Totally agree. Fast movers are especially important in the south because they’re expected to proceed into the Middle East as the Allies can usually hold the Italians off in the Mediterranean. Cairo is as many turns away from Berlin for mechanized infantry as Moscow is for regular infanty.
@Myygames said in Units, Mechanics, etc.:
Check out these strategy articles:
Probably worth mentioning at this point, that I did do a quick skim of the first few introductory posts in this thread.
It’s a lot easier to do in East & West, but what that game taught me is to never endanger any offensive units. For example, you should only really leave tanks on the front line if they add enough defense that whatever attack your opponent could put together won’t be enough to kill them. (Artillery I feel are kind of borderline-expendable; they cost the same as mechs and they don’t pack nearly the same punch as tanks, despite being just as vulnerable. I don’t go out of my way to waste them, but I am more likely to gamble with them.)
With a combination of units and can-opening tactics and such within USSR territories, you can do moves where you hit the back-line with mechs and aircraft and let the infantry and tanks hit the front line – because the first attack insulates them from being hit back. I think the ability to pair tactical bombers with fighters or tanks potentially gives the Germans some interesting options; in my 2nd game I shipped a tank up to Finland, which is a theatre I feel you’ll end up doing strafe attacks a lot. Sending a tac up there to assist seemed to give me a lot of flexibility.
I can definitely see the necessity of “fast-movers” for Germany – and if they had income numbers comparable to the US, it’d easily be tanks instead of mechs the majority of the time. I think the necessity of sea movement and transport capabilities means that the US is always going to cap out at 50% tanks; not to say that Germany doesn’t need a ton of infantry, but I could definitely see them going higher than that 50% threshold w/r/t fighting the USSR (if they had the income for it).
The problem I’ve run into in my 2 Germany games so far is that by about round 10, the Germans have nowhere near enough production/output to deal with a war on two fronts. I think Italy was reasonably well-played by my Ai sidekick in the 2nd game, but I still ended up with just a massive wave of US units on the western front, and not enough units to stop them – particularly because my offense was still almost entirely tied up in the east.
About the game attached:
I think you did a really great opener and your moves into the Soviet Union were probably what I would’ve done as well. Breaking out from Eastern Poland is what Cow’s G1 opener implies.
Anyhow, the AI basically handed you the game when they attacked the strict neutral.
Yeah, the tactical bomber-tank combo disproportionately benefits Germany.
I agree that it’s near-impossible for Germany to fight a war on 2 fronts once the US really gets into the war. In my view in your game you may have invaded the USSR too late (not sure whether that was your fault though, I didn’t look at the strength of the opposing sides, but from my experience Germany should be able to enter Soviet territory earlier than that). In Global at least most players plan for a Moscow capture of G7 or G8 I believe. Not sure whether that’s completely applicable to Europe, but that could be an explanation. I hope smarter players will respond to this question (I’m still looking for a more solid answer myself).
@AndrewAAGamer I know Europe 1940’s not your wheelhouse, but what advice do you have for Germany to capture Moscow by G7 or G8? Thank you!
@SuperbattleshipYamato said in Units, Mechanics, etc.:
@AndrewAAGamer I know Europe 1940’s not your wheelhouse, but what advice do you have for Germany to capture Moscow by G7 or G8? Thank you!
No idea. Due to time constraints I played one face to face game of Europe 1940 about 8 years ago and it turned out we used the wrong National Objectives.
My experience lies with Global 1940.
@SuperbattleshipYamato said in Units, Mechanics, etc.:
About the game attached:
I think you did a really great opener and your moves into the Soviet Union were probably what I would’ve done as well. Breaking out from Eastern Poland is what Cow’s G1 opener implies.
Anyhow, the AI basically handed you the game when they attacked the strict neutral.
I’m kind of stumped as to how badly the battles in France went. That genuinely seems to have taken way too long to mop up, and slowed everything else down.
My sense from the community was that France on the continent (and not just their capitol) could/should be mopped up on G1, every game, and if it takes longer than the first round, the Axis are basically cooked – but then in playing the German setup myself, I’m genuinely curious how anyone manages to put in enough force to accomplish that.
@The-Janus
I rarely if ever see a G1 that attacks all three French territories. Usually Southern France is left for Italy or G2.
And in many high-level OOB games on the League, the Axis player leaves Normandy French un-captured to deny the US the factory later. Kill any remaining French units with only air on G2.
Especially in League games where the bid is often in the 45-52 range, Germany needs to be judicious with their units. Risking a lot of counterfire in long battles with minimum of attacking units to capture S France or N-B is going to cost more than the 3-5 IPCs you gain (S. France the average convoy roll is -2)
With the Med usually being dominated by the Allies due to the bid largely going to UK fleet units in the Atlantic and Med, I am somewhat partial to another strategy which is to give everything that is not France to Italy and have them focus on garrisoning the wall.
@Stucifer said in Units, Mechanics, etc.:
I am somewhat partial to another strategy which is to give everything that is not France to Italy and have them focus on garrisoning the wall.
Is this saying to give Germany all of France and let Italy take everything in the Balkans?
@The-Janus I actually meant the territory labeled France, so Normandy and Southern France both go to Italy. Plus Yugo & Greece. Bulgaria goes to Germany for the extra infantry to use in Russia.
