French surrender issue v2.7.1 but suspect all versions

[Majorball68]

Situation is Germany has isolated enough French factories for France to surrender to Germany. Problem is a pocket of units around Marseilles are not removed from the map. It could be the Program is recognising it as Vichy and not French home country. When a Major power surrenders all units in the home country should be removed from the map.
Let me know if I am missing something or it needs fixing.

Save is attached just progress from Russian production to surrender option.

[BrianJH]

I can only count 6 french factories that would not count as being isolated by the surrender rule, but that still remains less than half. Lyons - should be considered Isolated, as should Nantes, but not the others as they have an adjacent French controlled hex. check RAC 13.7.6 - especially the clarification in this rule.

I wonder if Lyons and Nantes are not being treated as being isolated correctly.

Brian

EDIT - I originally thought I had found 7 factories not isolated, but I miscounted.

[Majorball68]

ORIGINAL: BrianJH

I can only count 6 french factories that would not count as being isolated by the surrender rule, but that still remains less than half. Lyons - should be considered Isolated, as should Nantes, but not the others as they have an adjacent French controlled hex. check RAC 13.7.6 - especially the clarification in this rule.

I wonder if Lyons and Nantes are not being treated as being isolated correctly.

Brian

EDIT - I originally thought I had found 7 factories not isolated, but I miscounted.

Regardless though when the option to surrender is selected as 'Yes' the French units in Metropolitan France should be removed from the map. Would like to know why the isolation rule when its easier enough for the the Axis player to leave an adjacent hex as French.
There should be a surrender option if Vichy is not installed if Paris is captured as it stops the Axis player using tactics to hold off French surrender to avoid US entry chits.

[Dabrion]

It should be about enemy control not isolation.

[Centuur]

The problem is not if France will surrender or not in this game. It's about the fact that non of the French units in France are removed when France surrenders. Both the unit in Lille and the units around Marseilles stay on the map and those hexes are still controlled by France. That in itself is a critical bug, since a player can't work around that one.

[Dabrion]

Agreed, should be handled as a conquest.

[Jagdtiger14]

RAC 13.7.6

Not that anything will ever be done about this rule, but in my opinion this is a BS rule. It only works against unsuspecting German players who have never encountered it before. The German player can easily leave one hex adjacent to each factory he doesn't want to take. No WiF player remembers every single rule, but this is one that a WiF player will always remember if/when he gets surprised by it.

Can someone tell me what this rule is supposed to do, other than ruin a game and waste time?

I agree with Majorball that the German player should be asked at the end of the turn Paris is taken if he wants to Vichy or conquer. Not that this adjustment would ever be considered in WiF.

[Dabrion]

It is not used a lot. There are some situations where the USE and or US DOW bonus is more beneficial than hanging on to a three corps China/France or the like. Sometimes you want to create a border earlier than waiting for conquest of a particular country (where the conquest may be stalled to deny the border). In a sense it is a counter to the various stalling issues.

I wonder what the bad effect on Germany would be though? Vichy is a liability usually. No Vichy/FF is in Germany's favour here i'd say.

[Majorball68]

ORIGINAL: Centuur

The problem is not if France will surrender or not in this game. It's about the fact that non of the French units in France are removed when France surrenders. Both the unit in Lille and the units around Marseilles stay on the map and those hexes are still controlled by France. That in itself is a critical bug, since a player can't work around that one.

That's what I thought

[brian brian]

The point of the Surrender rule in France’s case is to allow France the option of getting on with the option to ‘fight from the Colonies’. If the Axis take all of the coastal cities, French units overseas can’t trace supply or re-organize. So the Allies may wish to do this to get the French Fleet back in action, though nothing can be re-organized until the next turn due to sequence of play. Otherwise the Germans could just put the French Empire into stasis by never taking the last French factory.

Use of the rule to surrender China has always seemed quite a bit more dodgy, to me, and I’m sure Mao would never have disbanded any units, ever. But then that’s not a box you really want to open with this game anyway.

[Centuur]

ORIGINAL: brian brian

The point of the Surrender rule in France’s case is to allow France the option of getting on with the option to ‘fight from the Colonies’. If the Axis take all of the coastal cities, French units overseas can’t trace supply or re-organize. So the Allies may wish to do this to get the French Fleet back in action, though nothing can be re-organized until the next turn due to sequence of play. Otherwise the Germans could just put the French Empire into stasis by never taking the last French factory.

Use of the rule to surrender China has always seemed quite a bit more dodgy, to me, and I’m sure Mao would never have disbanded any units, ever. But then that’s not a box you really want to open with this game anyway.

But it's not the bug which is reported in this topic. Also, that bug (if it's in the game or not) can be avoided by the players themselves and isn't as important as the one which has been stumbled upon here.
Bugs come in several categories and the bug initially reported here is critical, where the bug which you keep mentioning is minor...

[brian brian]

Yeah, that bug is serious. I can’t quite follow the distinction between ‘isolated’ and ‘controlled’ without looking up the RAC but the rule does have it’s uses, which are mysterious until you see an applicable game. The new rules in WiF8 simplify the condition test considerably.

Really though it seems to me this is actually a bug in the Complete Conquest mechanism; the Surrender rule should be initiating that process. Maybe it could be tested by fulfilling the Conquest conditions with similar situations present - French controlled units, hexes, even non-factory cities still present at the end-of-turn state that generates a Complete Conquest.

[Jagdtiger14]

The point of the Surrender rule in France’s case is to allow France the option of getting on with the option to ‘fight from the Colonies’. If the Axis take all of the coastal cities, French units overseas can’t trace supply or re-organize. So the Allies may wish to do this to get the French Fleet back in action, though nothing can be re-organized until the next turn due to sequence of play. Otherwise the Germans could just put the French Empire into stasis by never taking the last French factory.

To be clear here, I'm sure Brian means the final factory to engage French surrender (the 6th factory).

I have never considered a French stasis strategy, which is still doable if the Germans can control Le Havre and the Western Med. The 5 factories the Germans want the most are: Paris(3), Metz(1 + resource), Toulon (1). That leaves one factory city as a port (Mars), and one factory with a port behind it that can only be reached by invasion or PARA drop (Rouen(Le Havre)).

The surrender rule does not work as intended since it can not force a surrender by the Allies unless the German player doesn't know about the rule, which will happen only once per WiF gaming life of him and anyone present when the rule is pulled out. Its a waste of time. I would love to hear how WiF 8 deals with this!

[brian brian]

I’m not totally following you on ‘forcing’ a surrender; I have always looked at it as ‘allowing’ a surrender. But this isn’t really the right place to figure that out, and it is all a moot point now, because -

WiF8 simplifies things:

During any peace step, you may surrender the current home country of your major power if your capital is enemy controlled or you have no in-supply land units inside the home country but your enemy does.

The new rules (“As Printed”) even, are up for download @ ADG. Looks like several more weeks before actual games arrive, but the newest ADG rep is 3 hours from me - I might just drive down there to save a couple days.

[Jagdtiger14]

I’m not totally following you on ‘forcing’ a surrender; I have always looked at it as ‘allowing’ a surrender. But this isn’t really the right place to figure that out, and it is all a moot point now, because - WiF8 simplifies things: During any peace step, you may surrender the current home country of your major power if your capital is enemy controlled or you have no in-supply land units inside the home country but your enemy does.

Bad terminology on my part, "allow" is better and accurate.

Good for WiF8! I like it!!! I'm too lazy to look up the WiF8 rules, but what if after Paris is taken, Germany does not Vichy, France does not surrender...can the French surrender any turn after that?

[brian brian]

It would appear so.