AARHE: Rule files

all you need to type is:

Economic Isolation of small islands:
If you occupy the sea zone that surrounds the small island groups, the controlling player of that island group does not receive income until the sea zone is cleared of enemy ships.

now heres the next part:

A sea zone part of a path* [see Spending or Saving IPC] is a convoy sea zone. Each hostile naval unit
(except Transport) destroys 1 IPC. This is applied to IPC going via the path.

rewrite it without the mumbo jumbo.

1. Each German or Italian naval unit outside the Baltic and Mediterranean sea can strip one IPC of income from either UK or USA (if at war).

2. Each Japanese Naval unit in the Pacific and within in any path of sea zones between British or American factories and any of her controlled income producing territories can cost either of these players 1 IPC.

3. Each British and American Submarine in the Pacific Ocean in any path of sea zones between Japanese factories and any of her controlled income producing territories can cost the Japanese player 1 IPC.

These ideas and what we have from your text are totally different. What you wrote allows:

1. Soviets to attack German IPC
2. British to attack Italian
3. British to attack German IPC
4. American to attack German IPC

Reality: Germany didn’t have any merchant trade by sea except by iron ore deposits from Sweden. And the Soviets never had any capability to interfere with it.

Britain didn’t sink any Italian merchant ships, they sunk transports sending supplies to support DAK, and this was 85% done by fighters based in Malta.

Britain didn’t sink any Japanese merchant trade either.

Japan did sink some American trade in the Pacific. VERY LITTLE

American subs pulverized Japanese trading in the mid and late war period as they closed inside to Japan. It should have been persued more because it nearly starved Japan

Quote
Economic Isolation of small islands:
If you occupy the sea zone that surrounds the small island groups, the controlling player of that island group does not receive income until the sea zone is cleared of enemy ships.
Just because an island (eg. East Indies) is under blockade, resources (4 IPC) don’t just evaporate.
The resources can be spent on the island itself.
Hence I tried to incorporate it into convoy raiding, to keep it real.

But as mentioned previously I am not fond of allowing one single naval unit to destroy everything. I think convoy raiding is enough.

++++++++++++++ But that was the point of the greater east Asia prosperity sphere, to build a insurmountable line of fortified outposts of islands to protect Japans holdings. If Japan cant do that they should not get the income. Perhaps we can say on the second turn of isolation, the owning player does not receive income. That would give japan a chance to recover. Besides you keep bringing up that 4 IPC thing, when it is only the most resource rich island on the map, while most of these buggers are 1 IPC.

Quote
rewrite it without the mumbo jumbo.
Heres the problem.
I prefer it written short, consistent, and in game terms.
You prefer the W@W style. Static, nation oriented, historic replay style of writing.

Its not Xeno W@W, rather its more clear to people who are just picking up these rules for the first time and don’t want to have to figure what your getting at and can clearly understand whats going on in a self contained writing style. Its not important if you want a universal writing style, what is important is the mass players who benefit from this can get on with playing the game as soon as they finish reading it ONE TIME.

We shouldn’t have to remember which particular player can be raided by which particular players.
We shouldn’t let players have immunity even if the game goes differently to history.

++++++++++These rules are also trying to balance the game, The axis are in need of some basic tools considering the fact that they are economically totally outclassed. And we address this by giving play balance and some historical justification. Your point would be correct if each nation started out with the same IPC and the same military forces.

Quote

1. Each German or Italian naval unit outside the Baltic and Mediterranean sea can strip one IPC of income from either UK or USA (if at war).
2. Each Japanese Naval unit in the Pacific and within in any path of sea zones between British or American factories and any of her controlled income producing territories can cost either of these players 1 IPC.
3. Each British and American Submarine in the Pacific Ocean in any path of sea zones between Japanese factories and any of her controlled income producing territories can cost the Japanese player 1 IPC.
   I’ve already explained why static systems are unrealistic.
   You can read the back log if you wish.

++++ what is written above is not a “static system” its just an outline of how income is stripped by naval ships, so that people are not confused into thinking that the axis are in the tank even more because we went against history in a variant designed to model History, and secondly, you made everybody have the same ability to sack 4 IPC or whatever because you want to give the allies even more things they can use their superior fleet for which bring imbalance.

I see this time you’ve expanded your system with wordings like “path”.
Its getting longer and longer. But it still doesn’t get rid of problems I’ve already mentioned.

What you wrote allows:
*10 German submarines at distant unrelated sea zones (eg. Argentina) hit UK for 10 IPC per turn
*10 Japanese submarines at Hawaii hit US for 10 IPC per turn
*10 US submarines at New Guinea hit Japan for 10 IPC per turn

++++++++ yes this is true, but its also true that the Axis cant pay for these items unless they are not spending it for land units. In the case of Argentina they are sinking ships that travel either to and from S America or go around the southern end. Look at a map of where the U-Boats operated and you will have the correct answer. www.uboat.net

In the case of Hawaii, this is also true. If japan can build that many subs and send them near American territories, then the USA player has either lost the game already or Germany just fell a bit early and they used every thing possible for Europe.

In the case of New Guinea, you can also look up what happened to Japanese shipping by American subs. If America built the historical equal to 10 subs, it would have been really effective.

Quote

These ideas and what we have from your text are totally different. What you wrote allows:

1. Soviets to attack German IPC
2. British to attack Italian
3. British to attack German IPC
4. American to attack German IPC

Nope.
The simple consistent rule models actual shipping.
Russia, Germany and US territories are lumped together. For the most of it you can’t hit their shipping. Until the status quo changes.

That consistent rule as you call it is not a historical model from ww2. Its an everything for everybody approach that turns a historical game into checkers. Otherwise whats stopping the American player from building SS panzers? You cant just lump together stuff that didn’t happen in world war two in sole pursuit of “universality” Remember this IS a historical version.

However if Germany takes Africa and they want to spend the money at Berlin, they’ll have to protect the related sea zones.

++++++++ Nope. I already made it clear that Germany is not effected by IPC naval raids. Besides they use the medd as the focal point of supplies, which the allies can only attack directly with planes if they control Malta or whatever.

