@crockett36
This seems interesting. I’ll try it out.
G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions)
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@barnee said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
right on. I kinda got the abstract thing it was the other that threw me. How’s the playtest going ?
Early days. I hope to get the brunt of it done over the weekend with proper 10k rolls and stuff like that. So far it feels good.
Submarines seem to be useful for hit and run tactics if they can escape. I ended up choosing for naval scale, BBs represent 2 ships and CVs represent either 4 light carriers or two fleet carriers (so that the air wing size of 100 planes makes sense).
I am redoing OOB in my spare time for the game as well so we have a more accurate force composition to the situation in 1940.
Oh and I think only Japanese and American carriers will be able to load 2 air wings at the start too. British and German carriers had quite smaller air wings (but had armoured decks so maybe an extra hitpoint?).
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Right on. I got ya now. You’re trying to decide how many dudes a unit represents. Kinda ? Anyway, you’ll still use the minatures to represent. Looking forward to what you come up with.
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@barnee said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
Right on. I got ya now. You’re trying to decide how many dudes a unit represents. Kinda ? Anyway, you’ll still use the minatures to represent. Looking forward to what you come up with.
Yeah. I feel it can make the game more consistent. One thing that always bothered me was the on off combat system for instance where you “killed” a unit in combat in one hit. These units are meant to represent divisions or something (I think corps is the better scale for this game) a division or a corp doesn’t disappear in one hit. And ships being fully destroyed was not that common either and neither were air wings. You could damage it but more likely than not it wouldn’t be all the planes in a wing would be shot down.
So yeah, trying to make it more consistent and then balancing it around it.
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sounds good. triplea allows units to take multiple hits so, if you ever want to try and convert it to digital it may be possible. Not as fun necessarily, but as Black Elk says, it’s a lot easier to test stuff that way.
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@mAIOR said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
@barnee said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
right on. I kinda got the abstract thing it was the other that threw me. How’s the playtest going ?
Early days. I hope to get the brunt of it done over the weekend with proper 10k rolls and stuff like that. So far it feels good.
Submarines seem to be useful for hit and run tactics if they can escape. I ended up choosing for naval scale, BBs represent 2 ships and CVs represent either 4 light carriers or two fleet carriers (so that the air wing size of 100 planes makes sense).
I am redoing OOB in my spare time for the game as well so we have a more accurate force composition to the situation in 1940.
Oh and I think only Japanese and American carriers will be able to load 2 air wings at the start too. British and German carriers had quite smaller air wings (but had armoured decks so maybe an extra hitpoint?).
IMO, you should enlarge your scale:
1 Fighter: Escort or Light Carrier
2 Fighters: UK’s Carrier
3 Fighters: US or IJN CarriersYes there is at least one thread talking about different way of scaling Carriers.
Here is how I see the scaling in combat power:a) 1 hit, 1 aircraft (this one is usually around 9 or 10 IPCs) I prefer 9 (scale of 3 IPCs)
b) 1 hit, 2 aircraft (may use a 12 IPCs range, like it is in OOB 1941)
c) 1 hit, 3 aircraft (maybe at 15 IPCs, it would be correctly incremented)
d) 2 hits, 2 aircraft OOB G40 at 16 IPCs
e) 2 hits, 3 aircraft at 20 IPCs (because it is well rounded, lol)Now, it is up to you to decide for A/D capacity.
We have seen:
A0 D1, 1 hit
A1 D1, 1 hit
A0 D2, 2 hits
A1 D2, 1 hit (1941 and 1942)
A1 D2, 2 hits (1942 Redesigned version actually tested on WW2, V5 TripleA map)
A1 D3, 2 hits My own houserule with Fg A2 D2 on board.
A1 vs D3 was needed to help a Full Carrier being better at defense than offense because my Fighter type is even offense/defense.Giving a minimal attack factor to Carrier help makes all warships equal because with “0” you get a special capacity rule: like it was a defenseless Transport but is not, may it enter a Sub infested zone with escort or not, etc.
