AA50: House Rules

After a year break we played a game according to these rules yesterday.
Japan heavy navy focused getting Honolulu, Sydney, Rio de Janero and even San Francisco! Leading to a land war on the American continent.
Meanwhile Russia and Britain heavy focusing Germany, with conquering the whole of northern and eastern Europe (Oslo, Kiev).
But then, Germany seized an opportunity of taking London after Britain player overcomitted and did some bad rolls.
Axis win the game.

It was very confusing, and we did a lot of bad mistakes. But it was fun, and we really had a game with battles at totally new battlefields.

After Russia and Britain both starting very defensive, Germany and Japan player decided to play an altrenative strategy, attacking US. It worked at least partially. Germany forced to play defensive on land, losing total whole of east and north Europe (but defensive Russia took quite a while). Japan using heavy Navy and invading Australia, South America and finally even US west coast. Land war on the American continent between Japan West coast and US East coast (and Canada a bit). Few action in China at all…all players were turteling after the initial clashes. Money was needed elsewhere and infantry could hardly attack alone. Tank war in Africa between German Egypt and British South Africa. Both players had minor factories in africa, pumping tanks. Great navy clash in the northern Atlantic between US+Royal Navy and the German navy. To some bad rolls, British and US player losing atlantic fleet. Germany lost as well nearly whole fleet, but was able to invade exposed London and win the game. Maybe one turn later, the Russian steamroller would have taken Berlin.

The changes in Navy Balance (increase offensive power by chaper Battleship and Cruiser) as well as the alternative start setup allows for totally new strategies like “Kill US”. We are still not sure if this setup is balanced, we did only 3 games with this so far. I’d be happy about any feedback.

@mattsk:

About your HR, Russia is merely strong enough to protect Moscow, not talking about some far east adventures.

I guess one way to handle this would be for the HR to say that Russia can declare war on Japan after two conditions have been met:

Germany has been defeated Russia has had time to transfer many of its forces from Europe to the Far East

This is basically what happened in WWII.  Stalin had an agreement with the Americans and British that he would declare war on Japan three months after Germany’s defeat, to allow him time to shift his forces eastward.  Which he did.

Here is an Italian rule (offset to Axis Vichy rule).

Italian Co-Belligerent Army / Italian Social Republic

ICBA is a pro-Allied Italian government created after Rome is captured.  At the same time, ISR, a remnant and a pro-Axis goverment of Mussolini’s regime is created and seated out of Northern Italy.  ICBA eligible territories are all Italian controlled territories, EXCEPT Northern Italy and Italian controlled territories with German units.  These territories are treated same as pro-Allied neutrals.  All other forces are part of the Italian Social Republic.  ISR becomes the new Italy and starts with 0 IPCs.  On the each ISR turn, they CAN get up to 5 IPCs from Germany.  For the ICBA, any movement is done after Vichy.
**Procedure:  **
After Rome is captured, the following happens:
1. All ICBA forces (land/sea/air) standfast and defend against Axis attacks.  
2. ICBA land forces can move during the non-combat phase.
3. If an ICBA territory with units is occupied by Allied player, no new units are created, but any ICBA infantry units are converted to the occupying Allied power, and all others disband.    
4. ISR units may move as normal.  ISR can be ordered to attack ICBA units.
5. All ICBA units return to Axis if Rome is liberated.  ICBA cannot be re-created.
(Optional: Any ICBA controlled Allied territories return to original owner, non-infantry units disband.)

EDIT: Ahem, I just realized that there’s a subforum for house rules… can a mod move this there, or should I just repost?

I’ve been watching this forum for a while, but waited until today to create an account. After looking around on the internet for house rules for Guadalcanal, and only finding Krieghund’s submarine changes (I can’t post links at the moment, I guess), I decided to make my own. This isn’t some small change, this changes how the game is played completely.

These rules are in early development, and we have only just started our first game using these rules, but I wanted to see what feedback you guys can give.

Introduction:
Guadalcanal was the first Axis and Allies game that I ever played. My dad got it for me for Christmas one year because it was the cheapest version at the time. After playing a few games, we found that we didn�t like some of the major components in the game. We felt that the 15 victory point limit made for a short game that was hard to change the course of midway through. We also felt that, though important, airfields shouldn�t be what decide victory over defeat.

We made some changes to the rules, the major change was that the victory condition was total domination, a simple objective, but it more accurately reflected the true objective of the Solomon campaign. We also did small tweaks to units, including changing the armor mechanics for battleships and adding an entirely new unit: the transport plane. But, these rules encouraged building up each of your islands with an unbreakable force which caused neither side to make large offensives. Usually someone (normally me) would surrender while both sides still had three of the islands.

I realized that, while I didn�t want to go back to the original rules, our primitive house rules had to change. I searched for house rules that did anything more than altering submarine mechanics, but none (that I found) existed for Guadalcanal. I decided it was time to take matters into my own hands and do a major overhaul of how Guadalcanal plays. This was the result, and with a few more changes it should be close to perfection.

