How useful are cruisers??

I don 't think I am at all missing the numbers, numbers is one thing I am very good at.  If you drop 4 units off with 4 cruiser shots you are merely scaling up the same ratio.  2 INF + 2 ART + 4 CC shots =  a power punch of 20 inflicting on average 20/6=3 1/3 units of damage for the cost of 4 of your units.  Unless you are taking out tanks or airforce you are killing about 10 IPC on average for the cost of 14 IPC of units.  Therefore you lose the war of attrition.

Now, for the bombers, lets talk averages.  You build 1 bomber per turn and own 6 bombers.  You fly out 6 bombers, 6 AA shots on average downs 1 bomber per turn.  The average damage a bomber does is (1+2+3+4+5+6)/6=3.5 damage per bomber.  (3.5 ave damage) x (5 remaining bombers) = 17.5.  So yes indeed, on average you can say that 12 IPC of bomber investment yields 17.5 IPC of strategic bombing damage and scale it any way you want.  Yes, some turns you might lose more than 1 bomber, and some turns you won’t lose any.  Never bet against averages when there are many trials of many units.  Yes, 1 destroyer might take out a 1 battleship, but never count on it.  And NEVER EVER count on a 5 destroyer fleet taking out a 5 battleship fleet.

Now, those 6 bombers might inflict more than 17.5 IPC of damage if used in land combat as they might get to fire several times each in a long battle.

make cruisers 10, and i’d buy them
else: fighters, destroyers and AC’s

At 10 they would be too powerful. As much, 11. Or give them a aagun shot

Interesting thread so far…

I’ve always seen cruisers as a ‘win more’ unit. In other words, they’re only good to purchase if you’re already on the offensive. Why?

Mathematically, cruisers are only better than destroyers if you get to use their shore bombardment ability. Successfully. Twice.

This means that in order to make a cruiser purchase a rational one, the enemy’s navy must have already been neutralized, meaning you’ll get your free bombard shot every turn for the four turns it’ll take to get it to pay off (at a 50% hit rate).

However, as has been pointed out already, if the enemy’s navy has already been neutralized, you no longer need ships to thicken up your navy’s defence (unless they have a large air force lying in wait), and so fighters and bombers will always be the better economical and tactically flexible units to purchase.

So, only under conditions wherein the enemy’s navy is dead but her air force isn’t, are cruisers a good buy. And even then, if you’ve got the money to fork out for an aircraft carrier and fighters, a good argument could be made for that purchase instead.

In short, cruisers are a luxury item; your purchase of them should signal to the enemy that the game has already been decided in your favor (or your miscalculation to that effect).

@MrMalachiCrunch:

Dylan, exactly how many times have you actually played AA?  The UK really doesn’t need a navy?  Really, exactly how do they get units into battle then?

The utility of straffing with offshore bombardment and landing units really does not seem to be of economic nor strategic benefit, if it were a good idea, then BBs over CCs should be the choice with a 33% better chance of inflicting a hit.  I just don’t see how even a battleship shot and infantry is a smart attack against a stack to ‘just weaken it a bit’ never mind a cruiser shot.  With a total offense of ‘5’ you should do 5/6th of a hit and therefore 5/6th of a 3 IPC unit.  Spending 3 IPC to inflict 2.5 IPC of damage just doesn’t win it in my books.  Better off to buy bombers and strategicly bomb there you spend 15 (or 12 in later games) IPC to do 17.5 IPC.  Moreover, you should drop 2 units rather than 1 to fully utilize the transport.  The best ratio would be 1 INF + 1 ART for land units using the math every 1 point of offense does .5IPC of damage against a stack of infantry.  Couple it with 2 CC you get 10 offense inflicting on average 5 IPC of damage for the cost of 7 IPC in units, you lose the war of attrition.  Moreover, those 2 units landed in a shuck operation in time coupled with air assests might take out 2-3 units in a territory being traded back and forth and thus actually earn income and change the tactical situation on the board.

Well even if they do they need cheeper units can’t spent too much towards a navy.

@MrMalachiCrunch:

The average damage a bomber does is (1+2+3+4+5+6)/6=3.5 damage per bomber.  (3.5 ave damage) x (5 remaining bombers) = 17.5.  So yes indeed, on average you can say that 12 IPC of bomber investment yields 17.5 IPC of strategic bombing damage and scale it any way you want.

Hang on a second.  I know this (bombers) isn’t cruisers … but I’m confused at your math here.

