Archive for Axis & Allies ForuMINI Specialised in the World War II Axis & Allies Miniatures and War At Sea Games          Axis & Allies ForuMINI Forum Index -> WAS Scenarios & Houserules jfkziegler jfkziegler's Troop Landing Rules Below you will find the rough draft of my new troop landing rules.  Please let me know what you think, and try to poke holes and let me know where I need to make corrections.  Thanks! --- Troop-Landing Rules Version 1.3 Many of the major actions of World War II, such as D-day or Leyte Gulf, were amphibious operations dedicated to landing troops.  While the current War at Sea rules work well for fleet actions, they do not necessarily cover these vital operations.  The rules presented here attempt to plug that gap for players who are interested in re-creating these historical situations or creating their own.  The following rules aren’t used in the Standard, Convoy, or Major Engagement scenarios. Setting Up: You may play using any standard map.  Instead of placing objective tokens, place islands on the spots where the objective tokens would normally be, and place the objective tokens on top of those islands.  These islands count as objectives for the scenario, and when they are claimed, score the exact same points as an objective would.  In the standard scenario, this means that each island is worth 50 points. Players may deploy a standardized transport unit in this format.  It has the following characteristics: Troop Transport Ship (Auxiliary) Cost 4 Armour 1 Vital Armour 7 Hull Points 2 Speed 2 Antiair 4 (range 0) Stay Close: The sector this unit is in can contain two Auxiliary units above its normal stacking limit. Slow 2: At the beginning of your Sea Movement phase, roll a die.  On a 2 or less, this unit gets -1 speed this turn. Claiming an Objective: Unlike in the Standard scenario, in these rules objectives are not removed from the board when claimed.  An objective is considered claimed by one side when that side is the only side with troops on the objective when the check for victory is made.  Objectives, even after they have been claimed, may later revert back to neutral status, or even be claimed by the other side. Checking for Victory: At the end of each turn, a check for victory is made.  Each player counts the total value of enemy ships that they have sunk, the total value of objectives that they have claimed, and any points they have acquired through other special abilities.  If their point total exceeds the amount needed to win the scenario, then they win the game.  If not, the game continues. Loading/Unloading Troop Counters: Each side has an unlimited amount of troop counters, which may be loaded onto units in the player’s deployment area.  Loading troops is a free action that may occur at any time.  However, each unit may only load troops up to its capacity.  Also, units may not deploy with troops already loaded.  Troop counters may be unloaded at any island, but this can only be done at the end of the Sea Movement phase.  All troop counters need not be unloaded at once.  A unit that has unloaded troops this turn may not make any attacks except anti-air attacks. Troop counters have the following characteristics: Troop Counter Armour 5 Hull Points 2 Hard to Kill: If this unit has more than one hull point remaining, it cannot be destroyed by a single attack from a Ship or Aircraft no matter how many successes are rolled. Regroup: At the end of each turn, remove all damage counters from this unit. Naval Gunfire vs. Troop Combat: Ships may attack troops in an objective sector during the Surface Attack phase, but only using gunnery attacks. Aircraft vs. Troop Combat: Aircraft may attack troops in an objective sector during the Air Attack phase, but only using bomb or gunnery attacks. Troop vs. Troop Combat: Troop combat occurs at the end of the Surface Combat phase.  Troop counters on the same island must attack each other in the Surface Attack Phase.  Each player, during his or her attack step, rolls one die for every troop counter they have on the island, and places a face-down destroyed counter next to an enemy troop counter for every 5 or 6 rolled.  At the end of the phase, if only one side has troops remaining, it is in control of the island.  If both sides have troops remaining, the island is still being fought over.  Combat can ensue again in the next Surface Attack Phase. Ship Capacity: An Auxiliary unit can carry two troop counters.  An Auxiliary unit with the Landing special ability can carry three troop counters.  A unit with the Secret Cargo or Precious Cargo special abilities may carry one troop counter.  No other units may carry troop counters unless a special ability allows them to do so.  If a unit carrying troop counters is sunk, the troop counters are lost, unless the Rescue ability is used (see below). Special Rules: - Units do not receive victory points for the Vital Cargo, Secret Cargo, or Precious Cargo special abilities.  Units also do not receive victory points for the Landing or Rescue special abilities. - If a unit carrying troop counters is destroyed while it's in the same sector as a unit with the special ability Rescue, you may make a Rescue roll.  If the Rescue is successful, you may place one Troop counter on the unit with Rescue. - Ships with the special abilities Bombard or Shore Support roll two extra attack dice when making gunnery attacks against troop counters. - The special ability No Sea Control has no relevance to this format. Optional Rules: - When an Auxiliary is destroyed, it is placed back in its owner's ship deployment area.  Victory points are still scored for it as normal. - For faster play, use the base map vertically instead of horizontally.  This will allow transports to get to and from the islands faster. A special thanks to chesty for helping me in the development of these rules!  Also, thanks to the_lucky_y, Lt_Vleclopity, Otto von Starkburg, drittal, Greyh Seer, UNC_Samurai, and Diamondback for development assistance. Updates Log: Version 1.1: -added standardized troop transport card -removed rescue section -changed section names to include the words Naval Gunfire and Bombers -added standardized troop counter card and re-wrote combat rules for ships and aircraft -added phrase preventing unloading ships from engaging in surface combat -added optional rule for speeded up play Version 1.2: -clarified the section not allowing troop counters to be vitaled through adding a SA to the troop counter -added text disallowing pre-loading troops -changed the word "ship" to the word "unit" in the loading/unloading rules -simplified the wording of the naval gunfire and aircraft sections -changed bomber section name back to aircraft -shortened the wording the in the Troop vs. Troop Combat section Version 1.3: -changed the wording of Hard to Kill SA to make troop counters able to kill other troop counters in one hit -added optional rule allowing transports to re-spawn -added Rescue option back in -clarified that troop counters do not all have to be unloaded at once -added Regroup ability to the Troop Counters -clarified that troop combat is at the end of the surface combat phase Otto von Starkburg Do you want some response? Lt_V It sounds pretty good to me, you have figured out some nifty ways to perform combat, playtesting will work out any bugs jfkziegler Otto von Starkburg wrote: Do you want some response? Yes, certainly. Otto von Starkburg Quote: Checking for Victory: At the end of each turn, a check for victory is made.  Each player counts the total value of enemy ships that they have sunk, the total value of objectives that they have claimed, and any points they have acquired through other special abilities.  If their point total exceeds the amount needed to win the scenario, then they win the game.  If not, the game continues. I would focus only on claiming/holding the objective. The Status of any fleet should be irrelevant. Quote: Loading/Unloading Troop Counters: Each side has an unlimited amount of troop counters, which may be loaded onto ships in the player’s deployment area.  Loading troops is a free action that may occur at any time.  However, each ship may only load troops up to its capacity.  Troop counters may be unloaded at any island, but this can only be done at the end of the Sea Movement phase. My suggestion: Instead of the Surface Attack Phase the ships can unload their Troops. They are only successfull at unloading their troops, if they are not destroyed until the beginning of the next Surface Attack Phase. You delay the deployment opperations and the (attacking) Player must protect their units. Also, lay smoke screen-unit get more important. Quote: Ship vs. Troop Combat: Ships may fire on troops that are on an island, but only using gunnery attacks, and only during the surface attack phase.  To do so, the ship will roll its gunnery attack, and the troop will roll eight dice.  The scores will be counted according to normal gunnery rules.  If the result from the ship is higher, the troop counter is destroyed.  If the result from the troop is higher, the troop survives. I would give them stats. Also, its nearly impossible to make attacks that destroy immedialty a unit. May be, you use something like "hard to destroy" (-> instead of immediatly destroying the unit, the unit get 2 damage). Also, there should be a limit of counters at one landing zone. Quote: Troop vs. Troop Combat: They should play A&A Minis. One round in WaS is 10 Minutes? [quot]Ship Capacity[/quote] Vital Cargo/Secret Cargo/any other Cargo quarted -> # of troop counters Landing Capacity halfed (round up) -> # of troop countrs jfkziegler Otto von Starkburg wrote: I would focus only on claiming/holding the objective. The Status of any fleet should be irrelevant. I suppose it could be done like that.  The reason I did it the way I did is because it makes it fit neatly into the existing War at Sea rules. If done your way, perhaps winning the game could be achieved by holding two objectives.  The only concern I have with that, though, is that if I manage to land my troops first, the game could be over before my opponent had a chance to counter-attack. Quote: My suggestion: Instead of the Surface Attack Phase the ships can unload their Troops. They are only successfull at unloading their troops, if they are not destroyed until the beginning of the next Surface Attack Phase. While that would be more realistic, it would also make it virtually impossible to ever successfully land troops.  Think of how difficult it is to keep transports alive in the convoy scenario. Quote: You delay the deployment opperations and the (attacking) Player must protect their units. Also, lay smoke screen-unit get more important. I think having to protect your units all the way across the map is difficult enough.  Having to protect them for an extra turn when both forces have converged on the center of the map is likely impossible, especially given how easy transports are to destroy. I do agree with you that it would make smoke screen more important, though. Quote: I would give them stats. The reason I did not give them stats is for simplicity.  Standardization makes things considerably easier to keep track of.  I am a firm believer in the principle of KISS when it comes to game design. Quote: Also, its nearly impossible to make attacks that destroy immedialty a unit.  May be, you use something like "hard to destroy" (-> instead of immediatly destroying the unit, the unit get 2 damage). Again, this would come down to realism against game mechanics.  Also, one must keep in mind the situation.  These are freshly landed troops, not troops that have had a while to dig in.  That would make them easier to destroy, in my opinion. Quote: Also, there should be a limit of counters at one landing zone. The reason I designed it without a limit of counters is so that if your ships survive, they can go back and pick up more troops.  Really, what I see as being the major limiting factor here is not the number of troops available, but how long you can keep your transports alive. Quote: They should play A&A Minis. One round in WaS is 10 Minutes? It's hard to tell online if you're being sarcastic or not, so I am going to assume you're not and outline my reasons for not going with that idea.  Basically, I think that having an AAM game break out whenever there is a land combat would make the game go on a long, long time, and would create a serious disadvantage for those people who do not play AAM.  Also, War at Sea remains primarily a naval game, so I don't want to get too caught up in the land side of things.  I think that the system I created does a pretty good job of allowing for land battles that are easy enough to carry out so that they don't distract from the sea battles, which are still the primary focus. Quote: Vital Cargo/Secret Cargo/any other Cargo quarted -> # of troop counters Landing Capacity halfed (round up) -> # of troop countrs You may be right here, but I have two concerns: 1) I want units with the Landing ability to be able to carry more units, not less, since they are dedicated troop carriers. 2) What you are proposing would create many more troop counters than my original proposal.  You may be right that more troop counters are warranted and would make for better play, but I would like to get see how my numbers play out in playtesting before deciding to change them. Thank you for the feedback, and please keep the feedback coming! jfkziegler Lt_Vleclopity wrote: It sounds pretty good to me, you have figured out some nifty ways to perform combat, playtesting will work out any bugs The bugs are the primary thing I am looking for at the moment.  I think the overall system is sound, but I am definitely looking for a lot of feedback on what the bugs inherent in the system may be.  I am especially concerned with rules loopholes or anything like that. jfkziegler Okay, I got a chance to do some playtesting (Germans versus British, with troops being carried by JOB and Nordmark only), and came to some conclusions: 1) Nordmark is very powerful.  It's statted like a destroyer with far better VA and hull points, and it can often move 2 spaces.  I'm not sure how to fix this one yet, of if it even should be fixed. 2) I may need to make troop vs. troop combat hit on a 4 or higher.  Then again, given the pressure that can be brought on them by warships and planes, maybe they should remain harder to kill. 3) Units with Convoy Guardian are very good in this format. 4) The game goes very slowly because most of the units have Speed 1 and it takes a while for them to get anywhere.  This is made even worse by the fact that they have to go all the way back to the starting area to pick up extra troops.  I'm open to suggestions on how to fix this one. Also, if anyone can playtest these rules some more and give me more feedback, I would love to hear it. Diamondback Idea: TRANSFER: If a loaded and empty transport spend an entire turn in the same sector with no movement or shooting by either, they may transfer cargo between them. jfkziegler I'm not necessarily opposed to the idea, Diamondback, but I'm not seeing what the benefit would be.  Since most transports would be of roughly equal capability, why waste the turn to make the transfer? Diamondback Good point--but if you have one large transport and a buncha APD's with Close Escort, you can restock two of 'em halfway and capitalize on their higher speed for the second half the run. The_lucky_Y fixing those transports suggestions: 1. a transport unit does never count towards the sector´s stacking limit   (allow to have two  or 3 escorting units in the same sector) 2. give all transports hull 4 as like the Nordmarck has   (would equal the massive advantage of the nordmark a bit) 3. Nordmarck speed shall be 1 w/o slow 4. if a transport is destroyed , other ships in the same sector may rescue      the  troops perhaps only with an successful dice roll.   (enemy submarines in possible attack range may forbid that action)   (only small ships as corvettes and  destroyers can pick up troops) chesty Re: jfkziegler's Troop Landing Rules jfkziegler wrote: Below you will find the rough draft of my new troop landing rules.  