and a green canadian dice too
Table Tactics New Product Release
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I’d love to see each nation get its own distinct type of medium tank, and I can see the point of each nation also having one light tank (at or just below the low end of the A&A tank size range) and one heavy tank (at or just above the upper end of the A&A tank size range), but that’s probably as much variety as could be introduced in a practical way. Giving every single country multiple types of medium tanks, for example, would be redundant.
Well, that’s why I created the previous table with substantial performance characteristics for light, medium, and heavy tanks… and why I then created the table to fit the key models into these three categories. (Admittedly, I also showed how some were sort of “tweeners” in the continuum, but that was to facilitate informed discussion on which would best fit which of the three categories, as well as the more-or-less parallel TD and SP categories…)
After coming up with the former table which included substantial performace characteristics between those three broad categories, it started to occur to me that these performance differences were at least as big, if not bigger, than that of the fighter/tac-bomber units.
This then led me to think that perhaps the size difference between units of these three categories should be analogous to the size difference between tac bombers and fighters, rather than the size differences within the different tank units.
Thus, I took a second look at all the piece sizes (WotC, TWG, TT & World’s Forge), and the TWG-tank/ WotC-tank difference suddenly didn’t seem as out-of-whack anymore…
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DrLarsen - EXCELLENT!
You have adhered to a formula that I really like - Attack+Defense+Move(-1)=Cost
The -1 is because 1 Move is standard for all pieces, and you should be paying a premium for an extra move space.
Hey reloader:
Do you suggest the same formula for air and sea units? Obviously, if you plug these formulas into standard A&A prices (of any edition) it becomes quickly clear that you pay a hefty premium for air and sea units. Do you suggest such a premium be maintained and if so, do you have you’re own formula for arriving at air/sea unit prices?
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GER Panther
22mm L / 9.5mm WRUS T-34
21.5mm L / 9.5mm WHow did you do these measurements, RL? I’m looking at my AA40 Panther and it has to be wider than my other AA40 pieces by at least 20%?
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I’ll double check those when I get home from work. I used track width, not tank width.
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“Much ado about nothing!”
You can quote me :-D
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Hey, TT!
Do you have a copy of that new game “Singapore: 1942”
I checked and it looks like the price has been reduced to $85. I just picked up a copy of the new Europe game with the Frence for $50.
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Checked, and the measurements are correct - the Panther and the T-34 are identical in track width.
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Well, like I said, you can pick up an assortment of individual pieces from FMG’s retail website for your reference purposes for much less than that…
I think if your mediums are going to be the size of WotC pieces, the World’s Forge Bren Carrier might be a good reference point for light tanks. We don’t seem to have yet found a consensus for the upper limit for heavy tanks, but I think we’ve definitely concluded that they at least can’t be BIGGER than the TWG Tiger; how much smaller than this seems to be unclear still… (If you don’t have TWG on the shelf, TWG Tigers are about the size of your current Panzer IV’s…)
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Dr Larsen,
I know this is going back a ways, but I have another question about your cool chart for the 10 different land units and their Att, Def, Move, Cost. It’s about the Armored Infantry. Would those be able to blitz by themselves, without a tank? -
I like the bren carrier as a point of reference, but it is too wide (well, it is appropriate as the bren carrier was quite square). However, a light tank would be narrower.
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It’s about the Armored Infantry. Would those be able to blitz by themselves, without a tank?
I would say yes to that, treating the “Armored” or “Mech” (halftrack) unit like a tank in this respect, and have the motorized infantry unit (truck) follow the current AA40 rule that they need to be accompanied… but what do y’all think?
I like the bren carrier as a point of reference, but it is too wide (well, it is appropriate as the bren carrier was quite square). However, a light tank would be narrower.
That’s fair enough; I was thinking more in terms of length anyway. Of course, with some of TT’s units, if you merely scale down without major changes they might have a similar width, like the M24’s (though the difference would actually be accurate as compared to an M3/M5 Stuart)…
Anyway, bottom line, I think if he got all of his light tanks (at least the “true” light tanks) down to this length the rest of the proportions would probably work fine, I think… Would that work for you?
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DrLarsen - one word…
Perfect.
I agree completely - that length would be ideal.
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Cool! Then it seems we’re making progress. Now if we work with that as a baseline, we might be able to give TT some truly useful feedback on just how much he should scale down his models.
Here’s an idea: If he were to proportionally scale down all of them the same amount, such that his smallest models (i.e., M3 Stuart) was the length of the World’s Forge Bren Carrier (WFBC for short), which ones do you think would still be out of proportion?
For me, I would say the fact that the Sherman is larger than the Panther is the most jarring mis-scaling. I think if the Panther were proportionally bigger to more-or-less match the Pershing, that would be an improvement. What do you think and what other issues do you see?
