Answer me this, what is YOUR approach to the goals you laid out. How many transports do you have, ICs, and where they are located. My typical approach is IC in FIC and IC in India. I think this is common. My alternative is IC in EI and IC in India. So the diff isnt the 15 ipc for the factory, that is the same, the diff lies in the 16 ipc for trans. The plus is an extra unit. Also 2 trans can become very useful for alot of the goals, if not all of them you listed. So if you want to tell me that you think japan having 6 transports is inefficient in getting troops to where they need to be, i will listen. But your post really contributes nothing. “If you have accomplished everything you want to as Japan, then blow a wad on it”. Useless post.
What I’m going to do on J2 and J3 depends on what the board looks like. I’m not going to say “THIS IS TEH ULTIMATE STRATEGIZ” and forecast a plan two turns ahead, because by the time two more turns come around, the board position is going to change a lot.
How do I know how many transports and ICs I’m going to have and where? It depends on the board position. I’m not trying to be secretive, I’m not trying to be coy; I’m very serious, if you ignore the board position, you’re going to get your ass kicked. I don’t think anyone’s going to dispute that; I don’t think YOU are disputing it.
My previous post explains why I think J2 East Indies IC (or even J3 East Indies IC) doesn’t work. It does not go into details about my precise position, because as I always say, you have to consider the board position when you make your move.
IF Russia didn’t reinforce India on R1, IF Germany took Anglo-Egypt, IF UK didn’t fly its India fighter to join 6 infantry at Burytia after killing the Japanese transport at Kwangtung, IF UK didn’t unify its fleet southwest of Australia - and IF Russia didn’t overextend or get bad dice on R1, and IF so on and so forth (just what does that mean? Wow, see what I mean, isn’t it really weird when someone says “I’m gonna set forth this strategy”, and doesn’t go into specifics about what’s going on? Sounds kind of dumb, doesn’t it, “so on and so forth”, you can just take it for granted that everything’s going hunky-dory, and nothing’s unusual, move along, nothing to see here! But what kind of an explanation of a strategy is that, “and so on and so forth”?! Okay, here’s my strategy; I win. How? Oh, you know, so on and so forth. God, I must be the greatest strategist EVAR. Yeah, I know, :roll:, Bunnies is beating his dead horse again. What can I say. It turns me on. :wink:)
But okay. Let’s say we have “so on and so forth”. R1 didn’t reinforce India, or go anywhere near it, pulled back from Asian coast. G1 took Anglo-Egypt. UK1 scattered the Pacific fleet (which is common THESE days . . . but I digress.) You build 3 transports 1 tank on J1.
J2 what would I do and why?
Well, what’s probably going on? By this point, did you see a US build of 1 carrier 2 transport or 3 transport 3 tank? US moved its West Coast battleship plus transport to Mexico, flew fighters to Eastern Canada? That probably doesn’t mean a damn thing, especially if the US kept its destroyer at Mexico on US1. If the US reverses on US2 (after J2), they can have a FAT Pacific fleet with battleship, transport, destroyer, 3 fighters, 1 bomber, plus 40 IPC of units, and what did US lose by this? Nothing. US aids UK in reclaiming Africa early, UK/US fleet switches to offloading from London to Europe using US units as naval fodder / a little bleed from E. US build. The Allies don’t worry about Africa - if Germany presses hard into Africa early, Germany CANNOT press hard on Russia at the same time (gives Allies time), Japan can’t press on Africa early, and of course with Allies pressing on Japan, Japan won’t go for Africa late anyways.
So US STILL isn’t really committed. So Japan needs to do another general-purpose build that can be used to either press on Asia or later on defend. What happens if Japan builds an IC? It’s another point to defend. How about if Japan builds two more transports for six plus ground units on J2?
If the Allies continue KGF on US2, then Japan builds an IC J3-5 on the mainland, and can now use four transports to empty Japan while using two transports to empty the islands (with turbo empty Pacific, this plays out a bit differently, but I digress); Japan will now have 11 unit production capacity, and later on can use those two extra transports to grab various Pacific territories plus French Madagascar, and can later on dump four units from India to any of a great number of African territories. (You produce eight at Japan, of which four go to French Indochina and four to Burytia or Manchuria depending on whether you’re pressing China or Yakut at the time, plus three more probably at French Indochina, leaving you with seven units to push through the southern route - it isn’t enough early, but around J6-7 (depending on board situation) you can bleed out four of those seven units to hit any number of territories in Africa; if the Allies control Africa, they can’t really trade Africa well - Japan should have air in the India/Africa region making trades easy, plus have the flexibility of offloading to five Africa/Middle East territories, which makes Allied holding on Africa d*** near impossible.
If the Allies switch to KJF on US2, then Japan switches production to infantry and naval/air.