Please let me know what you think, and try to poke holes and let me know where I need to make corrections.  Thanks! Thanks for taking this on! I'll admit that I'm excited by this project. Once you work out the basic rules (the "engine") for handling Troops, I'm sure we'll all find lots of interesting ways to use them.   jfkziegler wrote: Many of the major actions of World War II, such as D-day or Leyte Gulf, were amphibious operations dedicated to landing troops... I heartily agree that Troops should be included in WaS. I can't tell you how many Ships will be able to get useful SA's, once we get some reasonable Troop rules.   jfkziegler wrote: Instead of placing objective tokens, place islands on the spots where the objective tokens would normally be, and place the objective tokens on top of those islands. How about a mix of some kind, or saying that island objectives are optional? Oh, right. This is a special case.     Hmmm... jfkziegler wrote: Claiming an Objective: Unlike in the Standard scenario, in these rules objectives are not removed from the board when claimed.  An objective is considered claimed by one side when that side is the only side with troops on the objective when the check for victory is made.  Objectives, even after they have been claimed, may later revert back to neutral status, or even be claimed by the other side. I like having objectives that remain in play and have to be held, but I'm not sure about the part I emphazised with italics and bold. If a player is out of transports, but has Sea Control of unoccupied islands, can he or she claim the victory points for those islands? I think you might mention that Troops trump Sea Control, when claiming objectives, just to be clear. I should mention that this was the heart of my own efforts at finding something useful for Troops to do. I figured that being able to steam up to a contested objective and score the points for it by landing some Troops would be worthwhile. Especially if those Troops can then deny Sea Control to my opponent.   jfkziegler wrote: Checking for Victory: At the end of each turn... Right. jfkziegler wrote: Loading/Unloading Troop Counters: Each side has... Looks right to me. jfkziegler wrote: Ship vs. Troop Combat: Ships may fire on troops... I would suggest changing Ship to Naval Gunfire. I'm sure play testing will reveal a good Armor score for generic Troop counters. jfkziegler wrote: Aircraft vs. Troop Combat: Aircraft may attack troops If you aren't going to allow Strafing attacks, why not just call it Bomber vs Troops? I have to object to freshly landed Troops having an AA score of any kind, by the way. They should have to rely on Fighter protection and Heavy Antiair from supporting Ships. jfkziegler wrote: Troop vs. Troop Combat: If there are troop counters from two opposing fleets on the same island... I was hoping to avoid playing any land battles. I would much prefer the idea of one counter simply neutralizing another. I know the odds should be much better than 1 to 1 for a successful invasion, but I think we can justify the anamoly by assuming that a Troop counter is reduced in strength by the process of landing. A full strength Troop counter assaults the island and takes heavy losses. The surviving Troops take fortified positions that bring the odds back to 1 to 1. Sound reasonable? jfkziegler wrote: Ship Capacity: An Auxiliary unit can carry... Secret Cargo means Subs. Subs? I don't know. I've found some Destroyers that actually served as fast transports, and I'll be looking for some Cruisers, too. (They're harder to find than I expected.) If someone were to make cards for 'em, the Germans wouldn't be the only fleet with fast transports anymore.   jfkziegler wrote: Units do not receive victory points for the Vital Cargo, Secret Cargo, or Precious Cargo special abilities.  Units also do not receive victory points for the Landing special ability or the Rescue special ability. Makes sense only if you use Cargo SA's as proxies for Troop transport SA's. I'm not sure about Rescue either, since you can treat the example you cite below as a special case. jfkziegler wrote: Ships with the special abilities Bombard or Shore Support roll two extra attack dice when making gunnery attacks against troop counters. Excellent! Ships with those SA's just became more useful. jfkziegler wrote: The special ability No Sea Control has no relevance to this format. As mentioned above, I think Sea Control should still apply to unoccupied island objectives. I need to do some play testing, but I'd rather not rule Sea Control out, just yet. jfkziegler wrote: If a unit carrying troop counters is sunk while it is in the same square as a unit with the special ability Rescue, the unit with Rescue may roll a die.  On a 5 or higher, you may place the troop counter on the unit with Rescue. Nice!   Maybe just say "If a Ship carrying troop counters is sunk while it is in the same sector as a Ship with the special ability Rescue, and if the Rescue is successful, you may place the troop counter on the Ship with Rescue." jfkziegler wrote: A special thanks to chesty for helping me in the development of these rules! Well, we could use 'em. That's for sure. Thanks, jfk!   Otto von Starkburg Replay to JFKs 1st response. Quote: If done your way, perhaps winning the game could be achieved by holding two objectives.  The only concern I have with that, though, is that if I manage to land my troops first, the game could be over before my opponent had a chance to counter-attack. That can you solve that you rule: That landing zone (objective) must be hold three round without any interruption. Quote: While that would be more realistic, it would also make it virtually impossible to ever successfully land troops.  Think of how difficult it is to keep transports alive in the convoy scenario. Quote: I think having to protect your units all the way across the map is difficult enough.  Having to protect them for an extra turn when both forces have converged on the center of the map is likely impossible, especially given how easy transports are to destroy. Okay, i can understand you. But i wouldn't allow any unit to attack and land troops (so, landing instead of any attacks). Quote: The reason I did not give them stats is for simplicity.  Standardization makes things considerably easier to keep track of.  I am a firm believer in the principle of KISS when it comes to game design. I'am more a friend of holding the rules in line. You can give the landing forces an A and AV. For every token, you get a +1 on Hull. For every succesful attack against the landing force, they lose on hull (or two at VA). That is in line, you spare time with dice throwing and so on. Quote: These are freshly landed troops, not troops that have had a while to dig in. They are hundreds of soldiers, may be some tanks. Its hard to succesfull hundreds of soldiers and tens of tanks with ship guns. The terrain is their adventage. They needn't any time to dig in (they have about 5000squareyards to disperse). Quote: You may be right here, but I have two concerns: 1) I want units with the Landing ability to be able to carry more units, not less, since they are dedicated troop carriers. 2) What you are proposing would create many more troop counters than my original proposal.  You may be right that more troop counters are warranted and would make for better play, but I would like to get see how my numbers play out in playtesting before deciding to change them. Your point. Otto von Starkburg My response to rescue and transfer: You are talking about transfer or rescue hundreds of people in 10 minutes. That is quite impossible and should not be possible. Nordmark: Nordmark is a auxillary unit, but not transport unit. For these scenarios, its seem to be right made some custom cards represent by proxies. If i remember right, many liners and passanger ships were used as transports for troops. They differ in size and cargo capacity. I think, two or three different types of troop transporters are okay [the fast with speed 2, the slow and large and the slow and small]. These transporters shouldn't get any AA-Value, if you rule to negate the stacking rules. That make them very powerful and for your opponent very hard to destroy them with air attacks. Just my 2 cents. Lt_V I have a few ideas: - use standard transports or stats for each country (JOB or Maru) this evens the playing field - use either AA board game infantry or AA Land infantry for the troops, it would add a nice touch and you may be doing this already - I like the 8 dice roll for infantry, its not so much as an offensive roll but a survival roll against naval fire...those poor guys just went for cover for the most part and the idea is one way fighting not back and forth - if there is a tie on naval vs troop fire or troop vs troop fire the troop(s) should be considered 'damaged' 'disrupted' 'frightened' 'tired'...whatever you wish to call it but that troop unit would only get 6 die on any further attacks, until a new troop is added to the island to 'reinforce'...you know what I mean -each troop may only attack once per round so it is possible to have damaged trrops sharing the island - play with a point limit per nation and you decide in advance how many transports and infantry you have, infantry could cost 3 pts maybe... you decide... so do you go with more infantry to take the islands or do you go with more ships/planes to try to prevent landings and land smaller forces...there needs to be a minimum though otherwise people will abuse the rules...also a limit on air cover - to 'speed' up transports maybe playing with the map turned 90 degrees so each nation enters from the long sides of the map with the islands placed equally down the middle, instead of the short sides my brain hurts........... jfkziegler Thanks to everyone for your suggestions and feedback!  My thoughts are below: The_lucky_Y wrote: fixing those transports suggestions: 1. a transport unit does never count towards the sector´s stacking limit   (allow to have two  or 3 escorting units in the same sector) I like the idea, although I think unlimited would be a bit much.  If it were unlimited, I could just stack half or all my transports with two Atlanta's and call it a day.  However, the idea of increasing the stacking limit is worth looking into. Quote: 2. give all transports hull 4 as like the Nordmarck has   (would equal the massive advantage of the nordmark a bit) The only concern I have with doing that is that it would make it very difficult for subs to bring down transports.  Maybe Hull 2 with higher VA? Quote: 3. Nordmarck speed shall be 1 w/o slow That could work.  I am also considering creating a standardized transport unit, such as OvS suggested below.  That might fix a lot of the problem. Quote: 4. if a transport is destroyed , other ships in the same sector may rescue      the  troops perhaps only with an successful dice roll.   (enemy submarines in possible attack range may forbid that action)   (only small ships as corvettes and  destroyers can pick up troops) I think I agree with OvS below that the Rescue mechanic is not realistic and should probably be removed.  I do still like the concept, though, so I am not sure. chesty wrote: How about a mix of some kind, or saying that island objectives are optional? Oh, right. This is a special case. The major difficulty with that is that without island objectives there is no reason to have troops in the first place, since you would hae nothing to use the troops for. Quote: I like having objectives that remain in play and have to be held, but I'm not sure about the part I emphazised with italics and bold. If a player is out of transports, but has Sea Control of unoccupied islands, can he or she claim the victory points for those islands? I think you might mention that Troops trump Sea Control, when claiming objectives, just to be clear. I should mention that this was the heart of my own efforts at finding something useful for Troops to do. I figured that being able to steam up to a contested objective and score the points for it by landing some Troops would be worthwhile. Especially if those Troops can then deny Sea Control to my opponent. I see what you're saying here, but I am not sure I agree.  My major issue is the fact that Sea Control becomes irrelevant as soon as you make the objective an island, because ships cannot claim an island anyway.  Now, rules could be added to allow ships to claim an island, but I am not sure how that would work.  Maybe something like, "If you have a ship adjacent to an island without troops on it and the opponent does not, you claim that island?"  It seems to me that if such a mechanic were added, the best way to win would be to bring some big battleships, destroy your opponent's surface navy (or at least the part of it around the island), destroy whatever troop tokens were on the island, and never even bother with troops of your own.  That, of course, would be counter-productive to the whole idea of having troop rules.  I think any mechanic that allows ships to claim islands in this format would ultimately result in the winning strategy being not to bring troops at all, and obviously I think that would defeat the purpose of the exercise. Quote: I would suggest changing Ship to Naval Gunfire. I'm sure play testing will reveal a good Armor score for generic Troop counters. You and the names of things...   Sure, we can change the name of the rules section to Naval Gunfire. As for giving armor scores to troop units, I am of two minds about it. 1) It would standardize the combat system into the bigger War at Sea combat system, and that would be a good thing. 2) I think it would make it harder to figure out exactly what scores troops should have, because they would have to have an armour score that is fair against aircraft, fair against ships, and fair against other troops.  The nice thing about my current system is that you can alter the number of defense dice thrown if need be. You're probably right, though.  The system should probably be standardized.  Perhaps I could create a stat card for a generic troop counter at the same time as a stat card is created for a generic auxiliary. Quote: If you aren't going to allow Strafing attacks, why not just call it Bomber vs Troops? I have to object to freshly landed Troops having an AA score of any kind, by the way. They should have to rely on Fighter protection and Heavy Antiair from supporting Ships. I suppose it could be called Bomber vs. Troops.  The reason I did not allow strafing attacks is because I want to keep troops relatively difficult to kill.  If they were statted low enough so that fighters could kill them, then destroyers could also kill them with ease, and no troop counters would ever survive. As for the AA score, I suppose it could be dropped.  Again, it was added to make them a little more survivable, but I guess it could be removed. Quote: I was hoping to avoid playing any land battles. I would much prefer the idea of one counter simply neutralizing another. I know the odds should be much better than 1 to 1 for a successful invasion, but I think we can justify the anamoly by assuming that a Troop counter is reduced in strength by the process of landing. A full strength Troop counter assaults the island and takes heavy losses. The surviving Troops take fortified positions that bring the odds back to 1 to 1. Sound reasonable? I disagree with you on this one.  I do think that there should be some element of randomness involved, some hope that those two troop counters you just landed might prevail against the four troop counters already inhabiting the island.  I also think that the mechanic I created for this allows the combat to be done quickly and not significantly distract from the naval game. Quote: Secret Cargo means Subs. Subs? I don't know. I've found some Destroyers that actually served as fast transports, and I'll be looking for some Cruisers, too. (They're harder to find than I expected.) If someone were to make cards for 'em, the Germans wouldn't be the only fleet with fast transports anymore. The Japanese absolutely used subs to land troops during the war.  