1942.2 USA pacific fleet: Ships in sz 53 move to sz 56

@general-veers
Grasshopper has India as a minor factory till turn 3 or Japan attacks it. So it’s definitely nerfed in that aspect.
He does have a video explaining everything on YouTube.

@hengst not wasted at all. Repetition is what fine tunes these scenarios to make them the best they can be. Keep up the good work

I made little changes and a few tests in Pacific.
In PTO, I reduced US double Subs and DDs into single one.
It gives many interesting little and epic Naval battles in the first and second rounds.

Adding one additional TP in Japan SZ makes for a more dynamic and fast explosive deployment into main land Asia.
Japan can now better rivaled with Szechwan IC in second and third rounds or get to all money islands at the cost of loosing TPs.

IDK how would do a conservative player since all I tried is as many big naval combats within reach in the first two rounds.

Here is a picture.
I will do more game tests and then write the complete set-up, of the final version to be experiment in a F-2F game.

@Argothair:

Yup, I’m a big convert to Anniversary. I own both games, and I’ve played more Spring '42 2nd Edition (1942.2) than I have Anniversary, but that will change over the next couple of years, because now I almost exclusively play Anniversary.

1942.2 is maybe one hour shorter than Anniversary on average, but the price you pay to save that hour is having to put up with ridiculous sea zone configurations (America typically needs three separate stacks of transports to be effective in Europe) and weird, crunchy flight paths that force you to send fighters from California on turn 1 through Australia and India so that they can reach West Russia in time to stop the German advance.

1942.2 does have some interestingly tight/sharp trading in eastern Europe; I like the territory divisions in Eastern Europe better in 1942.2 than in Anniversary. Instead of being rapidly forced back to Moscow, Russia has a real chance to stack in West Russia or Archangel through the middlegame, and the Germans can be defeated if they over-invest in the pricey 6 IPC tanks and then let those tanks be killed by efficient stacks of Russian infantry and fighters.

There are also interesting possibilities in 1942.2 if you adopt a “US goes first with a non-combat turn and extra purchase,” which tends to re-arrange the entire board and perhaps even allow for a small Axis bid.

That said, the well-designed eastern european front is not enough to save 1942.2 from its otherwise terrible starting setup. With no bid, the Allies will be pushed out of Egypt, China, Siberia, the central Pacific, and the north Atlantic sea zones no matter what they try to do about it. The British are wedded to their disaster of a factory in India, which deprives them of the income needed to make a real contribution in the Atlantic. Because Australia, China, Malaya, Burma, and Hawaii are all 1-IPC territories, the Allies have nowhere in the Pacific that makes sense a a place to build a factory as a forward base. Meanwhile, the Japanese have no reason at all to go south or east, and so in every game they either seize the British Indian factory and use it as a base to attack Stalingrad, or plow through China/Siberia and attack Moscow. There is no Battle of Midway or Battle of the Coral Sea or Battle of Guadalcanal; instead the Japanese get to do a bizarre repeat of the Pearl Harbor attacks, even though it’s supposed to be Spring 1942 instead of December 1941. There is no Battle of El Alamein or Battle of Kasserine Pass; instead the British get thrown out of Egypt and the American Atlantic fleet is sunk in its entirety by German subs before the Americans even get a turn, which means that when the Americans finally do make it to Morocco, they land with overwhelming force. The setup is rigid, unbalanced, ahistorical, and ultimately unrewarding.

SanFran1941_Baron_Alpha07.png

If you and/or your friend are really upset about the loss of the original MB A&A tech chart, pretty sure that method and chart are still 100% compatible with the current 1942.2 game if you really wanted it (I’m not talking about game-balance, but mechanically speaking, it would still work).

The old method was spend 5 IPCs per die you wanted to roll… if you spent 20 IPCs, that’s four die rolls. You’d roll the dice… each result of “6” was a breakthrough and you’d then reroll for each breakthrough and apply it to this chart:

Jet Power (fighters defend at 5) Rockets (1 rocket attack on enemy industry a turn for any AAA within 3 spaces of an enemy Plant… 1D6 IPC loss to enemy) Super Subs (subs attack at 3) Long Range aircraft (all aircraft have 2 more range) Industrial Technology (all units are 1 IPC less) Heavy Bombers (all bombers roll 3 dice instead of 1… note this essentially ended the game… lol).

If it’s really a big deal to you guys, all the above rules would work mechanically with A&A 1942.2… however, not all are balanced, especially Heavy Bombers, but that could be changed (maybe roll 3 dice and choose your favorite of the three).

There’s lots of custom rules for tech research… its not hard to either add the original rules, use someone elses posted on the forum, or just make up your own house rules. In any case, this is one of the easiest rules to add back into the game if you really miss it.

