Posts made by aardvarkpepper

@brian-cannon said in Japan R1 attack on pearl harbor:

You should have Japan’s defense profile set to subs submerge.

mvp

@quintin said in Japan R1 attack on pearl harbor:

I disagree on the opportunity cost. Unless something bigger if offered by the allies doing pearl is a perfectly viable alternative to these marginal improvements on the ground

Another alternative I favor against strong opponents is hitting szechwan with 1 inf, 1 art 2 fight 1 bomb, even when the R inf is there. Overall w/l is about 80%. If UK lands the india fighter there, this is off the table. Then I generally default to pearl.

Edit: As for the J fighter and bomber being out of position J2, I dont think this makes a significant difference

mvp 2

BTW Quintin, was it you that said Allies should do early trading in Mediterranean in another thread and provided some specifics?

For OP - yeah I put up some text wall posts elsewhere explaining how KJF sucks in 1942 Online. There’s a lot to it, ranging from how UK can’t use US transports so doesn’t have a reliable Africa income plan, UK can’t use US carriers so KJF threats and timing is garbage compared to 1942 Second Edition, bunch of defensive profile applications, and I mean a BUNCH. But whatevs.

Tahweh’s guide combines simplicity and solidity. You ask aardvark (me) a simple question, probably you’ll end up with some kinda horrible decision tree that runs to five pages (at least). So you gotta figure there’s good reasons to keep it simple.

And Tahweh says to do Pearl. Complications aside, it’s pretty much as he says, as Quintin says. Maybe some games Pearl’s not strictly “optimal” but reasonably, you should do it.

But you want complications?

oo boy :joy:

:sunglasses:

Gonna try to keep it MOSTLY short, but a few basics

1. Starting forces on the board dwarf what you can buy/place.

2. Opening battles and dice outcomes change probabilities on subsequent possibilities. E.g. if USSR has horrible dice at West Russia, Germany may be able to build mass tanks and try to crush Russia before the Allies can really do anything. But if USSR doesn’t have horrible dice at West Russia, then Germany building mass tanks immediately is probably dumb as Germany will probably run out of steam then lose.

3. What you buy/place DOES make a difference, even almost immediately, but it’s less about your having total “command” of the situation, and more that you’re going for the best probability outcomes for what evolved from the starting position.

4. One unit isn’t just “a little” difference. One unit makes a big chunky difference even in battles of near a hundred units. Even the difference between buying a single artillery instead of a single infantry can set the stage for options for an entire turn, which affect the entire game. Some players are quick to dismiss the differences because they don’t want to think about them, and though I’m not saying you need to run all the numbers, you should at least be aware there really aren’t any “insignificant” actions, no matter how small.

So you’re asking about J1 attack on Pearl?

First, what happens if USSR has suck dice on USSR1 and Germany shoves a fat load of tanks down its throat?

The worst responses say it doesn’t matter, Japan just does what Japan does. Bad responses say Japan should “pressure” but don’t explain what, why, how, or under what circumstances, and there’s some vague handwaving that “it makes a difference” but nobody says HOW. Ugh.

So I’m going to say think on it. Suppose USSR bought four infantry two tanks (which I don’t recommend but whatever), tried what is it, 12 units to West Russia and 9 units to Ukraine, got lousy dice at West Russia, and didn’t do so hot at Ukraine (though still captured)? What then?

There’s some scenarios I won’t get into, but keeping it simple say Germany has odds to capture or horribly weaken West Russia and also recapture Ukraine. What happens then?

Then there’s some more scenarios but what it comes out to is in some scenarios USSR only has two tanks and two fighters to threaten Germany pressure in Europe. There might be no chance for USSR to recapture Karelia after Germany takes it. Or even if USSR does have odds, there might be no way that USSR can sustain defense against Germans sending in loads of tanks, especially with Japanese fighters reinforcing German-captured territories.

So UNDER those SPECIFIC conditions, you have to think, what Japan actions are right? Should you go Pearl or not? And the answer is, IF the game went that way (which requires a lot of luck but it happens) then probably you do NOT go Pearl.

And this is why I really don’t like the vague hand-waving some players do that it’ll all just magically work out and nothing makes any difference because that’s just not how it works mathematically.