In fact, one of the major criticisms of Japanese sub use was that they used them too much in that capacity and not enough as the weapons they were designed to be.  As for destroyer and cruiser transports, I would love to get some designed, as they would definitely diversify the strategy a bit. Quote: Makes sense only if you use Cargo SA's as proxies for Troop transport SA's. I'm not sure about Rescue either, since you can treat the example you cite below as a special case. Yeah, I think I am going to pull Rescue and let it go back to being what it normally is.  It's sad, though, because I thought this format had finally made it semi-useful. Otto von Starkburg wrote: That can you solve that you rule: That landing zone (objective) must be hold three round without any interruption. My concern is that having troops have to survive three turns might be nearly impossible.  I am also concerned that it would take what is already a long format and make the games even longer. Quote: Okay, i can understand you. But i wouldn't allow any unit to attack and land troops (so, landing instead of any attacks). That's a good point.  I need to add that into the rules. Quote: I'am more a friend of holding the rules in line. You can give the landing forces an A and AV. For every token, you get a +1 on Hull. For every succesful attack against the landing force, they lose on hull (or two at VA). That is in line, you spare time with dice throwing and so on. Interesting idea, and it may wind up forming the basis of how I re-constitute the combat system for troops versus ships and aircraft. Quote: They are hundreds of soldiers, may be some tanks. Its hard to succesfull hundreds of soldiers and tens of tanks with ship guns. The terrain is their adventage. They needn't any time to dig in (they have about 5000squareyards to disperse). True.  I'll think about a way to get the mechanic right.  Maybe troop counters should have an armour and hull score, but no VA.  That way, you would have to hit them twice to destroy them.  That would make them more survivable. Quote: You are talking about transfer or rescue hundreds of people in 10 minutes. That is quite impossible and should not be possible. As I said above, I think I agree with you here.  I will probably drop the rescue mechanic.  My only concern is that the timeline argument doesn't really apply, given the fact that planes can take off, hit a target, and go back to their carriers in one game turn. Quote: Nordmark is a auxillary unit, but not transport unit. For these scenarios, its seem to be right made some custom cards represent by proxies. I agree that standardized auxiliary cards may be the way to go. Quote: These transporters shouldn't get any AA-Value, if you rule to negate the stacking rules. That make them very powerful and for your opponent very hard to destroy them with air attacks. A valid point, although I may just give them a very low AA value. Thanks again to everyone for their feedback, and please keep it coming.  Also, please try playtesting the rules some.  The feedback is worth twice as much when it comes from playtesting experience. jfkziegler Lt_Vleclopity wrote: I have a few ideas: - use standard transports or stats for each country (JOB or Maru) this evens the playing field I think this is a good idea, although I think the JOB/Maru stats are too low to be an effective transport.  I think they would wind up making this similar to the convoy scenario, which obviously we want to avoid. Quote: - use either AA board game infantry or AA Land infantry for the troops, it would add a nice touch and you may be doing this already You mean as counters?  I think this is a good idea, although to be honest at the moment I am using pennies for playtesting. Quote: - I like the 8 dice roll for infantry, its not so much as an offensive roll but a survival roll against naval fire...those poor guys just went for cover for the most part and the idea is one way fighting not back and forth Yeah, I am still very split about this one.  I like my mechanic, but on the other hand I can also see the argument for standardizing it into the War at Sea rules. Quote: - if there is a tie on naval vs troop fire or troop vs troop fire the troop(s) should be considered 'damaged' 'disrupted' 'frightened' 'tired'...whatever you wish to call it but that troop unit would only get 6 die on any further attacks, until a new troop is added to the island to 'reinforce'...you know what I mean Interesting idea.  Of course, I'd have to find a way to re-work that idea if I do away with the die rolls. Quote: -each troop may only attack once per round so it is possible to have damaged trrops sharing the island Interesting concept. Quote: - play with a point limit per nation and you decide in advance how many transports and infantry you have, infantry could cost 3 pts maybe... you decide... so do you go with more infantry to take the islands or do you go with more ships/planes to try to prevent landings and land smaller forces...there needs to be a minimum though otherwise people will abuse the rules...also a limit on air cover I think limiting the amount of transports already puts a de facto limit on infantry, since it limits your ability to move them.  They do you no good while stuck in your starting area. Quote: - to 'speed' up transports maybe playing with the map turned 90 degrees so each nation enters from the long sides of the map with the islands placed equally down the middle, instead of the short sides Wow, I really like that idea.  That opens up all types of cool possibilities.  Thanks! Quote: my brain hurts........... Thanks for your help, though. The_lucky_Y maybe the stacking limits from my scenario grandest fleet version would help out a bit: Stacking limits: -in every sector you can place surface vessels for max 7 point total /past  1943  9 point total - Battleships: 4 points - Cruisers/Carriers  with capacity above one plane : 3 points - Destroyers/Carriers with capacity of one plane : 2 points - Auxillary and Vessels with shallow draft: 1 point * in every sector you can place one submarine/past 1943 two subs per sector * in every sector you can place aircraft for max 6 point total per side(axis or allies) -  pre 1943 aircraft  uses up one point - post 1942 air units use 1,5 points - large sub pen allows to place an extra submarine in its sector in that scenario the transport units are needed to occupy neutral islands and the stacking limits will work, sure if you play without year limits then use the pre 1943 limit . jfkziegler They're good rules, but I think they add more complexity than what I am looking for. Otto von Starkburg Easy rule: Stacking Rule (enhanced): Additionaly two the two combat ships (Carriers/BB/CA/DD/PTB/Auxillary). its allowed to have two additional Transport Ships in the same sector. The_lucky_Y jfkziegler wrote: They're good rules, but I think they add more complexity than what I am looking for. thats ok you can skip the aircraft and submarine thing and the post 1942 rules then you come out very simple. Otto von Starkburg Btw: I see, its easy to make scratch-build 'C-1 look-like' ships. That should be ideal for transports. C 1? jfkziegler Otto von Starkburg wrote: Easy rule: Stacking Rule (enhanced): Additionaly two the two combat ships (Carriers/BB/CA/DD/PTB/Auxillary). its allowed to have two additional Transport Ships in the same sector. This is the type of rule I was thinking of, though I am not sure as of yet if I want it to be a general rule for the scenario or if I want to make it a special ability on the generic transport card. Otto von Starkburg Hmm. I would use it as a SA. Diamondback Or, you might look at C2's (=Jeremiah O'Brien, the EC2 Liberty and VC2 Victory ships were simplifications of the basic C2). Or the Hog Islanders, which were actually more advanced than their next-generation C2/C3 counterparts: Type A, 122 built. Over half sunk during WWII. Type B, 24 built. All but one used as Army transports, many transferred to Navy. jfkziegler Updated with new suggestions incorporated and an update log added at the bottom. Otto von Starkburg @Diamondback: C1-like ships are very easy and cheap to scratch-build. In other case, you're right. Otto von Starkburg Quote: Troop Transport Ship (Auxiliary) Cost 4 Armour 1 Vital Armour 7 Hull Points 2 Speed 2 Antiair 4 (range 0) Stay Close: The sector this unit is in can contain two Auxiliary units above its normal stacking limit. Slow 2: At the beginning of your Sea Movement phase, roll a die.  On a 2 or less, this unit gets -1 speed this turn. 1st) They should not have a cost factor (if you want to use them in a campaign, than its okay). Jeremiah O'Brien have Armor 1/Vital Armor 4 and Hull 2. Kina Maru the same. You took Nordmark as archetype. So i think, 4 points are too good. You can make two types - a small but cheap transport and an more expansive but fast transport. I suggest a SA Troop Capacity 2 or similar (new) SA. Also, the AA-value is too high (with up to five ships in a sector...). Also, your SA is not clear. It should something like Code: Stay Close: The sector this unit is in can contain up to two additional Auxiliary units with these SA, above its normal stacking limit. Quote: A troop counter with more than one hull point remaining cannot be destroyed in one attack no matter how successful the attack is. In one attack phase? Attack of one unit? Please clarify this. Quote: Troop vs. Troop Combat: I like your rule, but the text is so long (i don't know how to shorten them). Quote: Ship Capacity My suggestion - Vital Cargo/Precise Cargo/Secret Cargo/Landing with a score of 5 or less can carry two unit counters. With a score of 6 or higher three counters, My resume: I like the version 1.1 much more as the first draft. Otto von Starkburg Quote: 1st) They should not have a cost factor (if you want to use them in a campaign, than its okay). Jeremiah O'Brien have Armor 1/Vital Armor 4 and Hull 2. Kina Maru the same. You took Nordmark as archetype. So i think, 4 points are too good. You can make two types - a small but cheap transport and an more expansive but fast transport. I suggest a SA Troop Capacity 2 or similar (new) SA. Also, the AA-value is too high (with up to five ships in a sector...). After take a look at the GUnston Hall and T1 Landing ship, i have to go a step back. The cost-factor seems to be good. drittal my main issues... 1)  How do you keep your opponent from rolling with all attack ships and no points being fielded on Auxilaries?  Maybe a certain minimum percentage must be alloted towards Aux, transports, and landing ships. 2)  Why can't fighters strafe troops?  They have a very low probability of success, but they could Also, I can see aircraft being the Bane of your transports...  Maybe add this,  If the attacking plane has a line of travel to your troop carriers that passes over an adjacent square occupied by a friendly ship, or ships, those ships can make AA attacks on the enemy planes with a -1 penalty to all dice. Food for thought.  I printed it out and took it to work with me.  My how it has changed in 7hrs.   chesty jfkziegler wrote: 1) Nordmark is very powerful.  It's statted like a destroyer with far better VA and hull points, and it can often move 2 spaces.  I'm not sure how to fix this one yet, of if it even should be fixed. You could rule that Auxiliaries are generic, so that both players can use them as transports. (Nordmark's stats would be for fast armed transports, and Jeremiah O'Brien's stats would cover standard transports.) Numbered or coloured pieces of tape could easily be used to identify which ones belong to which fleet. jfkziegler wrote: 4) The game goes very slowly because most of the units have Speed 1 and it takes a while for them to get anywhere.  This is made even worse by the fact that they have to go all the way back to the starting area to pick up extra troops.  I'm open to suggestions on how to fix this one. I haven't tried the sideways map idea yet. In the bits of play testing I've done so far, I run out of transports long before I run out of surface Ships. That's why I'd like to see normal Sea Control apply, in the absence of Troops on an objective (Troops trump Sea Control). The only changes to the normal rules for taking an objective would be that, if the objective marker is on an island, you don't remove the objective marker when you take it, and you only get the points while you hold it. Even so, that's a huge difference, and the ability of Troops to hold objectives becomes highly attractive as a natural consequence. In theory, anyway. jfkziegler wrote: Also, if anyone can playtest these rules some more and give me more feedback, I would love to hear it. This weekend. I'm stoked!   jfkziegler Otto von Starkburg wrote: 1st) They should not have a cost factor (if you want to use them in a campaign, than its okay). I like them having a cost factor because it allows you to choose how many you want to bring - in other words, to set your priorities.  If you go too strong on warships, you might not be able to get objectives.  Too strong on transports, and you might be too vulnerable.  It's a fine balancing act.  If each side just got a set number of transports like in the convoy scenario, it would remove the decision-making aspect. Quote: Jeremiah O'Brien have Armor 1/Vital Armor 4 and Hull 2. Kina Maru the same. You took Nordmark as archetype. So i think, 4 points are too good. Yes, my intention was to obsolete JOB, KM, and Nordmark all with this one transport.  I did that because I don't really believe that JOB and KM are survivable enough to be usable, and because I think Nordmark is probably a little too good.  I succeeded somewhat in this attempt.  This transport clearly outclasses JOB and KM, but people might still take Nordmark for the gunnery and the higher hull points and anti-air, even despite the extra point of cost.  Still, it means that German players don't get an autowin with Nordmark anymore, so I think it solved the problem. Quote: You can make two types - a small but cheap transport and an more expansive but fast transport. It's a thought.  Perhaps a 2 point transport similar to JOB.  I'll have to think about it. Quote: I suggest a SA Troop Capacity 2 or similar (new) SA. Also, the AA-value is too high (with up to five ships in a sector...). I disagree.  In my experience, AA 4 rarely stops anything.  It might occasionally stop a Kondor or a strafing Sea Hurricane, but that's typically about it. Quote: Also, your SA is not clear. It should something like Code: Stay Close: The sector this unit is in can contain up to two additional Auxiliary units with these SA, above its normal stacking limit. I could do it that way, but I kind of like the fact that the current wording can allow you to shelter a second auxiliary without the ability.  This could be useful if you want to shelter a Gunston Hall, for example. Quote: Quote: A troop counter with more than one hull point remaining cannot be destroyed in one attack no matter how successful the attack is. In one attack phase? Attack of one unit? Please clarify this. Perhaps if it were re-written like this? A troop counter with more than one hull point remaining cannot be destroyed by a single attack roll no matter how many successes are rolled. Really, I am just trying to give the idea that troops cannot be vital'd. Quote: Quote: Troop vs. Troop Combat: I like your rule, but the text is so long (i don't know how to shorten them). I agree on both counts.  I hate long, wordy blocks, but I don't know how to shorten it either.  I am open to suggestions if anyone has them. Quote: Quote: Ship Capacity My suggestion - Vital Cargo/Precise Cargo/Secret Cargo/Landing with a score of 5 or less can carry two unit counters. With a score of 6 or higher three counters, What would be the rationale for such a change? Quote: My resume: I like the version 1.1 much more as the first draft. I think you meant "opinion" or "conclusion" rather than resume, but regardless, I am glad you like Version 1.1 better.   