• I know Larry Harris thought about doing it, but decided against it for several reasons.  Anyone know why specifically?  He doesn’t address it on his website forums.  :|
    What would it look like?  What would be the set-up? 
    More Minor Allied players? (France, Poland, Greece?) 
    Would it be a cake walk for the Allies, or just a slow start?

    My curiosity is driving me insane!  :-P


  • nobody will ever know such a thing unless you were in his house looking at his files for AA50. And he wont let you do that.


  • Um, Mr Imperious Leader, sir……I’ve seen you on the Larry Harris forum.  You guys are tight, right?  Couldn’t you…oh, forget it.

    cries into the darkness Darn you, Larry Harris!!!


  • @Imperious:

    nobody will ever know such a thing unless you were in his house looking at his files for AA50. And he wont let you do that.

    Of course Larry could let him see the files, and then just killed him.


  • @Upside-down_Turtle:

    What would it look like?

    Its two options, it could be a scriptet game with Sweden, Spain and Turkey still neutral and impassable, and UK, USA and Russia as allies forever. The minor Axis allies like Finland, Rumania etc would be aligned to Germany from the start of the game. This version would be the same as the 1941 game, you would not see any difference.

    Or it could be a totally wild and free game, with rules for politics and diplomacy. I suppose this game would look like ATTACK! from Eagle Games. All the minors must start as neutrals, and even Sweden, Spain and Turkey must be object of attacks. This game must also have some kind of US Entry system, since USA at that time didn’t have the habit of attacking minors as we see today. It would also be a possibility that UK would declare war against Russia. Or that UK would stay out of the war and let Germany and Russia kill each other. This game would look like Diplomacy or Risk, and be nothing like the real WW II.

    The games that do start in 1939, like The Struggle, the Wargame, ATTACK!, World in Flames etc etc, usually have 8 players. At least they need France and Italy in play, maybe even China as full player. A 5 player game that start in 1939 will look……? huh …

  • Official Q&A

    Mr. Turtle, why don’t you just go on over to Larry’s site and ask him yourself.  He won’t bite, you know.  :-)


  • Hey Turtle.

    I do it by myself.
    1939 world at war game.
    I can send you you pictures by email…


  • Probably because a 1939 scenario would require too many rules and too much diplomacy, which kinda goes against the A&A game itself


  • A 1939 scenario, or from 1933 until 1939 would be different from the rest of the A&A games. There’s no problem in adding another game, which would be very different from the game mechanichs that we see in the A&A series.

    Such a game would not be instead of war games like AA50, AAR and AA42, but an additional game or series, which must include switching alliances and politics and could possibly have a similar combat system as other A&A games, or even a completely different combat system.

    Maybe after AA42??


  • @Subotai:

    Such a game would not be instead of war games like AA50, AAR and AA42, but an additional game or series, which must include switching alliances and politics and could possibly have a similar combat system as other A&A games, or even a completely different combat system.

    Why should it have a different combat system ?

    The A&A 50 Ann. combat system is perfect. Its easy and simple, fast to resolve, and realistic.

    The only thing a 1939 game need, are a diplomatic system. There are already developed severals of this systems, in the House rule section for AARHE and AARHEE, Jeff’s the Wargame, the Struggle, Eagle Games’ ATTACK! and Xenon’s World at war 1939. Also some of the serious WWII counter games like World in Flames have a diplomatic system that can be used in an A&A 1939 game. But if you ask me, I favour the rules from Diplomacy. They are simple and beautiful.


  • The only issue as I see it, is the US entry into the war.

    If the game start in 1939, everybody but USA are in the war. How to fix this ? Give USA no starting units, so it has to use some turns to build units before she dare to join the war ? Or make a rule that says USA are not allowed to attack anyone before Turn 4 ?

    Xeno do it this way:
    USA are not allowed to attack any before turn 5, and USA only recive half IPC income before turn 4.
    USSR are not allowed to attack any before turn 3, and only get 67 % of IPV income before turn 2.
    Uk are not….etc etc

    I dont like this s*ity rules. Then it would be better to start the game in 1933, and let any nation be free to allign to who they see fit, or free to attack any they dont like. In real world, the dark blue capitalist pigs of Britain and U$A was indeed allied to red commie Sovjet Union. Is there any rational reason that UK can not be allied to Germany, and gang up on Stalin ? Or what if Germany and USSR had continued to be allies, and togheter fighted the Western capitalist Allies ?

    There are games like this, like ADG (Australian Design Group)’ “Decisions” (wrong spell I know), but this game have a difficult and booged down diplomatic system with lots of sheeds and rules for what you can do in turn 3 and what is not allowed in turn 5 etc etc…

    The best is to keep it simple.


  • …thinking aloud about it, maybe overly simplistic, but I agree on the idea to keep it simple.

    the entry of USSR and USA would be the crucial points. if you setup a timeline for their entry, like the aforementioned Xeno play, with a certain number of turns till entry or attacking of any of a particular set of territories to bring them in. 
    for USSR, maybe turn X, or the attack of any SU territory, places like Persia, or chinese territories within 2 of SU, or even put places like turkey or Afghanistan into play and make these marks.

    entry of USA could be amphib assualt on Britain, Brazil, or Australia or turn Y.