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@baron-Münchhausen Hmmmmm… I have issues with that. As I said, I don’t want a single hit to completely remove aircraft. And remember that I am considering that each carrier figure represents 2 fleet carriers or 4 light carriers so capacities are similar. Carriers outside of the US at this scale will have half capacity and maybe an extra hitpoint (because they had armoured decks).
As I said, I will try this over the weekend and will get some results for Monday.
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@mAIOR
I don’t see why you cannot use 3 planes Carrier.Also, with half damaged aircraft sculpt, you are going to a lot of micromanaging stuff. Are you sure you want to go that way? It will be detrimental to overall strategy gaming experience.
By suggesting 3 planes, instead of doubling the number of sculpt. Which is not possible on actual plastic carrier. You can go from 2 toward 3. x1.5 increase in numbers of aircraft. A Fighter A3 D4 C10 is of similar strength per IPC invested to Fg A1.5 D2 C7. And you get 3 Fighter C7 for about the cost of 2 Fighter C10.
It is possible to work with 1914 values for Fighter.
Even Fighter cost 6 A2 D2, if Tank worth 5 IPCs.
TcB cost 7 A3 D2.
On your set up, for each pair of Fg or TcB, you can add 1 aircraft of your choice (either Fg or TcB).
It remains within workable size when going for the first game round with more and more units on board, which take more times to figure and move toward a specific location for combat.HTH
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@mAIOR said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
@baron-Münchhausen Hmmmmm… I have issues with that. As I said, I don’t want a single hit to completely remove aircraft. And remember that I am considering that each carrier figure represents 2 fleet carriers or 4 light carriers so capacities are similar. Carriers outside of the US at this scale will have half capacity and maybe an extra hitpoint (because they had armoured decks).
As I said, I will try this over the weekend and will get some results for Monday.
Another way to increase the number of warships sculpts (without going nuts with plastic chips under each unit) on your map board is to reduce their relative strength and cost. For instance, using:
Destroyer A1 D1 Cost 5 is a tool.
That way, your
Cruiser can be A2 D2 Cost 7
Carrier A0 D1 Cost 8, 1 hit, 3 planes (USN and IJN)
Carrier A0 D2 Cost 10-11 or 12, 2 hits, 2 planes (RN)
Battleship A3 D3, 2 hits Cost 12This is just an example of scaling down warships roster so for the same number of IPCs group, you have more units in a given SZ, for a similar firepower.
So instead of a Full Carrier of 36 IPCs with only 2 Fighters.
You get (suppose Fg A2 D2 Cost 6): same for 22 IPCs.
(26 IPCs) USN and IJN Carrier A0 D1 Cost 8, 1 hit and 3 Fg (18 IPCs)
(22-23-24 IPCs) RN Carrier A0 D2 Cost 10-11-12, 2 hits and 2 Fg (12 IPCs)In the last case, you mostly get 3 RN full Carrier (66-69-72 range) for the cost of 2 OOB fully loaded Carrier (72 IPCs).
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@mAIOR said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
@barnee said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
right on. I kinda got the abstract thing it was the other that threw me. How’s the playtest going ?
Early days. I hope to get the brunt of it done over the weekend with proper 10k rolls and stuff like that. So far it feels good.
Submarines seem to be useful for hit and run tactics if they can escape. I ended up choosing for naval scale, BBs represent 2 ships and CVs represent either 4 light carriers or two fleet carriers (so that the air wing size of 100 planes makes sense).
I am redoing OOB in my spare time for the game as well so we have a more accurate force composition to the situation in 1940.
Oh and I think only Japanese and American carriers will be able to load 2 air wings at the start too. British and German carriers had quite smaller air wings (but had armoured decks so maybe an extra hitpoint?).
So I see where your going now. Something to this effect.
BB= 2 BB’s. 4 hits each BB
CR= 2 CR’s. 3 or 4 hits each CR.
AC= 2 AC’s or 4 EscAC. US, Jap 2 hits each AC. 2 or 3 planes.
