The aberration of the defenseless transport

[Derek]

I suggest a retread, and stop talking like a politician
Lets use historical reasons and in game scenarios to debate, rather than mindless babble

even at 10 IPC, it would make more sense to build more transports than destroyers, simply because the destroyers are one dimensional, whereas your transports can defend, cock block (as garg put it  :evil:), amphib assault, and just the threat of those transports being able to hit all over the place at any given time really gives your opponent a massive headache,
it almost follows the discussion on bombers currently going on, no they wont hit everywhere at once, but they can hit anywhere, and you must either protect everywhere or give up ground

classic transports also kill any KJF strat because a good german player will add transports to his starting fleet, and thus severely threaton sealion on everyturn, UK must defend it, or risk losing the game

so classic transports = no KJF and horrible stale naval warfare
how many times do you see KJF in revised? extremely rare
yet i see many successful KJF in 42 with the new transports, this is because germany cannot afford both transports and the fleet necessary to protect them

it is also just plain fun to battle back and forth with destroyers subs and fighters rather than a bunch of transports
and i would argue this is magnified in F2F

as far as history is concerned…did not the allies at first not adequately protect their shipping against german u-boats? they were forced to send warships (god forbid) to protect their shipping
id like in the game it be necessary to build and use warships to protect the shipping, this better reflects historical accuracy

And as far as playing online vs F2F, are not the rules the same?
I play both and while it may ‘feel’ different, it is the exact same game
The exact same strategies that work online will work F2F and vice versa

This of course assumes no house rules

[toblerone77]

Politician? You just said the same thing you did on page 22. You also were originally for a modified transport earlier in the  thread. To me this just seems like trolling at this point. You’re arguing for the sake of arguing. This is a topic about a house rule not a design session with Larry Harris. I guess I am dumb and old for feeding the trolls.

[Derek]

You are the troll lol
And you are acting like a child :p
You offer no argument, you only bring up past comments made by me, thus a politician

But it’s ok lol

I’d prefer to have a good debate, but you succeeded in completely derailing the topic

Where I use history, and my own personal experiences from both F2F and online you just ramble on about a bunch of childish nonsense

Seriously, grow up

[toblerone77]

@Uncrustable:

You are the troll lol
And you are acting like a child :p
You offer no argument, you only bring up past comments made by me, thus a politician

But it’s ok lol

I’d prefer to have a good debate, but you succeeded in completely derailing the topic

Where I use history, and my own personal experiences from both F2F and online you just ramble on about a bunch of childish nonsense.

Seriously, grow up

Dude I’ve seen plenty of your posts. How is it that I’m the child when you frequently start posts by being condescending?  Calling me  old and gramps whose childish? As far as reminiscing maybe you should read your own posts about AA guns. Youve changed “sides” on this thread continually I did debate and argue my point as well as others. You simply didn’t agree at least most of the time. Your just bent because your opinion doesn’t offfer “proof”. Why can’t you be civil and simply agree to disagree?

[eddiem4145]

May I suggest a solution.

Make transports cheap. Like $4 cheap now that they are defenseless. It may require an adjustment to the beginning set up but I don’t think so. It would require Britain to spend more on defending its island on the first turn which may alter N. Africa more than it should, but ultimately those transports would be useless to Germany unless it spends foolishly to defend them, but then again, it would cause Britain to spend more to go after them.

With that idea, KJF I though was always foolishly unrealistic. BUT, I also agree that the lack of Pacific action is a problem. I do not like the unrealistic NO’s in the Pacific needed to entice SOME Pacific action.

I think if Navy’s as a whole were dramatically cheaper, that could solve the problem. What do you guys think. It would be less expensive to defend defenseless transports.

[toblerone77]

@eddiem4145:

May I suggest a solution.

Make transports cheap. Like $4 cheap now that they are defenseless. It may require an adjustment to the beginning set up but I don’t think so. It would require Britain to spend more on defending its island on the first turn which may alter N. Africa more than it should, but ultimately those transports would be useless to Germany unless it spends foolishly to defend them, but then again, it would cause Britain to spend more to go after them.

With that idea, KJF I though was always foolishly unrealistic. BUT, I also agree that the lack of Pacific action is a problem. I do not like the unrealistic NO’s in the Pacific needed to entice SOME Pacific action.

