💥 1941 Global Command Decision - Official Thread

[cameron]

i feel like i recall reading a TripleA rulebook/manual at some point in the distant past, at least a decade ago, probably longer, and didn't think much of it. probably back when the only subgames where WW2. and chess for some reason.

[JohnnyCat]

More Neutral Issues.

USA tried to invade a number of islands and none work. So Galapagos, to the Canary and other islands in the south Atlantic to neutrals in Africa, the USA is not allowed to invade.

This seems to be a bug.

Cheers,
Johnny

[JohnnyCat]

Also noticed that the USA cannot build anything in it's Seattle Washington territory.

[Black_Elk]

@johnnycat I saw the same thing but wasn't sure if it was just me, cause I slid into Azores on the first turn, but then I think after the turn when Brazil went to USA control it changed to no go.

Haven't played in forever and I was watching the Olympics so not fully focused, but I tried a couple outs with USA and Japan Solos just to try and recall what all was going on.

For neutral tiles, was mostly just observing what the computer did, but still not sure about how Neutrals are handled. Like I almost feel like it'd be simpler just to block those tiles out of play entirely. Otherwise it seems like there are some spots being attacked pretty regularly. The Soviets attack the Turks pretty reliably on their first turn, Germany tends to attack into Catalonia or Southern Sweden on their second or third turn, but the AI rarely comes out ahead when that happens. I wonder also if it might be dragging their calculations down? Trying to account for all the Neutral TUV on the board? Not sure, but I think it'd be rare to have the neutrals being much of a factor for either side, except when the AI goes after them and bleeds off a bunch of hit points that way.

I grabbed a save at what seemed to be the inflection points.

2024-7-27-1941-Global-Command-Decision_Elk_USA_round_8.tsvg

2024-7-27-1941-Global-Command-Decision_Elk_Japan_round_4.tsvg

For the first game as the USA that point came at about round 6-7 when I was able to stack into Southern Italy. The computer Brits went pretty hard vs the Italians in North Africa which helped clear the way for us. They were also pretty relentless along the Atlantic Wall, so there was never really a D Day, just sorta continuous fighting in coastal France. I went heavy on the cruisers to try and get something cooking. Threw pretty much everything into the Med to shore up North Africa which seemed the most straightforward. I liked the idea of trying to get something going up North out of Iceland, and South out of Brazil but ended up just sending most of the cruisers across the middle vs Italy hehe. I think it would make sense to have Iceland and Greendland as a way to funnel fighters across the N. Atlantic, or to stage forces into the UK from that position. Trying to get a secondary hub going somewhere, before the wind up in France, but I'm not sure that really happens unless the USA has some industry to pad the starting forces or to pull attention up that way. Maybe having fighters in those locations at the outset so they're thematically represented via the starting units? Otherwise I think it's a bit far afield especially with the M3 fighters. The most direct line to European production is just to take Gascony or Brittany. I think I would probably do that naturally and entering the Med is sorta like only cause I want to see a N. Africa campaign. I think it makes sense to clip Italy a bit, so they don't go monster, but I think just backing up the Brits in France with a Major Factory would have been simpler. Might try that next time

For the first game as Japan the turning point was a bit sooner, I'd say J3-4 with the Chunking take. Here just throwing everything towards Yunnan seemed the simplest way to get a leg up. The front in China feels sorta like dominoes, where once you attack you need to attack another spot too or else risk a big counter. I think the only safe stack I saw was just going all in Kunming to do the push Yunnan thing. Japan has like way more transport capacity than they could ever use, but I tried to keep them in position to shift units from the North to the South. I think trying to chase down the Chinese on the first turn is a bit rough, so instead I just let them come at me along the coast and then clapped back. The Pacific Allies got a break when I decided to pull off New Guinea and pretty much ignore them. Instead I sent the IJN to go blockade the West Coast of the United States. I think it can be a bit hard to parse what's going on with blockades as the blockader, when it's happening to you then we get the popup during collecting income, but it's harder to tell how much income you're taking from the enemy.

