no. the deal is over anyway. Oh well.
How will AA42 promote a Pacific Theater?
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Another possibility is to open up neutral South America to invasion, giving Japan a valuable expansion base too close to home for American comfort.
I like this. A variant would be making South Americas territories 1 IPC each, USA’s controled
Yes, but that did not happen in the real war, now did it ?
Next thing, we will se Japanese fleet in Atlantic, is that fun to you ?
In the real war, USA had this Monroe-doctrine, wich assured an automatic war against USA if attacking any minor in South America. Let me tell you this, South America is the backyard, or b*tch, of USA. South America is to US what Eire is to UK, or what Italy is to Germany, or what Sweden is to Norway.
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Another possibility is to open up neutral South America to invasion, giving Japan a valuable expansion base too close to home for American comfort.
I like this. A variant would be making South Americas territories 1 IPC each, USA’s controled
Not quite what I had in mind; all south America should be neutral (including Brazil) except small Guiana territories (French Guiana could be Vichy = German; I think USA had garrisoned Suriname by this time).
You have to give Japan plausible expansion targets other than India if you close down the road to Moscow.
Brazil should be worth 3 and Argentina 2, also Colombia 2 or 3 if we consider oil revenue as a factor. A total of 12-15 IPCs up for grabs cannot be ignored.
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Japanese control of south American countries from 41 is the same fantasyland as Japan holding/trading Alaska, India, and/or Australia. The pacific problem is that Japan hoped for a small scale war against the US, but US reacted/retaliated with a full scale war, even if US used only 25% of resources against Japan, and 75% against Germany. While these things are “less” fantasy than Japanese tanks in Moscow, it’s still pure fantasy.
Germany could win, even from 41, with great luck or skill, but Japan would lose anyhow.
For A&A to be more historical correct, you need to remove more fantasy happenings than Japanese tanks in Moscow.
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what if you just gave japan a really low income, like one that is historical. What if they only had an income of 15 IPCs even with the East Indies. They would still be a threat to the pacfic, becasue they start out with all that hardware, but now they are not able to replace their loses and is it not as costly for the US to go after them, therfore making the pacfic a more viable theater.
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or what Sweden is to Norway.
Very funny… :mrgreen: :roll: :-D Which country was the colony of the other?
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you need to remove more fantasy happenings than Japanese tanks in Moscow.
What about the fantasy of the Axis winning? You have to realize fantasy is the point of the game, If all you want to do is play for history, then of coure the allies will always win :P And there is no game.
You have to keep in mind, the reason Hitler declared war on America, right after Pearl Harbor, was because he wanted Japan to declare war on Russia.
Anything that didn’t exactly happen, as it did, is Fantasy, Just like Britian invading Berlin from an amphibious Assault, Or russians Defending China, India, or Possibly Egypt.
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@ Gargantua, exactly my point, I don’t understand people who have a problem with Japanese tanks in Moscow, or Italian control of India. A&A is only kind of semi-realistic in the vaguest sense. Some say it’s not fun with Japanese ftrs in Berlin, and other issues which is very unhistorical/unrealistic. I really don’t understand the arguments and/or the thinking behind such claims. As for the outcome of WW2, Germany could possibly win, but Japan would always lose with 99.9999% certainty. And Germany would also always loose if the game starts in 42 or later.
For me, it’s fun to play, and it’s fun to win as many games as possible regardless if the AA50/AA42 map looks like pure fantasy from rnd3.
Those who want a realistic/historical game should start making a complex PC game, a simulation category with many real WW2 battles. It can never be anything than fantasy with a boardgame which takes 2-9 hours to finish. Not a boardgame which takes 3 months either, only a very advanced computer simulation can bring some realism to a game which involves simulated/replayed battles from the real world.To look at any A&A global war game and believe there is more than 0.0001% realism are delusional. I’m not quite sure how Larry Harris sees this aspect, but if I designed games for people to buy and play, I would be a happy game designer if players/customers thought the games are fun, and A&A games are quite fun, if not, we would not be on this forum and debating what is good and bad in A&A, we would not buy the games, we would not play the games, we would just forget all the A&A games, and choose something else instead. But we’re still here arguing about balance and strats in AA50/AAR, and what we hope for will be included in AA42.
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Agreed. I’m still not sure why anyone is that interested in this upcoming game if they already have AA50 or revised.
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If you accept that the game is pure fantasy and anything goes, then I wouldn’t call it World War II.
I would say the point is to have a period game that allows different possible paths to win that are plausible. I don’t think you need to go to a computer game to do this. They managed it nicely in D-Day, Bulge and Guadalcanal. GMT does it. Even Xeno managed something that felt right. Some of the manouvres done in the game push my suspension of disbelief too far. It’s like watching a movie and seeing a scene that makes you roll your eyes.
