Italy Strategy

@tamer-of-beasts

We’ll see. I’m just super afraid it’ll increase American morale if I attacked first. Worth a shot though as morale never undermined most campaigns on either side.

@Stough just remember when playing tripleA that ‘1 more turn’ is never 1 more turn…

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.

Okay thanks for the insight.

1. Barbarossa it is!

2. Most of my opponents, when they play the US, play a almost-all-Pacific game. Why is it better to attack in the first round then the third? And how do you go about it? How do you defeat China? And I always defeat China in round four (with an extra MIC in Kiangsu). Is that still possible?

And with how many Japanese troops do you attack Russia? My opponents retreat all 18 units from the far east to Moscow asap…

Ok…. So another question. What would you consider the best naval defense against 1-3 German subs and 2-4 planes?

I superior force.  Use the battle calculator to tell you if they’d win or not, and if they would…don’t move in yet.  It’s up to you to place your units in harm’s way.  The US has the luxury of waiting until they want to or need to move in without fear of someone attacking their capital.

The “best” naval defense depends on what your strategy is.  I find carriers essential in the Pacific, and often judge if I have the upper hand by a carrier count of the Allies vs. Japan.  If Japan has 6 loaded carriers to your 2, Japan is probably winning at the moment.  In Europe, I tend to go with more offshore rolls if I’m feeling offensive, or just stick with destroyers and strat bombers that can land in Gibraltar and England and hit just about anywhere.

Back to your example.  I assume the subs are by Western Germany and the planes are in Normandy or carrier based.  I’d ask…why do you NEED to move in to Gibraltar this turn to put your fleet at risk?  Wait another round and add 4 more destroyers, another carrier and planes, or other round of purchases to your fleet.  Germany usually doesn’t have the same capacity to match your purchases if they want to make progress vs. Russia at all.  Take your time and build up, then move in.

One easy rule is to add up hits and attack power.  If they have 3 subs and 2 ftr 2 tac, that’s 20 atk and 7 hits.  make sure you have 1.5 times the number of hits and you’re probably good.  Go in with 12 destroyers.  or 2 loaded carriers and 4 dds.  Carriers are great because they bring extra 4’s into the fight, and if you’re hard up for money, the UK or France can land their planes on your carrier if you’re thinking pure defense.

If you try it out, you’ll see that the U.K. can’t sufficiently reinforce France, even with the additional 6 French troops, from having Germany crush it on round 2.  Even if every available plane is landed there, and the strafe leaves 2 tanks plus the fighter, it’s impossible to hold.  So all that landing planes accomplishes is wiping out the British airforce (and keeping France from falling to Italy).  The payoff isn’t worth it.

The biggest downsides I can imagine are that (1) it is much more difficult to hold off serious landings at Normandy by the US and/or UK.  Italy then has to protect Western Europe and the Med–although with Germany taking S France, they can dump ships in the Med as well if it comes to that (subs backed up by planes would be cheap).  And (2) delaying the war on the Pacific side until round 3 (which would make this work much better at times, depending on the US builds) means that UK Pacific can shuttle some troops over.

The really nice thing about this strategy is that it’s more efficient to have Italy be the 1 force in the Med, and not have to worry about building enough ships off the S France factory right away to protect them from UK planes.

I think it’s going to be the standard opening in our play group for the foreseeable future.

The counter someone mentioned above about making sure to buy troops in S Africa–either mechs, or infantry/artillery to go with transports, in combination with some shuttling from India, is probably the safe response.

Grover and I just started another game, with me being the Axis, and I’ve got to say I’m enjoying the big Italian boost.

I think Anzac should take a clear mission for itself. My last game I assigned to Anzac the occupation and defence of the DEI money islands. These are worth 16 IPC to the allies and even 20 IPC to Japan. I just occupy these islands with just enough infantry to make it difficult for Japan to take them without making a sizeable investment.

Even if Japan makes this investment you have succeeded: Japan is not investing that IPC in China/India!

If JP leaves the islands alone, Anzac can build a fleet to support the US!

@calvinhobbesliker:

Not too weak. OOB, they’re too strong with 28 planes and 3 transports. Both sides lost the same number of planes and transports, and Japan got 3 extra inf, while India got 2.

you find the Axis too strong in Global?  I like to reserve judgment this early on, but so far I’m finding the Axis quite challenging.

On topic, this strategy would leave Italy unmolested and invite a heavy India crush -  filling the coffers with a big bounty for Japan.  I’d be disinclined myself, but do let us know how it goes.