Play Balance in China

[Greyshaft]

The 73 hits is probably the same six people repeatedly coming back to see what everyone else thinks [:(]

[Froonp]

Hello,

What about
(9) Change China's Partisan value, or maybe make multiple zones. The Japanese had very little control over much of the territory they had "occupied." I'd give this one a B+

This idea (Making multiple zones in a country) should be used for USSR for instance, and maybe for every country (large enough) although this would need to be think about. Anyway this is a great thing for USSR who suffer from Partisan problems in WiF FE already, and where it is often suggested that are introduced Multiple Partisan Zones. This is an idea for another Thread maybe. For China, I'd give it a rating of C personally.

(10) Make more of the Chinese factories blue, put most of the Chinese resources in hexes that don't have a rail connection to any factory Japan can use, and then just put a couple of other blue factories along the Burma Road. A+

Isn't it amongst the suggestions of Devin Cutler ? Devin's House rules are here if you're interested : http://home.earthlink.net/~devinc/wifhouse.htm. I'd give a rating of B to these personally. Also, I must have the list of the Chinese GARR units from WIF5 he talks about (I've lists of many things [:)]).

Best Regards

Patrice

[Shannon V. OKeets]

There are hundreds (thousands?) of house rules. Each one would take a lot of coding to implement; and then there is the play testing.

I see my assignment as: implement WIF FE with most ADG add-ons (as listed previously in other threads), using RAW 7 as the basis for determining specifically what that means. The only reason we are exploring other options here is to correct perceived problems with Play Balance in China that might arise because of the introduction of the unified scale.

Opening Pandora's box to include other house rules could easily delay publication years. Not my cup of tea.

[Smiffus64]

(1) Change nothing and leave it the same as in CWIF - B
(2) Add Chinese warlords and/or territorials - C
(3) Unlimited breakdowns of Corps into divisions - C
(4) Add more Chinese cities - D
(5) Restrict Chinese attacks - D
(6) Add Japanese warlords - C
(7) Redo the Chinese and Japanese land orders of battle - C
(8) Modified setup - D


House rules - D

[Caranorn]

1)Change nothing and leave it the same as in CWIF F.
2)Add Chinese warlords and/or territorials B.
3)Unlimited breakdowns of Corps into divisions C.
4)Add more Chinese cities B.
5)Restrict Chinese attacks B.
6)Add Japanese warlords B (if 2 then also 6).
7)Redo the Chinese and Japanese land orders of battle B (note one option would be a revised OOB for Japan and China alone going from armies to corps even if fictional (the OOB's are largely that anyhow)...).
8)Modified setup D (alternatively have a more detailled setup but no reaction movement).

Marc aka Caran...

[petracelli]

HI

Have been playing WIF FE for some time now and whilst the Chinese front may not appear the most significant it is very important it remains balanced.

In my opinion by changing the map it will change the balance of the game as if Japan is able to beat the Chinese on a more regular basis it makes the job of conquering the Axis which is already difficult (against experinced players) that much harder.

In my view WIF is a great game as is and the computer version should be an accurate reproduction of the cardboard version asn anything else would just not be WIF.

Phil

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: petracelli
In my opinion by changing the map it will change the balance of the game as if Japan is able to beat the Chinese on a more regular basis it makes the job of conquering the Axis which is already difficult (against experinced players) that much harder.

In my view WIF is a great game as is and the computer version should be an accurate reproduction of the cardboard version asn anything else would just not be WIF.

Phil

If you haven't already, you might want to read the posts in the thread on the maps. The pros and cons of using the WIF maps versus going to a single map with a unified scale were discussed quite a bit there. I know that I for one certainly voiced my viewpoint completely there.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Ok, we have 8 voters in the balloting on optional rules for "correcting" the play balance in China.

Here is the tabulation and my conclusions therefrom.

-------------------------
Play Balance in China Voting (as of July 22, 2005)
I Possibilities for MWIF
(1) Change nothing and leave it the same as in CWIF
(2) Add Chinese warlords and/or territorials
(3) Unlimited breakdowns of Corps into divisions
(4) Add more Chinese cities
(5) Restrict Chinese attacks
(6) Add Japanese warlords
(7) Redo the Chinese and Japanese land orders of battle
(8) Modified setup

II The Voting
Possibilities.............. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Greyshaft................. D B B B C B B C
c92nichj................... D B* D A C B D C
Froonp..................... (F) A B* B* B B F C*
kram....................... (F) A A B D B F C
tiredoftryingnames... F B B B C C B D
doctormm................ F B B B D* C C F
Smiffus64................ B C C D D C C D
Caranorn................. F B C B B B B* D*

Summary................. No Yes Yes Yes Mixed Yes Mixed Mixed

I inserted (F) for “change nothing” because the same person gave high ratings to changes.
The asterisk (*) denotes that the vote came with comments and/or conditions.

