NWB 12/31/2001:
Invasion: America
Rules interpretations, information, clarifications & Errata ...
and a Justification
Portions of this document Copyright 2001 by Gary Christiansen and
Copyright 2001 by Chris Fawcett.
General: These are observed issues, which have been raised during recent
games. This is not an 'Official' errata as published by SPI.
The Map:
(Commentary) It is evident some "oddities" exist in the Map, however any
real changes to it would alter play balance. So the absence of Miami and
San Diego while noticeable are to be considered justified in the
'alternate history', something such as San Diego was nuked out of
existence so even the port is gone, and riots or fires in Miami reduced
it to rubble.
(Errata) Hex 2715 on the heavy stock paper, should be Rough, not urban.
(If you look, the hex is not colored in as round, and is not a named
city as all other urban hexes are. A close look at one of the hard
backed boards printed later shows the hex as Rough)
(Clarification) Hex 3145 has just enough forest to be a forest hex.
Rules:
[3.0] (Information) Units inventory (count graciously provided by Skip
Franklin):
One of the SAU infantry counters in the original publication had a
misprint on the untried side, showing "2010" instead of "2?10" as it
should have. The tried strength was 2-10.
SAU # units
Armor
6-10 4
4-10 4
2-10 2
Mechanized Infantry
5-10 5
3-10 8
1-10 3
Infantry
3-10 9
2-10 5
1-10 4
CAS
3/4-3 4
3/2-3 4
LRB
6/6-3 2
6/4-3 2
Transports
(4) 4
Amphibious
8 3
Supply
(4) 3
Total 66
ESC # units
Armor
10-6 3
8-6 6
4-6 3
Mechanized
8-6 4
5-6 8
3-6 4
Infantry
6-8 6
4-8 10
2-8 4
Hovercraft
3-5 6
CAS
4/4-4 5
4/2-4 5
LRB
6/7-4 3
6/5-4 3
Transports
(6) 6
Amphibious
12 3
CV
6-6 6
Supply
(6) 4
Total 89
PAL # units
Mechanized
5-6 5
4-6 5
3-6 2
Shock
20-4 4
Infantry
8-6 8
5-6 8
2-6 4
Hovercraft
3-5 3
CAS
4/4-6 4
4/2-6 4
LRB
6/6-6 2
6/4-6 2
Transports
(6) 6
Amphibious
12 3
CV
8-6 3
Supply
(6) 3
Total 66
USA # units
Armor
4-8 6
6-8 8
8-8 4
Mechanized
3-8 8
5-8 8
7-8 5
Infantry
2-8 5
3-8 12
4-8 5
Militia
0-4 8
1-4 8
2-4 16
3-4 8
CAS
3/3-4 6
3/5-4 6
LRB
10/6-4 8
10/10-4 8
Railroad
RR-60 4
Total 133
Canada # units
Armor
4-8 2
6-8 4
Mechanized
3-8 3
5-8 3
7-8 2
Infantry
2-8 2
3-8 4
4-8 2
Militia
0-4 2
1-4 2
2-4 4
3-4 2
CAS
3/3-4 2
3/5-4 2
Railroad
RR-60 2
Total 38
Additional units:
Game-Turn marker
4 SAU blanks
2 Canadian blanks
1 ESC blank
[4.2] (Errata/Clarification) Supply units, considered land units in all
other senses, load or unload from Amphibious units only during the Naval
Movement Phase. Loading for other land units occurs during their
respective movement phases.
[7.2] (Clarification) Supply units are loaded or unloaded during the
Naval Movement Phase and taking the entire naval phase for the
Amphibious unit to load or unload. This does make them useful the turn
they've unloaded.
[7.22] (Clarification) Naval units cannot go into a coastal hex
containing enemy units, except for Amphibious Assaults (see 5.23).
Supply units cannot be on an Amphibious unit conducting an Amphibious
Assault. This includes Amphibious Assaults of empty beach hexes. An
Amphibious unit may stack with another Amphibious unit conducting an
Amphibious Assault if the hex has no enemy units, though it may not
unload. Even an empty beach hex must be invaded before a supply unit can
be unloaded on it. The Aggressor must control the beach hex before a
supply unit can be unloaded. An Amphibious unit could carry other units
and unload them the same turn as the Supply unit, within the requirement
the hex be controlled by the owner of the units.
[13.3] (Clarification) Terrain effects are completely negated for combat
by the use of supporting air units. (see 14.16).
[14.16] (Clarification) The negation of defensive terrain effects
includes the Beach Hex multipliers. This does contradict 15.13 which
says the defenders always get the benefit of the multiplier even if
combined, but from context it seems apparent 15.13's intent is to
provide for other supporting adjacent ground units. (Commentary) This
will only affect anything if the US player has neglected to provide air
cover from out of range of air superiority attack.
[14.42] (Clarification) Air units suffer all Combat Results as any other
units, including retreats, whether attacking or defending.
[14.5] (Justification/Commentary - Gary Christiansen) Most contentious
of the Invasion America rules is the Air Superiority rule preventing use
of air power unless all LRB and CV units of the enemy force in range of
the defending hex are attacked first. This is not a simple matter
because the range of US LRB units is 10 and are able to reach the
Aggressor nation's air units, while the Aggressors range is limited to
6, permitting the US air to remain out of range to simply prevent the
use of Aggressor air in ground support. It gives an erroneous appearance
Aggressor air power is useless.
