@Builder_Chris:
the revised A&A has the fighter in china pretty much in the same boat as in AA50. If I remember right, the “china factor” in AAC and AAR is pretty similar to AA50; china is a speed bump for Japan on their road to world conquest. So on one hand I don’t see what the issue is with were that fighter is placed. It’s always died J1; hasn’t it?
Well, in first place, you allways can buy another figther or move one to China to replace the lost in Revised. You cannot replace the lost fighter in AA50.
In second place, I’ll not talk about Classic because I never played it, but in Revised, there are some strats that let China alive all the game (a combo of India IC, Sinkiang IC and Pacific fleet). That strat works (I played in many league games with winning result), but the better thing is that is not an auto-win move (there were a couple of games when I got a bit overconfident and lost, DM will remember the last, he played pretty well against me), so, at least in Revised, there was a strat that could let China AND India live the whole game being competitive but not an auto-winner (axis had enough chances of win). Now in AA50, we have lost that strat, even in 1942 scenario, not only because China lost her last fighter China1, but because China is unable of attack or trade terrain, colecting as much 1 inf in most turns, fate to die as much in J5, 1942. 1941 is a nightmare because of total killing J1. In both cases, the death of China makes India unable of hold unless playing 1942 and getting improved industry.
That leads to Godzilla Japan colecting 60 IPCs even if USA builds Pacific navy, and USA simply cannot beat Japan’s navy when Japan colects 15 IPCs more than USA. So, we get few chances of wining with a KJF (opposite to Revised, were you could win about 50% ot times with KJF)
But since a KGF leads 99% of times to axis economic advantage by round 4, we have a game that allies cannot win without massive amounts of luck (rolling a good tech in the proper time and hoping axis doesn’t get another countering the first, per example). And even if I’m wrong and KGF doesn’t lead to axis economic advantage so much times, we have a game that only can be won by allies with KGF, opposite to Revised were there are at least 3 mayor strategies for allies to won. This is a setback from Revised.
My whole point is not only the chinese fighter, is all the rules and setup of whole China who lead to a unplayable Asia mainland as TG Moses said. In best of cases, it’s allies doing 100% of times KGF (I’ll stick with Revised if this is the scenario, KGF bores me to the death). In the worst of cases, is allies losing about 90 % of games. I fear we are closer to 2nd scenario than first, but none of them likes me too much.
My only hope is that we are having a very interesting discussion here and we can all together manage a good fix :-)