Posts made by amanntai

1. Why not both?

2. What if the 2nd Year Medical student is native to the island? There are medical schools on islands!

3. What if the Medical Student can take you to the nearest Hospital on the island, and you can be treated by people who graduated medical school?

@ABWorsham:

My family plays Catan monthly. We play the regular game. The only addition we have is the two played expansion.

My question is, which expansion would you recommend.

You guys are my gaming advisory board.

KNIGHTS AND CITIES

By far the best Expansion for Catan. Although, Seafarers is a good expansion too.

@Arthur:

Sure, 8 loaded carriers would be sufficient to prevent the Germans from launching a bomber raid against the Allied navy.  Keep in mind that such a build requires 4 full turns of US spending in the Atlantic plus a turn or two for moving the fleet into position.  Time is on the German side in Dark Skies.  Once the Germans reach the oilfields, their income will start matching that of the US.  Also consider that Germany has quite a bit of flexibility.  The bombers can be used to destroy Russia, navies, London, and supporting raids on territories with medium-sized stacks of troops.

In my last game, the US tried a KGF strategy with a very large navy off the coast of Gibraltar on round 3.  The Germans mostly ignored it.  From the base in Paris, the bombers could limit the options of the Allied navy and also force Russia to retreat back towards Moscow.  Meanwhile, Japan was about to capture India and it seemed inevitable for a total victory on J7-J8.

1. As has been pointed out by myself and others, what the Germans can use the bombers for is not as important as what they do use it for. If the Allies don’t build a fleet because they are scared of Bombers, of course they will lose! The Allies in this strategy must force Germany to make a choice. As soon as Germany commits the bombers anywhere, flexibility and strength decreases. German bombers can destroy the Allied fleet or kill Russia, but it can’t do both at the same time.

2. The US doesn’t need 8 carriers. That provides only a 7% survival for 24 bombers, obviously this is overkill. I haven’t done the math, but I’m pretty sure the US could get by with a smaller fleet.

@Zhukov44:

@amanntai:

Baron had some interesting math in another thread: I believe it was a full carrier versus 3 attacking bombers. The bombers had only a 24.3% chance of survival! In a battle between 24 bombers and 8 full carriers, the bombers had only a 7% chance of surviving!

If the Allied match the Axis bombers 1 IPC for 1 IPC with carriers, There is no way the German bomber stack can wipe out the Allied fleet. Of course, they also need transports and land units, which means they can’t build all carriers. But just something to consider. I don’t think fleets are going to be demolished by bombers with very few Axis losses.

Theoretically, bombers are not unbalanced vrs. fleet.

What’s making them unbalanced is the combination of deterring Allied navy, bombing raids, killer range, overwelming superiority in land trades, and utility in major land battles.  All that together makes them formidable.

Changing SBR damage and/or interceptor rules is probably the way to go.  Until then…higher bids.  The higher the bid the less money Axis will be able to make and the less bombers they can buy.

But as DizzKneeLand pointed out, SBR isn’t even a part of the strategy! Changing SBR damage and interceptor rules will have absolutely no effect on Dark Skies.

How can such a strategy deter Allied Navy, if the Navy will inflict heavy losses on the bombers? How can Germany win in Russia if they spent less on land units and more on bombers that died in the Atlantic?

This would be a very interesting game… 1900 imperialism. I like it. A lot.

@Narvik:

Yes, exactly what do the rule say ?

Do winter limit combat move only ? In that case only Tanks will be weak.

Or do the defender get a bonus, like inf defend on a 3 or less during winter, and 2 or less during summer.

Or do winter limit the number of combat rounds ? Like you can only roll for one round of combat during winter, and unlimited rounds for summer ?

…or a combination of all the above ?

I was going with -1 combat move for all ground units. This would mean tanks could still operate, but less effectively, and infantry and artillery would be stuck in place. Perhaps I could also apply this to air units as well, which would be hindered in Winter. Maybe it could even be a reduction of two for air.

Naval units would be stuck completely in SZs touching the top of the board.

Baron had some interesting math in another thread: I believe it was a full carrier versus 3 attacking bombers. The bombers had only a 24.3% chance of survival! In a battle between 24 bombers and 8 full carriers, the bombers had only a 7% chance of surviving!

If the Allied match the Axis bombers 1 IPC for 1 IPC with carriers, There is no way the German bomber stack can wipe out the Allied fleet. Of course, they also need transports and land units, which means they can’t build all carriers. But just something to consider. I don’t think fleets are going to be demolished by bombers with very few Axis losses.

@Gargantua:

Yes!

I might be willing to buy some then.

@Baron:

@DizzKneeLand33:

Those are some great stats….  :-o

I hate to be a buzzkill, but this thread started by discussing a German bomber strategy.  It somehow has degraded into the merits of SBR’s versus not SBR-ing.  Well, in my games, I rarely SBR with the bombers (if there is going to be no interception, then I may go for that when convenient, but it’s not a central part of the strategy).  The power of the bombers is numbers, not SBR’s.  If you want to SBR, you really don’t need 18 bombers….

