There are not enough Italian Roundels!!!

@SuperbattleshipYamato Italian starting army in E.Africa is too slow and too weak by itself to take Capetown.If axis is able to control suez canal and can load TTs from sz 81 (red sea) it might be doable.Another plan could be to strafe attack Egypt from Sudan+Alexandria,retreat everything including fast movers to Sudan.

Italian canopening is even more effective when combined with the Germany “Dark Skies” option with lots of bombers.  The tanks+mechs+bomber attack options means that the Allies cannot place moderate-sized stacks within two spaces of the German/Italian main stack.  Russia ends up cowering in Moscow with a few minor exchanges each round.  UK ends up with a strong stack near Iraq, never daring to move it too close to the Germans.

Meanwhile the huge range of the German bombers give that power flexibility to find opportunistic attacks:
*Allied ground forces in W. Europe
*Allied ships in the Atlantic
*Allied ships in the Med
*Push into Siberia
*Mid-game Sealion or Egypt attack

I am not saying that this plan guarantees victory, but it allows League players to aim towards eventual victory in G13-17.  Most face-to-face games end up with a Moscow attack on G5-8 when the Axis players just decide that the numbers look close enough.  With the battlecaculator and more time on PBEM/PBF games, Germany can comb through the options every turn and patiently wait for the right opening with a big TUV swing.

Do people see Italy as an Axis minor? I don’t, I know it’s the poorest major power in the game but it’s still a major power. My two cents on this debate is you either take Italy and have it support Germany when it invades USSR or you use Italy as a naval power to keep India and UK from linking up or you can take a more questionable route and try to do both.

Yes, I know you can’t see vote. I just took a guess based on voter results and comments. I did remove the quote. :-)

For ‘Barbarossa’ Mussolini sent to Army Group ‘South’ sector, the Corpo Spedizionario Italiano in Russia (Italian Expeditionary Corps in Russia) of 60.000 men, formed by divisions ‘Pasubio’, ‘Torino’ —type 1938 divisions of 2 infantry and 1 artillery regiments— and 3rd Mobil ‘Principe Amedeo Duca d’Aosta’ —2 cavalry, 1 cycling Bersaglieri and 1 artillery regiments plus support units and an armoured group. Later on the 63rd Assault Legion ‘Tagliamento’ —formed by Black Shirts— joined the CSIR.

On July 1941 the Italian soldiers’ morale was high and the CSIR seemed quite impressive, according to their German counterparts, but their command, motorisation and armoured forces were completely inadequate and they also had a tremedous lack of artillery and AT guns.

In March 1942 Mussolini sent the II Army Corps made of divisions ‘Sforzesca’, ‘Ravenna’ and ‘Cosseria’ and the élite Alpine Corps composed of infantry division ‘Vicenza’ and Alpine divisions ‘Tridentina’, ‘Julia’ and ‘Cuneense’ plus more Black Shirt units gathered in the groups ‘· Gennaio’ and ‘23 Marzo’. The CSIR became the the XXXV Army Corps. This force of 227.000 men was comprised in the VIII Italian Army under field marshal Italo Gariboldi.

On August 1942 the VIII Italian Army took deffensive positions along the Don river, backed by some liaison German units. On November 11th, ‘Operation Little Saturn’ desintegrated almost immediately the II and XXXV Army Corps, leaving the Alpine Corps isolated. After more than 110.000 casualties, the remaining Italian forces re-grouped in the Ukraine and were sent home. “I don’t want to see not even another one soldier of our Allies in the eastern front”, Hitler declared after the débâcles of 1942-1943.

here are these 10 divisions and their commanders:
3rd Cavalry: Amedeo Duca D’Aosta
2nd Infantry (semi-mot): Sforzesca
3rd Infantry: Ravenna
5th Infantry: Cosseria
9th Infantry: Pasubio
52nd Infantry (semi-mot): Torino
156th Infantry: Vicenza
2nd Alpine: Tridentia
3rd Alpine: Julia
4th Alpine: Cuneese

@SgtBlitz:

Heh, ok.  I was being 50% sarcastic 50% fooling with ya at the end there, mashing the words together like that, Mr. SupremeGeneralICanKickANewbsAss   :-D.  I think TripleA came out with the Pacific setup a few months ago, but not sure how long it will be until we get a Global mod for it.  Considering how often Larry is changing the ruleset on top of the new Global rules it will probably be a long time before they get a Global working.  TripleA is definitely the way to go, though, savegames for the win.  Hope it comes soon.  We’re using an Alpha +.2 mod to the out of box rules so far.

You know how to use ABattlemap, right?  Some of the more computer savvy people on our forum have programmed a Global game map for it, its useful in that it stacks units and chips together like a real game board, so you can play games on the forum with the internal dice roller (I still say its biased on the crucial battles).  We just type out all our moves like a giant herd of nerds on the forums and let the casaulties fall where they may.  It’s pretty fun and can be nail-biting at times, the way it ought to be.  Let me know if you’re interested in starting a forum game, I’ll help you out.

Thanks for the offer to help Sarjento. Hope to get into an online game soon.

Sorry, I’m thinking of my own historical rules in which Romania starts neutral. ~Posting on this soon.  Yugoslavia or maybe later on Ukraine?

Look at rule book page 20. If you made a combat move into the tt(territory) and won, it is yours. If it was French to start with, then there was no combat move into the tt, and is still French. Liberate France if you want to collect income from it. The dutch are not a power, and are a different deal.