is too few (PLayed a bit of the PC version someone did).

Any thoughts on that?

Why not use the Russian ones? It’s not like they’ll see the light of day often  :roll:

@Cmdr:

I meant Kaingsu, just easier to type Kai.

It’s Kiangsu, not Kaingsu…

Most efficient: Ind and Man. + trns ofcourse, what are you going to spend the 60+ IPC’s on otherwise? And if things go really well, a third one in Burma or Egy is always fun  :evil: