Axis and Allies Europe Italy
- by Butler -
The Rules
Italy goes on the same turn as Germany. Italian units may attack and defend with German units. If a mixed force of German and Italian units conquer a territory, Germany decides who gets the territory.
Italy starts with the Northern Italy, Southern Italy, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Crete territories. All starting units on these territories and in the Tyrrhenian Sea are Italian units (designate with yellow pieces.)
Italy maintains its own cash pool, separate from Germany (at start of game it is 10 IPCs). Only Italian units may be built at N. Italy IC.
The first time that Northern Italy is captured by any Allied power, Italy is permanently removed from the game and must forfeit all of its IPCs to the conquering power and in addition remove all Italian units from the game board. All victory points accumulated by Italy are removed from the game. All other territories under Italian control become German controlled. This rule only applies the first time Northern Italy is conquered. After that, Northern Italy is treated as a regular territory for the remainder of the game.
In my house rules I allow IPCs from the oil countries to go to each Axis power and be taken away from each Allied power. So if the Axis have 5 IPCs of oil countries, then Italy and Germany all get 5 IPCs (while US, UK, and USSR all pay 5 IPCs to the bank.).
Additional Rule:
Germany can lend-lease to Italy by building 1 Italian unit per turn in Northern Italy.
Remarks
This gives a HUGE incentive for the Allies to attack the Mediterranean while not penalizing Germany a tremendous deal as Italian and German units can still attack together. (This works kind of like the US/China turn in A&A Pacific). The Axis benefit by getting twice the IPCs on the European map if they take oil countries.
It forces Germany to spend 10 IPCs a turn at the Northern Italy IC. And it takes longer for units built in Northern Italy to get to the Eastern Front, so this helps with the stack problem in a way.
At the most Germany can only build 10 IPCs a turn to send against the Middle East (unless they go through Causacus or send reinforcements from Germany) so this helps slow down the Middle East rush strategy for the Axis.
German units can ride on Italian transports and vice versa.
'Sea Lion' is not affected since Italy can attack with Germany.
Gibraltar becomes extremely important to keep the Allies out of the Mediterranean.
Rule by Buckles
I'm concerned that giving Italy and Germany a double bonus for oil money will tax Britain a little too much (a 12 IPC handover [assuming Russia coughs up 2x2 for Iran] is pretty pricey). The incentive for the Axis to invade the Middle East needs to remain high, so how about simply giving Germany/Italy NPC credit for the Mid-East territories they take? This way, Gerrmany/Italy can collect up to a total of 16 IPCs worth of income from the region, but the harm is more evenly distributed. A 16 IPC collect would take 8 from the bank (as standard NPC/IPC collection), 6 from Britain, and 2 from Russia (Iran only).