I think if Navy’s as a whole were dramatically cheaper, that could solve the problem. What do you guys think. It would be less expensive to defend defenseless transports.

eddie,

It seems like you’re really thinking about this. I like to play around with ideas too. It’s a good thing bro. The best way to present it though is to playtest it and then give an after-action report. You’re going to have to house rule it but be detail it in your report. If it works people may try it.

When all there was was the Milton Bradley version A LOT of players made different rules, added pieces , etc.  Just test it out and post your results. People might like it.

Cheeers.

[Der Kuenstler]

Wow - just got back from vacation to see this.

I’ve been reading Richard Frank’s historic account called Guadalcanal. On pp 79-80 he describes a Japanese air raid on US transports:

“Twenty-three Bettys …burst out of the East in several groups to charge the fat transports just before noon…the Japanese suffered grievously at the hands of the ship’s gunners. The Bettys rippled the sea surface from an altitude of only 20 to 40 feet in accordance with tactics that brought success early in the war against weak AA defenses. But now the Japanese faced more heavy guns guided by sophisticated fire control systems and, more important a proliferation of the deadly 20 mm antiaircraft machineguns…12 or so adorned each of the sluggish transports, and from some vessels came a further barrage of automatic rifle and submachinegun fire…only five of the attacking Bettys fluttered back to Rabaul…”

That is history. Under global transport rules, it would have read something like this: “then a single Japanese Betty flew over and all the transports were auto-sunk without firing a shot.”

To answer some of the requests for more details of our game, what happened was people would decide that they would invade somewhere, then buy ENOUGH TRANSPORTS TO DO THE JOB, and quit. That makes sense - at $10 a pop you are not going to keep spamming transports to use in battles when you can be twice as effective using DDs which cost $8 and attack and defend @2.

In the new naval setting, BBs need not fear transports - remember they can take the first hit free, and in some versions they are auto-repaired at the end of the battle. If you’ve bought five 10 IPC transports that is $50 worth of shipping there - do you think sane people will run them into battle situations as a regular strategy? We didn’t - it might have happened in dire situations but spamming transports was never strategy used in our group, with DDs available.

Remember, we’re not talking about going back to the old classic game world with 1 hit BBs and no DDs. We are advocating bringing the classic-type transport into the new global world which is a whole different story.

[Derek]

I would be in favor of letting transports have an AA shot
I’ve argued this before

[baron Münchhausen]

@Uncrustable:

I would be in favor of letting transports have an AA shot
I’ve argued this before

Then autodestroy as regular AAA (when alone in a territory)? TP will be like naval AAA.

I still think giving them AA capacity is the more historical way of rationalizing a TP unit with no escorting vessel included in the unit.

However, it makes TP far more dangerous than Classic TP when their is some Subs or DDs attacking with aircrafts. Attacking player will rather loose subs or DDs instead of aircraft.

So, this TP treated as naval AAA will be more annoying than ever.

Besides, it still be a nonsense that TP unit (excluding any escort vessel) can sink a capital ship like BB or CV and even cruiser.
And TP’s weaponry is not really fit to fight against subs.

[Derek]

That’s why giving them an AA shot makes sense
Roll an AA for each plane or each TRN whichever is less, if TRN are alone after AA casualties have been removed then they die just like now

[baron Münchhausen]

Preemptive strike will be a real “pain in the ass” compare to the OOB TT defenseless.

I prefer (for better balance) roll an AA for each plane or each TRN whichever is less but without the preemptive effect.
Said otherwise, 1 TT can only attack @1 1 plane once, and never more than 1 attack per plane.

[Black_Elk]

Why I am frustrated and disappointed by the new transport rules…

Before writing me off as a naysayer, I make this point because I believe the new transport rules have had the exact opposite of their intended effect. They do not, as has been stated elsewhere in this thread, encourage conflict between capital ships. What they do do is the following:

1. Half of the world’s navies are destroyed and sink to the bottom of the sea, before ever getting to move in the first round!

Because transports have no defense value, and the set up being what it is, scripted air on navy combat in the first round is even more scripted and more essential than in any previous edition of A&A. Basically you have to destroy as many ships as you can, trading your air for the enemies naval units and transports, before they have a chance to move together. Literally half the naval units on the board at the beginning of play, are destroyed right out the gate. Just nixed before ever becoming effective, and at the same time forcing a number of ‘standard’ openings.