And if Germany controls southern America, then the game is usually over anyway…

Quote
Reality: Germany didn’t have any merchant trade by sea except by iron ore deposits from Sweden. And the Soviets never had any capability to interfere with it.

Britain didn’t sink any Italian merchant ships, they sunk transports sending supplies to support DAK, and this was 85% done by fighters based in Malta.

Britain didn’t sink any Japanese merchant trade either.

Japan did sink some American trade in the Pacific. VERY LITTLE

American subs pulverized Japanese trading in the mid and late war period as they closed inside to Japan. It should have been persued more because it nearly starved Japan

Thats historic replay.
Its only realistic is the game happens the same as history.

My system is basic, universal and remains realistic regardless even if Germany takes Africa, or US takes South Pacific.

That would be fine for a ‘universal’ version of Revised. This is a Historical version. It is also a balanced version. Not one time in playtest have i ever used what you wrote on that 4 IPC thingy, rather we used the historical model, because for balance reasons the axis have a very small navy and would have to retool the economy totally differently to start buying 10 subs. If they did that Russians would crush Germany

Quote
++++++++++++++ But that was the point of the greater east Asia prosperity sphere, to build a insurmountable line of fortified outposts of islands to protect Japans holdings. If Japan cant do that they should not get the income. Perhaps we can say on the second turn of isolation, the owning player does not receive income. That would give japan a chance to recover. Besides you keep bringing up that 4 IPC thing, when it is only the most resource rich island on the map, while most of these buggers are 1 IPC.
yes but for one single naval unit to destroy whatever the island produce seems unrealistic
convoy raiding does the same thing but factors in more ships required to intercept more income/shipping/coastline

I bring up 4 IPC thing because there are just as many high income islands as low income islands
East Indies 4, Borneo 4, Phillipines 3 vs Okinawa 1, New Guinea 1, Hawaii 1

Ok so the solution to island isolation would be to deny income after a second turn of isolation. This gives the owning player one turn to remedy the issue. Other than that and its his own fault.

Quote

Its not important if you want a universal writing style, what is important is the mass players who benefit from this can get on with playing the game as soon as they finish reading it ONE TIME.
then you shouldn’t have to remember which country can be affects by which country

But the universal approach allows anybody to take the income, A historical version only allows the nations what historically and realistically could have done this. Of course is a game like attack, everybody can do what they want because all have equal capabilities.

Quote
++++++++++These rules are also trying to balance the game, The axis are in need of some basic tools considering the fact that they are economically totally outclassed. And we address this by giving play balance and some historical justification. Your point would be correct if each nation started out with the same IPC and the same military forces.
do things for realism not balancing
until you’ve done substantial playtesting you have no idea on the state of game balance
you could easily be making it worst
AARHE is very different to revised, Germany armor and air force crushes Russia
lets not complaint about abattlemap and start playtesting

Yes right I do playtest… on the actual map that cost me $185.00 to print. I am playing the 1939 version and i can say that if you allow the allies to take off income its imbalanced. The Germans have a small window to win, but they have something thats reasonable.

Quote

++++ what is written above is not a “static system” its just an outline of how income is stripped by naval ships, so that people are not confused into thinking that the axis are in the tank even more because we went against history in a variant designed to model History, and secondly, you made everybody have the same ability to sack 4 IPC or whatever because you want to give the allies even more things they can use their superior fleet for which bring imbalance.
it is static as it does not consider what is happening is the game, where are IPCs going to
my system don’t go against history, if Germany is confined to Europe like in history, then Allies can’t really perform convoy raid on Germany just like history
Allies can have a fleet in Altantic but it won’t do anything because Germany does not have shipping there, unless Germany performs differently to history

In AARHE both sides are given the historical abilities and also the ability to develop diplomacy and weaponry, but for example Germany is NOT given the ability to become the worlds largest naval power, because if they tried that it would bust them in every other theater of war, Likewise the allies are not going to get a jump on German merchant trade because frankly Germany was blockaded from trading outside of Europe, just like in ww1….so why in a version thats claiming to be Historical can you even consider giving the allies an equal ability to develop submarine warfare to the extent that Germany or Italy is losing IPCs because the British have ships in the Atlantic?  If Germany didn’t trade with say Mexico, then why can they possibly be penalized in the same manner as Germany herself did against the allies did in the real war?

Quote
++++++++ yes this is true, but its also true that the Axis cant pay for these items unless they are not spending it for land units. In the case of Argentina they are sinking ships that travel either to and from S America or go around the southern end. Look at a map of where the U-Boats operated and you will have the correct answer. www.uboat.net
that is the player’s option
the same can be said for Allies’ SBR bombing vs building landing air units

Argentina is only an example, the point is your (1) does not consider “where” like in (2) and (3)
and also none of them consider actual shipping
its ridiculous you can lose more than you ship
to bleed a player like that is unrealistic

What? who said lose a ship? We are discussing the western allies losing 1 IPC for each German sub or surface ship in Atlantic or Indian ocean. The rule exactly allows the only nation that historically effected the other nations to lose IPC, so that we are modeling what historically happened. Only the western allies had got income in this manner along with japan, so to model this we need those 3 lines of text.

this is quite similar to why AARHE have a round limit for SBR/rocket.

OK, but the British player is going to develop tech and buy more ships to sink the German ships. What we are doing is basically to simplify the convoy box system that normally would be in the game. Thats the starting point. The result because this system where you simply counted the German/ Italian ships and subtracted from western allies. That is the only thing we are doing. It worked in AAE and AAP.

Quote
In the case of Hawaii, this is also true. If japan can build that many subs and send them near American territories, then the USA player has either lost the game already or Germany just fell a bit early and they used every thing possible for Europe.
I wouldn’t have such judgement
AARe had a static system too
1/2 IPC per submarine near IC
Japan can easily afford to gradually build submarines to park at Hawaii or Western US

In the 1939 version Japan cant do anything of the sort. They need to focus on realistic ideas. I remember AARe having a 1 IPC loss rule, but i guess they went to .5 IPC. In play testing i don’t see the need to go lower than 1 IPC.

