Is the circle around Caen, Cherbourg & St Lo, just a "victory" city designation?

Welcome, Sarge85!

In that situation, the Allies would win.  They need to control all three cities at the end of two consecutive turns.

Our little group has played four games of D-Day so far and the axis won the first three by holding St. Lo. the fourth game was a narrow allied victory only because we added two more rounds to the game. At the end of ten rounds the axis still held St. Lo as usual. It took the two extra rounds for the allies to get it. We are now looking for ways to vary the game so that it does not play out the same every time. One idea I like is to increase the attack value of the allied airborne units to two. I am even thinking of having the two sides place their own units where they will for the starting setup. I would like to vary the unit types as well. We now have added many new types of units since this game was printed. This might require setting up a D-12 system.

@conanthelibrarian:

While I’m on here, any other of the smaller AA games (like battle of the bulge) that you guys recommend?  Im playing this with my 8 year old, and I like that he can understand and play with me.

Thanks alot.

@Krieghund:

D-Day is the easiest A&A game of all.  Battle of the Bulge and Guadalcanal are a little bit more involved.  However, if your son can handle D-Day, maybe he can handle one of those as well.  I think I’d try Bulge before Guadalcanal.  If you do, let him be the Germans, as it’s harder to play the Allies in that game.

I’d agree with this. Looking at the rules it might seem Guadalcanal is ‘simpler’ but you have to make many more “if I do this what will my opponent do,” decisions a lot faster and GCNL eliminates the reinforcement charts creating a daunting set of decisions regarding reinforcements.

If you are also new to BOTB playing the Allies will be a good handicap for you as it is tougher to play the Allies and will be easier and more interesting for him as the Axis on the attack.

I’d wait till you’re bored with D-Day though.

I have aa50 and have played pac40. I still like dday and learned how to play on dday. Dday is a great beginners game and is still a good game to play everynow and again.

Yes, you do.  You control a zone only if you have at least one land unit in it and the enemy has no land units in it.  A zone that has no land units in it is controlled by no one (bottom of page 10).

I’m a bit behind on my more thought out response to this.  :oops:

First off I think you can play in your home games any way you want. House rule anything you want.

Second I think that for simple ease targets do not need to be declared before hand for either Bombers or blockhouses. For simplicity sake I think that is easiest. Page 15 of the rulebook supports pick roll a die and pick again “the same blockhouse can be chosen more than once.”

As to the bombers again on page 15 “Each hit removes one land unit of th Allies player’s choice from play.” So if you have two  bombers in the same zone you would roll for your hits and pick the units to remove. Although the word target on the order card suggests pick before you roll but for consistency there is no reason not to do it the same as blockhouses and this is how I have usually played.

This is also along the same lines of the  blockhouses fire to sea order which targets and page 16 says “each blockhouse can fire on a different target. Roll dice one at a time.”

So for consistency I would go with target-roll-repeat till out of dice.

I think the pick all targets and then roll is more to the Axis favor than the Allies favor. I have never lost as Axis and tend to think the target-roll-repeat is a better way to go.

Target all first is probably more real for Aircraft (harder to change course midstream and end up on a dime) than for blockhouses. If you are sighting visually on a landing craft you will be able to see if it has been hit from somewhere else and can change the target.

Sorry for the tardy reply.  :oops:

Here are the major differences…

1. The Turn order is determined by a sequential action of cards that give orders to one side or the other…

2. There is no production… Instead Troops come in via a reinforcement chart that you roll for to determine what comes ashore (or from Rouen and Rennes)

3. The Objective (for the Allies) is to seize 3 VC (Cherbourg, St. Lo, Caen) by turn nine and hold them for a turn… otherwise the Germans win…

4. There is now a limit of 8 Land Units for one side or the other (so The Allies can only have 8 units in a zone and no more, the germans can not have any more either)…

5. Allies can only have Aircraft… German Artillery are AA capable… The Germans now get Blockhouses that get to target Allied units coming ashore… Plus all German defends on 3 instead of the allied 2  :wink:

6. Fortune Cards (optional) can give one side or the other an advantage brought on by bombings, shortages, Weather etc.

7. Tactic Cards (optional) give a one time use advantage to one side or the other…

8. Battles only last one cycle, so you have to be selective to not tie units down…

here is the rulebook: http://www.wizards.com/avalonhill/rules/axisdday.pdf

Overall it is more of a training game to teach the mechanic of fighting to new players imo… but it is a great short game… Although it can get boring with the same strats that usually get played… IF you want blockhouse pieces though get it…

GG