Some things possible in the game can’t be done by real armies today. I don’t have a problem with distorting things a bit in the name of balance, but there are some things that stretch it too far. This wrecks the WWII feel for me. I skipped revised for this reason, and was dissappointed AA50 didn’t fix it. I’m hoping these discussions are being read by someone that has a say and will take them into consideration for future games.
Cheers
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If it were to be accurate, then US should start the game with like $75, and everyone else with, oh I don’t know,……maybe $20.
……IMO
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For me it is not a question of realism. It is a question of available strategies. KGF and JTDM are stille the avenue to victory. Sure you can try something different. Someone has won games buying tons of BB with USA and then wiping Japan from the board for example … someone has won playing KJF and reducing Japan to control only Tokio … someone has won conquering London … but it seems to me that the numbers and the statistics say that KGF and JTDM are the more effective way of obtaining victory. Or I am making a mistake?
We already had three games that plays in such way: Classic, Revised and also Anniversary. We need a fourth? Maybe not.
What could be done then? Trying to introduce some variations in the game that allows for several different strategies to work could be interesting. For chance the two things of allowing the game to be more near to the history and allowing for several strategies to work seems be consonant. Allowing more action in the Pacific goes in such direction. Splitting the victory condition of the Axis also goes in such direction: Germany and Japan were only fighting the same enemies they did not coordinate their strategies. They were even jealous of the success of each other. Also winnig by conquering the enemy capital (and capturing a big safe with the writing enemy treasure containing ALL the IPCs of the enemy) is a dream. Moreover IPCs should be something like industrial capacity how is possible to store them in a safe and allowing the enemy o capture such safe?
Victory should be gained controlling key territories on the map (politically and economically relevants). Such key territories are different for different nations. Thay may be spread all over the board allowing different part of the map to be relevant for differen nations. Such points shoul be defended by IC and such IC, when in danger of falling in enemy hands, should be possibily destroyed by the owner. Victory cities (introduced in Revised) and NOs (introduced in Anniversary) could be used to make for such problems. Divide the national treasure of a Nation for his Victory Cities. So each VC is territoy that works as regional centre, that collects, and spend, the income of a set of territories. So not a unique capital but more than one. Lose such territory and you lose the ability to collect income in certain amount of territories. Moreover such territories may also give victory points that added to a runnig total, updated at each end of round, allows a nations to claim victory. Allow a nation to won with its own objectives, that are different and involve different territories.
Finally the question of historicity for me: the game has historical theme, the WWII, naturally it should allow for alternative results (fantasy), allowing for different strategies (not only 1 for each side). However such strategies should be even slightly “realistic” because the “war” is fought on territories that have geographic and economic features.
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The main problem is that Germany could win if the war starts in 41, Japan could not. Japan would only get what US gave away for free, and we don’t have political compononents in A&A, so it can not happen in A&A that US retreats if US lost the battle of Midway. As long as we don’t have politics in A&A, to let Japan get away with anything is fantasyland, unless they won such TTs in war, not politics, and Japan could not win anything in war against the US.
And since this is about AA42, the war starts in 42, so neither Germany or Japan could not win anything, b/c of the overhelming production advantage of US, UK and Russia combined.
Also for Germany, from 42 it was a question of time.Thats why we should have a 1939 game, or a game where every power can switch side, or something similar.
If politics changed before the WW2 started, then the millitary outcome would be different, and then we could have some historical correctness. To let Japan win anything in the pacific is the same as Japanese tanks in Moscow, unless we can have a game where Japan chose not to attack the US, only UK, and then US might not go to war against Japan, and so Japan could win some TTs in the pacific. -
…back to the pacific theater thoughts…
here’s a thought some guys in our group were kicking around to enhance the play in the pacific theater, why not zoom the Euro theater in more. instead of all of france being 1 territory, why not 2 or 3, 2 for belgium, 3 for germany. if it takes longer to get to germany than it does to japan, japan might be a more interesting target.
certainly things like the value of territories and proportional amounts of hardware would have to be examined, but in principle it could reverse the normal tendency to see Europe as the quicker way to victory.
on a revised size map this might make this look way outta proportion, though really we could lose SAmerica anyway, i mean heck, if they left out my nazi sub base in Antarctica, might as well drop brazil too, for play sake.
anyway, different direction on promoting pacific play, so i thought i’d toss it in… -
i mean heck, if they left out my nazi sub base in Antarctica, might as well drop brazil too, for play sake.
Kill Antarctica First! LOL! :lol:
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Something else I’ve been pushing for for years is a wider Atlantic ocean. Make it a minimum two turn hop over the pond and the Germans might just have a realistic chance of stopping the US from pumping in troops here, and perhaps force them to think about a Pacific assault.
Making subs cheaper might have helped, but then anything that delays the Axis from moving maximum units to Caucasus/Moscow ASAP seems pure folly… that damned capture the capital rule really does narrow down the options when playing to win at all costs.
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