Quote

In the case of New Guinea, you can also look up what happened to Japanese shipping by American subs. If America built the historical equal to 10 subs, it would have been really effective.
well well well, in WWII American subs were actually positioned at the right place to hit convoys

a super high concentration of submarines at South East Pacific don’t do much against shipping at South East Asia

But thats not the rule! In the pacific the case is different, you need to be within ( in between ) the path from enemy controlled territory and factory.

OK LETS TRY THIS:

new idea….  Each submarine or surface ship within 2 sea zones of any western allied controlled territory can destroy one IPC ( must roll as usual) not to exceed the total value of this territory.

Example: If German subs are off Canada, they can take income not exceeding the total income of Canadian territories, plus they need to roll as usual. This method does not drain the economy.

How bout you try realistic numbers of subs and ships to see how much Germany actually destroys.

Quote
That consistent rule as you call it is not a historical model from ww2. Its an everything for everybody approach that turns a historical game into checkers. Otherwise whats stopping the American player from building SS panzers? You cant just lump together stuff that didn’t happen in world war two in sole pursuit of “universality” Remember this IS a historical version.
it models realism
if gameplay occurs like history then things fall into place like history
its that simple

but players are not forced to do as the nation did in history

We are talking about capabilities. its not realistic to allow everybody to be able to do anything. Italy cant make the a bomb,

USA is not going to turn into a nazi state and fight the allies.

Some things are not to be allowed in a historical game.

The British are not going to be allowed to all of the sudden to become some huge submarine building nation and sink all the german convoys when the Germans don’t even have convoys. You might as well also ignore the fact that Germany is almost land locked, but force the allies to only invade Germany by sea. Thats about the same level as what you propose with the allies ability to sink “fantom German merchant convoys”

Quote
++++++++ Nope. I already made it clear that Germany is not effected by IPC naval raids. Besides they use the medd as the focal point of supplies, which the allies can only attack directly with planes if they control Malta or whatever.
can’t just use what happened in history and apply it to all possible cases

if Germany captured more than small holdings in North Africa I don’t see why don’t need to secure convoy routes

or if you think switching between ships and trucks multiple times (eg. Australia to Africa via sea, across Africa via land, Africa to UK via sea) is an effective way to transport then we can relax my system further to allow that

If German captured all of Africa the supplies would run into the medd and transport to southern Europe. It would not go by way of the Atlantic and get shot at and sunk by the allies, yet your universal system allows this.

Quote
That would be fine for a ‘universal’ version of Revised. This is a Historical version. It is also a balanced version. Not one time in playtest have i ever used what you wrote on that 4 IPC thingy, rather we used the historical model, because for balance reasons the axis have a very small navy and would have to retool the economy totally differently to start buying 10 subs. If they did that Russians would crush Germany
again I emphasis historic realism not historic replay
in terms of balanced or not maybe you should start playtesting fully rather than cherry picking rules you like where funny things can happen

If we succeed is modeling history AND also modeling what was realistically possible AND providing play balance so that the axis win nearly equally that the allies , then we have done what we needed to do. I can guarantee you that the way you keep making everything universal, its not the key to providing a historical or realistic version. Id rather playtest a version thats historical and realistic and then play test, than the other way around.

the 4 IPC thing is new, in attempt to incorporate your island isolation
my system is really just 1 IPC, just like in your system
except my system do not allow you do bleed a player unrealistically

The only reason why you wrote that 4 IPC thing was based entirely on your refusal to make a number of simple sentences, which clarify who can attack what.

2 rules:

1. you don’t get income of small island territories if the other player occupies the sea zone for 2 complete turns.
2. each European Axis naval unit in the pacific and Indian ocean costs the British player 1ipc ( each ship must roll as per rules)

thats all were talking about, but latter i added the idea that USA/ UK subs next to a Japanese IPC territory can also do this but also will roll.

Thats about as hard as this thing gets, but i have you with this 4 IPC, everybody does everything, 10 subs take off 10 ipc thingy…… Thats not the rules even for a second. Its only what is written in those 2 sentences and you can add the third to give the allies some historical play.

Its not like writing these 2 sentences are going to land you in prison or you become the laughing stock of Australia?

It will make every thing easy to understand then that 4 IPC rubbish

Quote from: Imperious Leader on March 31, 2008, 11:25:38 pm
Ok so the solution to island isolation would be to deny income after a second turn of isolation. This gives the owning player one turn to remedy the issue. Other than that and its his own fault.
just because East Indies or Borneo is surrounded by enemy naval units
the 4 IPC is not going to vaporate
it can be used to to raise infantry at the VC for example

Tekkyy i have shown that how YOU wrote the 4 IPC thing makes it seem that anytime you isolate a small island the other guy loses 4 ipc. Only in one case can this actually happen…. with Borneo. With the new rule the other side has a chance to protect his empire, and also under this system its not universal (thank god) it only applies to specific historical nations that had developed this ability also historically.

Quote
But the universal approach allows anybody to take the income, A historical version only allows the nations what historically and realistically could have done this. Of course is a game like attack, everybody can do what they want because all have equal capabilities.
my universal approach allows anybody to take income, but only where appropriate
an arbitrary rule (even if reflecting history) will only be realistic for a small subset of games where players do the same as history…in the other cases it’ll won’t be reasonable
if Germany goes outside of Europe…lets say they took UK, then control of North Sea becomes important to them

If Germany took UK the game would be OVER… thats the point the Historically based game design has victory conditions which take care of these issues, so Germany would not get in that position. The German u-boat campaign was developed exclusively by Germany during 2 wars, UK, USSR, Italy, and even USA had not real appreciation of how to successfully run a submarine campaign designed to sink commerce. Thats why only certain nations are given this ability.

At the same time the allies also have unique historical advantages, such as economics and ability to develop technology which historically they did have. In a game design the balancing issues must reflect the actual relationships and try to measure these differences so they balance out. What your supporting is creating checkers where everybody starts out the same and totally ignoring the History aspect of it.