2. Players are even less likely than ever before, to split their navies and attempt island hoping actions, or risking round 1 deployments that might put their transports (and the ships defending them) in harms way. Nixed, all those interesting opening plays that involved coordinated/but separate naval actions from smaller fleets.

3. The cost of transports, while seemingly less than in revised, are in effect raised prohibitively, due to the large number of ships required to defend even a single transport from attack from the air. Compare an 8 ipc cost transport unit that defends at 1 in deterring Air attacks vs a 7 ipcs transport unit with no defense + the Carrier, fighter and destroyer now required to protect it anywhere it moves.

Once again, new rules (and unit specific rules at that, which add even more complexity) have been introduced unnecessarily into the game, to fix a problem which could have easily been solved by just adjusting the unit cost structure.

The problem as stated elsewhere in this thread, is this: cheap transport fodder has traditionally been used to defend warships, (instead of the ideal where more expensive warships are purchased to defend transports.) I agree, that this was a problem. Maybe less of a problem than others think, but granted, it is a problem that should have been fixed. But the way to fix it is not to remove transports from combat altogether. A much simpler, and more consistent solution would be to raise the cost of transports, and have them use the same old combat mechanics/rules that they used in Classic and Revised.

A Transport at 10 ipcs is no longer cheap fodder. Or if 10 is too cheap for you, then raise it 12. I guarantee no one will be needlessly throwing away transports to defend other ships when their relative cost is that much higher. But 10 seems ideal to me (given the cost of every other ship and air unit as it stands in 1942 second edition.) And it could have been done without introducing such a Major Major rules change to naval combat, which itself doesn’t even accomplish the goal.

Under the new transport rules, fleets are even larger and more consolidated now than ever, with more time and more expensive warships required to move anywhere. What’s more, any ship that is purchased can be countered so easily with cheap air (and even cheaper bombers, but that is a separate digression. Why you would take the most overpowered unit in classic/revised, and make it less expensive is beyond me, but still…) Because the western Allies are so dependent on transports to get into the fight, this means that there is a built in Axis advantage to the game. I still can’t believe no one saw this coming?

Comparatively few alterations were made, either to the overall economy of the board, or to the starting unit placements, to accommodate this massive change, that is the new transports, which effects almost every aspect of allied gameplay. And so now we have an Allied bid to open?

I don’t want to come off too negative here, obviously I still love this game, but I mean come on… Just looking the options for Air attacks on G1, playtesters should have seen this, and called out the new transport rules back when AA50 came out.

The simplest solution I have found, to satisfy my own nagging annoyance, and more importantly to balance the clearly off kilter set up, is just to play the game using the old transport rules. The game is immediately, without doing anything else, re-balanced away from the Axis advantage, and more comfortably into Allied advantage territory.

But again, just to reiterate, with all the other unit cost adjustments, I do not find the new rules for transports compelling. The destroyer is a perfectly adapted fodder unit, that never got the chance to shine, because of this weird alteration to the transport rules. And now, I have to say again, I see the same problem occurring that occurred in all previous versions: Massive, slow moving, single navies that only engage one another when one side can bring a massive-land-based air force to bear!

My thoughts on this issue
thanks for listening
J

[Imperious Leader]

I remember you from before. You used to post on Larry’s site some good house rules.

Glad to see you have returned!

[Black_Elk]

Imperious leader! I recall you as well, and as a font of usefull information! How’s it going man?

Yeah, I must admit, my A&A dips and then recovers in wild swings (like a battle in the Ukraine hehe), but I always come back for more in the end. Usually this coincides with the purchase of a new board, like 42 second edition, or 1914 which I just picked up.

The thing about 1942 second ed, is that I really really love the updated map, the new unit pricing structure (for the most part anyway), the new anti-aircraft art rules and almost every other change that’s been made. I don’t even mind the loss of the paper money, or plastic factories. The only thing that bugs, and which I can’t get my head around is this decision to drop transports from the combat phase, and the fact that in this version Allies seem to need a bid rather than Axis.

