AARHE: Phase 3: Revised NA's

taamvan,

Excellent analysis on the differences between G40/G42 vs Oztea’s 41. I think in some ways, the 41 setup has “almost” fully realized the potential of the Global board. I like how it initially looks. It makes think of coming into a high level situation brief on in-progress ops. I imagine a table top board would seem very busy at first (I’ve only seen it on triplea, even there it’s cluttered). But like all axis and allies board games, they clean up real quick along the frontiers. Â

I did notice how this setup forces the Axis to stick to realistic solid objectives; but dangles out some “mirages” like Cairo.  I’m of the opposite opinion. I think I’d even evacuate the german tank and 1 infantry on turn 1. Rarely I see people really invest in Cairo and going for the middle east, but on the forums some people talk about it. I’m never good at that.

I don’t know which way the game leans axis or allies. I’ll have to play it out a few more times before I’ll have a definite opinion. Do you remember which sides won at your club? Regardless, it seems very balanced and the US could get real aggressive anywhere it wants immediately. The US does start out with an Army, but Germany has a sizeable European garrison for defense and a nice navy in the Baltic for reinforcing Finland. Russia starts with a destroyer/sub combo in the artic, so they have a chance to kill a german sub in sz 125 and can therefore almost be guaranteed to collect their 5 IPC bonus for a few turns. Also, over time, the allies gain a few more IPCs as the French territories get occupied by allies. Russia might be tempted to stack it’s much larger mobile army at Amur on round 2, but I think it better to move it to Europe.

Update -

Combined UK Commonwealth Nation

Works great! Played it out and it seems to be balanced and it allows for greater viability as the Allies.

US Rules -

The 2 IPC’s taken off from buying a bomber in Western US works fine and allows for some historical accuracy

The Free French

These units now move with the Commonwealth and attack and defend along with them.

Vichy France

Now moves with Italy instead of its own turn

NO’s

The NO’s are now an optional addition and you can pick and choose which ones are played in your game

Corrections

SS/Red Guard/Rangers/Commandos should move 1 instead of 2.

Canadian Sub starts in SZ 120 not 101

The Spain rule hasn’t come into play, as the German player has not been able to roll a 6, more on that later
R&D works like a dream and creates new tactics for the powers

Lend Lease

Gives the Russian and UK Player a better chance against German and Italian Aggression - Works well

@Vance:

Thanks YG.  If you don’t mind I think I will post “espionage” as a separate house rule that could work with your tech system, or with just about any tech system for that matter.  You never know someone might use it or get an idea from it.  I love the idea of STEALING the other guy’s tech LOL

Hey man, feel free to use any of my ideas for separate rules, I just ripped off some good ones from Axisplaya and I didn’t feel bad about it one bit 😏 As for espionage, I thought stealing a tech from an enemy might be to powerful for the 10 spot, so I modified it to say develop any tech that an enemy power possesses.

Well, we finished Round 7 last night and here is the situation:
England is pretty much stuck on their island, although the Canadian factory is helping put destroyers in the water. UK’s factory and both bases are maxed out in damage.  Germany has surrounded Moscow and Stalingrad, both of which factories are also maxed out on damage.  Gotta love those SBRs.  Japan has taken all of China, Mongolia and eastern Russia.  Still no action in the Pacific or SE Asia as the Axis have been very careful not to provoke America, which is still neutral until next round.  America has built up a monsterous fleet, most of which is by the Philippines.  With that and the few ships out by Hawaii, I think they out number the Japanese fleet.  The Japs have gotten a few more warships, but had to mix that with land units to hit China, Russia and get ready to go after Allied positions.

America also has a modest fleet in the Atlantic but is stuck on the East Coast since London hasn’t fallen and nobody has attacked them.  Italy has swarmed all over Africa and the Middle East and is currently on Calcutta’s doorstep in West India.  Only British assets left are on the UK itself, Canada and SE Asia.  I’m afraid that by the time the USA can do anything, the Axis will have all the Victory Cities in Europe, Asia and Africa.