III Conclusions

My decisions made on the basis of the voting are:

Yes: make it an option
No: don’t do this
Mixed: mixed voting, don’t include it unless play test shows we need more options

IV Optional rules (some new)

Because I am a minimalist (I don’t want to change from WIF any more than necessary), I prefer to introduce these new options gradually and only when required. The numbers following each option are averages based on A = 4, B = 3 and so on.

Add to options and play test:
2 Chinese warlords and/or territorials (3.1)
4 More Chinese cities (2.9)
6 Japanese warlords (2.6)
3 Unlimited breakdowns of Corps into divisions (2.6)

If we are still unhappy with play balance in China, then add one at a time in the order listed
5 Restrict Chinese attacks (1.9)
7 Redo the Chinese and Japanese land orders of battle (1.8)
8 Modified setup (1.4)

V Next task

Write the text for optional rules 2, 3, 4, and 6.

[Greyshaft]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
IV Optional rules (some new)

Because I am a minimalist (I don’t want to change from WIF any more than necessary), I prefer to introduce these new options gradually and only when required. The numbers following each option are averages based on A = 4, B = 3 and so on.

Add to options and play test:
2 Chinese warlords and/or territorials (3.1)
4 More Chinese cities (2.9)
6 Japanese warlords (2.6)
3 Unlimited breakdowns of Corps into divisions (2.6)

If we are still unhappy with play balance in China, then add one at a time in the order listed
5 Restrict Chinese attacks (1.9)
7 Redo the Chinese and Japanese land orders of battle (1.8)
8 Modified setup (1.4)

V Next task

Write the text for optional rules 2, 3, 4, and 6.

Has anyone already got House Rules for any these options which we could take as a starting point?

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Greyshaft
Add to options and play test:
2 Chinese warlords and/or territorials (3.1)
4 More Chinese cities (2.9)
6 Japanese warlords (2.6)
3 Unlimited breakdowns of Corps into divisions (2.6)

Has anyone already got House Rules for any these options which we could take as a starting point?

Warlords are in WIF Final Edition under rule 22.4.15 (Option 71). This applies to whichever major power controls the city, so it works for the Nationalist and Communist Chinese as well as the Japanese - should they take control of a Chinese city that has a warlord. However, that option contains wording about keeping the warlord within 2 hexes of its home city or else it is destroyed. Since we are changing the scale, I don't know what 2 hexes translates to.

Territorials are discussed in rule 22.4.5 (Option 10) which should serve as a starting point.

Unit breakdown is discussed in rule 22.4.1 (Pption 2) which should serve as a starting point. There was a good discussion in this thread about what the word 'unlimited' might mean. We should define that precisely.

Conclusion: we are not starting from scratch with these options. We should build on the wording of the existing options to design what we want to play test.

[Greyshaft]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
we are not starting from scratch with these options. We should build on the wording of the existing options to design what we want to play test.

Agreed. I'm just looking for a "Chinese Rules" champion to actually consolidate all these ideas and write the Chinese rules in 'WiFese' so I can develop a Test Plan. I could write the rules, but a) there are more knowledgeable players out there and b) Testers shouldn't write initial specifications if there is an alternative source of that documentation. Guess I'm just trying to build a "Chinese Wall" within the development team [:D]

[Froonp]

Warlords are in WIF Final Edition under rule 22.4.15 (Option 71). This applies to whichever major power controls the city, so it works for the Nationalist and Communist Chinese as well as the Japanese - should they take control of a Chinese city that has a warlord.

Or the Russian, or whoever controls the Chinese City.

However, that option contains wording about keeping the warlord within 2 hexes of its home city or else it is destroyed. Since we are changing the scale, I don't know what 2 hexes translates to.

4 hexes.
The "divide by 2" rule between the Pacific & European Scale is common practice in many domains (aircraft ranges, supply) there is only one way it doesn't apply (3 hexes stay 3 hexes) it is in the garrisons ratio iirc.

[Froonp]

For what is worth, it can be usefull for all to see what China looked like in CWiF. Here it is (hope it works) :

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Wow. I wish I knew how to do that.

[Greyshaft]

When you upload a file just check the "Embed picture in post" box

...or did you mean actually creating the China map [:D]

[Shannon V. OKeets]

I meant capturing a cropped image from the screen and putting it into a JPG (or equivalanet) file.