Quote
Yes right I do playtest… on the actual map that cost me $185.00 to print. I am playing the 1939 version and i can say that if you allow the allies to take off income its imbalanced. The Germans have a small window to win, but they have something thats reasonable.
now that you understand Germany can’t lose IPC just because they own Azores…you can get back to me after your next playtesting

But Germany can lose income if they lose Madagascar, or take India, or Norway, of if the Soviet sub is placed in the baltic, or this or that….

on AARHE standard map, at game setup, Germany’ll only be vulnerable to convoy raid on Algeria and Libya (total 2 IPC)…and later maybe for Norway (3 IPC) if they somehow lose Baltic…

But a Historical version must not have this because the Soviet player had no idea how to conduct these types of raids. Even if just 1 IPC was potentially at risk it would be a bad rule. This is a historical version and not a universal version. Revised is a universal version and the reason why we are doing a historical version.

Quote
In AARHE both sides are given the historical abilities and also the ability to develop diplomacy and weaponry, but for example Germany is NOT given the ability to become the worlds largest naval power, because if they tried that it would bust them in every other theater of war
but if Russia was reduced to an unimportant IPC level, Germany can put attention to its navy
or if UK was taken by Germany…their war strategy would change

We don’t allow IF’s of that type, It simply was not capable for some nations to pursue specific strategies. Its like saying both the Americans and Italians should basically have the same access to technology and diplomacy or the same IPC. Why the heck do we then just give Italy 50 IPC’s a turn?///??? Thats would be a universal idea as well….

OK ill make a new map here are the new ipcs…

USSR 50 IPC
UK  50 IPC
USA 50 IPC
Germany 50 IPC
Japan 50 ipc
Italy  50 IPC

there… now its universal rules. great… Now everybody starts out with 40 inf, 10 tanks, and 5 artillery…now just have the same 10 NA’s for everybody… and we just keep doing this until we have… checkers

Quote
OK, but the British player is going to develop tech and buy more ships to sink the German ships. What we are doing is basically to simplify the convoy box system that normally would be in the game. Thats the starting point. The result because this system where you simply counted the German/ Italian ships and subtracted from western allies. That is the only thing we are doing. It worked in AAE and AAP.
in my system you also count, but only ships that actually blocks you
and you don’t just subtract from income, because you shouldn’t be able to lose more than you ship (verb)
if AAE or AAP lets you lose more than you ship (lose more than you realistically can), then I don’t like AAE or AAP

Forget “lose a ship”… this is about convoy boxes and how we can make AARHE by simulating the historical boxes that normally would be on the map in a simple way. The conclusion is that each qualifying ship rolls a dice and potentially it can cost the other player 1 IPC… thats it… now specifically the convoy boxes are always allies, because historically the allies traded over the sea, while Japan also depended on the sea for economics. To model this we allow only specific nations and specific locations of enemy ships that can even engage of these attacks.

We are not talking about who is “blocking” or “ships” getting lost or anything.

You tell me how we incorporate the allied convoy boxes from AAE and AAP into AARHE and stop adding convoy ideas for Germany and Italy aside from a possible Italian Medd box.

Quote
But thats not the rule! In the pacific the case is different, you need to be within ( in between ) the path from enemy controlled territory and factory.
New Guinea is the income generating territory, Tokyo is the factory
thats how your rule can turn out

Ok if the USA player has subs in the New Guinea sea zone for 2 turns, then Japan faces economic isolation and thats just fine.

Quote
OK LETS TRY THIS:
new idea….  Each submarine or surface ship within 2 sea zones of any western allied controlled territory can destroy one IPC ( must roll as usual) not to exceed the total value of this territory.
Example: If German subs are off Canada, they can take income not exceeding the total income of Canadian territories, plus they need to roll as usual. This method does not drain the economy.
How bout you try realistic numbers of subs and ships to see how much Germany actually destroys.
once again we’ve changed your rule one step closer to what my system offers

unless you can show something good at this stage I just won’t buy nation specific rules because they are only realistic for a small subset of game outcomes that followed exactly like history
I am afraid players are not going to play the game exactly as history

Then they are not interested in any historical edition. You cant sell people on ideas and then be afraid to tell them what the ideas are. AARHE is for people who prefer more realism and historical ideas in these games. The OOB rules are the Universal version and thats why we toil for years to create something different.

normally Canada resources would be shipped to UK
in that case 4 IPC might be all you can hit from East Canada sea zone

but if UK fell, UK continues the fight from Canada, building infantry with resources from their colonies…then the amount that can be hit will be greater
so limiting damage to 4 IPC is not realistic

Yes correct IF UK falls and USSR falls, and USA falls and Germany owns every single territory on the map…. THEN your correct but the game is nothing but the movie “Fatherland” played out for humor in a new world run by Germany. You always seem the bring examples of a game condition thats beyond the reach of the allies to win anyway to make your points to support how unfair it all sames.

or imagine Australia, its 2 IPC but with an IC it can build 2x4=8 IPC worth
UK colonies might send resources to Australia for that…then Japan has work to be done
its no longer 2 IPC we are takling about but potential 8 IPC worth of shipping

This rule does not do that. Its only going by the printed values,not some inflated 8 IPC thing

“realistic numbers of subs and ships” is a large range…but unimportant now that they are seeing the importance of limiting damage (as reflected in this revision you made) , rather than 1 IPC per ship for unlimited amounts

Lets just stick with the original idea. I cant argue for the new idea yet.

Quote
We are talking about capabilities. its not realistic to allow everybody to be able to do anything. Italy cant make the a bomb,

USA is not going to turn into a nazi state and fight the allies.

….but is your universal world you allow anybody to do anything. Uk can start making SS units, France can have the worlds largest navy and the Soviets can sink all the non-land locked ipcs coming into Germany from the Baltic. All these ideas are equal with the USA player turning fascist in a universal world.

Some things are not to be allowed in a historical game.
though it seems you are talking about capabilities if the game happens the same as WWII
we model realism and everything falls into place
A bomb requires 10 tech boxes, only US is likely to achieve it
other nations can try (and probably fail) if they want
we use technology head start for that, rather than nation specific tech list
see? we don’t have to arbitrate it to history, models the factors…not force the outcome to happen exactly like history

We are giving each player the historical based tools to perform unique strategies to win, whether the actual players decide to engage in these strategies is not up to us, what our job is to model what was effective to each nation, and not rather make each nation have the same abilities as each other.

