Playable Nations in 1914

@Imperious:

How convenient that you leave out the appropriate context before my response. I was clearly responding to this statement by you (below), yet you leave it out to muddy things up and manipulate the truth.

ok yea sure. Now back in your cage feeding time soon.

Quote from: Imperious Leader on Today at 11:43:43 am
I made no claims about any other game but mine. You really need to stop babbling.

rolleyes Read the sequence.

Read the script for Groundhog Day.

Quote from: Imperious Leader on Today at 11:43:43 am
I made no claims about any other game but mine. You really need to stop babbling.

I then posted this as a direct response to the above:

Quote from: vonLettowVorbeck1914 on Today at 11:58:16 am
rolleyes rolleyes rolleyes
Quote from: Imperious Leader on December 11, 2012, 04:15:41 pm
Japan, China and these “Bolsheviks” should not be any part of this game. � Germany had just a few ships and very meager forces in China and some island groups. It is so marginal to combat on a strategic scale that it does not warrant any consideration. The Great War was mostly a European affair with some action in the middle east. To try to represent and model all these trifle little and meaningless struggles would be to the detriment of any decent Axis and Allies system. Honestly, if two guys fought with knifes in Brazil, somebody would want yet another set of freaking pieces to represent some game changing warfare…all they need is that Wikipedia entry to prove it.

I added the bolding to the script.

You say that you made no claims about any game other than yours. I show how you said the bolsheviks idea would be “to the detriment of any decent Axis and Allies system.”

So you saying that a bolsheviks rule like that would be “to the detriment of any decent Axis and Allies system” is somehow not a claim about a game other than your own? Seriously? For real?

You really need to learn how to read the English language properly. Should not be part of the game is an opinion, we are allowed them here. IN North Korea perhaps not.

Ah, so when you made the statement “To try to represent and model all these trifle little and meaningless struggles would be to the detriment of any decent Axis and Allies system”, you were just stating your “opinion,”  you were not making a claim of any sort at all? What a load of you-know-what.

Girls, girls; you can’t fight in here: this is the forum!

If I may make a few more inquiries regarding IL’s system.

So far I’m very pleased to see many of the ideas I’ve been advocating for years being implemented:

Rail movement
Production only in home areas
Infantry not linked to factories
Ships based in ports rather than the open sea
Air superiority phase before general combat

Some more ideas I’m hopeful for:

(1) Collect income at start of turn.
One of the silliest flaws of the standard system; I’ve seen tts such as Moscow and Caucasus change hands 3 or 4 times in a round, thus generating 4 or 5 times the income as normal. If money is calculated at the beginning of a turn, then areas which change hands actually generate less income, which makes a lot more sense.

My preferred turn sequence:

1. Purchase new units
2. Develop weapons (for next turn)
3. Collect income (to spend next turn)
4. Combat Movement (cannot use rail)
5. Non-combat movement (into uncontested areas)
6. Combat
7. Land aircraft (from combat)
8. Place new units

(2) No new factories.
Factories represent an entire industrialized area.  It is unrealistic for new industrial bases to be “built” in the course of a few years. The only exception to this is the possibility of the USSR dismantling factories and transporting them to safer areas such as the Urals. Even this example was a titanic effort in the face of extreme needs.

(3) Basic terrain.
Terrain seriously effects the type of warfare that can be fought on it. The only attempt at this in A&A so far is a few impassable areas.
Consider the early tanks of WWI. They had enough difficulty moving on the flat terrain of the North European Plain; its hard to see them being effective in attacking mountains.
So I’d like to see a few basic terrain types: Lowlands, Highlands(impassable to tanks/cars, Mountains(impassable), Marshes(impassable to all but infantry & Cavalry), deserts.

(4) Multiple turns for ship builds.
Took a long time to build a capital ship; certainly it should be a minimum of 2 rounds.

(5) Hidden Submarines. I know this might be a pain to keep track of, as locations have to be written down, but to me sub warfare will only be authentic if surface ships don’t know where enemy subs are when they try to move.

(6) Commerce raiding. I’m assuming that Convoy Zones, or something to the same effect, will be included. Like WWII, the closest the Allies came to defeat in this war was from the U-Boat menace. Germany’s surrender had at least as much to do with food shortages as enemy victories.
My suggestion is that ships from Cruiser up to Dreadnought should be able to bombard land tts regardless of simultaneous land attacks. This might involve firing upon undefended tts far from the front lines simply to reduce income (defender pays IPCs to bank to cover losses.)
This is less relevant in a game not featuring areas outside Europe; without the campaigns of German ships in the South Atlantic, Indian Ocean and Pacific the feature is less important.

