1940 Pacific - Japan territories

@all-encompassing-goose

Okay then. I would rather the Axis win, so…

@the-captain

Due to the fact that whilst most of your rules are historically accurate, their execution I have some problems with. To fix that, I wrote an article on changes to The Captain’s rules:

https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/37504/let-s-make-the-axis-and-allies-global-1940-expansion-rules-even-more-accurate?_=1636385389023

@FMErwinRommel I think that would be a good rule too. It makes more sense if you want to be as accurate as possible.

I am not a big fan of house rules, since this is supposed to be a balanced game that is played in tournaments, and only loosely based on a WWII theme. But if you insist to add all this extra spice, I suggest to keep it inside the A&A box of known game mechanics. Let China be the base of what happens when your capital is lost. And skip the pro neutral thing, its either true neutral or not neutral.

The Rule.
1. When your capital is lost, all territories under your control become true neutral. You are no longer an active player. You can no longer move any of your former units, they are stuck where you left them last turn. Your ships will not make a seazone hostile. Former allied units on your territory must either combat move out next turn or trigger combat. If you have units in former allied territories, they are removed from the map.

A lot of evidence from the real WWII support this rule suggestion. When the French capital was captured, all other French territories became neutral. Not pro but true. US and UK had to combat move into neutral French Morocco, Germany had to combat move into Vichy, and Japan had to combat move into FIC. Also, all French units that were in UK when Paris fell, were demobilized and sent home to occupied France. When the Italian capitol was taken, the former allied German units in Northern Italy would face combat against the by now neutral Italian units in that territory. When the Finnish capital was taken by Russia in sept 1944, Finland was declared neutral and the former allied German units in Northern Finland faced combat against the Finnish forces there. Same with Romania in 1944. And so on. When Japan captured the Chinese capital Bejing in 1937, China become neutral. When this game start, China is a neutral with an occupied capitol.

2. When a neutral territory is attacked, it is no longer neutral but allied to the enemy of the attacker. And remember, with this rule there are no pro neutral, only true neutral, so a combat move into a neutral territory will never trigger a world wide uprising by other neutrals, like in the OOB rules.

Evidence to support this.
Neutral Poland is attacked by Germany and Russia and get allied to UK and France. No other true neutral join the war.
Viborg territory of neutral Finland is attacked by Russia, and can join the Western Allies, but the road to Finland is blocked by other neutrals that dont want to join the war.
Neutral countries Norway, Denmark, Belgium and the Netherlands is attacked by Germany, and taken in one round since they are one territory each. No other true neutrals join the war.

3. When a neutral nation is at war, and it has no capitol, either because the capitol was taken in a previous turn, or it is a minor one territory nation, or Mongolia, then it can purchase infantry only, limited by its income, and place this infantry in any territory in order to the Chinese special OOB rule

Here is a rule we have been trying…

Engaged Land Combat:

The attacker has 3 options after each round of combat;

continue the battle, 2) retreat, 3) partial retreat, or 4 ) stand.  Options 3 and 4 end further combat by the attacker, and allow the defender a one-time only play of any of these 3 actions; retreat, stand, and/or counterattack.  Defending unit retreats follow the same retreat rules as attacker except the destination territory is any that is under friendly control.  Counterattacking units get one round free combat using attack dice.  Defending air units must retreat and cannot counterattack.  After the counterattack, the counterattacking units are considered engaged and cannot be moved on their turn and must become the attacker.  Attacking or defending units that stand and are still in a territory that contains unfriendly units on their turn, must either attack and/or move to territories that were in friendly control or had friendly units at the start of the their turn.

@knp, 3D6 heavies have never been popular. Back in the early nineties we played off and on with them. It’s one of those things where if you have them, you love them if you don’t, well life is hell. I like the 2D6 and seems like most players can live with them especially on the Global scale and sheer number of units on the board.

Personally I liked it better when SBR came out of the player’s bank. People really hate that one and democracy usually rules most of the time when you have a regular group. I understand why people hated that one, however I liked it. It’s one of the things I like about disrupting convoys.

Honestly I love HBG, you can now add a lot of stuff to the game especially when it comes to tech. SPA and TDs are a must.

Anyway your thoughts on mech blitzing and both dice counting for heavies was spot on.

@CWO:

@ossel:

If using my “Operation Valkyrie” scenario (http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=30059.0), all SS units are arrested if a zone chooses to comply with the order, and are removed from play until the scenario is resolved. If a zone stays loyal or converts back to loyal, the units are moved back onto the map.

What I’m wondering about this rule is: exactly who would arrest the Waffen SS?  The police?  By 1944, the police forces in Germany were pretty much under the control of the Nazi Party, if not actual branches of the SS and the Gestapo.  The Wehrmacht?  Since the Waffen SS are elite military units, I’m not sure why they’d quietly lay down their arms and agree to be arrested by the regular army without a fight, especially following the assassination of Hitler by high-ranking army officers.

This is why in my Operation Valkyrie rule, there is a caveat that each zone can decide whether to comply with the order. In the actual event, the Wehrmacht did indeed manage to neutralize the SS in some areas. From wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1944_Adolf_Hitler_assassination_attempt):

Meanwhile, Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel, military governor of occupied France, managed to disarm the SD and SS, and captured most of their leadership. …. City Commandant, and conspirator, General Paul von Hase ordered the Wachbataillon Großdeutschland, under the command of Major Otto Ernst Remer, to secure the Wilhelmstraße and arrest Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. In Vienna, Prague, and many other places troops occupied Nazi Party offices and arrested Gauleiters and SS officers.

If you read my rule, it states that if the assassination is successful, the remaining SS units will absolutely fight those allied with the responsible army officers.

IMO, keeping the Japanese focus on the American threat and the Chinese irritant is the preferred way to keep Japan out of Moscow… pretty much the way if happened historically.

If we find those two factors consistently being so minor that strategic adventurism prevails for the Japanese player then I’d lean towards beefing up his Pacific opponents versus “treaty handcuffs”.