AC= 2 AC’s or 4 EscAC. UK, Ger 3 or 4 hits each AC. 2 planes. 1 or 2 dam 1 plane only.
DD= 1 ship. 1 hit each ship
SS= 1 ship. 1 hit each sub
Fig = 2 planes. 2 hits each fig plane
Tac= 2 planes. 2 hits each Tac plane
Stg.= 2 planes. 2 hits each Stg planemaybe your planes could be fig = 3 planes 2 hits.
What ever you feel is historic. Basically you looking for correct hit status based on Divisions or corps like you mentioned. Ground is a different animal a bit. -
@baron-Münchhausen said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
@mAIOR said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
@baron-Münchhausen Hmmmmm… I have issues with that. As I said, I don’t want a single hit to completely remove aircraft. And remember that I am considering that each carrier figure represents 2 fleet carriers or 4 light carriers so capacities are similar. Carriers outside of the US at this scale will have half capacity and maybe an extra hitpoint (because they had armoured decks).
As I said, I will try this over the weekend and will get some results for Monday.
Another way to increase the number of warships sculpts (without going nuts with plastic chips under each unit) on your map board is to reduce their relative strength and cost. For instance, using:
Destroyer A1 D1 Cost 5 is a tool.
That way, your
Cruiser can be A2 D2 Cost 7
Carrier A0 D1 Cost 8, 1 hit, 3 planes (USN and IJN)
Carrier A0 D2 Cost 10-11 or 12, 2 hits, 2 planes (RN)
Battleship A3 D3, 2 hits Cost 12This is just an example of scaling down warships roster so for the same number of IPCs group, you have more units in a given SZ, for a similar firepower.
So instead of a Full Carrier of 36 IPCs with only 2 Fighters.
You get (suppose Fg A2 D2 Cost 6): same for 22 IPCs.
(26 IPCs) USN and IJN Carrier A0 D1 Cost 8, 1 hit and 3 Fg (18 IPCs)
(22-23-24 IPCs) RN Carrier A0 D2 Cost 10-11-12, 2 hits and 2 Fg (12 IPCs)In the last case, you mostly get 3 RN full Carrier (66-69-72 range) for the cost of 2 OOB fully loaded Carrier (72 IPCs).
I see where Baron’s going with now. You’ll need chips under each piece based on 4 hits each or 3 or what ever it is.
Now this is a what if you on setup doubled the pieces on map and they were at half there cost and values ? Kinda like Baron’s numbers he just posted probably better based on spamming and use the normal hits on each piece.
Like each BB 2 hits, US JAP AC 1 hit each, UK GER AC 2 hits each and 1 plane 1 hit each.
Ya that’s some testing there for sure.You have another person to test against ? More people the better which you probably know. You got people that can test in person ?
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@SS-GEN
Gotta Social Distance.Not you personally baron. :)
Bob Dylan "Times They Are A Changing " LOL
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@barnee said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
@SS-GEN
Gotta Social Distance.Not you personally baron. :)
Bob Dylan "Times They Are A Changing " LOL
Ya sucks right now. No games
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@baron-Münchhausen It has to do with scale. I Don’t mind the micro so much as long as we can get a more accurate representation of the back and forth of a battle. So far testing has been ok. Haven’t done as much as I wanted but so far I like the results. There is a lot more of backwards and forwards and fleets that might have been defeated will come back and haunt you if you don’t follow through.
Some of my early findings:
Submarines 0/1 costing 4 work well. Surprise attack 2 at 2 dmg per hit is also interesting.DDs… might lower the overall attack to 1. With their special ASW roll they work as a great hunter killer unit and fleet protection… Although, there is an argument to be made in order to abstract destroyers played this way and just give BBs and CAs inherent DD cover (like WiF does for instance) and use the DD purely as hunter killers and convoy escorts. Like a strategic unit you can place in sea zones that can make the submarine rolls harder.
Now that is an idea. They wouldn’t count for fleet vs fleet action and only count as ASW units (DDs and CVEs).
