@Midnight_Reaper Thank you so much! I have all the pieces I need. I’ve been curious about this for years.
"East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion
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Hi Janus
yea I think you should be able to rework the code. It would take a fair amount of work most likely.
The “Pact of Steel 2” xml explains how to go about it. Also here’s a link to the map making thread at triplea https://forums.triplea-game.org/category/28/map-making
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I have started on creating a mod for TripleA based upon East & West. You can follow my progress at https://forums.triplea-game.org/topic/4059/a-new-year-and-a-new-mod?_=1738631120040
My plan is to starting by implemented East & West rules on an existing map and then using the East & West map, thereby creating two mods. I see people have tried the Classic, Revised and Global maps. I was thinking of the Anniversary map or the Big World map from TripleA.
Any assistance or comments would be appreciated.
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
My plan is to starting by implemented East & West rules on an existing map and then using the East & West map, thereby creating two mods. I see people have tried the Classic, Revised and Global maps. I was thinking of the Anniversary map or the Big World map from TripleA.
As was mentioned here and there a few times, it appears to me that the map most closely resembles Xeno Games’ World at War (particularly the delineation of sea zones); if a map and/or module exists somewhere for that game, that would probably be the best place to start. Otherwise, of the A&A maps I’m familiar with, I’d say Revised is probably the closest; the ruleset obviously most closely resembles Classic, but there are also a few W@W-isms.
My hunch is that some of the technologies (and maybe the spying) will be the hardest to implement; the other hang-ups (also mentioned earlier in this thread) would be not allowing allies to land planes in newly-captured territories, as well as the ‘universal’ infantry placement rule. Also, tanks being able to move on non-combat and combat movement is pretty unique, for A&A; the submarine rules were also a bit of a stumbling block, since they’re not entirely clear.
Were there any specific rules questions you had about E&W?
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@RogerCooper @VictoryFirst is a good reference.
East and West absolutely deserves its own TripleA and can vouch that if created will get a respectable amount of play.
Let me know if you run into any snags. @VictoryFirst can probably help answer technical questions.
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@The-Janus said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
My plan is to starting by implemented East & West rules on an existing map and then using the East & West map, thereby creating two mods. I see people have tried the Classic, Revised and Global maps. I was thinking of the Anniversary map or the Big World map from TripleA.
As was mentioned here and there a few times, it appears to me that the map most closely resembles Xeno Games’ World at War (particularly the delineation of sea zones); if a map and/or module exists somewhere for that game, that would probably be the best place to start. Otherwise, of the A&A maps I’m familiar with, I’d say Revised is probably the closest; the ruleset obviously most closely resembles Classic, but there are also a few W@W-isms.
My hunch is that some of the technologies (and maybe the spying) will be the hardest to implement; the other hang-ups (also mentioned earlier in this thread) would be not allowing allies to land planes in newly-captured territories, as well as the ‘universal’ infantry placement rule. Also, tanks being able to move on non-combat and combat movement is pretty unique, for A&A; the submarine rules were also a bit of a stumbling block, since they’re not entirely clear.
Were there any specific rules questions you had about E&W?
There is World at War mod for TripleA, but the map does not resemble East & West.
The tech rules and the espionage rules would not be possible to implement in TripleA. What I was thinking of doing was using the WW2V3 (Anniversary Edition) tech model and giving some free tech tokens out to each nation.
You would select the type of advance you are looking for. Each of technologies would be padded with free units to prevent overly fast advances. For example,
Submarine Technology
- Snorkels (subs immune to air attacks)
- Nuclear Power (subs move 3)
- Cruise Missile (subs bombard at 2)
- Receive 1 free submarine
- Receive 2 free submarines
- Receive 3 free submarines
Spies would be implemented as a technology list. The diplomacy would have all 3 major neutrals and the 14 minor neutrals. If you receive that “tech”, you gain control of the neutral (as long as it still is neutral).
I would implement nuclear weapons using the rules from the “The Grand War”.
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
Submarine Technology
- Snorkels (subs immune to air attacks)
- Nuclear Power (subs move 3)
- Cruise Missile (subs bombard at 2)
- Receive 1 free submarine
- Receive 2 free submarines
- Receive 3 free submarines
It’d be interesting if you could also code in Nuclear Subs being able to go under the ice cap? Maybe there’s a way to model it as a strait/canal, to make that work.
The problem that immediately jumps off the page to me, is that you couldn’t throw the two types of A-bombs into a tech pool, and have it work out with just random rolling; I assume that might tie into this comment?
