Revised 1939 Map

I believe around the year 2004 I purchased two great axis and allies maps created by a gentleman by the name of Ralph Boerke from Waterloo Canada.  The maps were laminated and the first one was a 1942 world map.  The second one was a Europe only map.  Anyways I just found both maps at my parents house. I have played the world map and loved it as Ralph included different rules for his game.  The Europe only map is huge! I never played it though :(. Has anyone ever played this A&A Europe map created by Ralph?  I know he was working on a pacific map also and wondered if he ever released it?

@Skyian_Leader:

Any tips on game/map design? Like things to avoid doing? I might just need to finish up the map and post a photo of it so you experts can actually see it, instead of general assumptions.

The best advice on this will come from the board’s various map-making people, like Imperious Leader.  I’ve never made wargaming maps, but here are a few thoughts for whatever they’re worth.

I personally prefer area-movement maps (like in most of the A&A games) over squares and hexes.  They look more natural to me and better suited (in my opinion) to games that operate at the global/strategic level.  This is due to the fact that, at that level, things like combat and movement and the depiction of the military forces involved occur at a very high level of abstraction – so it doesn’t seem like a good fit to combine this abstraction with the kind of fine-scale movement tracking that hexes offer.  Hexes, to me, only work well for large-scale actions when tracking is a central game element, such as in hunt-the-Bismarck type games.  On another point, I find it annoying that hexes only allow straight-line movement in six of the eight main compass directions.  Hexes are better than squares in that regard (since squares only allow straight-line movement in four directons), but they still don’t permit movement in one of the two diagonal axes.

One idea you might want to consider, on the issue of map zone size adequacy, is to use a split-representation system along the lines of the “task force markers” that were used in the original A&A Pacific game.  In such a system, the plastic sculpts corresponding to a particular group of forces are placed off the game map (on a side table) rather than on the map, along with a small numbered identifying marker.  A corresponding marker is placed on the map to mark the position of the force group.  That way, the map sections only need to be big enough to accommodate these small markers rather than a pile of sculpts, and you only need to move the markers from position to position rather than the sculpts.

As a further refinement, you can even use this system (if you’re so inclined) to introduce partial blinding into the game.  This involves keeping your map markers face-down until they make contact with enemy markers (which are also face down).  Before the markers make contact (at which point they are both turned face up), each side knows the composition of the enemy’s various forces (seen via the groups of off-the-board sculpts) and the position of the enemy’s various forces (seen via the map markers), but remains unaware of which group of sculpts corresponds to which map marker. This makes possible the element of surprise, which is absent in a conventional A&A game in which you can always see every detail of the enemy’s forces.  The old Stratego game works a bit like that, in the sense that you know what pieces the enemy has and you know where on the board the enemy has pieces, but you don’t know the specific unit type of each piece until you make contact with it.

– Personally I would like to discuss the distribution of nations.

5,5,6,6,5 distribution might not be the ideal numbers… I moved china up to regional and dutch and turkey into minors to facilitate more middle map and southern asia play.
I guess the main question is, would the selection be more balanced if it was 6,6,6,9 or 6,6,6,6,3 instead of having the odd numbers in major and regional, and if yes, what list would make gameplay sense, as well as somewhat historically correct in their potential of projected power.

to quote the list as per first post:

Major Powers:
US (+Asia)
Japan
Germany
Briton (+Africa)
Russia

Regional Powers:
Italy (+Africa)
France (+Africa, Asia)
India (Asia)
Anzac
China

Minor Nations:
Canada
South Africa (Annexed: Angola, Mozambique)
Finland
Hungary  (Annexed: Romania, Bulgaria)
Turkey
Dutch territories (Holland, Asia islands)

(active) Neutral Influences
Scandinavia (formed between Sweden and Norway)
Poland (Annexed: Baltic States)
Spain
Greece (Annexed: Yugoslavia)
Iran
Thailand (Formed between Siam, French Indochina, Saigon)

(Idle) Neutral Influences
Communist China
Mongolia
Brazil: South America
Chile: South America (formed between Chile, Peru, Columbia, Venezuela)
Argentina: South America (formed between Corrientes, Viedma, Santa Cruz)

Oil Conglomerates
Saudi Arabia (Formed between Medina, Riyadh, Rub Al Khali)

in order to maintain a semblance of balance on the board I would consider moving India into the major powers list, renaming it as the British empire (with no tie to briton of course)

This would even out the totals to 6,4,6,6,5  The only real draw back of this would be in larger games of 6+  the 7th, and 8th player would need extra balancing in order to compete (ie extra nation or something)

any thoughts?

@Gargantua:

Does anyone have a copy of the map?

I would also like to have a copy. Anyone?

Its pictures from over a year ago.

I will post 1939 AARHE map pics soon

ok great.

theres people,cash,metal,gold/preciosjewls,wood,rock,oil, opps only 7