@17Mark71: Yes I know the rest of them surrendered, but if the Germans haven’t invaded France yet then Dunkirk hasn’t happened yet……right? look, dunkirk is some 10 or 20 kilometers from belgium. no real distance, though. and: IT IS JUST A GAME! (a really good one!)

We both had prior family engagements, thought I mentioned that in our last email, and Germany was a paper tiger after the sealion bid and all the failed tech rolls. Yes you were pushing India, and I probably would have lost it, but the us fleet was moving and ready to rumble, not to mention ANZAC actually had a BB and a fully loaded AC fleet ready to move! UK had sealed up Africa and Germany had a one layer offensive into Russia (no backup inf on the way). By the way you slipped the +10 IPC for Japan rule into the original Alpha setup when we played. That is part of the improved Alpha i think, Jim and I had never played with the Alpha setup before that so we never noticed. I still think it would have been close. But I distinctly remembering you folding during the auction due to time after we decided to call it (9 hours of game-play) but I may be wrong. Also I will send you some links concerning the tactical game I mentioned that we should demo next year at Ellis Con. I have made Terrain and stuff for it over the past few weeks. Its Axis & Allies on steroids.

Our group has played with India and UK as seperate parts of the Commonwealth (Global 39 has the FEC {Far East Command} and the uk seperate}).  The allies have to work together and nt compete against each other.  The ANZAC player already has to share the DEI with India if either of them are going to have any real income to work with.  India and UK can work together as seperate players. AS for the thread, build destroyers in Canada to hunt subs to work on your NO (no German Uboats in the Atlantic).  Also, bomg Germany in West Germany, Paris, Normandy…where ever you can hit them.  You may not be able to ivade effectively by yourself but you can harrass the German player enough that he has to pay attention to the Uk as well as smash the Soviets.  Landings in Norway and fortifying it takes away from Germany and opens another route to aid the Soviets.  Securing the Northern flank can help Leningrad or if need be retake it for the Soviets.  Zhukov44 was right.  Don’t lose Cairo.  Trops build in South Africa of tanks and mechs can help hold Cairo and even destroy the North African Italian army.  A IC build in Cairo, once secured will help limmit Italy and secure a route for US troops the attack the soft underside of Europe (usually not that well defended by the axis).  One last thing is hold Gibraltor if possible.  Building and air base there and sending some fighters can make US entry into the med so much easier.  It also  allows allied ships into the med to keep the Italians from their Med naval NO if the British med navy didn’t fare so well.

@Pelanderfunk: I like the early attacks against the US, but it looks like Russia was becoming a problem. The attacks against America were half baked - I was still at the drawing board but jumped in anyway. A bigger problem than Russia is UK in Africa, the Mediterranean, and South East Europe.  If Italy were an asset to Europe and not a liability, I think I could deal with the Russians.  In fact, if I could lock UK out of the Med (without extra effort from Japan or Germany) I would combine the Japanese North American campaign with Sea Lion and be sitting pretty. What to do about that pesky Med…

LOL , snuck in as an Morroccan  dancing girl . Not yet familiar with all the abv.

Wilk, I read through some of your posts. You seem to have a lot of questions. We’re happy to help, but I have to ask what materials you have for AAG40? Do you have the actual game to reference or are you part of a group and there’s only one copy you guys are sharing? One answer that might help is that the second edition of Axis&Allies Global 1940 has the most up to date official rules set. The alphas were for the first editions. If you have the manual you will want to read the rules very carefully and thoroughly.  Its easy to miss things in this edition. As for a picture I don’t know of one available that will suit your needs. Even if there was one, because the game is so large your avaerage sheet of paper is too small to see enough detail to use as a handout most likely. CWOMarc’s suggestion of taking a picture would be your best bet. I hope this helps.

I would really like to here the communities take on this subject. Praises and criticisms. I realize I’m late to the ball, but here I am and I’ excited about getting into this game. Here is my take. This board and map are great. I love the hugeness of it; this thing is just massive. The geography and how that effects play was very well thought out. Africa is squashed down abut as much as possible and there is more room available in Europe as one could have reasonably made without completely distorting the world map. The point being , the map still looks like the world while still being able to provide effective space for game play- that is a tough balance to achieve. The idea of making the Himalayas and Sahara impassible was inspired. Of course they are impassible to large armies. If the Axis want to do damage to the British Empire in Sub Saharan Africa, they need to either turn the corner at Alexandria or win the Atlantic or Indian Oceans. The neutral spaces are very well done. More on that when I review the Neutral Countries. But the main thing the map gets right is what it’s supposed to get right, it provides the right geometry to promote good game play. Their are major regions and regions within those regions and each set has its own keys to being manipulated for offense and defense. That makes for interesting game play. Even better, I haven’t found any rinky dink ways of manipulating the geography in ways that don’t feel true to the intent of the game/WW2. The space in the Pacific is an obstacle. The Space of Russia is an obstacle. As they both should be. The benefit from gaining Scandinavia is big, but its not a game changer. The Far East or the Black Sea can’t be used as some unanticipated flanking move. One doesn’t want to be tied down to replaying WW2 as accurately as possible, but one doesn’t want to completely break with reality either. Every game I play I learn new things about this board. I’ve played 4 intensive games with myself and am still feel like I am a long long ways from mastering the geography of this board. That is a good thing. Certainly there are things I could quibble about. The names for the Chinese Provinces could be better. In that , as someone who lives in China, I would prefer the proper current Pinyin names for them, A westerner defiantly made this game. But I understand they are trying to keep with the Pre 1949 feel for the region and using the terms the west used back then; so ok. Having Kazakistan so far south is a bit weird. There are times where I wish certain spaces were larger; I’m looking at you Bessarabia and SZ110. But most of my spatial problems stem from my style of game play which is still rooted in monolithic stacks of enormous proportions which worked well in the Axis and Allies of old. Which brings me to my biggest opinion about this board. This board is infinitely superior to the previous incarnations of Axis and Allies. This is a very good and interesting game and it starts with the map. What are your thoughts?