@imperious-leader said in 1914 Gen Con Rules:
@slip-capone Then this is to be in the smorey swamp section, they are his rules alone
They were used at both Gen Con and Origins.
I am just happy they are on the boards to share.
Playable Nations in 1914
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Here are some of my thoughts on some of the major/minor nations.
A lot of these are drawn from Imp Game’s The Great War, so I will reference that game a lot.Italy: had a defensive treaty with the Central Powers/Triple Alliance but went over to the Allies/Entente when the CP turned out to be the aggressors in the war. Spent most of the war fighting the Austrians and eventually gained some territory from them. I would like to see Italy as an “Entente†power, possibly with some special rules, and have some optional rules for Italy entering the war on either side.
TGW status: Major Neutral (mostly to preserve the 3v3 setup of the game, IMHO), supporting either Germany or FranceUSA: tipped the scales of war against the Germans; by that time, the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian Empires were in collapse, and the outcome was basically a foregone conclusion, despite the Brest-Litovsk Treaty which granted Germany a great deal of territory in the east (later undone by the Treaty of Versailles)
TGW status: Major Neutral, represented only by convoy zones, supporting the UKBulgaria: History identifies Bulgaria as the 4th of 4 Central Powers, after Germany, Austria-Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire. In TGW, it is often more tactically useful (so i am told) for the CP to invade Bulgaria, even if they are supporting the CP. Bulgaria and the Ottomans actually fought on opposite sides of several Balkan wars in the 1800s; as I recall, the alliances against the Turks often broke down into self-interests and backstabbing between Bulgaria, Serbia, and Greece.
TGW status: Major Neutral, supporting either the Ottoman Empire or RussiaSerbia: historically the fighting between Austria and Serbia went on for a long time; in TGW it is usually over by Turn 1. The rules of TGW state that if attacked and not conquered, Serbia joins Russia; I always thought it should just be a Russian territory from the get-go to avoid the need for this special ruling.
TGW status: Minor Neutral (special)The Balkans: From my understanding of history, Greece was pro-UK, Montenegro was pro-Serbia, and Romania was pro-Russian (or at least anti-Hungarian).
TGW status: Minor Neutrals; can be influenced by Austria, Ottomans, or Russia (Imperious Leader can probably correct me if I am misremembering this)Scandinavia: Norway, Sweden, and Denmark were neutral in WWI, and were not invaded (unlike WWII where Denmark and Norway were invaded by the Germans, and Sweden supplied Germany with iron ore). Also of note, Finland was under the control of Tsarist Russia during this era. I feel like Sweden and Norway could be left off the map in A&A:1914
TGW status: Minor Neutrals; can be influenced by UK, Germany, or RussiaWestern Europe: Since Britain were guarantors of Belgium’s neutrality, their invasion by Germany in WWI during the Schlieffen plan was cited as Britain’s reason for entering the European war. In WWII, the Netherlands were invaded by Germany in order to draw Allied forces further north into Belgium, allowing the main German force to slip past them through the Ardennes, further to the south. I seem to recall reading that Portugal was also a hub for intelligence and espionage during the war.
TGW status: Minor Neutrals, can be influenced by UK, Germany, or FranceSpain: I seem to recall in the years between German unification and WWI, that there were overtures made, trying to arrange a royal marriage between the German and Spanish monarchies, thus creating a threat to France from both sides. Spain remained neutral through the First World War, as well as WWII.
TGW status: Major Neutral, supporting either UK or Austria -
The Ottomans should only be allowed to buy one non-infantry piece per turn.
(I’m expecting them to only have like 12 IPCs anyway) -
Another “playable nation” is Bolshevik Russia. If that country is forced into Revolution, the Bolsheviks take over some of Russia and its units; the remainder are still controlled by the Allies.
Germany controls the Bolsheviks, who cannot move outside Russia. Indeed, every country can be split in this way if it suffers continual defeats.Is this actually stated to be in the game or is this just something you’ve come up with? Because I really woldn’t like to see that in a game.
The Playable factions will be:
Russian Empire
German Empire
British Empire
French Third Republic
Kingdom of Italy
Austro-Hungarian Empire
Ottoman Empire
United States of Americathese countries represent the major combatants of the war with Honorable mention going to Serbia, however being so small a nation it would be virtually impossible to represent them as a separate faction with in game terms.
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Why have the Ottomans playable if your just going to gimp them to all hell?. They were a strong threat to the brits and they gave them a hard time in modern day Iraq, threatened india/suez, and held off an allied force at Gallipoli. I can understand making them weak, but give the allies a good reason to not just ignore them.
