AA50 reprint?

@taamvan said in Anniversary 2017 Reprint - rule changes?:

The reprint could have re-organized the setup charts, which are not very rationally laid out and appear to just wander around the area and put the units in a different order in each list. In the better organized versions, the lists are alphabetical, or some snake around the land then the sea–but it would be more rational to have some uniformity to that, rather than just a messy list without any rhyme or reason.

As to the tournament rules, the game is VASTLY different in that setting than OOB. The NOs add a ton of money, the tech adds a lot of randomness. I think the tech favors the allies because they are well-positioned to invest in that starting on turn 1, and would probably make better use of most of the random outcomes than the Axis.

I find both games to be quite imbalanced, towards the Allies. There are no other maps where fighters can fly in one move from US to London, then from London unblockably to Moscow (over the top, 4 moves). There are more layers of buffer territories for moscow–almost as many territories in the “maze” as global. In the 42 scenario, the Germans just punch themselves out really quickly trying to fight in the russian maze. And the 5$ tanks are a big boon for Russia because it can fight Germany on even terms. You might argue that goes both ways, but in most of our 41 and 42 games, Germany has to buy DEFENSIVELY, all game–not just $5 tanks. The Allies have easy choices of what to buy–tanks for russia and fighters for the other two powers, until Russia is absolutely untakable. India without a factory is a lost cause. Both setups are an easy 5-turn KGF, OOB.

In the tourney, its a 6 turn game with less than a 6 bid for either side. The Allies won 1-2 more games than the Axis did, in 2018, under these parameters. I think the only way this is possible is for the Axis to grab Sydney, India, Karelia, and then hold those, plus the original Axis cities. They can lose 1 and still win a tie, I believe.

Not having watched the invitational games in detail, that’s the only conclusion I can draw from the available data.

This is an odd reply to a question about the rules being reprinted…

More than 10, I have about 7 games going on at the moment.

Interested ones please visit the Team Games forum, please  :-D

That file … yummy …  8-)

I was just looking over the new AA50 board image and it occured to me how arbitrary the geography is in this game.

Why is the Belgian Congo in this game at all?

Spain is off limits, even though certainly in the realm of possible history/gameplay Spain could have been a major player or battlefield of WWII; a lot more of a possibility than French Eq Africa or the Belgian Congo which are indeed in play.

Certainly Turkey could have been a significant factor in this alternative universe of a game we call Axis & Allies than ever could have would been French West Africa or Rhodesia.

Yet there they are: Belgian Congo, French West Africa, Rhodesia all open for invasion. Spain and Turkey and others are closed off.

This is so ahistorical, we disagree about countless other nuances and rules about being historically deficient. Yet without Spain and Turkey, we are are not even accorded the ability to play out WWII in ways which could have indeed happened a lot more probable than the invasion of the Belgian Congo and Rhodesia by the Nazi war machine.

Why of all the possibilities of the Axis and Allies timeline/universe are these 2 of the more likely ones that could have happend are indeed shut down?

@Imperious:

Larry has stated many times that the units don’t generally fit standard military models for classic formations (divisions, corps, army) and in some cases these are corps and others they are armies. They are not the same in every case, allowing for the corps in Africa to be symbolized as perhaps 2-3 units, while in the Soviet union one infantry may represent an army ( 3-5 corps).

Yes, IL thanks,
I have been reading those old posts.  I note he (Larry Harris) stated the Naval units abstraction was a greater dilution of unit strength, or a direct correlation to vessel numbers from standard representation of Classic fleet/squadron/Battle groups.  I am thinking more in chess terms, where tempo or position is sometimes of more value then individual pieces.

@Bardoly:

@Rakeman:

@Bardoly:

Thank you Krieghund for your answer.  The Fact Sheet was very unclear about this.
With this, I have to agree with Funcioneta that this can be quite detrimental to the smaller ICs, but at least Germany can never be SBR’d in 1 round for all of its $ now.

Couldn’t in LHTR either.

In LHTR, in order to do 20 damage to Germany, USA and UK would each have to dedicated 10 IPC worth of bomber damage.  In this game, USA or UK needs to dedicate that much.  Big difference.  USA sitting back shipping bombers off while UK invades Northwestern Europe should be a viable strategy.  We’ll see.

Yes, but LHTR was the fix which castrated SBR/Rockets.  This rule change seems to have struck a balance between having a strictly SBR capaign to eliminate all of a country’s cash (usually Germany, but occasionally Rusia, and rarely England) which is a little boring, and the opposing view in which just about the only time someone SBRs is when their bomber has nothing else to do.  I mean how often does Germany need to produce 10 units in 1 turn?  Almost never, unless it it the end of the game for them.  Usually 6-7 is okay, which means that if they repair 15 (less than 6-7 because the cost of repairs means that you can’t build as much) so as to produce 5 units, then the next turns SBR can’t do more than 15 points of damage.

Yes, but LHTR was the fix which castrated SBR/Rockets.  This rule change seems to have struck a balance between having a strictly SBR capaign to eliminate all of a country’s cash (usually Germany, but occasionally Rusia, and rarely England) which is a little boring, and the opposing view in which just about the only time someone SBRs is when their bomber has nothing else to do.  I mean how often does Germany need to produce 10 units in 1 turn?  Almost never, unless it it the end of the game for them.  Usually 6-7 is okay, which means that if they repair 15 (less than 6-7 because the cost of repairs means that you can’t build as much) so as to produce 5 units, then the next turns SBR can’t do more than 15 points of damage.  This rule change seems to be more fair, and especially if Germany gets Radar and/or the IC repair tech, then that really limits the effectiveness of the SBRs.

I disagree, nerfing a broken mechanic is a good thing IMO.  I don’t know about other players, but if I was Germany and only producing 5-7 units a turn, I’d be wondering how long it would take for Russia to run me down.  It is nice that damage doesn’t HAVE to be repaired completely, but most likely, it often will be, or at least enough to hurt badly.

@timerover51:

@Krieghund:

Chinese units can’t leave China.  However, they may enter Hong Kong.

Since in many respects, China is played closer to the historic reality, I am not sure that I would agree with that.  In 1944, Chinese units were moved into Northern Burma as part of the Allied offensive to clear Northern Burma and get the Ledo Road into operation.  You also had Merrill’s Marauders in operation there as well.  Once the Northern Burma area had been cleared, the British-Indian forces proceeded to clear the rest of Burma, using a fair number of tanks units in the process once they got clear of the mountainous terrain.  This is one area where it would be nice to have some terrain effects, as the Assam-Northern Burma area and the Assam-Burma border is some of the worst terrain in the world to fight in or try to conduct military operations through.  It is not totally impassable, like the Sahara Desert or Himalayan Mountains, just very close to it.

Please recall that the game rules are probably to facilitate game play moreso than to ignore the historical reality of what happened.  Maybe you can incorporate a house rule that says something like ‘after round 10, the chinese units are no longer restricted to China’

Substitute whatever round you want, I just chose 10 for an example.