Suppose you do Pearl. Some players talk vaguely about IPC differences, but really think about it. If UK did not blow up Japan’s East Indies fleet, any Allied progress in Pacific will be horribly slow. So what do you get by blowing up the US fleet at Hawaiian Islands? You kill a valuable carrier and a fighter, but you lose a fighter (if you’re LUCKY, because you NEED a fighter to die or else the fighter that starts on Tokyo pulls a Japanese carrier so the fighter can land then US just kills the carrier and the fighter on US’s turn). Then you also have a fighter and a bomber taken out of the action, not just on J1, but also J2 because that air is out in the middle of nowhere. It’s only by J3 that the air becomes relevant again.

And in exchange, what?

US wasn’t going to make fast progress in the Pacific anyways (provided UK didn’t blow up Japan’s East Indies fleet and even if that did happen with 1942 Online’s rules changes KJF (Kill Japan First) is still pretty not great for Allies). Yes, if you have KGF (Kill Germany First) then normally you expect the US Pacific carrier to make its way to the Atlantic just about in time for after Japan breaks India for Japan’s crazy air power to threaten the heck out of the Allied Atlantic fleet then you need reinforcements.

But in this game US4 Atlantic isn’t the issue. Under the Axis game plan by that point the Axis should already have secured a decisive advantage against USSR in Europe to the point that not only will Russia collapse but also that the Axis won’t have to pay too much to make that happen. That is, the expectation is Axis are well on their way to conquering Russia by that point, after which Axis consolidate their position and there just aren’t any good Allied options.

So in THAT game if Japan goes after Pearl, that’s just entirely besides the point of what the Axis should be trying to do. “Wrong” is a pretty strong term, but you can see if Axis have a tank dash scenario where there’s a pretty good case to say Japan going to Pearl IS “wrong”.

As to whether two fighters and a bomber would make a difference, again, remember. It’s not just J1, it’s J1, J2, and J3 too, because even on J3 Japan’s air that had to land on an island will have sharply limited options. Considering the timeline, it’s not even that the Allies need to screw up then Japan has some sort of magical “opening”. The simple fact is, if Japan cuts its early attack power for so long, then that means the Allies have better options on odds for a lot of choices they couldn’t otherwise probably make. Lasting another turn at India, having time to switch defense focus from India to Europe, all that important stuff is stuff that now the Allies have time to do, because Japan just doesn’t have the units because Japan fought a battle it didn’t have to, that it shouldn’t have fought, and if Japan had favorable odds for the battle, if Japan didn’t “lose” units straight out, what of it? You’ve heard the saying winning the battle but losing the war, this is exactly that.

See what I mean about the handwaving and saying it doesn’t make a difference? You can see it DOES make a difference. Mmm?

Second, what happens if both sides did “reasonable” plays, Allies have a strong defense on West Russia against a G2 attack, and there aren’t really any clear openings?

Well, then you really have to think on it.

What if UK hit Japan’s East Indies fleet and did well? What happened with UK transports in Indian and Pacific Oceans? You can’t really argue UK won’t hit Japan’s East Indies fleet, that UK doesn’t have great odds, that UK doesn’t have good backup contingencies; I mean you COULD argue those things, but if UK has already, in fact, hit Japan’s East Indies fleet and done amazingly, then you just have to deal with it.

Then there’s the question of what if UK didn’t hit East Indies fleet, if USSR put an infantry on Szechwan, if USSR dummied up and tried to fortify Buryatia.

Sometimes you do Pearl, sometimes you don’t. If you really respect your opponent and you don’t have some an Axis tank dash scenario, and if the board situation is right, then you do Pearl. But if not? Then you don’t.

Why “respect”? Because the “standard” Japan attack I’d say is sub, cruiser, two fighters, bomber, against Pearl. It isn’t a bad battle for Japan, but there is some chance the US sub submerges then Japan wipes everything out without losing the Tokyo fighter. Then Japan has to commit its Caroline Islands carrier and probably lose it to the US counter. What I’m getting at is though it’s a pretty good odds attack for Japan, there is some chance for things to go horribly wrong. If you think your opponent is bad then they’re not going to use the US carrier well anyways so you just gave up loads of early Japanese power in Asia (remember, three plus turns for two fighters and bomber) for basically nothing. Only if your opponent is very good will they use the US carrier to optimal effect, even if later on in the game, and only then is the chunky opportunity cost Japan pays really worth it.

Tank dash is tank dash, if the dice went that way that’s how they went.

If the board situation is right is a lot trickier. UK1 hitting Japan’s East Indies fleet has a lot of weird variations, plus Japan should think about G2 pressing into Europe, opportunity costs etc.