Quote: After take a look at the GUnston Hall and T1 Landing ship, i have to go a step back. The cost-factor seems to be good. I'm glad you like it.  I'm still leaving my response in the above section in case anyone else has the same concern. drittal wrote: my main issues... 1)  How do you keep your opponent from rolling with all attack ships and no points being fielded on Auxilaries?  Maybe a certain minimum percentage must be alloted towards Aux, transports, and landing ships. I'm hoping that the rules themselves will discourage players from playing an all attack ships style, especially since they could not claim objectives at that point.  Theoretically, if you brought all attack ships, you could only win if you sunk every single unit in your opponent's fleet and they did not manage to get any troops onto any islands. Quote: 2)  Why can't fighters strafe troops?  They have a very low probability of success, but they could Yeah, now that the way that troop defense works has been changed, this should be added in.  Good point. Quote: Also, I can see aircraft being the Bane of your transports...  Maybe add this,  If the attacking plane has a line of travel to your troop carriers that passes over an adjacent square occupied by a friendly ship, or ships, those ships can make AA attacks on the enemy planes with a -1 penalty to all dice. I'm hoping that the improved stacking limits on the new transport card can alleviate this problem.  I think it will take playtesting to know for sure. chesty wrote: You could rule that Auxiliaries are generic, so that both players can use them as transports. (Nordmark's stats would be for fast armed transports, and Jeremiah O'Brien's stats would cover standard transports.) Numbered or coloured pieces of tape could easily be used to identify which ones belong to which fleet. That's a thought, though I think I like the generic transport better, mostly because I think it is more appropriately statted for the scenario.  You could still use JOB or KM or Nordmark pieces to represent the generic units. Quote: I haven't tried the sideways map idea yet. In the bits of play testing I've done so far, I run out of transports long before I run out of surface Ships. That's why I'd like to see normal Sea Control apply, in the absence of Troops on an objective (Troops trump Sea Control). The only changes to the normal rules for taking an objective would be that, if the objective marker is on an island, you don't remove the objective marker when you take it, and you only get the points while you hold it. Even so, that's a huge difference, and the ability of Troops to hold objectives becomes highly attractive as a natural consequence. In theory, anyway. I remain firmly opposed to this idea, for exactly the reason I mentioned when responding to drittal's first concern above.  I believe that allowing surface ships to take islands will make troops entirely unnecessary.  The winning strategy will be to take a powerful surface fleet, destroy the opponent's transports (and fleet as well), and then go claim the islands.  Thus, I still think that allowing that caveat would defeat the entire purpose of building these rules in the first place. Quote: This weekend. I'm stoked! Excellent.  I anxiously await the results of your playtesting. Otto von Starkburg Quote: I could do it that way, but I kind of like the fact that the current wording can allow you to shelter a second auxiliary without the ability.  This could be useful if you want to shelter a Gunston Hall, for example. With my suggestion, there could be four ships in the sector (five, if a ship with Close Escort is present). I think, thats a much ships. Quote: A troop counter with more than one hull point remaining cannot be destroyed by a single attack roll no matter how many successes are rolled. Really, I am just trying to give the idea that troops cannot be vital'd. Sounds good. Quote: What would be the rationale for such a change? Easy way to use these unit also in the game as troop transports. jfkziegler Otto von Starkburg wrote: With my suggestion, there could be four ships in the sector (five, if a ship with Close Escort is present). I think, thats a much ships. I think that the same thing is possible with the way I worded the special ability.  Maybe I should see what Aquarius thinks - he's the special ability wording expert. Quote: jfkziegler wrote: A troop counter with more than one hull point remaining cannot be destroyed by a single attack roll no matter how many successes are rolled. Really, I am just trying to give the idea that troops cannot be vital'd. Sounds good. Okay, I'll modify that in the next revision. Quote: Easy way to use these unit also in the game as troop transports. I still don't think I'm totally understanding your point here.  The rules as currently written already allow all those units to be used as troop transports. Otto von Starkburg Quote: What would be the rationale for such a change? That the ships have different costs and units with larger cargo value can carry more units. But you're right: its nothing that must be changed. Greyh Seer Re: jfkziegler's Troop Landing Rules First off,  Well done.   This is one of the more promising rulesets I have seen for troop transports.   I have to admit.  Many of the things I had planned to comment on have been changed (and for the better imo).  So here is my thoughts on the rest: jfkziegler wrote: Setting Up: ... These islands count as objectives for the scenario, and when they are claimed, score the exact same points as an objective would.  In the standard scenario, this means that each island is worth 50 points. One way to encourage players to build fleets with auxiliaries would be to increase the worth of each objective.  Or simply make the game based on who controls more objectives at the end.   jfkziegler wrote: Players may deploy a standardized transport unit in this format.  It has the following characteristics: Troop Transport Ship (Auxiliary) Cost 4 Armour 1 Vital Armour 7 Hull Points 2 Speed 2 Antiair 4 (range 0) Stay Close: The sector this unit is in can contain two Auxiliary units above its normal stacking limit. Slow 2: At the beginning of your Sea Movement phase, roll a die.  On a 2 or less, this unit gets -1 speed this turn. I personally always struggle with changing the stats of the auxiliaries in a scenario.  It is frustrating, because I allready have a card for the unit and I hate having to figure out stats and rules for a unit that I almost never use with its printed stats.  On the other hand, keeping these transports alive is near impossible without changing something... You idea of giving them better speed, vital armor and SA's are great.  If I could figure out a simpler way to make the auxiliaries survivable, I would.  One thing I have been toying with in my own scenario that I am working on is keeping the JOB stats and simply adding the following SA: Auxiliary Escort: This unit may target one ship to be its escort each turn.  This unit and its escort count as one ship for stacking purpouses.  No ship may be targeted with this ability more than once per turn. jfkziegler wrote: Loading/Unloading Troop Counters: Each side has an unlimited amount of troop counters, which may be loaded onto ships in the player’s deployment area.  Loading troops is a free action that may occur at any time.  However, each ship may only load troops up to its capacity.  Troop counters may be unloaded at any island, but this can only be done at the end of the Sea Movement phase.  A ship that has unloaded troops this turn may not make any attacks except anti-air attacks. Can troops be pre-loaded before the game ?(thinking of my enemy using Casabiancas to get real close to the Islands) jfkziegler wrote: Troop counters have the following characteristics: Troop Counter Armour 5 Hull Points 2 Naval Gunfire vs. Troop Combat: Ships may fire on troops that are on an island, but only using gunnery attacks, and only during the surface attack phase.  To do so, the ship will roll its gunnery attack, and the result will be compared to the armour score of the troop counter.  If it is a hit, the troop counter will lose one hull point.  A troop counter with more than one hull point remaining cannot be destroyed in one attack no matter how successful the attack is.  Troops with no hull points remaining will recieve a face down destroyed counter. Too wordy.  I suggest two things: 1st - Give the troops a VA of 18 (if someone actually rolls 18 successes they deserve to kill off a troop counter) 2nd - Word it like this: Ships may attack troops in an objective sector using only gunnary attacks.   One sentence.  Easy. jfkziegler wrote: Bombers vs. Troop Combat: Aircraft may attack troops that are on an island, but only using bomb attacks, and only during the air attack phase.  To do so, the aircraft will roll its bomb attack, and the result will be compared to the armour score of the troop counter.  If it is a hit, the troop counter will lose one hull point.  A troop counter with more than one hull point remaining cannot be destroyed in one attack no matter how successful the attack is.  Troops with no hull points remaining will recieve a face down destroyed counter. Same as above. except switch out ships for aircraft and guns for bombs. jfkziegler wrote: Troop vs. Troop Combat: If there are troop counters from two opposing fleets on the same island, they will engage in combat with each other.  This combat can only occur during the surface attack phase.  First, the first player will roll one die for every troop counter he has on the island.  For every 5 or 6 rolled, a face down destroyed counter will be placed on one of the second player’s troop counters.  Then, the second player will roll one die for every troop counter he has on the island.  For every 5 or 6 rolled, a face down destroyed counter will be placed on one of the first player’s troop counters.  At the end of phase, all destroyed counters will be turned face up.  If only one side has troops remaining, it is in control of the island.  If both sides have troops remaining, the island is still being fought over.  Combat can ensue again in the next surface attack phase. I might re-word this...but honestly, your wording is more precise, just longer...I actually might like yours better... Troop counters in the same objective sector must attack each other in the Surface Attack Phase.  Roll 1 die for every troop counter and place a face-down destroyed counter next to the enemy troops for every 5 or 6 rolled. jfkziegler wrote: Ship Capacity: An Auxiliary unit can carry two troop counters.  An Auxiliary unit with the Landing special ability can carry three troop counters.  A unit with the Secret Cargo or Precious Cargo special abilities may carry one troop counter.  No other units may carry troop counters unless a special ability allows them to do so.  If a unit carrying troop counters is sunk, the troop counters are lost. I LOVE the fact that you can use the secret cargo just for fun! I plan to take a whole fleet of Casabiancas! All in all I really like the ruleset.  I can't wait to hear some reports on playtesting.  Looks great! Greyh Seer jfkziegler wrote: 4) The game goes very slowly because most of the units have Speed 1 and it takes a while for them to get anywhere.  This is made even worse by the fact that they have to go all the way back to the starting area to pick up extra troops.  I'm open to suggestions on how to fix this one. Add these rules to the special rules section: Vital Cargo x - When this unit is destroyed, roll x dice.  If you roll a 6 place it in the deployment area instead of removing it. (This would make Kinai Marus perhaps worth thier less effective AA and make Nordmarks one shot wonders) ...of course, this all means that you would have to use the actual stat cards for the auxiliaries (see my Auxiliary Escort SA idea above) jfkziegler Re: jfkziegler's Troop Landing Rules Greyh Seer wrote: First off,  Well done.   This is one of the more promising rulesets I have seen for troop transports.   I'm glad to hear that, especially coming from the House Rules specialist himself. Quote: One way to encourage players to build fleets with auxiliaries would be to increase the worth of each objective.  Or simply make the game based on who controls more objectives at the end.   Interesting ideas.  Here are my concerns: - The first idea, increasing the value of the objectives, could wind up rewarding someone who simply doesn't fail their slow roles and makes it across the map quickly.  I don't think grabbing two objectives early should be enough to win you the game, although I do think it should bring you close. - For the second idea, when exactly is the end of the game?  That might require putting in a turn limit, and doing that would seem to discourage players from trying to reinforce their garrisons and so on, because there wouldn't be enough time to go pick up reinforcements. Quote: I personally always struggle with changing the stats of the auxiliaries in a scenario.  It is frustrating, because I allready have a card for the unit and I hate having to figure out stats and rules for a unit that I almost never use with its printed stats.  On the other hand, keeping these transports alive is near impossible without changing something... Yeah, your later point is my rationale for changing the stats.  The JOB and Kinai Maru simply are not good enough to survive without help. Quote: You idea of giving them better speed, vital armor and SA's are great.  If I could figure out a simpler way to make the auxiliaries survivable, I would.  One thing I have been toying with in my own scenario that I am working on is keeping the JOB stats and simply adding the following SA: Auxiliary Escort: This unit may target one ship to be its escort each turn.  This unit and its escort count as one ship for stacking purpouses.  No ship may be targeted with this ability more than once per turn. Interesting idea - kind of similar to the ability I added onto the generic transport.  My only major concern is that even with that ability, I still think JOB and KM are too easy to kill. Quote: Can troops be pre-loaded before the game ?(thinking of my enemy using Casabiancas to get real close to the Islands) Good point on the subs.  I didn't even think of that.  I think I am going to have to add in a line to clarify that troops cannot be pre-loaded. Quote: Too wordy.  I suggest two things: 1st - Give the troops a VA of 18 (if someone actually rolls 18 successes they deserve to kill off a troop counter) 2nd - Word it like this: Ships may attack troops in an objective sector using only gunnary attacks.   One sentence.  Easy. My thoughts: - You are absolutely right, it is too wordy.  I tend to be overly wordy when writing rules to try to avoid loopholes. - I understand your point on vital armour, but I would rather leave out vital armour, for two reasons.  First, OvS's point that it would be very difficult for ship fire to destroy an entire infantry unit is well taken.  Second, it is simpler to have it work the same in all situations.   - As for your new wording, it is certainly much simpler.  Do you think it will open up any loopholes? Quote: Same as above. except switch out ships for aircraft and guns for bombs. Right. Quote: I might re-word this...but honestly, your wording is more precise, just longer...I actually might like yours better... Troop counters in the same objective sector must attack each other in the Surface Attack Phase.  Roll 1 die for every troop counter and place a face-down destroyed counter next to the enemy troops for every 5 or 6 rolled. I think I can work with your text to make it more precise but still avoid the wordiness of mine. Quote: I LOVE the fact that you can use the secret cargo just for fun! I plan to take a whole fleet of Casabiancas! Yeah, I love the fact that it gives Casabianca a use.  I may also have to create a Repaint Reference card for the Japanese to allow one of their subs to move troops.  