Notional unit question

[TeaLeaf]

So in the below picture, Germany wants to paradrop the red marked hex, attacking it together with the big German stack north of it.
The Notional unit is given 4 combat factors which I don't think is correct, but since I've been proven wrong regarding notionals before I humbly ask clarification here.

From RAW8 which is the same as RAW7 regarding this rule (Greek notional in red):

Notional Unit Combat Factor

1 Notional unmodified combat factor; 1
+1 defending in a city hex;
+1 defending in the home country of the major power (not minor country or territory) controlling the hex;
+1 if it is not stacked with a land unit, but is in the ZoC of a friendly unit(s); 2
+sbm of the sea-box section (modified for weather) of each invading unit;
-1 if it cannot trace a basic supply path of any length (see 2.4.2); and
-1 if surprised (see 15.). 1

1 combat factor doubled for mountains makes for a final combat strength of 2.
So am I missing something or is it a bug?

[Orm]

Did Italy DOW Greece? Or was it Germany? Or both?

I assume that Greece was declared war on this impulse.

[Centuur]

That's probably it. If Italy did DoW Greece, than the German units don't get the benefits of surprise...

[TeaLeaf]

Sorry, I forgot to include that piece of information.
Both Italy and Germany DOWed Greece this impulse, so German units should also benefit from surprise, right?

In the planned paradrop only German units involved. The Italian Marines do benefit of the surprise in their invasion.

[paulderynck]

Looks like a bug to me.

[TeaLeaf]

I did some testing and it turns out to be only the information prompt, displaying wrong information:

[TeaLeaf]

Then, during Land Combat Declaration, the prompt gets out the wrong information the other way around:

[TeaLeaf]

But, during the actual attack, everything works as it should work -and it also works correctly if (some units of) the German stack north of the drop attacks together with the Para into the hex.

[Joseignacio]

This is the rule relative to surprise effects for land units in RAW 7.0:

Land units
Land units are not halved when attacking a surprised land unit across a river or canal hexside (even if some other unit in the hex is not surprised). They still suffer the adverse effects of invasions and attacks across straits hexsides.
Surprised HQs cannot provide emergency HQ supply (see 2.4.3) or HQ support (see 11.16.3).

However I kind of remember that the defender not only could not enjoy the river or canal hexside effect but none of the terrain modifiers. Maybe it's printed in the map?

I went with a fast search in the FAQ and didn't find that but it was not exhaustive... Anyone?

PS: If not, I was cheated once with this (again) [:@]

[paulderynck]

Surprise does not undouble terrain like mountain and swamp. It does undouble rivers. It is possible in your game the defending notional was only a 1 (after all possible other considerations except surprise) - and was in doubling terrain. Then if surprised, it was still worth zero because the doubling is after the final value is calculated. Two times zero is still zero.

If not, you need to expand your opponent contact list so you can find people who don't take advantage of you. Or switch to MWiF for all your games and have the rules enforced for you. [:)]

[Joseignacio]

Problem is WIF rulebook is a book in truth, with small typography besides... At the beginning I read part of the rules and the rest were explained to me by this friend as well as the interpretation of them, which he based in things I did not have like optionals (we had "agreed") from Annuals, FiF, and so on.

The situation where I could have been cheated on was 7 or 8 years ago more or less, and he was invading Gibraltar, he had just aligned Spain and he was so lucky he disorganized my two corps rolling 1's with spanish fighters with bombing capacity 1, and happened to unsupply Gibraltar. Then he invaded. But Gib is in Mountain and I had built sea forts. He said a Fort is Terrain basing on the rules/map texts and that in surprise you didn't enjoy the Terrain benefits, basing on Clarifications or some other blurred source of knowledge I could not check at the moment. [:@]

From then on I try to learn the rules more intensely earlier, ..., to no avail as it has recently been proved.

Later on we kept on having this problem because he (with a general consensus of other players who believe that always new = better, which I not always agree to.) proposed to play with the last 8.XX rules. In my spare time I have enough time to learn a book of rules, but I don't have enough as to learn each version of this rules, detect the changes and understand how each of those changes affect the gameplay. In this one (and may be the couple of previous drafts, dunno) if you lose Italy you cannot simply declare Albania as your new home country but also all your units away from Albania more hexes than a dice roll, disappear (simplified).

As a GE player I was horrified because I had reserved most of the IT units for garrison duties, sending some GE garrisons to block access to Central Europe and France through Italy, the IT bombers were at USSR. The effect would be devastating. None of us had read that rule and we had to agree to swap some GE for IT or the game would be over, France would have been undefendable... This shows how bad it is to switch all the time to new rules.