For factories, I like the approach for Japan to downscale them a bit, there are so many on the board at the outset that I think it does take something away from the build up. I think having more tiles that are capable of supporting medium and heavy factories but which don't start with a factory on them would be good. There are a few spots that can support the small factory build out for most factions, but it's the Medium and Heavy factories that really set the playpattern. I think having to buy them to hit the production scale-up mid game makes sense for everyone. Say Japan in Chosen maybe, or Italy somewhere closer to home. USA felt good in terms of scale, but I still like the idea of them having a hub up North to stage into Europe a bit more from that direction.

I didn't catch any actual bugs, like errors or anything firing off aside from maybe the neutral thing, but that's been switched around before so might just be I misremembered how it worked. For the bomber aircraft though I did see some weird stalemates. I think the unit should not be able to hold/contest a territory by themselves. I've seen it happen a few times before where a lone bomber parked in a tile will stalemate the battle preventing the attacker from taking the tile even with a large ground army. In a situation where infantry are attacking, even if they have a malus from terrain or whatever, the bombers should maybe be auto-killed just to avoid situations where they can fly in to stalemate the smaller battles as a way to lock the opponent off the tile. The lone fighter in a territory with bunkers is similarly very tough to kill sometimes. Or maybe it's the terrain effects from forest and such, but just seems it's too simple for aircraft to stalemate a tile by themselves.

Good times though, I still had fun trying to iron out the kinks! Nice work

I'll try to do some heads tonight or tomorrow. For the spelling errors hopefully not too tough to tweak, let me know if I missed anything else.

Best Elk

[wc_sumpton]

@johnnycat said in 1941 Global Command Decision - Official Thread:

Also noticed that the USA cannot build anything in it's Seattle Washington territory.

Seattle, Sacramento and San Francisco share the same Sea Zone territory, so the combined total is 4 units per turn in the Sea Zone. Each can produce 4 units within their own territories.

Cheers...

[wc_sumpton]

@johnnycat said in 1941 Global Command Decision - Official Thread:

USA tried to invade a number of islands and none work. So Galapagos, to the Canary and other islands in the south Atlantic to neutrals in Africa, the USA is not allowed to invade.

The USA player, as Allied, cannot invade neutrals after the 3rd round.

Cheers...

[JohnnyCat]

@wc_sumpton this game is AWESOME. But the documentation…. Well “awful” is the word that comes to mind to me and I mean no offense.

But come on how is anyone to know all this?

And Washington-Seattle territory unit development is connected to LA??? So only 4 per turn for the ENTIRE WEST COAST ? Where is that documented and why is it different from everywhere else?

My biggest gripe with this game was always the difficulty finding relevant docs, the game STILL CRASHING ALL THE TIME (which may be a TripleA thing) and the absolute lack of intuition on how everything works (but this is likely just me needing to continue to learn how 18 units attacking 2 units results in a complete loss of the attaching force in numerous circumstances).

In other words, the issues I now face are strictly learning the rules. And getting a feel for how things work.

But that’s difficult to do without good documentation. So am I just missing this or are things like these neutral rules and unconventional PU development in Seattle somewhere?

Thank you VERY MUCH.

[wc_sumpton]

@johnnycat said in 1941 Global Command Decision - Official Thread:

And Washington-Seattle territory unit development is connected to LA??? So only 4 per turn for the ENTIRE WEST COAST ? Where is that documented and why is it different from everywhere else?

This is a standard rule when limited production is used. Seattle, Sacramento and San Francisco all contain Industry-Hvy which may produce up to 4 units each. If you produce all twelve units only 4 can be placed into a territory, that includes the connecting Sea Zone. After 4 units are placed in the Sea Zone the other 8 must be distributed between the remain territories but no more the 4 in a single territory. This is a standard rule and nothing special.