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Why have the Ottomans playable if your just going to gimp them to all hell?.
I think the best way to represent the Ottomans and their inability to produce modern arms will be to just have them have a really small economy, kinda like Italy in G1940. Flashman is absolutely correct in his appraisal of Ottoman capabilities and their absolute lack of modern industry and infrastructure. In game terms I think it will be represented by a poor economy and alot of poor or no value territories outside of the Turkish heartland. You will probably see a scenario where the Ottoman forces within what we would consider Turkey to be quite robust and powerful, especially on the defensive (think Galipoli), while those in the rest of the Empire will be weak and unsupported (maybe they could pose a threat to allied positions in the region in the beginning rounds but not for long).
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Granted China did not do a whole lot so I guess not them.
Yes, that’s right. I think the only Chinese territorial connection to WWI was Japan’s conquest of Germany’s colonial port in Tsingtao, where the Germany’s Asiatic squadron was based.
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It should be noted that Turkey was a major power in a limited sense, as it had no modern industry. All mechanical weapons were imported from Europe.
One factor to keep in mind is that, when Austria-Hungary occupied Serbia and when Bulgaria entered the war on the side of the Central Powers, these two events created an overland connection between Austria-Hungary and Turkey. So in one sense, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey had the advantage of being directly connected to each other by land from that point onward – unlike the Allies, who were geographically isolated from each other and whose Mediterranean/Black Sea connection route (which was far from ideal to begin with) was severed by Turkey.
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Yes, this is why the Dardanelles was seen as so important - controlling this area allows the Allies to supply Russia by sea (about 90% of Russian imports came through here); while for the CP it allows a continuous rail link from Berlin to Medina.
I’m not suggesting Turkey should be “weak”. It will start off with fully equipped armies from supplies purchased pre-war. As long as A & G can keep a supply route open they can continue to supply Turkey with mechanized units, especially since the Bosporus is considered to have an unbroken rail link from Europe to Asia. They just can’t be BUILT in Turkey.
This also raises the question of turn order: presumably the official game will still have every power playing individual turns one after the other. However if we go to the other extreme and have “All Axis plays; then all Allies play” converting units isn’t even an issue.
Personally I’m in favour of something in the middle for both eras: in WWII I have Japan and USSR as separate factions; Germany and Italy are one; UK, F & USA are one faction as the Western Allies; making 4 blocks, each of which plays all of its members simultaneously.
For WWI I’d suggest Russia and Turkey as separate, but ALL then ALL turn order makes more sense for this game.
Regarding Russia & the Bolsheviks: A reminder that Germany surrendered while occupying about 3 times the tt it had when the war began. Just defaulting to the old “capture 2 capitals” idea will not work if the game is reasonably balanced; the game will likely go on forever. Therefore, there needs to be a mechanism for nations collapsing into disorder and revolution. This can happen to any power, but Russia is the familiar example.
Otherwise, how do you represent a power suddenly just dropping out of the game? The Allies tried to keep Russia going as an anti-German power, Germany supported the Bolsheviks. As the great powers descended into anarchy, civil wars and revolutions were going on all over Europe; if the game just ignores all this its a poor representation of history.@CWO:
It should be noted that Turkey was a major power in a limited sense, as it had no
modern industry. All mechanical weapons were imported from Europe.One factor to keep in mind is that, when Austria-Hungary occupied Serbia and when Bulgaria entered the war on the side of the Central Powers, these two events created an overland connection between Austria-Hungary and Turkey. So in one sense, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey had the advantage of being directly connected to each other by land from that point onward – unlike the Allies, who were geographically isolated from each other and whose Mediterranean/Black Sea connection route (which was far from ideal to begin with) was severed by Turkey.
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Japan, China and these “Bolsheviks” should not be any part of this game. Germany had just a few ships and very meager forces in China and some island groups. It is so marginal to combat on a strategic scale that it does not warrant any consideration. The Great War was mostly a European affair with some action in the middle east. To try to represent and model all these trifle little and meaningless struggles would be to the detriment of any decent Axis and Allies system. Honestly, if two guys fought with knifes in Brazil, somebody would want yet another set of freaking pieces to represent some game changing warfare…all they need is that Wikipedia entry to prove it.
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I remember TGW originally had turn order as:
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Germany
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France
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Austria
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Russia
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Ottoman
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UK
The problem was that Russia was quickly "1-2 punch"ed and taken out of the game by Germany and Austria.
