Just to follow up on my earlier post about the atomic explosion markers (black mushroom cloud sculpts) made by Xeno Games, the best sculpts I’ve ever found for use as unexploded atomic bombs are the missile sculpts from the Superpowers game, laid on their sides rather than positioned vertically:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/455412/superpowers
The missile piece is the big one on the left side of the picture, not the little one on a wheeled undercarriage at the bottom. The colours in the picture are a bit misleading; the missile sculpts look beige, but they’re actually white.
I bought Superpowers as a game in itself, so the redeployment of its missiles as A-bombs in an A&A context is just a bonus use. I suppose, though, that if somebody were to buy the Superpowers game just for those missile sculpts, this would fit nicely with rules that would make A-bombs very expensive to purchase: there are just 8 such sculpts in the game, out of 440 pieces.
The main problem with A Bomb rules for this game is that 1) Whoever develops this tech will ultimately win the game. so do the “Hail Mary” dump all iPCs into research and you will most likely win.
2) The only country that has the resources to do this is the U.S. Even thou Germany and Japan can build their economy up to compete with the U.S. with comprable IPCs. They must use it all up to feed their war machine. Russia will not sit quietly at peace with Germany while Germany is spending all income on a A Bomb.
Ultimately both these senarios reflect what can and did play out in the real war but will unbalance the game into an unplayable situation.
A - bomb not for me. Leave it up to strategy and die rolls and if you need to change up game, play with some NO and Tech. But not A-bomb.
ATOMIC BOMB
Germany and the United States can build A-bombs. The first A-bomb that is developed by a power costs 500IPCs, and each subsequent A-bomb costs 50IPCs. An A-bomb is paid for at the Purchase & Repair phase and must be mobilized at a major industrial complex at the Mobilize Units phase. A-bombs can be moved like artillery (i.e. 1 space per turn on land; 1 infantry and 1 A-bomb can be moved on a transport). An A-bomb must be delivered by a strategic bomber that takes off from the same territory where the A-bomb was located at the beginning of Combat Movement. The procedure for delivering an A-bomb is the same as a strategic bombing raid (i.e. bomber and escorts fire, interceptors fire, AA fires, then bomb is dropped). When the A-bomb is delivered, the attacker rolls 1 die and if the roll is 4 or less the A-bomb detonates successfully. Any minor industrial complex, naval base or air base in a territory that is hit with an A-bomb is permanently removed and cannot be rebuilt. A major industrial complex that is hit with an A-bomb is reduced to a minor IC with 6 damage points. The damage points may be repaired for 1IPC each, but the IC can never be upgraded into a major IC. In addition, the power that receives an A-bomb attack loses 20IPCs to represent the loss of military and civilian morale.
500 IPC’s???
That’s CRAZY!
I would rather buy 166 infantry.
Well OK 500 might be too much but it was darn expensive.
I found this in the Cost section of “Manhattan project” on Wikipedia:
"The project expenditure through 1 October 1945 was $1.845 billion, and was $2.191 billion when the AEC assumed control on 1 January 1947. Total allocation was $2.4 billion. Over 90% of the cost was for building plants and producing the fissionable materials, and less than 10% for development and production of the weapons.
A total of four weapons (the Trinity gadget, Little Boy, Fat Man, and an unused bomb) were produced by the end of 1945, making the average cost per bomb around $500 million in 1945 dollars. By comparison, the project’s total cost by the end of 1945 was about 90% of the total spent on the production of US small arms (not including ammunition) and 34% of the total spent on US tanks during the same period"
So take whatever USA typically spends on tanks in a game and multiply that by one third and you should have a historically accurate price for building the infrastructure that is needed to build the first bomb. Subsequent bombs should cost 10% of whatever that is.
500 IPC’s???
That’s CRAZY!
I would rather buy 166 infantry.
[
/quote]See, Thats exactly what i mean. The odds for Germany developing A Bomb tech is CRAZY! You could buy enough tanks to flatten Russia 10X over.
