House Rules (Think tank)

[d142]

@Emperor_Taiki:

I think National morale should be respresented buy how many losses a nation can take before it pulls out of the war

i like that idea, it could mean that the nationional power’s army would be disbanded, and there could be a scramble to take over the territories, and the national power could be reinstated, if a national power from the same alliance managed to retake enough territories to build up the national morale again,

national morale could be determined by losing a point for each unit that would be defeated, and for victory cities and territories that are captured, there could be a national resolve that could be used when morale reaches a critical level before capitulation of the nation, a siege mentality, where the national power could call upon hidden resources, i.e. emergency supplies in the form of i.p.c that could be used for a last stand (or not) against the invading forces,

morale could be boosted by capturing territories

[Imperious Leader]

take total IPC divide by 10= national morale. Each territory you lose subtract one morale point

If you lose your capital you lose morale value of half the IPC value of territory, example losing Germany loses 5 morale points

If you go into negative numbers in any turn, you can face a collapse of your government. Roll one D6 using the modifier of negative net morale value and if the result is zero or negative, you have lost the game.

there done.

[Emperor_Taiki]

I dont think national morale should be associated directly with IPC production, sure the US had the most resources and the largest econamy, but could they have withstood over a million causalties like the Germans and Soveits.

Everyone who reads this, the next game you play, see if you can count how many peices each sides losses
and report back here

then we can figure out a historical and playable national morale for each nation

For each unit you lose, you lose one morale, + plus their will be other modifers and oppertunities to gain morale

when you morale hits zero, your nation must offer peace, the oppsing side can either accept or reject it. If they accept that nation surrenders and is treated as a neutral unless it is again attacked. the oppsing side can also reject peace and play continues as usaul

[Imperious Leader]

I dont think national morale should be associated directly with IPC production

well IPC is directly related to how well a nation is doing, plus the US player has perhaps the greatest historical resolve to win the war and had the best morale. Rate the nations in rank according to how you feel they wanted to win the war and you will see a more or less correlation of this based on how many IPC they had.

for the axis Germany had the high morale

for the allies USA UK

least was Italy and possible the Soviets who could have lost it and had Russian units fighting against the Soviets!

[Cowboybob]

@Imperious:

take total IPC divide by 10= national morale. Each territory you lose subtract one morale point

If you lose your capital you lose morale value of half the IPC value of territory, example losing Germany loses 5 morale points

If you go into negative numbers in any turn, you can face a collapse of your government. Roll one D6 using the modifier of negative net morale value and if the result is zero or negative, you have lost the game.

there done.

Well this is sounding a hell of alot better then what i came up with.

So you would Divide by 10 for each Nation?,and if so where did the 10 come from?,or am i just not reading you right? :?

[Jennifer]

If we were to do some kind of morale I would have to say it would have to go more along balance lines and less about logical or historically accurate ones.

Perhaps:

+1 Morale for every National Objective your nation has completed (you’d have to make sure to track them even when it is not your nation’s turn, after all, if Italy completes a NO, then Germany would still get the +1, likewise if England gets France then America would get a +1 as well.)

+1 For every technological break through you have completed. (Hey, soldiers feel good knowing their equipment is better than the enemies!)

+1 For every three enemy territories conquered. (Only applies if you are attacking that specific enemy.  For instance, if Germany has Baltic States, East Poland and Ukraine, they would get +1 when attacking Russians.)

+1 For each victory city you control

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-1 For each victory city you have lost

-1 For every three territories you have lost to the enemy currently attacking/defending against you (ie, if Germany had those three territories and you were attacking with Russia, you would incur the penalty.)

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For every 6 morale points more than you have than your enemy, you get one automatic “kill” in the opening fire step of combat (ie they cannot return fire.)  Your defender chooses what unit is “killed” (read: runs away.)  The killed unit does not “die” but is relocated one territory to a friendly territory as if retreating. (note, if no valid territory exists to retreat to, the unit is removed from the board.  Basically, same rules as a submarine shooting a carrier out from under a fighter, it gets a chance to land, if it cannot, then it dies too.)