(7)Munitions/Supply
Armies (particularly artillery) often ran short of shells and needed supplying with ammunition. Say 10 units of supplies cost 1 IPC. Built in any factory, can be railed or transported where you need them.
I’m toying with using Gibson’s Diplomacy shells: one idea from this is that different colours represent different types, for example HE, smoke, gas.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/371445/diplomacy

Stuff that IL has already rejected:

(1) Sculpts for every tech development.
Always wanted this for WWII, but for 1914-18 its actually much easier, in that only fighter planes had serious development during the war. Other stuff was essentially new items needing new sculpts anyway.

My aircraft development would be:

Recon planes (start)

Eindekker (The Fokker Scourge), countered by Allied Nieuport;

Albatross (Bloody April), countered by Allied Sopwith

Bombers

I would suggest that each of these represents a significant leap forward, justifying new sculpts for all. The 2 fighter developments were about a lot more than fitting machine guns; they were whole new generations of aircraft. And the sculpts would look so cool painted up… I don’t want to have to think “does that country have this tech” - the unit itself should tell me.

I also think that earlier versions of the unit should remain in place with their old abilities and be phased out gradually. An early war plane could not compete with the Albatross just by fitting new armaments. Also, units in outlying areas would be far less likely to get the new units and would have to make do.

(2) Revolutionary forces.
IL believes that Russia, on the Revolution of October 1417, simply drops out of the war to fight its own internal civil conflict - something irrelevant to the Great War itself. He has yet to reveal how this will be implemented, especially in regard to how and what Germany gets in Russian tts.
I think this is oversimplifying the reality, and believe that Bolshevik and Nationalist forces were an inherent part of the conflict. Hence, I would like revolutions in every country to be possible, with relevant forces in red and black used (will have to buy a 2nd copy…)

(3) Open development of when countries enter the war.
This has been discussed “at some length” above, suffice to say my view is that the game should aim to simulate August 1914 exactly, with everything that might have happened thereafter possible in the game. I appreciate that this can make balancing more difficult to achieve.
The USA joining the Allies eventually would still be very likely; but the possibility of it joining the Central Powers should be just feasible; for example if the British Navy blows the German fleet out of the water the Americans might begin to consider the RN as its greatest rival.

Very interesting, collecting at the beginning of the turn.

Could definitely help a TON with the annoying 2 inf 1 ftr vs 1 inf frontier battles that can go on forever in some games.

If the game is balanced with setup changes, etc. to account for the ability of the US to enter on turn one, then of course it can be balanced. Obviously if a major rule change is made to an existing game that already has balance, the balance can be disrupted, but no one is talking about changing an established game (unless you are crazy enough to think that the game that will be released is going to be exactly like yours and that anyone who wants anything to be different is violating your rights. That actually would explain a lot.).

It cant be balanced if USA enters on turn one or never. An early entry destroys the chances for the CP to win on one hand, and on the other the CP will probably win…all resulting on the effect of what and when USA does. IN global at least the axis can control when that happens until the fixed date of entry.

But to say that it would be broken in a game THAT ACCOUNTS FOR IT IN THE � BALANCING PROCESS FROM THE BEGINNING is just stupid.

OK you are entitled to being wrong, it happened before many times…countless actually.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxhuUdZzGYw

Hmm. So even though UK and Japan can choose to go to war against each other one any of their respective turns, you would consider that to be fixed?

Didn’t say anything about Japan. I’m talking about Europe, of which you skip over and never admit to anything because the spoiled brat can never admit anything. Address comments to Europe but we both know that will never happen because it destroys your argument completely.

Some more ideas I’m hopeful for:

(1) Collect income at start of turn.
One of the silliest flaws of the standard system; I’ve seen tts such as Moscow and Caucasus change hands 3 or 4 times in a round, thus generating 4 or 5 times the income as normal. If money is calculated at the beginning of a turn, then areas which change hands actually generate less income, which makes a lot more sense.

that’s already done long ago. You know how long i fought for that.

Order of Play:
(Pre-turn) Performed before players/sides turns:
1.Alliance Phase– if a nation is to enter the game then set up their forces.
2.Technology-- check to see who advances in technology.

