The Med is controlled by the USN with no real threat so the US can take its units in France and dump them to support UK.
German Push into USSR
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There is nothing wrong with Capital Capturing rules.
CtC rule has almost no impact on game strategy for anybody past begginer and possibly intermediate players mixed with beginners.Wrong. You just spent an entire post describing how this game is all about economics. Then you want to tell us that the biggest posible economic swing in the game (capitol capture) doesn’t matter as an incentive? :roll:
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This is the fundamental problem caused by the archaic “Capture the Capital” rules: however you try to avoid it, the game always comes down to the Axis trying to capture Moscow before the Allies bring their combined industrial muscle to bear.
This makes Moscow the inevitable prime objective for Germany (except perhaps London, which must be achieved without Japanese help), and as the above posts suggest this is only likely with Japanese help from the east.
No matter how many territories Larry places between Moscow and Manchuria, or how many false diversions towards “Victory Cities”, the C-t-C rule will always bring those Axis armies towards Moscow like a giant magnet. The huge benefits of closing down the Russian economy are still so vast that any other Axis strategy is completely insane.
This is why so many house rules delete the rule in favour of a power being able to collect money from every territory it holds regardless of capitals, and produce units as long as it has a factory remaining. In other words, the Axis must close down the Russian economy by stages, capturing all it’s industrial centres in turn, rather than the inevitable drive to Moscow.
There should in fact be 5 such centres in Russia, with Kiev (west Ukraine) and Chelyabinsk (Novosibirsk) having factories and respectable IPC values. Japan can cast envious eyes on the Siberian factory, but with the race to Moscow no longer the key to everything, a long term Pacific adventure may be more rewarding.
This. Fucking THIS. I’ve always hated the capitol capture rules. They are the only things that immediately end the game no questions asked, so it’s the only goal of any player. It makes the game extremely repetitive because the only feasible capitol to capture is Moscow for the Axis and Berlin (maybe Rome, though it’s much harder to pull off) for the allies. If you remove the capitol capture rule and make victory cities a more thoughtful component, the game play would be significantly more diverse.
Axis don’t need to take Moscow, London, or any North American territories to win.
I never said they did, but since capitol capture is an instant win (in 95% of cases) it still has a huge impact upon optimal play. There is very little incentive to do anything else with the instant win condition dangling there so easily.
My ideal house rule would be to remove VCs in locations which never see any action (washington? LA? Ottowa? Are you serious?) and provide an instant win for axis and instant win for allies based on VCs (one which is attainable without capturing capitols, forcing players to attack/defend more than one spot, thus increasing possible strategies).
Off the top of my head I would add a VC to South Africa (Cape Town) and then say:
Axis win with:
- Total of 12 VCs between the two theaters
OR - 6 of the 7 in the pacific
OR - 7 of the 10 in Europe/Africa.
Allies win with:
- 10 Total VCs Starting End of Turn 4
OR - 4 of the 7 in Pacific Starting End of T4 (they start with 5 on T1)
OR - 7 of the 10 in Europe Starting End of T4
OR - Capture of Japan (very hard to do compared to Moscow if Japan is paying attention, and only provided to prevent Japan from ignoring it’s capitol in favor of land rush).
Would need to playtest this to see if it’s too easy for Axis/allies and need to maybe adjust a number or two.
Then I would weaken the capitol capture rules to only give half cash to victor and still allow loser to earn income and produce in remaining factories (even build one if neccessary). This would provide a reason for the Quebec factory to exist (in case London falls). This, IMHO, would provide a much more dynamic game. Does Italy drive hard for Cape Town? Do the brits fight for Africa (and it’s two VCs) or try to stall them in continental Europe? The US cannot ignore Japan because if they take all VCs but 1 (honalulu, calcutta, or sydny most like) axis win. Japan has a much bigger incentive to work historically and not drive for Moscow.
- Total of 12 VCs between the two theaters
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Umm, capitals were historically the primary objective. Also, if you’re able to capture a capital other than France, 99% of the time, you’re going to win anyway. The ipc’s represent the purchasing power lost by the collapse of the government.
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This is the fundamental problem caused by the archaic “Capture the Capital” rules: however you try to avoid it, the game always comes down to the Axis trying to capture Moscow before the Allies bring their combined industrial muscle to bear.
This makes Moscow the inevitable prime objective for Germany (except perhaps London, which must be achieved without Japanese help), and as the above posts suggest this is only likely with Japanese help from the east.
No matter how many territories Larry places between Moscow and Manchuria, or how many false diversions towards “Victory Cities”, the C-t-C rule will always bring those Axis armies towards Moscow like a giant magnet. The huge benefits of closing down the Russian economy are still so vast that any other Axis strategy is completely insane.
This is why so many house rules delete the rule in favour of a power being able to collect money from every territory it holds regardless of capitals, and produce units as long as it has a factory remaining. In other words, the Axis must close down the Russian economy by stages, capturing all it’s industrial centres in turn, rather than the inevitable drive to Moscow.