@johnnycat said in 1941 Global Command Decision - Official Thread:

So am I just missing this or are things like these neutral rules

Neutrals are governed by the relations between them and the major powers. There are 3 neutral settings in GCD. Neutral which is the standard neutral setting. Closed-Borders is a very stringent setting, nothing is allowed into territories between the powers that have this relationship. This is how Allies and Neutrals are treated, to include the USA after the 3rd round. Open-Borders are at war with each other with very little restrictions. This is how the Axis and Neutral are set.

I really hope this helps!

Cheers...

[Black_Elk]

@johnnycat I think the issue you mentioned may have more to do with the order in which you are placing those units, rather than anything particular to the map/rules. I mentioned this a while back when discussing the Carrier unit and the issue where multiple coastal production centers border a single sea zone tile. I think I was focused on the Baltic at the time, but basically you can run into the same issue anywhere on the board I think.

The problem occurs because there is currently no way to tell TripleA which factory you intend to place a naval unit from, and no way to tell which factory is the default for first placement. If you have enough purchased units to max-place a given factory, then you can use that to sorta work around the issue (basically max placing, so it will move to the next factory, then undoing the previous placement once the ship is in the water), but it's a chore. Also because it doesn't really make sense that a player would need to purchase say 20 infantry units just to ensure they have enough units per turn to max a placement, in order to somehow control that. The same issue is present in other smaller boards, but because there are fewer coastal tiles the workaround isn't as onerous there. Here it's much more pronounced.

On the Eastern Seaboard of the USA, it can be really hard to tell which factories are placing which naval units. It's possible to have 6 Factories adjacent to sz 101 A. Basically the frustration comes when, having already made a bunch of placements, you then need to undo moves when you realize the wrong spot was responsible for producing a transport instead of an infantry unit or whatever. I don't know if it's possible, but some way to define the Factory when the Sea Zone is clicked, and to have that Tile highlight with a way to skip to the next Factory for all that apply?

I agree the documentation leaves a bit to be desired, but in fairness the game is basically in Alpha, so writing a manual would probably come after all the pieces are in place. Especially since the rules and roster have changed many times since we first started. I think the XML is pretty well organized though, and the popup notes and tool tips do have a lot of information. It's just harder when we don't really know what we're looking for, or why something might not have worked say a bug vs a specific design choice. The production values/placement thresholds (at max 4 for Major Factory) those were added after the map was drawn. I think in some cases this creates a placement tension for some tiles and chokepoints, also an incentive to purchase further production where available. Since LA-Southern California is the only tile to border sz 010 A that's not an option. For me this would incentivize the purchase particularly of battleships and carriers since you'd want to get the most hitpoints and firepower from the placement as possible given the restrictions. Though with Carriers this is a challenge, because placing fighters on deck is harder. Purchase comes after Combat/Non Com so there is no LHTR hovering fighters in a sz here, which is problematic. The game wouldn't be able to fire off the "1 purchased carrier available to land" message, because no purchases have been made yet the way the phase order is set up here. I think this makes it challenging to purchase the Carrier from say Long Beach or San Diego into sz 010 A which would be thematic, compared to sz 010 B SF where there is more production that can also drop the fighter aircraft on deck. Part of me thinks we should differentiate Naval Aircraft based on carriers from Land Based Fighters, but that might be a bridge too far for some given the A&A style framework where fighters can sorta dance on an off deck and everyone being used to that dynamic. Though it can be confusing probably, especially when it comes to stuff like advanced aircraft from tech where those aren't treated the same way as reg fighters. I didn't play long enough for the P51s to figure in but I recall in older builds they couldn't be used on carriers. Anyhow, not sure what I'm driving at now, but yeah I hear ya.