Each bomber does an average of 3.5 ipc’s of damage.  So 3.5 ipc’s x 5 remaining bombers = 17.5 ipcs (like you said).  However, that’s an investment of 60 Ipc’s, not 12 (5 bombers x 12 = 60 … 72 if you include the assumed 1 bomber hit by AA)

Ahh someone from the accounting school of Axis and Allies

Axis & Allies is not an accounting game.

Let that sink in a moment.

It does not always necessarily matter that a unit take out its IPC value to be of worth. Especially if you can replace the losses easier than your opponent.

With whittling away at Axis stacks in France or especially Germany those loses MUST be replaced to stave off invasions. Under the damage rules of Anniversary unlike in earlier editions damage can be ignored. If Germany has enough units to deter allied invasions, and maintain against Russia while Japan takes out Moscow it can sit there with 20 damage if it so pleases. Also with the UK’s limited funds if she has been buying a bomber every round there is not going to be much left over for invasions or a fleet to even carry out such.

MY point is that CAs are not a bad investment for England. They will need something to flesh out their fleet, and as Darth and some others have pointed out, CAs can be used to bombard with while DDs are just going to sit there as potential fodder against an air attack.

@Rorschach:

@MrMalachiCrunch:

The average damage a bomber does is (1+2+3+4+5+6)/6=3.5 damage per bomber.  (3.5 ave damage) x (5 remaining bombers) = 17.5.  So yes indeed, on average you can say that 12 IPC of bomber investment yields 17.5 IPC of strategic bombing damage and scale it any way you want.

Hang on a second.  I know this (bombers) isn’t cruisers … but I’m confused at your math here.

Each bomber does an average of 3.5 ipc’s of damage.  So 3.5 ipc’s x 5 remaining bombers = 17.5 ipcs (like you said).  However, that’s an investment of 60 Ipc’s, not 12 (5 bombers x 12 = 60 … 72 if you include the assumed 1 bomber hit by AA)

I think by “investment” he meant loss

Calvin is indeed correct.  My point with the bombers was simply to illustrate the math using less fractions.  Choosing 6 bombers makes it easy to note you have ‘on average’ a 1 in 6 chance of losing a bomber, so if you have 6 you can count on ‘on average’ losing 1.  It’s much harder to use an example with 1 bomber where you lose 1/6th of it to an aa shot.

One neat thing about being a software engineer is that I can easily write a program to simulate anything I want, and I have with the bomber example above.  With the simulation, 1 bomber per turn was purchased, all surving bombers faced AA shots then did a bombing raid.  As one would expect the bomber fleet slowly increased until it reached a steady state of about 6 bombers losing on average 1 per turn and buying 1 per turn, thus investment of the cost of a bomber 12 or 15 depending.  The average damaged inflicted was about 17.5 IPC

I am not advocating SBR as a strategy, but if you think dropping infantry with cruiser shots against a huge stack is the way to slowly attrit the enemy I would strongly disagree.  Sure, if you ALREADY own a cruiser and its NOT being used then maybe…maybe, but you are still trading 7 of your (IPC or units) for 5 of the enemy.  However, that X units infantry landed into russia releaves the russians of X units of their own to counter defensively a german stack, which allows those units to press perhaps the Japs.  Or it allows England to clear a russian territory of a few germans/japs using just a few infantry and massed airforce.  Nothing better than to hit a stack of 4 enemy units say 3 infantry and a tank which just took a satelite russian territory with 3 Brit infantry, 2 bombers and 4 fighters.  Battle simulator says you win 99.7% of the time and ‘on average’ you inflict 14 IPC (14 as its only 99.7% certain you will win!) at the cost of 8 IPC.  Moreover, you change the strategic situation on the ground AND russia will get the income from that territory next turn without having to fight for it, thus allowing it to retake a different territory.  So, rather than trading 7 for 5 you are trading 8 for 14.

Now as for this game not being an accounting game, I could not disagree more.  Its all about accounting.  Accounting for what can hit you so you have just enough to defend against an attack, having too much on defense implies you might not be using those ‘surplus to need’ forces somewhere else.  Purchasing capital ships for fleet defense when it is not required implies you have less land force to better your position.  Not accounting for the fact your enemy has tied you with income and you are trading 7 IPC for 5 of his over a long period of time will win you few wars.  Obviously, sometimes you have to lose the IPC battle to gain strategic advantage, sacrafice the queenfor a biship is obviously a bad IPC choice unless it gets you checkmate in 2.

@calvinhobbesliker:

@Rorschach:

@MrMalachiCrunch:

The average damage a bomber does is (1+2+3+4+5+6)/6=3.5 damage per bomber.  (3.5 ave damage) x (5 remaining bombers) = 17.5.  So yes indeed, on average you can say that 12 IPC of bomber investment yields 17.5 IPC of strategic bombing damage and scale it any way you want.