@boston_nwo said in Japan R1 attack on pearl harbor:

The only cases where you should clearly not do Pearl is if UK attacks borneo, Russia places 5 infantry in buryatia, or some similar level of UK aggression where Japan has use the starting units to great effect. In this scenario, attacking pearl as well overstretches Japan’s navy.

Actually you can still do Pearl in both situations. I don’t know that I would say Japan should do Pearl anyways, just because 1942 Online rules changes makes KJF so generally bad, but Borneo, Buryatia, not so much issues.

You have to think about the opportunity costs, and how the position develops.

Look, I don’t want to overcomplicate it, but some posters REALLY oversimplify stuff. Like, there is no mention of UK successfully hitting Japan’s East Indies fleet, and that’s just . . . . I mean you can’t even talk about it seriously if you don’t consider that.

It works out something like this if Japan didn’t have its East Indies fleet blown up:

1. If UK captures Borneo, Japan sends Tokyo fighter, Caroline Islands fighter, bomber, sub, cruiser to Pearl. Borneo recaptured with Tokyo transport, up to three fighters two battleship bombards (probably less), leaving Japan a discretionary fighter in Asia. There’s a lot of problems there, I won’t deny it, but Japan can still get good odds on hitting US’s two infantry on Anhwei, US’s two infantry on Yunnan, and defend Manchuria - unless USSR sent a lot east to the point that USSR’s development in Europe will be all screwed up. And if Japan doesn’t defend Manchuria well, at least it can pressure a commit out of USSR. What’s USSR going to do? Keep USSR infantry and fighters and maybe a tank east, walk into the teeth of Japan’s logistics, USSR suffers opportunity cost in Europe? And USSR WILL suffer in Europe. Or does USSR not hit Manchuria then Japan keeps the income?

2. If USSR put five inf on Buryatia, the “normal” thinking is, your opponent screwed up and left 15 IPCs of units on a bad-odds defense, bam, you hit that. If Japan can bleed out USSR leaving less to challenge Germany with, bam, you hit that. But Buryatia is a bit of an exception. Again, if USSR wants to commit to threatening Manchuria that’s going to pull away from Europe; the territories are just too far apart. And if USSR retreats immediately, USSR will STILL miss the timing on timely reinforcement to West Russia. It’s going to be nasty for USSR whether Japan crushes USSR at Buryatia on J1 or whether Japan just yawns and lets USSR do whatever on USSR2 then Japan hits the coast and consolidates on J2. To be plain, USSR already screwed up badly by USSR1 5 infantry on Buryatia. Japan doesn’t need to jump on it.

Let’s say Japan’s two fighters and a bomber down for four turns in Asia. Okay. So tell me how USSR pushes a chunk of units through northeast Asia and/or China, UK pushes an offensive from India into Burma and points east. No matter how you slice it, Germany gets more freedom, and it uses that to pressure Europe, then Japan gets its units and logistics going and crushes any Allied incursion - and any Allied pressure in Europe simply means Allies are way out of position in Europe. It’s not GUARANTEED it works EXACTLY like that but that’s the mechanics of the rules and board.

I don’t say that I would do Pearl anyways, but if I were considering Pearl, I wouldn’t consider either Borneo or Buryatia “clearly not” situations for Pearl. It’s still good for the reasons it’s good (and still bad for the reasons it’s bad). Provided Japan’s East Indies fleet wasn’t hit, Japan can still recapture Borneo and hit Pearl and still have a reasonable (if not fantastic) position, and I just mentioned Japan can defer at Buryatia - again it’s not fantastic, but it’s an option.

@quintin said in Japan R1 attack on pearl harbor:

As for the J fighter and bomber being out of position J2, I dont think this makes a significant difference. Szechwan and sinkiang is usually uncontested, which leaves only Burma and Yakut. The difference between 2 planes and 3 planes in a 2 inf vs 1 inf trade is quite small, and the bomber has reach to Burma.

In MOST games, if you must generalize, that’s pretty safe. But if I remember right Quintin favors USSR1 buy 4 inf 2 tank, 12 units to West Russia, 9 to Ukraine, and capture of Ukraine.

Yeah yeah I know, some critics say aardvark meanders around. But think about it. REALLY THINK!

(blank stares)

Aren’t we talking about Pearl Harbor, then what’s this about USSR1’s buys and moves? . . .

==

Remember, right now we’re talking about J1-3 opportunity costs of Japan doing Pearl. And I’m saying that Quintin’s USSR open and assumptions are playing into his advice, which I’m saying in turn is often true, but not always.