One proposal to give the rule more basis in "reality" involves any
additional attacks on those LRB & CV units in range of the attacked hex
occur at the attacked hex, since this would represent contesting the air
superiority where the dogfights would occur. This idea is not supported
by the rules, and may unbalance play since for the purpose of air
attacks on enemy air units it effectively extends the range of all LRB
and CV units to 16 hexes.
In looking at rule 14.16, without the Air Superiority mechanism the
beach hexes cannot sustain their increased defense strength to protect
the beach. The US forces become far more brittle with Aggressor air
support negating front line terrain benefits. Aggressors need the air
units to cover their front line to prevent the terrain from being
negated as well. Once either side ceases to have their front line
covered to prevent enemy air support from taking away defensive terrain
multiples, the line can be attacked far more easily, though by no means
is a defense without air cover impossible.
The rules as they stand work properly for game balance and play
reasonably well as a game mechanic. The sudden negation of terrain
effects by ground support causes a serious impact on defensive play for
either side in the game. The US player will spend the early part of the
game trying to crack the Air Support of the Aggressors while trying not
to give up too much ground. This is a difficult task for the US player
to accomplish, and gives a lot of benefit to the Aggressors for having
air power at all. Complaints about the Air Superiority rule seem to come
from a (aggressive) desire to fling units that are more suited to
providing a protective defensive umbrella to the ground forces into
offensive battle.
This implies the term LRB (Long Range Bomber) is a misnomer. These units
do not represent B1 and B52 bombers as the name implies, but more,
including fighter resources. CAS (Close Air Support) units are basically
the helicopter gunships and short-range tactical bombers like the A-10
or perhaps the Harrier loaded just for ground support. The air defenses
over the front would be sufficient to impose a serious barrier to such
assets if not significantly supressed.
The actual function of LRB units is Strategic Air Assets (to take a
broad swipe at explaining the multipurpose of these units). Air
Superiority is provided by preventing them from being able to deliver
interception over the target hex, though not by beating them in
dogfights at the target hex. To do this, any interception force has to
be diverted to concentrate elsewhere. Air escort and protection through
dogfights over the target hex doesn't necessarily guarantee all defenses
will be suppressed.
This is a 'justification' for a game mechanic necessary for play
balance. This is not a rules change or any intent to dismiss 'reality'
concerns!
[15.13] (Errata) Air support negates the beach hex multiplier, support
from other adjacent ground units does not. (Commentary) This will only
affect anything if the US player has neglected to provide air cover from
units sitting out of range of air superiority attacks.
[15.15] (Clarification) Even landing on an unoccupied beach hex is an
Amphibious Assault.
[19} (Clarification) See 18.31, the Aggressors always set up first.
[19] (Errata) Scenarios suffer from a problem with victory point totals.
There are only 376 VPs total to the map, yet Scenario II and III call
for the US to retain 400 points, rendering a US victory impossible.
Following reflects adjustments based on Chris Fawcett's analysis of the
distribution of VPs assuming the original basis was to have been 450 VPs
total in the game. (Chris's excellent commentary included at the end of
this file) This sets VP for all scenarios more fitting to those
available actually on the map.
[19.16] (Errata) Victory Point requirements: 282
[19.26] (Errata) Victory Point requirements: 339
[19.36] (Errata) Victory Point requirements: 339
[19.46] (Errata) Victory Point requirements: 207
[19.56] (Errata) Victory Point requirements: 76
[19.66] (Errata) Victory Point requirements: 38
Chris Fawcett's VP analysis for Invasion America:
I think the VP values of the hexes got adjusted late
in development, and the changes didn't make it to the scenarios.
The solution I came up with was to estimate what the designer (JFD)
may have had in mind for acceptable territorial loss levels that the
US might accept and still claim "victory." I then applied these
levels to the actual number of VPs on the map (US/CAN/CAA only), and
revised the victory levels accordingly.
Here's some new stuff from my overactive brain, concerning the
whacked-out victory condition levels for the scenarios.
I did a careful count (and recount, and re-recount) of the victory
point hexes on the map. Here's what I came up with (by region):
Region Supply Urban Resource Point Value
Canada 2 2 9 43
CAA/Mexico 0 1 3 12
US-Alaska 0 1 1 6
US-East 7 13 6 92
US-Plains 2 5 17 76
US-West 3 5 9 57
14 27 45
Point Value 70 81 225 376
(5 ea) (3 ea) (5 ea)
This number is not consistent with the victory conditions in the
scenarios. I don't know what happened, but changes were made
somewhere between design and publication, and there are no published
errata for the game.
I took a look at all of the victory conditions for each of the
scenarios, and came up with a revised set of victory conditions that
would take into account the true number of victory points available
on the map. This is what I came up with:
Scenario Old VPs % of Original Adjusted % Revised VPs
3-Pronged Invasion 340 76% 75% 282
Early Assault 400 89% 90% 339
European Invasion 400 89% 90% 339
Inland Campaign 240 53% 55% 207
Inland Campaign II 80 18% 20% 76
Partisan Revolt 50 11% 10% 38
"Old VPs" indicates the number of VPS required for US/Can Player
victory in the rules as written. Note that this number often exceeds
the number of Victory Points available on the map. "& of Original"
gives the percentage of Old VPs as compared to an assumed value of
450 VPs. While this number of VPs (450) is just an assumption of what
the total VP count may have been at one point in the game's
development, it does work. "Adjusted %" rounds this number to more
even values. "Revised VPs" is a calculation of the actual VPs on map
(289) multiplied by the Adjusted % value for each scenario.