(Players/sides turn) Each player/side does the following:
3.   Collect Income– count up your nations income, subtract convoy loses.
4.   Purchase Units-- purchase for self and any controlled minor allies.
5.   Repair Units – Dreadnoughts, fortresses, ports, and Zeppelins.  
6.   Subs Resurface – Place submerged subs upright.
7.   Combat Movement-- naval interception, sub detection, and pass-through fire may be done by opposing side. Rail guns may move in this phase.
8.   Air Response-- aircraft in adjacent territories may respond to attacks.
9.   Combat - a) naval bombardments, b) land bombardments, c) naval combat  d) naval invasions, e) land combat, f) strategic bombing, g) sweeps for mines.
10.  Non- Combat Movement  railroads may be used; aircraft return to base, ships  may strategic move from port to port, infantry entrench, naval interception and pass- through fire may be done by the opposing side.
11.  Unit Placement- Place non-mechanized units up to limit of production value, plus mechanized, air, and naval units only in original home areas with factory and or port.

My preferred turn sequence:

1. Purchase new units
2. Develop weapons (for next turn)
3. Collect income (to spend next turn)
4. Combat Movement (cannot use rail)
5. Non-combat movement (into uncontested areas)
6. Combat
7. Land aircraft (from combat)
8. Place new units

(2) No new factories.
Factories represent an entire industrialized area.  It is unrealistic for new industrial bases to be “built” in the course of a few years. The only exception to this is the possibility of the USSR dismantling factories and transporting them to safer areas such as the Urals. Even this example was a titanic effort in the face of extreme needs.

RIGHT.  They are printed on the map directly, not new ones.

(3) Basic terrain.
Terrain seriously effects the type of warfare that can be fought on it. The only attempt at this in A&A so far is a few impassable areas.
Consider the early tanks of WWI. They had enough difficulty moving on the flat terrain of the North European Plain; its hard to see them being effective in attacking mountains.
So I’d like to see a few basic terrain types: Lowlands, Highlands(impassable to tanks/cars, Mountains(impassable), Marshes(impassable to all but infantry & Cavalry), deserts.

Indirectly the number of areas passable between these major terrain features is built into the number of areas ( example: it takes a while to move in the desert, hence more areas)

(4) Multiple turns for ship builds.
Took a long time to build a capital ship; certainly it should be a minimum of 2 rounds.

Realistic, but not fun. Sometimes a player could never recover from another player who built a huge blockade force since builds of this type would not be disclosed. I tried this in AARHE but it didn’t work

(5) Hidden Submarines. I know this might be a pain to keep track of, as locations have to be written down, but to me sub warfare will only be authentic if surface ships don’t know where enemy subs are when they try to move.

yes a pain, to me marginal benefit to the game. Realistic yes.

(6) Commerce raiding. I’m assuming that Convoy Zones, or something to the same effect, will be included. Like WWII, the closest the Allies came to defeat in this war was from the U-Boat menace. Germany’s surrender had at least as much to do with food shortages as enemy victories.
My suggestion is that ships from Cruiser up to Dreadnought should be able to bombard land tts regardless of simultaneous land attacks. This might involve firing upon undefended tts far from the front lines simply to reduce income (defender pays IPCs to bank to cover losses.)
This is less relevant in a game not featuring areas outside Europe; without the campaigns of German ships in the South Atlantic, Indian Ocean and Pacific the feature is less important.

yep we got this like it was in old AAE with boxes, when Germany gets unrestricted submarine warfare the effect doubles.

(7)Munitions/Supply
Armies (particularly artillery) often ran short of shells and needed supplying with ammunition. Say 10 units of supplies cost 1 IPC. Built in any factory, can be railed or transported where you need them.
I’m toying with using Gibson’s Diplomacy shells: one idea from this is that different colours represent different types, for example HE, smoke, gas.

Tedious but realistic, would favor the allies

(2) Revolutionary forces.
IL believes that Russia, on the Revolution of October 1417, simply drops out of the war to fight its own internal civil conflict - something irrelevant to the Great War itself. He has yet to reveal how this will be implemented, especially in regard to how and what Germany gets in Russian tts.
I think this is oversimplifying the reality, and believe that Bolshevik and Nationalist forces were an inherent part of the conflict. Hence, I would like revolutions in every country to be possible, with relevant forces in red and black used (will have to buy a 2nd copy…)

October 1417?  oh that revolution!

(3) Open development of when countries enter the war.
This has been discussed “at some length” above, suffice to say my view is that the game should aim to simulate August 1914 exactly, with everything that might have happened thereafter possible in the game. I appreciate that this can make balancing more difficult to achieve.
The USA joining the Allies eventually would still be very likely; but the possibility of it joining the Central Powers should be just feasible; for example if the British Navy blows the German fleet out of the water the Americans might begin to consider the RN as its greatest rival.