Hang on a second.  I know this (bombers) isn’t cruisers … but I’m confused at your math here.

Each bomber does an average of 3.5 ipc’s of damage.  So 3.5 ipc’s x 5 remaining bombers = 17.5 ipcs (like you said).  However, that’s an investment of 60 Ipc’s, not 12 (5 bombers x 12 = 60 … 72 if you include the assumed 1 bomber hit by AA)

I think by “investment” he meant loss

Ok, thank you for the clarification.  That makes sense.  Just a terminology issue then.

I wrote the software utility years ago.  It’s really not that much code, hardly something worthwhile to put up as a download.

It’s too nice a day to write code now, maybe tonight I’ll fire up visual studio and whip together a re-creation of that little app tonight, or maybe I’ll got hit the bar, its ladies night at the Olympia!  Put on your thickest pair of beer goggles and geterdone!

@a44bigdog:

Ahh someone from the accounting school of Axis and Allies

Axis & Allies is not an accounting game.

It does not always necessarily matter that a unit take out its IPC value to be of worth. Especially if you can replace the losses easier than your opponent.

True that!

If someone defeats you AND they purchased cruisers, do NOT cry that there is something wrong with the rules!

Just realize that you were outplayed and that the winner understood that each unit has its place and purpose.

In a game, every unit may or may not be purchased or used, but it is there if needed.

@a44bigdog:

Ahh someone from the accounting school of Axis and Allies

Axis & Allies is not an accounting game.

Let that sink in a moment.

What a great point, bigdog.
I’ve been a professional accountant my entire adult life, and I echo this sentiment.
Axis & Allies is NOT an accounting game.
Sure, math and averages and stat analysis are useful in helping you play smart, and ignorance of these things will hurt your game a lot.  But by the same token, Axis and Allies cannot be reduced purely to formulas.  One of the great appeals of the game is that decisions every turn are so situational.  I don’t want to play a game where the optimal strategy is always “buy max bombers per turn with the USA and strat bomb Europe every single turn”, for example.  Or “never ever buy cruisers because they are a sub-optimal unit”.

I guess it means what you mean by accounting.  If you compare your income to that of your enemy, is that not ‘accouting’ for differences.  If you don’t know if you are outearning your enemy and you don’t know if you are winning the battle of attrition then I want to play you next!

I ‘account’ for every move, what can hit me, what can I hit.  Am I safe here, can I force the enemy to retreat because he ‘accounts’ for the fact he is going to lose a battle.  If you put out some ‘bait’ you account for the fact you might lose more in that battle but the strategic position is improved to a greater extent.

The argument was cruisers are awesome cause they can do shore bombardment.  My premise was that the utility in that action is not so good so is it that great a benefit to sway you to have 2 CC over 3 DD?

Gamerman gets it.

So many times I hear people stating that X unit that cost Y IPCs will never do Y damage to the enemy therefore it is useless, btw the bombers for SBRs that you were posting about generally fall in this category. My point is that this is not a ledger sheet. I don’t care if a unit does it’s value in IPC damage as long as it achieves the strategic purpose that I purchased it for.

As far as your question about 2 CAs vs 3 DDs that depends on the situation. If I need pure fodder the DDs are the obvious choice. If I need either shore bombardment or some more offense with a fleet then the 2 CAs are the better choice. As Gamerman said, it is all situational.

And if you ever want to play me start playing in the League as that is where I play. I may not be the best player on this site but I have no problems putting my money where my mouth is so to speak. I deal with Axis and Allies from the viewpoint of years of gaming experience, not from the theoretical viewpoint.

Well, I never once said a cruiser or any other piece was useless first of all, so let’s be crystal clear on that.  All pieces have utility, some a bit more than others.  I also stated earlier that a mix of pieces is ideal.

For fleet offense, 3 DDs beats 2 CCs

For fleet defense, 3 DDs beats 2 CCs

Using as a blocker piece saves you 4 IPC versus using a cruiser and can’t be sub shot killed like a cruiser, nice when using as a blocker because you always have a 1/3 chance of killing something (other than a BB).  I will acount for the fact 1/3 of an enemy sub equals 2 IPC when my destroyer kills 1/3 of it….on average or better if I take out an air unit.  On the other hand if a sub is not used to kill the blocking CC then yeah, you have a 1/6 greater chance of hitting back.  If you think my accounting is wearing you down, wait until Japan turn 15… then the averages start to work out in the long run.

A destroyer obviously has the advantage of sub warfare over a cruiser, so the ONLY thing a CC has going for it over a DD was the shore bombment.

