"I know this is a Boardgame question, but..." Topic

Hi all,

In a fit of nostalgia I recently purchased good copies of the old TSR games 'WW2: European Theatre of Operations" and the companion piece covering the Pacific War. I remember enjoying these hugely.

I still do, but I have a question for anyone who can help. When we played these games – we invariably played the huge campaigns (!) – we found that you needed house rules of some type in order to give the Axis any kind of chance. This was especially true in the Pacific. Has anyone else found that with these strategic level games, things will always end up going the way of the Allies, particularly once the massive economic/industrial might of the USA gets involved?

If you did, did you do anything do balance it out? And do you think it's a good idea to balance it out? Do you prefer to game it out as it was?

Any thoughts gratefully received.

Thanks.

Most of the problems with playing the Axis in games such as this(World in Flames, ETO/PTO, Third Reich/Great Pacific War) is that the Axis player(s) lose sight of what they need to do to win the game. Usually they overextend themselves and when the Allied juggernaut gets rolling(and it will-it's just a matter of time) they are caught out of position and collapse usually before '45.

The best place to get your questions answered is under the appropriate folder on ConSimWorld or Baordgamegeek.

"good idea to balance it out?"

Depends what you mean. Alter the conditions so the chances of actually winning the war are changed? No, don't care for that in general; perhaps a few specific cases where alternate cases can relieve an otherwise fairly dull situation (France 40 being the classic example).

Part of the fun of a WWII strategic game is "I get to attack for a while, then you get to attack for a while, and the victory points will tell us who was better at it."

Alter the victory pointing so there is a more balanced chance of winning on the points spread? Sure.

Well,

From a miniatures gaming perspective . . .

Marty Blow wrote a set of WWII air rules for the Pacific / campaign. He quickly came to the conclusion that if he did things 'realistically' the Japanese would have no chance and no one would want to play them. So he modified his game considerably to give them a fighting chance.

mjc

The situation might well go the way of the Allies in strategic board games, but the victory conditions can be expected to take that into account.

Yes, all good points guys. Cheers for that. I really enjoy campaign/strategic level games, and the war in the Pacific has some of my favourite things to simulate – carriers, island hopping, naval/air/land strategy and so on. It's just unfortunate that historically the Japanese never really had a chance (Yamamoto's famous quote comes to mind) in the long term. It makes them hard to play.

I agree that it's a bad idea to alter historical fact so that the Axis have a better chance – in general the Axis player(s) need to make a better job of it from the start. We have the lessons of history to give those players the edge maybe?

One thing you might do is give them a little more German tech. Corsair v. Japanese version of the Me 262 would be of some interest surely?

mjc

Well, this problem certainly applies to lots of games. In essence, you want a game where you can lose the war and win the game. Think of The Alamo, Vietnam, and lots of other battles where one side has no real chance at "victory."

I played an Alamo game where the Texans win if, at games end, one is alive. Otherwise they lose. But if you find the game always ends in both military defeat and game defeat, you have an unbalanced game. I'd adjust the victory points. Give the Axis a 50 point head start or whatever.

On the other hand, I enjoy playing and winning is honestly not that big a deal to me.

Yeah, its something I'm giving some thought to as well as IO finish up the WWII version of Naval Thunder. Early war, the Japanese have a significant edge, but late war they get crushed.

I'm building in some optional rules to mollify the allied advantages somewhat, and even considering some blatantly a-historical optional rules for people who just want a fair fight, not necessarily a historically accurate one. Of course, everything is going to be appropriately labeled. So people can play with the unrealistic rules if they like, but don't do it accidentally.

I have always found that the preplanned colapse of the luftwaffe and u-boats in third reich to be particularly alarming…..you can be in total command militarily and strategically then hey presto economic factors relating to bpv of said units cripple you.

Whether a macro boardgame on the whole war or a skirmish level miniatures game the easiest way to "balance" is in relation to historical outcomes. If, for example, the third reich is still around in May 45 then perhaps a marginal German victory is in order even if another few months will see the total collapse. By using the historical outcome as a benchmark and adapting victory conditions to them you can usually come out with a decent game without the need to artifically tinker with the game mechanics themselves.

@Marc 33594

Another good point, but one thing occurs to me. When gaming at this level surely an Axis player is limited by the fact that they would never make the same mistakes that Hitler/Tojo did.

