Our game groups world domination Global, simple balancing.


  • Hi,
    First post wow.

    Out of box simple balancing for world domination.
    In our gamegroup we played out of box and we found the game unbalanced for our taste ie. domination.
    What we did in order to balance Out of box was to add a bonus on philipines for US. We simply moved out a bonus on philipines that was stacking dpeending on the game result.
    When axis won the bonus became -1 of the previous result and when allies won the bonus in the next game stacked up by one.
    After a few games we had a bonus of 7 on philipines.
    This didnt fix all of our problems since the game got heavily scewed to all in europe strategy and abandoning the pacific.

    When AA+ rules got introduced we took the bonuses and kept the setup of the out of box, this is because of two reasons. When we started to play AA plus was under development, and 2 we didnt like to change the setup before we understood the game better. Since a game takes 10 h+ to play once well you do the math of when one can say how things will change.

    So currently we play with out of box setup and AA plus bonus rules, but we add a +5 bonus when germany controls all of france, and we reduce the bonus of not being in war and not violate french indochina to +5 for japan.
    We also allow building IC on neutral countries with +2 in production value (finland, persia, iraq Industrial centers are very interesting choices).

    What we like about these rules are the following:
    In our experience 20-30 games this setup is quite ok from a balancing perspective, a sligth edge for allies due to their economic advantage but not a total walkover.
    The +5 ic bonus for germany does help in defending for an american assault, but also makes a target for the allies of hitting france. The bonus does usually not kick in from round 2 and onwards so its not to imbalanced since it does not help sealion that much.

    Any comments?


  • I ll put in a bit of strategy in our gamegroup.

    Ill try ot put up the germany strategies:

    First barbarossa.
    In short the war on russia is either round 2 or 3 and seldom 4. Round 4 war on russia is when you try to hold the russians as bay and spend your resources on other things.

    First principle:
    The key to barbarossa is who controls easter poland, if russia manages to push you off this square you ll be in big trouble. But this is up for german player to decide since they spend the money on enough boots on the ground in order to control the square. From this square all manouvers as germany begins.
    In order to win this battle you need to calculate 2 rounds in advance since you see the russian troops standing on the field and also the amount that is walkng towards you. If oyu cut it short first round you need to seriously pull in more then him for the next round in order to be able to stand there anyways.
    Remember that he can get in 3 extra from leningrad buying takns also he can build loads of mech one lap and get in 20 untis very quickly. So you need to have a solid grip on the square.

    Second principle:
    You cant just run in and smash moscow, even though you have a extra +5  ipc from controlling france (our house rule). You have to starve the russiand before commencing the final assault.
    The best ways to starve russia is to deny the russians their warbonus and taking 4-5 ipc with Japan on the far east. The war bonus is easiest denied with buying a destroyer and place it on zone 125. Forcing USSR to kill it with planes or not having the bonus. If you havent a use for your BB Cruiser add it up there 4 hp is a lot for british planes too.

    Thrid Principle:
    Do you go for a offensive war or a defensive one?
    A defensive war is when you expect heavy allied push into europe, the key of defending as germany then is a factory in Finland. If you lose norway you lose loads of income and also a american norway factory (that can be upgraded to a big one) is only conutered by raising berlin and pulling up loads of infantry and hope Japan becomes a monster.
    Key here factory in Finland.

    Offensive war: Different paths.
    In order to go to war round 2 you need to do the yugoslavian jump with your inf and put up factorys.
    Here there is a lot of options: 1 rasie berlin reliy heavily on mechanized in order to pump into eastern poland. This is a expensive strategy but your strategic plan is when you reach 25-30 mech is that italy opens to leningrad or south russia this depends on russian players setup he chose to defend north or south. And then your bulk of mech goes where russians isnt (most often south). The key of raising Berlin here is that if you go south with your mech you can still defend berlin if the russians move onwards.

    The other option is to do a ultra push:
    That is to maximize the amount of troops that can hit R4 on belarus. (buy 1 DD, 2 inf berlin, 1 art berlin, 3 mech West germany), do yugoslavia jump. R2, go towards east poland, build a IC in poland, and romania. Build 8 mech 2 tanks. Then on round 4 you got a nice attack on belarus and you got 2 factories on the front pushing the russiand back.

    Round 3 war: here one can go with 3 small ic in finland, poland, romania. Then get a bulk of inf/art into eastern poland, this is a slow strategy that is bit though if allies go all in europe. But hey then you got a defensive factory in finland that defends norway (also you got a indirect threat on russia if he decides to go for your finland factory by pushing the middle).