As I was testing, a submarine could get destroyed on a convoy attack as soon as escorts were available but what if with one DD in the same sea area, instead of on a 1, you have to roll a 2? That would increase submarine atrition nicely which was something that I was struggling with (too easy for Germany to just build up inordinate ammounts of subs while not sacrificing resources elsewhere).
So basically, all sea units would have organic ASW instead of just DDs so when a sub tries to attack a lone BB or a carrier, it has to go through an ASW check and if detected it could be either pushed back or destroyed (will have to test to see what works best. Remmember, each sub is not just one sub so outright destruction might not be the correct way to do it).
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@SS-GEN said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
What ever you feel is historic. Basically you looking for correct hit status based on Divisions or corps like you mentioned. Ground is a different animal a bit.
hmmmm I am not sure about naval hitpoints. I mean, I keep going backwards and forwards and sometimes I step dangerously close to a CRT… Because I just find the overall attrition rate too high. Star Wars Rebellion does this with the hit markers under each ship but I also find that not very elegant. For instance, things like the sinking of the Bismark or the Hood were not that common and results like the battle of Riverplate were more common, I want there to be a chance of back and forwards and a single battle not being a monumental victory or defeat like game most of the time represents them (kind of because you then get the insane rebuilding economy). What I am trying to achieve (naval for now, land for later) is a sense of strategic warfare like A&A sometimes gives us but other times fails to do.
Anyway, I am sure I will reach a solution… Not sure it will be as simple as I want it to be.
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@mAIOR said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
@SS-GEN said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
What ever you feel is historic. Basically you looking for correct hit status based on Divisions or corps like you mentioned. Ground is a different animal a bit.
hmmmm I am not sure about naval hitpoints. I mean, I keep going backwards and forwards and sometimes I step dangerously close to a CRT… Because I just find the overall attrition rate too high. Star Wars Rebellion does this with the hit markers under each ship but I also find that not very elegant. For instance, things like the sinking of the Bismark or the Hood were not that common and results like the battle of Riverplate were more common, I want there to be a chance of back and forwards and a single battle not being a monumental victory or defeat like game most of the time represents them (kind of because you then get the insane rebuilding economy). What I am trying to achieve (naval for now, land for later) is a sense of strategic warfare like A&A sometimes gives us but other times fails to do.
Anyway, I am sure I will reach a solution… Not sure it will be as simple as I want it to be.
IMO, Axis and Allies is much more pleasant as a tabletop game because of eye candies it provides with all these little sculpts. Especially warships and aircraft on carriers.
On land, I usually use chips for Infantry, MechInf, Artys, but not Tank, when there is enough room in the TT. However, in SZ and Naval, I will never use chips. Just the sculpts.
My personal taste would be to rather increase the number of units but not going into damaged units besides aircraft or Battleship.
US and IJN have a limited numbers of Carriers and Battleships, per se.
These number might provide a level of individual unit which remain manageable.At Pearl Harbor Raid time, there was no more than 8 US Carrier with various aircraft capacity (before Essex was launched) . I noticed that Light Carriers or Escort Carriers were able to carry around 30 aircraft while Fleet was around 90.
So about one third. For me, this provided the ratio: 1 aircraft on light Carrier, then 3 aircraft sculpt on a US Fleet Carrier.So, all sturdier aircraft carriers might just hold two. It works on the table top. The only issue is about TcB scultp. 3 does not hold on a Carrier, but 2 TcB and 1 Fg can be put on a Carrier sculpt.
If this can be your starting point, then think about 1 aircraft Carrier unit figures for about 4 or 5 Carriers. Take a look at how many Fleet Carriers were available for Japan.
For instance, 2 US Carriers (for 8 to 10), if IJN gets 5 Carrier sculpt then would signify around 20 to 25 Carriers.
This might come handy if you want to set an adequate numbers for each sculpt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_Japanese_Navy_in_World_War_II
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@baron-Münchhausen said in G40 Redesign (currently taking suggestions):
IMO, Axis and Allies is much more pleasant as a tabletop game because of eye candies it provides with all these little sculpts. Especially warships and aircraft on carriers.