So I tried playing with the old transport rules on the new board

and lo and behold, the game more or less reverts to the familiar dynamic. With a slight Allied advantage initially… Except that now, because of G’s stronger starting position on the eastern front, and the new Pacific dynamic, the game plays and balances more like I always wished it would. The ability for UK to potentially keep one battleship afloat, and transport in round 2 removes the need for the Allied bid I find. But the increased distance between E. USA and Europe, also prevents a total creeper of allied units getting shuck shucked for the same old KGF. USA also has a fight now in the pacific, instead of a wash under KJF scenerios, where Japan is just forced to cat and mouse, after getting thoroughly trounced by the UK in the first round. I find that old transport rules, also alleviate some of the pressure to totally tank stack India with the UK, since you have more flexibility into Africa.

That is my gripe, that in every other respect the game is beautiful… More beautiful than it’s been in years!
and then the new transport rules go and screw it all up again…
Alas. So close. Why this unnecessary change?

In house games, I do think a cost of 10 ipcs per transport makes more sense than the old 8 ipcs, to reflect their defensive ability, but I still find something about it much more appealing with the old rules. I mean, you can’t just take away the unit’s roll can you? or the defender’s choice to select their own casualty priorities? It feels wrong somehow to me under the new rules, and I was hoping they might just be an Anniversary experiment. But now it seems they are in for sure?

So I just wanted to voice my opinions on the subject, in the post above, to give my reasons for why I think the change to defenseless transports is problematic, and doesn’t really accomplish what many people claim it does for the gameplay. I still see round one blowouts that kill half the ships on the board, in scripted/standard air on ship round 1 attacks. Then a slow, tortuously slow naval rebuild and stacking, with single fleet armadas inching along, and only really getting hit when they come in range of land-based enemy aircraft… And the reason is entirely because of the transports!

All the other changes to the naval game are fantastic, the new units and new pricing, and these would lead to a brilliant naval game if it weren’t for these weird transports that play by their own rules! I wanted to share my thoughts on that, and of course, also to offer a house fix for anyone who might be interested.

A simple addendum to rulebook, stating the old transport rules and allowing them as an “option” would go a long long way in improving this game for me.

best again,
and good to be back
J

[knp7765]

So you advocate raising the transport’s cost to 10, letting them defend @ 1 and allowing the player to select them as casualties BEFORE any warships? I don’t think that is a good idea. Even with the increased price, you are still going to end up with some players using transports as fodder even in attacks. I remember that from Classic, when someone would have a “fleet” made up of a couple of battleships and 10 transports and would attack another fleet, sinking it while only losing 5-6 empty transports.

However, I will agree that making transports totally defenseless is an overstretch. One thing I have never liked is seeing a single fighter or sub wipe out a big stack of transports. So I suggested that each warship or plane be limited to 3 transports. So, for 1-3 transports = 1 attacker, 4-6 transports = 2 attackers, etc. So if you want to kill a stack of 10 transports, you would HAVE to commit 4 attacking units.

As for transport defenses, simply giving them a hit @ 1 isn’t right either. As stated in previous posts, transports were not equipped to deal with submarines and it’s really ridiculous to think of a transport being able to hit a warship. I do like Baron Munchhausen’s idea of giving transports an AA shot. It’s not unbelievable to imagine a transport being able to shoot down an enemy plane. It shouldn’t be an automatic destroy of the aircraft like on land though. I would combine this with my 1 attacker per 3 transports idea. For example, 1 fighter flies out to kill 3 transports. Each transport gets to roll @1. If one of them gets a hit, then the fighter rolls to get a 3. If the fighter gets a 3, then it destroys 1 transport and the fighter is destroyed by the transport AA hit. If none of the transports get a hit, then the fighter automatically destroys all three transports without having to roll. This gives any attacker that goes “air heavy” an element of risk when going after unescorted transports.
As for transports that are escorted by warships and attacked by only aircraft, I would say roll the battle between the aircraft and warships first. If the aircraft destroy all escorting warships, then they take on the transports AA defenses. However, in the battle if the aircraft get more hits than needed to sink the warships, any extra hits are applied to transports and only the surviving transports would be able to use their AA shots. EXAMPLE: 5 fighters attack 2 destroyers and 3 transports. Fighters get 4 hits, killing both destroyers and 2 transports leaving 1 transport left. The destroyers manage 1 hit, leaving 4 fighters. That last transport would get 1 AA roll against the remaining fighters. If it hits, 1 fighter will be killed. You wouldn’t have to roll for that fighter because the remaining 3 would automatically kill the last transport.