[Incy]

To buzy to follow the discussion a few days now, bur here are some comments:

First, what my vote would have been:
(1) Change nothing and leave it the same as in CWIF - C
(2) Add Chinese warlords and/or territorials - B
(3) Unlimited breakdowns of Corps into divisions - B+
(4) Add more Chinese cities - A
(5) Restrict Chinese attacks - B
(6) Add Japanese warlords - B
(7) Redo the Chinese and Japanese land orders of battle - D
(8) Modified setup - B*

It should be noted that 2+6 are an existing optional rule(warlords), the same is 5 (chinese attack weakness). There are people that like and dislike optionals, so I'm not sure it's so smart to fix a problem by forcing an optional rule. Recommending people play with it, yes. Forcing it on people, sure, but some will dislike that.

That said, the myriad of optionals in WiF IS a problem when developing a computer game (especially for developing AI, etc). So I think it might be a good idea to give serious thought to implementing MWiF with a reccomended/default/supported/forced set of optionals.

(*)Someone did suggest changing the order of setup to have China setup after Japan, I think that's a brilliant idea. It will force Japan to start in a defencive posture, and will allow China to start with a balanced defence. Japan has the first impulse with guaranteed good weather, so will not be terribly exposed to funky chinese setups attempting to blow through some japanese weakpoint. And the coding neccesary to implement the change should be almost nil.

Some unrelated comments:
I'd like to add that partinsans are stronger in CWiF than in regular WiF, and particularily in china this works out nicely. Japan is especially vulnerable (to a PART on the railline for instance) if it advances at the edge of it's supply, or far along a single railline.

I like the idea of separate partisan zones in China, many zones would:
-discourage japan from concentrating force to much (a strong concentration would overkill the local partisans, but leave other zones underdefended)
-discourage japan from advancing to far (would open up brand new partisan zones)
-lessen the partisan menace for japan if it pulls back to a smaller area/is loosing
The downside is of course the very limited precedence (only USSR has two sones in WiFFE/CWiF)-> coding, & tweaking required

I don't have a good (= simple and within frame of existing rules) solution for china beating up on Japan

I would definetly like to see a rule change that China isn't allowed to Lend lease BP to others. I find no reason why it should be possible for china to LL away, and it can turn a chinese blowout victory into gamebreaking. To often do I see china LL'ing a big pile of BP to Russia in 44, or even 43. Having china mess up the european theathre is just silly. By not letting china LL away, japan has real options if the going in china gets though.

I think there needs to be some type of discouragement or weakening of a china that is beating up Japan, and I don't think chinese attack weakness is enough, as attack weakness only tends to help on a stable front, not in OOS or overwhelming odds situations. The least worst ideas I have are along the lines of:
-linking chinese PM closer to the number of japanese cities in China
-giving japan reserves for loosing chinese cities (wifzen: national pride invoked)
-allowing japan to remove/replace(with a warlord DIV??) existing PART when cities are lost (representing either communist or nationalist units deciding that japan is no longer the enemy)

Incy

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

I meant capturing a cropped image from the screen and putting it into a JPG (or equivalanet) file.

Just hit the PRINT SCREEN key, and it will put the picture you have on the screen in your clipboard, from where you can paste it in your favorite picture editor or anywhere else.
Alternatively, you can also hit the ALT + PRINT SCREEN keys, and it will only shot the open dialog and not the background, and put it into your clipboard.

[Froonp]

Some unrelated comments:
I'd like to add that partinsans are stronger in CWiF than in regular WiF, and particularily in china this works out nicely. Japan is especially vulnerable (to a PART on the railline for instance) if it advances at the edge of it's supply, or far along a single railline.

Yes, he's right, Partisans can be very devastating for Japan in China, as the railroads are very scarse.

I like the idea of separate partisan zones in China, many zones would:
-discourage japan from concentrating force to much (a strong concentration would overkill the local partisans, but leave other zones underdefended)
-discourage japan from advancing to far (would open up brand new partisan zones)
-lessen the partisan menace for japan if it pulls back to a smaller area/is loosing
The downside is of course the very limited precedence (only USSR has two sones in WiFFE/CWiF)-> coding, & tweaking required

Moreover, this IS something that the designers would have liked to introduce into WiF FE (for Russia), but changing the maps & charts is harder on a paper game.

Regards

Patrice

[c92nichj]

ORIGINAL: Incy
I think there needs to be some type of discouragement or weakening of a china that is beating up Japan, and I don't think chinese attack weakness is enough, as attack weakness only tends to help on a stable front, not in OOS or overwhelming odds situations. The least worst ideas I have are along the lines of:
<Snap>
-allowing japan to remove/replace(with a warlord DIV??) existing PART when cities are lost (representing either communist or nationalist units deciding that japan is no longer the enemy)

I like this option alot, this is what I was thinking of when talking about japaneese warlords. Prohibiting Chineese lendlease is also a good suggestion.