So what happens if Allies KGF and Japan crosses 33 IPC and starts being able to produce more than 11 units a turn? Depends on the board situation. If you built an industrial complex early so you wouldn’t strain your transport infrastructure, you probably didn’t do it at India (if it’s that early, you can’t be sure of securing India). So either save for an industrial complex at India (14 unit capacity eating minimum 42 IPC a turn for pure infantry, requiring a strong air force and/or extant tank and/or artillery so you have some attack power), start pumping out tanks at Japan and your second IC for the big Moscow push (4 infantry 7 tanks eats 47 IPC a turn, this is if it looks like Russia can successfully be pressed down), or try to grab Caucasus for 15 units per turn production, so Japan can press from south and east while Germany cuts Allied reinforcements from the north (while contesting Africa, if the game looks like a long one) - all this is dependent on board position of course. The game develops over time, and Japan has to adapt properly.
An IC in E Indies puts you in the same boat as USA.
Your IC is safe so you have to export the war.
LT
I like the idea of the EI IC in theory but in reality as the others have pointed out it just doesn’t seem worth it. I’ve thought about it a lot and it always comes down to the fact that I can’t justify putting an IC that far away from Russia.
My view on IC’s is their #1 goal should be to shorten supply lines and second would be number of units placed. I’d much rather have an IC on Sin or Novo then I would on EI. I may place two less units but by the time you get the 4 EI units to Sin I’ve placed 4 so it is even.
I even tend to view a J Sin IC over a J Ind IC. I get one less unit, but from Sin I can threaten Mos and Cauc and reinforce Kaz or Novo.
:-o
I always pave the roads between the Japan sea and Russia with I.C.s!
Infantry Carcuses, that is :-D.
Really though, FIC, India, and Manchuria are your best bets, and I usually get them all built before I lose the game. Or sometimes win. :roll:
I like to get the best bang for my buck, so I will eventually be cranking out nothing but tanks, and 9 tanks a turn, within 2 moves to Moscow is the kind of pressure I prefer to put on old Stalin. :wink:
Well …. alright bunny. I guess I got what I asked for. Yes, your second post was a novel, and although alot of it said “it depends on what allies do”, and some of it ignored points I made in previous posts, it was much more useful than your first post. You have obviously had much more time to analyse and weigh different approaches to this game than I have, as I first discovered the revised verion in dec of last year, and only recently began to read forums on strategy.
Im sure others have thought through the entire gambit of an EI IC. This is why i posed the idea to the forum for discussion, as I AM EVALUATING the merit of it. So detailed reasons are very helpful to me, instead of “your idea stinks!!”. First off, Any AandA strat considered always “depends” on what the allies do. That is a given. Id say an US :“KJF” strat is certianly not a time to build an island IC that needs naval support. agreed. UK making a stand in India is not necessarily a deal breaker though. Ur japanese fleet should be in the Indian ocean in this case anyhow, so providing cover is natural. As far as bypassing other island targets, i never stated that this was necessary, in fact i stated i usually hit at least Australia, “dependant on allied position” OF COURSE!
And once again you compared the EI IC to two mainland IC. When I specifically stated i planned on 1 mainland IC and 1 EI IC. So as far as builds, yes, you are constrained to building at least 2 inf. But a build of 2 inf and 5 tanks doesnt seem too bad. What is funny is at the very same time you chastise me about making asumptions, you make asumptions about what i “always” do. Any Japan strat is dependent on allied position. this I consider a given.
So reasons why I gave thought to the EI IC was brought up by another poster. I want to contend early and often in africa. So given that assumption, that the allied positon makes it possible for Japan to contend in Africa, is the setup of 1 IC in FIC and 1 IC in india, better than 1 IC EI and 1 IC India? That is what I am evaulating. with the EI IC, in 1 turn i get inf to egypt which can be followed up by tanks from india. But I understand that a dedicated US will out muscle me unless i divert many troops from russia.
This begs to question, what does an axis player do about the africa problem?
Lets be careful about yelling at me for what I always do, as I attempted this idea twice in a “game”. :)
So as far as builds, yes, you are constrained to building at least 2 inf. But a build of 2 inf and 5 tanks doesnt seem too bad.
2 inf, 5 arm is a nice build from the IC’s but in order to build that and still fill 4 TP out of Japan with minimum 8 inf, Japan needs to be earning 55 IPC’s. In my opinion, many people make this very mistake, when they are calculating Japanese builds, as well as another mistake I’ll detail later.
55 IPC’s is hard to come by for Japan. Short of owning Caucasus, it pretty much means that Japan owns all the Pacific IPC’s, Madagascar as well as some other African IPC’s, and either owns or is regularly trading Novosibirsk and Kazakh. That’s endgame kind of money so I never count on it it when I do my build predictions for the majority of Japan’s turns. You could say that you won’t be building 8 units out of Japan to make that 2 inf, 5 arm build happen but, again, that only happens in the endgame when you’re making that final push for Caucasus or Russia. If you aren’t building to max out Japan’s production(in your case 15 units) with infantry first, and then upgrading inf to art or arm second, income permitting, then you are probably doing something wrong.
The second mistake I mentioned doesn’t have anything specific to do with the E Indies IC in particular but it does factor into all of Japan’s IC’s. I kind of cringe when I see people build their Japanese armor in their forward IC’s and infantry in Japan. Armor will easily catch up to infantry but not the other way around. So if you’re building 2 inf, 5 armor out of the E Indies and FIC IC’s, you’re usually hamstringing yourself. Not always, but usually.
