FAQ (old)

[Julius Borisov]

Axis & Allies 1942 Online is an official digital adaptation of the iconic board game, Axis & Allies: 1942 Second Edition.

Please check out our official FAQ about the game, its system requirements, game features, etc: https://axisandalliesonline.com/aao_faq_1.5.pdf

Here you can find Axis & Allies 1942 Second Edition Rules - http://media.wizards.com/2015/rules/AA_1942_rules.pdf

I. Q: I think I have a bug/a troubleshooting issue/my game is broken/not working. What should I do?

A: Please contact us via our Service Desk - https://beamdog.atlassian.net/servicedesk/customer/portal/3 - and we’ll help you out! If you want to report an issue, please follow these steps:

1. Ensure that your connection is stable and that the speed of your connection is equal to or greater than our minimum requirements. We recommend a minimum of 5MB/sec.
a. Measuring stability and speed can be done here: https://www.speedtest.net/
b. Please include these specs in your report.

2. Ensure that your system meets our minimum system requirements.
a. On Windows, you can get a fairly complete system spec readout by using the dxdiag tool. This should work on most Windows systems.
i. Click Start.
ii. Click Run. If on Windows 10, type "run" (without the quotes), then select the first option in the Start Menu.
iii. In the Run window, type "dxdiag" (without the quotes) and press Enter.
iv. Select No on the WHQL signature prompt that will appear.
v. Select Save All Information... in the bottom right corner.
vi. You'll be prompted to save a text file – save this somewhere you can find later. You'll need to attach this to your email or service desk report.

3. If the game seems stuck on the initial loading bar.

a. Please ensure that you have enough system memory available. If you're close to the minimum (6GB), having other applications open at the same time may bring you below the minimum for the game to launch.
b. Please follow the %appdata% deletion steps at Q2. This will force the client to redownload from Steam, which can fix bad cache/loading screen issues.

II. Q: My game gets stuck on a loading screen and the progress bar isn't moving. What do I do?

A: Let's try wiping the local cache the game creates by following these steps:

1. Open Windows Explorer
2. In the address bar type in %APPDATA%
3. Delete the axisandalliesonline-desktop folder
4. Empty the Recycle Bin if necessary
5. Ensure that no other unneeded applications are running, specifically any web browsers
6. Reopen the game and try again.

MAC: ~/Library/Application Support/axisandalliesonline-desktop/

WINDOWS: %APPDATA%/axisandalliesonline-desktop/

LINUX: ~/.config/axisandalliesonline-desktop/

If you go into your local-games folder, look for any games with a size of 0 KB. Deleting these then relaunching may resolve this issue. If that doesn't work, try deleting the entire axisandalliesonline-desktop folder.

III. Q: The game is slow to respond to clicks, such as moving units, or it takes multiple times for a click to register. What gives?

A: This is an issue with latency / our servers.

IV. Q: I'm seeing lots of empty games created when I create a new online game. How do I delete these?

A: This is an issue with latency. If the game creator joins the game, then leaves the last slot they're a part of, the game should be deleted. We are also monitoring and trying to delete empty games periodically to keep the list clean.

V. Q: Why is the Computer not joining my online multiplayer game?

A: In order to facilitate the asynchronous play style of the game, when players play with or against the Computer online, the Computer player(s) are run on our servers. This allows the Computer to take its turn if the Game Host isn't present, which allows the asynchronous play to continue to the next human player.

VI. Q: I'm seeing slowness in map panning, intro/outro videos on the combat board, and stuttering on the UI. What gives?

A: These are front-end issues, possibly related to your machine's specs. You can try lowing graphics settings to improve performance.

VII. Q: What are the controls for the game? Are there shortcuts to help if I'm on a touchpad?

A: All keyboard controls can be found in the settings menu on the Input tab. WASD and arrow keys are the default controls for map movement, and + and - are the default mapping for changing the zoom level. You can customize almost all inputs.

VIII. Q: Combat is very slow. Is there a way I can speed it up?

A: If you access the settings, then go to the Graphics tab, you can turn off combat animations (this will notably turn off dice roll animations) and the combat introduction sequence (which will get rid of the intro video showing the type of combat).

IX. Q: The combat went too fast to see. Where can I find out what happened?

A: After a phase has been committed, the events are recorded in the war diary. You can access this by selecting the second tab from the left at the top-right of the screen.