Suppose USSR hits West Russia and Ukraine, captures Ukraine, does decently at West Russia. Without going too into detail, probably Germany recaptures Ukraine (killing most of USSR’s ground attack power), doesn’t hit West Russia (too scary), and captures Karelia lightly, anticipating USSR will recapture Karelia next turn.

And why do we think these things?

West Russia can be pretty scary if USSR got decent dice and moved both AA guns in. I’m not talking about UK fighters from London and US fighter from Szechwan, those happen AFTER Germany’s turn. BTW note that Quintin mentioned hitting Szechwan with Japan which is NOT VERY SAFE AT ALL but it DOES fit into the fundamental doctrine that Japan tries to bleed out the Allies so Germany doesn’t have to so even if precious precious Japanese air is risked, well, I might not like it, but I’m certainly not going to say that’s “wrong”.

But anyways back to West Russia. Suppose Germany decides to try to capture Karelia in force on G1. What do we know? German fighters can’t land on, as Karelia was newly captured. So you have a load of German infantry and a load of German tanks. And the thing about German infantry, especially early, it takes a LONG time for German infantry newly built on Berlin to reach the eastern front. If Germany loses those forward Germany infantry, that’s not a nice thing at all for Germany.

If USSR wants to hit Karelia on USSR2, then what does it need? USSR1 build infantry and artillery won’t reach, only USSR1 build tanks or air will.

So. Think about Karelia. If Germany bulks up at Karelia, USSR has a good chance to kick its teeth in a little, and that’s going to suck for Germany. Germany could even lose some valuable tanks. Then USSR just retreats to West Russia and moves in infantry reinforcements, too bad for Germany. Yes yes, hand clapping all around, good job Allies.

And if Germany doesn’t move into Karelia in force then USSR trades Karelia, which isn’t flashy, but if Germany didn’t control Karelia for the full round then Germany can’t place two units there, which hurts German logistics. And to be real about it, it’s not that Germany is “just going to make up the difference” with infantry from Berlin. It takes time for Germany to get stuff to the front, it’s a real problem, so again, hand clapping all around, good job Allies.

What I’m getting at, in my aardvark way, is explaining why I believe Quintin doesn’t think Germany necessarily holds Karelia at the start of G2. Because I think that is not in his expected range of projections. And why not, if he’s going to say USSR buys two tanks, he’d probably be quite right.

But to me, who favors USSR1 4 inf 3 art buy and who also thinks about a soft USSR1 hold of West Russia in case of bad dice, I do NOT assume that USSR2 has good options against Karelia. Instead, I try to exploit positional distances between Germany’s objectives, and accept the possibility of a German-controlled Karelia at start of G2. (And note, I’ve also written a lot about Allies attacking and retreating from Ukraine, which preserves a USSR2 Allied threat against Karelia, so I’m not just saying the Allies necessarily totally give up on Karelia, plus there’s the possibility of good USSR1 dice, but I digress).

So, Karelia. So what?

So what is Japan can put a bomber on Karelia by the end of J1. It might not WANT to, but it’s an option. Further, as I mentioned elsewhere, in some setups Japan may want to put battleship, carrier, and two fighters south of Persia at end of J1, from where Japanese fighters can make it to Karelia.

Okay, so let’s keep considering the development of the position. Suppose at end of G1, Germany has two infantry on Finland (started out on Norway) and three fighters. Those fighters have range to UK’s sea zones and threaten West Russia. You could say NW Europe is an option, as is France, but if UK’s East Canada transport survived then UK has some attack options against the Finland infantry, and Germany doesn’t want that to happen. Lose territory in Europe, get pressured in Karelia, lose reinforcements to Karelia, bad bad bad, do not want. It’s not a GREAT UK attack but if they make it and get lucky, oof. So German fighters on Finland, yes? Make sense?

Remember I mentioned Quintin’s reference to Japan hitting Szechwan earlier? Specifically I said Japan may be risking valuable Japanese air but the general doctrine is Japan tries to deal with as much as it can so that’s less for Germany to deal with? Pretty important though I didn’t dig into it at the time, then there’s starting position, stack size, effective reinforcement.

But long story short, generally Germany should go ground and NOT air, and Germany wants to press at least one battle against a combined Allied stack in Europe so long as it doesn’t cost Germany too much. I’m not saying Germany must BREAK the Allied stack, but it wants to press a battle on Axis terms so even if Axis don’t win right there, at least Japan can finish Russia off then reinforce a beleaguered Germany. (And then there’s how German carrier or bomber builds aren’t the worst Germany can do but I won’t get into that now.)

