Will Rockets be a gamebreaker?

People : please keep the house rules out of this thread.

Why not take rockets as a tech out of the game. Only Germany had rockets that went country to country. The rest of the other countries their rockets were nothing more than another type of artillery. If you insist on rockets then give Germany V-type Rockets for a NA. The other countries like Russia and their Katyusha Rockets give them Heavy Artillery(with a modifier if needed) as a NA.

Rockets are not in the game. They are optional rules. You dont need them unless you want more historical flavor, which makes them unfair because its unrealistic to include something Historical and makes its value to a game useless because it decides the game sooner. Thats the whole reason why they have them to make the game end soon.

But Canuck’s point is that its the wrong historical flavor to begin with, since the only power invested in that sort of rocket program was Germany. There were no Western or Japanese parallels to the V1/V2. The Russians made use of rockets as artillery batteries, and the Anglo-Americans used them on aircraft, but only the Germans had anything like the Rocket technology we see in A&A.

National Advantages are alright, but only as an optional thing. If you need NAs to make the game balanced that’s a problem. I’d rather the vanilla game was balanced out of the box, and I think we need to get all the basics in order, before we think about technology or optional rules. That’s just me though.

Trying to achieve a balanced game by introducing new National Advantages and special rules, is like trying to fine tune a microscope with Boxing gloves on.

:-D

Doesn’t everyone always argue that the point in the game is to change what ACTUALLY happened?  So, someone else develops rockets in the game instead of Germany.  What’s wrong with that?  Think of it this way, rockets have always been more effective for Germany than any other country because of the number of enemy ICs in range, which means Germany would invest more into researching rockets than other countries.  There’s your historical accuracy, I suppose.

the only change of the this game is that the axis can win.

@Imperious:

Rockets are not in the game. They are optional rules. You dont need them unless you want more historical flavor, which makes them unfair because its unrealistic to include something Historical and makes its value to a game useless because it decides the game sooner. Thats the whole reason why they have them to make the game end soon.

thats the truth if i played i would take tech out of the game a&A

@Subotai:

By all means, I’m happy about the reduced cost of bmrs, but what’s missing in AA50 is the possibillity to buy more AA guns, and each AA guns fires one shot each. Most players would not buy AA guns if not needed, tanks+inf+art+ftrs is much more useful. So what seems broken in AA50 is not SBR rules regarding bmrs+damage, but that the rules constrict players from using approriate countermeasures if faced by massive SBR attacks.

Absolutely agree. I’ve been saying this for years. Even to LH himself when he happened to frequent this very forum a month or so before Revised was released. I said when you face a SBR specific “ploy” (won’t use the term strategy, because it truly isn’t) you aren’t truly outplayed as much as you are out-purchased. On a tactical level currently the only possible counter to SBR would be to get yourself some bombers too and give as good as you get. But the fundamental problem is that not all nations can take advantage of SBR because some can’t ever afford to buy bombers. It’s almost always going to be an American bombing campaign. It will never be a Russian bombing campaign. And that’s where the whole thing kinda becomes unbalanced.

A nation that can’t afford bombers can manage an extra 5 IPC for an AA and at least have some means to stop a player bent on doing nothing more interesting than buying bombers for the rest of the game. I said to LH you should have multiple AA guns that can fire to achieve a balance here. The general reply consensus in that thread was  “yes, but AA fires at each aircraft see”. True, but with each successive bomber & corresponding AA shot the risk to each bomber doesn’t ever change. So a player that will risk/send 1 bomber against AA will just as easily send 5. There should be some recourse to a dedicated SBR ploy other than to simply hang on for favorable dice. ~ZP

sbr is basically impossible to stop if you use it correctly and yes if your all bombers you can win easily.
we need something to stop them a bit then less people woudl rely on tech

We dont actualy know if SBRs or rockets for that matter will be a game breaker yet, however i do agree it is a concern. I personally like the new STB and Rocket tech rules (though my opinion may change after playing the game). My concern stems not from those rules themselves, but from the weaking of the AA Gun. It sounds like once the USA and Britian commit to SBRs Germany is screwed. I’ve thought of three countermeasures that may (or may not) level the playing field. (I assume that only one of these countermeasures should be implimented not all three)

1. Include Dogfights for SBRs like in AAP.

2. AA Gun still defends at a 1, but instead of firing one dice per plane, it rolls one dice per round. A player could purchase and use multiple AA Guns in a territory.
  (this could dramitically change the game, espically in drawn out battles, as airpower would be killed easily)

3. Change AA Gun to defend at a 3 like in AAG and NOVA. The AA Gun would only fire one shot no matter how many planes are present. This shot could be repeated each round of combat. No more than one AA Gun per territory would be allowed to fire. (this one would probally be too rough on small SBR forces, however it would force the attacker to commit to a large bomber force in order to have a sucessful attack.)

Has anyone tried any of these? I’d be willing to impliment them especially #2 if it does turn out that the new rules are broken.  let me know what you all think.

You made a good point. AA gun is now weaker only by the fact that bombers cost 12, so the value of its carnage is not so much a big deal and secondly, the SBR is more potent by its own effects in the game.

1. Include Dogfights for SBRs like in AAP.

I go with this. to not have it totally ignores the aspect of the constant dogfights over Europe when bombers arrived.

2. AA Gun still defends at a 1, but instead of firing one dice per plane, it rolls one dice per round. A player could purchase and use multiple AA Guns in a territory.
  (this could dramitically change the game, espically in drawn out battles, as airpower would be killed easily)

This would weaken the AA gun way too much. you get 5 rolls at 1 for 25 IPC spent? not a good investment.

3. Change AA Gun to defend at a 3 like in AAG and NOVA. The AA Gun would only fire one shot no matter how many planes are present. This shot could be repeated each round of combat. No more than one AA Gun per territory would be allowed to fire. (this one would probally be too rough on small SBR forces, however it would force the attacker to commit to a large bomber force in order to have a sucessful attack.)

Has anyone tried any of these? I’d be willing to impliment them especially #2 if it does turn out that the new rules are broken.  let me know what you all think.

This is not a place for house rules, but we have alot of goodies to cover AA guns in that section. Give it a try.

dog fights is good because in a&ae it stops me as the allies bombing the germans also i hate buying aircraft carriers until i actuallly need it so i take norway with russia

Hi guys, it is good to be back in the community. I used to be on Doc D’s forum, then went to AH, but this seems the place to be!

This is a good discussion, I remeber being beaten in AAR once with the rocket strategy. He had it well planned out, and he knew before we started that he would use it. Now, however, it seems like it will be less likely simply because tech.'s are random. I guess (at least for me), it will be a wait/play and see strategy.

As for the SBR, I read the whole thread instead of jumping to the end to post this question “will there be fighter interceptors?” I see the answer is “no” on that. I think the SBR is dangerous, most games I’ve played end up with many American bombers. Italy may get clobbered early by this. Germany will definatly be hurt too. But, again, there might be some early counters for this, i.e. capturing territories where bomber might land, like gibralter, etc. I think the best counter would be interceptors.

As a side note: I once played classic with a guy and we used para’s. Oh, the money we spent on bombers. :-D It was really fun.

and now they cost 12 IPC so you can get busy with that.

12!!! great and i thought 15 was cheap lmao wow!

I still can not beleive that they did that 12 this is getting cheaper for units everywere im addign as a house rule you cna defend with fighters no matter what either ide adding no amtter what unless super duper balanced for germany