That utility was the crux if my thinking.  IF you are buying CCs over DDs because you have lots and lots of opportunity to use shore bombardment against targets with AA guns (else a plane is way way better than a cruiser shot) and large stacks of pieces ‘just to whittle them down’ then maybe a cruiser.  Honestly, you dropping off lots of pieces in futile battles turn after turn to ‘wittle them down’ then you play a different game then me.

As for my thinking being all theory…  :-)  Ever read the Art of War by Sun Tze or something like that spelling.  Great book.

@MrMalachiCrunch:

Well, I never once said a cruiser or any other piece was useless first of all, so let’s be crystal clear on that.  All pieces have utility, some a bit more than others.  I also stated earlier that a mix of pieces is ideal.

No argument there.

@MrMalachiCrunch:

For fleet offense, 3 DDs beats 2 CCs

For fleet defense, 3 DDs beats 2 CCs

With a mix of units already in a navy I would prefer the 2 CAs on offense as opposed to the 3 DDs, I will already have DDs in my navy for fodder purposes and would prefer some additional rolls @3 as opposed to @2. Also I find it is less of a matter of purchasing 3 DDs or 2 CAs especially with the UK. It is more a matter of purchasing 1 ship in a turn and for offense I would again prefer the CA @3 as opposed to the DD @2. And yes I know that is no longer truly an equal comparison due to the differences in IPCs.

@MrMalachiCrunch:

Using as a blocker piece saves you 4 IPC versus using a cruiser and can’t be sub shot killed like a cruiser, nice when using as a blocker because you always have a 1/3 chance of killing something (other than a BB).  I will acount for the fact 1/3 of an enemy sub equals 2 IPC when my destroyer kills 1/3 of it….on average or better if I take out an air unit.  On the other hand if a sub is not used to kill the blocking CC then yeah, you have a 1/6 greater chance of hitting back.  If you think my accounting is wearing you down, wait until Japan turn 15… then the averages start to work out in the long run.

A destroyer obviously has the advantage of sub warfare over a cruiser, so the ONLY thing a CC has going for it over a DD was the shore bombment.

DDs ARE the go to blocking piece. The use of any other should be restricted to emergencies, rare but it sometimes comes up mostly with the US in the Pacific.

@MrMalachiCrunch:

That utility was the crux if my thinking.  IF you are buying CCs over DDs because you have lots and lots of opportunity to use shore bombardment against targets with AA guns (else a plane is way way better than a cruiser shot) and large stacks of pieces ‘just to whittle them down’ then maybe a cruiser.  Honestly, you dropping off lots of pieces in futile battles turn after turn to ‘wittle them down’ then you play a different game then me.

There are some circumstances in my Allied play where this does arise with the UK. It is not often but it does happen. Germany id forced by the threat of the bombardments to keep more troops in coastal locations and once this is going on it can be beneficial to start “whittling” down the stacks. As I said before Germany must make good on these loses or they stand to loose either France or even Germany depending on the situation.

@MrMalachiCrunch:

As for my thinking being all theory……  :-)  Ever read the Art of War by Sun Tze or something like that spelling.  Great book.

Yes I have read the Art of War by Sun Tzu and Clausewitz and a few others. Purchasing CAs to threaten bombardments to tie up Axis troops is straight out of the Art of War.

I think for the most part we are talking past each other. I get real twitchy though when I see players state stuff such as a unit must do its IPC value in damage to be effective and other such ledger-sheet approaches to the game. I also want less experienced players that might be reading this to understand that Cruisers can have their uses and should not be dismissed out of hand due to cost calculations when it is the strategic calculations that need to be addressed.

My question is for 20ipc is the ca dd combo better than the bb ?

@Battlingmaxo:

My question is for 20ipc is the ca dd combo better than the bb ?

:lol:
Situational!

Do you already have any battleships?  How much does the opponent have?

Battleships are awesome for deflecting the enemy’s attempt at 1-2 or 1-2-3 punching your fleet, because they deter that by absorbing a hit every time.  Also, they deter hit and runs on your fleet, which destroyer fleets invite.  Also, battleships are awesome for your own hit and runs, because you get X number of free hits in the first round.

Obviously, BB can bombard better than a cruiser.  And if you take one hit, you lose a DD if you have DD and CA, but if you have BB, you lose nothing.  However, a battleship cannot be two places at once, while a DD and CA can.  Also, a battleship can only hit once per round, but a DD and CA could hit twice.

Of course, this question could be analyzed further, but most of it would be a waste of time, because it’s entirely situational.  Depends on what your opponent has and what you’re trying to accomplish.  :-)

Cheers, maxo.