I see your concerns that this could cause internal conflict between the two US commanders. But well, to be a little candid … this is exactly what we were hoping it would create. heheh…
I’ve only played this way one time a few months ago in a game that we didn’t even fully finish. I was Pacific Command and fortunately, a friend of mine whom I value his strategic judgment, was European Command. Therefore, we could come to agreements relatively easy.
To do this right, it requires a bit of roll-playing. Each US commander has to assume the roll of a general/admiral competing for resources in Washington to accomplish his/her mission.
In the end, ALL USA income arrives to the US Treasury in Washington. Also, USA requires the ability to throw tons of resources into alternating European and Pacific theaters in order to gain supremacy when the time is needed to do so. … If the resources are constantly divided relatively evenly between the two theaters, it will be difficult to dominate the Atlantic and launch an Operation Torch. Alternately, it will be equally difficult to crank out enough naval units in the Pacific to make the Japanese regret they ever even contemplated taking the Philippines.
Therefore, the philosophy we were hoping to adopt in the “One Nation, Two Players, One Economy” USA rule is that of maybe Nimitz and King competing for respective naval resources in their Pacific and Atlantic theaters. And it should get a little heated … but never hostal.
For people who might be in to this, maybe a good way forward would be to have the Russian player act as the “President / Congress / Defense Secretary”? Since Russia has interest in both the Atlantic and Pacific theaters (let’s face it, it sucks if India becomes Japanese for the Russians … you can pretty much say goodbye to the Caucuses), that player could help be a tie-breaker if and agreement cannot be reached.
Anyway … just something to kick around. If we ever have another 8-player game we’ll give it a shot over/down here again with the Russian mediator. … But I understand that a “divided economy” way could be used … or maybe a “guaranteed income” for each US theater an only have perhaps 20 IPCs that need to be decided upon etc … there are lots of ways to do it. Would be interesting to read some of the ways this has been attempted before.