I am sure there are plenty of candidates from Guadalcanal. Quote: All in all I really like the ruleset.  I can't wait to hear some reports on playtesting.  Looks great! I am anxiously awaiting playtesting as well.  Thanks for your feedback! jfkziegler Okay, Version 1.2 is up.  Changes are listed in the update log.  I still need helping shortening the Troop vs. Troop Combat section.  Thanks again to everyone for their help so far, and I look forward to seeing some playtest results.   Diamondback IIRC IJA had some troop-transport subs, and many of the later Type B-series were modded to carry Daihatsu landing-craft instead of planes. For one (again IIRC), I-370 started as an IJA supply sub, then the Navy got her and eventually converted her into a six-shot Kaiten carrier. Check out the Type D boats: http://www.combinedfleet.com/type_d1.htm http://www.combinedfleet.com/type_d2.htm The loss of I-364, -365, -370 and -371 respectively suggest that SS's USS Sea Devil and Scabbardfish, DE USS Finnegan and SS USS Lagarto  respectively should get SA's for their subkilling prowess, or these boats should be given a weak Armor or Vital score. I-368 was killed by CVE USS Anzio; I-373, the sole D2, was killed by SS USS Spikefish... perhaps this class should have a special vulnerability to "Submerged Shot" attacks. jfkziegler Thanks for the info, Diamondback! I also got a chance to do some more playtesting, and here are some more thoughts: - I need to revise the wording of the Hard to Kill SA so that troop vs. troop combat can kill in one shot. - It seems that the most effective strategy if your opponent gets to the islands first is to land a few troops of your own to put up some resistance and keep the objective unclaimed, and then try to prevent your opponent from being able to reinforce, therefore leaving his troops to wither on the vine.  I'm not sure that this is a bad thing, as this was the basis of the island hopping strategy that won the real Pacific war. - I thought the armour and hull values for the troop counters played very well.  Of course, the fact that my Revenge and Royal Sovereign kept missing with their main batteries may have made this look like it was playing better than it really does, but I was still encouraged with what I saw.  The troops were survivable enough to last a while without being impossible to kill. - The transports, even with their improved stats, died pretty quickly, but maybe that's to be expected. - With the increased speed on the transports, you often had to make a choice whether to leave the transports back with the slow "Guard the Convoy" battleships, or race them ahead to get to the islands first.  I was very happy with that. Overall, I thought the rules played fairly well.  I am anxious to see what others come up with in their playtest results. Otto von Starkburg Quote: Loading troops is a free action that may occur at any time. Hm, may be i've overseen it but i think it should stated: "At the end of a turn, you can load troops on a ship. The rest of changes sounds good. chesty Otto von Starkburg wrote: Hm, may be i've overseen it but i think it should stated: "At the end of a turn, you can load troops on a ship." That would let you move and load Troops on the same turn. What if you put a rearming counter down for a Ship loading Troops in your Deployment Area? jfkziegler wrote: I need to revise the wording of the Hard to Kill SA so that troop vs. troop combat can kill in one shot. I'm not all that excited by the idea of Troop combat, but it seems like you could resolve Troop vs Troop by just having opposing Troop counters throw a die apiece. High die wins, and a tie means both counters stay on the island until the next turn. Simple. Too simple? Has the special Rescue rule been withdrawn from debate? I really like that one for the unexpected coolness factor. Could we at least test it before we toss it? jfkziegler wrote: The transports, even with their improved stats, died pretty quickly, but maybe that's to be expected. Yeah, and what happens when you run out of transports? That's the biggest problem I've had, so far. I can't wait to get some serious testing done. I think I'm more excited about these Troop Rules than I am about Flank Speed coming out.   I made a list of all the Troopy SA's from the Guidelines and posted it over on the other Troop Rules thread. Looking at those SA's, certain things about them take on a whole new meaning. Check out Convoy Defender, for example. I'm sure there'll be others. I also listed all the descriptions of Ships and Subs with Cargo SA's from the Repaints, including the U-511, I-29, and the I-30. I'm assuming those will have a little more interest, all of a sudden. I think I can find some Rudderows that carried Troops, if I look for 'em.   Otto von Starkburg Quote: That would let you move and load Troops on the same turn. What if you put a rearming counter down for a Ship loading Troops in your Deployment Area? And, what is the problem? In fact, you can't load troops in 5 minutes/10 minutes. The 'loading' of the transport is more an exchange. An empty transporter leaves the map, a new and load enters map. Your rule makes too much work imho. chesty Otto von Starkburg wrote: And, what is the problem? In fact, you can't load troops in 5 minutes/10 minutes. The 'loading' of the transport is more an exchange. An empty transporter leaves the map, a new and load enters map. Okay, but what if the Ship was damaged? Would the Ship carrying the new load be undamaged? jfkziegler Otto von Starkburg wrote: Quote: Loading troops is a free action that may occur at any time. Hm, may be i've overseen it but i think it should stated: "At the end of a turn, you can load troops on a ship. I like the current wording for two reasons: 1) It quickens game play because you don't have to stop for loading. 2) It's simple and easy to use. I'll give you that it's not totally realistic, but sometimes easy of play has to trump historical accuracy. UNC_Samurai jfkziegler wrote: I like the current wording for two reasons: 1) It quickens game play because you don't have to stop for loading. 2) It's simple and easy to use. I'll give you that it's not totally realistic, but sometimes easy of play has to trump historical accuracy. So I'm going to use your troop rules in my Malta scenario for October, with a few modifications to how victory points will work.  Do you know if anyone has produced cards for shore AA guns or installations?  I have the shore batteries from the fall Guadalcanal campaign, which can easily be converted into British and Italian cards, but I was curious to see what other work people had done. Greyh Seer I agree that bogging down transports with re-arming or extra time for loading troops is uneccessary. I also suggest the following - make transports infinate re-spawn.  When it dies, re-deploy it in your deployment zone.  Makes buying them even more worth it and keeps you from having to sail all the way back.  Also will keep the pressure on the escorting fleets to keep enemy transports away. jfkziegler chesty wrote: I'm not all that excited by the idea of Troop combat, but it seems like you could resolve Troop vs Troop by just having opposing Troop counters throw a die apiece. High die wins, and a tie means both counters stay on the island until the next turn. Simple. Too simple? Essentially, that's how the system works, except for the high roll wins part.  I think the current system is about as simple as we can make troop combat.  It is also a lot faster than having each troop counter throw its own individual die would be.  I also like the fact that it makes troops a little more survivable.  That, to me, is advantageous because troops have to deal not only with other troops trying to kill them, but also aircraft and ships. Quote: Has the special Rescue rule been withdrawn from debate? I really like that one for the unexpected coolness factor. Could we at least test it before we toss it? I like the rescue rule as well, and I was very sorry to see it go.  I think I liked it mostly because it gave some use to what is otherwise a fairly sucky ability.  I'm still open to re-adding it.  Really, it comes down to a balancing act between realism and game utility.  I typically fall on the game utility side of that fence, but I do concede points to the realism side every now and then, and this was one of those that I conceded.  I'll go with whatever the majority thinks on it. Quote: Yeah, and what happens when you run out of transports? That's the biggest problem I've had, so far. I can't wait to get some serious testing done. I think I'm more excited about these Troop Rules than I am about Flank Speed coming out.   That's the biggest problem I can see, too.  I think the problem can partially be solved by protecting your transports well with smoke screens and special abilities, but maybe Grehy Seer's suggestion below should be considered.  I'd like to see some playtesting before deciding the issue one way or the other. Quote: I made a list of all the Troopy SA's from the Guidelines and posted it over on the other Troop Rules thread. Looking at those SA's, certain things about them take on a whole new meaning. Check out Convoy Defender, for example. I'm sure there'll be others. I also listed all the descriptions of Ships and Subs with Cargo SA's from the Repaints, including the U-511, I-29, and the I-30. I'm assuming those will have a little more interest, all of a sudden. I think I can find some Rudderows that carried Troops, if I look for 'em.   Thanks for all that great work, chesty!  I feel like we're really close to creating a good set of troop rules that will make all those units usable. I think these rules can also be adapted for scenarios where troops have to take a held position, though that would require more modifications, such as maybe shore defenses.  It's a potential future project once these rules are fully vetted. UNC_Samurai wrote: So I'm going to use your troop rules in my Malta scenario for October, with a few modifications to how victory points will work.  Do you know if anyone has produced cards for shore AA guns or installations?  I have the shore batteries from the fall Guadalcanal campaign, which can easily be converted into British and Italian cards, but I was curious to see what other work people had done. I'm glad you're going to put the rules to use.  Hopefully we'll have them completed by then.  Other than the WotC cards, I know there have been some different forum ideas.  Here are some from afilter: http://aaminis.myfastforum.org/about7382.html the_lucky_y has some here in his Grandest Fleet scenario: http://aaminis.myfastforum.org/about2735.html I know someone else made stats with nice cards, but I can't find them. Greyh Seer wrote: I also suggest the following - make transports infinate re-spawn.  When it dies, re-deploy it in your deployment zone.  Makes buying them even more worth it and keeps you from having to sail all the way back.  Also will keep the pressure on the escorting fleets to keep enemy transports away. I like this idea, though I do have  a couple concerns: 1) I suspect that those who favor a more realistic game are not going to like it. 2) Would a transport grant more victory points each time it re-spawned and got sunk again? Diamondback I'd say it should--the additional VP's from killing 'em represent a "war of attrition" depleting the other guy's merchant-marine, exactly like the Germans attempted to do against the Brits and we succeeded in against Japan. Otto von Starkburg Quote: I like the current wording for two reasons: 1) It quickens game play because you don't have to stop for loading. 2) It's simple and easy to use. I'll give you that it's not totally realistic, but sometimes easy of play has to trump historical accuracy. Its your point. At all, i think the 1.2 rules are well balanced and easy to use. That we also included is quiet realistic. The unlimited ammount of troop counters is okay. One counter represent only tens or hundreds of soldier. Thats quiet a few. On D-Day, they landed thousends of soldiers. An it make much work if we limited the troop counters by giving them a cost factor. jfkziegler Diamondback wrote: I'd say it should--the additional VP's from killing 'em represent a "war of attrition" depleting the other guy's merchant-marine, exactly like the Germans attempted to do against the Brits and we succeeded in against Japan. I do think that's probably the better choice, as it forces you to make the strategic decision as to whether you want to keep feeding victory points to your opponent or not.  I'm curious to hear what others think, though. Otto von Starkburg wrote: Its your point. At all, i think the 1.2 rules are well balanced and easy to use. I'm glad you think so.  I am hoping we will only need a couple more revisions to come up with a final product.  I do think we're close. Quote: That we also included is quiet realistic. The unlimited ammount of troop counters is okay. One counter represent only tens or hundreds of soldier. Thats quiet a few. On D-Day, they landed thousends of soldiers. An it make much work if we limited the troop counters by giving them a cost factor. Good point.  I agree with your reasoning.  After all, we never really established how many troops are in a troop counter, and the vagueness was intentional.  And I also agree that putting a cost on troops is unnecessary, since it would create more and work also because the transports are the more important limiting factor. UNC_Samurai I'm going to give these rules a walk-through this afternoon, and hopefully do some playtesting this weekend.  I will have some comments, including a couple of word changes in a day or so. Diamondback Found a diagram that should help: Left to right, LCI, LCT, Higgins Boat. I'll see about resizing it to WAS scale and making Rokossovsky-style 2d "semi-models" later. chesty Greyh Seer wrote: I agree that bogging down transports with re-arming or extra time for loading troops is uneccessary... I also suggest the following - make transports infinate re-spawn.  When it dies, re-deploy it in your deployment zone.  Makes buying them even more worth it and keeps you from having to sail all the way back.  Also will keep the pressure on the escorting fleets to keep enemy transports away. For game purposes, I would agree.  You'd be buying the transports' capacity instead of the particular transports themselves.  I would also like to renew my request for reinstatement of the special Rescue rule, using the same argument.  We could change the wording of the rules a bit... __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Ship Capacity: An Auxiliary unit can carry two troop counters.  An Auxiliary unit with the Landing special ability can carry three troop counters.  A unit with the Secret Cargo or Precious Cargo special abilities may carry one troop counter.  No other units may carry troop counters unless a special ability allows them to do so.  If a unit carrying troop counters is sunk, the troop counters are lost, unless a unit has the Rescue special ability (see below). Special Rules: - At the end of each turn, Auxiliaries that have been destroyed or landed Troops are returned to their deployment areas and loaded with Troop counters before the next turn begins.  Although redeployed Auxiliaries cost nothing, victory points are still scored for destroying them. - If a unit carrying more than one Troop counter is destroyed while it's in the same sector as a unit with the special ability Rescue, and if the Rescue is successful, you may place one Troop counter on the unit with Rescue. - Units do not receive victory points for the Vital Cargo, Secret Cargo, or Precious Cargo special abilities.  