naval retreat from port when region is likely to be lost

[WanderingHead]

Related to the bug report here.

I am not too fond of this rule that naval units will retreat from port as soon as enough enemy units have been moved into the port region to make the loss of the region likely.

I don't really see what it adds to the game, but I do see a big irritation with it. When the attacker is moving in, the naval units of the defending player can retreat and make the attacker's moves non-undoable. I think that the undo impact is large, but the actions that cause it are rare/subtle enough that most players won't think about it while moving. Which I think is unnecessarily irritating, particularly since I don't see any benefit to having the rule.

I'd kind of prefer to remove the rule rather than attempt to fix the reported bug. Thoughts anyone?

(obviously, naval units would still retreat from port when the port is captured. I would just remove the early retreat that can happen while the phasing player is still checking his attack odds)

[Lucky1]

I am not sure what purpose it serves. Perhaps if someone were to make it clear.... As things stand, I am not a fan of the current situation (same reasons as Wanderinghead).

[SGT Rice]

The only difference in game terms if ships displaced only upon capture of their port (rather than the current mechanism) is that in those cases where a 50+% ground assault failed the fleet would not displace, and therefore would not be exposed to attack at sea nor have to expend supply to return to port the next turn.

Hard to come up with any compelling arguments why this is important. I agree with Brian that the loss of the undo option when ships displace can be a very big deal; when you're checking your odds for a final assault on West Germany, you're unlikely to think about a lone German ship being able to 'freeze' you into the attack when it scurries out of port.

[Forwarn45]

I 100% agree the rule should be changed. The only odd thing is that players have put up with the occassional frustration up until now. I can recall a couple times when I have been annoyed by this rule.

[GKar]

As far as I can tell the rule should go.