So what I’m getting at is, again indirectly - if Germany has really good odds on a hugely IPC-favorable naval battle in the Atlantic early, then Germany wants to think about taking it. If the Allies are competent probably that doesn’t happen, but Germany wants to watch for it. But if it’s not hugely favorable, then Germany doesn’t want to bleed out its air, because Germany wants to SAVE Germany’s air for that big stack battle that eventually will be coming one way or another. Make sense?

Then there’s some complications I won’t get into that mean probably Germany can’t hold on to Finland for too long, Germany wants to choke off US/UK reinforcments to pile up uselessly in Norway and Finland while it also prevents any “teleport” retreating into West Russia, pushes USSR back from West Russia . . . things.

Right. But anyways, Karelia.

In the meantime, consider UK and US’s naval situation. UK is choked for income for various reasons I won’t get into, US has lousy logistics. But there’s not much Germany can do about US1 naval build off East US, US2 air build and naval movement, UK3 fleet drop, US3 fleet reinforcement. That is slower than the Allies ideally want, but at the latest, even if Germany builds crazy loads of air, there’s not a lot Germany can do against that combined UK3/US3 fleet.

But Germany is not alone, and this is where it all starts to come together. Just to recap, so far I talked about USSR1 buy / dice assumptions, how West Russia develops, how that affects projections on Karelia, and the Allies in Atlantic in KGF. I also referenced how by end of J1 Japan can put a bomber on Karelia and by end of J2 two fighters and a bomber (the two fighters from a J1 carrier that ended its turn south of Persia).

Suppose UK1 and UK2 place three infantry at India, leaving 70ish IPCs for a UK3 fleet drop. Say UK drops another 12 IPCs on four infantry for London to fill out four transports that plan to drop eight units every turn. (Actually there’s some old papers on Axis and Allies org I think on the Revised boards that talk about the merits of UK transports 5-7 in the Atlantic, and though that’s for a different version, some of that still applies, but I won’t get into that too much here). Anyways that still leaves around 60 IPCs for UK3 four transports, destroyer, and carrier, and a bit to spare besides.

But now think about what happens if UK just drops that fleet on UK3. UK3 placement followed by US3 reinforcement isn’t something Germany can at all reasonably handle. But if it’s Japan? If both Germany and Japan have air forces in Europe, then if UK’s Atlantic fleet moves then Japan can hit before US can reinforce; if US moves then Germany can hit before UK can reinforce. True Germany doesn’t want to spend its air, but if there’s a fat transport payout that disrupts Allied shipments to Atlantic, well, if UK and US have to build another escort fleet and transports (and they need some escorts if Japan still has a mighty air force), well, you see how it is.

But that isn’t a “real” issue because UK/US can still do all that, just going northwest of London? And J2 fighters on Karelia won’t have range? Well, I could say Japan could send those fighters to France instead but whatever. If Japan’s sending stuff to France then it’s definitely out of circulation near India and that’s going to mess with Japan’s timings there. And three Japanese dice isn’t the greatest attack force against five or six UK defenders which is a real possibility etc. etc. SO eh.

But the real problem, as I mentioned with USSR “pressure” at Buryatia earlier (quotation marks because imo it’s not a real threat) - is if Japan doesn’t move into Europe on that timing, that opens UK’s options.

Some things in the game, the timing can be deferred. But is that what happens here?

Suppose Japan doesn’t move fighters to France, which there’s good reason not to as Japan wants its Japanese fighters to pressure UK’s stack off India. Is that a thing?

In some games, even most games, I’d say Japanese air can push UK off India 1-2 turns earlier, and that’s not a small thing.

But I don’t know that it’s decisive. I say if Germany moves its stack up and captures Caucasus, and if UK’s stack at India is cut off at that point that’s a big shift in favor of Axis. Yes, I think Japan should try to capture India early, yes, I think Japan can capture India early, but I’m saying even if Japan doesn’t do it, if Germany cuts UK’s India stack off, that does quite nicely, that’ll do.

But what happens if Japan doesn’t move Japanese air to Europe early?

Let’s say Japan keeps the bulk of its air back to trade in Asia and pressure India and keep light UK/US fleet action off in the Pacific, in a KGF (Kill Germany First) scenario.

