@andrewaagamer
Ah. I hadn’t understood that subtlety. It’s a bit like assuming that, as an attacker, I’m going to win - so, retreat isn’t an option. Thanks a lot for your help.
Victory Cities: What I feared…
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Didn’t Larry say victory cities were going to play a bigger role in AA50? Seems pretty misleading since they actually play a lesser role in each of those victory conditions vs. Revised OOB ones (13 requires controlling more territory than 8, 15 more than 10, 18 = 12). Unless there’s something else special about victory cities, they still seem rather pointless, even at 13 for a win. 13 now seems to be about comparable to 9 in Revised, for Axis at least. I think adding Ottawa as a VC was a pretty big mistake, Cairo seems like a better spot, something that is actually going to be fought over.
I generally try not to gripe about problems in AA50 when it’s not even out yet, but I just don’t see how VCs are any more significant than they were in Revised. If the game were balanced for an Axis win at 11-12 VCs with the Allies having an advantage as far as a domination game would be concerned, but having something like a 13 VC win (only because they start '41 with 12), then I think VCs would actually bring to the game what they should.
In general, I agree.
AAR is perfectly balanced at 9 VC if you move the VC from LA to Hawaii. This forces USA to focus some effort in the Pacific.
I wish Ottawa was likewise eliminated as a VC, in favor of South Africa. Makes Africa really worth fighting for, although it is still important.
However, at 13 you dont need Ottawa or London, and I think 13 VC will end up the “standard”, just like 9 was for revised.
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I always felt VC were a cheap victory anyway, just like I feel that M84 in classic is a cheap victory. (There’s a reason we call it MAGIC 84, because you can be losing and magically win.)
Anyway, I am really only posting because I dont think VCs are there to make the game faster so much as to make the players go in directions not normally traveled.
On the plus side, if invasion USA is required, at least I am one of the, if not the only, player on these boards who has practiced Kill America First with Japan. :P
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However, at 13 you dont need Ottawa or London, and I think 13 VC will end up the “standard”, just like 9 was for revised.
Sure, but that still pretty much means Axis has to take Moscow. Unless you think Japan can dominate US in the Pacific so much that they’re able to hold Hawaii, never mind everything else. If US holds Hawaii, Axis has to take Moscow. And that’s at the lowest VC condition possible, it just seems pointless. And I’m afraid 12 VC victory would screw up the balance, especially since Allies could win '41 after J1 failing to take Philippines :P. Ottawa being in Egypt or SAF instead seems like it might actually make a 13 VC game interesting from the VC perspective.
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However, at 13 you dont need Ottawa or London, and I think 13 VC will end up the “standard”, just like 9 was for revised.
Sure, but that still pretty much means Axis has to take Moscow. Unless you think Japan can dominate US in the Pacific so much that they’re able to hold Hawaii, never mind everything else. If US holds Hawaii, Axis has to take Moscow. And that’s at the lowest VC condition possible, it just seems pointless. And I’m afraid 12 VC victory would screw up the balance, especially since Allies could win '41 after J1 failing to take Philippines :P. Ottawa being in Egypt or SAF instead seems like it might actually make a 13 VC game interesting from the VC perspective.
When revised came out, I’m sure alot of players tried the 8 VC game…and found it to be a bit lacking. Who knows with AA50… the 12 VC game might be doable. You could also tweak a 12 VC game to be 12 VC for Axis, 13 (or whatever) for the Allies. Point is, we can tweak the VC victory conditions as needed. The VC system is flexible enough for that tweaking.
Plus, again, we are all speculating. I wouldn’t worry about it so much at this time.
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Plus, again, we are all speculating. I wouldn’t worry about it so much at this time.
You are correct, and in about 5 weeks we know for sure.
About the topic, now I dont care too much about this VC-stuff, I wish it was more simple, just grab two capitals and win.
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I think if you grab two capitols the game is pretty much decided at that point regardless of what “Victory Cities” one holds.
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Should Tripoli find itself on a victory city list for the Italians?
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No, allies would conquer for sure in a obsesive KGF strategy, something Larry seems want avoid. Alexandria or Cape Town would be better than Ottawa, I think. Even Chongquing would be better than Ottawa.
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Victory cities will play a larger role in the game. It’s true that, in effect, you must capture one, two or three enemy capitals to satisfy the victory conditions. However, just doing that by itself isn’t enough to win. The new Victory City requirements will cause the action to be spread out more on the map. Specifically, more Victory Cities in the Pacific Theatre will mean more action there, as Japan must make an effort in that Theatre in order to help contribute to Axis victory, and the US can’t ignore it and just let Japan have all of those VCs.