    Another strategy is to go with transports on round 2 and few small factories in poland (romania?).
    This strategy is based on forcing and keeping leningrad by shipping in units to leningrad and putting pressure on the center. This is best combined with a DD, IC poland R1 and war on R2 (yugoslavian jump).
    I’ve never played with it so the details are not upto what I want to present as a strategy.

    Alternative strategies:
    One of them is relied on building the yugoslavian factory and maybe building a carrier R1. This puts a lot of ipc on the sea so a defensive russian campaing is a must against a good russian player.
    In the yugoslavian strategy and the carrier pulling the german northenfleet down to gibraltar and into mediterrean
    is that UK london cant build a IC in Egypt without you having the option of smashing it. Since you can pull in 2-4 german transports and air onto alewxandria.
    Now this implied threat is better then actually building the transports so one of the better uses of the yugo factory is to pull in one transport and then pull in troops into eastern poland which is the key defence square for you to fend of the russians. This takes a lot of calculations in order to pull off since you must control EP and this is depending on the losses of air and troops in germany R1/R2.

    In this plan you want to lower UK londons income a lot and subs in canada is a good start (having lost few troops in france and air on sea and having 2 subs alive outside canada is probably a must for this selection to be a good plan).

    The fleet on gibraltar is quite annoying for US since you can hit panama and let a japanese fleet sail into the atlantic. Another idea is to have low planes count on the fleet and let japanses planes from Zone 11 land on this carrier.
    It can also obviously hit canada (this manouver sux and should not be mentioned) and washington etc. Both these plans can be blocked by US but still it foreces him to do something and sometimes they bungle up later on since people get tired under constant longterm pressure.

    Turkey smash:

    This is a R3/R4 german strategy: Build a factor R2 on finland, yugoslavia and romania.
    Place bulk of mech in bulgaria on R3, the inf close to eastern poland. You need serious low losses in paris, air on sea for this one also you need to do calculations on mech/tank combos and how to check eastern poland the key square on russiand front).
    Build a few artillery in finland, every round in order to take sweden. Set up japan with a attack on mongolia (probably a factory in manchuria).
    R4 smash turkey and build a factory in grece, go south, use italian fleet to hit caucasus and try to force turkey.

    Tactics:

    I like the following attacks (the buys are strategy dependent in order to do the strategies above you have to amend your buys from R1).
    Hit all in on france with landforce.

    On sea:
    2 subs on Canada transport/destroyer
    1 sub 1 figther on zone 109 (outside UK).
    1 sub on each battleship have 3 planes on both these battles.
    Situation dependent hits:

    Yugoslavia if germany wants to go yugoslavia factory they need to win here, and then R3 war with russia is earliest option). If they go for R2 barbarossa aim for 3 hits and retreat inf artillery from Germay to russian front. Let italy take bulgaria and use those 4 inf to take grece for you.
    If you go carrier then hit with one plane on the double cruisers outside denmark and your fleet, if they socre double tap take cruiser or plane depending on situation (and opposition!!).
    Else leave these (buy a sub so you can hunt them lateron).
    If oyu leave the cruisers you got a spare plane, use it either on the Battleship/cruiser combo outside scotland or put in a tactical bomber into paris battle (saving you on average 3 ipc).


  • Japan strategies:

    You got the following to handle: 18 russians in the north, a exponentionally growing plague called the chinese, 2 very rich neighbours in the form of India and Anzac. And a jolly green giant of a monster.

    You got loads of planes, thats good, very few infantry on the ground and horrible logistics.

    Now:

    In order to be quite organized ill try to write one front at a time.
    Russian front:
    The key here is to starve russians of 4 ipc, but the goal here is to gain these 4 ipc in order to survive., this is easy to do pull up 1 or 2 transports and take the far east provinces J1.
    2 transports if russiand sent a plane to the far east, thus denying landinzones. If russians mass up on the border hit with all you got, then adapt strategies.

    Chinese front:

    Walk in with what you got, hit the chinese in the south with 2 or 3 infantry and 4-6 planes. Land 10-12 planes on the square next to hong kong. These babies are there if china decides to pull up their bulk on the burma route then you hit with 12 planes and whipe out the chinese and hopefully you dont lose more then 4-5 planes.
    Now you also got 1 decision to make, do you want to close the burma route or not. Closing the route is 1 transport lands 2 dudes to the far south. take frenchindochina with 2 infantry and walk down 1 mech from russian front. Hit with 2 infantry on the 3 stack, take a plane in losses if needed.
    I prefer to do a mix of this depending on other allocations of troops.

