G40 Balance Mod - Feedback Thread

@Ichabod:

Are Axis wins up to a ratio of 54:46 now?

That’s a 10% spread. Does this meant that people may stop giving a small bid to the Axis?

In a lot of cases this is indeed happening.

@Gamerman01:

Or take the Iwo NO away from Japan lol

Not sure what the big deal about the Iwo Jima/Okinawa objective is. Was it needed? No. Does it damage or improve the game? Neither really.

@oysteilo:

BM mode achieves one very important thing compared to high bid OOB games. Italy. If you get a bid of 40 (and you need at least 40 to have an even chance) and spend it all towards taking out Italy it means Italy is neutered from round 1. That is not so fun.

Hmm, my Italy achieves very little most games beyond can opening and defense. Perhaps I suck at playing Italy then.

If helping Italy was the main goal of BM, wouldn’t moving the starting position of the SZ95 Cruiser, DD and sub to SZ97 be an obvious move? That makes a maximum attack on SZ97 UK1 a 37% one with a German tac. Perhaps make the sub an additional one because I don’t like the idea that you can put an unescorted TT in SZ91 as the allies. I don’t really understand why there was this requirement to avoid changing the setup.

@Adam514:

Main point of BM is improving the game, not the balance part. Bid is fun.

If that’s the case, do you feel that guerilla fighters are a success in improving the game? I’m still a bit frustrated that most league games include this rule TBH.

I still don’t like the USSR lend lease bonus for a Japanese DOW on it either but I can accept that it doesn’t enter the game very often.

Little has changed my initial view of BM even after 114 games played (I just checked).

A lot of good/valid points here simon33.
I agree, I don’t see the need for the IJ objective for Japan either. However, it is not that bad and it is a fairly easy objective for the US to take out. I am not sure if it is worth it for the USA to mess with this as it is easy for Japan to take back. But honestly, I think the med islands objectives are worse. If Taranto is not done, then Italy has a good chance to take all three islands for a gain of +5 for Axis. If Allied controlled it is +6 for the British with a difference of up to 11 IPC. It is BIG trouble for the Allies if Axis gain +5 here. It can’t be ignored, but the problem is you loose sooooooooo much tempo in your play if you are going to protect your transports and re-take those islands with USA/British. I am not sure how to deal with it.

As for Italy, in my playoff game against Wittmann he got a +38 bid for allies and spent it “all” towards Italy. Here is Italys income: 3,18,10,3,5,7 …… single digits……7,8,13(round 16). You never see number like this in BM. I believe this is a good thing about BM. Here is the tread: https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=41972.315 for that game. I am sure helping Italy to become a more playable power is one of the main things the developers wanted to achieve. I think it is very difficult to move units around in the starting set-up and I think it is fair not to mess with that. I did not understand your point with the unescorted TT in sz 91 though.

As for the guerilla fighters I think it is good improvement of the game. It makes it much harder for Japan and it seems like you agree that Axis are still overpowered in BM? If you disallow the guerilla fighters it is not even close to compensate with no IJ objective. Axis will be even more overpowered. I think China is more playable in BM than in OOB.

Then I agree with you about the lend lease and Soviet/Japan relationship. In OOB you can say it is a no-brainer to DOW on Japan with Soviet. In BM I feel it is almost the opposite. It is less need for Soviet help because of the Guerilla fighters though. But I would substitute the lend lease objectives (Persia and Amur) with an objective for holding Novosibirsk, like it is if you play Europe only. I would also keep the original Archangel objective of +5 and I would keep the original DOW rules for Soviet and Japan. The +3 for no allied units is good too. I guess this is the original +5 split up in two (+3 and +2 for Archangel). I also liked the Soviet money for Iraq and Africa. I guess I am the only one.

@simon33:

Little has changed my initial view of BM even after 114 games played (I just checked).

I love it.  :-)

@oysteilo:

I did not understand your point with the unescorted TT in sz 91 though.

