What to do with France?

I would usually not liberate Paris until Northern Italy and Western Germany were both in Allied hands. OR, Italy was taken out and Germany is in such a poor position that they couldn’t afford to mount an attack against Paris. In that case, the US/UK would have to have a lot of units in Paris along with the free 12 IPCs of French units. So much so that Germany just can’t muster enough attacking units to make it worth their while.
I remember one game where we had a situation like this and our German player got all crazy like “Oh, I got to get Paris back!”. Germany did get Paris back and gained something like 15 IPCs (some French territories were still in Axis hands), but they lost so many units in the process it ended up being a negative for them. Plus, their defenses were severely weakened both in W Germany and Germany itself. Russia had a fun time on the Eastern Front.
So, basically I wouldn’t liberate Paris unless the Allies had an overwhelming force to either keep it or make it stupid for Germany to retake it.
Another reason is the Normandy and S France factories. I like for the US in particular, but also the UK to have factories on mainland Europe. I don’t want to give them up until I have and can keep the factories in Italy and possibly W Germany. Then you can give up the French factories.

What I was talking about is that Russia has more muscle in this set-up then in G40. They can be more aggressive and can help defend the Chinese wall and/or the Middle east against the Japanese once India falls (things they don’t get to do much in G40).

What I like, for turn order, is the following:

Germany
Russia
Japan
United States
China (order is important rarely, but kill the issue NOW)
Italy
United Kingdom (all one power)
Australia/France

To solve the Italian issue with fleet deals:
-1 Destroyer Italian
-1 Transport Italian
-1 Submarine Italian
Move Alexandrian fleet to Suez Canal (east of Egypt, not north)
Move the Gibraltan fleet to SZ 91
Move the French fleet to SZ 87

This ends the threat to the British fleet by an early Italy move, saves the Italian fleet so they are a threat to Africa, and does not suicide the French fleet for no real game purpose.  The fleets can still engage, the British/French can always move into the Med if they want (but Italy should get one round of the NO) and Italy being down a transport can stop it, but cannot take all of N. Africa (for instance) they’re moves are limited other ways.

Also, this kills the whole issue with a dead nation having a turn of their own.  Just dump them on the Australian player as a semi-useless nation (they have units left, but no purchases/builds) so you are not holding up an entire game JUST so France can say “nah, I don’t want to do anything.”

I had one game where France almost survived 2 full rounds. On G1, Germany didn’t commit quite enough plus had bad dice so they didn’t take France. UK did send the RAF there to help out Paris and those extra planes caused Italy to fail to take Paris. On G2, Germany threw what they had left, although they were kind of short on land units due to purchasing navy on G1 and the bulk of their stuff was on the Russian border. Even though they had quite a few planes to throw at France, the British and French planes mauled them in defense and both sides wiped each other out. So Italy ended up taking Paris on round 2.
By the way, this game did end up as an Axis loss. The Euro Axis were pretty much pasted by UK and USSR with very little US help while Japan was pretty well handled by the bulk of US attentions.

As the Germans another fun little trick is use the transports you start with to land in lenningrad and take it very easily on G2 and maybe even G1.

France surviving the first round attack by Germany puts up a very interesting rest of the game. Various things can happen.

1. Italy takes France on their turn making Italy a very rich country. 30+ IPCS gives them a strong I2 purchase letting them destroy the British navy in the Mediterranean Sea, fulfil their NO’s, take over Africa and the Middle East and most importantly open a new front for Russia and survive whatever America can throw at them. This makes Italy more powerful than Germany so there should be Italian intervention going on in Russia and the French coast.

2. The French open a land campaign against Germany and Italy causing trouble. Creates an opening for British and eventually American troops to land and land fighters. More importantly it takes Germany’s attention off of Russia and Italy’s off of Africa and the Mediterranean Sea. This almost gaurentees that America will invest in Japan.

3. France can build a fleet with England to land troops early in the game. This can in turn put more heat on England as Germany may build a navy as well. Puts alot of heat west and off of Russia. The Navy can later help Germany and attack Russia in two places. This navy that France and England builds may make America fully invest in Japan as well.

The last 2 of these these seem to ask for a German capture of London as a German capture of Moscow doesn’t seem possible at that point. The first looks like America will invest in the Europe side. This begs for the capture of Moscow.

In conclusion I think that the French surviving the first attack doesn’t make the Axis lose but it limits their choices.

@Sid:

France offered to hold their action so that Germany could go immediately, thus allowing Italy and Germany to coordinate more fluidly, instead of interrupting to state they were doing nothing and causing a multiple day delay between Italy and Germany.

If the players agreed to the change in order, the agreement should stand.  Why should the Axis assume France would not make the attack if the order has been changed.  Have the online moves been being submitted as if France was going in it’s original order?

It was not an agreement that the turn order was different.  That would have constituted a house rule and why would France give up the right to screw up the Axis plan forevermore in perpetuity?  No, it was a contingent offer that if Italy did nothing to instigate an attack by France, then Germany could be allowed to move so as not to slow down the game.

Germany takes France or you can call the game on turn 1 because the germans need the extra cash otherwise they are screwed.

Once again an absolute on winning the game turn 1.