Russia declare war on allies house rule. HBG 1936

Hey!

When I first bought GW36 years ago, my group misread the rules and played the first dozen games with “full access to allies bases”. Since then we’ve played both “full access” house rule and vanilla rules, without significant balance issues.

With full access, USA shuttles troops to UK quicker. But the USA lands somewhere in Europe anyway and therefore full access doesn’t affect anything.

Eventually we settled on “Full Access to Allies Bases” as a house rule, and we like it.
It’s more historical, for the navy it doesn’t take the American fleet a full year to get back to America. For air forces…we figure that even if historically the Commonwealth and the USA didn’t share air bases; we assume Normandy had more then 1 air base, so in game everyone benefits.

Do the same thing and add me on Steam and we can work out details!

1936 senario we are using the add 1$ to every landzone and double for original German house rule and Russia is free of Berlin fall declaration of war restrictions. This one is so bizarre we are continuing even though its 1946 by the calendar next turn.

Allies went for Japan first. Russia joined in and attacked allies for Chinese ownership. Us beat Japan down as a can opener. Then had Australia take all of Japan’s money and land (just because I wanted Australia to dominate the Pacific when America went with everything Atlantic). As a result Germany went sealion but was kicked out by uk when Russia attacked Germany. Italy has all of Africa and most of south America. While Germany is fighting with Russia. Its now a race, For the Atlantic and south Africa by US and Australia is taking China and Eastern Russia while eating up pieces of Africa, to liberate the UK its south African factory back. Both are out of position to attack Germany. Axis is using Italy as a screen similar to how the UK and French start the game, on the defensive to buy time, for Germany to focus on its only front Russia. French and Netherlands are eliminated they lost all possible capital locations on the same turn. When london was lost and Italy owned all Africa. Vichy was attacked to prevent funding the German war machine and became German aligned. Only allies way to attack Germany.

Honestly the income change, only changed our purchase power per turn but was virtually identical in ballance of income across all players.

@Rank:

Jinx

As for the highlight every time we get a new guy the charts are so busy this may help simplify the starting learning curve. If you can get a new to game tester for your charts it may assist on readability. I know that the standard charts were a bit of info overload. Suggestion to have starter units better separated from upgrades and researched units. Takes a bit of explaining that every time we get a new guy in. Example germany jumps strait into super heavy tanks skips the 6 regular heavies required first. And all new guys think they can build heavy tanks off the hop without research due to chart placing. A simple coloured highlight signifying reasearch required would eliminate this. Or maybe 3 charts first basic units, second tech and upgrades, final all units together. And get them more into the game faster rather than getting corrected constantly, increases the fun factor for the new guys.

Ah, that explains a few of your chart lines. Didn’t realize you had developed your own air combat rules. They sound interesting. Maybe a bit much for our group now though, lots of newer players. Still not fully grasping current rules without the odd reading.

What program are you using? this has me interested in tidying up our charts.

As for the switch from historical its not often I agree but a real Stalin in this position would. In current game as soviets I own South America and Middle East. And am neutral across the board nonagression pacts with axis.  Im ready to attack germany, italy,usa at panama canal,  india (fec), africa (uk), and japan at Tokyo, all at once. Germany has london, and japan focused on only us and owns San Francisco. But im not allowed to unless us attacks me first or berlin falls. All combatants are severely unit depleted due to fighting while im ready to go. Russia has largest navy on both oceans lol. In no way would Stalin really hesitate, Russia is a global power able to expand all over the globe.  But the rules have the Russians handcuffed. So im now forced to take berlin first and allow the rest to rebuild before i can take it all. Meaning allies must win first, so I can never actually attack allies until the game has already ended realistically.

John Brown

Welcome and thank you also. Ill look into those sets. Was more thinking if 1939 setup comes out. Chart changes adding their newer units would also be a help,  if all in one chart. Rather than add-on expansion charts or I’ll need a massive amount of paper on the walls. Don’t want it to become a legal style rules with endless exceptions and loopholes lol. Or nobody will want to play it.

