Alpha 3 due next week

Nice, maybe i can try this HR! Thanks

The Japanese advance through Russia is annoying, but it very much opens the door to shut Japan down and stall the Japanese advance.

You’ve got two options.  The first of which is to sink the Japanese fleet and take control of SZ6 to prevent Japan from ferrying over units to the mainland while convoying Japan’s eventual income to zero and stopping the flood into Russia.  You can trade your ships for Japanese ships early, sacrificing carriers by absorbing two hits to allow your aircraft to continue to sink ships in SZ6 (which of course means their demise too). Once the fleet is crippled, Japan is going to be stuck putting out a DD or CR at best each round in SZ6 - easily sunk by US DD/SS.  By Japan ignoring income and making a bee line to Moscow, its most likely going to lose the fight in China as I’d expect India to DOW and stack up the Burma Road to get Chinese artillery out, nullifying the Japanese advantage over China.  Losing Chinese income, the DEI income and getting convoyed, Japan’s going to be making less than 10 IPC/round once the US DOW occurs.

The other option is to ignore Japan and just build the US to land on Gib on Round 4 and then onto Norway/Italy/the French Minors on Round 5.  A reinforcement of British units- a combination of infantry and aircraft can help prevent a German counter for the US landing.  The only hope is that you put enough of a threat on Germany that it has to reverse its economic spending getting units into the fight for Moscow so that Berlin has to be defended instead of a factory of Mech supporting what I’d expect to be Armor purchases that were made earlier.  India can also then ignore China and start churning out Armor/Mech and start marching toward Egypt/Afghan/Southern Russia.  Japan will not be able to hold territories near Moscow for long with India spending from India1 forward on a march in that direction.  Particularly as India claims all the DEI to pump its income into the 30’s.  I’d let Anzac just build SS every round and continue to convoy/harass Japanese territories to further compound Japan’s problem of spending to get units towards Moscow whilst being harassed via convoy everywhere.

Basically the Japanese making the Moscow Rush equates to a boring Pacific Theater and UK, India, US all converging on Europe.  Italy can easily be convoyed out of the game with a combination of SS purchases out of S.Africa, India and UK.  Japan has an 8 roundish march to Moscow (unless theres a suicide aircraft punch).  Germany is 7ish rounds out itself.  If rounds 5, 6 and 7 equate to Allied landings in Europe, Germany has a tough decision to face with a convoy’ed Italy, an over-extended Japan and a split economy defending Europe and advancing on Moscow.

Realize you still may lose Moscow, but with the Allies entrenched in Europe with a full economic investment, India may be able to reclaim Moscow for the Russians as Germany has to reverse course instead of swinging south towards Egypt for the win.

@Cmdr:

Spend 6 IPC to take out the Russian NO, Wrath.  A submarine in SZ 125 takes away the objective as well as a destroyer does.  It also requires the allies to send a destroyer to go kill it, instead of using only planes.

A submarine isnt a war ship according to our definition of the rules but I wont argue about that. The price of 8 ipc is still worth it.

Russia was buffed in Alpha 2 because many Axis players blew their strength on England, dedicating all of their power to taking it out and thus, not having enough to hit Russia with.  Now that England is no longer a prized posession, but more of a “well, I need one more VC to win, and it is underdefended” move, Russia is getting really easy to take out.

Dont care if russia is buffed, Germany is so much more buffed with their extra planes and units, thats why I find that theather a bit balanced.

Looking ONLY at the game board for the first 3 rounds (bringing you to Germany Round 4, Purchase New Units) one can see that the Axis are more than double Russia’s strength with more than double their income.  That means England and India need to be focused on sending reinforcements to Russia to prevent them from falling (and thus, negating the need to block SZ 125).  With the NonAggression arrangement being virtually nullified, there is no reason not to invade early and heavy with Japan and more reason TOO do it, to remove even more IPC from the Russians. 
So yes, Wrath, I agree, Barbarossa is probably the better avenue and makes Victory more assured, not assured, but more than attempting Sea Lion.    I don’t see Russia ever getting their Objectives (any of them).

If you go after russia on round 4 as germany you are to late imho, you are better off attacking round 2 (with a fake attack on yugoslavia) or on r3.

By 1943 Russia had 2-5 times as many tanks as germany on every front. 2-10 times as many planes. 2-5 times as many artillery pieces, and 2-5 times as many infantry units. Remember Germany had to send 15-20 % against the allies in the west. Norway, france, Homeland Germany, Denmark, and other occupied states, while as Russia had nearly all of its forces Against Germany since Japan was NEVER going to attack russia after it had previous battles against Russia and saw it was hopeless as well as Japan had its hands full against the other Allies. This is just Russia VS. Germany. The allies (UK, Canada, and US) had 10 times as many tanks as Germany and 10 times as many aircraft. Japan was equally screwed. US built over 100 Carriers in WW2. Japan had a total in the 20’s, but never at one time due to battle losses. The US built over 1,300 warships. Japan could never have handled this. No matter what you say the Axis had about a 5% chance to win WW2. this only if Moscow would have gotten taken, but if you read military history you will see that this probably wouldn’t have mattered anyway seeing as how Russia moved its factories back into Siberal in the Ural mountains region. Germany never could have taken Russia due to Russia’s huge size as well as huge manpower advantage, industrial advantage, only one front to deal with, and the fact that their front lines were in Russia meaning tanks and airplanes could drive and fly strait into the battle off the assembly line. While as Germany’s front lines in 1942 were far from Germany’s industry. If the game was ever played to history allies would win 98 percent of the time with two equally skilled players IMO. This is why the game is made to recreate history sort of, while being playable so that both sides have an equal chance of winning.

Thanks for the post, Frank.  Yep, you pretty much summed up a few of the many reasons why OOB is fatally flawed, and you have the 30-35 games to back it up.

I get the feeling from my few games of Alpha2 so far (not going too crazy playing it - just a couple games at a time because it will probably be changed anyway) that the Allies still have a significant advantage in Alpha2.  But I have to admit none of the games have lasted even more than a few rounds (with the Axis getting obliterated each time) so maybe those oil field NO’s could really come into play sometimes I suppose.

To me, Russia and USA have suffocating power (Russia is very deep, and as Larry himself acknowledged - he wondered if it was 1 territory too deep), and the UK can be very powerful as well.

the occasional cruiser

Yea the ones you start with, because I doubt you’ll be building others.

oh, dert-a-der!  I totally missed that… Thanks!

Fighters that are damaged roughly lose around half their abilities @: attack: 2, defense: 2, Movement: 2, they also gain 5 damage points. The reason to this change, was so that players would feel more enthused to strategic bomb knowing they wouldn’t lose a fighter, instead, they could continue using the fighter just at a damaged level. The downgrade in its abilities would be a temporary result until the fighter is repaired at half the price (5 IPCs) of a new fighter.

Fighters that missed or didn’t get hit, are free to return to base like in the OoB rules.

One other thing i forgot to mention, bombers that are not accompanied with escorts are considered ‘locked on’ therefore are subject to interceptor fire @ 1d6 of damage per defending interceptor.

These rules make bombers and interceptors very powerful units. It encourages players to strategic bomb with 2d6 of damage, however there is also the risk of interceptor ‘lock on’ that would minimize the bombers full 2d6 damage potential.