The solution was a more “historical” turn order-
Austria (attacks Serbia, thus starting the war)
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Russia (counters by declaring war on Austria, in support of Serbia)
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Germany (declares war on Russia in support of Austria)
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France (declares war on Germany because, damnit, they hate Germany)
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Ottoman
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UK
This seemed to work a lot better, and maintained the original “back-and-forth” of the original turn order. But if the objective is to allow for a bit more team coordination, you could easily switch the Ottoman and UK turns, allowing Austria and Ottoman to collaborate in the Balkans, and the UK and France to coordinate their moves on the western front.
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Turns:
Each game turn constitutes four months (except the first) of real time outlined as follows:- August 1st - December 1914 9. May - August 1917
- January - April 1915 10. September - December 1917
- May - August 1915 11. January - April 1918
- September - December 1915 12. May - August 1918
- January - April 1916 13. September - December 1918
- May - August 1916 14. January - April 1919 (extended game)
- September - December 1916 15. May - August 1919
- January - April 1917
Turn order:
Turn 1 only: Austro-Hungary, Russia, Germany, France, England and Ottomans.
Turn 2 - till end of game: Russia, Central powers, Allied Powers.Note: Each nation must perform their turn individually on turn one. On later turns, Russia always moves first and separate from the other Allies. The Central Powers and Allies may move simultaneously when it is their sides turn.
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If I had to have 8 separate turns, my order would be:
Germany
Russia
Austria
France
Ottoman Empire
United Kingdom
Italy
USAAustria shelled Belgrade, but this was hardly a major action. The first big attack came from Germany, then Russia attacked in the East while Austria was dawdling between 2 fronts.
So for a 4 block game, I would have:
1. Germany (& Italy?)
2. Russia (& Italy?)
3. Austria (& Turkey)
4. France (& Britain, & USA)Turkey joins in round two (or perhaps when a battleship is delivered to the Sublime Porte…)
Britain joins after an attack on any neutral (only the CPs can ever attack neutrals!)
USA really needs a chart to track its attitude to war; its entry certainly shouldn’t be automatic after X turns.
Italy decides who to join in May 1915 (see my timetables attached)
http://www.emersonkent.com/map_archive/world_war_i_1914.htm
The Russian Civil War cost as least 3 million casualties. Hardly a bar-room brawl.
How do you represent the Russian Revolution? When and how does it happen? What do the Germans do - just stop at the borders? Is Russia declared off-limits (lets leave them alone while they fight among themselves?)
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Britain joins after an attack on any neutral (only the CPs can ever attack neutrals!)
USA really needs a chart to track its attitude to war; its entry certainly shouldn’t be automatic after X turns.
The game would be ruined since the Central powers would avoid UK the entire game, A variable entry USA is also a game breaker. It must be fixed because the games balancing would prove impossible. The game must be Historical, not full of nitpicking rules that destroy play balance.
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Would Britain have gone to war if Germany had avoided Belgium? Not certain.
What if Germany had not even attacked France?
At the very least, offer a number of scenarios leaving the possibility of unhistorical results.
American entry was based on so many factors that it is ridiculous to make it mandatory on turn X. Instead, each side should be able to influence it in various ways. It will always be likely, but if you make it and its date certain where’s the game?
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Would Britain have gone to war if Germany had avoided Belgium? Not certain.
What if Germany had not even attacked France?
At the very least, offer a number of scenarios leaving the possibility of unhistorical results.
American entry was based on so many factors that it is ridiculous to make it mandatory on turn X. Instead, each side should be able to influence it in various ways. It will always be likely, but if you make it and its date certain where’s the game?
The only way to make a balanced game is to allow Historical developments at specific times, not variable. American entry was assured after the Zimmerman note no need to figit with what happened. If it does not add to the game it does not need a place in the game. Axis and Allies is a broadstroke of History put in a game. It’s not supposed to account for every single incidental because these types of rules bog down an otherwise good game.
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@Imperious:
The only way to make a balanced game is to allow Historical developments at specific times, not variable. American entry was assured after the Zimmerman note no need to figit with what happened. If it does not add to the game it does not need a place in the game. Axis and Allies is a broadstroke of History put in a game. It’s not supposed to account for every single incidental because these types of rules bog down an otherwise good game.
I think that “to allow Historical developments at specific times” makes for a predictable game, rather than a balanced game, necessarily. This isn’t a bad thing, as this kind of predictability allows you to create a framework for balance.
I’m broadly of the opinion (usually pertaining to East & West but in all history-based wargames) that the game should only be as historical as it is balanced. If adding something historical ruins balance, edit it out/obfuscate it/whatever. If you can add in something historical to balance out a deficiency in the rules, all the better! I think this is the direction that the A&A franchise is going with National Objectives and such.