[Emperor_Taiki]

@Imperious:

I dont think national morale should be associated directly with IPC production

well IPC is directly related to how well a nation is doing, plus the US player has perhaps the greatest historical resolve to win the war and had the best morale. Rate the nations in rank according to how you feel they wanted to win the war and you will see a more or less correlation of this based on how many IPC they had.

for the axis Germany had the high morale

for the allies USA UK

least was Italy and possible the Soviets who could have lost it and had Russian units fighting against the Soviets!

I dont see how that is true at all, if national morale is the resolve of the people, government, and the military to fight a war, then what shoes the US having the highest morale. I think the US player should have to think about all of his battles very carefully and determine what this would do for the home front. What do think would have happened if 1 million Americans were killed attacking Japan. What if 1 million Americans were killed and the attacked failed. Sure you might still control fifteen victory cities, but that is not how politicians are elected.

Just look at Korea, Veitnam, Iraq. the effect on National Morale by how many bombs you make or how well you do on the battlefeild, is dwarfed when compared too the lives that are being lost

Lets look at the Soveit Union. sure maybe they could have had a seperate peace when Stalin was having his mental breakdown during 41 or if Moscow was captured, and I argee the outcome of battles should have a big effect on national morale, but once the Russians started fighting back and Stalin made it clear that it was his goal to destroy Germany, the Russians were prepared to lose millions and millions, which they did.

Also stratigic bombing should have an effect on national morale

[Jennifer]

I agree, IPC production shouldn’t be part of the computation, but for a different reason than Taiki.

Morale should be linked to major objectives because that’s what the feet on the street would be looking at.  They wouldn’t give three shiites to the wind if Russia build 400 tanks if they lost Stalingrad!

[Imperious Leader]

So you would Divide by 10 for each Nation?,and if so where did the 10 come from?,or am i just not reading you right?

yes so if Germany has 32 IPC they generated 3 national morale points that turn, but lets say the next turn they lose 3 spaces so they lose 3 MP, but have a new adjusted total of 28 IPC, so the new total is 2… of course a few first turns will be building up the points.

AS far as VC being used as National morale points… you can use this as your counting basis rather than the IPC divide by 10 thing but the allies will have the advantage and i feel the points generated for these VC would create too large a point total to ever get into negative.

I suppose you collect 1 point if you hold each turn and lose 3 points if its captured to compensate, but for modeling its entirely possible to capture lots of IPC and have no morale points to speak of. This is because the VC were not designed or assigned for any “morale rules” so it does not make an accurate model as would the general volume of conquests…again coming from IPC.

In rank of national resolve …e.g. Morale i rate the following order:

USA
Germany
UK
Soviet Union / Japan about equal
Italy

so if you look at IPC you see also that this ranking is more or less equivalent to the morale, so thats why i use that model

The other thing would be to add unigue military points to the map like Polesti oil fields, Tobruck, or Singapore because these have great impact of the war effort and national resolve… so the issue would be if you follow this method, you NEED to add more cities and rate them for both balance and what historically had an effect on the will to resist or fight.

[Jennifer]

Anyone know how to modify the map file in battlemap so you can edit the picture and have the space usable for toolpieces?

I fixed up the 1941 map, but no idea how to fix it so you can put flags on it!  ARGH!

[Emperor_Taiki]

IL, what is your definition of national morale, because the Japanese were preparing to fight to the last man, women and child

[Imperious Leader]

National resolve or morale:

The people, (not the political leadership) believing in total victory and total national commitment to achieve this aim

In Japan the Bushido concept and the military leadership combined its philosophy but did not really integrate the people into any credible war economy.

For example they didn’t have the women all working in factories, nor had early war rationing, nor employed much in the way of their population working for the war efforts.

The philosophy they employed didn’t allow women to labor, and foreigners working as slave labor on Japanese goods offended the Japanese.

Latter in the war they rationed everything, but the only fanatical resolve was the soldiers themselves. At any time the emperor could remove the leadership as it did in 1944, and the people could easily fight or not fight depending on what the emperor says. Thats not indicating they had resolve in their hearts, but rather the culture of support was entirely dependent on what the emperor says. To me this is not a high level of support.