I have hit the UK to clear it of all land/air units with the bombers – your SBR rule differences don’t change that dynamic.
I really, really like the idea of not being able to repair bases until the end of the turn (or during noncombat, or whatever).  But again, this isn’t a house rules thread. ;)

The power of the bombers is not by sacrificing them for petty things.  It’s the projection of threats across Europe.  And the more bombers that exist, the more threat that is projected….

Sorry, I couldn’t restrain myself to get all the numbers side by side to have all comparison points.

According to your idea, do you mean the bombers stack is the more a threat than an effective combat (or SBR, if anyone willing to do it) forces?
You trade bombers casualty at 12 IPCs against grounds casualty (3 to 6 IPCs).
But you cannot do this on every occasions.

As far as I understand, the bombers stack is preventing USA or Russia from moving with bombers range toward Central Europe.
This is a blocking strategy.
What happened if USA chose to sacrifice the Navy?
Does Germany will lose his bombers stack in the attack or not?

Does this strategy work as long as no Allies is willing to compromise a stack of his units as a necessary sacrifice?

---

If it is not the case and StBs stack is really so powerful to destroy a lot of units and lose only 1 or 2 bombers per attack,
does delaying the repair of Air Base to the Non-combat move Phase is really a way to hinder StBs Spams strategy (by creating some SZs or Territories unreachable)?

Or the only way to really hinder their offensive power is to reduced their attack value?

I believe someone pointed out earlier in the thread that the bomber stack seemed threatening until Germany had to commit it anywhere. As soon as it is used in combat, the stack decreases in size and usually has to land somewhere where it will be of less use than it was originally.

Basically, its goal is to intimidate the Allies into losing. I have yet to test a game where the Allies risk losing heavily in order to entice the bombers out, but such a strategy will go one of two ways:

1. The Bomber stack threat is greatly decreased and the Allies can now proceed to combat the Axis on even ground.
2. The Allied losses are so heavy they can’t recover, and Axis wins.

Also, has anyone tried launching two allied invasion fleets simultaneously? This would force the Germans to either let one through the bombers, or split the stack. In either case, the bombers would face losses. The main concern is the invasion fleets not having enough units to capture the territory they land in, but with Germany spending so much on Bombers, I’d expect their land defenses to be weaker than usual.

@alexgreat:

Horta, Tholians, Sheliak, Species 8472, Calamarain, Tribbles, to name a few on the top of my head. And then there are aliens like Gorn, which I guess could pass as humanoids in a way.

Just because those pretty dancers have lekku doesnt mean they are non-humanoid, and the same goes for wings of Geonosians.

Comparing not only screened aliens (would be unfair I guess) but all things in the books as well, I dont think that Star Wars has more biodiversity. And in any case humanoids cannot come cooler than Romulans :)

And as Wheat said, Star Trek explained why there are so many humanoids, in I guess another attempt to picture our similarities, not our differences.

So having said all that, both franchises are great if you include the books, but Star Trek is maybe richer overall, with more time devoted to more cultures.

Agree with Wheat, SciFi cannot come better than as DS9.

@wheatbeer:

@amanntai:

I just find the aliens in Star Trek boring. They all look like humans. Vulcans are humans with pointy ears. Klingons are humans with weird foreheads.
Star Wars has more biodiversity in my opinion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chase_(Star_Trek:_The_Next_Generation)

This episode sort of explained away the similarities but saying that life was seeded by some earlier species.

Most Star Wars aliens are still bipedal, with heads featuring eyes/nose/mouth/ears, who communicate with vocalizations. A truly alien creature wouldn’t be able to emote for a human audience.

(and just in case, I didn’t geek out enough already, Star Trek aliens have more deeply developed cultures than Star Wars aliens)

I wasn’t thinking of Twi’leks. I was thinking of Hutts, Ortolans, Wampas, or the Sarlacc (which is indeed a sapient creature in the Star Wars universe).

I also believe the humanoid species in Star Wars are considerably less human than the humanoids in Star Trek. Dugs are technically humanoid, but don’t really look like humans.

Also, Geonosians aren’t really humanoid. Just take a look at the Geonosian Queen, she doesn’t resemble humans at all.

@CWO:

@Slovenehero:

A ‘world war’ between rational state actors in the atomic era would most likely necessitate the use of thermonuclear weapons at some point.

The concept of rational state actors in politics is a bit like the concept of rational investors in economics: tricky.  In the abstract, the concept of rationality in politics (and economics) basically implies that the people involved in a decision-making process (“Should we go to war against such-and-such a country?”  “Should I buy or sell this particular stock?”) are making decisions based on a clinical analysis of the costs, benefits, risks and opprtunities, and that one of their objectives is to avoid decisions that would result in their coming out on the losing end of the cost-benefit trade-off.  Sounds reasonable enough, and by that logic politicians (and investors) would be unlikely to make stupid decisions, to say nothing of decisions that are monumentally stupid and massively harmful to both themselves and others.  But in reality, things don’t always work out that way.  It’s said in the world of finance that nobody ever performs more badly on the stock market than the average investor; I’m not sure if there’s an equivalent expression in the world of international politics, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there were.

