Posts made by Lynxes

The idea is for Germany to have such strong forces they can stack FRA, GER and POL against invasion, which is a real possibility with NOs. If you do succeed to get POL a turn, it should be retaken by superior German forces to UK’s and these can then continue towards the east front. Forces retaking NWE are sent the wrong way, on the other hand.

France, in your strategy…

No, Russia can’t hit France. Caucasus can be hit Japan, Italy and German on consecutive turns without a Russian counter. I’m sure that’s why Larry Harris introduced the Dardanelles rule.

France is better than Poland since it has a 6 production cap. It helps against SBR and you can pump out a lot of inf if you need to. It’s usually no problem getting an infantry chain going starting at Germany, the big thing is getting enough inf into it and for that you need a high IC capacity and loads of IPCs.

One favourite of mine is to drop an AA-gun into NWE, it will make the Germans gnash their teeth!  :evil:  Honestly just sitting watching the Germans building up a massive inf stack in France isn’t going to get you anywhere, you just will be waiting for that Japanese flag over Moscow! If you build CAs as UK, they should be used every turn.

Artillery not attacking into mountains?  :? If you look at the world war I battles in the Alps, artillery RULED both on defence and offense. I don’t think reducing unit attack values etc is fun, better boosting artillery which still is a tad weak for its cost.

On a side, what territory changes from AAR to AA50 do we want to keep?
Northwest Europe: more of a hassle, not worth it.
Norway/Finland divide: great since it protects Karelia a bit.
East front: great! KAR IC is just right and the division of land as well.
Balkans/Czech/Bulgaria: too many!
Siberia: great! Although on a smaller map introducing rough terrain will have the same effect.
Africa: poor… Even more IPCs here but in real life not much of value could’ve been gotten from invading the Sudan or beyond. Give them zero value exc. for Egypt and SAF and move IPCs to other parts!
Burma: great!
China: too many territories, a stronger China or some terrain effects would have the same effects. I still can’t figure out how Hong-Kong is more important than Singapore!  :?
Pacific: great! Japan not being able to invade Hawaii nor Solomons from home ports is great and a cat-and-mouse game often takes places around Solomons where the Yanks can slip through.

True, UK sometimes has to bail out the Russkies in KAR. Good Russian play can deadzone KAR though without undue effort and once Germany is forced to trade FRA as well they will run out of steam. Defending CAU later in the game with three Axis powers going at it though is another thing and it’s here I really like the optional rule since it gives the Russkies more of a fighting chance. What other territory can be hit by all three enemy powers, contains an IC AND is next to a capital?  :?

Well, I see a French IC as the best German strategy and if they’re allowed to build with impunity there you will be very hard pressed as Allies. If you make small preliminary assaults before the big one Northwest Europe is good since it divides forces (Germany can’t use territory trade forces to march vs. Russia, as they will be doing if you invade Poland). And Poland isn’t worth 10 IPCs since the Russian NO is on the Russian turn.

The main strat is to set-up that transport shuck from East Canada to France, it’s by far the most effective strategy for the Allies. You should gear UK and US strategy towards that, AND at the same time at least destroy the Italian fleet and protect Africa, as well as distracting Japan. It’s a tall order, yes, but you won’t win AA50 against a NO-boosted Axis easy!

We really shouldn’t make terrain too complex in a game like this. But one effect I thought of would be to give artillery ‘3’ in defence in rough terrain, but the movement effect for tanks is what is important I think.

PS. And Italy shouldn’t be rough, Balkans is enough and since it’s between Italy and Germany it is a nice simulation of the defence lines Germany was able to put up after the fall of Italy proper. DS.

Why invade Poland?  :?  France is worth 11 IPCs for England and then 5 for USA as well, it’s really the way to go. Sure you drop some troops in Nortwest Europe or Poland if you can’t get into France, but that just means your invasion force is too weak and you need to build up UK+USA troops to do it better. You’re almost never going to win a game as Allies if you don’t punch a hole in that Atlantic wall where it hurts, i.e. France.

No need to do the Baltic closing, Allies should be invading France or Italy and the Baltic isn’t as good a place as it used to be sail that invasion fleet into.

Maybe we should start playing with the optional rules in League and Tourney games? It might be more balanced, maybe even a 50/50?

Good! The Japanese sure don’t need any favours given how strong they are in most games…  :wink:

Not too complicated is better. Extra search rolls etc adds more rules to an already rule-laden sub section. My idea just means you erase one sentence from Destroyer special abilities. The point is that Germany needs to be able to buy subs in Baltic Sea and then attack invading fleets without a single destroyer in North Sea blocking them, a simple but effective change.

are these convoy zones like the ones in AAP? that correspond to a particular territory(s)?  Then you could cut off Borneo on one turn and take it the next if you had to delay, but you would deny UK the income.

All this is speculation and probably we won’t see any of it in the game. The same effect can be arranged by just moving IPCs from territories in Africa to Middle East and Southeast asia. But the idea would be that a convoy zone lost means that number of IPCs lost for the owning player, so not like in AAE where convoys represent off-map income but rather like transport networks that can be disrupted. Maybe subs could have the special power to fire a shot at a convoy and you then lose that number of IPCs directly, since subs have such poor defence values. Number of IPCs on convoys could be fixed at 5 per country or even better range from 10 down to 2 IPCs depending on how vital sea routes were for each power.

