Game report for 1914…from Larry Harris
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Larry did mention the Romanian troops could either be reinforced or pulled back on Russia’s turn, so I’m assuming that yes, on your strategic movement phase you can abandon contested territories. There should be nothing to stop you from doing this of course, it happened several times during the war.
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So, when two sides are facing each other over some 100 yards of no man’s land, one of them can just decide to up and walk away, and the enemy will just wave to them and cry “cheerio!”, rather than shell them or pursue with cavalry?
Oh, I forgot - no cavalry.
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So, when two sides are facing each other over some 100 yards of no man’s land, one of them can just decide to up and walk away, and the enemy will just wave to them and cry “cheerio!”, rather than shell them or pursue with cavalry?
Oh, I forgot - no cavalry.
Yes? Hell they did it when the enemy was 25 yards away. Look at Gallipoli, not a man killed. The German withdrawl from the Somme to the Hindenburg line, both large scale operations within close contact with the enemy that went off without much fanfare and often caught the opposing forces off guard. It’s not like they put up signs saying “we are leaving, please do not shell us during the hours of 0200-1200”. But instead falling back on well laid out timetables and defensive positions.
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Gallipoli was by sea at night, hardly the same thing. The Turks were probably glad to let them go…
But as someone had suggested on HGD, you’ll probably always prefer to leave a single infantry in there just to stop the enemy controlling the tt automatically, and to impede his future movements. That is (I assume) he’ll have to spend a turn attacking the lone defender before he can move units through the tt.
Its a return of the “nuisance” attacker, used to block defenders retreat routes in some systems.
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Looking again at the setup picture, I think Turkey AND Russia have ships in the Black Sea. However, the Russian ship may well be “in port” (Sebastopol?), with the Turk on the open sea. From what LH said about the Austrian navy it seems that ships can indeed stay in port - another improvement I’ve been campaigning for.
The Austrian dreadnought also looks like it may be moored at Trieste. I just hope the size of the pieces and board doesn’t lead to arguments over which ships were and were not in port…
On the other hand the Black Sea may be two SZs and I’m completely wrong…Shouldn’t Germany have a cruiser in the Madagascar SZ?
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Not sure if the parent thread has been linked or not, here it is:
http://harrisgamedesign.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=44&t=16531
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So, when two sides are facing each other over some 100 yards of no man’s land, one of them can just decide to up and walk away, and the enemy will just wave to them and cry “cheerio!”, rather than shell them or pursue with cavalry?
Oh, I forgot - no cavalry.
They certainly don’t ‘walk away’ into another battle from a battle. They retire from combat, get pulled out of line to regroup, etc.
Cavalry didn’t cover retreats in this war except sporadically in the middle east theater.
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It’s been said that if Germany had cavalry in the west in 1918 they could have exploited the gains of the Spring offensive much better. By that time, their cavalry was almost all stationed on the eastern front, holding down the tt ceded by russia.
The Allied kept large cavalry units in the west throughout, but they were kept in reserve waiting for a breakthrough that never came. Only in the Hundred Days Battles did they have the chance, and played a big part in rounding up German prisoners.
As I understand the combat rules, a lone tank attacking a single defender is effectively invulnerable. It might be worth using tanks for nuisance attacks, forcing contested status on lightly defender areas.
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Looking again at the setup picture, I think Turkey AND Russia have ships in the Black Sea.
You cant rely on this, not one of these pics were ever accurate in any AA game. Some blockhead just set up these pieces and they didn’t get in the planes or tanks, so they just thru together whatever they had at the time.
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It’s been said that if Germany had cavalry in the west in 1918 they could have exploited the gains of the Spring offensive much better. By that time, their cavalry was almost all stationed on the eastern front, holding down the tt ceded by russia.
The Allied kept large cavalry units in the west throughout, but they were kept in reserve waiting for a breakthrough that never came. Only in the Hundred Days Battles did they have the chance, and played a big part in rounding up German prisoners.
As I understand the combat rules, a lone tank attacking a single defender is effectively invulnerable. It might be worth using tanks for nuisance attacks, forcing contested status on lightly defender areas.