There should in fact be 5 such centres in Russia, with Kiev (west Ukraine) and Chelyabinsk (Novosibirsk) having factories and respectable IPC values. Japan can cast envious eyes on the Siberian factory, but with the race to Moscow no longer the key to everything, a long term Pacific adventure may be more rewarding.
This. Fucking THIS. I’ve always hated the capitol capture rules. They are the only things that immediately end the game no questions asked, so it’s the only goal of any player. It makes the game extremely repetitive because the only feasible capitol to capture is Moscow for the Axis and Berlin (maybe Rome, though it’s much harder to pull off) for the allies. If you remove the capitol capture rule and make victory cities a more thoughtful component, the game play would be significantly more diverse.
Axis don’t need to take Moscow, London, or any North American territories to win.
I never said they did, but since capitol capture is an instant win (in 95% of cases) it still has a huge impact upon optimal play. There is very little incentive to do anything else with the instant win condition dangling there so easily.
My ideal house rule would be to remove VCs in locations which never see any action (washington? LA? Ottowa? Are you serious?) and provide an instant win for axis and instant win for allies based on VCs (one which is attainable without capturing capitols, forcing players to attack/defend more than one spot, thus increasing possible strategies).
Off the top of my head I would add a VC to South Africa (Cape Town) and then say:
Axis win with:
- Total of 12 VCs between the two theaters
OR - 6 of the 7 in the pacific
OR - 7 of the 10 in Europe/Africa.
Allies win with:
- 10 Total VCs Starting End of Turn 4
OR - 4 of the 7 in Pacific Starting End of T4 (they start with 5 on T1)
OR - 7 of the 10 in Europe Starting End of T4
OR - Capture of Japan (very hard to do compared to Moscow if Japan is paying attention, and only provided to prevent Japan from ignoring it’s capitol in favor of land rush).
Would need to playtest this to see if it’s too easy for Axis/allies and need to maybe adjust a number or two.
Then I would weaken the capitol capture rules to only give half cash to victor and still allow loser to earn income and produce in remaining factories (even build one if neccessary). This would provide a reason for the Quebec factory to exist (in case London falls). This, IMHO, would provide a much more dynamic game. Does Italy drive hard for Cape Town? Do the brits fight for Africa (and it’s two VCs) or try to stall them in continental Europe? The US cannot ignore Japan because if they take all VCs but 1 (honalulu, calcutta, or sydny most like) axis win. Japan has a much bigger incentive to work historically and not drive for Moscow.
FYI, on this map, capetown is in SW Africa
- Total of 12 VCs between the two theaters
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Umm, capitals were historically the primary objective. Also, if you’re able to capture a capital other than France, 99% of the time, you’re going to win anyway. The ipc’s represent the purchasing power lost by the collapse of the government.
That’s all well and good, but that doesn’t change the fact that it makes the game stale and repetitive.
FYI, on this map, capetown is in SW Africa
Johannesburg then.
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Umm, capitals were historically the primary objective. Also, if you’re able to capture a capital other than France, 99% of the time, you’re going to win anyway. The ipc’s represent the purchasing power lost by the collapse of the government.
That’s all well and good, but that doesn’t change the fact that it makes the game stale and repetitive.
repetetive? If you don’t want Moscow, you don’t have to go for it. You can have Japan invade Australia and Hawaii instead.
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Umm, capitals were historically the primary objective. Also, if you’re able to capture a capital other than France, 99% of the time, you’re going to win anyway. The ipc’s represent the purchasing power lost by the collapse of the government.
That’s all well and good, but that doesn’t change the fact that it makes the game stale and repetitive.
repetetive? If you don’t want Moscow, you don’t have to go for it. You can have Japan invade Australia and Hawaii instead.
Sure, and I could invade Brazil with Japan too :roll:
It’s repetitive because it is the optimal strategy. Sure, if you want to play sub-optimally you can do all kinds of stuff. But if you don’t care about winning why are you playing the game? Game systems don’t work unless all players buy into the goals of the game.
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France and Italy both surrendered before their capitals were captured.
Hitler ignored the pleas to head for Moscow in order to destroy the Russian army in the field and gain the more valuable oil of the Caucasus.
Germany was essentially defeated economically by the capture of the West German Ruhr industries, rather than the fall of distant Berlin.
Britain would not have stopped fighting if the Germans had captured London.
I don’t think ANY capital was captured in WWI, certainly not of the major powers.
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France and Italy both surrendered before their capitals were captured.
Hitler ignored the pleas to head for Moscow in order to destroy the Russian army in the field and gain the more valuable oil of the Caucasus.
Germany was essentially defeated economically by the capture of the West German Ruhr industries, rather than the fall of distant Berlin.
Britain would not have stopped fighting if the Germans had captured London.
I don’t think ANY capital was captured in WWI, certainly not of the major powers.
France surrendered on June 22, Paris fell on June 14.