I would implement nuclear weapons using the rules from the “The Grand War”.
I’m not familiar with how that game does it. I also would have to assume that the nuclear complication table is off the… well, table.
Spies would be implemented as a technology list. The diplomacy would have all 3 major neutrals and the 14 minor neutrals. If you receive that “tech”, you gain control of the neutral (as long as it still is neutral).
From my experience with Europe 1940, I think you would have to treat each major neutral similarly to how the “true neutrals” are modeled, in that game i.e. declaring war on one declares war on all. Activating the neutral units properly RAW is going to be the real problem, I’d imagine – just based on how in A&A games everything is dependent on moving units into those territories, whereas in E&W it’s not. The other thing you could maybe do is represent the income provided by the major neutrals as “National Objectives” that you achieve through spying… assuming there’d be a way to code those two systems to interact together.
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
There is World at War mod for TripleA, but the map does not resemble East & West.
(Credit to @thrasher1 from his old Axis & Allies page: https://web.archive.org/web/20011122195430/http://www.wargamer.com:80/axisandallies/ce/xeno/waw/scenarios/waw_scenario_warsaw_page1.html )
I know you specified the version that’s in TripleA, but just for comparison (and since I don’t believe I’ve mentioned it in this thread before) here’s a mock-up of the W@W map, modified to include things like north/south Korea, as well as Yugoslavia/Greece:
…and here’s my edit of it in MSpaint, for a mock-up of E&W:
(For those who’ve been following the thread a while, I also brought up this exact example, outlining the similarities in our “podcast” episode, with @The_Good_Captain : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4KrQ1V9IcI )
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@The-Janus Your MSpaint version is good starting point for me.
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@The-Janus said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@RogerCooper said in “East & West” by Imp Games - Discussion:
It’d be interesting if you could also code in Nuclear Subs being able to go under the ice cap? Maybe there’s a way to model it as a strait/canal, to make that work.I could add an ice cap territory. However, I doubt that it would have a significant effect on play
The problem that immediately jumps off the page to me, is that you couldn’t throw the two types of A-bombs into a tech pool, and have it work out with just random rolling; I assume that might tie into this comment?
I would implement nuclear weapons using the rules from the “The Grand War”.
I’m not familiar with how that game does it. I also would have to assume that the nuclear complication table is off the… well, table.>
TripleA can support tech trees. The nuclear complication table is off the table. As the Soviets would also start with fission bombs, there is not much point to creating a tech tree.From my experience with Europe 1940, I think you would have to treat each major neutral similarly to how the “true neutrals” are modeled, in that game i.e. declaring war on one declares war on all. Activating the neutral units properly RAW is going to be the real problem, I’d imagine – just based on how in A&A games everything is dependent on moving units into those territories, whereas in E&W it’s not. The other thing you could maybe do is represent the income provided by the major neutrals as “National Objectives” that you achieve through spying… assuming there’d be a way to code those two systems to interact together.>
The major neutrals would be handled as separate countries that could be allied with. I am not going to try handle the multi-step process of getting neutrals, you either get them or you don’t. However, rolls on the diplomacy table are more likely to get minor neutrals than major neutrals.
An interesting question is what to do if you gain the support of a major neutral that is already allied with your opponent. Does it?
- Have no effect
- Go back to neutrality
- Flip immediately to the new alliance
All of these are interesting possibilities.
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
you either get them or you don’t
You’re going to have to unpack what you mean by that.
If China is allowed to effectively be a 16 IPC swing on a random die roll, I’m calling bullshit.When you “get” a major neutral, would you get all of their units/territories? Or if they can still be influenced back to the other side, are you basically suggesting we compress the 9-point influence scale down to just 3 (positive, neutral, negative)?
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@The-Janus said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
you either get them or you don’t
You’re going to have to unpack what you mean by that.
If China is allowed to effectively be a 16 IPC swing on a random die roll, I’m calling bullshit.When you “get” a major neutral, would you get all of their units/territories? Or if they can still be influenced back to the other side, are you basically suggesting we compress the 9-point influence scale down to just 3 (positive, neutral, negative)?
Yes, you are correct I am proposing effective a 3 point scale.
An alternative would be variable entry. China always comes on the Soviet side, OAS on the NATO side. The Arab League would still be random.
As this a mod, I could have different scenarios with different rules.
