Doomsday MP House Rules Suggestions

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Has it ever been tried?

I almost got the Monday game crowd to try it but some were still too in love with idea of building über armies of tanks with the USA and other superpowers. I think you need a good quorum of players who have played the usual countries enough to become sated with them and so relish the challenge of playing a minnow like Ethiopia for a while.

Andrew

 

[Mr.G 24]

I almost got the Monday game crowd to try it but some were still too in love with idea of building über armies of tanks with the USA and other superpowers. I think you need a good quorum of players who have played the usual countries enough to become sated with them and so relish the challenge of playing a minnow like Ethiopia for a while.

Andrew

Ahh, I would be up for it. I think that it would be fun and a refreshing change.

As for game balancing I was fortunate to join a group who the core players are mature. We have good games with no house rules and for that part its feasible for countries to suceed. For the most part a good player is needed to fill the shoes of Germany who will be most influential. Albiet 36' scenario will stray furthest from the historical path but I think Germany could, with the help of Italy withstand an attack from both Allies and Russia from anytime. Remeber, if you have correct message boxes set you should have a month to allocate forces to combat them (DoW on Poland). Plus is it the most sound thing for Russia to fight Germany? , let them beat down allies a little.

The long list of rules discourage me a little from joining other games but then there are things that we can assume will be fixed in coming patches and are out right gamey that players should just not do. Historical handicapping I think shouldnt be a house rule. But its just my humble opinion.

 

[unmerged(55727)]

It's clear there must be some rules, such as not allying with countries already at war. This to prevent people from allying with republican Spain or Changxi clique early on.(Quite hard in the first case, never tried the second.)
There's also a problem when minor axis member Hungary suddenly join a war against Yugoslavia, or other non-alliance members, Romania, declare war on your ally Hungary.
Or when Japan declare war on Netherlands and Germany for once decide to bypass Holland entirely in '39/40. Suddenly the Netherlands is full of British troops, and the Russians are at the gates.

Regarding forts; In a SP '36 GC I built level 9 forts along the entire border with Luxembourg and Belgium, and had levle 3 forts in the border provinces with Italy.
I had an average of 4-5 divisions, reinforced by Art and AA, in each border province. (I could hardly afford more because I wasted IC on useless aircraft.)
Germany never managed to penetrate into France, instead I actually made incursions into Italy.
Germany had about 15-30 divisions in EACH province bordering France, their org was at the usual; about 94%, while mine was at 54% or so.
So if you want a "historical" game and don't want Germany allying with NatSpain and winning the SCW without but a few Beligerence points, then the Maginot Line should, for fairness sake, NOT be expanded.

Edit: For gameplay's sake, you could pretend that France doesn't expand it because this would look like they were leaving Belgium to face the brunt of the German Attack. (Historically part of the reason why.)

Edit 2:
If you want to try something REALLY refreshing, have one player play as Argentina and ally with Germany in 1937 while annexing Uruguay and Paraguay, and Puppeting Chile. Take Brazil in '38, and Cayenne and the West Indies are within Striking Distance. From there, USA is but a small step for Übermensch-kind...

 

[Brasidas]

Edit 2:
If you want to try something REALLY refreshing, have one player play as Argentina and ally with Germany in 1937 while annexing Uruguay and Paraguay, and Puppeting Chile. Take Brazil in '38, and Cayenne and the West Indies are within Striking Distance. From there, USA is but a small step for Übermensch-kind...

How is this refreshing in MP? US gears up, UK DoWs in 1938, Germany collects belligerance that it can't do anything about and gains little in return.

 

[Codias]

Decided on house rules.

Well we decided on some house rules! Thank you all for your help on this matter. Here they are as I remember them. (don't have them in front of me)

No one can ally with either Spanish faction until the SCW has resolved.

No player can guarantee the indepenence of another nation manually. Guarantees through events or the ones already in existence are exceptions.

You may only give troops to puppets, nations you are allied with, or AI nations. (USA excluded in our case since France will become USA and is thus considered an AI nation)

No "phoney wars" or gamey tactics. This rule is rather fluid but it's aimed to give grounds to dispute exploits since there really are too many to list out in a ruleset.

At Jan 1 1936 all nations must move their sliders one toward isolationist for their first move. This is merely done to help elongate the game and encourage peace in the short-term.

I think that's all of them! I drew France for next game. My only human ally will be UK. Axis is Japan, Italy and Germany. Two players will be USSR in co-op mode.

I've played some as France but not a whole lot. If anyone has some good advice for initial builds and strategy for them in Doomsday edition, etc. I'd love to hear them. There is no rule forbidding the expansion of the Maginot line and I'm wondering about the feasibility of that, although I would have to pity Germany if they actually let me finish it! Does the construction bonus for Advanced Construction apply on the fly now in a similar fashion to the Assembly Line techs? That could be huge if true.