Hehe, sometime our games turn out to be a lot like that. But we have a core of experienced players and a kind of forgiving system for mistakes in purchases and those that neglected to read the rules.
I’ve played full games of G36 over twenty times now, and I still keep the manual by my elbow and a bunch of online FAQ pages printed out. I’m generally the referee for our game and there is so much to remember and so much grey area that we find we often need to patch it up with house rules.

We have tried it out in past games. For instance, we allowed the Soviets to DOW against the Allies. The Soviets built a massive fleet presence. Though they did DOW against the Allies, the Soviets natural enemy is the Axis.
The fact that the Soviets could now DOW against Allies did not change the game in the slightest. The Soviets VP points are mostly gained from taking neutral nations which they gathered from the middle east. But they had no reason to come into conflict with any western powers except for India (which was taken by Japan) and Egypt, which was far off and did not matter. The Soviets played a great game of pacifism and won the game. Sure at one point they declared war against the Allies, but only because it made the Axis hope that they would come to blows and eased pressure from the German/Soviet border. Only one French Militia was lost in Syria to the Soviets.

My conclusion is that there is no reason for that rule, except for historical railroading (not meant in a derogatory way).
Theoretically the Soviets could build a large fleet (which they did) and marines (which they did) and invade…England (which they did: northern Ireland) or America. But they don’t need too, all the IPP they need can be found on the continent, and in our game, after the soviet fleet invaded Ireland. They trundled back home to the Baltic. It was a pretense to gain them time on the German/Soviet border to strengthen and achieve parity on the border. Earlier, Germany could have taken them, especially with their expenses into a large fleet. But by the time the Axis saw that the Soviets in England in any meaningful way was a pipe dream; it was too late.

No need for a Soviet limiting of DOW, at least in my opinion.

So in our current game. The French (according to designer rules of French DOW to Neutral nations) DOW against Republican Spain while they where in Civil War. They actually went so far as to lose Bordeaux and Marseilles to Republican Spain in Early 1938.
We thought about the rules a little, and said that for this game, we would let the Soviets be capable of DOW against allies, and begin their rearmament rolls because of being at war with a “Major” power. France will be collecting its Wartime Income.

It worked to some degree in Axis favor in the short term, because the French and Soviet fleets mutually decimated themselves, and the Spanish/French forces have cleared western Europe of troops. Perhaps the Soviets will continue to sink Lend Lease to Spain. Perhaps, and if nothing else, France has lost half of its land army because of its need to watch Germany.

In the long term it will bite Axis in the butt. But…perhaps a Chamberlain-Ribbentrop pact can be signed. Perhaps.

Anyways, its exciting. :-)

coach there are a bunch of questions I still need you to answer there, on e you are finished your Christmas turkey and holidays :).

You seemed to have missed some around the pag 2 to 4 Mark, and the nixes I haven’t listed as resolved still have pending questions!

Thanks for when you have the time.  I am concluding our game jan 2 and hope to have info!

thanks for the link to the rules, they will come in handy this weekend  :-P

Read the rules. Generally happy with what I see. Greatly simplified in the right places (e.g. no more US dud torpedoes) while some optional complexity is added in others (terrain rules).

One thing I really do miss, however, is the inability to retreat for the defender?? Was that decision made simply for reasons of added playing time?

Yep, you should be able to knock out both their big fleets (plus the Canadian ships) G1 setting them back for quite awhile. With a couple subs here and there and the Luftwaffe you can keep them from building ships around England for a couple turns and they are forced to build a starter fleet off Canada. Even building off Canada isn’t to easy early on if the wolf pack is in tact because of the 1:1 detection ratio, and there is no airbase to scramble in Canada when they see your subs. It forces them to spend $ on ships, and less on resources elsewhere.