Looking at the East & West rules, it seems unlikely that you could ever bring a major neutral over. You only have a 1/6 chance to move it one step and your opponent can deploy spies to counter you.
As E&W is set in 1948, the Chinese Civil War is still raging and a Nationalist victory possible.
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I think its best for the mod to function with basic unit attack and defense values and just use the forum dice roller and edit mode for the neutrals, spying and tech.
Just having that would be leagues better than what we are currently using, lol.
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@The_Good_Captain Tech will be optional
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
Looking at the East & West rules, it seems unlikely that you could ever bring a major neutral over. You only have a 1/6 chance to move it one step and your opponent can deploy spies to counter you.
Have you considered the knock-on effects of changing those mechanics?
Would you want China and OAS to become active powers?
Or would they just swing all their income, units, and territories to USSR/USA in one dice roll?Genuinely curious as to what you’re thinking this implementation would look like.
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@The-Janus said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
Have you considered the knock-on effects of changing those mechanics?
Would you want China and OAS to become active powers?
Or would they just swing all their income, units, and territories to USSR/USA in one dice roll?I was assuming they would become active powers on their own. But that is not the only possibility. You could have them join the power recruiting them.
The problem with E&W rules for neutrals is that they are just passive sources of income, that can also be attacked. That is not very interesting.
We could also try eliminating major neutrals entirely. The major neutrals could be handled like minor neutrals and recruited through technology or events. That is arguably more realistic and probably more interesting with wars breaking out in unexpected places.
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@RogerCooper said in "East & West" by Imp Games - Discussion:
The problem with E&W rules for neutrals is that they are just passive sources of income, that can also be attacked. That is not very interesting.
I think you’d just be swapping one problem for another, because making them function in more “interesting” ways would throw the game balance completely out the window. Also, the USSR can attack any neutrals at any time, but NATO can only attack major neutrals, and only if they are providing their full income to the USSR. So generally speaking there isn’t a military solution to the passive income provided by major neutrals.
Without getting long-winded about it, China basically serves as a buffer for the USSR, keeping the US and UK to the perimeter; if the Americans could just land anywhere along the Pacific coast of Asia, that’s a whole different ball-game – and not in a way that’s good for the USSR.
The other function of major neutrals is to prevent the game from being bogged down with roughly double the number of minor neutrals on the map. Having them function as a bloc and then tying them into things like nuclear complications, controlling the Suez Canal, and North Korea rules are what make the system really shine. This also circles back to the rule allowing the USSR to attack neutrals; there’s more of a downside if attacking Iraq means that Syria, Jordan, et al. also turn against you. If you get rid of the Arab League as a major neutral, I imagine the USSR would start gobbling up the middle east piecemeal in probably every game. (And I have to imagine the major neutral mechanic is an outgrowth of the original designers having tested these kinds of strategies, and found them to break the game.)
If you wanna rebalance the game around an “active China” paradigm, be my guest – but depending on things like turn order, they either get dogpiled, or they win the entire continent pretty early on. These are the types of bog-standard house rules that people immediately tried once they got their hands on the game 25 odd years ago, and couldn’t get to work. I remember those discussions, trust me.
E&W is much more about ‘politics’ mechanics than any other A&A game, full stop, and basically the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. If you swap out one mechanic for something you think is more interesting, that doesn’t immediately mean it’ll be better or that the game will even still function properly from a balance perspective. Trying to reinvent the China rules is probably the biggest hornet’s nest you could kick, and it’s not much less perilous to mess around with how the Arab League works, either.
Honestly, if you feel the need to strip things down, but maintain the flavour of it, I can definitely give you some suggestions in that regard – I’ve written an E&W scenario for Risk. But I’d lean more towards major neutrals not having any mechanics for getting active, than to add mechanics making that easier to do.
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@The-Janus So is there any plausible reason to attack a major neutral except maybe USSR attacking the Arab league? It sounds like there isn’t . Which is easy enough to handle in a scenario.
It seems a shame to have deployments defined for major neutrals, and not get to use them.
As always, I can have multiple scenarios which handle the major neutrals differently.
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@RogerCooper After reviewing maps, I concluded that the East & West map is closest to the TripleA Big World map, so I will implement it first on Big World and then use the actual map.
In terms of neutral handling I see the following possibilties
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Major neutrals impassable except that Russia may attack the Arab League.
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Major neutrals are fully playable and can be allied through the diplomacy technology table.
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Major neutrals can be allied through the diplomacy technology table and are absorbed into the allying power. They are impassable until then.
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