I would really like to allow subs to ignore DDs when moving, it would make for more a chance for subs to be bought by Germany. If we don’t have convoy zones, at least that would mean something more like an Atlantic war.

You could have two types of resources that would be on-the-map-NOs, so to speak. Better for a simpler game and easier to learn.

1. Oil well: 5 IPC value areas that adds to your income, you can have several but start with one only.
2. Convoy zone: UK: group of Central Atlantic sea zones, Japan: group of West Pacific sea zones, USA: group of East Pacific sea zones, Soviet Union: two North Atlantic sea zones, Germany: Central mediterranean sea zone. One sub or other warship in any of the sea zones means you lose 5 IPCs/turn. Maybe subs could have the ability to fire shots at convoys and if they hit the enemy loses 5 IPCs, they wouldn’t need to hold the territory in this way.

Trade zones would mean those expensive ships of yours can have economic impact without needing to take territories, something missing in the game.

OK, voting is over, China inf bids won but by a very small margin. I’ll move the discussion over to the League discussion forum and we’ll see what people think there! Join in and we can influence how the game will be played!  :-)

/Subotai

Read Larry Harris’ introduction to the rulebook: “One important aspect of the game was to adress the ahistorical tendency for the Japanese to attack Russia”. I wouldn’t mind having a bid system that goes in the direction of his intentions. ALL bid system are house rules, you can’t argue around that. I think we should be playing with Larry Harris’ optional rules and then use China inf bids along with them, I’ll argue for that and I’m sure you’ll argue for your view and we’ll see what other people think.

A simpler way of modelling resources than NOs or changes to IPC-values (that might have other effects as you describe) is to have oil wells such as in AAE. It could work for AA42 and shouldn’t be too hard to implement. Just put an oil well in vital territories, and make the owner lose 5 IPCs immediately and then for each turn not controlled. Also doesn’t disturb game balance as much as IPC-value since the aggressor doesn’t gain the money. Oil wells could be placed in: Balkans (Bulgaria), Persia, Borneo, Caucasus and Central USA. Maybe the capturing of an enemy oil well could offset for the loss of your own, so you only lose IPCs if you control no oil wells at all.

AA50 used more spaces to try to model the geography of Asia and Africa, but if AA42 is more like AAR in the number of spaces, in order to have a less bulky map, maybe terrain should be added to the game? “Rough terrain” could be shown with small mountains on the map, in Africa south of Egypt, China in territories without a coast and in Siberia and Persia. Maybe Burma, Norway, Balkans and the Rockies (Alaska, West Canada, Central US) as well. The effect would be simple: a tank must use both movement points to enter an area with rough terrain. Should have the same effects as adding spaces, and model the absence of roads and railways in many areas of the world during the war.

or what Sweden is to Norway.

Very funny…  :mrgreen: :roll: :-D  Which country was the colony of the other?

/corbeau blanc

Agree with you on Karelia, even though Germany can take it sometimes it’s not too difficult to take it back by Russian counterattack and/or UK invasion. Only once Germany gets heavy inf reinforcement east can they hope to hold it, and if you do a good UK/US invasion combo into Europe there should be tied lots of Germans tied up manning the West wall. In my games, Germany and Italy often seem to end up being inf-heavy hedgehogs, leaving it to Japan to finish Moscow off.

India, on the other hand, isn’t easy to hold at all. This is due to Japanese number of transports and fighters, which will overwhelm you sooner or later. I think ICs in SAF and EGY are a better UK focus, better fighting a delaying action over India and reinforce Russia with aircraft to make it impregneable.

IPC-distribution it seems is kind of a consensus, but probably not enough. We can’t hope for a bigger map with more sea zones in a budgetized game. What we CAN hope for though is a better setup. I mean, the slight AA50 changes really made USA more likely to go Pacific just by having a CV surviving turn 1. For the setup I would go for:

1. Japan should have max 1 BB and max 2 CV, instead some DDs and CAs.
2. USA should have 1 CV protected from turn 1 attack, and several DDs and CAs, as well as at least one sub.
3. Pearl Harbor ‘2’ shouldn’t happen, it shouldn’t be in reach by Jap units, only a move towards Midway perhaps. This means there must be three sea zones from Sea of Japan to Hawaii.
4. India set-up should be strong enough to allow for an IC purchase without a Japanese auto-capture on turn 1 or 2. Max 2 Jap transports.
5. China, enough said about this, of course a stronger set-up.

With a set-up like this combined with more IPCs in Pacific, we might get to the point where a Pacific strategy combined with an Europe strategy will be better than just a maxed KGF, due to the fact that Japan would reach an IPC level that is unstoppable if ignored in the Pacific, AND the investment to make this possible isn’t too steep for the Allies.

PS. I very much disagree on the “split-USA” idea, to me it goes against both playability and historicality! DS.