For every turn of Japan delay, the Allies have time to get naval escorts in. It’s not just about US having time to build and being able to use its decent economy but sucky logistics to help UK’s sucky economy and fantastic logistics. Nor is it even about pressuring early UK/US naval escorts that could otherwise go to transports. Nor is it even about the awkwardness of Allies defending new UK naval builds placed around London. It’s also that UK can get its Australia fleet to the Atlantic, UK’s India fleet survivors may move around south Africa into the Atlantic, and any US Pacific fleet arrives too. It’s all these things adding up. And even then I’m not saying early Japanese air to Europe is this amazing thing. I’m not saying “omg! u lose J1-4 air pressure!” I am saying, though, that there’s considerations. The less pressure Japan pushes on Allies, the more freedom Allies have.

This isn’t supposed to be some kind of super comprehensive address on Pearl Harbor. I’m just trying to give you the idea that J1 attack on Pearl is not really a “simple” question. Sometimes it’s right, sometimes it’s wrong, often it’s ambiguous and you make the call depending on factors other than simply the board position - such as your read of your opponent’s risk assessment, and your understanding of your own playstyle.

I’m not saying players need to be thinking about all this stuff to play. Players can do whatever they want. But if you’re looking to rationality and mathematics, you’ve got to understand things are connected, and not in some vague way, but in very specific and detailed ways.

==

Would I attack Pearl Harbor?

If I were serious about the game and trying to win, I would not attack Pearl Harbor in 1942 Online. I don’t say that’s categorically correct; I’ve never run serious projections using hard math. But I do have a lot of reasons, only some of which I’ve gone into here. I’m not saying it’s all one-sided, there’s plenty of counterarguments, only some of which I’ve mentioned here, but on the balance I’d say no, I wouldn’t go for it.

But that is not to disagree with Quintin. I think if the meta were different, I probably would go Pearl.

Roughly my thought is - provided UK didn’t hit the East Indies fleet -

If I do Pearl then I have some positive chance (not super high but still) the Tokyo fighter doesn’t die then I have to commit Japan’s Caroline Islands carrier, it’s a US no-brainer counter and that sucks for Japan, because I want to move one carrier into Mediteranean and probably keep another for east Pacific. So I want two carriers at least, and I don’t want to build any new carriers as they’re expensive, so I don’t want to lose any.

If I don’t do Pearl, considering what I’ve seen in the hundreds plus games I’ve played, considering what I’ve ever read from posts by players, I think the odds are VERY SMALL that I’ll actually have to deal with a competent player that will actually use the carrier in a way that makes me feel “wow, messed up there.”

So very small (but non-zero) chance of eating a nasty counter, versus practically zero chance of maybe someone playing accurately but even if they did I’d have counterplay. That’s what it comes down to in my mind.

That said, I probably am NOT going to be serious in any given game, and I will probably do Pearl, or UK1 attack on Japan’s East Indies fleet, or whatever thing, almost certainly I won’t run proper projections and there’s every probability I won’t even use any calculation aids.

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Should YOU do Pearl Harbor?

I’d say yeah. If you have any doubt about it, you should do it, for your development as a player if nothing else.

And for your development as a player you should also play games where you do NOT do Pearl Harbor.

Even when things are pretty “dumb” you should probably do them at one time or another just to get a better understanding of why you shouldn’t do these things, how you can try to salvage the situation if you do do them, and often this sort of thinking lets you work out a better plan in case of bad dice.

Like if you think USSR defense is hard, try a USSR1 battleship buy. It’s NOT SMART, but the longer you play it the more you understand some weird stuff you might not think about.

Like what happens if USSR builds a fleet north of Karelia? Nobody’s saying it’s smart, but how does that affect the development of UK and US in Pacific? If Germany wants to challenge that fleet, what does Germany need to give up to make that happen? If Germany doesn’t challenge that fleet what are USSR’s options? What if USSR builds navy at Caucasus? What are the percentages of projected attacks against Germany’s Med navy, and where do USSR’s fighters have to be to make that happen? If USSR has decreased unit count in Europe, in what ways can UK and US slow Germany? If UK and US fly fighters in for quick reinforcements, how does that position develop, how does that delay UK/US fleet in Atlantic, what is the timing of Germany and Japan’s threats - not poorly handled by an incompetent player, but in the hands of a very sharp player? Etc.

