A discussion on Russia's National Advantages


  • I play face-to-face with all 6 NAs turned on for all 5 nations.  In the 15 games I have played in this way, I have seen Salvage taken advantage of exactly twice.  There may have been some fights in there where it was forgotten, but STILL.  That’s a pretty poor return on an “advantage” if you ask me.

    Russian Winter merely gets you a round of breathing room.  Useful when it’s coming down to the wire and Moscow is threatened.  The Japanese player tends to forget that this NA has been activated when his turn rolls around, and might make miscalculations in the east to reflect that.

    Railway is consistently useful in every game.

    Nonaggression Treaty can be a blessing or a curse.  Sometimes you’re afraid to take easy Manchurian pickings just because you don’t want to lose your 4 free men.  Sometimes the threat of those free men can keep Japan off your doorstep for a good long while.  It all depends on what you can force her priorities to be.

    Mobile Industry is useful for pulling the Caucasus IC back when that territory is threatened.  If Germany can build 4 units in Caucasus, you’re on the verge of screwed.  Retreating the complex means that you don’t HAVE to retake Caucasus next round (a heavy strafe is often adequate to set up for the following round retake).

    Lend-lease.  I like it, but usually Allied gear thus obtained is destroyed before it has the chance to actually do anything.  (arriving typically in war-torn territories as they so often do).  And often I’d rather have a US or UK unit messing around in the area rather than just another soviet soldier.

    ~Josh


  • Thing is if you play with all NAs on, the Allies’ NAs can’t get much more useful or else they get an advantage by sheer number of NAs (18 vs 12). There’s a reason that all of Germany’s are good and only 2-3 are good per Allies.

  • '18 '17 '16 '11 Moderator

    I agree, Bean.  If you play 18 NAs vs 12 NAs then the Allies have a significant advantage.  That’s why I am trying to lock down what the NAs do and do not allow you to do on an individual basis and try to get the NAs for the allies to equal in number the NAs for the axis. (Might be interesting to give the axis an NA in lieu of a bid as well.)


  • Well the way it’s currently set up in LHTR, if you have all NAs on I think it’s actually balanced because the Allies have a lot of crappy NAs. If you play with selecting NAs, then the same ones will be selected over and over because there’s so many crappy ones. The best way to do NAs is sort of like how enhanced does it, where each NA is strong and equally valid.

  • '18 '17 '16 '11 Moderator

    I like random NAs.  1 Random for each nation, then the allies get to pick 1 for one of their nations and the axis each get to pick one.

    High chances of the allies getting comparably cr@p, but having at least one they like.  And the axis almost certainly get 50% na’s they like since they chose 50%.  Meanwhile, both sides have 4 NAs


  • I like random too, except id like more choices at least 10 per side and placed on cards so its easy to see what everybody has.

    i guess roll d6= result=NA since there are currently only 6 per side.

    it takes away from home study strategies where the game is played out before the game at home…a new adventure is what makes it fun,while taking cliff notes to playing games destroys the game and its intent for social interactions.

    One of the reasons why i hate published strategies because theirs no life in the game if you play from notes you got from somebody else.

  • '18 '17 '16 '11 Moderator

    I believe the point of 6 NAs per country was so that you could random them with the dice provided. :P  I don’t believe in coincidences.


  • Yes, but us former AD&D gamers also have ready access to lots of d4, d8, d10, d12, d20 and d00 :-D

  • '18 '17 '16 '11 Moderator

    @ncscswitch:

    Yes, but us former AD&D gamers also have ready access to lots of d4, d8, d10, d12, d20 and d00 :-D

    1st, 2nd or 3rd edition?

    I was a 2nd edition mostly, but I got roped into 3rd edition because my DMs refused to play second anymore. :(

    And yes, I have roughly 48d4 because I had a spell once that did 3d4 * Level damage for 1 Level/Round. (Way over powered, but the chances to get it was less then 7-tenths of 1% and I got uber lucky…well, not UBER lucky, there were actually better ones that were harder to get.)

    Fun, fun!


  • First Edition (though with 2nd Non-Weapon Prof added).

    I have a LOT of dice, but in my primary set I have 25d4 for one of my character’s Cone of Cold :-D

    I like those 13d4 Magic Missiles too :-)

    The sound a Magic Missile makes… THWAP!

    Asbestos’ Magic Missiles…
    Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-THWAP!
    Average Damage:  45 hit points… no save, automatically hit :-D

Suggested Topics

  • 7
  • 14
  • 13
  • 17
  • 6
  • 9
  • 5
  • 9
Axis & Allies Boardgaming Custom Painted Miniatures

33

Online

17.0k

Users

39.3k

Topics

1.7m

Posts