The three problems with rationality in politics and in finance are that: a) emotions can easily trump rationality, as can be seen whenever there’s a panic sell-off on the stock market; b) rational analysis can often be tainted by prejudices, misconceptions, incorrect assumptions and incomplete information; and c) even correct and dispassionate analyses can sometimes produce the wrong answer, given that political and economics events are the products of the collective actions of countless individuals (of varying degrees of importance) interacting with each other in multiple and complex ways.  These things simply can’t be analyzed and predicted accurately and reliably.  The outbreak of WWI is a classic example of a major war breaking out through a complex combination of deliberate intent and unforeseen miscalculation.  In business, the notorious Edsel debacle is a good example because it was actually one of the most carefully planned new car projects in automotive history, yet it flopped to such a degree that “edsel” became and remains a synonym for a lemon.

The made-for-TV movie World War III includes, as I recall, a conversation that sums up the problem neatly.  The US President (played by Rock Hudson) is on the phone with a US Army colonel (layed by David Soul) during a crisis involving Soviet troops in Alaska. The President gravely informs the colonel (who’s in Alaska) that the incident could lead to a thermonuclear war.  The colonel says, “But nobody would win a thermonuclear war!” The President answers, “That has nothing to do with getting into one.”

The problem with assuming Rational actors is that rational actors most likely wouldn’t engage in a World War. Wars are costly, world wars even more so, and are usually caused by emotions, stupidity, radical ideologies, or out of the necessity to combat any of the above.

There isn’t really a whole lot of rational thought behind plunging the world into chaos and destruction.

@Gargantua:

Everything from Revised to Anniversary.

Does that include D-day’s blockhouses?

@barney:

4 bucks for a D 3 unit sounds pretty badass. Especially if it boosts a dude.
I saw you wrote somewhere else about that but don’t recall the details. Have you done any playtests with it?

It was on the Heavy Artillery (Now named Anti-tank Gun) thread. The math looked pretty solid. Better defense than pure infantry, but worse offense.

I like it. Simple and effective.

@Smarties:

Not every winter is terrible, so at the beginning of a winter round (R3, R7, R11, etc…), someone should roll a die to see if the winter is going to be bad. If the roll is 1-3, then there is a heavy winter that lasts the entire round. Here is what I think that the winter should do:

1. Axis units may not make any combat movements (including amphibious assaults) into or through original Russian territories with their ground units. The same applies to Alaska, the Aleutians, and British territory in North America.

2. Allied units may not make any combat movements (including amphibious assaults) into or through Norway, Finland, Sweden, and Denmark with their ground units.

3. Air units starting in any of the above mentioned territories are grounded, and they cannot make any kind of movement.

As you can see, winter can be really nasty! At least it only has a one in two chance of happening once every four rounds. :wink:

What about Germany, France, Poland, Switzerland?
The Battle of the Bulge was fought almost entirely in Belgium, and winter inflicted a devastating toll on Allied forces there.

The territories you listed aren’t the only territories affected.

I agree that maybe not every winter was bad, and a random factor is needed.

Still, one must consider scale, simplicity, and purpose.
On the global scale, terrain is hard to model, as many regions have a wide variety of terrain. More complicated rules are usually more realistic, but harder to implement. Does this HR do anything, or does it exist only to make the game more “realistic”?

I believe that a random roll for territories on the Northern third that limits movement regardless of side is simple, exists to aid the Russians slightly, and while not very realistic is at least slightly more realistic than the OOB game.

@variance:

Know what would make this whole issue go away in a hurry, and also make the game a whole lot more fun?

That old house rule that repairs to bases do not become effective until the start of noncombat movement phase.

What does that accomplish?

@Gargantua:

How about red chips!?

@Gargantua:

Anyone need a couple extra Germans?  Lol!

What versions?

@Gargantua:

Or we could do precious metals!

UK = Gold
Japan = White Gold
Germans = Germanium
Russia = Copper (sort of precious lol)
USA = Platinum

Etc!

The Russians should be plutonium. China can be copper. ANZAC shall be Silver, and France cobalt.

The dice are ruby and obsidian.

Can we expect to see an android version? I don’t buy apple products…

@Jester09:

Thanks for the quick reply. � I know Triple A allows me to places existing fighters on new carreirs (Even gives me a warning saying that “you have x new carriers to be placed, do you want to end your move phase” when I try to end my NCM phase with fighters sitting in a sea zone without the carrier…yet).

Also, if I buy a carrier, it allows me to attack Western Germany and land on the newly placed carrier…just not S. France…its weird. � As a side note, I seem to recall a few games ago when I tried to move a UK tank from Normandy to Northern Italy thru S. France (S. France being held by Italy). � When I moved to S. Italy, I captured it but it wouldn’t let me move again (no units in S. Italy so the blitz move should have worked). � Is this may just an issues with S. France…it sucks up all other combat moves or something? :-D :-o :?

Anyone else see this or am I just going crazy? � :|

Okay, I looked at the map, and…

A fighter from UK can reach S. France in three moves only if it flies over Normandy (which therefore must be unoccupied).
There also must be an operational airbase in UK for the fighter to make it back to sz 110.

Are both these conditions met? If Yes, then TripleA is just being stupid, apparently.