Factories in World War One?

I think it’s part of the aesthetic of the game that troops are supposed to move slowly from their capitals, so that it takes a long time for reinforcements to reach the front lines. It’s meant to evoke the theme of trench warfare. The only exception is the extra British factory in India, which is supposed to thematically represent all of the ships, etc. bringing soldiers from India, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, and so on.

With no bid, the Central Powers have a very hard time of it, because the Indian factory turns out to be too powerful – the British can cripple the Ottomans in about the time it takes for the Central Powers to reach Paris or Rome or Moscow, and then the Americans can reinforce and stabilize Paris or Rome before the Central Powers can take their second capital. Eventually the British press on past Istanbul, or else shift gears and build a fleet in the English Channel to start shuttling over their starting troops, and then it’s all over for the Central Powers.

The Munich factory seriously speeds up the attack on Paris or Rome, and also makes that attack more effective, since there are fewer French troops on the board to defend against the attack, so the Germans take fewer casualties and reach Paris faster. It makes a big change in the game.

Could you put factories in Budapest and Canada, too? Sure. The Budapest factory will make Austria that much closer to Russia, and could also give Austria a chance to reinforce Istanbul if Britain is going hard against the Turks. The Canada factory will probably not see much use, other than maybe building a transport to help ferry over the starting Canadian troops, and building the occasional sub to scare away the German navy. The Canada factory could make it that much harder for Germans to gain naval superiority in the Atlantic.

Just be aware of what options you’re giving to which players, and how that will change the game for everyone else. If you just plop down factories wherever they seem realistic, you may not like the results!

But the principle reason for trench warfare was precisely that each side could reinforce their front lines so quickly using rail transport that breakthroughs were impossible. Prussia used this to win the Franco-Prussian conflict; by 1914 the French had wised up and were ready to do the same thing = stalemate.

Units should be able to non-combat move as far as they want along any chain of friendly land territories. Both sides should be constantly railing reinforcements into contested territories ready for the next big push. The only restriction needs to be on aircraft which should have to stop when flying into
enemy/contested tt.

So…

Consider each capital to be a rail hub. After a player’s combat phase, any land and air units in his capital that started there can use rail movement to travel an unlimited distance along friendly land tts, stopping when they enter a contested tt. They may not initiate further combat, but may be used to activate minor neutrals.

This should balance the game back towards the CPs against the fast naval movement that usually favours the Allies after the first few turns.

An alternative has rail hubs roughly equidistant across the map at:

All capitals
Scotland
Marseille
Lorraine
Portugal
Munich
Holland
Venice
Poland
Sevastopol
Serbia
Trans-Jordan
India

In this case a railing unit can only move from hub to hub, creating obvious focal points for the game which can also be used for Victory condition purposes.

Historically, I think you’re right. Thematically, having to move units one territory at a time helps evoke the frustrations of fighting over the same mile of turf for a year at a time. OoB A&A Waw1 game actually does have much more stalemate in it than the world war 2 maps.

I like the way you’re thinking about the rail hubs, but the central powers have the central lines of communication. Except for Marseilles-Milan and Sevastopol-Persia-India, I don’t think the allies have any international rail links at all. The game would probably focus on central powers attempts to cut one or both of those connections with a multinational force, so that the central powers could pick off a now isolated France, Italy, or Russia. I’m not convinced that it’s realistic for large numbers of Turkish troops to be sent by rail to Marseilles, or for large numbers of German troops to fight Italian defenders in Sevastopol.

If the CPs control Marseille and Constantinople and a chain of tts connecting them why not move Turks to Marseille? The Allies can make the same move in reverse by sea. It’s up to the Allies to block such moves. Remember you can never rail units into combat, only to reinforce contested tts.

The proposal is to counter the Allies domination of the seas, which they usually get after 2 or 3 turns, and means they can move troops virtually immediately to any front.

Yes, the actual combat in WWI was slow and static, but as I mentioned this came about precisely because they could move troops so quickly from the depots to the front lines by rail.

Requiring German infantry to “march” one tt at a time from Berlin to the front lines fatally cripples the CPs in OOB rules. The Allies can easily see where they’re heading and send troops there by sea. In my view rail movement is essential to balance this game.