Ok, I think a little reorganizing of the countries might be in place. Thought this for a while and might make things a bit more simple. We have 12 spots for countries and they should be divided into groups...
With China down, we have
6 major powers. These are ofc
ENG, GER, SOV, FRA/USA, JAP & ITA. These countries should survive for several sessions, like France and US counts as a one country for these purposes.
Then we have
4 medium powers, two of them Axis and two of them Allied.
CAN, AUS, ROM & HUN. These are aligned medium powers, when they have something between 40-80 modified IC, at least that's what I think. These countries should survive for several session too, unless Japan gets Australia or the Red Army crushes Romania.
So with 6 majors and 4 mediums, that leaves us
2 wildcard countries. Yes, these will be kinda wildcards, the countries might be switched very quickly, be high or low-IC countries... it differs. Anyway Pegasus wishes to be Spain, so that makes one 50 IC country. If you have looked at the rules for Spain joining the war, it will be quite hard to join, unless the Axis dow Spain. But this is very speculative and we'll have to see what happens to France in the next session and will the Axis blitz all the way to Gibraltar. One simple rule might be that Spain joins the side whoever controls France on January -41. This might be a bit too simple, like Republican Spain joining the Axis, it should align with the Allies, coz the Republicans won the war and the Axis supported the Nationalists... but it can be discussed.
Anyway this leaves us with 1 nation. We have 13 players on the country list and 12 is the limit. We have Delex'es Commie China trying to stall the inevitable Japanese conquest of China and Finland trying to stall the Red Army with Swedish help.
...Both are going down, I guess. But the question is which country do we keep or do we keep either of them? Honestly I can say that Finland is going down under my masses of infantry and bombers. My army is advancing on all fronts and the Finnish are retreating, honestly. So it might not be much use to keep Finland for the next session, coz it will probably get puppeted in one month anyway. Communist China has lots of terrain and still their forts, so with good luck they might hold out for a year. Or could Delex broker some sort of deal with the Japanese? We have good nations like Bulgaria and Brazil left. Bulgaria had about 20-30 IC maybe, but with the cores it might rise between 30-40 IC, althrough I have the impression that it won't get Constanta. Brazil on the other hand had about 50 IC when I last checked, so not bad.
Also we have to reach an agreement on two things before the next session, China and Sweden.
As you know, Hatuke switched to Canada. Nationalists are getting annexed soon and the others will follow. So Japan has some options, made up some of them and I'm not sure of the event paths either.
1. Total Occupation of China: Ok, I guess nobody has anything against this. Japan gets more IC, resources and MP, but LOTS of partisans and TC load.
2. A puppet China: So... this had caused a lot of debate. Japan might keep the IC rich coast and leave the inland to a puppet China that will spam massive amounts of infantry, that will be a huge problem in India and Burma, once the time comes. Japan will be extremely powerful to strike the Pacific.
3. A puppet UNALLIED China: This might be a compromise. Japan still gets the puppet resources (over 1k stockpiles) from China and keeps the beaches. Little partisans and some IC, but not a huge Chinese army. I think this might be the historical option, coz IRL Japan planned to keep the coast and give the inland to loyal warlords. Most of those warlords wouldn't have supported the Japanese at attacking India and Burma though. I think this is a somewhat fair option, Japan gets a nice amount of IC and little partisans, but has to fight with her own army.
4. Divide China with the commies: I think Delex asked Juspe something like this in the chat in the last session. Japan and Communist China make a peace after the Nationalists are annexed. I have no idea how the lands would be divided and would the commies be allied with Japan or anything. An alliance might sound weird, but so did the R-M pact when it was done.
So yeah, lots of ideas and stuff, but those are really important for the game balance. If we can't reach an agreement, then we'll have to vote.
If that wasn't enough, there is still Sweden that went against me in the Winter War. So owning Sweden is no problem, but what to do with it is...
During the last session I was told that annexing/puppeting Sweden might be unfair for the Germans? Well, the Germans allied with HUN and ROM early and invaded Yugoslavia in -39. Is that unfair for me? I don't ask that I could puppet or annex them, but surely I will get something out of this?
I will go with bring socialism in the Winter War, so maybe if Germany won't dow me in -40 in exchange for leaving Sweden alone? This isn't much, because I think France won't fall that easy that Germany could still deploy to the east in time and dow me, but better than nothing, I guess. Other options might be that Germany won't invade Norway (not sure if they will get past the Royal Fleet anyway), won't trade with Sweden and won't get military access through Sweden. So nothing big you see, but some small tweaks might be interesting.
So what do you guys think? We have to decide this together uknow...