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On the Armored Infantry question, that was kind of what I was thinking. Half-tracks and armored cars I think could blitz on their own and truck units could take the place of the “mechanized infantry” that we have now.
I also agree that the Panther should be closer in size to the Pershing. The Sherman should not be bigger than the Panther and certainly not the same size as the Tiger.
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Aha, I finally found a ruler…
And guess what: I got the WFBC at 17mm x 9mm
Given RL’s recomendations for French units, I’d say his recomendations are spot on for the Frenchies:
Hotchkiss H35
17mm L / 7.5mm WSOMUA S35
19.5mm / 8.5mm WChar B1-bis
21.5mm L / 9.5mm WI also went back through some of the older posts and rediscovered an old RL post… and concur with his choices for mech and air units:
Golden opportunity for you as France is not cut yet – could you make their set the following?
Hotchkiss H35 (Light Tank)
SOMUA S35 (Medium Tank)
Char B1 (Heavy Tank)Panhard 178 (Mech Inf/Armored Car)
Morane Saulnier MS.406 (Fighter)
Bloch M.B.170 (Tac Bomber)
Amiot 354 (Bomber)Make these as a set, in A&A size, without any of the infantry. This is a test set – if sales are not as you expect, make the “infantry” pieces and then sell it as a normal set, without the air pieces. Win-win I think.
I concur in all of this now, though I might also put in a word for the LeO 45 (the most used) or MB 162 (the best) as bomber alternatives.
If cutting a mold really has the sort of finality that those old messages seems to imply, then I say, just go for the full A&A expansion approach and assign the previous six sets to some as-yet-undeveloped separate game of its own… and go for a full line of French A&A-sized pieces, sans infantry, with all remaining resources immediately, as that’s where the market is.
In fact, I would consider adding in the naval units to the set as well and not waiting for a separate naval series. (Heck, French ships might be the last remaining French pieces on the board on turn 3 anyway…)
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ok start working on naval.
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Honestly, I’m a big land warfare historian - but my vast knowledge of naval warfare could be written in a half-page tome (double spaced).
What I am trying to say is I couldn’t begin to list the naval classes for France (or anyone, for that matter). Anyone else want to give it a shot?
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Piece of cake…
CV: Joffre Class
BB: Richelieu Class
CA: Dunkerque Class
DD: Mogador Class
SS: Redoutable Class
Transport: Don’t bother: the Liberty ships AA40 comes with are fineAdmittedly, the Dunkerque Class is more of a battlecruiser, but hey, they’re WAY cooler than any of the very conventional French heavy cruisers, and, looking at the official AA40E set-up charts, it looks like the Frenchies don’t get to start with a BB, but they get two CA’s. Why not give them something interesting to put on the board? (Those Frenchies can’t ever seem to catch a break, why not give them one?) The Dunkerque is kind of like a mini-Richelieu in much the same way that the German Hipper Class is like a mini-Bismark (though bigger than the Hipper)… It was built specifically in answer to the German Deutchland-Class “Pocket Battleships” that caused so much interest… It almost inspired the Italians and the Dutch to create similar “tweeners” for their navy, and did cause the Germans to up the ante with the Scharnhorst Class (which was bigger yet, but under-gunned).
The Mogador-Class was an impressive design. Admittedly, it was a bit of a tweener too, almost coming up to the size and firepower of a light cruiser, but I figure, hey, the French only get to start out with 2 CA’s and 2 DD’s, might as well give them the best they had… and what’s more, the Mogadors were specifically built to escort the Dunkerque’s…
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If you do a really good job of matching the plastic color to the WotC French, like I said, you could dispense with worrying about a transport, as the liberty ship they come with is fine… and the same is true of the infantry sculpt they did for the French; I’d say their poilus (if the term is still appropriate for WW2) cut a rather dashing figure.
Two other ways to save on a sculpt:
1. The 105mm they come with is admittedly anachronistic, but artillery pieces mostly look alike on this scale, so that’s another one where we can stick with the OOB units.
2. I don’t know what the others think about this idea (or even if it has any practical utility from a production angle) but perhaps you could save on a sculpt by using your old “generic” half-track from the “Central Powers” set instead of doing an armored car. I’m looking at a grey one next to the three half-track sculpt pieces from AA40, and all four look fine together to me. I’m no half-track connoisseur, but I’m guessing most folks wouldn’t find it at all jarring mixed in with the WotC pieces. I’m thinking that when it comes to transports, artillery, and half-tracks people in the A&A world aren’t as picky as they are with, say, tanks and fighters. -
I agree with all of Dr Larsen’s points - I did notice the similarity of Jack’s mech in to the pieces we have OOB. I would still like an armored car, but if it would add too much to the cost just skip it and use the old mold.
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