Flames and Steel (official thread)
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To answer your per se sensible objection (but touching something I did not meant to touch), Malta, Rhodes and most of the Pacific islands would have no limit because, as a matter of space, you could fit more than enough number of men and stuff in there. For example, the area of Malta (only the main island) is 36 times that of Gibraltar. Yes, if we set a limit at 2 for Gibraltar, we could set a limit at 72 (or whatever) for Malta and not have limits for whatever other territory having bigger limits: this would keep the number of territories needing this special rule fairly low (practically only islands as big as Malta or smaller).
The support capacity of many islands was tied more to how much drinkable water was available rather than just land area. Malta, for instance, is much larger than Gibraltar, but also had a large civilian population to support, which limited the size of its garrison to about 20,000-30,000 men - not that much more than a maxed out Gibraltar. And that caused heavy strain on the water supply that necesssitated extremely strict rationing and the importing of fuel to pump water out of very deep reservoirs. So full realism demands a lot of case by research on the geography of every particular location, which is beyond the scope of what is fundamentally a beer and pretzels kind of war game.
And anyway, we can’t even really quantify what “1 infantry unit” means in Axis and Allies. Is the Infantry piece supposed to be one division? In that case, the math breaks down at both the micro and the macro ends of the scale - a full division is too large to represent most of the garrisons that were involved in island fighting, while Germany and the USSR have far too few infantry units to represent the full scale of their armies. If you say it’s a brigade, that reduces the micro problem but increases the macro one, if you say it’s a corps, it does the reverse.
Same with planes, if you judge by aircraft carrier deck capacity, a single Fighter or Tactical Bomber unit must represent around 40-50 planes at maximum, but you would need need dozens and dozens of such units on the board at a time to represent the full extent of major power air forces.
The game has always been “vibes based” in that regard. The force mix each country gets is meant to be evocative of their real capabilities, but not literally representative of them. So that only adds to the futility of assigning unit limits to specific territories - now you have to assign an arbitrary value to how many men or machines a particular unit represents, which is not likely to hold up consistently when you start considering every different circumstance on the board.
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@KurtGodel7 Much better on the maps now. The Gibraltar box looks exactly how I pictured. That could also be a good way to depict other small enclaves like Singapore, Hong Kong, etc at their proper size if you choose.
With regard to coloring Vichy, I understand the logic of simplicity there. But it still looks wrong visually just because France was an actual wartime belligerent and its territories were major historical theaters of operations, so it feels off to see them in the same colors as Spain or Portugal (and also makes it look like they’re all owned by the same power).
I guess part of what’s off-putting about it is that Flames & Steel has generally added more detail and depth versus the base G40 scenario, while this is one of the few cases where it feels like it’s consciously downgrading from the original.
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If Gibraltar's garrison is limited, that means it can't be defended against Allied attack.
To be clear, if you can have at most X land units in Gibraltar (which would need to be decided based on a guess of how many infantrymen is an infantry units and the broad assumption that the other land units take about the same space when deployed or in reserve but ready for immediate deployment), you can also attack Gibraltar with at most X land units. (No other rules for land units here.) This would make Gibraltar actually more defensible, possibly much more defensible.
(Obviously, this is an approximation: you should realistically be able to attack with infinite land units but only Y at the same time, with Y lower than X, then, when you win, every land unit exceeding X goes back to the transports (because it never left them), but I'm not proposing front-line based limits or anything else other than a max X both stacking and attacking for a few very small territories like Gibraltar and Midway. Ideally, every territory for which X would be greater than 10 gets infinite - so no limit - for simplicity (yes, an arbitrary upper limit over which not to bother): this would likely include Malta and every island bigger than Malta depending on how many men an infantry unit is representing.)
Moving on to air limits, Gibraltar would also have a maximum air unit limit to land (like an aircraft carrier) (again, arbitrary and limited only to a few extremely small territories like Midway etc.). In this case, however, there is no limit for attacking air units over Gibraltar. (Again, I'm not claiming this is very realistic.)
Practically, the land limit would favour the defenders, and the air limit would favour the attackers.
In case of paratroopers, the limit would be total on land units. For example, if Gibraltar has a land unit limit of 2, you can offload 2 land units, or para-drop 2 land units or 1 of each, no more. (Again, a simplification.)
My point is not that this would be highly realistic, just that it would be more realistic than nothing, everything else being the same (and it is meant to be limited to Gibraltar, Midway and at most a few other similar cases if not just these two).