The game has no Cavalry, why talk about it?
Tanks reduce hits in this game, so buying them saves “lives”…but you have to have infantry because of the pairing rules bonus.
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A little confused on some points:
When we get to the battle board, Larry says you have to have at least one infantry survive as the last unit, even if it means taking other units as casualties. Got that. But does this mean that you cannot have stacks in land areas which contain no infantry?
Does it mean that, for example, you could not station aircraft in a rear area without infantry present, because they wouldn’t be able to fight if attacked?Also says that infantry of a friendly power do not count - does this mean that friendly units can fight in an attack, or just when defending?
For example, the “Alsace-Lorraine” area is contested between 5 French and 5 German units. The British move 5 units in to attack the Germans. Do we assume that the French units sit in their trenches holding their own sector of the front, and cannot participate or be taken as casualties? If so, the reference in the battle board description is curious.
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But there aren’t any planes or tanks to start with. My guess is that its accurate. Although its curious there are no French is central Africa…
@Imperious:
Looking again at the setup picture, I think Turkey AND Russia have ships in the Black Sea.
You cant rely on this, not one of these pics were ever accurate in any AA game. Some blockhead just set up these pieces and they didn’t get in the planes or tanks, so they just thru together whatever they had at the time.
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I guarantee you that setup is wrong. 100%.
When we get to the battle board, Larry says you have to have at least one infantry survive as the last unit, even if it means taking other units as casualties. Got that. But does this mean that you cannot have stacks in land areas which contain no infantry?
Does it mean that, for example, you could not station aircraft in a rear area without infantry present, because they wouldn’t be able to fight if attacked?He didn’t say that yet but it makes sense. I bet you need one infantry to claim even income ( sort of a garrison rule)
Also says that infantry of a friendly power do not count - does this mean that friendly units can fight in an attack, or just when defending?
Turns are separate, so only in defense they roll together.
For example, the “Alsace-Lorraine” area is contested between 5 French and 5 German units. The British move 5 units in to attack the Germans. Do we assume that the French units sit in their trenches holding their own sector of the front, and cannot participate or be taken as casualties? If so, the reference in the battle board description is curious.
If that happens it has not been established how that works based on the current information.
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Well looking at a blown up picture of the map setup, all of the Austrian units that Larry used in his attacks are where he said they would be (He leaves one inf in the territories he moves troops from)…so it could be accurate.
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Well looking at a blown up picture of the map setup, all of the Austrian units that Larry used in his attacks are where he said they would be (He leaves one inf in the territories he moves troops from)…so it could be accurate.
Yet USA and Italy are using red chips instead of blue…
They always have inaccurate pictures of a set-up, I doubt it would be correct this time. -
On the topic of long range artillery, the best way to house rule them in at a later date will be with Grey AA guns cannibalized from other AA games. (with so many country colors, this would be the easiest and cheapest way)
All in all, I like how this is shaping up.
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Just use the ones from the other game when it comes out.
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@Imperious:
I guarantee you that setup is wrong. 100%.
But that is not to say that the setup is 100% wrong. Just because we can’t trust the setup does not mean that what see see on there won’t be there. Like all promo pictures so far, it would be safe to assume a lot is the same and a lot is different.
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I didn’t say it was 100% inaccurate. I said that the setup is not totally accurate, and i am 100% sure of this. Probably 20% of it is accurate because those areas have at least one infantry.
The pieces we see are the ones that will be in the game, just that many of the pieces are not even on the map…for anybody.
This is typical because WOTC does not always have ready the pieces when the picture is taken. Very typical for them.
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This seems pretty cool thus far! Does anyone else feel just 4 rounds to get to 1917 seems a little quick though? Especially since decisive battles will be few and far between with one round attacks? The CP has just 4 attacks to crush the allies before America and it’s power house economy comes over and puts the hurt on. If the game follows history the CP is done once the US shows up in numbers. They really needed to take France out before then to win, but maybe it will take the U.S. a couple rounds to really do anything. Over all I’m liking the rules, but still wish there was a blow up box for the Western front.
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