Nice feedback!
I can see the logic there, as it’s an endgame I’ve definitely played out before, but I just read it the other way. Where it’s usually German momentum rather than Russian momentum that ends up being so decisive to the gameplay.
The endgame advantage to Allies of those coastal factories existing seems somehow less compelling to me than the strong Axis endgame advantage they provide. And if it’s mainly about recovering factories post Moscow collapse, then I feel that strays even further from any kind of historical dimension to the thing.
I suppose what I’d like to see is a production spread that makes it easier for the Russians to hold the center, and which forces them to confront Japan by making this easier to do. As opposed to the Japanese walk in that A&A usually produces. Generally Russia is forced to abandon both Karelia and Caucasus to defend Moscow. Likely they would be forced to do the same with Kazakh and Vologda, but until that point they’d have a stronger incentive to try and hold in the face of a Japanese advance. Post Moscow collapse, having 2 interior factories instead of 2 coastal ones presents a logistical challenge for Axis. They will have more production than they can really spend for ground (with Moscow already contributing 8 production). But usually what Axis is a way to achieve Naval parity with Allies during the deep endgame, more than they need inland production for ground.
In the case of Super J (post Moscow, post Berlin), As Axis, I think I’d rather have a factory at the ready in Karelia or Caucasus as Axis stolen from Russia, than a pair in the Asian interior farther away from the action in Europe and the Med.
I just see that factory shift as producing a substantially different kind of gameplay than OOB. I don’t think it requires KJF, but it makes totally ignoring Japan much harder to justify.
Alternatively moving the Karelia factory to West Russia instead of Vologda could also be interesting. Though that might have other drawbacks, and Vologda was empty and worth 2, so I just went there haha.
ps. Watching “Soviet Storm” with its amusing music, silly CGI, and super high production values… crispy digital green-screen and the finest acting talent haha, has inspired me to once again revisit Russia with ideas to make the A&A play more interesting.
:-D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhXKlYnSWjA
I know I’m not the only one who finds that the Japanese conquest of Moscow, again and again on most A&A boards, is getting a little stale. I’ve even taken to dividing the game into two distinct kinds of “endgame”, the initial Endgame (the final rounds leading up to the fall of Moscow) and the Deep Endgame (how things shake down after Moscow falls.) Basically the scripted collapse of the center, and the way that effects everything else in the game, seems pretty distorting. With no NAP, and no way for Russia to fend off Japan, the game feels more one dimensional than it might otherwise. The whole Air Wall dynamic relates to the fact that Germany can advance so quickly, and then make up their production and shore up their logistics on the back end, via captured Russian facilities. I think it would be entertaining, if possible, to change the production spread in Russia through some simple means, so that the play around the center would involve a bit more back and forth, and where the fall of Moscow (if it occurs) would be truly decisive and equate to Axis victory, not just another inevitability. The factory tweak alone might not really achieve this completely, not the full on storm haha, but it could be a start.
:-D