Whether or not something like Gibraltar could be attacked with paratroopers at all is of course a disputable matter. Personally, I would say that a simple rule that Gibraltar can never be attacked with paratroopers unless completely undefended would be a good special rule to add for Gibraltar and anything else about as small as Gibraltar (as an approximation of how insanely borderline suicidal would such a thing be). An arguably more realistic rule would be limiting it to the unused stacking limit. For example, if Gibraltar has a limit of 2, then you cannot para-drop if there are 2 defenders, can paradrop at most 1 if there is 1 defender and can paradrop at most 2 if it is undefended by land units. In any case, the total attacking land units would never be more than 2.
In the early part of WWII, Japan's best tank was the Chi Ha. It later created an upgraded version of that tank: the Kai Shinhoto Chi Ha. But even this upgraded version proved inferior to America's Sherman tanks: inferior armor, inferior main gun. Even a Kai Shinhoto Chi Ha could not successfully attack a Sherman from the front, and so needed to attack from the side or rear. Japan had a tank under development which it believed would equal or exceed the Sherman. Meanwhile, the United States was looking to upgrade from the Sherman, and towards the end of the war a small number of Pershing heavy tanks were produced.
To what extent is this dynamic captured by Flames and Steel? The game starts off with Japan and Italy being able to produce light tanks only. A light tank attacks on a 2, defends on a 1, and has one hitpoint. Whereas, the U.S.S.R., U.K., U.S., and Germany all start with the ability to produce either light tanks or medium tanks. A medium tank attacks and defends on a 3 and takes two hits to kill. Japan and Italy can research tanks tech, which would allow them to produce this kind of tank also. But they have other techs they would rather research first, so it probably won't be until rather deep into the game when they gain the ability to produce medium tanks.
All five of Germany, Japan, the U.S.S.R., the U.K., and the U.S. are able to build special production centers (SPCs). All except Japan are able to use SPCs to produce heavy tanks (or Panthers for Germany, which are basically heavy tanks by another name). A heavy tank attacks and defends on a 4, and has four hitpoints. Late game, Germany can research the King Tiger. This tank fires on a 4 + 4 and has six hitpoints. All of these heavy tanks, Panthers, and King Tigers are considered advanced units. They cannot be purchased with PUs, but can only be received by building SPCs. Your normal units--those purchased with PUs or with manpower points--will generally be much larger in number than your advanced units.
Flames and Steel does not have, and will not have, either coastal guns or paratroopers. If you impose a unit cap for Gibraltar, that unit cap means that it's no longer a competition of unit quantity, and turns into a competition of unit quality. In the latter type of competition Italy would be at a distinct disadvantage due to its inferior tanks tech. To hold Gibraltar, the Axis would need, say, two German tanks there. (Later in the game these could be replaced with Panthers, and eventually King Tigers.) Suppose Britain attacks these two German tanks with two tanks of its own. If amphibious, the two attacking tanks wouldn't get to fire on the first combat round. But Britain would get battleship bombardment instead.
Suppose that conflict ended with a German victory: Germany has one damaged tank left at the end of the battle. Injured units heal at the end of the game round. This means that for now, Germany's tank is still injured. Italy goes after Britain, so it uses the opportunity to ship in a heavy gun. A heavy gun defends on a 4, and has one hitpoint. So now America Atlantic attacks with two tanks, plus battleship bombardment. It brings four hitpoints to this battle, compared to only two hitpoints for the Axis. The Axis has a slight advantage in firepower due to the heavy gun, but America Atlantic is still very likely to win. Injured units heal at the end of the game round. In this case that benefits America Atlantic: any injured units it has will heal immediately after its turn.
On Germany's next turn it ships in two tanks to retake Gibraltar. At first this seems like the cycle starting all over again. But there is a problem. America Atlantic has enough strength to at least damage one of the invading German tanks, if not to kill it outright. This means that Britain will be facing a somewhat weaker defender when it launches its own two tank attack. Which allows Britain to win the battle with its two tank attack. Italy must now retake. It is barely able to do this, and then only because the British force got weakened in the attack. America Atlantic then takes it with two tanks, one tank takes damage, and that damage heals immediately after the end of the round.
I fail to see how any of this makes the game better. It does not increase the strategic depth of the game. It does not make the game more fun. What all this does do is make the game a lot more luck-based. Die rolls in the Gibraltar battle really start to matter. As far as I can tell, you are not actually arguing that a space limitation for Gibraltar makes the game more fun, or adds strategic depth. The sole argument in favor of this which you have made is that a space limitation increases realism.
I would argue that a space limitation decreases the strategic element of the game. If there is a space limitation for Gibraltar, and if it's contested, then on any given turn a nation should send the max number of its best unit to Gibraltar. No thought or strategy needed. Whereas if there is no space cap, then Italy must decide how many resources to use to harden Gibraltar, versus how many resources to use elsewhere. That is absolutely the kind of strategic choice I would want a player to have to make. A space limitation denies the game this strategic choice.
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