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the US can’t ignore it and just let Japan have all of those VCs.
Why not?
If Japan captures every single Pacific victory city, so what? It doesn’t matter until the end. If America went purely KGF like they do most of the time in revised, the Allies can crush Germany/Italy, then, with an exceptional income, walk over Japan, just like in revised. It just appears that ignoring victory cities entirely, until victory is obvious (capitals have fallen), is the best method for victory. This makes victory cities seem, to me, more of an unnecessary complication than something that has an “effect on gameplay” like Harry wanted. The only time I see victory cities making a difference is if the Allies for whatever reason decided to capture every Axis victory city except for capitals… which doesn’t seem like a feasible strategy.
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Maybe do we lack some information? VC are different from Revised?
If they work the same way it is difficult to spread the game all over the map. If it is needed to conquer 1, 2 o 3 capital to win the game than the capital are still the premium objectives. Having or not the needed VC is secondary. After the fall of a capital it is more easy to take the VC controlled by that nation. Generally the opposite is not true. Even if Axis control the Victory cities of USSR conquering Moscow is still hard, IMHO.
Simply putting more VC here and there do not increase their importance… but Krieghund said:
Victory cities will play a larger role in the game.
I try to imagine … what if the “capitol features was spread over” to all the original VCs controlled by a nation? VC will be really important. Or maybe other ways to increase VC interest?
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@Rakeman:
the US can’t ignore it and just let Japan have all of those VCs.
Why not?
If Japan captures every single Pacific victory city, so what? It doesn’t matter until the end. If America went purely KGF like they do most of the time in revised, the Allies can crush Germany/Italy, then, with an exceptional income, walk over Japan, just like in revised. It just appears that ignoring victory cities entirely, until victory is obvious (capitals have fallen), is the best method for victory. This makes victory cities seem, to me, more of an unnecessary complication than something that has an “effect on gameplay” like Harry wanted. The only time I see victory cities making a difference is if the Allies for whatever reason decided to capture every Axis victory city except for capitals… which doesn’t seem like a feasible strategy.
1- You dont need a capital to get to 13 VC. If you ignore Japan, that’s several “free” VC Japan gets.
2- Japan will get bonus income (and the allies lose it) which makes Japan even stronger.
3- Since Japan cannot just march to moscow easily, it has nothing better to do than conquer LA. Which it CAN do if you give it its starting (1942) 30 IPC, plus IPC for territories it takes, PLUS 15 bonus IPC for its goals. Japan will soon become a 65-70 IPC monster.
I dont think the allies can just “ignore” Japan. That was the whole point of the pacific VC and the bonus system. You will be forced to spend $ in the pacific, or you will lose.
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Squirecam’s comments means there will be real balance change in the game. An Indian IC with 10 IPCs build/turn by UK and US builds in the Pacific of 20 IPCs /turn will be a MINIMUM to contain Japan. Maybe this is the explanation for the cheaper bomber cost and higher damage limit for SBR compared to LHTR: UK and US can never just focus all their builds vs. Germany & Italy, so if SBR should be a part of the game it had to be boosted. That US starts now with 2 bombers seems to reinforce this picture, as well as the return of heavy, heavy bombers (two dice attack+SBR). Building ships for invading is now a bit more difficult since more escort ships are necessary when transports are sitting ducks, this also counts against the Allies.
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I think the bomber is too powefull now. We have a stronger SBR, that crappy paratrooper tech, a lone bomber can kill infinite undefended trannies and the bomber can still support naval combat. And now costs 12 ipcs, go figure :?
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I dont think the allies can just “ignore” Japan. That was the whole point of the pacific VC and the bonus system. You will be forced to spend $ in the pacific, or you will lose.
That seems to be much more the effect of National Objectives and the new Chinese rules/territories than any need for Pacific VCs.
If Japan is able to take and hold W. US, I still don’t think VCs really matter. Assuming Japan has every Eastern VC including India and all Pacific VCs…In that situation, the Axis would win by VCs (13-win) if Germany/Italy can take and hold either Leningrad or Stalingrad, or if Japan can take Ottawa or Washington. If Germany/Italy are still in a position to take Len/Stalingrad with Japan established in W US, the Allies are done. US would soon fall to Japan anyway in this situation because of the huge disparity in income, and the fact that UK can’t help US that much because they already seem to be having trouble containing Germany/Italy. If Japan takes Washington for the win, you’ve once again won with a capital. If Japan is able to take and hold Ottawa to win, then once again it seems they have a large enough force to soon overwhelm the US in Washington. This whole scenario was brought about in the first place by National Objectives, though, not VCs.