@Flashman:How do you represent the Russian Revolution? When and how does it happen? What do the Germans do - just stop at the borders? Is Russia declared off-limits (lets leave them alone while they fight among themselves?)
I am thinking you could borrow from A&A Europe (1999 version), where the territories that the USSR captured since the start of the war were coloured differently (this is also similar to Chinese territories under control of Japan in A&A Pacific, IIRC).
So, basically take the territory that (historically) was given to Germany in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, and colour that separately from the main Russian territory colour; have the rule be that if the CP capture all of those territories (or alternately, Russia’s capitol) then Russia is out of the war. CP units in other Russian territories are moved to the nearest friendly territory, perhaps. Have this as a sort of “Check For Victory†rule at the end of any turn or round. -
I’m most curious about the color for each nation
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I’d check out the MapView module for The Great War; IMHO they did a great job with the colours for the various countries (granted, there are only 6)
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Otherwise, how do you represent a power suddenly just dropping out of the game? The Allies tried to keep Russia going as an anti-German power, Germany supported the Bolsheviks. As the great powers descended into anarchy, civil wars and revolutions were going on all over Europe; if the game just ignores all this its a poor representation of history.
The British television series “The First World War” (based on Hew Strachan’s book of the same name) has an episode on strikes, revolts, mutinies and revolutions. It discusses the concept of revolution as a weapon of war: trying to prevent it on your own side (both in the army and on the home front) while simultaneously trying to encourage it in enemy countries. Germany succeeded in Russia (it helped Lenin get from Switzerland to Russia, ultimately resulting in the Bolshevik Revolution and the Russian surrender to Germany at Brest-Litovsk), and it had a partial success in Ireland (in the form of the Easter Rising). Britain lost a large number of man-hours to strikes, to which the government responded by ordering its negotiators to give the strikers what they wanted. The French Army mutinied in 1917, and was brought back into line through a mixture of reforms, concessions and executions. The Italian Army responded to excessively harsh policies from its highest officers by surrendering to the Autro-Hungarians in the tens (or possibly hundreds) of thousands. The German Navy mutinied in 1918 when its leaders planned a suicidal final sortie against the Royal Navy for the sole purpose of salvaging its honour. Austria-Hungary and Germany both underwent social collapse in the final months of the war. Ultimately, none of the regimes on the losing side survived the war: the Russian, German, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires were all destroyed, and the latter two were dismantled into a patchwork of successor states.
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Yeah, I know about all that, but I think the only way to represent it is a disorder and revolution chart similar to the IPC income chart. When a nation drops so far it falls into disorder; after another target is falls into revolution.
When all powers of one side are either defeated (occupied) or in revolution, the game ends. Indeed if the game is correctly balanced this is the ONLY way it can end, otherwise the stalemate continues forever. But a nation should always be recoverable, even after revolution; hence I prefer to put revolutionary forces in the game, rather than just placing a country off-limits.
@CWO:
Otherwise, how do you represent a power suddenly just dropping out of the game?� The Allies tried to keep Russia going as an anti-German power, Germany supported the Bolsheviks.� As the great powers descended into anarchy, civil wars and revolutions were going on all over Europe; if the game just ignores all this its a poor representation of history.
The British television series “The First World War” (based on Hew Strachan’s book of the same name) has an episode on strikes, revolts, mutinies and revolutions. It discusses the concept of revolution as a weapon of war: trying to prevent it on your own side (both in the army and on the home front) while simultaneously trying to encourage it in enemy countries. Germany succeeded in Russia (it helped Lenin get from Switzerland to Russia, ultimately resulting in the Bolshevik Revolution and the Russian surrender to Germany at Brest-Litovsk), and it had a partial success in Ireland (in the form of the Easter Rising). Britain lost a large number of man-hours to strikes, to which the government responded by ordering its negotiators to give the strikers what they wanted. The French Army mutinied in 1917, and was brought back into line through a mixture of reforms, concessions and executions. The Italian Army responded to excessively harsh policies from its highest officers by surrendering to the Autro-Hungarians in the tens (or possibly hundreds) of thousands. The German Navy mutinied in 1918 when its leaders planned a suicidal final sortie against the Royal Navy for the sole purpose of salvaging its honour. Austria-Hungary and Germany both underwent social collapse in the final months of the war. Ultimately, none of the regimes on the losing side survived the war: the Russian, German, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires were all destroyed, and the latter two were dismantled into a patchwork of successor states.
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