ps. One possible idea is to create a kind of naval factory unit which is attached to the sea zone tile rather than the adjacent land tile. Absent a ready way to change how coastal production works in tripleA during the placement phase that might work. I imagine the current scheme probably goes off the listing order in the xml, or alphabetically by that for whatever relevant tiles, but it would be hard for the player to parse that. Even if they know which factories are involved they'd need a way to skip or blank the placements from that factory to move to the next one that they actually want to use. I'm not sure how this might look, or if it would require a graphic, but it could perhaps function as a way for subs to interdict or ships to blockade. It's a feature of A&A going back to Classic that a player can save a big pile then drop a massive fleet in one turn. Kinda wonky to think like even if there is a massive armada parked outside the dry docks that it's possible to still launch as many ships as one could afford to drop in a single turn. Having the production attached directly to the sea zone would dampen that a bit maybe. Not sure though, that's like a massive tweak to how things work, and then the production requirements for the naval powers would be sorta reset, along with all the attachments like by Medium vs Large or whatever for Factory types. I think the current works fine, it's just that not every nation/player is going to buy a big stack of hitpoints to make sure they can place the ships where they need to go.

[Black_Elk]

Couple further quick thoughts.

So for the extra generals, or the Italians mentioned if you got any images let me know. I haven't been able to find anything except the BWs on the wiki or stuff from HoI 3 mods hehe. For those there are quite a few. I'm partial to this image just cause it's hard for my untrained eye to know who's who and they become sorta the generic general, like esp when there are a bunch shown together. I think this one was from an old steam page, but I kinda like the vibe. Like just has a little grain to it that's kinda cool, whereas the HoI 4 stuff is kinda very clean a bit slick nowadays.

Anyhow, let me know I can probably throw something together. Or just go ham with the circle tool in GIMP.

For the overall playpattern I like the feel. I'd say probably focusing on the Computer player's behavior is the main thing from here. Like if they are hitting the right beats and moving where we want them to go in the opening round to fit the theme for the start date. Taking control of say USA, Pacific Allies or China and just seeing that the battles that the Fast AI wages match up with the 41 vibe. For the most part seems pretty solid. I think I'd just tweak the starting units in cases where the AI does something notably ahistorical, like USSR attacking the Turks right away or stuff of that sort.

Japan in particular has a pretty nice opener, where they do a fair bit of island hopping. Italy and Britain have some pretty big trades in the opener. That battle in the Western Med seems like it can tip the scales a fair bit, since Italy always seem to gun and then Brits respond. I guess it could be thematic for convoys to Malta, but I think those units are destined to die every game I've played so far. For me that works well enough, similar to German actions vs UK or Soviet ships up North, something for the fireworks. Britain is probably a bit OP I think, if taken over by the player, just cause they have so much to work with starting out, but I haven't actually tried them since the last iteration. USA I'm sure is the simplest to get the head around, since the play is a bit similar to how they work in other games, sorta slow build with the delay on really being able to push until the HQs come online. I think for a new player Germany or UK might be a bit overwhelming since there's so much happening. J1 is kinda similar, just many many things to account for, so I'd guess that people might start out playing as USA, or USSR perhaps and sorta reacting to what the Fast AI does as a way to figure out the broad strokes. Not sure on that though, it assumes the player will want to watch all those dice rolling for a while before their turn comes up. If starting with G, I guess just sorta throwing forces at the wall and trying to see how the combat scheme works by trial and error till they got a feel. It's still quite different from A&A, but I kinda slip into my A&A patterns. Like find the best unit/purchase and gun for the production core to try and tilt the balance of power, but I'm still trying to get my around half of it heheh.

Off to watch the Games! Catch ya next out

[JohnnyCat]

@Black_Elk thanks for the reply. I should have been more clear about the Seattle build limits. I understand perfectly what you said and, in fact, assumed that was the case. For some reason however my notes and recollection on this suggested an actual problem with that territory. It’s possibly I simply got that wrong so I’ll reassess that.

And it’s GREAT TO KNOW that this is in Alpha!!! It’s so good now that when the game gets more finished it will be TRULY AWESOME!

I don’t make the next offer lightly but…. I’d be willing to write a comprehensive manual for this thing if any would prefer me to do that. And I actually have relevant experience , lol.

[beelee]

@black_elk

wow ...that is impressive.

AWESOME !!!