This begs to question, what does an axis player do about the africa problem?
Well, you already detailed the biggest obstacle for the Axis in Africa. Generally, the US will muscle you out of Africa. There are things Japan can do to make it costly for the US, but don’t ever count on owning more than a few IPC’s once the US gets rolling. Personally, I like to use the 2 BB’s to bleed them with a landing of 1 inf, and use my other TP’s to either land in IEA, Kenya, or SAF to force them to divert units away from the push toward Caucasus.
And that is another drawback with the East Indies IC. You can’t do the 1 inf backed up with 2 BB’s landing because it would mean not landing a full TP out of E Indies. You also can’t land in SAF or Kenya because it’s out of range of the TP shuffle. In both of those cases it would require yet another TP to implement. With the East Indies IC, you’re committed to landing 4 units every turn whether you want to or not. If all you want to do is move 1 unit somewhere, you’re SOL unless you spring for another TP for that flexibility.
Well …. alright bunny. I guess I got what I asked for. Yes, your second post was a novel, and although alot of it said “it depends on what allies do”, and some of it ignored points I made in previous posts, it was much more useful than your first post. You have obviously had much more time to analyse and weigh different approaches to this game than I have, as I first discovered the revised verion in dec of last year, and only recently began to read forums on strategy.
Im sure others have thought through the entire gambit of an EI IC. This is why i posed the idea to the forum for discussion, as I AM EVALUATING the merit of it. So detailed reasons are very helpful to me, instead of “your idea stinks!!”. First off, Any AandA strat considered always “depends” on what the allies do. That is a given. Id say an US :“KJF” strat is certianly not a time to build an island IC that needs naval support. agreed. UK making a stand in India is not necessarily a deal breaker though. Ur japanese fleet should be in the Indian ocean in this case anyhow, so providing cover is natural. As far as bypassing other island targets, i never stated that this was necessary, in fact i stated i usually hit at least Australia, “dependant on allied position” OF COURSE!
And once again you compared the EI IC to two mainland IC. When I specifically stated i planned on 1 mainland IC and 1 EI IC. So as far as builds, yes, you are constrained to building at least 2 inf. But a build of 2 inf and 5 tanks doesnt seem too bad. What is funny is at the very same time you chastise me about making asumptions, you make asumptions about what i “always” do. Any Japan strat is dependent on allied position. this I consider a given.
So reasons why I gave thought to the EI IC was brought up by another poster. I want to contend early and often in africa. So given that assumption, that the allied positon makes it possible for Japan to contend in Africa, is the setup of 1 IC in FIC and 1 IC in india, better than 1 IC EI and 1 IC India? That is what I am evaulating. with the EI IC, in 1 turn i get inf to egypt which can be followed up by tanks from india. But I understand that a dedicated US will out muscle me unless i divert many troops from russia.
This begs to question, what does an axis player do about the africa problem?
Lets be careful about yelling at me for what I always do, as I attempted this idea twice in a “game”. :)
You didn’t read a thing I wrote. :roll:
What a waste of time!
See, you go and ask for an in-detail explanation. I give it to you. Then you totally ignore what the h*** I wrote and say I wrote a lot of stuff I didn’t, and say I didn’t write a lot of stuff I did.
I don’t blame you though. I know you’re blonde.
2 inf, 5 arm is a nice build from the IC’s but in order to build that and still fill 4 TP out of Japan with minimum 8 inf, Japan needs to be earning 55 IPC’s. In my opinion, many people make this very mistake, when they are calculating Japanese builds, as well as another mistake I’ll detail later.
Thanks U 505. Good points. i agree with all. I am also a big believing in inf first, followed by tanks. My reference to the 2inf 5arm build was in response to the argument that the EI IC didnt allow the felxibilty of an all tanks build.
Yeah. I am certainly on the side of not supporting an EI IC at this point. I first explored it in order to have a stronger presence in the indian ocean, and contend for africa. Africa is a money pit against a good allied opponent, better to do as you said and just annoy the USA in africa.
@Bunnies:
You didn’t read a thing I wrote. :roll:
Yeah sorry Bunny. I ran out of energy, (and time at work), to read the second post. I just read now. Good info, thank you. That sonds like the ideal Japan strat. I see too many player buyinf too many IC too fast. Thanks.
Yeah sorry Bunny. I ran out of energy, (and time at work), to read the second post.
My text wall gom jabbar claims another victim! :lol:
@Bunnies:
Yeah sorry Bunny. I ran out of energy, (and time at work), to read the second post.
My text wall gom jabbar claims another victim! :lol:
Is this similiar to Mr. T’s Jibber Jabbering?
@Bunnies:
Yeah sorry Bunny. I ran out of energy, (and time at work), to read the second post.
My text wall gom jabbar claims another victim! :lol:
Is this similiar to Mr. T’s Jibber Jabbering?
Tanks are STRONG!!!
(and you can only get two of them from EI to asia each turn!)
Tanks are STRONG!!!
(and you can only get two of them from EI to asia each turn!)
C-SUB representing! In da house!
