Naval modifications questions and ideas.

  • '19

    FIrst off, let me start by saying that I have never even read the rules for any version of A&A other than classic/2nd edition, so keep that in mind for the following ideas.

    Back in the day, my gaming guys and I noticed that there were some ship types missing from classic, but we never really did anything about it. Now I’m reading posts about destroyers and cruisers and such, and wanted to put forth some ideas for the communities consideration.

    Here goes:
    I like things logical and neat, so going by the costs of existing ships, I would make Subs and Transports remain as they are, as the base, while CV’s and BB’s costs would also remain at 18/24 respectively, there would be changes.

    BB would cost 24 IPC’s/PU’s, attack and defend on a single roll of 1-4/d6, but have 4 Hits To Kill (HTK)(rather than just two), and while they have just the one attack, against units that have more than a single HTK, it does two points of damage. The rational being, a BB isn’t going to break the game by killing multiple units a turn, but hits from very strong units (Bombers and Battleships), should do more damage than weaker units (everything else in the game), and so do more damage than other units. What effect this would have on units with just 1 HKT is unchanged, but for units with more than 1 HTK, this makes the BB a much more feared foe. Now for fleshing out the other surface combatants added into the game…

    CA would cost 18 IPC’s/PU’s, attack and defend on a single roll of 1-3/d6, and have 3 HTK. This makes the heavy cruiser more powerful and badass than the smaller ships, as well as making it more survivable, and thus possibly a better buy.

    CL would cost 12 IPC’s/PU’s, attack and defend on a single roll of 1-2/d6, and have 2 HTK. This makes the light cruisers more costly and powerful than all the lesser ships, while still being weaker than the heavier/more expensive and stronger ships. While an attacking BB or bomber could kill them with one hit (that does two damage), nothing else in the game could do that to them.

    DD would cost 6 IPC’s/PU’s, attack and defend on a single roll of 1/d6, and have 1 HTK. The rational is that a destroyer doesn’t have to be able to carry troops/submerge, so cost less than transports and subs. The DD, as the weakest surface combatant, has just one HTK, but is cheap to produce.

    Naval Bombardments. All four surface combatants would get normal one-shot-attacks just like BB do now, with the same restrictions.

    Last but not least, the carriers.
    CV would cost 18 IPC’s/PU’s, attack and defend on a single roll of 1-2/d6, carry 2 fighters, and have 2 HTK. The rationale for these stats is as follows, aircraft carriers are, by their very nature, large ships with vast spaces to accommodate their aircraft, and are thus not up to the same standards as more compact surface combatants, and so only have 2 hits to kill, and while in normal games, they have a 1a/3d, I don’t really see a carriers gun armament as something more effective on the defence than offense, and so use them as a 2a/2d unit.

    CVL would cost 12 IPC’s/PU’s, attack and defend on a single roll of 1/d6, carry 1 fighter, and have 1 HTK.

    For those interested in being able to extrapolate bigger and badder ships, using what I have attempted to outline above, let’s summarize.

    Surface combatants, BB CA CL DD, cost in lots of 6 IPC’s/PU’s per point of ATT/DEF/HTK, while carriers cost 6 IPC’s/PU’s for aviation facilities, as well as their equivalent hull costs, so 6/12 for their hulls, and then 6 more for aircraft capacity. Keeping in mind that having large amounts of open spaces within/atop a ships hull requires specialization of the ships hull away from maximum damage resistance, and thus the ships are inherently weaker than their surface combatant contemporaries.

    So say you wanted to contemplate building a ‘super carrier’, just use the other two surface combatant hulls, and add 6, so two heavier than normal carriers could be built, and the player would have to decide what exactly they were wanting for their money, more fighters, or more survivability? Say one guy wants a flattop with more fighters, and so pays 24 for his ship that can carry 3 fighters, rather than the standard 2. Great, he gets his wish, but this carrier still has just the same 2a/2d/2htk as the ship that costs 18. Want to go the other way, and keep 2 fighter capacity, but get a stronger ship, cost 24, 3a/3d/3htk? Go for it. Of course, we could have someone that wants both of these, and then we would be looking at a hypothetical ship costing 30, with 3 fighter capacity, and 3a/3d/3htk.