Units also do not receive victory points for the Landing special ability. - Ships with the special abilities Bombard or Shore Support roll two extra attack dice when making gunnery attacks against troop counters. - The special ability No Sea Control has no relevance to this format. Diamondback For the pics above, an LCT would be 0.776" x 0.213" (Type 13 size?), a Higgins would be 0.233" (call it 1/4", so figure 4 on an MTB-like tiddlywink), and the LCI would be 1.057" x 0.158". For comparison, an 80' PT should be ~0.533" OAL. Anyone wants to try to make to-scale tokens, go ahead--my eyes and cuttin'-hand ain't up for that one. jfkziegler Anyone get a chance to playtest these yet? UNC_Samurai We're bogged down on our 1st scenario, trying to balance the German-British scenario where the Germans have to get ships across a 15-hex board.  As soon as that's finished, we're going to start testing the rules with our invasion of Malta scenario. Jeffrey5665 Alternatives to Transports & Victory I love the idea of amphibious ops.  Transports are inherently weak.  Yes, that's why they always packed them in tight together.  A lot of lightly defended ships can throw up a lot of light flak.  So, how about this....each transport represents a convoy...say of 10 transports.  These 10 ships hold "X" points, call it 20.  Every time this convoy is attacked, the number of damage points it takes is not hull damage, but lost cargo damage.  So it will (or at least should) almost always reach the beach, but it will (or should) almost never do so with the entire cargo it shipped out with. You could further this by saying each player has a total of 6 convoys, and enough cargo (at the start) to load each convoy twice.  Once one player has no further cargo to unload, the game ends.  This way, you could throw a fake by sending out a convoy with virtually no or at least very few cargo points as a fat juicy target so your big convoy can attempt to slip through while they get pounded.  On the other hand, do this too much, and you'll find most of your cargo still sitting on the pier while your opponent's last load is sinking into oblivion & even though you sank way more of his, he landed way more than you and thus wins. As for victory conditions....the number of warships lost in supporting a landing is irrelevant.  All that matters is did we take the island or not?  So, once a player is out of cargo to unload, you simply count up who landed the most points, and viola, victory. You could even take it further by saying a slight victory is by 5 or less points, a solid victory by 6 to 10, a smashing victory by more than 20, etc, etc. I've been working on a Guadalcanal campaign, but I intend to employ many of my several hundred Japanese & US AAM mini's for the ground battles.  Where I'm getting hung up is when WaS pieces shoot or is shot by AAM pieces.  AAM has several aircraft WaS does not, and naval gunfire support (NGFS) can be absolutely devastating.  In time, I'll get it & when I do, Thodafett and I will get into it & not get out of it until one or both of us comes out with malaria. chesty jfkziegler wrote: Anyone get a chance to playtest these yet? I'm in the middle of a slow motion game. (My internet service has been keeping me out of touch, and I've been unusually busy.) So far, we're only up to the Air Mission phase of the second turn, but we've already bumped into some basic questions. How many counters can the Transport carry?  When you land troops, do you have to land them all? (I just got my computer working, and I already need to hit the sack.) I'll have to get back to you with more details.   Here are the builds we're using... Good Guys 1x Wildcat (7) 3x Avenger (42) 1x Intrepid (26) 1x California (45) 1x Cleveland (16) 1x John C. Butler (6) 2x Troop Transports (8) 150 Points Bad Guys 2x Bf-109 (14) 1x Graf Zeppelin (18) 1x Tirpitz (55) 1x Scharnhorst (38) 1x Hans Ludemann (8) 1x U-66 (12) 1x Troop Transport (4) 150 Points jfkziegler chesty wrote: How many counters can the Transport carry? Two, since it's an auxiliary. chesty wrote: When you land troops, do you have to land them all? I guess not, although I think you would typically want to. Greyh Seer I am very eager to hear about playtesting.  I would love it if we could get a solid ruleset here. I've also started a thread on the AH/gleemax forums about what other type of rulesets could be in the new starter and I suggested a troop lading one...mostly because of how promising this ruleset is... Though RB might want something simpler...hmm...Still, I really want to see some reports on this rulest! Otto von Starkburg I too. I am looking for someone who want to testplay these rules in the online game forum. My personal view: The troop landing rules are, in conjuction with the convoy attack, surface fleet battle and harbour attack rules, the most important rules and make the game playable (and allow playing a campagin without using AAM). chesty Before spilling all the details of this test run, I'd like to say that these rules add a lot of fun to the game. It's nice to have a purpose, for one thing. For another, you have to consider your deployment and strategy very carefully. Once we get the details worked out, I think everyone who tries them will be hooked. I know that "the Devil's in the details", but I'm sure we can work it out. These rules are too cool not to use.   I made a battle map with Paint and set it as my background for reference.  The Americans on the left, the Germans on the right, and islands where the objectives normally go. The top and bottom islands had storage tanks and wharehouses to represent resource objectives. The center island had an optimistic airstrip as the objective. Before the game, we agreed on a 150 point limit for the fleets. We didn't say we had to bring any transports. We agreed that victory points would equal 50 points per objective held by troops, 25 points per objective held by sea control, and points equal to the value of units destroyed, to be determined at the end of each turn. First player with 150 points at the end of any turn wins the game. We agreed to use the Special rules for troops regenerating damage (re-grouping?) between turns and for Transports re-deploying when they die or deliver. We argued about whether Transports should get to carry three Troop counters, but decided against it for this test. Both sides brought a Battleship and a Carrier, but the Germans also brought a Submarine (of course). The Americans brought two Transports, but the Germans brought only one. Deployed like so... Intrepid                                                    Graf Zeppelin _ Wildcat                                                      _ Bf-109 _ Avenger                                                     _ Bf-109 _ Avenger                                                    Hans Ludemann _ Avenger Transport                              U-66 Cleveland California                                                    Tirpitz Transport                                                Transport John C. Butler                                              Scharnhorst On the first turn, the German Battleship Group moved two sectors toward the bottom island while their Carrier Group moved two sectors toward the center island. The U-66 started to circle the center island. The California failed her Slow roll, and her Battleship Group moved one sector toward the bottom island. The Intrepid group moved two sectors toward the center island. The Germans split their Fighters between their two surface groups. The Americans sent all their air against the Tirpitz, and the single Avenger that made it through got two hits on the Tirpitz for two points of damage. On the second turn, the John C. Butler failed her Slow roll, and the California group moved another sector toward the bottom island. The Intrepid group moved two sectors to come adjacent to the center island. The Graf Zeppelin group moved two sectors to end up adjacent to the center island, opposite the Intrepid group. The Tirpitz group moved two sectors to reach the bottom island, and the U-66 moved another sector around the center island to get next to the Intrepid group. When the American wanted to land only one Troop counter on the center island, we agreed to allow it. The German Transport landed both Troop counters on the bottom island. The Americans sent all their air against the U-66, and the Germans sent all two of their Fighters to defend it. An Avenger died, but the U-66 took a point of damage. When the American wanted to make normal Gunnery attacks against the troops on the bottom island, we agreed to allow it. We also agreed that damage should spread before stacking. The California hit one Troop counter and the Cleveland hit the other. The Scharnhorst got a hit on the Cleveland and a hit on the American troops on the center island. The Tirpitz hit the troops again and wiped them out. The U-66 put a torpedo into the Cleveland and sank her. The German Transport was re-deployed and damage markers were removed from the Troop counters on the bottom island. On the third turn, the Intrepid Group moved two sectors to reach the top island. The California group moved two sectors to finally get next to the bottom island. The Tirpitz group moved two sectors to pass between the center and bottom islands. The Graf Zeppelin group moved two sectors around the center island, toward the top island. The U-66 moved one sector around the center island, toward the top island. The re-deployed German Transport moved two sectors toward the top island. The Transport with the Intrepid landed its last Troop counter on the top island and the Transport with the California landed both Troop counters on the bottom island. The Germans split their Fighters between their Transport and the U-66. The Americans committed all their air against the U-66, killing the Fighter and sinking the U-66 with hits from both Bombers. The Intrepid hit the Graf Zeppelin and the California hit the Tirpitz for a point of damage apiece, but the rest of the American Gunnery attacks were Maggie's Drawers. The Hans Ludemann put a fish into the Intrepid for a point of damage, but she and the Graf Zeppelin scored no hits with their Gunnery attacks. The Tirpitz hit the California for a point of damage, sank the John C. Butler with a Vital hit, and hit the American troops on the bottom island. The Scharnhorst missed the California, but got two hits on the American Troop counters on the bottom island, killing one and damaging the other. We agreed that Troop versus Troop combat should be at the end of the Surface Attack phase, and that undamaged Troop counters should throw two attack dice instead of one. The American troops scored a hit, but hits from both the German units killed them. Since the U-66 had been sunk, there was no Sub phase, and the damage marker was removed from the German Troop counter on the bottom island. At the end of the turn, the Americans held an objective for 50 points and had destroyed 19 points of enemy units, for a total of 69 points. The Germans held an objective for 50 points and had destroyed 36 points of enemy units, for a total of 86 points. Although neither side had enough points to win, the handwriting was on the wall. A glance at the map showed the Germans on the American side of the map, with both German Battle Groups closing on the Intrepid group. Although it was an interesting battle, there seems to be no need to go on beyond the third turn. The decisions that shaped the game had already been made, by then. (The Americans lost.) Comments? UNC_Samurai jfkziegler, I've got a preliminary rules sheet typed up for our playtesting, along with unit counters formatted for card sleeves.  PM me your email address and I'll send them to you. jfkziegler Thanks for the playtest, chesty!  Here are some of my thoughts: 1) I think your playtest showed why I have been so opposed throughout this process to allowing ships to take islands.  Because of that option, there were only three transports between the two fleets you ran.  If that option did not exist, I have to believe that more transports would have been placed into both fleets. 2) In a 150 point game, the objectives would normally be worth 75 points, and the victory total would be 225.  I think that reducing both reduced the value of the objectives, and also encouraged ship combat over trying to take islands. 3) Interesting decision to allow troops to regenerate damage.  I suspect that might end up being a really good rule, because it makes bookkeeping easier, and makes the troop counters a little more survivable. 4) I'm glad you didn't allow transports to carry three troop counters, for two reasons.  One, doing so would reduce the value of the LSI ships.  Two, it would encourage people to not bring as many transports. 5) I think the transports re-deploying after they die rule is good and I am glad you used it. 6) Were you rolling slow rolls for the transports?  I don't recall seeing any of the transports missing their slow roll. 7) Allowing transports to split their landings seems like a decent rule.  I can definitely add that into the rules system somewhere. 8) Why wouldn't the Americans have been able to make normal gunnery attacks against the troops on the bottom island? 9) I'm not crazy about the rule saying that you should spread damage before stacking it.  This is mostly because I don't like forcing people to choose certain targets.  However, I can see its value, as it does make troop counters more survivable. 10) Putting troop attack at the end of the surface combat phase seems like a decent idea, but I don't like undamaged troops throwing two dice.  It makes troops too easy to kill. 11) The fact that the game was over by the third turn supports my point from above that allowing for sea control turns it into a standard War at Sea game instead of an amphibious invasion. Overall, I'm glad you playtested it, and as I said in my comments, there are definitely some lessons that can be taken from your experience.  I really wish you had stuck to the actual rules, though, and not included sea control, because that fundamentally changed the way the game played out.  I'm still anxious to see how future playtest results come in. Greyh Seer UNC_Samurai wrote: jfkziegler, I've got a preliminary rules sheet typed up for our playtesting, along with unit counters formatted for card sleeves.  PM me your email address and I'll send them to you. Please post!  I would love to see this! Greyh Seer Yeah, turn 3 seems a little fast for a game.  Sounded like fun though!  Obviously some more playtests are in order.  I am very excited for these rules to be fully ironed out! chesty Greyh Seer wrote: Yeah, turn 3 seems a little fast for a game.  Sounded like fun though!  Obviously some more playtests are in order.  I am very excited for these rules to be fully ironed out! The game went on for three more turns before the Allied surrender. I only described the first three turns because all the critical decisions on how to use the rules had been made by then. (Also, because my internet service kept failing before I could finish the longer version. Three tries over two nights, before I got through.) Anyway, it was so much fun that I'm planning to use the Troop Rules as often as possible, from now on.   chesty jfkziegler wrote: 1) I think your playtest showed why I have been so opposed throughout this process to allowing ships to take islands.  Because of that option, there were only three transports between the two fleets you ran.  If that option did not exist, I have to believe that more transports would have been placed into both fleets. The low number of Transports was influenced more by the vulnerability of the Transports than a lust for destruction, which is what made the game interesting. Sea Control was never a factor. The idea of wasting a Ship on Sea Control seemed ludicrous, and neither side bothered. jfkziegler wrote: 2) In a 150 point game, the objectives would normally be worth 75 points, and the victory total would be 225.  I think that reducing both reduced the value of the objectives, and also encouraged ship combat over trying to take islands. Yeah, we just added 50 points for Transports and escorts and went at it. Buncha rookies. jfkziegler wrote: 3) Interesting decision to allow troops to regenerate damage.  