Bidding?

If the Axis starts with 6-9 IPC’s worth of additional units(placed before R1), the game is balanced. I’ve played with two basic versions of the bid. Players can bid high to low for the Axis. Example: I bid 9. You bid 8. I bid 7. You don’t think the Axis has a fair shot with only 6, so you let me have the Axis. You don’t necessarily need to bid down one at a time. The other variation involves players writing down their bids, revealing them at the same time, and the lower bidder gets the Axis.

Balancing by tech or NA could be fun, but I haven’t tried this. Obviously, you’d have to be careful about which NA or tech you give. LRA or HB’s for either country would be too powerful, Super Subs would be too weak. German Rockets could be interesting.

@Funcioneta:

@Subotai:

The KGF strat is not about ignoring Japan, no countries can be ignored, it’s just that allies cant do much against Japan for the first 2 rnds, and Japan can be partially ignored early in the game. The KGF strat involves slowing Japan down as much as possible, but most resources goes against Germany.
The reason why KGF is most popular among the best players is because a good axis player will make a too strong Germany if only Russia and UK tries to stop them.

And there is no such thing as KGF fanmania, it’s about the-most-effective-strat-fanmania :)

There is not really a KGF for many (99%) Revised games. A true KGF will include some US naval units to Pacific to distract Japan and force fight it … I only had seen a true KGF once in my PBEM games and it was in AA50. 99% of players do a Try Ignore Japan strat that includes sending all stuff to Europe and Africa, even the starting Pacific fleets. Most (99%) of players will counter this making a JTDTM, while some others will counter with a Polar Expres, that’s why I call the “so-called KGF” a “Try Ignore Japan (if you can)”
Allies can do a Ignore Japan strat only if Japan lets them. In my games I noticed that Polar Express is, at least, as good as JTDTM, and I’m pretty sure that Polar Express can improve because it has been used less (many play by memory with TIJ-KGF)

The funny thing is when in some games Japan gets diced J1 and anyway allied player lets Japan breath and TIJ just because they think that a Pacific Fleet is useless

My point is that in this or any future A&A games many players will never stop from trying ignore Japan, no wonder how bad idea is, how many income have Pacific Ocean and mainland Asia, how bad gets Japan diced, how good can be Polar Express or how boring can be ignoring Japan. KGF is a religion

If they try that in Global 1940, Japan will destroy everyone with its 2 BB, 3 CV, and lots of transports/income.

Lots to think about here.  Thinking about the Polar Express and the entire game itself, the phrase, “For everything gained, there’s something lost” comes to mind.  If Japan is in W. Canada, it halts the US shuck, but if they’re in Asia, it forces Russia to spend more to defend against Japan.  Every game I play as Japan, the thought always crosses my mind to send my 4 transports to Alaska/W. Canada, but I can’t ever come to terms with it because of all those units you take away from Asia.  Even if the US was out of the picture in Europe because of having to deal with the polar express, I don’t see how Germany could overcome Russia and the UK by themselves anyway.

As far as simply bidding a Jap transport….that works well regardless of whether you go after the US or not.  It’s a win-win for Japan.  I just won an Axis game with that transport in SZ50 implementing a KRF.  It’s key to grabbing income very early on–income that you wouldn’t normally get a hold of that soon.  I was able to hold Africa for a while with Germany as well.  I admit, I was pretty fortunate to do that without the German bid.  Overall though, I definitely recommend bidding the Jap transport.

Here’s another complete system; very easy to use.  If you have seen the game show “Name that Tune” then you’ll get the concept immediately.

Caspian Sub Bid Rules
1. Roll for high roll to see who gets the first bid.

2. Conduct the bid like “Name that Tune”.  The player with the first bid says “I can win with the Axis and X IPCs.”, where X is the number of IPCs the bidder receives to play the Axis.  You are always bidding to play as the Axis.

3. The other player either lets the first player have the bid or counters with a bid that is smaller than the first bid such as, “I can win with the Axis and X-2 IPCs.”  This is a bid-down system.

4. Keep going until a bid is accepted. If the bid ‘goes negative’, then the bid becomes “I will take the Axis and give the Allies X IPCs.” Counter-bids then become higher values given to the Allies.

5. Once the bid is accepted there is a pre-game bid placement turn. Whoever is getting the IPCs may buy units to place on the board.
  a) Unit costs are normal
  b) Land units can be placed in any territory a power controls
  c) Naval units can be placed with other naval units or in territories adjacent to a power’s land
  d) There is a limit of 1 bid piece per territory
  e) Powers cannot put their units in another power’s territory (i.e. no German pieces start in Japanese territory)
  f) IPCs do not have to be spent on units.  IPCs not spent on units can be given to any of the team’s powers.

6. Play starts as normal with the Soviets.

If Russia does WRu/Ukr you can stack Kar even without a European bid in most games. Even if Russia has good odds attacking it, its still a good move since Germany can afford to replace its losses whereas Russia can’t.

personally if i got a 11 ipc bid it would be 1 fig to Germany then 1 ipc to Japan. then i’d build 4 figs as Germany first round. it seems interesting to do.

@AJ:

What is FIDA?

http://aamc.net/bunker/forumsql/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=68

All AARevised games played in AAMC use FIDA bidding unless the players agree to another bid system prior to the game starting.  FIDA stands for Flames of Europe, IAAPA, DAAK and AAMC, the four clubs that developed the bidding system.  Under FIDA bidding, each player submits a number of IPCs for a bid.  The lower bid plays Axis.  Up to half of the value of those IPCs can be placed on the mapboard prior to the start of the game in new units.  Germany can place units in territories and sea zones that already contain German units.  Japan can place units in territories and sea zones that already contain Japanese units.  Neither Axis player can place units in territories or sea zones where it does not already have units.  The remaining balance of IPCs from the bid can be given to either Germany or Japan or split in whatever manner the Axis player chooses.

Example of a bid:  15, 1 Inf in Ukraine, 1 Rtl in Libya, 6 IPC Germany, 2 IPC Japan.

I am speaking of averages here…

And it is not the INF that creates the extra Russian deaths, it is the FIG and ARM living longer with the extra fodder AND the extra single roll of a 2 which gives you a 33% chance of an extra death in and of itself.