Hitler in particular made too many decisions out of vanity and insanity. Would a tabletop player decide to neglect the strategic arm of the Luftwaffe or the German Navy in the way he did? What if a player wants to build German carriers, or to pursue rocket technology much earlier and so on? These are where it gets interesting. The 'what ifs' that might allow the war to pursue a different course.

I like victory conditions that compare the game results to the historical reality. If the Axis can manage to do better or the Allies muck up worse in the same time frame as the actual war, the Axis get a victory.
These fun games do this:
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"If you did, did you do anything do balance it out? And do you think it's a good idea to balance it out? Do you prefer to game it out as it was?"

As commented above, this should be covered by the victory conditions. The Japanese will always 'lose' Victory in the Pacific, but they very often won on points, to the extent that we fiddled it a bit to make it fairer on the Allies. Conversely, the Allies need a bit of help in War at Sea.

We had to give the Allies a hand in Third Reich, just far too easy for the Axis to score a stalemate, although hard for them to actually win overall in real life terms as oposed to points (but by no means impossible at all, especially 2nd Ed).

Really, many games are like this and some of the absolute monster games just don't get playtested enough to throw up the imbalances. Highway to the Reich had such a ridiculously high casualty rate that everyone was dead by the end of Day 3. The perils of bottom up design, in this case fixed by the introduction of 'tiffin turns' (ie where there wasn't any fighting). Next War was OK, but there was a glitch in the victory conditions whereby there was a fixed penalty for initiating chemical warfare, but once NATO had done it, there was nothing to stop them retreating slowly across western europe spraying persistent chem behind them. This made a Warpac victory a tad challenging.

Never got to play Drag nach Osten, but I did see it set up once with real people playing it.

Perfect games need very little tweaking of course. IIIR 3rd Ed didn't need much help, but we played it a lot. Certainly sufficiently frequent to see the French 1-2 counterattack against Paris vs five panzer corps and the paras in a bridgehead succeed not once but twice (1/32 chance of that). I suspect the second time was sheer luck though:-)

"What if a player wants to build German carriers, or to pursue rocket technology much earlier and so on?"

Many of these avenues turn out to be blind. 'Hitlers War' models this sort of thing quite well, but frankly, the cost of pursuing strategic warfare is so high that the Germans are better off just cranking out lots of infantry and panzer divisions. If the Germans go for the bomber/rocket/nuke approach, the Russians win in 1942 unless the Germans are very lucky with their research progress. Just going for bombers OR rockets is more viable but a big navy is a waste of time as they just can't match the Allied naval preponderance.

"Never got to play Drag nach Osten, but I did see it set up once with real people playing it."

I have played it. I have also seen both sides win; my group probably played it half a dozen times. Serious "good old days".

Wow, actually enjoying this and no has degenerated to name calling yet! :)

I Never Touched It. Interesting points. I suppose it depends on what role you want to play in these games. For example if you want to deal with strictly the military situation then you play the cards dealt you by the folks in charge of things like R&D or production. You might want to choose a more encompassing role with many hats, just depends on what you enjoy. It also depends on how historical you want to adhere to. There were numerous branches to the various decisions. One very small example. The ME-262 could have been operational with fighter units much earlier had Hitler not demanded they be turned into and used as Blitz Bombers as well. Do you allow the Germans to have them 6-12 months earlier? What about allied efforts. If the emphasis turns out jets sooner will you allow say the Meteor to be accelerated?

The other problem I have seen is there may be no reason to carry out some of the operations that were carried out. I have seen strategic games where the Germans win by never attacking Russia. I have seen a gambit used in one strategic game where Poland isnt attacked or indeed France is attacked first in 39. I have seen another game where the Germans crank out UBoats like donuts and strangle the UK. There is no reason to go into Greece rationally for Germany or Italy. I think you get the idea.

I agree with Martin. I like games where a player is free to pursue whatever course they want but things like expenses tend to make them gambles rarely worth pursuing.

The other problem I have is we have the benefit of hindsight and what worked and what didnt. The participants didnt. I just watched one of the "Wings of the Luftwaffee" installments on the Military History Channel. It was about the ME-110 and the whole concept of German "Destroyer" aircraft. They were pointing out what an utter disaster the ME-210 was and how much wasted resources went into the TA-154. No sane player would pursue such projects knowing they were failures. And of course the German player, if given the opportunity, will accelerate jet production knowing they were a success. What would balance that might be a roll that say after committing time and resources to the jets they turn out to be utter disasters like the 210.

