New concepts in naval combat

[Imperious Leader]

Yes quite right!

I am thinking to raise carriers to 16 IP, but i was waiting to see Anderssons math on these new prices/values.

A carrier is now closer to a battleship which is better because they were about the same size only lighter.

But we also have the “game” considerations to account so pricing may have to reflect the cost in terms of value in the game.

What price would you make a carrier?

[Biofury]

If you have Cruisers for 16 ipc, then leave Carriers at standard 18 ipc.
Battleships should stay at standard 24 ipc (ducks from the thrown tomatoes by the other members :-P) and heres why…

1. Revised edition and many house rules put Battleships at 2 hits without ever adjusting the price. (I dont like this rule, the smaller ships in a fleet are their to protect the flagship (battleship or carrier) by intercepting the enemy torps. All the smaller ones should go down before the flagship. You dont need to blow up the entire battleship to sink it. Just a well placed hit can break its back and send it to Davey Jones locker, maybe hit its fuel or power source, etc…
2. Battleships can conduct shore bombardment and the shelled units cannot fire back (unless you use the coastal defense gun house rule)
3. Battleships attack at 4
4. Battleships defend at 4
5. Sure 24 ipc is high but remember that the battleships saw their last days in use during the second world war, made obsolete by fighters and aircraft carriers. Why use big guns, when you can just drop ordnance over the enemys’ ships from greater range. Battleships are even easier targets than tanks for a fighter. With this in mind, and 1 hit only at 24 ipc, no one is gonna buy battleships anymore and instead build carriers, just like after the war. This also means you build more ships to protect that starting battleship that would be a pain to lose…

[Imperious Leader]

I see your points,but the general idea is to bring down the naval prices in general, because for the most part i think you will agree that the Navy is largely a limited importance in terms of overall purchases for many nations, while the axis and allies pacific game laid this to rest and provided a glimpse of what might have been with more substantial naval forces available to a player, the trick IMO is to get the prices down and to invigorate some the the way these naval units interact with each other. I d prefer that all the prices go down equally or that their is some compensation to their price structure based on some new attribute they recieve under these new proposals. In the case of a Cruiser at 3/3/3 you propose that with all other factors as equal, the difference from a battleship is a new of 6 IPC for one extra attack/defense factor and one movement point ? i think this is too much money to spend to now buy a battleship as i would fair batter with a cruiser and destroyer. BUT if the battleship goes to 20 IPC and the cruiser is at say 16… then would you still buy a cruiser and destroyer combo instead of that battleship? or would you get the carrier? I am just trying to get the prices realistic AND make the choices work with the math so that everything is basically equal and DESIRABLE. Showing us some math what would the value in combat situations then be under what you and i have proposed?

[Biofury]

How about adding more islands and sea zones in the Pacific and increasing IPC in a few areas. (Yep, I made my own expansion for it) Cheaper ships will not really encourage me to fight in the south Pacific, instead add more islands, sea zones, add more and adjust some IPC values. Its bad enough that the game currently doesnt support any fighting for Port Moresby and the control of Australia. The East Indies are a great source for oil.

[Imperious Leader]

Id like you to post an image of your map. On the matter of east indies oil, the most important consideration for japan going to war was for this oil source since we cut them off after they went into French- Indo China. The game completely misses this point and an oil center should be included on some of these islands to feed the japanese war machine. Summatra/borneo should have greater values and additional islands should be on the map. The whole idea of island fighting in the pacific is lost in revised with that dreaded KGF deal. Ill post something on this more elaborate soon… stay tuned.

[Biofury]

Problem with KGF plan is like the British mentality in the real war they wanted USA to focus 100% on Germany first, but of course we did not accept that fact and routed at least 30% of supplies/manpower etc to Pacific theatre, becuase ignoring Japan and letting them trample through New Guinea and walk across across Australia then going east would have been foolish. And we wont ignore someone that bombs Pearl and claims Autu and Kiska for themselves. Just think of what a “pipeline” connecting both Axis powers would have done.

Im still playing around with my map, I keep making changes and never seem to finish.
I do have a handful of these mineature red fuel pumps (half the size of infantry) from another board game that I want to incorporate in Axis and Allies some how. But currently dont know what to do with them. I’ve added territories from the Nova version that were dropped out by MB and rearranged the islands to their actual spot in the pacific with many more sea zones and islands in the area.

[Imperious Leader]

They make nifty little oil drums from that command decision miniatures series (old glory) . You get about 20 clumps of oil drums (4-6 drums molded together). 13.00 each bag

[opengeno]

IL,
  These are the oil drums you used for Battle of the Bulge right?  I remember seeing a photo you had of these.  How do they measure up height wise to the Axis and Allies Infantry piece.  About 2/3 the size an infantry piece?  The General Storage Pack is the one that has the oil drums your talking about right?  Can you tell me what the supply and fuel dump set look like.  What kind of piece/pieces are they and about how big compared to an Axis Allies Infantry piece.

