Neutral Activation

I think you should re read the rules. They’re clear.

Yeah, the issue is that I would like Ethopia in USSR hands, it is one that is avoidable, like I said, I have seen a USSR marker on it but I wasn’t playing this game so I didn’t see how it came. However, I usually have no problem getting to Somalia, and the northern African territories can be confusing because in my case, UK had Italy on a stalemate front line not pressing so Italy had no reason to assume what I was doing until of course he saw me bring my mech. into Africa.

Just to add to wittmann, the Russians are played with different political rules on each map (Europe/Pacific). They are still one power though, so you can send units from the Euro side to the Pac side if you want. For example if you are at war w/Japan you can send Russian ground and air units that start on the Euro map into China to help prop them up (because the Chinese are also at war w/Japan). You could even send those Russian ftrs to Burma or India (via China) once the UK Pac is at war with Japan (but just because you can doesn’t mean you should LOL)

Going through the med is just impossible in pretty much any game. Either Italy or Germany is going to sink that transport with planes.

So with that reasoning, you must hope for a J1 declaration of war on the US, and then you could do this:

US 1: Buy 5 fighters. Sail your single atlantic transport 1/4th toward Saudi (SZ 87)
US 2: Buy 5-6 bombers. Sail transport 2/4ths to Saudi (SZ 82 or 69). US 1 fighters to French West Africa.
US 3: Transport now 3/4ths to saudi (SZ 71). US 1 fighters to Egypt. US 2 bombers to French Equatorial Africa.
US 4: Go time.

Hit Saudi with your transport. Send in 5 fighters and 5-6 bombers from Africa, taking bomber losses.

US 5: Build factory (and an air base couldn’t hurt), land your planes on it or near it. If Iraq/Persia are still available, take those if possible.
US 6: First turn you can purchase units in Saudi Arabia. Buy factories in other middle east countries, if available.

This is about the time Moscow has gone to hell or the Germans are coming into the middle east. Not enough time to really get any ground units over there. But you could build fighters on US 3 and 4 that would arrive US 5 and 6 for a respectable plane stack. With a bit of UK help, probably enough to shut down any hope of Moscow or the middle east being seriously threatened. A huge problem with this is that you’d have +8 Germans or Italians coming from Turkey.

This is a 100% Atlantic buy for the first 2 turns turns and a significant drain for US 3, 4, and 5 as well. Very dangerous. Japan is going to go nuts because, remember, they J1’d you.

Seems like a crazy damn idea–one that is too crazy to work well, probably. Not only that, but it’s completely obvious what you’re up to. However, I think it’d be pretty easy to have UK prevent Japan from killing/blocking your transport J3. And if Japan invested too much in the Indian ocean to stop you for sure, then they’re ruining some of their J1 momentum, so maybe that’s not entirely awful.

edit-
I guess you could also send your pacific transports through the panama canal, building a naval base there. This would give you four more units in the middle east shortly after your first transport arrived.

Better alternative, with nearly the same effect:
Don’t do Saudi, just have UK save you Persia/Iraq. This saves you from having to violate neutrality, and both are reachable on the same turn as Saudi. If you do hit Saudi, do it the next turn, saving the neutrality violation for one round later.

@Herr:

Politicians need more time than soldiers. The friendly neutral is expecting a formal delegation to pay a visit, not someone in a tank dashing by and waving “Hi! You’re with us now!”

But I agree that in the game, it’s a bit odd.

Yeah that’s basically it!
Allies stop and wave and Axis, well they…march.  :-)

Fun aside, I agree with you, it is a bit odd.

.tsgv file???  What do I need to open it?

With some simple house rules attacking the true neutrals does not need to be insane.

In our group we are remove 1 inf in each of the mongolian territories and in angola and mozambique. This makes attacking an European true neutral less devastating for the asian land war and makes it less severe for the Italians. Its also more true to history which is a bonus.

We are also thinking of making Argentina as a pro-axis minor. This would be partly to make south america a possible theatre of operations and also to reduce the extreme impact on the american economy and manpower from attacking a true neutral. Not very true to history but we just regard that as a potential bonus.

I just want to say, that in real life in 1944 the US produced 3x more planes than all other world powers combined. If you make it historical, you have to give the US an income of 200/turn. The idea is that it be an entertaining game and that it jog your memory of history class.