    -they could also receive percentages of their normal income until these occur.

    instead of all the minor countries added, I’d think they could fall under the UK’s control, as they’d be the only Allied power in play from the start and they are already either connected to or in control of most of these places in the game as it stands.  Most of Africa is UK controlled, even though France and other European countries had colonial control/influence there.  It would be similar to how Germany assumes the control of smaller Axis-nations like Yugo.

    The play setup could allow Germany to attack Poland or France on G1, and not invade SU until later, or else UK could utilize the Polish troops for example.

    I’m not familiar with the ‘Diplomacy’ rules but I would think that the diplomacy of the game could be as simple as you attack and we’re enemies or you don’t at we aren’t.  Much of what the Axis power-grabbed was allowed simply because the rest of the world didn’t think it worth the effort to step up against it.


  • In the AA50 Rulebook, Larry Harris cites three problems with a 1939 scenario:

    1. The game would automatically be much longer to play.

    2. The Unites States would not participate in the Game for the first three of four turns.

    3. The game would suffer from a rather slow and predictable start.

    This, and several other issues, would prove to be too problematic from a game point of view.

    As many of you have said, the fact that all the powers start with much fewer units is a problem, yet there are also other obvious ones.  It’s these notorious “other issues” I’m curious about.  Yet, now that I reread through what Larry said and have thought it over, I don’t think he sees it as simply “to add a cruiser, or not to add a cruiser.”  It seems that he really feels that a 1939 A&A game wouldn’t just be difficult to make, but not be fun to play.  Perhaps he feels it would be as painful as watching the first two Star Wars prequels.  All they do is talk politics, and you just want them to get on with the darn war!

    Larry has said on his forum that he doesn’t want to talk about it.  Perhaps we’re better off simply not knowing , just as we would have been better off not knowing Darth Vader was a winy teenager.


  • @Upside-down_Turtle:

    In the AA50 Rulebook, Larry Harris cites three problems with a 1939 scenario:

    1. The game would automatically be much longer to play.
    -like playing 10 hours now is the apparent breaking point…

    2. The Unites States would not participate in the Game for the first three of four turns.
    -a historical aspect that only affects 1 of 6 players, about as short of a straw as drawing Italy’s 10 IPCs…livable

    3. The game would suffer from a rather slow and predictable start.
    -after all the complaints about being stuck with another game where Axis must sandwich Russia, wouldn’t the ability to take out UK first be a nice change of pace?

    This, and several other issues, would prove to be too problematic from a game point of view.
    this means it’s being worked on, but other things are in the queue first.


  • What about a 1939 scenario in which Germany probably captures UK, but all countries have more realistic industrial production levels than today?  This means US about 80-90 ipc? Japan 15? And industrial production doesn’t change as much as in A&A games, but only the most important TTs will give more income to the powers. So Germany could actually pull it off against Russia if UK already done deal, Japan will be an easy prey nonetheless, and US is actually strong enough to recapture UK and take on Germany. Or if Germany goes all out against Russia, Moscow will probably fall, but then Germany must fight UK+US? I think it could be a great game, just not too much realism instead of a fun game.


  • @crusaderiv:

    Hey Turtle.

    I do it by myself.
    1939 world at war game.
    I can send you you pictures by email…

    I would like to see these pictures also - can you send them to me?
    Thanks.


  • I think it was probably meant for the AA50 board, so I can’t imagine an 80 IPC US.  Maybe we should design our own 1939 scenario.  You can download a 39 scenario for AA Classic from this thread: http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=14068.0;topicseen
    Sorry, I forget which download.  It was printed in Battleplan Magazine in the 80s.  I don’t agree with the scenario completely.  I think each side has too much stuff, though I agree with UK player having control over France.  There are several A&A variants in the one issue, all compliments of Imperious Leader.


  • 1939 is a very silly date to start any wargame. All that happened is poland was conquered and the Russia’s launched a botched invasion of Finland which is something impossible to simulate in axis&allies unless the 2 finish infantry take four hits to kill each.

    A much more intersting date is spring 1940, a whole lot happens that year that changed the war dramaticly. I  always feel in 1941-1943 setups that everything is locked in place and their is no varaity.

    A 1944-1945 start date would also be intersting if you added some cold war rules, Italy would be on the allies side and their peices would also represent free french and Germany and Japan would be severly weakened. What would make it intersting is the Soveit Union would have its own victory conditions seperate from the US/UK/Italy.

    Anyways I would love to make or for someone else to make a good 1940 scenario


  • With a 1940 scenario we could have a wargame similar to AAR, AA50 and AA42, just some different scenarios. A 1939 map (or earlier) should include politics and switching alliances, if not then there’s no point in making a 1939 scenario.

    Perhaps we should ask Larry to make a 1940 scenario which would not be much more different from AA50/AA42 than AA50 is from AAR.

    It would still be cool to have 1939 variant with politics and backstabbing other players.


  • I’m not sure if the politics thing is how it would work.  Even AA50 starting in spring 1941 is a sort of “what if” where things start off a bit earlier than they did.  I’m sure a 40 or 39 scenario would be the same with no politics.

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