CDSP-01  General Storage Pack - Jerry cans, oil drums, crates, camo net, tarpauline  $10.40 
CDSP-02  Sherman Track and Road wheels, jerry cans, .30 cal, .50 cal and M/G  $10.40 
CDSP-03  Sumply Dump  $10.40 
CDSP-04  Fuel Dump  $10.40Â

Thanks

[opengeno]

Can someone confirm A&A scales for me.  Are these numbers correct?

Ships-     1/3000 (.54mm) or 1/2400 (.67mm)

Planes-    1/700 (?mm)

Armour-  1/300 (5.4mm) or 1/285 (5.6mm)

Infantry-  1/107 (15mm) or 1/72 (?mm)

[Imperious Leader]

CDSP-01  General Storage Pack - Jerry cans, oil drums, crates, camo net, tarpauline  $10.40 
CDSP-02  Sherman Track and Road wheels, jerry cans, .30 cal, .50 cal and M/G  $10.40 
CDSP-03  Sumply Dump  $10.40 
CDSP-04  Fuel Dump  $10.40

Thanks

Not sure what the code is and yes they are the same. I will get the code but i think its 04

Can someone confirm A&A scales for me.  Are these numbers correct?

Ships-    1/3000 (.54mm) or 1/2400 (.67mm) 1/3000 is best IMO

Planes-    1/700 (?mm) Yes good

Armour-  1/300 (5.4mm) or 1/285 (5.6mm) 1/285 is best imo

Infantry-  1/107 (15mm) or 1/72 (?mm) 1/72 (HO scale) best or 20 MM

[opengeno]

About 20 individual/separate pieces per bag?
How large would you say they are in comparison when standing next an AA infantry piece?
and thanks for looking into which code it is so that I can place the order.

[Imperious Leader]

Yep about 24 pieces, plus some jerry cans, but they are too small for any use.

The oil drum goes up to the just below the head of axis and allies pieces, or about the chest of a 1/72 scale man. The drums are in groups of 3-6 drums so the girth is about 5/8 inch.

[opengeno]

jerry cans too?

CDSP-01  General Storage Pack - Jerry cans, oil drums, crates, camo net, tarpauline  $10.40 
CDSP-02  Sherman Track and Road wheels, jerry cans, .30 cal, .50 cal and M/G  $10.40 
CDSP-03  Sumply Dump  $10.40 
CDSP-04  Fuel Dump  $10.40

Maybe it’s code 01, not code 04?  What do you think?

[Imperious Leader]

camo net, tarpauline

you will have to call… but i didnt get the above items, so im thinking its just fuel dump. All that was in the bag was oil drums, jerrycans, possible crate (very small) pieces. I immediatly threw away everything except the oil drums.

[opengeno]

Very good.  Thanks for the info IL!  Appreciate it.

Just placed my order.  I had been meaning to ask you about those pieces ever since I saw your Battle of the Bulge pictures.

[Imperious Leader]

I gotta post them pictures. damm it!

[Biofury]

Ive dropped the idea of rearranging and changing the map and instead bought one of those large world maps and drew in the borders for territories and sea zones. I cant stand narrow Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and hate the idea of how US transports can just go from eastern US to Africa in 1 turn without the Axis being unable to have a chance of hitting them in the middle of the ocean.

Also came up with a new unit for those fuel pumps…

Supply Dumps/Ports

Cost: 5-10? ipc / Move: 2 / Atk: – / Def: –
You may place 1 newly purchased land unit on each territory that is equipped with a  supply dump once per turn. If an attacker overkills a defender (more hits than neccessary rolled), the defender has the option of destroying the supply dump so the attacker cant claim it. Supply dumps are first placed on a territory with an IC. A transport can carry them also, but only 1 supply dump and nothing else. Once used to deploy a new unit, Supply dumps can no longer be moved.

Starting placement: Egypt, India, Southern Europe…

Not sure on starting placements, maybe some ideas from you guys, what do you think.

Supply Ship (Use either MB transport or Revised transport)
Cost: 8 IPC / Move: 2 / Atk: – / Def: –
When a battleship is damaged, taking only 1 hit, you may repair the ship at no cost if grouped with a supply ship in the same sea zone at the end of your turn. If a battleship has no Supply ship, then it must be repaired at a port and suffers the effects of being damaged, atk: 3 / def :3 / move: 1

[Imperious Leader]

Along the lines of what you have proposed:
I am not sure about the suitability of having ports have any defense, but rather coming up with a unit that can adress a number of characteristics of a fortified territory (think maginot defenses).

REPAIR DAMAGED BATTLESHIPS
Battleships are powerful units. A damaged battleship may be repaired if it is in a sea zone adjacent to a territory with an IC controlled by its country. The repair costs are equal to the roll of one d6. The battleship may not move or participate in combat during the turn of repair. The repair is complete at the end of the players turn.

Fortresses
These units can be added to any controlled territory for the cost of 10 IP and can defend only with two rolls each combat round with a defense value of 3/3.They “protect” the defending units from direct attack. The units inside the fortress cannot be affected by attacking combat rolls until the fortress is destroyed by a roll of 1 only. Once built they cannot move and if destroyed cannot be reused by enemy forces. The maximum number of fortresses is limited to the IP value of the territory and in the case of China is limited to one.