I Dig it Big time

[Black_Elk]

I didn't put that one together, but I liked the look for the color grading.

Here's the source...
https://hoi3.paradoxwikis.com/index.php?title=File:GIP-HoI3.png&mobileaction=toggle_view_desktop

A manual would be cool!

I feel like the main thing that distinguishes it from an A&A game in terms of how the combat works or the units interact is just that it's more variable. Owing mainly to the lower hits at values of the attacking units, whether coming from terrain or targeting or just the way those units tend to work. Hitting at lower values like the 1 and 2 on a D6 (or sometimes a D10) as opposed to A&A where you have more units with reliable attack at 3. This makes it harder to count pips or approximate how things will shake down in the smaller battles. Forces need to be larger for the odds to stabilize in a direction that favors the attacker. You can use the battle calc, which is sorta the adjutant officer giving advice using the best intel available I guess, but when trying to approximate the results it can be pretty swingy.

Of course then the economy is much higher here too though, and many more units in play, so there is an offset for the attrition from random results. For production I think the big difference is the very low production values per tile kinda similar to AA50 or the old Big World games, but having more of those spread about the board. In the smaller A&A boards this pushes down the inf spam and encourages the purchase of heavier hitters like tanks and such. The difference between Moscow at say 6 PU, vs Moscow at 8 PUs on one of the smaller maps. You have more reason to buy tanks when the production ceiling is a bit lower, this is sorta the more extreme version of that where everything is held to either 1 (From the base) 2 from the Small, 3 Medium, 4 Large factory. I think it's probably familiar enough at the low end because that tends to be the scale in A&A which caps production at the TT value. Mostly they are 2 or 3 or 4 production except for the core tiles like Capitals. I think it makes it more relevant to stage things a round ahead so you have time to group the units together when they move out esp at the M3 distance, which is a novelty.

I guess on the high seas main difference is that the cruiser is actually pretty useful now for the cost, the M3 carrier with a tactical bomber, a couples cruiser with a pair of elites. It's expensive but works pretty well for island hops or the shuck. And then the whole dynamic with the HQs that could probably be expanded upon since once they are involved it changes things a fair bit just cause the boost is so potent. I'd be interested to read a kind of guide or even just ballpark strats. Glad you're having fun with it!

ps. took another crack at Japan just now. Here it is again on J4, this time I went after Hawaii and New Guinea as well, slightly stronger line probably. I think the J2 Yunnan take is pretty solid, even if giving up ground along the coast was able to recover position via shifting the amphibious units around. China put up a good fight and advanced pretty far, but then got turned back. I think New Guinea is like a coin flip. Hawaii I think is probably more reliable. I went in light to Wake and still managed to get on it with all the fighters in range. Anyhow feels like that's probably the turning point. From this position I'd maybe just mop up the islands and pick a direction for the push vs UK for the income and most straight forward logistics.

2024-7-27-1941-Global-Command-Decision_Elk_Japan_round_4_rematch.tsvg

[beelee]

@black_elk

sweet

Yea GCD seems way badass. Same as TWW and ebbe's oil and snow. Wish he'd update his notes because it seems way cool but idk how to play lol

Anyway, my brain just can't comprehend it all. Like anything, the more you do it, the more you get used to it, but ... I'm just ... overamped with tmi.

Doesn't make it a bad thing, some will be able to rock on it, just saying I'm not one of em lol

[TheDog]

@JohnnyCat
Here is a first draft of the Politic Relationships.