    All of this is meant as food for thought, and is in no way based upon ANY level of playtesting, so perhaps something interesting? Or just a waste of time?

    A couple more things, construction times, and R&D needs to unlock some of this stuff.

    More later, for now, any thoughts?

  • '22 '21 '20 '19 '18 '17 '16 '15 '14 '13 Customizer

    @CrazyIvan

    Your 4 hit Battleship is way to strong.
    1 Carrier C18 A2 D2 2 hits = A4 D4 holds 3 figs
    3 Figs C30 A9 D12 =
    C48 A13 D16 5 hits
    vs
    1 BB C24 A4 D4 4 hits = A16 D16

    Besides Cruisers shot down more planes than Battleships but that’s another discussion.

  • '19

    I’m unclear on what it is your saying here? Could you explain the above for me, because at first glance, I cannot tell what your message is trying to say?

    OTOH, I had a moment to rethink the use on the surface combatant rules for extrapolating bigger carriers, and thought about this, instead.

    Say carriers, what with their needs for open spaces and large flight decks, use a 9 IPC/PU standard, and get improvements in lock-step?

    So standard;
    CV costs 18, 2a/2d/2 htk/2 fighters, while;
    CVL costs 9, 1a/1d/1 htk/1 fighters, while;

    and then the ‘super carriers’;
    CVA costs 27, 3a/3d/3htk/3 fighters. Would that be a better method for doing this, do you think? Otherwise, we would have a need for different playing pieces based upon player choices, for the same cost units, and that might just get a bit sticky…

  • '19

    Here is your post, moved to this thread…

    @SS-GEN said in [Classic/2nd edition] LL + Mutually Assured Destruction:

    @CrazyIvan

    Think I got most of it. Your getting away from KISS, But that’s how you want to play.
    Got to remember here your playing a game that doesn’t have a lot of pieces on setup
    and some pieces cost to much and the Battleship cost to much but this is all balanced into cost and setup pieces. You need battleships for punch and then your out of money.
    If you want I can post a list of pieces C A D values that are close to each piece costing correctly to punch.

    I would like that, but first, I may be misunderstanding what you said above this, so let me ask a clarifying question, are you talking about ships getting more than one attack per round? I’m not breaking that demographic in my proposals, every unit gets just the one roll/round, it’s just that the games ‘heavy hitters’ get a much deserved bonus to their damage, not in number of units hit, but in the damage that unit takes, so…

    Non-naval units, which all have just a single hit to kill, are killed just like normal, but units with more than 1 hit to kill have more to fear from the BB/Bomber than lesser foes, whose attacks all do just a sing point of damage.

  • '19

    You know, I should probably explain something, as this might be part of the problem.

    Hits-to-kill is an expression of how much damage a unit can sustain before dying. It has nothing to do with how much/many attacks a unit has.

    Sorry if I used terminology that was confusing, and not really much used in A&A (at least as far as I know it), without making clear what I had intended. Like I said, I’m infamous for that.:white_frowning_face:

    Hopefully, That clears up part of the misunderstanding…


  • No. I would adjust costs to punch. So your Battleship may come down in cost.
    So like 2 cruisers should kill 1 BB close to the same cost.
    Like
    1 BB C20
    2 CR C20 or 22 or 24 like that. You would still use your LL and MAD.

    Stg Bomber should just get 1 shot On first round carpet bombing. Be like
    C14 A3@2 D@1


  • @CrazyIvan said in Naval modifications questions and ideas.:

    You know, I should probably explain something, as this might be part of the problem.

    Hits-to-kill is an expression of how much damage a unit can sustain before dying. It has nothing to do with how much/many attacks a unit has.

    Sorry if I used terminology that was confusing, and not really much used in A&A (at least as far as I know it), without making clear what I had intended. Like I said, I’m infamous for that.:white_frowning_face:

    Hopefully, That clears up part of the misunderstanding…

    OK Thats what I mean by KISS. I see where your going. If its just a few guys and not that many pieces like Classic game Should be OK I guess.

