Looking for Triple A PBEM Game

@all-encompassing-goose said in Ways to make the game better?:

@cernel I do have a bad track record for accidentally making posts in the wrong topic but I got Spring 1942 from Ebay. Unless the seller makes a mistake and gives me the 2nd edition, I know I’m receiving Spring 1942. Also, you cannot get 2nd edition anywhere in new condition for less than $60 which I state in the post I ordered SE for $30 (with all the shipping added)

Definitely worth the money (assuming it’s like new), but your decision to pick the 1st edition does not make a whole lot of sense to me. If you wanted a game that could take less than the 1940 games and still have the Axis&Allies experience, I would think the 2nd edition of 1942 is the most obvious choice (unless you are still playing the first edition of the 1940 games).

This said, one thing that Spring 1942 has going for itself is balance: the game is fairly balanced (being only very slightly unbalanced in favour of the Axis) and can be reasonably played with no bid (and no optional rules picking) at any skill levels, which is rare or even unique for any Axis&Allies world games.

My suggestion, however, is to alter the starting set-up by relocating the American destroyer into the sea zone next to the Eastern United States territory: it near-to-perfectly balances the game (by giving a very small advantage to the Allies) and avoid the very dicey attack by the German sub in than zone on round 1 (being either a +26 or a -6 swing value for the Axis).

Hello, Krieghund!

I didn’t realize that transports couldn’t be destroyed in amphibious assaults with no sea combat. That information actually saves me a lot of IPC each turn, since I thought I needed to buy three new transports every turn when offloading units from the transport during an amphibious assault in the previous turn.

Thanks for all of the detailed information. This should help make the next game I have with my cousins more challenging for them!

Right.  Just to clarify, your destroyers and combined fleet can happily sail right past enemy subs and transports.  You need to spend 8 IPC on a destroyer to use it as a speed bump.  Even then, you can destroy the blocking destroyer with air and a sub maybe, then non-combat move past that contested sea-zone leaving behind only the sub and the attacking air units non-combat move to where the fleet will end up.  It gets even harder to slow down a multi-national fleet, your ally clears the blocker then you can move 2 spaces and do combat before a new blocker can be placed, unless the defender was also multi-national….

You guys seem to play quite a bit, so you’ll get a handle on the rules pretty quickly. In the mean time, I would suggest not playing with any house rules. The game is very ballanced as-is, so give it some time before you change things up. We played two games last weekend, same teams on the same sides both games: the Axis won the first, and the Allies won the second. Like I said, it is a very ballanced game. We do use the optional rule for industrial bombing raids, but that is listed in the rulebook, so I don’t consider it a house rule.

We’ve talked about moving up to the the Global 1940 game, but the fact is that we’re finally comfortable with the 1942 rules, and since we only play once every month or two, we’ll stick with what we’ve got for a while. I never liked winning or losing because of a rule issue, and now that we’re familiar enough with the game, outcomes are decided on strategy and to some extent, dice. Our games are very interesting; no house rules needed.

@Cromwell_Dude:

Find the loudest, big-mouthed bragger of Axis and Allies and make them play as the Axis in this game.  They should be humbled, hopefully.

Ha! That’s a great use for it!

@GrizzlyMan:

It’s really important for the allies that US is in the game. Russia can’t survive long unless Germany is threatened by US/UK to its west, and Japan can have free reign in the Pacific without the US to quell its expansion

My oldest son was both US and Russia and when Russia fell so did his spirits, especially when my uncle, the UK player, was not able to do anything against Germany or Japan. I struck UK and Russia early and often and it was too much for either one to handle. Next time we play I am taking the Allies so I can see if they will try what I did with Germany. They will be in for a surprise since I know what to do with the US and UK to help Russia and defeat Germany.

sorry we quit because were gonna try to play a forum game

@Granada:

Although I can see the argument that for the experienced players the AA50 is more attractive and for everyvody there are too little changes to revised. I think actually Spring 1942 is actually quite different game to revised because of the change of the transport rules you cannot use many startegies developed for the revised.

Anyway I still cannot understand why the community would not give the Spring1942 more support.

The basic strategy is the same for the Axis: kill Russia as quickly as possible. The Allies might have a better shot if they decide to go after Japan, and both KGF and KJF strategies might have similar odds of succeeding, although this is highly debatable. From what I’ve seen so far Allied players are sticking to KGF (I haven’t played against a KJF yet and it is my standard Allied strat), which is harder to accomplish because of the German subs and airforce, plus any Japanese planes sent to Europe, and the transports’ lack of defense.

AA1942 is a bit like the ugly duckling. AA50 and AAP40 are new and bigger, plus there’s the stigma of being seen as the new rules being stuck on Revised along with a few map changes.