The American player can build A bombs more easily than Italy
The German player has developed U-boats to the extent where they nearly starved the island kingdom of England.

America can pursue technology and make a bomb and blow up Germany
Germany can build lots of subs and wipe out UK commerce

may the best nation win… thats AARHE in a nutshell.

If people want checkers and no idea of what actually was historically plausible, then keep playing OOB

Quote
If we succeed is modeling history AND also modeling what was realistically possible AND providing play balance so that the axis win nearly equally that the allies , then we have done what we needed to do. I can guarantee you that the way you keep making everything universal, its not the key to providing a historical or realistic version.
on the other I can guarantee you that if we keep making more static/arbitrary rules (even if they reflect history), the game would be realistic for only a small subset of game outcomes,
specifically those where players play like history

Play test then. but don’t encourage design where you start with checkers and everybody is left with " i thought this was a historical version?" and these blokes allow the British player to destroy German IPC’s just by having ships off the coast of African German controlled coastline.

Quote
Id rather playtest a version thats historical and realistic and then play test, than the other way around.
your system is historical but unrealistic
my system is realistic (and historic until you prove otherwise…so far your complaints such as Allies can hurt Germany or Germany can hurt Russia has been shot down…my system do you let you bleed a player by hitting on non-existent convoys)

Go look at the map and tell me which are the 2 island nations> UK and Japan, the whole convoy system thing is for nations that are islands and USA is sort of in this block. By extrapolation we conclude based on the war, that UK was nearly starved and Japan was nearly starved. Also, we conclude that USA lost alot of Liberty ships and the Murmansk convoys got attacked as they sent trade to USSR. In the latter war period American subs sunk a huge % of total foodstuffs going to japan because they were feeding off of Japan like vultures.

WE DO NOT conclude Germany lost income or Italy lost income, nor do we conclude American surface ships sunk japanese merchant ships to a high degree…. the solution is we model only the participating nations that historically were effected in this manner. WE DO NOT allow Germany to lose money because they grow food and build supplies from central Europe, while UK / USA must ship stuff to other places and also receive stuff via the SEA because they control many places that are outside in different part of the world or support these localities.

Quote

Quote
thats all were talking about, but latter i added the idea that USA/ UK subs next to a Japanese IPC territory can also do this but also will roll.
we got rid of the roll already
but if you want to introduce it again I guess we could…

fine reintroduce the rolling idea and playtest.

some reasons why I defend my system:
(also a benchmark I use against your evolving system (which is improving) and certainly has the possibility of passing and replacing my system in the future)

*you do not lose more than you ship
*enemy units do not hit your convoy when they are in a different part of the world
*remains realistic even if territory control changes

OMFG… what is this? why do you keep going back to losing one ship?

you lose one ipc  (potentially with a roll)
Enemy ships do not hit the convoy or “travel path” from another part of the world. Only German naval in Atlantic and Indian can cause 1 ipc damage each ship to british or American,  i guess the allies decide by committee who loses this, or the German player can declare, or we allow this to be dependant of how close he is to enemy IPC of territories separated by sea.

remains realistic even if territory control changes

This is the radioactive part of what you are arguing for.  UK is an island economy and Germany and Italy are NOT, but YOU want them to be treated the same…. that cant be possible unless we turn Germany into an island too.

ideas and discussion were repeated
most important discussion/progress was at the end of your last post:

Quote from: Imperious Leader on April 01, 2008, 05:11:33 pm
OMFG… what is this? why do you keep going back to losing one ship?
haha I answered already
this is funny, a bit your like misunderstanding at the “Lite” thread

here it is again
“don’t lose more than you ship”
ship as in the verb
my system do not destroy any ships, only IPCs

good then stop using that as a verb, just talk about losing IPC…

basically the idea is say US has Hawaii, takes New Guinea…that is 1 IPC + 1 IPC
if Japan raids convoys from those two islands going for Los Angeles…US can potentially lose 2 IPC…not 1 IPC per Japanese ship for unlimited amount

but its ok I think in the other bits of your post you agree already not to bleed a player like that

fine just make it so only Germany and Italy can affect UK/ Lend Lease/ and USA, while UK/ USA effect Japan… no other relationships

what remains in the merely last point:

Quote
remains realistic even if territory control changes
This is the radioactive part of what you are arguing for.  UK is an island economy and Germany and Italy are NOT, but YOU want them to be treated the same…. that cant be possible unless we turn Germany into an island too.
its not radioactive once you see it differently…

you mean view Germany as an Island that requires its resources to be transported by sea rather than land???  No i dont “SEE” that.

its definitely not realistic for African income to go to Berlin if Allies control Med Sea and Altantic right?

Yes by way of the medd, or thru persia land connected all the way to Berlin, The ISLAND OF ENGLAND IS TOTALLY DIFFERENT AS WELL AS THE ISLAND OF JAPAN, unlike THE TERRITORY OF GERMANY CONNECTED BY LAND TO MANY OTHER LAND TERRITORIES…

if the convoy system is nation specific, then you would need to have some sort of blockade rule about Germany Africa, (and potentially Madagascar, Brazil…and other nations depending on the map situation)

No you dont, because they ship from the medd, and italy controls the medd for the most part, plus England didn’t use submarine warfare and didnt have the last great wars experience where it was a focal point to attack Germany, rather they attacked Germany by SBR. Also, if they occupied Brazil thats not a good argument, because Germany has the ability to park subs off the island of England, while UK does not have the ability to park subs around nazi controlled Europe, Africa and asia.

Your looking at the location of where the money is coming from, Im looking at the destination of where the money is flowing.

Money flows to the island of UK, Money flows to the Continent of Europe, thats a huge difference.

