Tech problems

[Trig]

@vondox

Here is how tech works:

The production phase is at the start of the turn. In it, you may do actions in any order you like. This means you may repair a facility, finish a tech, and then build that tech, all in the same turn. There is no “cooldown” turn for tech. Once you have it you have it.
References:
7.6 “If you repair a damaged factory, you get the technology die roll in the same turn.”

Secondly, you roll as die to advance to the next stage, it only takes 4 rolls to get a tech. Once your roundel is on “complete” you have completed the tech.
References:
7.7 “Rolling the indicated value of higher on a d12 results in success and the player places a roundel on that stage of development to show that the stage is complete.”

Major factories are not tied to a specific tech. They just grant one tech roll. This is nowhere even hinted at in the rules. Tech rolls may be used for any tech, with the only criteria that a) a tech may be only rolled for once a turn, and b) you can’t move techs past stage 2 before Jul 39.(section 7.6) You may change up your research as much as you like to suit the changing war. There is no sunk cost.

Thus, as Germany, you start with 4 tech rolls in Jul 36. You roll one dice for wartime income, heavy armor, advanced mechs, and long range aircraft. You hit wartime income and heavy armor. You place a roundel on stage one of each.
Next turn you have upgraded the Med. Factory, and you get 5 rolls. You roll of the above, along with advanced artillery. You hit wartime income and long range aircraft. You move your roundel to stage 2 of wartime income, and stage one of long range aircraft.
Next Turn in Jul 37, you roll for the above, but instead of advanced artillery and wartime income, you roll improved construction and improved factories.
This continues till Jul 39. You have 7 techs currently sitting at stage two. You roll for five of them, and hit wartime income, advanced mechs, and long range aircraft. You move the roundels on those techs to stage 3.
In Jan 40,with good luck you roll and hit long range aircraft and advanced mechs again! You move your roundel to the last box: “completed.” As of this point, you now have long range aircraft and advanced mechs. This turn your planes get the bonus. This turn you may build advanced mechs.

I hope that makes sense.
You may house rule as you like, but this is the official rules.

[VonDox]

@trig Okay… So, based on the replies…

1. It’s 4 rolls to get to a tech. A roll to get on the chart to stage 1, 2 more for stage 2 and 3 and then 1 more for complete. Once you reach COMPLETE you get the tech immediately on that round so you build JETS or get wartime income ALL in that turn.

2. What I am NOT understanding yet is that if you start in 36 and you start 4 techs then have to hold at stage 4 can you start ‘researching’ four MORE techs and get them to stage 2 as well? It would seem to me that once you start a tech, if you stop and switch to another tech you should lose that tech advance you had been working on. Otherwise, Germany and the US run amok in tech advances. The only problem is that Germany gets a HUGE jump on the US on units built and the advantages of having that tech which is a huge game imbalance. I can find no rule in the game that states you have 1 roll per major factory and once you start researching a tech you can’t stop and switch to another tech and keep the advancement level of that previous tech at whatever stage you were at.

[Aldrahill]

@vondox No, you can switch between techs as you like, you don’t HAVE to stick to a tech each time.

The idea is that you spend 36-39 getting to Step 2 on as many different techs that you consider useful, and then you work on completing them.

You can easily get to STep 3 on one tech, but then want to spend your dice elsewhere. Think of it like assigning scientists to working on specific weapon specs and technologies - their notes don’t just get deleted if they get sidetracked and start investigating advanced artillery instead!

Germany and the US are indeed meant to be pretty tech heavy, yes. But that’s the point! The US will peel ahead and be able to lend lease units to Britain and USSR once they’re able to, which helps keep them strong.

The rolls themselves come from your major factories - every Major gives you 1 dice roll, plus Germany gets an extra one for free. USSR also gets one if they sign the Molotov-Ribbontrop pact.

A common move for Germany and USA is to immediately upgrade one factory on turn 1 to get access to an extra roll, as Germany is sitting on a medium factory in their home country.

Also, something I tripped up on, remember that captured Major factories act as a Minor factory, so after taking Paris’s Major, Germany does NOT get an extra tech roll.

[VonDox]

@aldrahill My A&A group has always struggled with TECH and it doesn’t seem any different in GW36. In our last game Germany had 13 of the 16 techs by the end of 1941. While the US had 8 of the 16 techs because of some bad rolls. I guess we might need to make a house rule that once a tech is started you can’t stop researching it unless you want to lose that advance OR you have to move back 1 stage so you can start another tech. So even if you get lucky in make 10 rolls in 2 turns and you want to switch over to a new tech those stage 2 techs drop down to stage 1. Does anyone else have an issue of run-away tech OR is that what everyone expects/wants in this game?