I just meant that if UK1 a TT moves to SZ91, the SZ95 Italian sub can attack it. I think that’s a good thing. If you moved the sub from SZ95 to SZ97, it couldn’t reach.

@oysteilo:

As for the guerilla fighters I think it is good improvement of the game. It makes it much harder for Japan and it seems like you agree that Axis are still overpowered in BM? If you disallow the guerilla fighters it is not even close to compensate with no IJ objective. Axis will be even more overpowered. I think China is more playable in BM than in OOB.

Ok, but isn’t that just an argument about balance?

@oysteilo:

Then I agree with you about the lend lease and Soviet/Japan relationship. In OOB you can say it is a no-brainer to DOW on Japan with Soviet. In BM I feel it is almost the opposite. It is less need for Soviet help because of the Guerilla fighters though. But I would substitute the lend lease objectives (Persia and Amur) with an objective for holding Novosibirsk, like it is if you play Europe only. I would also keep the original Archangel objective of +5 and I would keep the original DOW rules for Soviet and Japan. The +3 for no allied units is good too. I guess this is the original +5 split up in two (+3 and +2 for Archangel). I also liked the Soviet money for Iraq and Africa. I guess I am the only one.

I’ve noticed a couple of players DOW on Japan USSR1 to allow the Soviets to enter China. But you need a real reason to do this - the idea of keeping peace is pretty appealing.

I like the change to the lend lease but it definitely reduces the incentive to block the lend lease as Germany with only 2IPC at stake.

A couple of minor points I’ve thought about and decided to ventilate them:

• What about having all nations starting with paratroop tech? Was there any nation which didn’t have paratroopers at some point in the war? Not sure who would benefit from that one.
• Would having fighters A1 D1 on a d4 in SBR be better in any way? I’m starting to think that the 33% chance of a hit is too high but 16.7% was too low. The problem with the A2 D2 on d6 fighters is that unless you can deter an intercept, you are unlikely to attack unless you have some gamey reason to do so.

BTW, I’m not sure if the last point is easy to achieve in Triple-A.

One other point I’ve wondered about. In lower tier G40 games, the bid is much lower than in the higher tier games where it is normally well above 30. Why is the bid for Balanced Mod normally about the same at the bottom and top tiers? Do top players feel that the allies have an advantage? Here’s some stats:
M level BM games Axis 44-5 Allies 45-14
E level BM games Axis 44-30 Allies 36-31

Looks like an axis advantage to me!

Other figures:
Level 1 BM games Axis 38-40 Allies 29-44
Level 2 BM games Axis 16-34 Allies 11-43
Level 3 BM games Axis 0-11 Allies 5-15

@Ichabod said in G40 Balance Mod - Feedback Thread:

Are Axis wins up to a ratio of 54:46 now?

That’s a 10% spread. Does this meant that people may stop giving a small bid to the Axis?

55:45 now.

@MrRoboto said in G40 Balance Mod - Feedback Thread:

The Guerilla fighters in China work similarly: While in 2nd edition, Axis players usually throw everything asap against India, in BM you’d be punished by spawning Chinese fighters, if you move too many of your troops to India.

I didn’t say this before but I disagree with this point. The guerilla fighters provide increased incentive to go after India ASAP - just avoid taking unnecessary Chinese territory and they don’t trouble you much if at all.

I’m also unsure about the reduction in the IPC value of the Burma Road from 6 to 3. China fights on for a while with only a few territories with the 6IPC NO.

I don’t know, I guess I’ve done a lot whining about BM and the guerilla fighters in particular. It doesn’t look like anything is changing anytime soon. I’m not the best player but not the worst either and why should the top players listen to me! I agree with many points and the point about Italy being more fun under BM is a great one. I just wish we didn’t have to make the sacrifices that I don’t like to get all that’s good in BM.