  • '22 '21 '20 '19 '18 '17 '16 '15 '14 '13 Customizer

    Another option is lets say your Battleship takes 4 hits.
    Then it would be like this
    No Dam A4 D4
    1 Dam A3 D3
    2 Dam A2 D2
    3 Dam A1 D1

  • '19

    Forgive me, I need a minute to get my ideas into a table, and as I have never done that before with this software, it going to take a second. I’m struggling to keep up, and also trying to get better organized, both at the same time, lol.

    One minute…


  • @CrazyIvan said in Naval modifications questions and ideas.:

    Forgive me, I need a minute to get my ideas into a table, and as I have never done that before with this software, it going to take a second. I’m struggling to keep up, and also trying to get better organized, both at the same time, lol.

    One minute…

    Ya was gonna say post all your pieces and what numbers they have.

  • '19

    Ok, so this is a start, but I need to do at least two more, so hold off for a second.

    For the Naval Surface combatants, here is what I have in mind…

    Ship type Cost Att Def HTK other
    BB 24 4 4 4
    CA 18 3 3 3
    CL 12 2 2 2
    DD 6 1 1 1

    And now for the revised carriers…

    Ship Type Cost ATT DEF HTK CAG*
    CVA 27 3 3 3 3
    CV 18 2 2 2 2
    CVL 9 1 1 1 1

    *CAG = Carrier Air Group

  • '19

    Ok, that is probably the cleanest it’s going to get, now do me a favor, and tell me what that table is telling you, because I know what it means to me, and what it is supposed to mean to everyone else, but as you have seen, what I think it says to other, and what it actually does, may not be exactly the same.:relaxed:


  • @CrazyIvan

    Whats CA and CL Cruiser and Light Cruiser ?


  • @SS-GEN Yep, once again using out of A&A naval terms.

    CA = Heavy Cruiser {Used to be ‘Cruiser, Armoured’ hence CA}
    CL = Light Cruiser {'Cruiser, Light}


  • @CrazyIvan

    Right let me get back to you. I can give you best costs for punch but its gonna be based on
    4 hits each hit dam will drop in A or D if it applies.
    If thats not what you want then basically you just gave ships more hits.


  • Also you just added more hits to ships so you don’t need to buy more ships in game. Do to income you sure dont get a lot of money in this game.


  • Any Subs in game ?

  • '19

    Here we go, now I’m all caught up, lol.

    @SS-GEN said in Naval modifications questions and ideas.:

    @CrazyIvan

    Right let me get back to you. I can give you best costs for punch but its gonna be based on
    4 hits each hit dam will drop in A or D if it applies.
    If thats not what you want then basically you just gave ships more hits.

    That’s the general idea, as I have never had the opportunity to playtest any of this out, and so have no clue how (or even if) this will work out in game. After playtesting, this whole thing may get scrapped as to complex/adds nothing to the game. And by the way, thanks for helping me out with this!

    @SS-GEN said in Naval modifications questions and ideas.:

    Also you just added more hits to ships so you don’t need to buy more ships in game. Do to income you sure dont get a lot of money in this game.

    Yep, I’m trying to develop a way for germany to build cheap ships to attrition UK/USA/USSR navies, so the game can (maybe) restored to balance and once again become a popularly played game! Crosses fingers…

    @SS-GEN said in Naval modifications questions and ideas.:

    Any Subs in game ?

    Drat!

  • '19

    Ok, so here are the missing ship types, lol.

    Ship Type Cost ATT DEF HTK Other
    SS 8 2 2 1
    MM* 8 0 1 1

    *MM = Merchant Man (AKA Transports)


  • OK I’ll post back later with something tomorrow morning. SO your saying like a Battleship can have 1 -3 damage but still A and D. So no repair for any of the damaged ships that this applys too. So now your looking at either the dam ship gets same AD shot or it has to lower its A D due to damage which it should. Which way you going with this. I mean a 3 Dam BB should only get to A1 due to all its other Gun turrets are damaged.

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