Quote
fine reintroduce the rolling idea and playtest.
to clarify, we only reintroduce rolling if you wish (I am good with 1 IPC per unit)
because rolling is incompatible as earlier you got rid of ability to store war material at victory cities

ok fine no rolling just 1 ipc lost per ship

Quote
If Germany took UK the game would be OVER… thats the point the Historically based game design has victory conditions which take care of these issues, so Germany would not get in that position. The German u-boat campaign was developed exclusively by Germany during 2 wars, UK, USSR, Italy, and even USA had not real appreciation of how to successfully run a submarine campaign designed to sink commerce. Thats why only certain nations are given this ability.
no it doesn’t have to be over for Allies if Germany takes UK
it depends on the rest of the map
(and lets history replay arguments would be nice)

Look at the victory conditions of the game….they are not universal, Germany controls victory city points, taking UK will put them over the top, little chance (with all things being equal) for the allies to come back because Germany is probably owning most of Europe anyway, and with UK out the Soviets are not far behind w/o help from UK.

1939 map in particularly gives us the option to explore a heavy Battle of Britain rather than going to Operation Barbarossa
Russia given the spare time could have built up even better than they did in history

yes this is true, but the 1939 version uses HISTORICAL VICTORY CONDITIONS TO WIN, so your point is reflected in that Germany may win at that point.

Quote
But Germany can lose income if they lose Madagascar, or take India, or Norway, of if the Soviet sub is placed in the baltic, or this or that….
you don’t lose more then you ship (verb) in my system
so Madagascar nor India are not going to be become a negative income contribution

naval units don’t hit convoys in a different part of the world in my system
so Soviet sub in Baltic is only going to hit shipping in that particular sea zone

OK cut out part of the map and make a clear example with MS paint of how the system works that you propose. To me it looks now like its going to be a freeking chain of supply thing where you lose income if you cant trace a path of clear sea zones back to UK.  That system is silly and tedious

Quote
But a Historical version must not have this because the Soviet player had no idea how to conduct these types of raids. Even if just 1 IPC was potentially at risk it would be a bad rule. This is a historical version and not a universal version. Revised is a universal version and the reason why we are doing a historical version.
this is not a question of how well one nation can raid, that can be dealt with by a Germany NA that increases German raiding efficiency
if Soviet has submarines in Baltic and Germany dont kill them, those submarines are not going to stand there and watch hostile convoy shipping going by

No instead they crash in the anti submarine nets that the Germans had layed down before the war. The Soviets were locked into the Baltic, they cant escape, thanks to Germany. And Germany mined the straights too. Soviet subs were only for coastal defense anyway.

In fact Germany and latter USA and the Japanese 400 series of larger subs were the only subs made for anything approaching long patrol range submarines. Everybody else could only come up with coastal submarines to protect coastlines, from invasion etc…

Quote
We don’t allow IF’s of that type, It simply was not capable for some nations to pursue specific strategies. Its like saying both the Americans and Italians should basically have the same access to technology and diplomacy or the same IPC. Why the heck do we then just give Italy 50 IPC’s a turn?///??? Thats would be a universal idea as well….
please, you are comparing grossly different probabilities

Germany damaged Allied shipping more than US damaged Japanese shipping
but Germany put most naval resources into submarines

WOW your starting to see my point…. now we just need to model only this aspect of what was possible and your universal idea is trash can fodder.

Quote
OK ill make a new map here are the new ipcs…

USSR 50 IPC
UK  50 IPC
USA 50 IPC
Germany 50 IPC
Japan 50 ipc
Italy  50 IPC

there… now its universal rules. great… Now everybody starts out with 40 inf, 10 tanks, and 5 artillery…now just have the same 10 NA’s for everybody… and we just keep doing this until we have… checkers
A system takes into factors as input and gives an outcome.

My system is simple and universal. It is based on actual shipping. It generates different vulerabilities for each nation.

your system totally ignores the very real capabilities of the historical participants of the simulation we are modeling and since its a historical edition , i suggest you forget universal ideas…

The system is realistic. No arbitration in the outcome needed.

Their is no arbitration either is saying “every German/italian naval ship in atlantic and indian ocean costs the western allies 1 IPC”

Quote
To model this we allow only specific nations and specific locations of enemy ships that can even engage of these attacks.
That is no modelling. That is arbitration in outcome.
I repeat, your method will only be realistic for a small subset of game outcomes. Players are not going to perform the same as WWII. Its a game, a simulation.

Its a simulation of history, thus the nations who dont have certain capabilities are not going to be allowed to have them. They have to play only the cards they are dealt with, but they can play those cards how they want. Thats AARHE.

I’ve already mentioned specific examples (territory control and which unit in which sea zone) why your system is unrealistic.
You’ve engaged in a lot of historic replay kind of talk, if you can be more concrete in your argument and give specific examples (territory cotnrol and which unit in which sea zone) why my system is unrealistic it’ll be more helpful.

Ok fine, UK controls Canada, Canada ships resources to England which is fighting Germany, England is an Island economy and needs to import nearly everything to win the war, Germany has subs, they are long range and feel that these subs can starve England because England is an ISLAND, and also tried to do this for 4 years in world war one.

UK only has coastal submarines to protect her coastline, Germany controls most of Europe and her income comes by way of train, thus England using the same technique as Germany will invariable fail.

NOW IS THIS CLEAR ENOUGH???

Quote
Ok if the USA player has subs in the New Guinea sea zone for 2 turns, then Japan faces economic isolation and thats just fine.
that get rid of the problem of US ships at New Guinea hitting convoys from Phillipines to Toyko
this is your isolation rule, which is realistic for islands without VC/IC and low income islands

then you’ve got to create an exception for high income islands like Borneo, East Indies and Phillipines

Thats fine then we go with the 2 turns of isolation rule, Japan has a full reaction turn to stop the income from being cut off

potential players of AARHE are still interested in what-if
they just want the what-if to be more meaningful
or they just want the new dimensions added to the game such as land units can’t hit air units

No they want all the silly tricks of AAR to go away, They want some of the stupid ideas removed because they are not realistic, and view AA as a kids game with lots of dice rolling. They want the defender to retreat, they want real air missions, and airborne infantry and victory conditions that are realistic, They want submarine warfare and try to starve England to submission like Hitler tried.