Well you then see the issue of early entry. I prefer the “opportunity” to occur as it did historically, with modifiers for both sides from that point. Allowing them to start on turn 3 would mess up the game just like it would by allowing the Russians to attack Germany in global 40 on turn 1. Global does have provisions like when London falls, it activates USA at war. I guess the same could apply here.

Ah, yes, 1417. Back in my medieval mode, there.

They’ve found Richard III.  Never thought it would happen. Dead, unfortunately.

My turn order requires a bit more planning.

Weapons developments and money collected can only be used next turn. Hence, you still save money between turns for paying bombing damage etc.

With techs, its surely more realistic to have to wait a turn before putting the new units into production.

I prefer both movement phases consecutively and both before combat; combat movement first, then non-combat (so you can immediately see which units have moved into combat, without mixing up retreating units). I also don’t like immediately reinforcing newly captured areas; it took time, for example, to reconnect rail lines which were often sabotaged or of a different gauge. Instead, reinforcement should only be to areas you already hold, just as aircraft can only land in areas where you’ve already established an airfield.

I think this also speeds up the player turn.

note: you say rail guns can move in the combat movement phase. I assume that means they can move them to a tt you already occupy in order to bombard units you’re attacking. Under my system this distinction isn’t needed.

My turn order requires a bit more planning.

Weapons developments and money collected can only be used next turn. Hence, you still save money between turns for paying bombing damage etc.

In our game, the developments occur for each nation as it did historically, so you can employ them on the turn they become available.

With techs, its surely more realistic to have to wait a turn before putting the new units into production.

The only units that appear as “New” are bombers, and tanks and each nation has a different turn when they can be bought, but they can be used on the turn following placement so in those instances they don’t have an effect till the following turn.

I prefer both movement phases consecutively and both before combat; combat movement first, then non-combat (so you can immediately see which units have moved into combat, without mixing up retreating units). I also don’t like immediately reinforcing newly captured areas; it took time, for example, to reconnect rail lines which were often sabotaged or of a different gauge. Instead, reinforcement should only be to areas you already hold, just as aircraft can only land in areas where you’ve already established an airfield.

I think this also speeds up the player turn.

yea good idea, but rail movement cannot be part of this. It must be separate or you could bring too many units into combat, rather than allowing the other side to anticipate your rail movements. For this reason we keep them separate, but really this is all axis all allies movement. In our game railguns can move by rail in the combat movement phase, but this is the only unit.

note: you say rail guns can move in the combat movement phase. I assume that means they can move them to a tt you already occupy in order to bombard units you’re attacking. Under my system this distinction isn’t needed.

They can.

@Imperious:

Hmm. So even though UK and Japan can choose to go to war against each other one any of their respective turns, you would consider that to be fixed?

Didn’t say anything about Japan. I’m talking about Europe, of which you skip over and never admit to anything because the spoiled brat can never admit anything. Address comments to Europe but we both know that will never happen because it destroys your argument completely.

What? My comment was that GLOBAL had variable entry. You can’t change what I am talking abaout just because you feel like it. Look at post 34, my second post in the thread. I pointed out how Global has variable entry and you denied that. You can’t restrict the Global game to just Europe. I would love to play you in a Global game where you ignore the pac side completely. Now that I proved you incorrect, you try to say you were only talking about Europe. Nice try. Anyways, I am not sure how much longer I am going to bother with your trolling. I am very thankful that it seems that since your post count is so high on here, it means you have very little input in a venue that actually has bearing on what we will see in the game.

What? My comment was that GLOBAL had variable entry. You can’t change what I am talking abaout just because you feel like it. Look at post 34, my second post in the thread. I pointed out how Global has variable entry and you denied that. You can’t restrict the Global game to just Europe. I would love to play you in a Global game where you ignore the pac side completely. Now that I proved you incorrect, you try to say you were only talking about Europe. Nice try. Anyways, I am not sure how much longer I am going to bother with your trolling. I am very thankful that it seems that since your post count is so high on here, it means you have very little input in a venue that actually has bearing on what we will see in the game.

What? My comment was that GLOBAL had fixed entry. You can’t change what I am talking about just because you feel like it. Look at post 12,785, my second post in the thread. I pointed out how Global has fixed entry and you denied that. You can’t restrict the Global game to variable. I would love to play you in a Global game where USSR and USA can attack Germany on turn one. Now that I proved you incorrect, you try to say you were only talking about Global. Nice try. Anyways, I am not sure how much longer I am going to bother with your trolling. I am very thankful that it seems that since your post count is so low on here, it means you have very little input in a venue that actually has bearing on what we will see in the game.

