What percentage is luck involved in a games outcome?

Allies won in round 9. Russia took all of Europe, Manchuria and Kwangtung. England took the Pacific , from India to Tokyo.

I just had a game where my friend conceeded after Russia’s second turn. Total time was a little over an hour. The game before that, same teams, took us about 12 rounds and over ten hours.

I will just say that there can be no Bombers or Aircraft Carriers with out advanced flight.

And I prefer to use “boat anchor” place of “cat”

@Bean:

Miscommunication, I was talking about your game with Rising Dragon, not your game with me. That game waiting for lucky dice didn’t help, that was what I’m talking about.

I have to say you’re putting up a good fight in our game, except it doesn’t look like much of a KJF.  :roll:

Yea, I had to wait until round 4, remember?

Now you have a sizable, but weak British fleet in the Pacific and a large American fleet in the Pacific.  Looks a lot more like KJF now, eh?  And it’s round 4, as predicted.

Anyway, I almost got screwed in SZ 15 by the dice gods.  But luckily, my fighter found a bullet to put the bismark at the bottom of the sea. whew.

As for Rising Dragon, yea, I fully expected the game to be over a few rounds ago!  But he waited, decided to go blitz up Africa instead of hitting Russia, giving me time to entrench and he got nailed with defensive fire.  He’ll get it this round though.  Nothing I can do, even with good dice, to stop that!

@Mr:

I saw some of the expansions of A&A have cards.  Do they offset the luck factor of the dice?

I’ve played a many of card-driven military board games and the luck factor is just a high as dice only games.

Ahem, if you are drawings cards, how is that any less random (barring cheating) than rolling dice?

I agree with critmonster – the bizarre results make the game more interesting.  Think of it this way – if every game played out the exact same way, then how interesting is that?  Chess is a bad comparison in some ways because, except for the fact White moves first, the players are perfectly evenly matched.  Not so in A&A.  The game is carefully balanced, but the Allies and Axis clearly don’t have all the same pieces or all the same advantages.  Their positions, pieces, economies and opportunities are all different.

A great example is a recent game I played where, as Japan, I DID NOT GET A SINGLE HIT IN PEARL HARBOR!  Lost 5 pieces (yes, probably should have pulled back) and then proceeded to lose my transport fleet on the U.S.'s turn.  Talk about your big holes, but it was great fun figuring out how to dig out of that situation.  I probably won’t face that again for another 50 games, but you bet I’ll always remember THAT battle!

So my point is, the bizarrely random results are the stuff of which great war stories are made!  That’s why we all spend our time on a forum dedicated to a dice game instead of being hunched over our chess boards.  :wink:

@newpaintbrush:

@Craig:

@ncscswitch:

…I DO like those VT’s that Craig posted though.  I may give those SERIOUS thought for our next Tournament.

You are a man of wisdom! :wink:

I am glad that someone has seen the light. :-D

Craig

Although I sort of like Craig Yoper’s territory idea, I would like it a d*** sight more if it were officially recognized and accepted by Avalon Hill as the tournament standard.

Actually, I would like ANYTHING to be accepted by Avalon Hill as the tournament standard.

As it is, there are different tournaments, but no OFFICIAL tournament standard.  LHTR is close, but it is not the Official Deal.

WOTC/AH pays for Greg’s FTF tournaments at Origins/GCI. They consulted Larry on “tournament” rules specifically for this purpose. I’d say this makes LHTR the prominent ruleset.

Look here for the best FTF tournaments in the country…

http://www.geocities.com/headlesshorseman2/smoreyswamp.html

@Craig:

c) Naval units can be placed with other naval units or in territories adjacent to a power’s land

This would create some interesting bids… in games where the bid was high enough
(but with the auction bid system, I doubt there are many bids of + or - 8 or more to allow naval units)

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