To do a basic comparison here. Check the maths if you want.
France is faced with a German stack of 12 infantry.
Compare
Case A: France attacks with 18 infantry (54 IPCs).
Case B: France attacks with 6 infantry & 6 tanks (54 IPCs).
The upshot is that in Case A, France eventually wins and is left with 10 infantry (30 IPCs).
In case B, France wins and is left with 2 infantry & 6 tanks (39 IPCs). It could of course choose to take tanks as casualties, but this rather defeats the object of building tank stacks.
On the face of it, the mixed stack is the better investment.
But hold on:
The victorious mixed army is in a poor state defensively with only 2@3 & 6@1 if attacked.
Perhaps more importantly, it took 4 combat rounds for the mixed force to eliminate the Germans. It took the all-infantry French army only 2. Without rail movement, the time it takes to bring up reinforcements is crucial, so if you’re driving into enemy tt you really need to capture areas quickly before they can restack their infantry defences.
To do a basic comparison here. Check the maths if you want.
France is faced with a German stack of 12 infantry.
Compare
Case A: France attacks with 18 infantry (54 IPCs).
Case B: France attacks with 6 infantry & 6 tanks (54 IPCs).
The upshot is that in Case A, France eventually wins and is left with 10 infantry (30 IPCs).
In case B, France wins and is left with 2 infantry & 6 tanks (39 IPCs). It could of course choose to take tanks as casualties, but this rather defeats the object of building tank stacks.
On the face of it, the mixed stack is the better investment.
But hold on:
The victorious mixed army is in a poor state defensively with only 2@3 & 6@1 if attacked.
Perhaps more importantly, it took 4 combat rounds for the mixed force to eliminate the Germans. It took the all-infantry French army only 2. Without rail movement, the time it takes to bring up reinforcements is crucial, so if you’re driving into enemy tt you really need to capture areas quickly before they can restack their infantry defences.
Of course, in scenario A you lost 8 Inf and in scenario B you only lost 4 Inf. If you can win and hold the territory against counterattack, the tank stack is superior in some ways. In addition, you would likely want to be using a tank stack in conjunction with artillery and aircraft.
Granted, in every Axis & Allies board game, rookie move #1 is to attack with infantry and tanks only to leave a tank stack vulnerable to counter attack. This is pretty much what you are talking about. This doesn’t change in AA1914.
2. The cost of tanks will be reduced
3. The attack value of tanks will be increased to 3/4
I figure Larry run the numbers in his pc to make it balanced, so no need to complain.
And do remember that a matching art boost the tank up to a 3 in attack. It looks like Larry want to favour a player that purchase a variety of units.
France is faced with a German stack of 12 infantry.
Compare
Case A: France attacks with 18 infantry (54 IPCs).
Case B: France attacks with 6 infantry & 6 tanks (54 IPCs).
The upshot is that in Case A, France eventually wins and is left with 10 infantry (30 IPCs).
In case B, France wins and is left with 2 infantry & 6 tanks (39 IPCs). It could of course choose to take tanks as casualties, but this rather defeats the object of building tank stacks.
…and case C, France attacks with 8 inf, 3 art, 2 tanks and 1 aircraft (54 IPC)
Air supremacy make all 3 art attack on 4 or less, and the art boost up the 2 tanks and 3 inf to attack at 3 or less, and the rest of the inf attack at 2 or less.
This combo will likely get 6 to 7 hits.
The 12 defending inf will get 6 hits, but our 2 tanks will soak up two of the hits, so we only lose 4 inf.
Now the defender has lost units of 21 IPC’s value, while we only lost units of 12 IPC’s value.
And compared to case A, we have saved units of 24 IPC’s value, and to case B we have saved 3 IPC’s.
But when case C defend, they will make at least 5 or more hits on the enemy, while case B will make 2 hits.
I like your thinking Razor
That’s hardly fair, as you’ve given yourself an automatic air supremacy win. I left out planes and artillery on both sides to keep the experiment pure. I will examine your theory in due course.
Another issue to factor in:
Because of the multinational army rules, a unit can only ever attack once in a game round. However, it may be attacked 2 or even 3 times. This gives the all-infantry buy an even greater benefit over tank mixes.
Hasn’t that always been the case Flashman?
Has what always been the case? This is a completely new combat system.
Regarding Razor’s theoretical attack; is he correct in assuming that each artillery can boost an infantry AND a tank?