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I dont think the allies can just “ignore” Japan. That was the whole point of the pacific VC and the bonus system. You will be forced to spend $ in the pacific, or you will lose.
That seems to be much more the effect of National Objectives and the new Chinese rules/territories than any need for Pacific VCs.
If Japan is able to take and hold W. US, I still don’t think VCs really matter. Assuming Japan has every Eastern VC including India and all Pacific VCs…In that situation, the Axis would win by VCs (13-win) if Germany/Italy can take and hold either Leningrad or Stalingrad, or if Japan can take Ottawa or Washington. If Germany/Italy are still in a position to take Len/Stalingrad with Japan established in W US, the Allies are done. US would soon fall to Japan anyway in this situation because of the huge disparity in income, and the fact that UK can’t help US that much because they already seem to be having trouble containing Germany/Italy. If Japan takes Washington for the win, you’ve once again won with a capital. If Japan is able to take and hold Ottawa to win, then once again it seems they have a large enough force to soon overwhelm the US in Washington. This whole scenario was brought about in the first place by National Objectives, though, not VCs.
Well, the “China rules” were there to prevent the “JTDTM” scenario. Make it more like the real war.
But taking that away from Japan means there MUST be some way to force the allies into the pacific theatre. Or we would be going backwards from AAR, not forwards.
VC are means to end games prior to a total war scenario. If Germany/Italy are strong enough to withstand a 3v2, (at least long enough to take lenningrad/stalingrad before the might of the allies crushes them), then we dont “need” the bonuses to fix anything because leaving Japan alone would cause a loss.
Here, we dont know whether G/I can do this, but we do know Japan gets alot of bonus help if left alone. This bonus + the axis military starting advantage may be enough.
We will have to wait and see. But clearly, the system was designed to force some pacific participation. The consequences for failing to do so should be a 13 VC loss.
In a 15 VC or higher (which requires Moscow/London) I would suspect you can still KGF w/o much risk. You are not easily going to get London in that scenario.
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I suspect that some additional Victory Cities may be required (via a house rule like we did with Sydney, Honolulu and Stalingrad for Revised.) Ottawa and San Francisco may work on occassion, with a concerted naval effort by the Axis, and some mistakes or poor luck for the Allies, but I don’t think anyone here expects Washington to ever be in play. Probably the only way players are going to take Victory Cities seriously, is if they can consistantly win by focusing on them, as opposed to just taking a capital. The Axis in particular, need a way to achieve victory that doesn’t involve Moscow; otherwise the game will always be focused on triple teaming Russia. We need some more VCs on parts of the map which are likely to change hands regularly.
I would propose 3 additional Victory Cities.
-Benghazi (Libya)
-Singapore (French Indo-China)
-Cairo-Suez (Egypt) or Cape Town (South Africa)That would give us 21 to work with, and a few in Africa, which seems appropriate.
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I suspect that some additional Victory Cities may be required (via a house rule like we did with Sydney, Honolulu and Stalingrad for Revised.) Ottawa and San Francisco may work on occassion, with a concerted naval effort by the Axis, and some mistakes or poor luck for the Allies, but I don’t think anyone here expects Washington to ever be in play. Probably the only way players are going to take Victory Cities seriously, is if they can consistantly win by focusing on them, as opposed to just taking a capital. The Axis in particular, need a way to achieve victory that doesn’t involve taking Moscow; otherwise the game will always be focused on triple teaming Russia. We need some more VCs on parts of the map which are likely to change hands regularly.
I would propose 3 additional Victory Cities.
-Benghazi (Libya)
-Singapore (French Indo-China)
-Cairo-Suez (Egypt) or Cape Town (South Africa)That would give us 21 to work with, and a few in Africa, which seems appropriate.
Sounds plausible with Singapore, but I don’t know about the other proposed two…
Good catch about needing more VC’s, though. -
Benghazi is the spot for Italy. Tripoli and Tobruk have a tendancy to steal the spotlight, but for logistics and the campaigns in north africa, I think Benghazi makes the most sense by far (for another VC in any case.) Another possibility for the Duce, might be Athens.
Egypt is already critical for either side on account of the Canal, so I think it would make sense, and certainly concentrate more attention on North Africa. South Africa is a bit of a stretch, but it would give the Italians a real target to shoot for. Seems to me that if we have Italy as a playable faction we might as well give them something to do right? Go Graziani hehe.