Marc,

You're right – this needs to be thought about from the POV of whoever the player represents. Excellent point and one that I see now.

Players in these games are the military commanders. I might write in a mechanism for them to 'request' that research and development goes in this or that direction, and they might be lucky enough to get what they want (or not)but ultimately they have to work with what they've got ('twas ever thus!), and the game goes from there. Ah, I love it when things work out cleanly.

Hindsight is a difficult one for sure. If I were playing the Germans then I wouldn't go anywhere near the USSR! But they did and so we need to model that somehow. Again it comes back to the players Point Of View. If you're told to invade Russia – even though you know it to be madness – you do it.

Your question brings to mind a favorite from years ago. There is a wonderful game called Speed and Steel by Standard Games (of Cry Havoc fame). The border between imaginary Alemania and Franconia is shared with a netherlandic neighbor of both. The game supposes a time between the Great War and the World War. The contest starts as a strategic game with players able to invest in their country's economy, technology, and consumer level, as well as in military units. Higher tech levels allow techier units like tanks, better tanks, aircraft, and better aircraft, etc. Builds are secret with counters placed face down. A spy segment each turn may allow one to view a face down enemy counter. When a hot-war erupts, one may discover the enemy has paratroops, the ability to bridge rivers quickly, long range bombers, heavy tanks, or scads and scads of breach plugging infantry. The player is then assaulted by the problems of logistics…building lots of weak militia to plug gaps in the line, etc. Makes for a great game with really tough decisions. I guess the scale is yearly until the war starts,and then monthly turns, or such. Allows the player to explore some of the "alternate" paths some like to explore. Well worth the playing.

Jim

"I have played it. I have also seen both sides win"

I am impressed. I'm not taking the mick either.

"Hindsight is a difficult one for sure. If I were playing the Germans then I wouldn't go anywhere near the USSR! But they did and so we need to model that somehow. Again it comes back to the players Point Of View. If you're told to invade Russia – even though you know it to be madness – you do it."

Many games work around this by allowing Russia to attack Germany if they aren't invaded after a certain point. It depends how free-form you want to be really.

I would be careful about R&D, particularly allowing player influence. It either needs to be integral to the game mechanisms, in which case the costs/benefits are quantifiable and players can make informed decisions, or treat it as some sort of random event as in IIIR – so maybe the Germans get jet fighters a year early, or the Allies get their act togther with centimetric radar and trash the U-Boats a year earlier or something.

I played a lengthy PBM WW2 campaign which was as free-form as you could want, but the R&D system was distinctly creaky as the Russians entered WW2 in 1941 with KV-85s….

Once again some excellent points.

I too agree with mechanisms much like Martin pointed out which allows say Russia to invade at a certain point. This is usually coupled with an increase in Russian OB/production such that putting off an invasion by the Germans, or at the point the Russians are allowed to invade, the Germans will be in a very poor situation!

As to incentives to go into some of the minor countries the usual one is some sort of boost in production or resources for the Axis. Another is points awarded which influence neutrals with countries like Hungary, Romanian, Bulgaria and the like not joining the Axis until certain trigger points are met. This can be effective along with an increase in the points needed over time.

If doing production as well I like the idea of limited resources and having to allocate them, no free R&D for example. If a player has to forgo building more Panzer Divisions, for example, for a shot at accelerating Jet production which is not a sure thing then they face more of the dilema the actual participants faced.

There seems to be several schools of thought on this. The Europa series puts the player in the role of military leader with a set OB over time to include upgrades and new equipment, they have no control over it. Macro games like War In Europe feature simple yet effective production spirals but usually have fixed R&D with new weapons, or their effects, appearing at historical points. And then you have other games which are really free flow with most anything goes.

I guess one problem with all this is with tinkering you can throw the baby out with the bath water. To use Martin's example IF the allies get their act together and early on trash the German UBoat campaign it can have profound impact on the game as a whole. In some cases the effects can become so profound as to render the game uniteresting as the other side has no chance based on a simple luck of the dice early on.

As to me my prefernce is the Europa model with OB provided OR the War in Europe model with simple production and rather fixed R&D. I prefer to concentrate on the military problem. I do like options, such as going into France in 39, but also like consequences for things like failure to invade Russian by summer of 41.