National Advantages

Yes, generally speaking, I have found that most players roll two dice for each country and then the allies pick 1 nation for ALL the allies (Russia or England or America) and the axis pick 1 for each nation (Germany gets 1 and Japan gets 1.)

That results in 7 NAs for the Allies and 6 NAs for the Axis.  Then there’s the bid for more money/units at start of game.

I’ve also seen where you just pick the NAs.  Each side gets 6 picks (3ger,3jap v. 2rus,2usa,2uk)
NAs are fun.  If you’re tired of the “same old AAR,” NAs make the game much more interesting!

Japan:  Lightening strike was replaced with Most Powerful Battleships.  Attack and defend at 5.

My last three FTF games have been “all-NAs-turned-on-for-all-nations” and I don’t think I’ll ever go back.

~Josh

I don’t debate that NAs add character.  But I do say that the NAs, particularly the OOB NAs, make the Allies a heck of a lot stronger.

True… I play LHTR though.  As has been said by someone before - I forget who - , OOB Lend-lease and Superfortresses are stupidly and insanely powerful.

In LHTR, I think that Germany has the best NAs overall, when all nations have all of 'em active.

~Josh

OOB lightening strike was taken out because that is super powerful.

@Wazzup:

OOB lightening strike was taken out because that is super powerful.

SUPER powerful, I disagree with.

Best German OOB NA, yeah.  But super powerful, no.

It was Japans.  And it can wreak havoc.

I’ve never played with all NAs.  I would think that would make the allies incredibly strong, both OOB and LHTR since they’d get 50% more NAs then the Axis. (18 vs 12)

Try it.

~Josh

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Crazystraw:  that avatar is hilarious!  How’d you do that/find that?

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If someone wants to make a bid for Axis, I’ll play with all NAs.  LHTR style though.  No lightening strike.

Actually, that avatar is of an old video game character.

It was the hero of “Karateka”, a Broderbund game.

That game was pretty funny.  You fight your way across a lot of levels, and at the end, if you walk towards the princess, she kicks you in the nuts and kills you.  (If you walk towards her, you’re in a fighting stance.  You have to run).

The character doesn’t bust a move though.  I bet someone decided to have fun with the character.

I thought djensen didn’t want animated avatars on here for some reason?

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Straw:

That might be accurate for out of the box rules. But I disagree that Joint Strike is a game breaker.

Odds are you are using Joint Strike to kill a massive German fleet in SZ 5 so you stop getting crippled by UBoats.  Yes, those things are VERY annoying!  Get 10 of them and you’re doing -10 to England, -10 to America and you’ve probably taken all of Africa and Japan has Australia, New Zealand, Madagascar, India, Persia and T-J.  That means England’s earning about, uhm, 1 IPC?  America’s earning about 28 IPC?

After Joint Strike, England’s at 11 IPC and America’s back to 38 IPC.  (Since odds are you can’t land troops AND sink the German fleet.)

Dug-in Defenders are stupid.  Though, they are useful in preventing an allied invasion of Japan itself.

Banzai has been pretty effective for me.

Dive-Bombers are just friggin awesome!  Attack at 5 or less?  Same with Super Battleships, means you almost always score a hit with your bombardments!

Then you add in Inf and Art defending at 3 or less for Germany and amphibious assaults become almost impossible.

In return most of England’s NA’s are worthless and ALL of Russia’s NAs are worthless in a traditional game.

yes, I agree somewhat.

I can play a pretty killer setup with Allied if you want to play I’ll show you :)

I agree with you there Jen about England’s and Russia’s.  I got the “Non-Aggression Pact” b/w Russia and Japan.  All I have to say to that one is, friggin’ bah humbug!  :x  My friend wasn’t even too worried about me sticking 4 extra guys in Novo.  He just brought along almost his entire airforce to eliminate what I had.  And England’s advanced radar?  Come on, it’s only good for ONE point in the game, and that’s it.  And honestly, who even knows when the best time to use it is anyway?  You could end up playing a 20 round game and never be sure, ‘oh, is this the time I use it, or is THIS the time I use it!!!’ Â