Buy a mech rounds 1&2 with Italy so you have some fodder for your starting tanks once you need them to can-open in the USSR.
I’m basing the strategy more on Global play, but still holds true for Europe map on its own. However a fair bid for Europe may be significantly different, so the Axis may have more viable options for flexing some naval strategy 🤔
@Stucifer said in Units, Mechanics, etc.:
@The-Janus I actually meant the territory labeled France, so Normandy and Southern France both go to Italy. Plus Yugo & Greece. Bulgaria goes to Germany for the extra infantry to use in Russia.
Here’s my latest attempt: 2025-2-11-World-War-II-Europe-1940-2nd-Edition – Germany all artillery.tsvg
The gimmick this time is basically that I went all artillery with Germany for 3 turns, then split inf and mech the rest of the way; on rd8 Germany took Moscow, but US took Rome.
My rationale for this is kinda wild/stupid, but basically I wanted to test whether artillery had any real value; they move like infantry, cost the same as mechs, but attack better than either, and buff both. It seemed to work out OK…?
Getting the bombers to the front line ASAP so that they could be bombing Moscow seemed to help out a lot.
Germany I feel just generally needs a lot of land units in order to cover the ground they’re taking and absorb losses; artillery seems suitable for this, with the added perk of a little bit of extra offense. But once your front-line moves far enough, their speed becomes a real weakness, and you need those “fast-movers” (generally mechs, just due to budget restraints.)
I could probably continue with this game, by sweeping down into the middle east, but man… it always seems like around the time I’m in position to take Moscow, the allies just show up all over western Europe. I’m not sure how I could get Germany to finish the job any sooner than I have been (round 8, in this case.)
P.S. I think with a map looking like this, the allies should just go in on the neutrals; UK is well-positioned to take out Turkey (if they wanted) and then continue on through the Balkans, and the Americans (as always) can easily stomp down Spain. Even the remaining USSR forces are insulating Sweden from being used by the Germans.
@The-Janus I’ll take a look at the game soon, I will say that all artillery isn’t ideal either. I don’t know if there’s a consensus, I’ve heard 1:4 and 1:5 artillery:infantry build ratio.
Making notes here:
Round 2 - moved 7 units into Holland belgium to retake it from 1 artillery. Should have been 1 inf, 1 artillery, if you want more % use a mech that can move fast afterwards. Should buy a destroyer for the sub in the baltic/norway to cover your transport. USSR should be convoying you in 125 if you don’t have a DD. Attack on Karelia isn’t worth it, with a big stack in Novgorod you need to protect Norway and Finland. Everything should stack in Finland. Don’t worry about the 1 IPC. Rest of the battles look good. A human player typically wouldn’t gift you the UK fleet like that in 111, but I see a lot of Italy mistakes by the AI so maybe it balances out. The 3 infantry in W Germany should have moved to Germany. on NCM. Shouldn’t have built in France, it’s another turn away from the front. Certainly not artillery with no Allied transports around. I changed your buy from 16 artilleries to 3 mechs, 6 infantry, 4 artilleries, a destroyer, and a fighter.
That's 'cause a droid don't pull people's arms out of their sockets when they lose.
I used the “save game at this point (beta)” feature to save the game at the start of round 3 and will play out round 3 and post it.
That's 'cause a droid don't pull people's arms out of their sockets when they lose.
It’s not perfect, and I have no idea what the US AI is doing, but this is through round 5
Round 6
janus test europe g6.tsvg
Round 8
janus test europe g8.tsvg
USA certainly should have been more of a threat, but I played this pretty quickly and so was buying on autopilot and not looking at USA’s turns
@Stucifer said in Units, Mechanics, etc.:
Round 2 - moved 7 units into Holland belgium to retake it from 1 artillery. Should have been 1 inf, 1 artillery, if you want more % use a mech that can move fast afterwards.
[…]
The 3 infantry in W Germany should have moved to Germany. on NCM. Shouldn’t have built in France, it’s another turn away from the front.
What you’re saying all makes sense in the context of the pieces actually in play; I guess I would say that I did these sorts of moves under the assumption that I would have to leave more units in these areas for defense, if I was playing against a tougher opponent/I’m also working from the assumption that Ai Italy won’t have my back at all, and therefore I basically always need to be producing a few units in France, so that I can react to landings in the area.
Part of the reasoning is that in previous games, I’ve had West Germany’s industry get bombed into smithereens for the entire game, and I never felt like I should bother spending the money to repair it; I just assumed from that experience that I’d need to be building in France and “convoying” defensive units out to West Germany for the entire game.
…
I agree that I definitely didn’t need to build all artillery on rd2, but I had already decided to “commit to the bit” for the sake of seeing the experiment through. I stuck with it until the US entered the war, because by then it was already obvious that I needed to switch it up.
About Paris:
The French overshot by almost 2 hits in the first round of combat in your second game. Even so, however, you were still on track to have nearly a 100% chance to conquer the territory and make an IPC profit:
Wait, how’d you do that? Can you please teach me? Thank you!
@SuperbattleshipYamato open up the game history and right click on any line
Should bring up the menu
I recommend only using it at the start of a round or the end of a turn. End of a turn usually duplicates the income command so you’ll have to edit