So if you said the Japanese soldier was prepared to fight to the last man i will agree, but not the people. They just do whatever the emperor says which comes from their culture.

[Emperor_Taiki]

If a nation is willing to do whatever their emperor says, that is high national morale. production is already represented in the game. national morale should represent the willingness of a country to continue the fight. I think Japanese would have fought just as long and hard and probalby longer and harder than any of the other powers. Sure the US is a much better system to die for, but thats all the more reason to stay home, forget Europe. It is the people of horrible countries like the Soveit Union who were willing to sacrfice everything for their nation.

[Imperious Leader]

If a nation is willing to do whatever their emperor says, that is high national morale. production is already represented in the game. national morale should represent the willingness of a country to continue the fight. I think Japanese would have fought just as long and hard and probably longer and harder than any of the other powers. Sure the US is a much better system to die for, but thats all the more reason to stay home, forget Europe. It is the people of horrible countries like the Soviet Union who were willing to sacrifice everything for their nation.

The Japanese surrendered ( actually the emperor surrendered) after dropping the A-bombs

Japan surrenderd and didn’t even get invaded… thats not much for national resolve. Basically make the emperor feel bad and give him a bad hair day, and japan folds… thats not what USA would have done.

Japan would have to basically march from Los Angeles to Washington DC to force FDR to surrender.

Hitler would not surrender if he remained alive. Thats a fact., same with Churchill and Stalin

Japan had the resolve to sacrifice her soldiers to die, but when it came to the people dying… the emperor had enough.

In Hitlers and Stalin’s case they would better let everybody die fighting till the bitter end, but its less clear with Stalin because he asked for peace in Oct 41 ( secretly of course) and Hitler refused.

Any way the general pattern remains remarkably similar to the IPC levels and perhaps its a measure of assesment:

the national leader can compare his position like you may compare your position playing your nation and knowing fully well, your potential is only as good as the production of war goods to sustain the war. If its really small its easy to see your position as hopeless.

Take the poker analogy: the short stack player knows the players with more cash can bully the pots and poor players get pushed around knowing w/o the chips they have little chance to win.

This was the Italians take on the war, Duce knew he was not prepared till 43, but sided with adolf in 1940 because he figured the war was won when france fell.

Japanese strategy was nothing more than: “we are prepared to blow up the US pacific fleet and HOPE the USA will leave us Japanese alone because to fight us would not be worth it because USA has no claims in Asia. But if USA decided to try to kill us it would be unavoidable, so we are gambling on one good slug against Hawaii, so we gain a temporary advantage”

This is not the strategy of a nation with great resolve. its like a gamble in a point in time for Japan. Thus Japan didnt really believe it was better and could win, but only a chance to win. Germany believed it would win, as UK and USA

[Emperor_Taiki]

I am not saying the US would surrender, I am saying that Americans in World War Two didnt have the gut for millions of caualties, their would have been an armistice or something besides unconditional surrender

And it wasn’t that the emperor was having a bad day, the Americans had been fire bombing Japan for awhile before they dropped the two A-bombs. Saying Japan had poor national morale becasue they surrendered when two of their cities disappeared is like saying someone is a bad swimmer becasue they lost to Michael Phelps.

[Imperious Leader]

The Allies firebombed Dresden and other German cities and the Germans didn’t surrender. The Germans lost many more people in these raids over the years and they didn’t surrender. Two cities that were not really military targets got killed and Japan surrendered in a few days. Germany had to be invaded and occupied completely, while the Emperor loses 200,000 people die and no allies set foot in japan…. and they surrender.

Even after Hitler dies, the Germans fight for 2 weeks. The emperor has breakfast, surrenders and by afternoon hes drinking tea and the people receive the Missouri with open arms. That is not the sign of “fighting to the death” only a week before.

In addition: Japanese military planners knew precisely that the entire undertaking against the American people was a gambit of sorts and it would take a miricle to win. But it was a desperate gamble calculated based on that point in time. Even the war leader of the navy Yamamoto only believed that within 6 months the Japanese power would be eclipsed and japan would be doomed.