X. Q: How do I change my defense profile?

A: If you access Settings, then go to the Account tab, you can create and edit new defense profiles and set a default for your account (this will automatically apply to newly created games of all types). To change the defense profile in a game, access the game settings (either from the in-game menu or by clicking the gear icon on the game card) and go to the Defense Profile tab. Changing this will affect the next combat.

XI. Q: How do I click and drag?

A: This is tied to the middle mouse button. Click in the mouse wheel and drag the map.

XII. Q: How are dice rolls determined? This doesn't feel random.

A: Check out our Development Letter from September, 24, 2020.
https://steamcommunity.com/games/898920/announcements/detail/2798381623619272595

XIII. Q: How can I tell what units are already in a territory?

A: If you click on a region (either a sea zone or a territory), the dossier appears at the bottom-left of the screen. If you expand this (click the ^ arrow), you can see all units currently in this region.

XIV. Q: How can I tell what units I've committed to an attack? The arrows are confusing.

A: If you press the "end phase" button, a confirmation screen appears, breaking down what unit types (and how many) are moving into each region. If you aren't happy with the setup, you can make changes and keep tweaking your movements.

XV. Q: How do I start an online game? The lobby is full and nothing is happening.

A: Currently, the game creator needs to confirm they want to start the game with the current setup.

XVI. Q: How do I talk to other people in the game?

A: Presently, our only communication system is our map notes, which can be viewed only by other players on your alliance. You can create a map note by left-clicking on a region and pressing “N”.

[123]

Are you working on developing new renderer so we got 16 times the detail in 16 times the map size?

[Capricious]

communication is key. is there any plan to have an in-game or steam-based message system? or some way that allows players to contact each other? other than knowing someone beforehand, of course...

[Julius Borisov]

There's already such a system - you can leave notes for your allies to read.

[awgwiebe]

Is there a plan to develop other game editions for play? (e.g. A&A 1940 global, A&A D-Day, A&A 1914)

[Julius Borisov]

There're no such plans at this moment (the game has "1942" in its title).

[Blondie]

Is there anywhere to tell you how to play? The tutorial was good but very basic and didn't talk about other elements of the game (I couldn't figure out how to conduct a strategic bombing raid, for example).

[jasonwclark]

Unfortunately the system you mentioned, "leaving notes for your allies to read" isn't what Capricious and others are talking about.

At the competitive level Axis and Allies is generally played 1v1, so a note for a teammate isn't going to do us much good if each team is only one person. What we need is a way to communicate with our opponents.

Don't want to give the wrong impression, of course there are such things as team tournaments, and group games in Axis and Allies. We often refer to them as Multi, 3 man games, 5 man games etc. Those are clearly great if you can make it work, but they are rarer. By far the greatest number of games played will be 1v1 matches, and currently there is no way to talk to the other player in those situations.

[simply4est]

Well whether you're playing 1v1 or a 'multi' game, it can be important to be able to talk to players of both sides.

[Julius Borisov]

If you’d like to submit the suggestion to our development team you can do so here:
https://beamdog.atlassian.net/servicedesk/customer/portal/3

[Julius Borisov]

We have updated the FAQ for your convenience.

[Stonedog]

Originally posted by Julius Borisov:

There's already such a system - you can leave notes for your allies to read.

Julius have you guys considered going the DISCORD SERVER route for a chat system ? You should be able to qualify for a partnership with them and the app of course is then free for the players as always. If nothing else its a good fill in if you have future planes to implement in-game chat , till time/resources are more available for you to do so .

[Nokowi]

Can you add some more information about online play?
--- How often are we expected to take a turn (can we see this before joining a game?)
--- When hosting an online game, there are two options - "you" or "computer". How would I host a game where I want to play allies, and have 1 other player play axis?
--- What happens when I click "join game"? Do I get more options from the available games (what are they?) or do I get thrown into a game.
--- Are games ranked??? (how?)

These are probably obvious after the fact, but I haven't found where these are addressed (FAQ or sticky).

[Lt.NightHawk]

Am I missing something in game or can I not roll against the AI when I am defending a territory?

[Julius Borisov]

Try going into your options and slowing down the AI (Settings -> Gameplay tab). This will allow you to see combat rolls.

[Lt.NightHawk]

Originally posted by Julius Borisov:

Try going into your options and slowing down the AI (Settings -> Gameplay tab). This will allow you to see combat rolls.

Alright thanks. But to be clear, as of now the game is not implemented for me to manually role on defense?