What is the most unusual/annoying/strange allied bid

Just finished up a game a couple days ago with some friends, and it always seems to come down to a valiant last stand at Moscow followed by either an admission of defeat or (as is the case with the game we played) Italy is contained and the Allies can still hold Egypt to some extent.

That is an interesting idea that could be considered when the Germans look as though they are a couple turns away from taking Moscow. I’m not sure I’d do it just because of the amount of time to move those infantry would make it totally obvious to the Axis what you were doing. At that point you are completely giving up Russia’s IPC income to the Axis which is not very wise. The advantage to this Alamo battle is that the Axis also lose a lot of units and Germany remains licking it’s proverbial wounds for a turn of the game at least.

So while it’s interesting and I have never considered it, I’m not sure it would be worth it.

A couple of years ago there were a few games like this but with the USSR starting with all the Chart 1 (land and production) techs. Played properly, this gave allies the advantage I would say, although the Axis still won a few.

Thank you again for all the helpful advice. You were right on my misstep with Germany building 10 units on Paris instead of 3. You also have good ideas about buying artillery, which I was thinking because you can combine them with infantry to get attack or defense at 2. And the United States targeting Norway/Denmark/Western Germany combined with bombers is helpful. Thanks again for all the great advice from such nice players; you guys are awesome.
AxisandAlliesGeneral

I think the point is, all three of my opinions infer that Germany is waiting until at least round 3 to declare war on Russia.  Personally, I see no good reason to declare war on them before then anyway and, personally, I prefer to have Italy declare war on Round 3 with Germany maybe not even declaring war on Round 4…that way Italy can take the road and Germany can reinforce it.  That allows Germany to collect the NO for Russia and move towards Moscow.

Those are some good ideas. I think to make this game balanced, I do need to make some adjustments. Just giving Italy the Axis NOs and ANZAC the Allied NOs doesn’t quite work. It seemed to be working for a while, but once ANZAC got the upper hand, it just gradually got worse and worse for Italy. I know that happens even in some games of regular A&A, but I don’t think there was any hope of Italy turning things around once ANZAC started getting ahead.
We just finished this game tonight. It took 15 rounds before Italy surrendered. For the first three rounds, Italy really grew and just about closed the gap between them. Rounds 4-8 were somewhat even between the two. If Italy did well on one front, ANZAC was doing well on another front. From Round 9 on, Italy was more and more defensive. ANZAC managed to take Japan and pretty much ruled all the Pacific and Asia within the next 2 rounds. Once all other Italian presence was eliminated, all ANZAC had to do is keep pounding on Europe until something gave way. Between amphibious landings every turn in Western Europe and a flood of tanks, mechs and planes rolling in from Russia, Italy was finding it harder and harder to maintain any kind of border.
For a while, whenever ANZAC would land somewhere in W Europe, Italy had enough to take it back. There were a few sparks of good for Italy, like when they sacrificed most of their European air force to kill the ANZAC fleet outside of England, including a stack of transports. That delayed ANZAC for a couple of rounds, but soon they were making landings again and Italy couldn’t afford a whole new air force to risk against the navy.
While playing the game this way makes each round go somewhat faster, it is pretty hard keeping track of all the different fronts. You literally have attacks going on in every point of the map on some turns. It’s a little easier when Germany is dealing with England and Russia, Italy is dealing with the Med and Japan is dealing with China and the Pacific. Still, it is kind of cool to be able to carry out ALL your ideas in the same turn.

I am kind of interested in what people are having trouble with these 18 inf that russia can throw towards japan? I think those 18 inf are a lot less annoying than say giving brittain more troops, though giving china more troops at the expense of russia’s 18 inf might be a good change. I honestly like it when Russia keeps her 18 inf on the japan border or near it (18 inf and 2 aa guns less for germany to kill in moscow). If you weaken russia’s power here too much it might be worth it for japan to attack russia’s north. Maybe a good way to test it would be to make a house rule where russia looses 6 inf in the east and china gains 6 inf, but you can only put 1 inf per territory. I don’t know if letting china have the Burma road from the start of the game would be fair for japan? US going 100% japan for first couple turns might prove impossible for japan to beat it china is now significantly stronger with those 4 extra inf yunan plus the extra money and possibility of buying artillery. I see japan as being much weaker on the land since china will be more than just a pain, but a real threat and japan will have to buy more ground to compensate making japans navy weaker and in turn making US’s navy that much stronger. I haven’t played and extensive amount of games, so what do people think about the pacific side of the board and those 18 russian inf? Are you guys having a hard time beating japan as the allies, or keeping japan in check?

@Fishmoto37:

A stalemate exists in China. The Soviets moved their 18 infantry back up to threaten the Japanese but have never attacked. Japan was forced to garrison Manchuria. They need those infantry in china as they have mostly expensive units facing the Chinese and Indians. Japan never made it to the Indies as the U.S. had major fleets moving west. The Japanese did defeat an American fleet in the Marianas but with all that income they will be coming again.

After eleven rounds the stalemate in China has been broken and the allies are pushing the Japanese back.  The Indian westward march has been checked by Italy. Japan has broken the Siberian armies and is starting to claim Soviet territory.  12/27/10

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@Funcioneta:

They will attack each other first round 90% of games if you don’t agree a penalty for the attacker … something like 15 or 20 IPCs. Higher penalty -> later attack

Not sure about that 90% on turn 1, but sooner or later, they certainly will atack!