On land, I usually use chips for Infantry, MechInf, Artys, but not Tank, when there is enough room in the TT. However, in SZ and Naval, I will never use chips. Just the sculpts.
My personal taste would be to rather increase the number of units but not going into damaged units besides aircraft or Battleship.
US and IJN have a limited numbers of Carriers and Battleships, per se.
These number might provide a level of individual unit which remain manageable.
At Pearl Harbor Raid time, there was no more than 8 US Carrier with various aircraft capacity (before Essex was launched) . I noticed that Light Carriers or Escort Carriers were able to carry around 30 aircraft while Fleet was around 90.
So about one third. For me, this provided the ratio: 1 aircraft on light Carrier, then 3 aircraft sculpt on a US Fleet Carrier.
So, all sturdier aircraft carriers might just hold two. It works on the table top. The only issue is about TcB scultp. 3 does not hold on a Carrier, but 2 TcB and 1 Fg can be put on a Carrier sculpt.
If this can be your starting point, then think about 1 aircraft Carrier unit figures for about 4 or 5 Carriers. Take a look at how many Fleet Carriers were available for Japan.
For instance, 2 US Carriers (for 8 to 10), if IJN gets 5 Carrier sculpt then would signify around 20 to 25 Carriers.
This might come handy if you want to set an adequate numbers for each sculpt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_Japanese_Navy_in_World_War_IIA certain level of abstraction is needed of course but I went with a 2:1 ratio (fleet carriers to light carriers) for flexibility. I am not considering escort carriers as they were not used in fleet to fleet action. Although some could carry 30 aircraft others could carry a lot less and they were not suitable to military operations.
Pearl Harbour is the next scenario I am intending on “gaming” and it would include 3 Japanese carriers with 6 fighters on top vs 4 American BBs and 2 Cruisers (with a similar conversion of 2 Light cruisers to a single heavy cruiser and DDs abstracted).
This will be a great balancing scenario I believe as regular Axis and Allies would not be able to give you historical results regardless of what you did (4 BBs would take 8 hits to destroy and would defend on a 4 so fighters would go down faster than anything).
Regarding damage, a simple solution could be allowing units to retreat battle to absorb hits. So after a round of combat and damage assignment, if there were no hits left to assign and units had their HP depleted, they could chose to abandon the Sea Zone instead of being destroyed. Units in bases would be the exception.
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@mAIOR
Assumed there was 8 BB and 8 Cruiser at Pearl Harbour.
You want to do a 2:1 ratio with these so
4 BB A4 D4 and 4 Cruiser A3 D3.There was 6 IJN Carrier, means 3 units.
If each were 3 Fg on each, it means:
9 Fg A3 D4
6 Carriers
21 hits total
Vs
12 hits.If you give a special preemptive shot or an additional opening fire round to these 9 Fg, , for initiating an unprovoked act of war.
You might get 4-5 hits.
And you may specify that once a Battleship is damaged, the next hit has to be allocated to the damaged one, or sink a Cruiser.Just my two cents at how I would deal with it.
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@baron-Münchhausen The other reason to represent ships on a 2:1 ratio is that that was basically what a Battleship or Carrier division was. So you get ar,y corps on land and fleet divisions on sea. Heavy cruiser divisions were also 2 or 3 heavy cruisers and light cruiser divisions were 4 light cruisers. At Pearl Harbour there were 6 light cruisers and 2 heavy cruisers so that is roughly 2 cruiser fleets (since two of the cruisers were lead ships of DD flotillas) and if I don’t abstract the DDs, 2 DD flotillas… That might be a good scale) for the American side and 6 fleet carriers for the Japanese (3 carrier figures).
the math would be:
8 BBs on a A:4D:4 2 HP
2 Cruisers A3D3
2DDs A2D2
(and an air wing AND AA defense but I won’t even deal with that for now)vs
6 fighters A3D4
(9 fighters at 3 per carrier division)So that makes it on average:
3 hits or 4.3 hits for the japanese and six or nine hitpoints6.3 or 7 hits for the Americans and 8 or 10 hitpoints of which 4 are “free”.