Unfortunately, my weekend is wrapping up.  Got to go back to work tonight.  We might squeeze in a round or two before going to work sometime this week, but more than likely this game will have to wait until next weekend, which for me is Mon/Tue nights.  I will post how it ends, but at this point I’m almost sure it will be an Axis victory, unless USA is able to pull a pretty big rabbit out of their hat.  I’m pretty sure Moscow will fall next round and after that will come Sealion.  Don’t think that UK will be able to do much to stop it either.

Thanks for your imput.

I included the critical strike on grounded aircraft to give the attacker reason to get involved in a dogfight seeing how deffending aircraft hit @4. The critical strike is @1 and for the first round only, I believe attackers shouldn’t get a disadvantage for being agressive. Without the critical strike, players ask themselves why should I attack with my valuable aircraft and get all the odds against me.

I don’t enjoy changing the attack and defend capabilities of any units, I believe the game is difficult enough without trying to calculate all the different changes for any given senerio. for example: Fighters attack @3 except when escorting and except in dogfights and except on carriers and except….ect.ect.ect. (you get my point).

I am still tweeking the merchant convoy rules when transporting supply chips however, this is a major aspect of my rules and it must be handled with care to balance the game. On one hand, the allies have enough to do, what with keeping up with with the axis agression during the first 4 rounds and on the other hand it is too much of a factor to just ignore the importance of the merchant shipping lanes. For example: if I were the supreame commander for Germany during the war, I would never have shiffted towards bombing London or even think about opperation Sea Lion when they were so close to starving the little Island. Non the less the rule is still a work in progress… any Ideas?

I might think about a rule for the Gibralter however, I don’t want to limit the Italian fleet entering the Black Sea. That would only limit them to Africa and I want the Italian player to have options.

As for my Tech charts, I believe that if your going to have the kind of game ender like a nuke just for historic reasons, I would prefer to limit it to one Nation (U.S) and still leave it to chance of getting that advantage. As for Nations limited to thier own charts, I have found in my games that players really think hard about what Nation they wish to play at the begining of the game because they want to play with some charts but don’t want to be up against others. One aspect that I have found very important is giving each nation one free chance per turn to get a tech, this way techs are always a factor in the game while still rewarding others for buying extra chances.

I have a book where I have cut and pasted the Axis and Allies rules into a word document and have added my own rules to make everything more compleate to the newbies I play with. It took alot of work and I think it looks nice, I could e-mail you a copy if you like and that way you can edit it to your own house rules, the good thing is that most of the work is done for you. Just send me a personal message with your email address… I think you would like it.

oh no worries
we can still have your goals instead of territories
just copy over the goals you had initially and we go from there

Ok that explaination makes more sence. Can you reword it in such a manner that it captures both the examples and the language of your description?

I love copy and paste  :-).

I am a big fan of Diplomacy, but can’t imagine adding simultanious movement to A&A. First, as Imperious Leader noted, there would be a large amount of moves to write. In Diplomacy a leader has to write at most 17 orders, but will generally need to issue 5-10. In Axis and Allies both the number and the complexity of the orders increases.
Second, writing down orders will likely serve as somewhat of a deterent to inivation. For example; as Germany I draft a set of orders to strike the U.S.S.R at Causcus and Karelia. If I suddenly see a stronger strategy that involves me completely changing my orders for both countries, the time I already put in that will be lost and the time I will need to write up new orders may deter me from attempting my new course of action. Having to continuously edit a page or two of orders will be tedious.
Third, in real life military leaders would re-act to enemy movements. If as Japan I ordered my units in Kwangtung, Manchuria, and French Indochina to attack China, but was attacked by units in Soviet Far East and India my attack would not proceed. Not only that, the Manchurian units would likely be diverted to re-inforce and/or counter-attack.