Yeah, 500 IPCs is way too much. Think about it, even the US would have to buy NO units for 6 rounds to get that much money.
I understand the facts you dragged up, but how could you figure out how much the US would spend on tanks? It really depends on the player for one thing. Some guys might buy almost no tanks for USA, preferring to purchase inf/art for all their transports. Others might be very tank heavy. Then you have to figure in whether or not the US captures an IC or not. Usually, I will go more with inf/art when I have to load them on transports but once I get an IC over in Europe, I tend to build all tanks there.
There has to be a better way to figure out how much developing the first A-Bomb would cost. This is assuming they already have the tech of course. Perhaps 1/3 of total cash on hand? Or better yet, perhaps 1/3 of the total income from all territories and NOs at that time. Also, would it be the same for Germany?
The problem with this idea is it could end up being a variable amount and might even possibly make one country pay more for an A-bomb than the other, depending on what time during the game they decide to make an A-bomb. (USA could be making 100 IPCs with territories and NOs, A-Bomb cost = 34 IPCs. Germany might be making 75 IPCs with territories and NOs, A-bomb cost = 25 IPCs.)
With that in mind, should the cost be a set level? Perhaps 50-70 IPCs or so for the first one. Subsequent bombs should be more than 10%, perhaps 15-20 IPCs each.
A - bomb not for me. Leave it up to strategy and die rolls and if you need to change up game, play with some NO and Tech. But not A-bomb.
I agree with SS. If you wanna play with A-bomb play world war III
Just make it a NO for the US that it needs a cumulative die roll to obtain nukes
Certain things have to happen in order for the US to roll “Atomic Dice”
Allied control of Rome
No Axis controlled territories in Africa
The Axis cannot control US originally controlled territories in the Pacific (Guam, Midway, Hawaii, Johnston, Line, Philippines, Aleutian)
The Axis cannot control UK originally controlled territories in Europe (London, Scotland, Iceland, Gibraltar)
Anzac has to have collected IPC that round
Before Germany goes in that round, the US gets to roll a die for each of the following:
US Control of Rome
US Control of Hawaii
US Control of Caroline Islands
US Control of Marianas
US Control of Iwo Jima
US Control of Okinawa
US Control of Marshall Islands
France collected IPC that round
Allied Control of Egypt
You have to roll something like six sixes in order to obtain an atomic bomb. Thats six sixes cumulatively. Alternately, you can make it a cumulative total so something like you have to roll something like a die total of 40-50 cumulatively on the die roll(s) over multiple rounds.
Each nuke thereafter costs the US 1/3 of its IPC to purchase it (so probably something like 25-30 IPC at this point in the game).
The Nuke works just like a SBR however it can only be on the Nation’s Capital (Tokyo / Berlin). If the StratB’s with the Nuke(s) get to the roll dice phase for damage to the Major IC, then the attack is successful.
A successful attack means that nation does not collect IPC that round.
From the German perspective:
Germany rolls a single die every round for the following objectives:
German Control for each VC it controls
So G1 would see Germany likely roll die for Berlin, Warsaw and Paris.
Germany would also be able to roll die if it controls London, Egypt, Leningrad, Stalingrad, and/or Moscow which allows for Germany to go in any direction to obtain extra die rolls.
Germany scores half (rounded down) its total die roll if the Axis does not control Paris and Rome.
Germany has to obtain the same objective as the US to obtain an Atomic Bomb (six sixes or something like 50 total showing on the dice cumulatively through all rolls).
I believe this puts the Atomic Bomb in play for Germany around turn 7-8 if it never loses Paris and owns London. However Germany could only really play that Atomic bomb against Moscow if it sealioned G3 as its pretty darned difficult for it to launch a SBR against the US. In effect it penalizes Moscow for sitting back and really doing nothing instead of pushing back against the Germans.