AandAtech.jpg

@Larrie:

Wow, things can really get out of hand, can’t they? First of all, I stand corrected, but only to a point. What I mean by that is, Baron, you are correct, all planes would be defending, therefore they would be in the air to begin with. What I was still trying to address is the statement, Cannot carry plane when damaged. That is still incorrect. If say A British carrier has one British and one American fighter on it and is in the attacking force, and it is the British turn, then the American fighter of course would not participate in the attack. It would be relegated to sitting on deck, and if the carrier is subsequently damaged, the American fighter would still be on deck, not able to take off on the American turn. Again I am addressing Cannot carry plane, not anything else.

You were right about this statement, it was too absolute and didn’t accurately describe OOB rule.
That is why I answered by adding the point on friendly aircrafts trapped in a carrier.
But, if your carrier is damaged, it is not possible to trap your own aircrafts inside.
This last point wasn’t clear, especially when subs only are attacking @2 first strike carriers with no destroyer escorting. I returned to the rulebook to be sure about it.

@Baron:

@Larrie:

Baron, I have to disagree with you on the cannot carry plane when damaged statement. They cannot launch or receive planes after being damaged, but if for example a loaded carrier was surprise attacked by a sub and only damaged and not sunk, then I believe the plane(s) would be trapped on the carrier until such time as it was repaired or sunk.

Talking OOB rules, …

On offense, only friendly plane(s) carried on board is/are trapped if the carrier was damaged in combat.

So, A&A takes place in an era where the locomotive is a mature and widely-implemented technology, even in remote regions like Africa. Why can infantry only move one space? For combat movement, this makes complete sense. The troops are moving in a hostile situation in which every mile can be a struggle. But, why couldn’t the USSR move troops from Vladivostok to Leningrad in a single turn? Turns represent a lot of time, plenty of time to shift all the resources that go along with an infantry unit. Trains are fast, when its simply a matter of moving men and equipment through friendly land.

Now, A&A is a game and is not always realistic. But, being able to move troops more fluidly within friendly territory could open up the game’s strategies somewhat. I think it makes an interesting thought experiment. I’m using AA40G to think this through - but it could be applied to other versions as well. Its particularly important for the AA40 series though because of the larger map size that can mean some land units move entirely through friendly land can sometimes take 5-6 turns to get where they are going - far too long. 4 Turns to shift infantry from Normandy to Poland. 6 turns from Korea to Burma. Russia’s Eastern Front to the west… etc. This unnecessarily ties game resources up.

Suggested rule:
All powers in possession of their capital may move land or units that have not moved in combat at all and are on a land friendly space (not on a transport) to any other friendly land space, as long as a path can be traced that only involves land spaces that started the turn under your control. Air units may then make an additional non-combat move as per regular rules.

Can you guys help me think this one through?

Problems:
The game is not designed around this, which means assured problems with the setup.  Is there any potential leapfrogging abuse? Say, my ally takes over a space, and then during my turn this paves the way for me to take some abusive path.
It also means the extra price of Mech and Armor is not as worth it. They are much more flexible on the front, since they can attack two spaces away, but it does boost the effectiveness of Infantry and Artillery which decreases Armor and Mech by comparison.

How it would affect powers:
Germany: I actually think this would add a lot to the game, since Germany’s troop deployment is more liquid. You still have to keep troops on the Atlantic coast to resist allied landings, but Germany can also react to these landings effectively. This also means that getting air units to Norway is easier.

The USSR has 18 infantry on its eastern front. If they are more easily able to send things between east and west, those 18 become a bit much. This seems solvable though - reduce infantry that start there and then add some in case of Japanese attack or some such. I think the change will make their front with Germany more interesting.

Japan is able to funnel troops into SE Asia much more easily. It presents an interesting dynamic where Japan could keep lots of transports in the sea of Japan to funnel troops into Manchuria, then from Manchuria to their destination the next turn. I like this dynamic, but this rule change seems like it could break an already troubled India.  Perhaps a reduction in starting units could offset the advantage that increased mobility gives them - they benefit from it more than any other Pacific power.

UK is now able to move troops from South Africa to Egypt very easily. This makes stopping Italy very hard. Other than that, so much of the UK is overseas that they benefit very little.

Anzac can move troops to Western Australia with ease. I think this is a good thing - it means if Japan invades they don’t invade lightly.

Italy is able to help Germany out on the eastern front more easily. They also are able to shuffle troops plunging into Africa back to defend Morocco.

United States: This makes it easier to shuffle troops between the east and west coasts. A plane built in Eastern US can make it to Hawaii. Which actually makes a lot of sense. I don’t view the decreased need to commit builds to one front or another as a major problem for the game - naval builds are still committed and other builds are committed the second they leave the continental US.

France doesn’t have their capital and can’t take advantage of this. This stops them from stockpiling their African troops in Egypt.

China doesn’t have a capital, can’t ever use this.

Anything I am missing? Thoughts?

@Zhukov_2003:

i have played this way

Who won? Was Karelia a dead zone?