I suspect that might end up being a really good rule, because it makes bookkeeping easier, and makes the troop counters a little more survivable. It was crucial, a time or two. jfkziegler wrote: 4) I'm glad you didn't allow transports to carry three troop counters, for two reasons.  One, doing so would reduce the value of the LSI ships.  Two, it would encourage people to not bring as many transports. We weren't sure if the Transports were supposed to be specialists like the Landing Ships, or not. I take it we chose wisely. jfkziegler wrote: 5) I think the transports re-deploying after they die rule is good and I am glad you used it. Huge influence, from our builds to our tactics. jfkziegler wrote: 6) Were you rolling slow rolls for the transports?  I don't recall seeing any of the transports missing their slow roll. The Transport with the California missed her first Slow roll, too. On the fourth turn, ALL the re-deployed Transports failed their Slow rolls. The Slow rolls were extremely important. jfkziegler wrote: 7) Allowing transports to split their landings seems like a decent rule.  I can definitely add that into the rules system somewhere. I scratched my head over that one, but why not? It might have been a good ploy, if the American Battleship Group hadn't stumbled twice on the way to the bottom island. jfkziegler wrote: 8) Why wouldn't the Americans have been able to make normal gunnery attacks against the troops on the bottom island? They had no troops on the island and no Ships adjacent to act as spotters. I think it's a valid question. Should Ships have to be adjacent to bombard troops? jfkziegler wrote: 9) I'm not crazy about the rule saying that you should spread damage before stacking it.  This is mostly because I don't like forcing people to choose certain targets.  However, I can see its value, as it does make troop counters more survivable. In practice, you have to make three successful attacks to kill the first of the usual two Troop counters on an island, and four to wipe them both out. The Americans often chose not to waste attacks against troops they couldn't kill in one turn. The powerful secondaries and tertiaries of the German Battleships were definately an asset in that regard. jfkziegler wrote: 10) Putting troop attack at the end of the surface combat phase seems like a decent idea, but I don't like undamaged troops throwing two dice.  It makes troops too easy to kill. We need a way to account for the fact that a Troop unit that has been damaged and scattered by Bomb and/or Gunnery attacks should be ripe for the plucking by an undamaged Troop unit. Some bonus or penalty or something. jfkziegler wrote: 11) The fact that the game was over by the third turn supports my point from above that allowing for sea control turns it into a standard War at Sea game instead of an amphibious invasion. The game went on for a while longer, but Sea Control was never used. I know you were against the idea from the start, but I wanted to try it. Having tried it, I have to admit it was worthless. jfkziegler wrote: Overall, I'm glad you playtested it, and as I said in my comments, there are definitely some lessons that can be taken from your experience.  I really wish you had stuck to the actual rules, though, and not included sea control, because that fundamentally changed the way the game played out.  I'm still anxious to see how future playtest results come in. Allowing Sea Control was a notion left over from my worry about a sort of stale-mate, but the re-deploying Transports took care of that. It made no difference to the way the battle unfolded, since neither side bothered with it. For my next test-build I think I'll try to get a Battle Group to escort the first Transport and defend the landed troops, with an Escort Group to lag behind and protect the re-deploying Transports. Maybe a Transport swarm and a big Battleship. So much to explore, now. The fact that we're even talking about "actual rules" is a vast improvement over where we stood a month ago. Progress, my friend.   chesty Greyh Seer wrote: Yeah, turn 3 seems a little fast for a game... Although relatively short, it was probably the slowest game I've ever played, with frequent internet interruptions and constant arguments over all the new ideas. Man, was it fun, though! You gotta try it.   UNC_Samurai Some thoughts on our match we played last night, an alpha playtest of an invasion of Malta.  There are three coastal objectives which British infantry and shore batteries (see Custom Card Section)  are defending. We allowed the Italians 8 transports which did not count for or against their point total or victory total.  This was because the British were merely defending the island.  We built a large, multi-sector island for Malta.  As a result we gave the infantry Speed 1, and allowed defending infantry to relocate as soon as attacking troops landed.  Another problem we came across was the tallying of victory points - right now, we're working on the assumption that you don't check for victory totals until the first landing invasion. All of the aforementioned problems are resulting from trying to fit the rules to scenarios.  There is another problem, however.  The rules for troop movement and combat need to be refined.  Specifically, the Hard to Kill SA.  Upon testing the rules, I found neither jfkziegler's original wording nor my attempt at rewording really worked: Original SA:   Hard to Kill: If this unit has more than one hull point remaining, it cannot be destroyed by a single attack roll no matter how many successes are rolled. Revised SA: Hard to Kill: If this unit has more than one hull point remaining, any attack that would destroy it instead reduces it to one hull point. Allocating damage from bombardment and then troop combat is a little odd, because some interpretations of the SA mean that damage in one Surface Gunnery phase would not stack, meaning you couldn't eliminate a Troop Counter in a single turn.  We thought about making Land Combat a separate phase, maybe after the Submarine Phase.   I'm writing all this off of memory, and maybe Odysseus or Hossmosis can add some details. chesty UNC_Samurai wrote: We thought about making Land Combat a separate phase, maybe after the Submarine Phase. Since torpedoes can't hurt troops, the end of the Surface Attack phase seems proper. I mean, troops are on the surface, and nothing moves slower. Speaking of movement, troops marching down a road might cover half a mile in ten minutes. It would take 'em over an hour (6 turns) to cross one sector. Under fire, or over broken terrain, it would obviously take even longer. In game terms, they might as well be standing still. I can see where we might want a mechanized Troop counter, someday, that would have better Armor and take up more space to deliver. UNC_Samurai wrote: Revised SA: Hard to Kill: If this unit has more than one hull point remaining, any attack that would destroy it instead reduces it to one hull point. Allocating damage from bombardment and then troop combat is a little odd, because some interpretations of the SA mean that damage in one Surface Gunnery phase would not stack, meaning you couldn't eliminate a Troop Counter in a single turn. I think you can achieve jfk's intent with a Special Rule, instead of an SA. It worked well in the test we gave it, and it's very simple... Special Rule: - After the Surface Attack phase, remove any damage markers from all Troop counters. Or, if you really want to use an SA... Regrouping - After the Surface Attack phase, remove any damage markers from this unit. UNC_Samurai Special Rule: - After the Surface Attack phase, remove any damage markers from all Troop counters. So, does this mean that after damage is allocated, any unit which isn't destroyed is at full health? jfkziegler Version 1.3 is up.  Please poke holes where needed, and let me know what you think.  I greatly appreciate all the help I have gotten from everyone on these. chesty UNC_Samurai wrote: Special Rule: - After the Surface Attack phase, remove any damage markers from all Troop counters. So, does this mean that after damage is allocated, any unit which isn't destroyed is at full health? We assumed that Troop counters destroyed by bomb or gunnery attacks could not take part in Troop combat, and that damaged troops should get a penalty of some kind during Troop combat. The concept of damage spreading before stacking needs more testing. Consider two Transports arriving together and landing four Troop counters. You'd have to get five bomb or gunnery hits to kill one unit. If you've troops of your own on the island to take advantage of that damage, you've done well. If not, you've wasted your time, since the troops will Regroup at the end of the turn. Does that sound right? chesty jfkziegler wrote: Version 1.3 is up.  Please poke holes where needed, and let me know what you think.  I greatly appreciate all the help I have gotten from everyone on these. I don't see too many holes... jfkziegler wrote: Loading/Unloading Troop Counters: Each side has an unlimited amount of troop counters, which may be loaded onto units in the player’s deployment area.  Loading troops is a free action that may occur at any time.  However, each unit may only load troops up to its capacity.  Also, units may not deploy with troops already loaded.  Troop counters may be unloaded at any island, but this can only be done at the end of the Sea Movement phase.  All troop counters need not be unloaded at once.  A unit that has unloaded troops this turn may not make any attacks except anti-air attacks. I'd like to offer a slight re-wording that plugs the loophole for Subs... Loading/Landing Troop Counters: Each side has an unlimited amount of Troop counters. Units that are in their deployment area at the beginning of their Sea Movement step can be filled with Troop counters before they move.  Units that are adjacent to an island at the end of their Sea Movement step can land one or more Troop counters, but they can't make any attacks except Antiair attacks that turn. jfkziegler wrote: Troop Counter Armour 5 Hull Points 2 Hard to Kill: If this unit has more than one hull point remaining, it cannot be destroyed by a single attack from a Ship or Aircraft no matter how many successes are rolled. Regroup: At the end of each turn, remove all damage counters from this unit. The Armour 5 makes it tough for Destroyers, or small secondaries, to get a hit. With no Vital Armour score, 5 hits are as good as 50, and overkill is un-rewarded. With 2 Hull points and no Vital Armour score, there's no way to kill a Troop counter with a single attack, is there? Torpedoes don't work, and SA's like Skip Bomb affect successes rather than points. Do we need Hard to Kill, then? I'm looking forward to another test game, and I promise I'll stick to the given rules, this time.   chesty chesty wrote: The Armour 5 makes it tough for Destroyers, or small secondaries, to get a hit. With no Vital Armour score, 5 hits are as good as 50, and overkill is un-rewarded... I should say that I think this is a good encouragement to bring cruisers, by the way, and I like it. I don't know if a heavy cruiser with good secondaries would work better than a pair of light cruisers, but I'll be delighted to find out. These rules have definately made the game more interesting.   jfkziegler Well, I tried another playtest of these rules today.  I thought they played very well, and I was very satisfied with them. The only thing that I didn't like was that the game got a little boring towards the end when both sides has their surface fleets mostly gone, but neither side could quite make that magical number of winning points.  I'll have to think about whether that needs fixing or not. One rule change that I noticed is needed - If auxiliaries are regenerating, they can't be counted as surface ships for the purpose of the fourth objective bonus points. Of course, I am still anxious to hear about more playtests if anyone ends up playing some. UNC_Samurai jfkziegler wrote: The only thing that I didn't like was that the game got a little boring towards the end when both sides has their surface fleets mostly gone, but neither side could quite make that magical number of winning points.  I'll have to think about whether that needs fixing or not. We playtested the Malta scenario under slightly different rules tonight, using v1.2 as a baseline.  The changes: Troop transports are no longer Slow.  We are playing on a 15x20 hex map, and Slow is too cumbersome for that distance.  It also streamlines the game a little, as it's one less roll we have to remind new players about. Troop transports are loaded at the beginning of their Sea Movement Step and unloaded at the end of their Sea Movement Step.  It's a semantic change, but it cleans up the rules sheet. Troop counters lose Hard to Kill and gain a variation of Uniquely Tough...   Infantry:  This unit cannot be destroyed by or lose its last hull point to attacks from ship or air units. Troop Counter vs. Troop Counter Combat:  The Infantry Combat Phase occurs after the Surface Gunnery Phase.  Each player rolls a die for every infantry unit in a sector with opposing infantry units.  Each 5 or 6 counts as a success.  Each success counts as a hit, which may be applied to any opposing infantry unit in that sector.  (Thus, if multiple successes are rolled, it is possible to destroy an infantry unit in one turn.  However, smart generals will assign those hits to units already damaged). Scenario-specific alterations:  The three objectives are located on the south end of the map (I'll draw out a map in a day or two; we're more interested in getting the scenario balanced at the moment); The Italian fleet contains 8 Troop transports which are trying to get across the map (I don't foresee the scenario lasting long enough for the transports to re-load and conduct a second landing.). The Italian fleet, not counting the cost of the transports, is 359.  The British fleet, not counting shore batteries, is 248.  Victory conditions will be adjusted through the course of playtest to determine a balanced victory.  (After all, the results of scenario 1 and this scenario will determine the fleet selection available for scenario 3, when the Italians invade Gibraltar with German support.) At present, there are 3 objectives, two of which contain a shore battery and three defending infantry.  The third objective, furthest from the Italian deployment zone in the northeast corner of the map, is defended by three infantry but flanked in either adjacent hex by artillery. Both fleet lists have been painstakingly researched by the group's resident Naval History professor, who is also responsible for the research which led to the Aquila we'll see in a couple of weeks. The Italian fleet was 2x Giulio Cesare, 4x Zara (some will become Gorizias), 2x Bolzano, 2x di Savoia, 2x d'Aosta, 4x Targio, 4x Vivaldi, 3x Ambra, and 6x SM.79.  This fleet is almost 100% accurate for what the Italians would have fielded in the Sicilian-Maltan theater on 2 July 1940.   The British fleet is a bit of a compromise.  As the British are about to attack Oran, and Force H had yet to approach Malta, They would have had Royal Sovereign, Ramillies, and Eagle, along with 2 Town-class CLs, 2 Ajax-group Leander CLs, a Sydney-group Leander CL, 8 destroyers, and a squadron or two of Gladiators at Malta.  Our fleet is 2x Repulse, 2x Belfast, 2x Ajax, 1x Sydney, 8x Javelin, and 1x Illustrious with 2x Swordfish.  We're going to hand-waive both sets of relatively ineffective fighters, the Fiat CR.42's and Gladiators, and say they're having a slap-fight somewhere in the skies over the Med.  We may also add a Kent and another Belfast to the British fleet, which could easily have been recalled from Oran or South Africa given the imminent danger of an Italian build-up on Sicily. The second playing of this scenario was far more successful than the first.  The British fleet took serious losses early, but managed to eliminate all Italian BB's and CA's in the process of having their surface force wiped out.  