This means that on average, you would not destroy a single ship while you would get swated from the skies.
If you allowed air wings to take two hits, the combat would go a second round but you would never get the results obtained historically.
The idea of a -1 bonus to die rolls for surprise attacks is a cool one and I might play around with it.
With my changes so far, what you would have on average for the combat however:
American Fleet:
4 BB Divisions each rolling 2 D6s for air defense (hit on a 1)
2 cruisers rolling 1D6 for AA
optional (though I do like the representation of DD flotillas at this scale) 2 DD flotillas rolling 1D6 for AAyou would get 1.6 to 2 hits from AA
6 fighters rolling on a 2 would be 2 hits. 9 fighters would be 3.6 hits.
This still feels a bit low so a bonus from carrier based planes against naval targets could be an option.
It would still not be enough to get an historical result but it is getting there. I can either lower the AA value of BBs to one D6 ,which would remove 0.6 hits so it would make the American fleet get one hit or 1.3 hits Depending on DDs being there or not.
This would make it so that planes would suffer one hit on the AA barrage, and damage 2 to 4 BBs… Second round of combat could see the naval forces destroy another plane and suffer another 2 or 3 hits… This would make that you could destroy one BB division (2 BBs) possibly but of course, a savy player would allocate hits to cruisers or DDs. So the Japanese would damage BBs and destroy a single ship on two rounds But lose as much as half their striking force (2 or 3 planes) and now things would continue to worsen.
The removal of the extra defensive die would also make other fleets more vulnerable to air attack but again, I need to revise OOB on the other theaters which I didn’t get around to yet so I will have to do a bit more work I guess.
This would get us closer to the result.Anyway, if planes had the ability to soak some hits as well (becoming disrupted and attrition) this would be different and probably a lot closed to the historical result. The Japanese are unlikely to suffer any losses until round 4 or 5 and even with six fighters rolling on a 2, you would get 8 hits in four rounds. That would make the enemy fleets lose a lot of ships. But now the Japanese are a bit too strong as That would wipe out basically all cruisers and DDs and leave the BBs with one health. For no immediate losses or maybe one aircraft loss (and we still need to add the aircraft and the base AA to the result).
If we had objectives to an attack (like, the Battleship moorings were an actual objective for the Japanese fleet), we could say that the Japanese player has one hit choice or two hit choices or something.
I will game this out
but it looks like it is on the right track imho. Then we can play around with surprise attack rules (like enemy units do not get a defensive shot in the first round of combat) and see how it goes.But that is basically the reasoning behind my proposed changes.
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@mAIOR
To simulate Pearl Harbour, you will need a special procedure because A&A is working under the assumption of Powers at war and fleet fully operational at sea.In that case, you can go for a full combat round without retaliation, followed by Surprised strike type of roll for Fighter.
This Pearl raid is a very special case, similar to Taranto.Or, if you want to go historical. Pearl harbor was not the most efficient raid and IJN were not willing to throw a third waves against all Fuel facilities and Submarines.
Which makes all the attack a strategic failure… -
@baron-Münchhausen I won’t go into a discussion about why the Japanese didn’t attack the fuel facilities and the submarines but it was not in their immediate strategic goals for a reason.
Even if you go a full combat round without retaliation in A&A you will still not achieve the immediate result.
A&As scale a fleet being in port on in the adjacent sea are doesn’t really matter. There are other battles we can use to fine tune naval combat like Coral Sea or Midway even but each has their own particularities. The role of Naval intelligence was huge (hence this all began for me with adding a roll to see if you even find a ship or not).
But even in a pitched Sea Battle, a Battleship ability to swat an air wing out of the sky was certainly not as high as it is represented in this game. Neither should strat bombers attack on a 4.
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