Just figured out i should post here instead of the ww2 europe thread for my concerns and suggestions about 1942:
1. Indonesian cities need harbors. This will help the japanese subsidize the cost of their occupationt hrough the trade. Most all of the island cities should have a harbor, to allow for the embarcation.
2. Russia needs a tremendous land army put out in Western Siberia that will arrive to fight germany 7-12 turns in. Germany is incredibly over-positioned to crush Russia within 10-15 turns and Russia is incapable of outproducing or catching up in sheer infantry to just defend their entire line. In reality, the Russian line needs to be 2 or 3 tiles deep and full of infantry. At this stage in 1942, the german war machine was grinding a halt in southern russia due to stiffined resistance from Russia and their willingness to occupy every inch of ground with entrenched infantry and massed artillery.
I would suggest adding somewhere between 8 and 10 infantry and 4-6 artillery to the immediate border, especially right behind moscow and leningrad, and seeing if the osmosis of free space ins outhern russia might 'soak up' the german reinforcements.
3. It was already mentioned, but USA needs a single tile city in western England to base aircraft and rally and then embarc large land forces.
4. 1 or 2 more low population cities in Algeria and Tunisia would add to its strategic value.
5. China needs to have a ton of more infantry. Similar to Russia, they are too easily rolled up by a human player playing Japan. One suggestion i might have is to give chinese infantry a special buff that hardens them to attack, making them harder to kill. I watched the China Theatre very closely while playing as Germany and Japan just got quagmired due to their inferier gameplay, despite overwhelmign advantage. In my subsequent game as Japan, china was crushed with pathetic ease. i had captured their two big cities within 10 turns.
China needs infantry to occupy every tile of Chinese territory in eastern china, and to occupy every tile bordering Japanese territory in the middle contested area southeast of Xian. This would be the easiest thing to impliment.
6. Buildings. Why can you not build banks or harbors anywhere? I would be ok with a bunch of the islands being undeveloped and having to build or buy harbors there, but i cannot even do that, and subsequently they become worthless. Harbors and banks would make it much easier to really justify a huge japanese empire, much less fund the whole thing.
7. Western desert campaign. It starts with the victory already assured for the axis, which is just plain backwards. in january 1942, italy was on its heels, and the Afrika Korps was just getting involved, beginning to push to El Alemian. England needs 2 more tanks there.
8. Sahara desert. This should be basically impassable. Some tile-specific conditions may be required, but i shouldnt be able to drive 3 tanks down to lagos by turn 20 and start sacking the Sub-Sahara.
9. On the whole, its still pretty easy, but not as easy as the Europe scenario. USA doesnt get involved enough in a significant way, though. On a purely AI driven basis, i would make all of north africa and vichy france and bordeuax "Occupied American Cities" to incentivize the AI to recapture them. Having them be 'occupied french' is good and well from a historical sense, but the original impetus to liberate france is insufficient for the AI to get involved, and they dont harass Europe in the same way they go after the Phillipines and Guadalcanal.
I dont have a ton of experience with the mechanics of teh AI, but putting whatever hatred negative values at the top end for the belligerent powers here would be ideal.
10. Spawn soviet convoys that start in New York and head to Murmansk. They should all be fighters, bombers, and heavy armor. Ditto English convoys heading from New York to Plymouth/Liverpool.
11. If the Axis captures Egypt, spawn gold convoys heading to Italy and Serbia for Germany and Italy, to incentivize this.
12. I know this is asking a lot, but the invasion plain of france/germany/poland/russia needs to be heigheted by at least 3 tiles. Its way too crampt. The map will look funny, given the accuracy of the rest of the map, but it could be compressed to the north in Scandenavia, and the extreme north of Russia.
13. I think transportation rates are fine, but i should find some way to hardcode the AI wanting to move 'in blob' and not 1 at a time. Move 3 infantry and 3 tanks together, not 1 every 2 turns to arrive alone and die, etc. WW2 was exemplary of 'massed manuever' as 3rd generation warfare, and the AI needs to be taught to do this.
14. I just wrote a longpost in the europe thread about my ideas for incorporating strategic bombing of cities, the need for city repair to cost money, etc, so i wont paste that here, although its worth considering if you and Gedemon work together on these things.
I'd be happy to test new versions for bugs/playability. Great work, i prefer this map to all the others, with the exception of just sitting through 200 turns as USA int he 1936 to reenact the invasion of North Africa, which i did while watching television and 2 entire movies to just kill the time while the AI processed 200 turns of nothing lol.
at least, easy by my gauging of the difficulty degree of modding)
.