[Black_Elk]

@thedog

Here are some Mansteins if you want to choose one. Pretty sure one of them is already in the folder somewhere, or maybe in the UHD, probably just flipped or whatever with a different person doing the tint. You can see the first at the top is a standard colorized photograph from the wiki entry. The second is a similar image taken and used for a painted illustration

Artist Boris Chaliapin, 22 Sep 1904 - 18 May 1979 sourced from a Smithsonian article. https://www.si.edu/object/erich-von-manstein%3Anpg_NPG.88.TC46

I like the second image for it's bold graphic qualities, but 'usage conditions apply' there, so not sure if it's really above board. When cropped into the circle the graphic part of the Iron Cross is sorta lost too so that's another thing like getting it into the circle just so. Anyhow I liked that one cause it's from a painting, but probably the period colorized photograph is likely more appropriate for fair use

Then for this next pair of Mansteins you can see the difference between a period colorized photograph in scene vs one that's set against a background color field. Both from the wiki if I recall. It also depends a bit on the size of the head like if you want to show more of a hat or the features of the face with a tighter crop. In this case the images almost look like two completely different people, but it's basically just the cast shadow on his beak being slightly less pronounced in the first image vs the second, lower angle photography and probably a candid rather than staged portrait like the second one that's used for all the book covers hehe. Also like with the hat and everything, it elongates his face a bit to give the very recognizably Manstein mug. To me that's like a coin toss though, cause a less recognizable image might be preferable sometimes, like if it still fits the bill. Not sure. I'll let you make the call. I tend to just prioritize some vague quality I liked, such as overall color balance or how it looks when loaded up and sitting on the board which is harder to see without running tripleA

I think it just comes down to little things like the accent color, if it's too overpowering, or just cause one wants maybe some flash of red or something for the uniform to pop. There are a bunch for Generals like Manstein.

For the Italians the pickings are much slimmer. There is artwork for HoI and World of Warships, but I was trying to find a source to work from that wasn't like already owned by Paradox or whoever.

Here's a Bastico, it's cropped from an Italian Postage Stamp. The source image is that one where he's chillin' next to Rommel in the dugout. For the other famous image where he's wearing the cap haven't found one in color yet, aside from the paintovers from the games mentioned above. I'll keep hunting around

[TheDog]

@black_elk
Thanks a Manstein & Bastico in game for v180

[JohnnyCat]

@thedog Cool. Thanks for posting that. What does, "USA 1-3 Rounds for TripleA benefit so USA can add Gulf States &" mean??

Also where, and perhaps WHY, do the rules state that USA can invade neutrals only during rounds 1, 2, 3?

By the way, I finally played two games in full. In both I had to save and restart a few times as has been "normal" for the past year - and like I said, I am sure that this is a tripleA thing. The game will sort of freeze but allow me to save before it actually freezes or crashes so no worries.

And while I still encounter some crazy unexpected combat results even with Low Luck checked, I am now getting rather intuitive about what the units can do as well as how terrain and SUPERHERO COMMANDERS affect things.

NOTE: that for the year of play all other TripleA games had that display details option but it was cosmetic only so I really had no idea to turn that back on thus I missed the terrain type effects that entire time, duh...

Anyway, THIS GAME IS EVEN MORE TRULY AWESOME now that I have figured out how to play it as intended. So my sincerest compliments again...

The only thing that I notice, and this is no surprise, is that the game as is setup in the default, is heavily favoring the Allies. But that is easily corrected with some startup bid adjustments.

I am still interested and willing to write a comprehensive manual for this game.

-Johnny

Finally, does anyone reading this know if anyone plays the old Avalon Hill Panzer Blitz and Panzer Leader games online?

[JohnnyCat]

@black_elk Your new faces are VERY NICE. I would like to suggest, however, that all these commander icons have a collar.

Apologies for the poor quality but I just want to convey the idea here - if there is interest I would fire up Photoshop and make this very pretty. In any case I envision this to draw some attention to the commander as I found them easy to miss. I could see the Nazi's having a tiny Iron Cross... the Yanks with national colors, etc. But maybe they all have some sort of Gold Band to draw attention and standardize the unit to some degree.

Does anyone have any good suggestions for this collar thing?

[beelee]

@johnnycat said in 1941 Global Command Decision - Official Thread:

the old Avalon Hill Panzer Blitz

Idk of any online version. I have the old boardgame. If you know anybody who wants it, I will mail it to them on my dime, as long as they donate the same to the site.

That and they aren't halfway acrooss the world from me Heartland of America my current locale