I had worked on the assumption that it was an infantry OR a tank.
If it’s both I’ll have to recalculate.
If it’s either, my conclusion is that with the forces listed (including 2 tanks) you will save marginally more material (though including tanks poor in defence), while if you left out the tanks for 4 extra infantry you’d be left with a slightly weaker surviving army BUT you’d wipe out the enemy a whole turn earlier. Therefore, if the aim of buying tanks is to break through enemy lines and drive toward his capital you’ll find its a false economy; you’re actually slowing down your rate of progress.
Has what always been the case? This is a completely new combat system.
I think what he means is: Hasn’t it always been the case that a unit can only attack once, and yet can be attacked multiple times (from multiple nations)?
Yes, that was what I meant. It’s always been the case that Germany can only attack once, yet in theory it can be counter attacked by up to three nations, so it always needs to be wary of taking a new territory with insufficient infantry.
OK, but the issue is more acute here when we consider the huge difference in combat effectiveness that tanks have changing from attack to defence.
I can see scenarios where the Allies deliberately make 2 or 3 successive attacks on German tts with tank units, simply to exploit the sitting duck nature of defending armour.
It may well be that the best use of tanks is in a single attack round, taking the tanks as casualties and leaving well entrenched infantry behind. But then again, why not just invest the money in infantry in the first place?
The final word on tanks will come down to the official ruling on the AND/OR artillery support issue.
From the Talk to Larry A&A WWI forum on HGD, page 41 (posted Jan, 14, 2013):
Hey WB…
- What are the values for some of the units (attack/def/move/cost)
That depends on the values the battle-board assigns to them. It depends on the influence of some of the combined arms. For example. If you have air superiority all you artillery are promoted up a hit point. For each artillery present one infantry or one armor unit is promoted up a hit point. It�s all about the battle-board.
http://www.harrisgamedesign.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=93&start=320
Edit: Forgot to add, this was posted by Larry.
OK, but the issue is more acute here when we consider the huge difference in combat effectiveness that tanks have changing from attack to defence.
What I’m wondering is: What happened between WW1 and WW2 that made tanks 3X more effective at defense? I know tanks in this period were used mainly for offense (because the Allies were pretty much the only ones who had them, and they were on the offensive), but what’s to say a tank sitting still couldn’t contribute a lot to defense?
So Razor’s math is invalid.
WWI tanks were about reaching and overcoming obstacles such as barbed wire and trenches, preparing the way for infantry. They did have armament, but of rather limited effect compared to WWII vehicles. Essentially, they were designed to lead infantry assaults.
WWII tanks (at least after 1941) were principally mobile artillery platforms, and as such were as powerful in defence as attack.
I agree with the way tanks are depicted in the new game; I just feel that they may be a little overpriced, or under-powered in attack. By slowing down the combat, they defeat the object of a breakthrough weapon…
But I’ll need to see them in action to be sure.
It’d be kind of cool if there was some sort of breakthrough rule…like, if a territory is captured (read: overrun), the attacking player may move all his tanks and 1 inf per tank to a territory adjacent to the captured territory, and may engage in another combat round there. That’d give an awesome incentive for buying tanks, and it’d be pretty accurate to what they were actually used for.
Looks like Artillery will be the new King, very cost effecient.
With air supremacy all your artilleries will hit on 4 or less. This is going to be strong.
During amphibious assaults all defending artilleries fire a pre-emptive strike against the invading land units, just like the Blockhuse from A&A D-day, and the casualties are removed before return of fire. On top of that, the artillery can roll again in the general combat. Very strong.
Make them even stronger:
If a side has uncontested air superiority, its artillery all get to fire a preemptive opening barrage before the main battle begins.
The enemy can reply with its own barrage, but not before removing casualties.
This might be considered in conjunction with upgrading tanks.
Could you envision tanks being heavily used in the Western Front by 1 of each of the Entente and CP? I have not thought about turn order and may not even work but if there is a large amount of German/Austrian & British/French cooperation what about one nation focusing on tanks while the other mainly on infantry to support? Tanks go in first to soak up the hits before the infantry stacks move in to support and to protect the armour from counter-attacks.
Not quite sure what you mean, multinational armies cannot attack together. Tanks attacking without infantry and artillery would do too little damage.
I’m yet to be convinced that tanks are worth buying, but maybe something alone these lines might work.