Rule Changes:

Mass Invasion: When one player lands at least six land units on an island controlled by the other player, they must declare a �mass invasion� on that island. Put a marker on that island to signify a �mass invasion�. The �mass invasion� ends when all of the attacker or defender�s units are killed or moved off of the island.

Note: If the attacker already has units on the island and declares a �mass invasion� those units become part of it, along with any units put on the island after the �mass invasion� has been declared.

Objective Changes:
It was difficult thinking of some middle ground between getting points for airfields and total domination. We decided to stick with the point system, but instead of just getting points for airfields, we added more objectives for the player to complete.

Note: The points gained from each objective are added at the same time during the �score victory points and check for victory� If both players reach 15 victory points in the same turn, the player with more points past 15 wins. In the case of a tie, play until one player has more points at the end of the turn.

Objectives:

Build Airfield: Build an airfield. (1 point)

Capture Airfield: Capture an island that has an airfield on it. (1 point for 1 airfield, 2 points for 2 airfields.)

Capture and Hold Island: Capture an island and still have control of it at the end of the next turn. (1 point)

Sink Capital Ship: Sink a battleship or aircraft carrier. (1 point)

Damage Airfield: Succeed in damaging an enemies airfield. (1 point)

Foil Invasion: As the defender, have control of the island at the end of a �mass invasion�. (2 points)
Unit Changes:

Submarine: There are two different types of submarines: Fleet submarines and Patrol submarines.

Submarines are fleet subs if they are in a sea zone with a friendly non-sub sea unit. They behave as submarines normally do.

Submarines are patrol subs when they are in a sea with no friendly sea units, besides friendly submarines. They may not be attacked unless they attacked that turn. After a patrol sub attacks, any surviving unit may fire back at the sub(s) during the Attack Sea Units phase at its anti-submarine power, which is shown below:

Artillery: 0
Infantry: 0
Submarine: 0
Destroyer: 2
Cruiser: 1
Aircraft Carrier: 0
Battleship: 0
Bomber: 2
Fighter: 1

Battleship: A battleship hit by a one on its first hit that survives the turn retains the damage and loses the �heavy armor� ability until repaired using a supply token that is at a friendly island during the Reinforce, Repair, and Deploy phase.

A battleship hit by a two on its first hit that survives the turn ignores the damage like normal.

Fighter: Instead of fighters moving two zones during movement and two zones during regroup, fighters can move a total of four zones, but they must have enough movement during the regroup phase to get them to a friendly airfield or aircraft carrier.

Bomber: Instead of bombers moving three zones during movement and three zones during regroup, bombers can move a total of six zones, but they must have enough movement during the regroup phase to get them to a friendly airfield.

@Imperious:

OK.
Cruisers when they shoot and roll a 1 can force the defender to remove a plane
Cruisers move 3 spaces even if they didn’t come out of port.
Now they are worth the extra 2 IPC.

@Young:

@variance:

Another idea has been that each cruiser would only fire an AA shot at 1 attacking plane.

This is better than 3 shots per ship IMO.

So our Cruisers combine those ideas and get:
1-An attack and a defense @3 + 1 bombard @3,
2-A first round AA @1 against 1 attacking aircraft,
3-Cruisers when they shoot, either on attack or defense, and roll a 1 can force the attacker/defender to remove a plane.

In the game I played, the AA has more of a psychological impact than a real effect.
Indeed, it never destroyed any aircraft. And thus, neither by the AA and even by the “1” roll which force the defender to destroy an aircraft.

But UK bought 3 cruisers, instead of any BB, against German Luftwaffe.

Thanks everybody, those suggestions makes cruiser a more interesting unit that worth buying.

However, it can be a real nuisance for Germany but it may also help protect the Baltic fleet against UK aircrafts: at least, it slightly upgrade the Baltic fleet to better defend against attacking UK planes.

It should read:

4)  When a battleship has a damage marker its firepower is reduced by one i.e.
a)  A battleship with one damage marker, hits on a roll of 3
b)  A battleship with two damage markers, sinks
c)  An Aircraft carrier with a damage marker sinks
d)  A cruiser with one damage marker sinks

all ships thats take one hit sink is the rule

the BB can take 2 hits before it sinks.

If you want to make all the units take 2-3 hits, that will be a big change

@timerover51:

Hmmm, that would be a reasonable approach as well.

I was merely making an observation that each bombardment ship supporting each infantry +1 on 1-to-1 basis…is the same as rolling one bombardment die per infantry at 1 and not preemptive

like you can arrange the rules to appear as only a minimal rule change, and then people are less resistive

This would be more appopriate here.

I’ve played with No table talk before.  Kinda fun.

We’d do 10 Min strat sessions at the end of each rd.

EDIT:

IL, I hope that is a joke.
but you might want to be carfeul there.