[paulderynck]

That is certainly not the rule for Italy in the just released RAW8, and I don't recall anything like that in the myriad of drafts I saw while a member of the Rules forum over the last several years; but I suppose it is possible. More likely it was a house rule or from the "House of Rules" section in one of the Annuals.

It is a complicated game and rules set and even players who play a lot need to have access to the rules so they can check things that seem doubtful. Before starting, they also need to agree on and understand all optional rules and house rules that will be used during the game.

Could it take that long to check a couple paragraphs?

[Courtenay]

My gaming group found that the WiF rules were written on a special quantum paper: The text changed after we had read it.

Either that, or a bunch of reasonably intelligent people all repeatedly misread the same rules in the exact same way. You can choose between these two possibilities, but there is no doubt which of the two my group believed. [:)]

[TeaLeaf]

ORIGINAL: Courtenay

My gaming group found that the WiF rules were written on a special quantum paper: The text changed after we had read it.

Either that, or a bunch of reasonably intelligent people all repeatedly misread the same rules in the exact same way. You can choose between these two possibilities, but there is no doubt which of the two my group believed. [:)]

LOL, I think I believe the same as your group:
Mr. Rowland wrote the rules in a parallell universe -on special quantum paper [:D].

[paulderynck]

...and we are all victims of entanglement...

[Joseignacio]

Well, I always insist that we go through the text of the 60 or 80 optionals plus the rules of the annuals like the FiF, but people never want because it takes time. The most I use to get is to be explained briefly.

And yes, after years of changing once a year or years, and with few changes, we are now in a moment when every six months or so the game is upside down with substantial changes, that improve the game most of them but even so...

And yes, there is that rule, seems like another example of Quantum rule :

Incomplete conquest

If a conquered major power or minor country still controls at least one aligned minor country that was aligned to it prior to 1939 (i.e. has its initials printed after the minor country’s name on the map) then that major power or minor country is only incompletely conquered, and fights on with its remaining units. It now chooses one of these aligned minor countries as a new home country for the units of its conquered home country.

Example: During the game Italy aligns Yugoslavia. Later Italy is incompletely conquered while still controlling Albania and Yugoslavia. She could choose Albania as her new home country but not Yugoslavia.

Conquered Commonwealth major power home countries may instead pick another CW major power home country (e.g. if Australia is conquered, you could pick Canada as the new home country for Australian units).

Conquered minor countries may pick either their controlling major power’s (current) home country or any home country that the minor country itself controls.

Example: Germany controls Brussels and Liege at the end of the Mar/Apr 1940 turn. Belgium (a Commonwealth aligned minor country) is conquered. Belgium is not completely conquered because the Belgian Congo is still aligned with Belgium. Belgium must pick a new home country. This can be the Belgian Congo or any one of the 6 Commonwealth major power home countries.
If the conquered country is not a Commonwealth major power home country that has just chosen another as its new home country, you now roll 1 die. All of the conquered country’s land and aircraft units that are more hexes (and/or hexdots) away from hexes they (or their controlling major power) control in their new home country than the die roll, are removed from the game. When counting hexes only distance matters (not terrain, units, zocs etc). Off-map hexes and hexdots cost 2 each. Units in sea boxes must count the movement points to reach their section in the total.


Example: Japan is incompletely conquered. She chooses Manchuria as her new home country and rolls a 5 on one die. She controls every hex in Manchuria. The Japanese land unit in Chang-Sha (6 hexes from Port Arthur) and aircraft in the 3 Sea of Japan sea-box section (2 hexes from Manchuria and 6 to get into the 3 box) are removed from the game..

[Design Note: CW major power units were wholly integrated and not subject to the same disruption as other major powers which did not have a world-wide empire to call on in time of need.]

Now roll a die for each of its naval units on the production circle, or in the construction pool or repair pool. On a 1 or 2 it becomes controlled by any major power the conquered major power chooses (including itself). On a 3 through 5 it is destroyed. On a 6 or higher it becomes controlled by any major power the conqueror chooses. If the Commonwealth is chosen to control the unit, it becomes a British unit.

From now on, if a unit’s original home country is conquered and not yet liberated, remove it from the game if it is destroyed while out of supply. Immediately roll a die if it is destroyed in supply ~ remove it from the game on a 5 or less; otherwise return it to the force pools.

Units from incompletely conquered home countries may still be built with whatever production the major power retains.

Incompletely conquered major powers (only the UK in the case of the Commonwealth) have only half their normal activity limits (see 10.2) until liberated.

Incompletely conquered countries still receive annual additions to their force pools (see 4.1.1) as normal.

[paulderynck]

I was totally entangled with the previous rules. That one really snuck up on me. Don't like it, but yeah that is the new RAW.