Posts made by Wolfshanze

1942 PTO:

Updated my 1942 map pics with new vinyl map in-play. Here’s some initial setup pics of the 1942 map… ETO:

I’m very glad I took the dive to making a couple of enlarged vinyl maps.  I don’t have a permanent war room like Young Grasshopper… I don’t even have the space to setup a temp table like Munck… but I did have a fairly large kitchen island which doubles as my war room hub, so it was large enough to stick a couple of large maps on (with barstools!).  So happy I could pull that off!

Bigger maps are definitely better.

Oh you’re from Denmark… so no Danish version of Global War map?  Can’t be moving non-stop around that board… how bout we settle on a barstool or two? lolz!  :-D

Obviously Germany is about to fall, which means its an eventual Axis loss, as Japan can’t hold out alone forever.

You should look into getting a bigger map printed out, everyone looks so squished!

Very nice… so you keep the maps rolled up and unroll them and put the plexiglass sheets over them when its time to play?

No chairs?  No CHAIRS?  For a game as long as Global War… man, you’re killing me… I gotta have chairs!  :-D

I love your unit bins… where’d you get em?  What’s the make/model of the bins?

I thought the best strategy to counter KJF was to KRF with Germany, since the Allies are ignoring you.

Lol…

Ya, if you read my previous thread, then you know I’ve basically abandoned about 95% of the HBG custom units I’ve ordered. I had a goal of doubling or tripling my available force pool of units (if I had 10 tanks from the base game, I wanted 20 to 30 in my bins for example). I had at first ordered a little of everything… some additional OOB units, some custom HBG units, etc… after receiving several waves of additional units, I came to the conclusion that the only thing really working for me was mostly the planes (HBG planes blended well with OOB planes). For the most part, the tanks and ships suffered with scaling issues next to the OOB units (as we’ve discussed).

So, in the end, I kept almost all my custom HBG planes, and found a new home for the ships and tanks (another forum member scooped them up)… I then refilled what I wanted with OOB units… once again, this was more about conformity and ease of identity for the new players I was teaching than anything else… I think the HBG units are well done otherwise.

As for my final order of that German Expansion Set 3… we’ll see… they will all get used… one way or another… either i’ll like them and integrate them… or i’ll find a new home for them… don’t want to see them go to waste. I really WANT Panzer-IV’s in my game… if they’re at least close to OOB size, they’ll stay put… if I got to break out tweezers again to move them around, i’ll rehome them.

@LHoffman:

Personally, I don’t mind at all and agree with HBG’s sizing convention. It would be weird to see a Pz III or Pz IV piece being the same size as a Tiger piece.

I went over my personal thoughts on this extensively in the other thread about HBG scaling here:
http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=37717.0

It kinda boils down to an all or nothing thing with me… either put everything to scale, or don’t do it at all… you’ve already got American OOB Shermans the same size as Tigers and Panthers, yet nobody complains about that… plus, HBG isn’t consistent with their scaling which is another issue… it’s not three tiered or consistent. Some of their light tanks are more on a 4th or 5th scale down from OOB… the 7TP is so damn small, you practically need tweezers to pick it up, and that doesn’t work well on a crowded game board. HBG’s P-51 is way too small to other aircraft and even their own, it’s off-scale. Also, teaching new people that something you need tweezers to pick up is the same combat value as something 4x its size is another issue.

Bottom line, as I stated in the other thread about HBG unit scaling, there’s so many things that the scaling messes with… there are Cruisers the size of Battleships, which is historically accurate but damn confusing in a game like A&A especially when you’re teaching new people to the game unfamiliar with equipment differences… scaling things all over the size map with the exact same combat values can just throw monkey wrenches around… I know it’s a personal peeve of mine, and certainly not shared by all, but I like the simplicity of similar sized sculpts for same unit capabilities (in A&A a tank is a tank is a tank, we don’t have 3 or 4 tank ratings).

In the end, I decided to keep units of same ability to be basically same size, which means sticking with OOB units… and that includes Shermans the same size as Tigers, and nobody complains about that issue. None of the pictures on HBG’s site show scale to OOB… HBG has some finely crafted units, but many of them have drastic size differences that are all but impossible to tell until you have them in hand. My final thought on the HBG Pz-III was that it was nearly half the size of all other OOB tanks, so I would skip on it (like I said, it should be an all or nothing on scaling, not some are scaled while others are not). If the HBG Pz-IV is same scale as OOB, or just a tad smaller, I can work with it… but if it’s another model that turns out be tiny compared to OOB units it won’t fit the bill of the set of units I’m working on.

I already ordered HBG’s German Set 3… I’m just waiting on it to ship. I’ll anxiously await seeing the size of the Pz-IV and hope it fits in with OOB units… if it stands out like a sore thumb, I wont use it, so at this point, I’m just waiting on that set to ship so I can have a look at it.