Quote
This rule does not do that. Its only going by the printed values,not some inflated 8 IPC thing
oh you have new ideas for IC output limit?
anyway, remember its not a "some inflated 8 IPC thing)
the output limit is proportional to territory value, Australia is 2 IPC, her IC can build 8 IPC worth of units

No NO NO… You can still build the 4x rule in those places, thats not effected. Only the total income for purchases, not placement.

Quote
….but is your universal world you allow anybody to do anything. Uk can start making SS units, France can have the worlds largest navy and the Soviets can sink all the non-land locked ipcs coming into Germany from the Baltic. All these ideas are equal with the USA player turning fascist in a universal world.
my system do not allow ships in the Baltic to hit convoys in other parts of the world
so no Soviet ships in the Baltic can’t “sink all non-land locked ipcs coming into Germany”
I wonder if you still have wrong interpretation of the rules

The only thing i have interpreted is what you wrote where its universal, when historically its not universal.

Germany is likely to have submarine campaign while UK is unlikely simply because at game setup, UK territories are spread while Germany are packed together
but anything goes once the game starts

Yes everything goes? you mean England is not not an Island?

Quote
Go look at the map and tell me which are the 2 island nations> UK and Japan, the whole convoy system thing is for nations that are islands and USA is sort of in this block. By extrapolation we conclude based on the war, that UK was nearly starved and Japan was nearly starved. Also, we conclude that USA lost alot of Liberty ships and the Murmansk convoys got attacked as they sent trade to USSR. In the latter war period American subs sunk a huge % of total foodstuffs going to japan because they were feeding off of Japan like vultures.

WE DO NOT conclude Germany lost income or Italy lost income, nor do we conclude American surface ships sunk japanese merchant ships to a high degree…. the solution is we model only the participating nations that historically were effected in this manner. WE DO NOT allow Germany to lose money because they grow food and build supplies from central Europe, while UK / USA must ship stuff to other places and also receive stuff via the SEA because they control many places that are outside in different part of the world or support these localities.
you’re bringing up history replay type of arguments again

Yes i like to stuck with the facts to support ideas in a historical version of an abstract game… yes admittedly.

anyway at game setup this is the likely outcome (that Germany can’t be raided much)
my system keeps convoy raiding on actual shipping, if you play the game like historic it remains realistic
on the other hand, your longer and nation specific system is do not remain realistic all the time

take out the map and just give germany 10 subs and then give the uk player 10 subs… See the potential damage each can have on the other under both systems and post.

Quote
No you dont, because they ship from the medd, and italy controls the medd for the most part, plus England didn’t use submarine warfare and didnt have the last great wars experience where it was a focal point to attack Germany, rather they attacked Germany by SBR. Also, if they occupied Brazil thats not a good argument, because Germany has the ability to park subs off the island of England, while UK does not have the ability to park subs around nazi controlled Europe, Africa and asia.
as mentioned, Germany’s submarines expertise can be model with an NA
convoy raiding rule is about naval units in general

NA’s are assigned randomly, so if Germany does not get it, then its a huge deal because submarine warfare was Germany’s primary way to strike against UK. If Italy uses the rule where they capture Gibrater/ Malta and gains the ability to leave the medd, then they should have a chance as well.

The historical accuracy of a strong German submarine campaign MUST be in every version of AARHE, because its a palpable aspect of the war that we need to model.

naval blockade affects everybody
when there is an obvious naval blockade of Med Sea by Allies, its totally unrealistic for Berlin to receive Africa income via Med Sea
my convoy system deals with it all and we do not require addition naval blockade rules

Naval blockade did not effect Germany. It did in ww1, but not in ww2. Naval blockade did not effect Italy inspite of her colonies. In both cases it could not be effective because they are not ISLANDS, and as usual your not looking at the DESTINATION of the raw war making materials.  Please consider this.

Quote
Your looking at the location of where the money is coming from, Im looking at the destination of where the money is flowing.
actually my system looks at both source and destination, considers where we are building or raising infantry, this is the IPC path idea

your nation specific system only considers where the capital is and do not consider actual production, and the actual rule do not look at neither source nor destination

The reality is the production in large part centered in the HOST country, then shipped back to the colony for deployment.

Exceptions: Canada, Australia…. In India infantry were trained by British and equipment sent from england and the boat loads of men were shipped to england and Egypt to fight Germany. Thats how it works.

Quote
Ok fine, UK controls Canada, Canada ships resources to England which is fighting Germany, England is an Island economy and needs to import nearly everything to win the war, Germany has subs…
NOW IS THIS CLEAR ENOUGH???
I said “territory control and which unit in which sea zone” but you still remain philosophical
like give me a game example

here is one for your system

Allies control Altantic and North Sea (sz7, sz6) and Med Sea (sz 13, 14, 15)
Germany holds Africa (from Algeria to South Africa)
oh, Germany performed different to history, exposing themselves to convoy raid, what happens in the two systems?

in your system, you continue to let the Africa income (11 IPC) be used to build units at Berlin…too bad…we don’t consider players would perform different to history

Ok fine, now heres what would happen: Uk has not long range submarines nor would develop this technology for a few years, nor had any experience conducting a major submarine campaign, If they have all sorts of money to waste on submarines , while Germany controls the entire continent of Africa, then UK is being run into the ground by poor leadership. They need to make transports and land men to counter this. So the short of it is UK wont be fighting Germany like this if what Germany did and secondly, they dint have the capability historically.

In real games the only thing we are modeling is the fact that Germany and possibly italy got a few ships to escape in the Atlantic or subs are running loose to interfere with British shipping…. this is to offset the Lend Lease that is beefing up the Soviets by way of sea, and the fact that the ISLAND economy of UK needs to ship goods to survive. So to model these we give Germany and possibly latter Italy the ability to interdict the shipping…  What your doing is not historical, but application of a universal rule to equally apply. The problem with this is that that did not happen historically.