Ottawa and Washington I don’t really understand. I know as political capitals they fit the bill, but in terms of the history and as realistic war objectives, they were never really threatened. I think you can make a strong case for San Francisco and London as possibilities, but I’d rather the Victory Cities were scattered in more accessible regions of the map. I would prefer a heavier concentration of VCs in the Pacific for example, at least one more. Iwo might work too if Singapore doesn’t grab you, or Rangoon. Or possibly Victoria (in Western Canada) if the idea is to force the Japs to go after North America. It stills seems kind of odd that there are no Victory Cities in Africa though, since that was a major theater of opperations for much of the war.
Also, I really don’t see the benefit of having this overlap between Capitals and Victory Cities.
Why not just leave the capitals as their own seperate thing?
Instead of Moscow as both a capital and a VC, why not say that its just a capital, and save the VC for someplace more interesting, like Vladivostok or Murmansk? Instead of Berlin, how about Bucharest? Its not like there’s any long standing convention that states that all capitals have to be victory cities as well. Classic didn’t even have VCs (which is probably why most Revised players continue to just ignore them as irrelevant.) I’m sure the rules and game board have been printed already, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still establish our own standards after the fact. :) -
@Rakeman:
the US can’t ignore it and just let Japan have all of those VCs.
Why not?
If Japan captures every single Pacific victory city, so what? It doesn’t matter until the end. If America went purely KGF like they do most of the time in revised, the Allies can crush Germany/Italy, then, with an exceptional income, walk over Japan, just like in revised. It just appears that ignoring victory cities entirely, until victory is obvious (capitals have fallen), is the best method for victory. This makes victory cities seem, to me, more of an unnecessary complication than something that has an “effect on gameplay” like Harry wanted. The only time I see victory cities making a difference is if the Allies for whatever reason decided to capture every Axis victory city except for capitals… which doesn’t seem like a feasible strategy.
1- You dont need a capital to get to 13 VC. If you ignore Japan, that’s several “free” VC Japan gets.
2- Japan will get bonus income (and the allies lose it) which makes Japan even stronger.
3- Since Japan cannot just march to moscow easily, it has nothing better to do than conquer LA. Which it CAN do if you give it its starting (1942) 30 IPC, plus IPC for territories it takes, PLUS 15 bonus IPC for its goals. Japan will soon become a 65-70 IPC monster.
I dont think the allies can just “ignore” Japan. That was the whole point of the pacific VC and the bonus system. You will be forced to spend $ in the pacific, or you will lose.
I disagree.
1. Same in revised. If you ignore Japan, they take India (VC). But that didn’t matter.
2. Same in revised. If you ignore Japan, they could realistically get an income of about 45 IPC. But nobody cared.
3. If it’s anything like revised, which we don’t know, the IPC from territories it takes wont be very much. For example, in revised, you get 4 IPC for China. It seems like about this amount in AA50, but that 4+ IPC is spread among a good 5 or 6 territories, not 2 territories.
I understand the point, that’s why I’m debating it: I don’t think VCs made ANY progress in achieving a pacific theater, and I don’t think bonuses will matter enough to change the ignore-Japan strategy. If the VCs mattered, that alone would solve it, but clearly capitals are what matters since you need them anyway for a 15 VC win (standard win amount).
The only ways bonuses will change the pacific is if:
1. Bonuses for Japan are large enough to counter the increased soviet mass and china, therefore bonuses cancel out the JTDTM nerfs and allow Japan to capture moscow.
2. Bonuses for Japan are large enough for Japan to launch a successful invasion against North America.
3. Japan is able to do enough economic damage to the Allies through capturing territory so that Germany and Italy alone can take on the allied onslaught.
All of these seem unlikely, but I suppose we will see. I know the first thing I’m going to do is launch an all out KG&IF against Germany and Italy, ignoring Japan entirely, and see how it works. Japan will be powerful by the time Germany and Italy fall, but it wont matter since, well, the Allies will have Germany and Italy.
I think the problem is that adding Soviet territories, China, etc., attempt to fix the problem, but not the core mechanic, the root of the problem. Capitals are what matters in this game and Japan is in no position to threaten any, which led to the Allies ignoring Japan since they weren’t a threat, and Japan rushing to Moscow since it was the only capital within range. They fixed the whole “Moscow is the only capital within Japan’s range” part, but not the core of the issue, which was that Japan was never a real threat to anything besides Moscow using a lame gimmick strategy.
In Revised, they attempted to fix this by adding IPC value to Japan in the Pacific, but they did it wrong- if they added ALLIED IPC value to the Pacific, then maybe Japan would have been powerful enough to, if left unattended, cripple the Allies to a point where Germany could take them on.
So yes, in my opinion, the problem is that Japan isn’t a threat to anything significant, and until that is changed, JTDTM and KGF will still remain the most viable strategies.
Disclaimer: This is all based on speculation about past and future A&A games
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