Stop hiding behind that phony badge of saying the opposite of what is true:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxhuUdZzGYw

@Imperious:

What? My comment was that GLOBAL had variable entry. You can’t change what I am talking abaout just because you feel like it. Look at post 34, my second post in the thread. I pointed out how Global has variable entry and you denied that. You can’t restrict the Global game to just Europe. I would love to play you in a Global game where you ignore the pac side completely. Now that I proved you incorrect, you try to say you were only talking about Europe. Nice try. Anyways, I am not sure how much longer I am going to bother with your trolling. I am very thankful that it seems that since your post count is so high on here, it means you have very little input in a venue that actually has bearing on what we will see in the game.

What? My comment was that GLOBAL had fixed entry. You can’t change what I am talking about just because you feel like it. Look at post 12,785, my second post in the thread. I pointed out how Global has fixed entry and you denied that. You can’t restrict the Global game to variable. I would love to play you in a Global game where USSR and USA can attack Germany on turn one. Now that I proved you incorrect, you try to say you were only talking about Global. Nice try. Anyways, I am not sure how much longer I am going to bother with your trolling. I am very thankful that it seems that since your post count is so low on here, it means you have very little input in a venue that actually has bearing on what we will see in the game.

Nothing but a fake cop:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxhuUdZzGYw

And instead of actually addressing my post you devolve into mockery. It’s clear that you have no valid argument to give, your last weapon is to mock and insult. In that case I accept your admission that you were incorrect. Enjoy the game when it comes out.

And instead of actually addressing my post you devolve into mockery. It’s clear that you have no valid argument to give, your last weapon is to mock and insult. In that case I accept your admission that you were incorrect. Enjoy the game when it comes out.

When you acknowledge that the Russian and USA player are not allowed to enter the war early on their own accord, and can only enter voluntarily on turn 3 and 4 respectively, you might see the light.

So going back to the topic of the tread… I think Ottoman will be one of the funnier nations to play. or atleast the most different

Not unless they mothball that player ( e.g. no tanks, just basic units).  It would be like playing “china”

not sure that will matter, even a country like china hitting into southern russia or mideast or pushing into africa would be interesting and again atleast different

IL: yea good idea, but rail movement cannot be part of this. It must be separate or you could bring too many units into combat, rather than allowing the other side to anticipate your rail movements. For this reason we keep them separate, but really this is all axis all allies movement. In our game railguns can move by rail in the combat movement phase, but this is the only unit.

Just to be clear what I meant - all combat moves first, then all non-combat. You cannot use rail at all in the combat move phase. So you cannot rail units into combat, but you can rail them to your own front lines to build up your reserves prior to combat on the following turn.
In the case of rail guns, they would move in non-combat, but because this takes place before combat resolution they can still bombard adjacent tts.

Turkey is not mothballed - it just has to obtain its mechanical units from its Allies. If Germany transports tanks to Baghdad Turkey is free to use them.

Similarly, the USA will probably not build fighters at home (I don’t think they should have the range to fly over the Atlantic anyway), but acquire British and French models in Europe. Furthermore, if F/B/U all play at the same time, it matters little which country the unit belongs to.

Turkey is not mothballed - it just has to obtain its mechanical units from its Allies. If Germany transports tanks to Baghdad Turkey is free to use them.

You can use the same reasoning and allow them to build normally, assume the planes and ships came from her allies. The CP have too many foes and making special rules to limit Ottomans makes them weaker.

Similarly, the USA will probably not build fighters at home (I don’t think they should have the range to fly over the Atlantic anyway), but acquire British and French models in Europe. Furthermore, if F/B/U all play at the same time, it matters little which country the unit belongs to.

Same thing here, whatever planes they build can be assumed to be from elsewhere, make no changes.

But… they… didn’t. have. any. industry.

One of the principle strategic goals of the CP must be to keep the supply lines open to Turkey. As long as they do this they can rail/ship/fly the units there, so it isn’t a big handicap.

If the Allies succeed in cutting the supply lines, then Turkey should be in trouble.  Otherwise you’re suggesting they just teleport the units from Europe, and the game is just a big killing match with no strategy worth the name.

If the CP intends a major campaign in the middle east, its up to them to build up Turkish supplies while they still can. Is the “Sick Man” worth propping up?

The only thing America needs to build, then, are ships to transport their infantry over the sea. They generally used French and British tanks, machine guns, steel helmets and airplanes; the only snag with this is the limit on production in European factories. The main US contribution was precisely the thing the Allies were running out of - manpower.