Version 4?

Thanks @Trig and @Mark-the-Shark. I guess I hadn’t really considered that before! Has there been official rulings on that? I have somehow missed those discussions here. I can’t imagine they meant to not have planes be able to attack. I’m guessing that was an oversight when creating that rule allowing ships to move 5 spaces. That’s what I had always assumed at least. We’ve never even considered not allowing planes to go in that circumstance. I just let them ride with the carrier the 5 spaces, but they can’t attack outside that last landing spot.

My thoughts are this: If you can get the space, make more territories. If possible, make the sizing as realistic as possible. For instance, the Belgian Congo is the same size as much of western europe, which is over 20 territories. That is not necessary, but 2 or 3 might be nice. And there is space, considering that almost nothing happens there and the armies involved are quite small. similarly, you could cut down Quebec of Northwest territories, or add in more territories in Siberia (or especially Western Kazakhstan. That thing is bloated.) Tsinghai or Tibet could be two territories. Even Iran could get another territory, Southeastern Iran or something. I could list a bunch of places but you get the idea.

On Yugo, I like the idea from the expansion, but I think a better solution would be to make 2 or 3 territories in the base game. A northern Croatia and a southern Serbia, possibly adding Northern Macedonia if needed. (Slovenia is just too small.) The expansion also only takes effect after the conquest, and the point is to make it a little longer to conquer Yugoslavia and show their historical problem of a decent army but a huge border. (Also, Greece is about 1.5 times smaller than Yugo, but gets 4 territories. Really?)

I definitely get your overall argument for such large swaths only being one territory when much smaller areas are more. I guess to that I’d just say there’s a point in game/map designing where “less is more”. The Congo for example, while I totally agree with you given it’s size, is really a backwater in the game that is probably hardly ever touched, right? There were probably decisions made on that based on playability and overall usefulness I’d think. I know the overarching complaints on the size of Africa in this and basically all A&A games have always been there. But I think it ultimately comes down to playtesting and realizing nothing usually happens down that way outside of Northern African more or less.

I think a similar argument could be made for Yugoslavia. The entire invasion of Yugoslavia, start to surrender, was 11 days. That’s hardly even a fraction of a game turn of 6 months! It would seem weird to me to have that occupation potentially take 3 game turns to playout. I get your point on comparing to Greece, but the Greeks also held out for 6 months, and even then were only defeated after the Germans helped out.

I’m not sold on Iran though. Again, I get your points, but for a Neutral nation that historically was a backwater, I think 3 territories is fine. But obviously we all have our different thoughts. Yugoslavia, when put in the context of Greece, is pretty glaring too. I just always assume the expansion layover. Maybe you could just start your games with the overlay on your board as a bit of a house rule?

I do, however, completely agree with you on China. I think Tibet, Sinkiang, and Xibei San Ma, at the very least could each be split in two. Maybe even into three for Xibei San Ma. Yunnan could maybe have a North and South also. I think the internalized struggle of the Chinese Civil War alone could warrant this. But I agree too that it could help bog down the Japanese. Our games don’t usually see the Japanese move far inland after taking the money territories, so maybe we don’t see it as much. From a gaming sense though, I could see how the free recruitment rolls for the CCP, for example, could get too out of control if you give them 6-8 more territories to conceivably take over and utilize. Again, I could see how that could start to unbalance game play a bit.

Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound combative by mentioning everything piece by piece. I think you just hit the nail on the head on a lot of intriguing areas and the pros/cons can probably build up forever! I just think sometimes there was probably gaming considerations put into some of these thoughts as opposed to glaring, intentional omissions from overall landmass!

@mark-the-shark, @David-06, in a perfect world for us as consumers, I would love that. I don’t want to sound disparaging at all, but part of me says it would be good to reward your long-time/loyal customers/players who have endured 3-4 (and maybe more in the future) map iterations with that option.

But the practical part of me gets that that would never happen. I’m sure profit margins are already thin, and it is a business after all, so having them discount maps in exchange for existing old ones probably doesn’t work well. Not to mention they’d have who knows how many V2 maps just lying around collecting dust now.

Frankly, I’m going to see if I can sell my V2 map for something. I won’t need to have multiple lying around. My dad (who I play this game with mostly along with my brother) is convinced we should keep it as a practice map for my now-11-month-old-son haha. To me that’s what the older A&A versions are for, but he does bring up the good point that this doesn’t take up a ton of space when all rolled up.

As was mentioned earlier, ~$150 more for a new map isn’t so outrageous to deal with, especially when you consider all the other money you’re bound to have dropped to complete the game. While true not everyone has the same (or hardly any) disposable income, I think it’s safe to say those that don’t have much aren’t exactly shelling out for this game and all its components in the first place.