[Black_Elk]

I do, for all the reasons outlined in my post of on the previous page, advocate this. For simplicity, I favor the rules of Classic and Revised, with the only adjustment being the cost of the unit.

I see the advantage of a more developed rule as well, (such as the one you outline) and for people who enjoy more nuanced rules that seems a good solution, but I am just not one of those people. I always prefer to handle the issue with an adjustment to unit costs, rather than the introduction of new or specific rules, and I favor consistency with the previous versions of the game when it comes to the transport.

So just for clarity, if using the old transport rules
att 0, def 1, defender chooses casualties, can block etc.
Then I suggest an increase to the cost, of either 1, 3, or 5 ipcs. +3 being my personal favorite

I do not mind if some players use transports as fodder even in attacks, as they did in Classic and Revised.

It is a familiar phenomenon that we all recall, for an attacker to take every advantage, in which units to commit and which to take during casualty selection. Unloaded transports were frequently killed first, loaded transports were killed last if possible, which makes an intuitive sense. The major difference now is that transports are more expensive and relative to other units they become less ideal in this role after a certain point. At which time they are substituted for destroyers beyond their effective ability to transport land units. Using the old rules is for simplicity sake, where transports behaved as did all the other ships (the only anomaly being submarines, which everyone is already used to operating with their own unit specific rules, and for me that was enough complexity right there.)

In my evaluation, if you really want defenseless transports in this game, than Russia needed to be stronger (not requiring UK ground support, which it barely receives now) which seems the reason for an Allied bid, or more covering warships, or else the cost of defenseless transports maybe lowered even further, to compensate for the fact that they die so easily and do nothing to assist in combat. I look at the round one attacks and see a major advantage to the air attacker. It’s to the point where in some of these round 1 scripted attacks, you could just as well have removed a German fighter and sub from the board with the British ships they invariably attack from the board and saved everyone the time of rolling, since the outcome is more or less a foregone conclusion. At least under the old rules a smaller cover fleet can be used, allowing for earlier move outs, or split fleet actions.

The old transport rules mitigate somewhat the built in Axis advantage of the 42 set up. The old rules favor particularly the US, but also the UK and Russia in that order, because of the support aspect. Japan less so, because the distance they need to transport is comparatively smaller. You only need to defend 1 sea zone to get troops from Japan to the mainland, and can do so without even moving the transports (to Manchuria.) By contrast, the US has to move a number of spaces before reaching combat, as do the British. The Atlantic crossing is already farther to both UK and Africa from E. USA. These rules allow the western allies to move out sooner, rather than waiting the extra 2 rounds (at least) that it takes, to rebuild navies piecemeal, or save and build for a magnified drop. By which time Russia is typically already folding, even with fighter support. The game at it’s core is built around the need for the western Allies to move ground units to Eurasia, and they need transports more than any one else to do this. The old transport rules make this easier to do, the new ones much much harder (since not much was done to re-balance the starting unit set up against this change), or at least that is my conclusion. At least under the old rules, the round 1 battles go a little more favorably for the Allies, who then have the option to build out effective fleets sooner than they otherwise can right now.

[Der Kuenstler]

@Black_Elk:

For simplicity, I favor the rules of Classic and Revised, with the only adjustment being the cost of the unit.

Thank you! Thank you! My group has been playing this way for weeks now with no objections at all.

[toblerone77]

You know DK and Elk, I wish this would be an LH rule but it’ll never happen. I totally agree with you guys though!

I only play solitaire games or the occasional F2F game with well known people and it works fine for us even with transports at 8 still no hordes of transports.

I get why people like the newer rules. I don’t expect everyone to change or even want to.
I have to say though, maybe me and my group suck, but it hasn’t thrown the game off or made anybody flip the board on to the floor.

[Gargantua]

Clearly we need to break you guys into Online play…

Then you will learn to love the new rules :)

Care to try?

[toblerone77]

I’ll keep it in mind Garg LOL!