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I’m still unsure about people saying that this is the optimal strategy. Although I think something we could do to make the game a little more realistic would be to institute unit counts for each country based on the populations of the powers. Like Russia could have up to 75 units on the board at once, Germany 60, Italy 30, etc. IDK how that would work but I think it could help the people that still cry the inf. push mechanic is king.
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I’m still unsure about people saying that this is the optimal strategy. Although I think something we could do to make the game a little more realistic would be to institute unit counts for each country based on the populations of the powers. Like Russia could have up to 75 units on the board at once, Germany 60, Italy 30, etc. IDK how that would work but I think it could help the people that still cry the inf. push mechanic is king.
Not units, inf. And it should be total inf in the entire game. If a division dies, it can’t be replaced without depleting the manpool. Other units would have to be limited by resourses of the country, and this become very complicated when you capture/lose resourse territories
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You know the other thing we could do is maybe make infantry that are not supported by a mechanical unit and are defending by themselves essentially, maybe make them defend at 1. That way a defender has to complement every infantry he purchases with a tank/fighter/artillery/etc. in order to get the defense bonus. I just think that would make it in all honesty a little more realistic when you are making your purchases for powers like Russia, they can’t just have super-stacks of infantry anymore unless they just want to defend at 1.
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Probaly love to face my Russian opponent. Japan attacked on J2, Germany waited till G4. The russian player did not try to seize any neutrals. He refused to fight with his 18 infantry, always backing up. He never sent any troops east to help. And the units he bought waiting on the germans were anything but infantry.
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I’m guessing he lost….?
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Capturing capitals was almost always the primary goal: it’s a symbolic act, and they are typically the centers of power, either economically, culturally, politically, etc. The reason the Europe board is set up the way it is now is because Hitler ignored the more strategic goal of crushing the UK at Dunkirk and instead went towards Paris (no UK troops in the Normandy territory). After the mistaken bombing of London, Hitler continued because he thought it would wear the British down, and England retaliated by sending a bombing mission to Berlin, even though it was mostly useless. The invasion of Poland was focused mainly on capturing Warsaw, and the Polish fought very hard to defend it. And I thought it was common knowledge that if Hitler had not called off the Moscow offensive to divert to Stalingrad, the Germans would’ve triumphed because of how the Russian society, military, communication network, etc was set up (all centralized to maintain control).
So, I have no problems with how capitals are set up now. Is it a more interesting goal to capture all the useless East Russian territory? I don’t think so. And as others have said, you don’t need a capital capture to win the game. Maybe it’s more efficient in terms of number of turns to destroy the enemy, but it’s always the most heavily defended territory and requires the most IPC investment.
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Has anybody tried building multiple minor IC’s in southern Russia as Germany? It seems like Germany could build one in Western Ukraine, then Ukraine, and then even Rostov. All of these territories are only two spaces away from Moscow.
I’ve only played one game, as USSR, I was admittedly playing defense not very aggressively, giving up some territory and waiting for Germany to overextend herself so I could strike back with my stacks of infantry and artillery. But Germany didn’t attack until G4 and was advacing very efficiently herself. But it seems like there are too many territories in the south to defend, and it occured to me after the game that it would have been a good idea for Germany to build multiple minor complexes in the southern territories to drastically shorten her supply lines. Ideally Germany will have some transports in the north from the sealion/fake sealion action to deal with Leningrad, but the south is further away. Three minors can produce 90% as much as a major, only cost 6 more, and don’t cripple the rest of your builds quite so much in any given turn. Thoughts?
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If they could find the IPC’s and the turns necessary to do this, then sure. How they pull that off is another question entirely.
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Yeah, how Germany pulls it off is certainly not resolved. And like I said, I’ve only played once. But in my mind it seems its going to take 10-12 rounds for the Axis to reach 14 cities. And if they don’t do it before then, America will have made too much progress fighting back. Even if Germany doesn’t attack Russia until turn 4, the first minor complex can likely be built turn 6, and the 2nd and 3rd on the 7th and 8th, respectively. This gives you 3-5 rounds of being able to pump in up to 9 infantry right on the front line, with the tanks rolling in from western Germany. This should enable the conquest of certainly Stalingrad and likely Moscow, especially with Japan picking up all the scraps in eastern Russia.
This is certainly not a guaranteed path to victory, but I think it could be a decent idea in the right circumstances. I tend to not have enough urgency in my thinking though, so maybe America is nipping to far into France by round 12 for this to work.
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I think I’d rather spend those IPC on mechs, tanks or planes.
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You guys keep talking about buying Minor Industrial Complexes to get infantry to the front, but what about just building infantry?
Play it kind of like old A&A europe. Build a crapton of infantry the first turn. something like 3 inf in Berlin, 7 inf in West germany for 1 or 2 rounds. Start moving those Inf to the front on turn 2. Turn 2-3 and beyond, buy a couple Inf for France and tanks/mech to catch up to the Inf on the front line.
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