The Italians landed two transports at each objective, eventually (after several turns of just troops fighting) capturing all three objectives.  Allowing infantry to die in one infantry phase sped up gameplay without taking too much from the original rules.  The shore batteries tied up a couple of CL's, and even managed to pop a crippled Cesare that stuck around off shore to sink the last Repulse.  Taking a re-arming counter instead of damage 50% of the time is almost as good as receiving a damage counter - the Italians could run CLs right up against the coast and blast away at the battery and ensure it never got to fire back.  The bombardment rules now make more sense - you can easily disrupt infantry, but you have to put boots on the ground to kill infantry. We still aren't sure about a redistribution of victory points, owing to the scenario being wildly different from the original troop rules set up for a meeting engagement invasion, and we're kicking around a couple of ideas.  One is to gradually award victory points to the Italians for occupying objectives at the end of each turn.  Scoring 25/75/150 for controlling 1, 2, or 3 objectives, respectively, for each turn compensates for the smaller British fleet.   We're going to run this scenario again on Saturday, and I'll take pics of the map to give you a better visual of our board.  I'm also going to ask Hossmosis to discuss his experience playing British this week after alpha testing this scenario as Italian deputy commander last week. UNC_Samurai Quick follow-up:  You had the same idea I had by rewording Hard To kill.  We arrived at the same revision.  I'll talk to the group about Rescue and regenerating damage and respawning transports before we play again. jfkziegler Thanks for the report, UNC.  I definitely feel like we're getting close with these rules.  I'll have some more specific feedback sometime when I'm less tired.   Hossmosis You win some, you lose some. Thanks UNC_Samurai.  I'll keep my comments few in number and short in length.   (1) Removal of slow from transports makes game play a little quicker and works quite well for the 12 hex distance that the transports must cover.  However, I feel that the advantage of not having to roll 8 d6 each move and possibly staggering transport groups would be a scene for game imbalance using a smaller/normal map. (2) Troop counters lose Hard to Kill and gain a variation of Uniquely Tough... Infantry:  This unit cannot be destroyed by or lose its last hull point to attacks from ship or air units. This is spot-on.  A small modification but I found that it worked. (3) Sizing/points:  The 110-point advantage fielded by the Italian fleet was noticeable but was not unreasonable.  An assessment of play in turn 1,2, and 3 would reveal a relatively balance duo of engaged fleets.  Having commanded the Italian fleet (incarnation #1) last week and seen the play of the Italian fleet (incarnation #2) last night, I support a point advantage for the Italians but would suggest somewhere along the lines of 50 points.  A possible remedy?  The addition of a two-cruiser or an cruiser-destroyer squad on the British side. (4) The new map (land mass of Malta) is more appropriate and - in conjunction with the absence of troop movement - produces a more realistic chance for landing success (Ital) or land defense (Brit).  My only suggestion: the position of the Malta land mass could stand to be moved a single hex closer to the British deployment zone but this needs additional play-testing and discussion.  As the Italians moved forward on turn one and two it became obvious to this Admiral that one objective was lost, impossible to defend with ships.  The success of the Italian fleet was not ensured but I would still consider a movement of the land mass. (5) Sidenote: Unloading troops at Malta, sending transports back to the Italian base, and then returning these transports to land is close to impossible barring incompetence on the sea from both Admirals. (6) We will be playing again in a few days.  UNC_Samurai and I will keep you posted. jfkziegler UNC_Samurai wrote: We playtested the Malta scenario under slightly different rules tonight, using v1.2 as a baseline.  The changes: Thanks again for the playtest.  My thoughts are below. Quote: Troop transports are no longer Slow.  We are playing on a 15x20 hex map, and Slow is too cumbersome for that distance.  It also streamlines the game a little, as it's one less roll we have to remind new players about. Perhaps this should be added as an optional rule.  I don't like making it a standard rule, though, because it seems to me that on a small board lack of Slow 2 makes things too easy.  You don't have to worry about protecting the transports because they're at the islands so quick. Quote: Troop transports are loaded at the beginning of their Sea Movement Step and unloaded at the end of their Sea Movement Step.  It's a semantic change, but it cleans up the rules sheet. This is probably a good change.  It wouldn't affect gameplay and would make more sense. Quote: Troop counters lose Hard to Kill and gain a variation of Uniquely Tough...   Infantry:  This unit cannot be destroyed by or lose its last hull point to attacks from ship or air units. I actually don't like this ability, because I do think that ships and aircraft should be able to destroy troop counters.  I just think it should be hard to do.  In my playtest last night, I was actually pretty happy with how Hard to Kill played.  The troop counters were tough to take out, but not impossible. Quote: Troop Counter vs. Troop Counter Combat:  The Infantry Combat Phase occurs after the Surface Gunnery Phase.  Each player rolls a die for every infantry unit in a sector with opposing infantry units.  Each 5 or 6 counts as a success.  Each success counts as a hit, which may be applied to any opposing infantry unit in that sector.  (Thus, if multiple successes are rolled, it is possible to destroy an infantry unit in one turn.  However, smart generals will assign those hits to units already damaged). I'll have to think about this.  On the one hand, I worry that it would make troop counters too strong.  On the other hand, I like the combined arms feel it gives.  One thing to think about is that creating a separate Infantry Combat Phase means that destroyed troops would be removed before engaging in Troop Combat. Quote: Scenario-specific alterations:  The three objectives are located on the south end of the map (I'll draw out a map in a day or two; we're more interested in getting the scenario balanced at the moment); The Italian fleet contains 8 Troop transports which are trying to get across the map (I don't foresee the scenario lasting long enough for the transports to re-load and conduct a second landing.). I'm anxious to see the map for this scenario, and I am very excited to try this when I come down to play in October. Hossmosis wrote: Thanks UNC_Samurai.  I'll keep my comments few in number and short in length. I appreciate your thoughts, Hossmosis. Quote: (1) Removal of slow from transports makes game play a little quicker and works quite well for the 12 hex distance that the transports must cover.  However, I feel that the advantage of not having to roll 8 d6 each move and possibly staggering transport groups would be a scene for game imbalance using a smaller/normal map. I think you hit my thoughts right on the head here.  I think an optional rule is the best way to cover this. Quote: (2) Troop counters lose Hard to Kill and gain a variation of Uniquely Tough... Infantry:  This unit cannot be destroyed by or lose its last hull point to attacks from ship or air units. This is spot-on.  A small modification but I found that it worked. I'm still not crazy about this because I do think that ships and aircraft should be able to destroy troop counters - I just think it should be hard to do. Again, thanks for both of your input! UNC_Samurai jfkziegler wrote: Quote: Troop transports are no longer Slow.  We are playing on a 15x20 hex map, and Slow is too cumbersome for that distance.  It also streamlines the game a little, as it's one less roll we have to remind new players about. Perhaps this should be added as an optional rule.   This is going in the mini-campaign-specific rules.  I'm working on a document with all the notes and fluff for the first two scenarios today. The packet will also include a map, and as soon as I can get a hold of Odysseus and his 1337 shooping skillz, I'll make a blank map template.  We'll have specific deployment information for each scenario in handy visual format. jfkziegler wrote: Quote: Troop counters lose Hard to Kill and gain a variation of Uniquely Tough...   Infantry:  This unit cannot be destroyed by or lose its last hull point to attacks from ship or air units. I actually don't like this ability, because I do think that ships and aircraft should be able to destroy troop counters.  I just think it should be hard to do.  In my playtest last night, I was actually pretty happy with how Hard to Kill played.  The troop counters were tough to take out, but not impossible. I don't have a lot of background in the effectiveness of shore bombardment on infantry in the European or Mediterranean theaters other than the Massachusetts' attack on the Jean Bart and port facilities at Casablanca.  I have studied a lot of reports from island bombardments in the Pacific, and every single report despite years of evolving and improving naval gunfire, naval bombardment never successfully dislodged infantry.  It certainly softened them up for the landing infantry, but in every case I've seen the defending infantry units remain functionally intact.  This resulted in what I thought was a fairly accurate playtest when the Italian infantry landed last night.  The light cruisers were able to disrupt infantry and destroy fixed artillery positions, and when troop combat began, the defenders were using their successes to first disrupt and then destroy attackers, while each success by the attackers delivered the fatal blow, thanks to sea-land cooperation.  We'll discuss the use of Infantry versus Hard to Kill 3.0, and of Regroup. jfkziegler wrote: Quote: Troop Counter vs. Troop Counter Combat:  The Infantry Combat Phase occurs after the Surface Gunnery Phase.  Each player rolls a die for every infantry unit in a sector with opposing infantry units.  Each 5 or 6 counts as a success.  Each success counts as a hit, which may be applied to any opposing infantry unit in that sector.  (Thus, if multiple successes are rolled, it is possible to destroy an infantry unit in one turn.  However, smart generals will assign those hits to units already damaged). I'll have to think about this.  On the one hand, I worry that it would make troop counters too strong.  On the other hand, I like the combined arms feel it gives.  One thing to think about is that creating a separate Infantry Combat Phase means that destroyed troops would be removed before engaging in Troop Combat. I think the solution is another step within the Surface Gunnery Phase: First Player's Surface Gunnery Step Second Player's Surface Gunnery Step First Player's Infantry Step Second Player's Infantry Step During the Infantry Step, a player rolls for his infantry, and the damage stacks or applies along with bombardment, but it rewards admirals who start by unleashing naval fire. jfkziegler wrote: Quote: Scenario-specific alterations:  The three objectives are located on the south end of the map (I'll draw out a map in a day or two; we're more interested in getting the scenario balanced at the moment); The Italian fleet contains 8 Troop transports which are trying to get across the map (I don't foresee the scenario lasting long enough for the transports to re-load and conduct a second landing.). I'm anxious to see the map for this scenario, and I am very excited to try this when I come down to play in October. We'll work on that template.  We're also trying to finalize the exact position of the islands, and then I'll build land masses out of Styrofoam. Run Silent Quote: If you aren't going to allow Strafing attacks, why not just call it Bomber vs Troops? I have to object to freshly landed Troops having an AA score of any kind, by the way. They should have to rely on Fighter protection and Heavy Antiair from supporting Ships.   I suppose it could be called Bomber vs. Troops.  The reason I did not allow strafing attacks is because I want to keep troops relatively difficult to kill.  If they were statted low enough so that fighters could kill them, then destroyers could also kill them with ease, and no troop counters would ever survive. As for the AA score, I suppose it could be dropped.  Again, it was added to make them a little more survivable, but I guess it could be removed. End Quote Why not allow planes to use there AA dice then troops could have a higher armour  vs ships and still only have one armor value 2 cents UNC_Samurai We're going to run Malta this afternoon.  We'll post results and other thoughts later this evening. jfkziegler Cool.  I look forward to hearing the results. Greyh Seer As do I.  I'd like to have a well - worked out scenario for landings.  jfkziegler - have you considered submitting your ruleset to RB as an example of something we'd like to see in the upcomming starter?  I for one would like to see SOMETHING surrounding our auxilaries and island assault in the new starter. jfkziegler I have not.  However, if someone who corresponds with RB frequently would like to submit the ruleset, I would have no objections. Otto von Starkburg I hope, RB see this rules. This is typical scenario for the pacific war and makes much more fun than a simple "take this invisible objectives". UNC_Samurai So we playtested our invasion of Malta yesterday...and I have nothing to report. The Italian admiral pulled a fast one on the British.  He moved towards Malta for two turns, then promptly began slowly withdrawing to the southeast.  The transports never landed, and the British were forced to chase the Italians across the Messina Strait.  The Regia Aeronautica conveniently rid the British of any Extended Range, and the two Giulio Cesares picked off the British cruisers one by one.  The only damage suffered by the Regia Marina were two Ambras, a Luca Targio, and a single point of damage on a Gorizia. For the next iteration of the scenario, we will be moving Malta a couple of hexes further to the west.  With this alteration, we believe the scenario is just about ready to lock & load, in spite of the one-sided affair yesterday.  On to designing the invasion of Gibraltar... Otto von Starkburg Moin Moin! I've created two maps for online-gaming - a 11x7 square large map and a 11x11 square large map. jfkziegler Very cool Otto!  Thanks! Greyh Seer Ok.  I finally think I'm gonna have a chance to fully test these rules.  (Especially now that I have LSDs...muahahahahaha!) It may be a few days, but as always, I'll report my findings and suggestions. jfkziegler Awesome.  I'm holding off on any more revisions for the time being until some more feedback comes in.  I don't think we need any more than minor tweaks from here. Greyh Seer Well, we did a few games (two 200 pts and one at 300pts).   I have to say that the system works well.  It was a lot of fun and it forced you to really use your auxiliaries.  I learned that the GH and the T1 were really good.  Protecting your "convoys" of troops became very important and often if you had lots of Islands there would be very stratigic moving of fleets. Not really sure there is anything I would change.  I would love to have a really-really nice card made up for the auxilaries to look just like the WotC ones that I could print out. We didn't try the Casabiancas - but we'd like to try it. All in all, this is a solid ruleset.  I approve! jfkziegler I'm glad to hear it.  I think I'll probably finalize it with version 1.4 soon.  Or maybe I should call it version 2.0, since it should theoretically be the base version. chesty Will this be a sticky?  Do we vote, or something?        Axis & Allies ForuMINI Forum Index -> WAS Scenarios & Houserules Page 1, 2  Next Page 1 of 2