So lastly, your only left with 2 models to represent the national resolve:

IPC- which indicates conquests

or

Victory Cities- which additional centers need to be added to the map to make it even reasonable to work with, because the one listed on the map were only designed for game balance and very limited political objectives or economic centers.

I think w/o having to mark up the game map its easier to indicate the accumulation of Morale points based on the conquest of territories indicated by IPC.

What idea you have that may model this more accurately?

[Emperor_Taiki]

First I think alot of people would disagree with you besides me.

Second even in Japan and the Soveit Union had weak “national morale” you are still discounting the effect caualties have.

You must agree that Americans could not have had the will to fight if it took millions of their dead soldeirs to do it. Dosen’t that show week morale when compared to the millions of Soveits and Japanese killed. and how about the Japanese soldeirs we kept finding in pacific who thought the war was still going up until the 70s. The Japanese people had never heard the Emperoprs voice until he announced their surrender on the radio. He was God. Surrender was the ultimate shame for them, if the emperor had not told them to do it, their would have been unbeleivable bloodshed on both sides

[Cowboybob]

I must say that if the Japanese attack on pearl had destroyed the American Carriers (which at the time were on practice runs in the South pacific) then that would have been one more card out of FDRs hand,as well if the Battlewagons that were sunk in the harbour could not be resurfaced then the odds for japanese victory would have been greater.

With out the carriers the battle of Midway would prolly not have taken place which means the Japanese would still have all of theres.

just my 2bits

[d142]

i have been working on an idea for the use of an event card deck in the game,

at the beginning of a round, a player would draw a card from the event deck, could be a 100 card deck, with event’s ranging from, diplomacy card’s, oil supply shortage, i.e only half of the force’s attack from one of your territories , national uncertainty, a patriotism card that could get free infantry, spy card’s, and severe weather card’s

there would be about 10-15 event’s, and some non-event card’s

[Imperious Leader]

You must agree that Americans could not have had the will to fight if it took millions of their dead soldiers to do it. Doesn’t that show week morale when compared to the millions of Soviets and Japanese killed.

Your talking about soldiers and we are talking about what the average people thought about how they helped their nation win the war by various means and how they accepted or did not accept defeat.

and how about the Japanese soldeirs we kept finding in pacific who thought the war was still going up until the 70s.

The japanese SOLDIERS were the most tenacious, while the Japanese average citizen was not. I am only talking about national resolve or morale being the population and not the army.

The Japanese people had never heard the Emperors voice until he announced their surrender on the radio. He was God. Surrender was the ultimate shame for them, if the emperor had not told them to do it, their would have been unbelievable bloodshed on both sides

That demonstrates that the population just follows what its told and the military controls the decisions. So the population wasn’t not involved in the war effort or would fight to the death because they were not down with Bushido, but just living day to day. Even the top military didn’t believe in victory, but kept fighting in the hope that the Giant American arsenal would tire of fighting a little fish across the pacific.

If the japanese invaded California and FDR said “we surrender”, the American people would never surrender and fight on

If the a bomb got dropped on Germany, Hitler would say “thanks for helping Minister Speer on his scorched Earth policy”

If the same got dropped on Russia, Stalin would say “well we still got people left…keep fighting”

If the British got a bomb dropping, they would flee to Canada or somewhere and continue the fight

If Il Duce saw the bomber coming her would surrender as soon as he found out it was on its way, or the king would fire him like he did, effectually ending his rule.

But if the Emperor said “hey i had enough” the japanese people would welcome the Missouri in Tokyo Bay. If the Japanese had any resolve they would have made trouble in the post war period. Instead they took up baseball and made plastic toys for the next 25 years till the automotive industry got retooled.

Anyway as far as the solution i now favor this:

+1 Morale if you capture a territory that was not your original territory
-2 if you lose an original territory
-1/2 of the IPC of your capital= lost morale points if you lose your capital… London=4 lost morale points, Berlin=5 lost morale points

total IPC divide by 10= accrued points ( remember the IPC is manpower to produce the war materials) if the people are not actively supporting the production of industry by building tanks and planes, then they are not making the required sacrifice ( hence morale)