Again I'd like to thank everyone for their comments and suggestions!

 

[Brasidas]

I drew France for next game. My only human ally will be UK. Axis is Japan, Italy and France.

"Japan, Italy, and... France?"

Two players will be USSR in co-op mode.

If anyone has some good advice for initial builds and strategy for them in Doomsday edition, etc. I'd love to hear them. There is no rule forbidding the expansion of the Maginot line and I'm wondering about the feasibility of that, although I would have to pity Germany if they actually let me finish it!

Fortresses have been toned down alot. Even level 10 to the atlantic isn't a gamestopper for an invasion.

Does the construction bonus for Advanced Construction apply on the fly now in a similar fashion to the Assembly Line techs? That could be huge if true.

Yes, it does. But fortresses only take a few months after the tech and they take on the order of a year beforehand. So you still don't want to build forts beforehand. Its just not worth it.

Focus on infantry. If you want to do the whole fortress line, its 5IC each for at least 4 provinces - 20IC. Budget when you're going to build your troops to allow your full manpower to be turned into infantry by the time you expect a war - decide when he may attack you. If Germany's worried about your preparations, he may attack in march 1939, for example. He'll have most of his helpful events and he can even get the M-R pact while at war if he doesn't annex Poland before it fires.

If you are hot about the fortress line approach, I would suggest a line of Le Havre-Paris-Compiegne-Rheims-Maginot. You lose 8IC, but its after your major builds anyway. This line gives you a better defensive position with the rivers, reduces his org and separates fast and slow units further by having him take more land, and it opens him up to an amphibious assault behind his lines. He'll have fewer troops available and you'll be better entrenched and on better terrain.

 

[Codias]

"Japan, Italy, and... France?"

Two players will be USSR in co-op mode.


Fortresses have been toned down alot. Even level 10 to the atlantic isn't a gamestopper for an invasion.



Yes, it does. But fortresses only take a few months after the tech and they take on the order of a year beforehand. So you still don't want to build forts beforehand. Its just not worth it.

Focus on infantry. If you want to do the whole fortress line, its 5IC each for at least 4 provinces - 20IC. Budget when you're going to build your troops to allow your full manpower to be turned into infantry by the time you expect a war - decide when he may attack you. If Germany's worried about your preparations, he may attack in march 1939, for example. He'll have most of his helpful events and he can even get the M-R pact while at war if he doesn't annex Poland before it fires.

If you are hot about the fortress line approach, I would suggest a line of Le Havre-Paris-Compiegne-Rheims-Maginot. You lose 8IC, but its after your major builds anyway. This line gives you a better defensive position with the rivers, reduces his org and separates fast and slow units further by having him take more land, and it opens him up to an amphibious assault behind his lines. He'll have fewer troops available and you'll be better entrenched and on better terrain.

Yeah sorry about the France in the Axis typo - I was sleeepy last night! Then again I could have been prophesizing the future French occupation of Germany in our game lol. :wacko:

With fortresses being toned down - are they toned down in a way that it's easier to wear them down or does a lvl 10 fort simply not provide as much protection as it once did? I had a decent stack of troops in Genoa and Turin as Italy with default fortress size and I was holding back swarms of Frenchies with ease so I'm just curious.

I like your suggested Northern Line provinces - I think it's worth losing some IC to make the Germans cross rivers with forts on the other side - not to mention it gives me a well-fortified capital.

Any suggestions on head of state/head of gov to choose at election times?

 

[Brasidas]

With a democracy, I aim for market liberal (to allow for a full free market economy). For France, that means a shift to the right in elections.

 

[Lord Ederon]

I'm another lucky guy to meet group which doesn't need rules. Rules are good if you are trying to re-create same scenario again and again, while you still enjoy it. Or ballance abilities of various players, whose expertise may differ greatly.

Although not needed in groups with strong core, for groups just forming I'd suggest specifying at least rules which explicitly warn people from doing actions, which are believed to be game engine flaws/far from reality. It can be summed up into rule: "Play nice, do not cheat and ask before you do something you have doubts about." If you want it more explicit, you may get:

• do not play phoney wars
• do not disband encircled troops
• do not strategically redeply troops which are to be encircled (i.e. there is only one province to be taken to finish the pocket and is driectly threatened by enemy forces)

That's what comes to my mind right now, but there might be more of such things. As you play, you probably cross sword with some of them.

Ahh, I would be up for it. I think that it would be fun and a refreshing change.

Yes, it sounds pretty interesting. I don't know why it was outvoted, but next time it may be better