[Aldrahill]

@vondox Assuming Germany upgrades their Medium to a Major straight away, Germany gets a total of 54 tech rolls by the end of 1941.

They’d have to have literally succeeded on 52/54 rolls to end up with 13 out of 16 techs :P If they manage to defy probability like that, I say kudos to those German scientists.

Are you sure they weren’t accidentally adding the French Major to their tech rolls, giving them a total of 6 rolls?

[VonDox]

@aldrahill Yes, our german player was very lucky in our last game… While I, the USSR was not and had only 3 techs on the board by the time he attacked me in 1940. Nothing like changing history when jets, heavy armor, advanced artillery and advanced mechs are pouring over your border. He blasted pass and me drove into the Caucasus and got Turkey and Iran both on his side. The game was over by then since he had upwards of 90 IPPs and Japan had all of the Netherlands Islands and most of China and was over 70 IPPs.

I look at the 1939 set-up charts and none of the nations have tech beyond stage 2 except Japan with heavy BB’s at stage 2. Since many of the tech rolls are 7+ it’s almost 50/50 odds you make it a tech or not. I think my group could solve it’s tech issues by not allowing a nation to research more techs until they finish a tech line. This would slow the introduction of tech (if your playing the 36 opening ) to something similar to what is shown in in the 1939 tech levels for that opening set-up. There is nothing in the rules that state you are allowed to switch to a new tech line if your playing the 36 game and there is nothing to say that you can’t.

[insaneHoshi]

@vondox said in Tech problems:

@aldrahill Yes, our german player was very lucky in our last game

There is lucky and there is a player getting 52/54 rolls which has a chance of 00.0000000000082% occurring.

You guys were probably doing something wrong, and if you weren’t, you shouldn’t be trying to balance it around an exceptional set of luck.

There is nothing in the rules that state you are allowed to switch to a new tech line

The part of the rulebook that says “For each tech roll, select a tech and roll…” (paraphrasing) lack of conditions regarding switching, says you are allowed to switch.

[VonDox]

@insanehoshi Germany upgraded the factory in eastern Germany to a major and then built another factory (major) in East Prussia. So he had a total 6 rolls a turn! ( not all starting in 1936 of course ).

One of the things that attracted me to this game was the tech and how it’s played. What I had not expected/failed to understand was the ability to stop researching a tech line and then start a new one. If agree 100% with you that before I start making house rules we need to play more and we are planning to do the 1939 start this time and with the tech positions as indicated. We will see how it goes… Yes, I did want to throttle the german player because of the luck he was having…

[insaneHoshi]

@vondox Are you playing v2 or v3?

As far as I am aware the 39 setup’s doesn’t have starting techs.

[VonDox]

@insanehoshi It does… For example if you look at the set-up chart for GERMANY in 1939 they start with the following techs ALL at stage 1: Adv mechs, heavy armor, jet fighters, adv. subs, strat rockets and heavy battleships for a total of 6. USA starts 1939 with the following: Heavy bombers, heavy carriers, heavy battleships and attack transports all at stage 1.

I guess, based on the fact that GERMANY has 6/ea tier 1 techs to start off with in 1939 would indicate that you CAN STOP researching 1 tech line and start another.

I have toyed around with the idea that no tech can NOT go beyond tier 1 (July 1939) instead of tier 2 in the 1936 scenario. So you could have, maybe, if you were Germany or the US 10 or 12 tier 1 techs in 1939 if you got slightly above tech rolls. This would mean the soonest techs could hit the game if you got all 3 rolls would be July of 1940… Which would mean the first TECH/advanced units wouldn’t hit the board ( moveable ) until Jan of 41. To me that is more reasonable

[insaneHoshi]

@vondox I see now, ty.

[Trig]

@vondox Just a note, Germany can’t build majors in East Prussia. It isn’t German Home country.
That said, if you have 6 factories, you will be getting absurd amounts of tech. But 6 is also overkill on the most part. You usually can get what you want with 5 at most. I don’t see many nations going above 3 or so. Maybe 4 for the UK and 5 for Germany, US and USSR.

[VonDox]

@trig Wow… you’re right… I guess I should have double checked that when they were building I just assumed they read were reading the sheets. I just looked at the Japanese sheet as well and the minor factory in REHA is not in home territory as well… BIG MISS… Well, it was our first full game play through and for some of the others they didn’t even get a chance to review the rules before they arrived.

[TheVeteran]

@vondox no issue with tech in this game at all ever