When I say Japan can hit Pearl even if USSR stacks Buryatia, why do you think I say that with such confidence? Because I’ve been there, I’ve played that game, not once, but multiple times, from both sides, and each time I didn’t just knee-jerk react to what my opponents played, I ran projections (even if very basic ones) and did some light calculations. That’s why I know USSR committing east is going to mess them up at West Russia in upcoming turns, that’s why I say USSR committing to threatening Manchuria costs in Europe. I know that because I thought about things from the USSR perspective, I know about Japan’s best responses because I thought about things from the Japan perspective, and though there wasn’t a lot of “thought” involved, a lot of it was just you play a lot of games, do a lot of different stuff, even stupid stuff that you know doesn’t work, you think about things.

If I recall right, when I stacked Buryatia with USSR, Japan botched the response, Germany botched the response, and I just steamrolled them. But that’s not how it should have worked. When I played the Axis side, I knew Allies would have weak defense at West Russia, and you think I’ll say I steamrolled West Russia? But I didn’t, I used my basic Japan strategy, ended up with unit count, positional, and economic advantages, and attritioned my way to the win.

The point I’m making is - you can know the theoretical advantages and disadvantages of a line, but raw theory has a way of interacting with other theory and mathematics in actual practice. If you want to improve as a player you have to understand the practical expression of conflicting theoretical factors, such as, say, concentration versus dispersion of force. If I played Axis saying the “theory” says Allied West Russia is weak, therefore I MUST break West Russia, that would have been wrong. But the fact that the Allies sent so much towards Japan in that game what was what messed with them in the end. They made sacrifices to protect West Russia; instead of taking the Allies head on and playing their game, I redirected some to Africa and choked them out.

So try different things, don’t worry so much about whether something’s “right” or “wrong”. Try to improve your fundamentals so you know why something is “right” or “wrong”.

@william-macphereson said in How to play UK:

I have a somewhat different approach to Great Britain.

I’m going to make a distinction. Some posters say that I just don’t like anything different to what I write, which is the same I say of certain other posters. But you’ll notice I don’t hesitate to break down the numbers and the details (which others don’t do, not really), and even when I do disagree with something “different” to how I would play, I make a distinction between “different wrong” and “just different”.

Recent example, I think it was “1baddude” on Steam, said he split a German Atlantic sub off to hit the UK cruiser. And this is NOT something I would do, it IS different. But I do not say it is WRONG; I can build out a mathematical line that shows that there are solid reasons to do that exact play. It isn’t something I would normally do, it’s “different”, but I don’t say it’s “wrong”.

But for the unquoted parts, building UK1 3 fighters and the planned usage, mmm . . . well, I hesitate to say “wrong”, but I’m certainly going to say it all is described completely different to what I’d think reasonable to expect.

“3 fighters which get dropped into India. Ideally, by the end of round 2, you’ve consolidated the other two fighters with those 3 in India, creating a hornet’s nest to warn off the Japanese fleet.”

. . . except that doesn’t happen, I think.

First, Allied defense of West Russia is by no means a certain situation. Can you really afford to have a “hornet’s nest” at India? Considering even German attack and withdraw actions could be profitable, considering Japan could kill the US fighter on Szechwan even if USSR reinforced with an infantry. Second, why do you need five fighters on India? Even if Japan’s Kwangtung transport survives, even if you transported units out of India (which you said you did to attack Borneo), you still won’t need five fighters on India, Japan simply shouldn’t leave anything in range for UK to get a good battle - why would Japan do otherwise?

If you are playing out-of-the-box setup instead of the LHTR setup then you could maybe make a case, but I assume the LHTR setup is used as that’s what’s standard for ladder. Which, by the way, if you DO assume out-of-the-box setup, that’s perfectly valid, but I think it would be good to make that clear, yes? Makes a lot of difference.

But either way, let’s think about what really happens.

1. My assertion is India is NOT immediately threatened by Japan. I say UK1 build of 2 fighters on London 3 infantry on India means, if West Russia isn’t broken, that UK2 can land those UK1 London fighters on West Russia then by UK3 they make it to India. More specifically I’m saying UK overcomes its local production limits of 3 units on India by building on London and shifting those to India.

If you claim UK1 3 fighter build on India has a use, I could go with that. But you’ll need something better than a vague “hornet’s nest”, got to have some very specific usage that makes the unit count loss at India worth it (compared to UK1 2 fighter 2 infantry 1 artillery or some other combination of 3 UK ground on India).