Instead of sea path which has to be traced, consider each ocean separately…

1)Atlantic, 2)Meddeterean, 3)Indian Oceans 4) Pacific Ocean…

Each German sub or naval unit in 1-3 costs either UK or lend lease ( German player choice) 1 IPC
Each Italian sub in 2 costs UK 1 IPC, if Italy takes Gibrater, then its subs and ships can now take from 1-2 from UK
Each Uk sub in 2 costs Italy 1 IPC
Each American sub in 4 takes 1 IPC from Japan but must be adjacent to the Island where the IPC is coming from not in excess of the printed IPC value, ( so you cant just park 10 subs off of Japanese controlled New guinea and take 10 IPC)
Each Japanese sub in 4 will also have the same capabilities to USA.

Now heres a questionable idea: allow UK “surface warships only” perform this only against enemy controlled Islands in 1-4. An island is not africa, but can be German occupied South America, North America, or Japanese controlled Australia.

Quote
[uqote]Germany damaged Allied shipping more than US damaged Japanese shipping
but Germany put most naval resources into submarines
WOW your starting to see my point…. now we just need to model only this aspect of what was possible and your universal idea is trash can fodder.

you didn’t get what I meant
as in, US can have better sucess if they put more of the naval budget in submarines like Germany did

Yes but only against Japan which has an ISLAND ECONOMY. It wont work against Germany. They will laugh at you in the Reich Chancellery.

Quote
Yes everything goes? you mean England is not not an Island?
I only said anything goes once the game starts
as in the situation can change away from the game setup situation
its that simple, nation specific ideas won’t remain realistic in all games

They need to be in a historical game. IN a game like Attack! thats like checkers. In a game about world war two the British and Japanese were island economies and they must be treated differently with respect to how income can be destroyed on the high seas. Thats historical, but taking income off of Germany by submarine warfare makes no sence.

This is my proposal.
IPC to be spent must have a path* from the original territory to the Industrial Complex or Victory City.
IPC to be saved must have a path* from the original territory to your capital.
This also applies to lend-lease. IPC that are not spent and not saved are forfeited.
A path is chain of territories your land units may go through and/or sea zones.

Each hostile naval unit (except Transport) on a path* [see Spending or Saving IPC] destroys 1 IPC. Damage is applied to IPC of the path.

Ok heres mine:

For the Island economies of England and Japan income is considered to flow from the colonies or conquests of these nations to the host nation of  England or Japan. In either case each enemy submarine and or ship located between these points can cost the owning player 1 IPC up to the limit of the total value of each “blockaded” territory. The only way to protect this from happening is to sunk the enemy ships or prevent them from leaving home waters by naval blockade.

Example: Germany has a sub in the Atlantic so potentially income flowing from British colonies to UK can be reduced by 1 ipc, The limit would equal the total number of subs posted from these areas. however Income from british controlled territories in Asia would require a German sub in the Indian ocean.

The American player can post a sub or ship in between the Japanese controlled island of new guinea and Japan. but the total that can be lost is equal by the total value of IPC that the island is worth.

And heres another idea: Take the total number of subs “at large” (these are subs in open waters - not baltic or medd)

1. Axis European players look up a chart roll a die, and index IPC lost, the more subs you got the more potentially you kill, and the owner of the sub decides if its lend lease or income from uk or usa.

2. The American player also does this but only counts subs in the pacific

3. The Allies then takes up his ASW units (DD and CA) indexes a chart , rolls a die, and thats the number of subs that are lost that turn

ok find something that is somewhere in between our two systems.

possibly your rule but only effecting UK and Japan. Ill leave it up to you, but be fair to both sides.

ok fine…… i don’t wish to go over it again.

carry on soldier!

yes right!

Greetings from San Antonio!

Bottom Line Up Front (BLUF):

• What version of AARHE should I consider as playtested and stable?

I’m really intrigued by AARHE, you all have done a fantastic job of breathing some realism into this game.  So, I printed off some maps and rules and committed myself to working through it.  However, I ran into some burps today and I’m a bit confused by all the revisions I’ve found:  two dated drafts from vers 4.0, and an older 1.3.

I’m using the following source as my touchstone:
http://home.exetel.com.au/cometo/aarhe/

I worked through the AARHE DEMO (e.g., turn 1 through G1 & J1), but it doesn’t cover all the angles required to understand the nuances of combat.  Are there other DEMO’s and examples that I’ve missed in the forums that can walk me through some of this?

Thanks in advance,

Enjoy the day!

• Bierwagen

Yes sir!

I will get the latest files so your not printing all the wrong stuff.

Id favor the 1939 version using the generals, but you can also go with AARHE: Lite and play on your normal map.

here are some files you need.

http://home.exetel.com.au/cometo/aarhe/–-which is where you are. The watermark and clear just means if you want the pretty pictures then DL watermark… otherwise a plain copy is also offered.

but it doesn’t cover all the angles required to understand the nuances of combat.  Are there other DEMO’s and examples that I’ve missed in the forums that can walk me through some of this?

note that all the player aids should be downloaded and printed out so your not forgetting some of the rules. These are intuitive in that you get a strong impression of what is going on even if you don’t read the rules.

So i suggest you read AARHE lite and use the formal ruleset to solve any clarifications that arise.

I also suggest you don’t play with the extra units until you have played at least 2 games fully. Probably don’t use the Generals either till then.

You may present your questions here and we will answer them. The demo was just to get the basic idea of the game.

Moin!

O.k. I finally followed this discussion on AARHE: Lite from the beginning, and think I caught a clue.

AARHE: Lite was source of my confusion because I thought it was a short-cut sheet for AARHE.  But it appears to be a stand alone upgrade played on the old AAR map vs. AARHE 1.3 or 4.0 which is suppose to be played on the updated maps.

Things that really confused us were Naval Combat, declaring DAS, neutrals, and a Combat Reinforcements (n.b., which seems to have disappeared in the AAHRE 4.0, 10 Apr 08 version).

I’ll keep working my way through the messages in hopes of getting more insights.

I think the main thing that would help those of us trying to integrate this into our gaming groups would be more examples (e.g., particularly with air and naval combat).

Another suggestion would be for version control to be embedded in the headers.  While we were playing and I went and printed off another copy so we didn’t have to share – only to get in a good argument over “what in the hell are you smoking!, right here on page, xx…”.

Thanks again,

• Bierwagen