    South ocean front (the amount of ships you sail down the coast of china).
    I think you need a fleet of 7-10 hp and at least 2 DD on this fleet in order to push on with it, else you need 7 hp in order to stand outside french indochina holding your transport and ground alive and waiting for reinforcements from japan or builing in IC french indochina).

    Hawaii front:
    Either you mass your fleet at caroline island and try to keep the amerians at bay and go with your fleet to the islands and forcing them with few transportlosses (you can hit blockers then sail fleet trough and guard the transports that comes from frenchindochina sea, japan sea).

    Or you pull in 2-3 carriers, a BB or two one or two destroyers the sub and a tranpsort place yourself onto of hawaii. Build a strikeforce on hawaii on sea of japan (2 subs 2 tranports or 1 carrier 1 transport). The first strategy if you sent a 7-9 hp fleet south to french indo china, second if you sent 3 carriers to hawaii, if so that carrier is aimed for the islands at the south ocean front.

    on round 2 you sail your fleet towards india on the south front in peace of course, and also you sail your fleet to a mix of zone 11/12. The tranport should not be blockable. Zone 11 is for sending carrier aircraft to german carrier on gibraltar and/or sending enough of the fleet into atlantic if germany opens panama.

    You migth want to declare war on J2 depending on the situation (read payoff), what you have done is to threaten US on hawaii, west coast, panama.
    If US leaves pacific and focuses on atlantic then you ll really like if you build 2 subs J1, since now you got 3-4 subs stealing IP on US west coast and you kill off his income since you control 2 of his bonuses (philipines, hawaii). Next stop is to claim solomon island in order to reduce Anzac to the midget he is. Or go for malaysia in order to get a large factory (this is easy for india to defend by having loads of planes and infantry there J2/3 hard to brute force it after J4 its harder).

    Choices:
    Builds and mixes, and where to land planes is very situationdependent and very though calcutaltions.
    But rule of thumbs: 1 bomber next to hong kong is good to kill off a UK transport on sumatra.
    mid area in china availible on J2 (anwe or what its called) can hit both russian front and burma route. Also you can land planes in a factory in french indochina.
    Having 2-3 figthers on caroline island stops pesky transports taking the spot.

    But in all Japan is very situation dependent and you need to play response game to some extent if you try to go for all fronts like above.



  • Where is the axis & allies global 1940 domination thread, ie no victory cities ?
    This victory cities is just artificial rules in order to make a strange game, this game (even with AA rules) is balanced with the principle of catching a runner with a laborgini, its just a matter of how far back you start with the lamborgini…


  • @wrath3:

    Where is the axis & allies global 1940 domination thread, ie no victory cities ?
    This victory cities is just artificial rules in order to make a strange game, this game (even with AA rules) is balanced with the principle of catching a runner with a laborgini, its just a matter of how far back you start with the lamborgini…

    If I remember correctly A&A always had VCs.  A larger map means more VCs and slightly different VC rules, that’s all.


  • VC is for viet congs. And even them played to win the war and not the cities.
    Limiting the game to VC takes away a lot of different strategies and we don’t like linearity, we prefer organized chaos/creativity.


  • @wrath3:

    VC is for viet congs. And even them played to win the war and not the cities.
    Limiting the game to VC takes away a lot of different strategies and we don’t like linearity, we prefer organized chaos/creativity.

    I’d call Saigon a victory city within the Vietnam war.

    Wars are mostly won/decided by taking cities.


  • @wrath3:

    VC is for viet congs. And even them played to win the war and not the cities.
    Limiting the game to VC takes away a lot of different strategies and we don’t like linearity, we prefer organized chaos/creativity.

    What strategies exactly are taken away?


  • What he is trying to say at least I believe is that the strategies will always focus around capturing VC. He prefers creative strategies where VC are unimportant and the idea is to knock out your opponent. The problem in his logic is that this is a historical game and historically there were certain cities that were essential to winning the war. Capturing Paris won the war against France, the German failure to take Stalingrad was a turning point in the Eastern campaign, so on and so forth. While I can understand his point the fact is that the victory cities are located in the strategic centers (for the most part) even if there were no VC in them those are still the territories you would want to attack and take over so it kind of makes the arguement null and void.

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