One thing I have only recently noticed about BM3’s IJ/Okinawa objective, it allows a J2 purchase of an IC/NB/AB without any money saved J1. If you also have bought 3TT 1 marine J1, it’s difficult to stop the J3 Calcutta crush. This also means taking out China can be done faster with the 3 extra units you can build on Asia from having the IC a turn earlier. Doesn’t sound like much but these things do have an effect.

So perhaps there is a problem with the IJ objective. I guess the other argument is that perhaps you should be able to stop the J3 Calcutta crush then there’s no point to the AB/NB/IC purchase. I don’t find that particularly convincing though.

sz 5 should be a convoy lane in BM because of the lend lease rules. The other lend lease lanes are, why not sz 5?

But you can’t play it IRL without doing something about the marines. Why’s it too hard to do something which changes the convoy zones?

I’ve posted something similar to oysteilo previously.

A downside to changing the convoy zones would be that it would increase the disincentive for USSR to declare war on Japan. I think that would be a problem. If Japan does a DOW and drops a sub in SZ5 while Archangel or Persia LL are nullified, USSR doesn’t gain anything from the Japanese DOW on it. The trouble with that argument is that both those scenarios are difficult to guarantee.

However, I think the community has spoken. There’s no push for change in BM unfortunately.

Maybe I should get some more players to play test the Canadian mod - but I think having to buy 7 inf UK1/Europe is a bit of a problem.

Marines are optional, and putting a piece of tape on inf to make marines is simple enough. Changing the set up/board is drastic in comparison.

Main reason for why it shouldn’t be added is that it doesn’t improve anything, and may actually put too much value on that part of the board.

Come off it, you can just remember where the extra convoy zone is, or write convoy zone on a piece of paper and put it there, or put some tape on the board and write on that.

Not aware that marines are optional! That’s like saying that air battles preceding strategic bombing raids are optional because you can house rule them out.

I have some sympathy for your argument that too much value may be put on that area, although if the Axis could have isolated Kamchatka, I think it’s completely fair enough that Moscow doesn’t get its income.

Let’s just agree to disagree.

I agree that a sz 5 convoy lane would decrease the incentive for USSR to DOW on Japan. However it is not important as in most cases USSR will loose control of Amur in the next couple of rounds anyway

It seems like a “no change” to the original set up is holy and there are many good arguments for that, I agree. But then way handle it in a way that is illogical? (At least to me.)

There are ways arounds this, why not just say that the USSR gets it lend lease objective as long as they control Archangel, Persia and Amur? (without the sub limitation for sz 125 and sz 80)

After all the Allies need more money in BM3 (and +2 for USSR seems fair) and in this way, all the lend lease lanes are handled more similar. Maybe it would even be an argument for G1 or G2 DOW on USSR, isn’t that a good thing?

So why is this bad:

USSR should collect +2 for each of archangel, persia and Amur (allied controlled). No war ship limitation on sz 125, 80 and 5. Also no doubling of lend lease if Japan dow on USSR.

I think it does the following

1. Gives in most cases +2 to USSR. I think many people start to see that allies need more money
2. The lend lease are handled the same way, less confusing
3. It will encourage G1 and G2 dow.
4. USSR will try to fight archangel. Now it wont bother in most cases, because of sz 125

The interaction between land territory and sea zone for the Lend Lease is what makes it interesting and dynamic in my opinion.

@regularkid But only if the USSR declares war on Japan, or you’re prepared to risk incurring the USSR lend lease bonus.

here is another improvement to make BM more playable

The allies objective for

UK Europe if Allies control two of: Sicily, Sardinia, Greece, Southern Italy, and Allies have at least one land unit in any of these territories

should include 4 of: gib, southern france, greece and egypt

This is to encourge attack on the neutrals by the allies. I am sure however, the team has a good expelenation why this is not a good idea (would love to hear it though)

@oysteilo Don’t you know that you can’t change the sacred texts!

@simon33 said in G40 Balance Mod - Feedback Thread:

@oysteilo Don’t you know that you can’t change the sacred texts!

I dont understand. Did i do something wrong?