P.S.
Forgot to mention the OOB Type 95 Ha-Go Japanese tank is basically the same size as the Tiger and Panther as well… people play with this stuff all the time without thinking it weird… it “works” because all the tanks are the same size, even though in reality the Type 95 is a tiny fraction of what a Tiger would be. HBG has a Type-95 too… another tweezer job… while it makes sense in comparison, I don’t like PLAYING the game with these tweezer jobs.

If I heard of a G40 Vichy mod, I would think it just collaborates with what I had in mind.

OMG I started a math riot!  :-o

Ya, using it as a possible early war German tank… note, I have NOT committed to this thought, just tossing it out there.

HBG has a Pz-III, but I find it annoyingly small… I am aware there is a Pz-IV coming in the new set, but to my knowledge it hasn’t seen the light of day yet, and I’m still concerned of its scaling to OOB units.  I have a German Expansion set 3 on pre-order, but I haven’t seen it yet… has anybody gotten theirs?

My overall personal dilemma has been three-fold…
A) Go with an HBG solution, that I find too-small to scale compared to my OOB units.
B) Go with repainting the 1984 generic tank that while Panzer-ish in overall look, is not an actual tank.
C) Shrug and just stand pat on OOB Panthers and Tigers.

I realize that MY mind is a bit OCD on this sort of thing… a lot of people would laugh and either use the smaller HBG unit, or not give a damn about even having Panzers and just stick with the OOB units.  It’s a personal problem, I admit… anyways, I’m hoping the pending Panzer IV from HBG will solve this issue permanently, but as usual with HBG custom tanks, I’m worried it will be too small for my liking.

I picked up a couple of 37" Alvin Ice transparent PVC storage tubes (pic below) to store my 1941 and 1942 maps in to keep them safe.

Since they are totally contained and protected, I roll them map-side-facing-out, so that when I unroll them, if there’s any kind of curve, its a downward one, which quickly flattens in a few seconds.  It might also be the materiel… I know you used Pyrene while I used Vinyl… I don’t know if one is a better choice or not, but I just stuck with Outdoor Banner Vinyl since it seemed to work so well with my earlier battle board project.  When I unroll the map, it has a slight downward curve to the table for a few seconds, then flattens out on its own… I don’t do anything special to get it to lie flat (other than perhaps rolling it map-side-out).

Well I realized they were cheaper than I first thought once I realized the current exchange rate.  :evil:

Besides, you told me on your Youtube Channel to support Canada, so I did.  Also, I ordered some extra 10s and 25s, which are already in-route from Toronto.

I’m very happy with the map results for both 1941 and 1942… I lack the skills and room for a proper bunker, but I was able to get much larger maps that can fit on my largest flat surface, and they roll up nicely into a couple of solid storage tubes I got for safe keeping.

1941 PTO:

Updated my 1941 map pics with new vinyl map in-play. Here’s some initial setup pics of the 1941 map… ETO:

@Baron:

G40b or G40B maybe missleading to G40 second edition, G40A being first ed.
Why not use G40BM?

I really don’t think you want to call it a BM… just sayin…  :-D

Just curious what folks think of AAA in the game… you buy a lot, a few, some, none?  What are your thoughts on AAA in Axis and Allies and its importance (or lack there-of) in the game?

Ya, there’s a lot to like with your map… i did notice the setups on the territories themselves, but i’m really digging Dedo’s Supreme map work… i just need to figure out how to edit it to my personal tastes.

As for Dedo’s work, I would either need a PNG or BMP version of Dedo’s Supreme map, or I need to figure out how to edit PDF files… I can view them just fine, I can take them to the printer and have them printed (as I have), but i’d love to figure out how to edit the suckers with some skill… I’d love to play around with some IPC numbers on the map.

@RetroFuhrer

There’s definately some nice things in your map there… I see you added some plants in Leningrad and Rome… I can see both of those (why Italy doesn’t start with a factory in 1941 is beyond me).

Two things though… and these are totally “me only” issues.

1. going over your numbers, I see Germany has 15 to start and the US 20… in both cases, that’s only a 3 IPC boost over default… and not enough IMHO to get where i’d like to see 1941 be… it’s certainly suitable for a replacement of 1941, but its not really the change I’m thinking about.
2. once again… very personal choice here… but I have grown fond of the “style” of the 1941/1942 maps with their coloring and contours of geography, which is why I really like Dedo’s Supreme maps for 1941 and 1942.  Unfortunately for me, they are in PDF format, which editing PDFs is not something I’m familiar with (maybe something I should look into).  Your map, while completely functional and a fine alternative to the 1941 map, just isn’t what I’m thinking of.  But kudos for your work… it’s certainly better than mine (which is non-existant!).