2. My assertion is UK does NOT have a hornet’s nest to warn off the Japan fleet. J1-J2 consolidate control of the Asian coast, then J3 Japan starts dropping to Yunnan. This is what happens even if the Allies push KJF (Kill Japan First). UK fighters on India simply don’t have the range to hit any important Japanese fleet elements at any sort of favorable odds for those first few turns, and probably UK will never be able to use its air effectively against Japan, barring possibly threat on Burma, but there again, compare UK1 3 fighters on India to UK1 3 ground on India and 2 fighters on London. The application for UK fighters at India is very specific. It’s not all bad, but I don’t know that I’d say it’s worth the opportunity cost.

Remember, 1942 Online (unlike in 1942 Second Edition) you can’t land UK fighters on US carriers. If you COULD then mass UK air is a whole other story (and how), but you CAN’T. Supposedly it’s been about a year and a half and no official announcements as to their intending to put it in, so I figure it’s probably not in. Anyways.

“After R1, it’s 3 infantry every round to India until Japan has fully committed in Central Asia, then maybe build some armor”.

Disagree. If you said infantry or artillery and maybe a tank somewhere, then I’d be like yeah. But pure infantry cuts your options.

Theoretically you build infantry because you don’t want to spend on artillery which you’ll lose to a counter. Theoretically you have a glut of UK air. But in practical terms that isn’t the case. If you must use your air to get favorable odds to hit a target, then you must use that air for that attack, which means you can’t use your air for other actions. Your opponent knows your options are limited, so then they can hit you with multiple threat options and force you to choose. Whatever you don’t hit they then have the advantage at, and why? Because you went pure infantry and limited your options. And remember, you specified UK is fighter-heavy, not bombers. UK fighters aren’t bad at all, but what do UK fighters on India really have range to do? Sitting on India all they can do is defend. Yes, UK1 mass India air does threaten off J1 battleship/carrier/2 fighters south of Persia, but on the flip side those UK fighters aren’t on West Russia defending there either so Germany has better options. From India, UK fighters can fly to West Russia but there’s not really room for any other action; UK fighters can also help stave off German incursion into Africa etc. etc. but again and again the issue is UK fighters don’t really have a load of flexibility for a long time. And when you do have openings, I assert that often you’ll want cheap UK artillery so you have better options.

Maybe in the back of your mind you’re thinking those UK fighters threaten the Borneo sea zone. But if Japan recaptures Borneo, which it has excellent chances at (unless UK lucksacks on the capture and again on the defense) - but at the outset of the UK action, UK can’t know it will lucksack. So the expected outcome is Japan recaptures Borneo then UK fighters on India don’t have range to hit the sea zone.

But moving on, suppose Japan tries to capture and hold Burma. There’s going to be a turn where it’s awkward for Japan; all UK units on India can hit Burma then retreat, potentially killing a load of Japanese units for a few UK units, and Japan won’t be able to land fighters if it just captured Burma. But in that scenario, if you want to inflict a chunk of casualties, cheap artillery is going to boost UK’s options. But you can just use a UK fighter to make up for the lack of UK artillery? Not really; that’s why I made the point that UK fighters aren’t terribly flexible. If you want to use a UK fighter to help defend West Russia, you can’t have that UK fighter hit Burma, it won’t make it. So if you want to make up the difference, you will want something else. Make sense? And 1 IPC for changing an infantry for an artillery buys two attack pips; 10 IPCs for three attack pips on a fighter you can see isn’t as efficient. (The mathematics works out a bit differently to what I’m implying but in effect 1 IPC for 2 pips or 10 IPCs for 3 pips, it’s just a lot.)

As to late tanks, I sort of disagree. UK can get some very interesting and nice things off early tanks between Africa and even later in Europe, just opens up a lot of options. But is that really worth trading off sheer early unit count? Maybe not. So maybe you don’t build early tanks. But late tanks? Assuming the Axis are competent, probably late UK tanks are way too late to do anything useful. So if you do want gains off tanks, early can make a big difference. Late tanks, it’s sort of too late and UK’s economy gets tied up with units at London anyways.

The rationale on UK tanks early/late? Okay, obviously if you have a UK tank at India then you can blitz towards Africa, and maybe depending you can capture Morocco, Algeria, Libya, or at least deny German income in the south and at Egypt. Or if you have a UK tank at Europe, maybe you can use it (there’s a lot of complicated shenanigans UK can pull) against probably Germany, sure. But it must be early. If UK delays too much at northwest Africa, then Germany is sitting on uncontested income, probably US wants to step in, then US gets the income and UK never does. So it’s early or never there. Or if Germany somehow managed to sneak a tank into undefended south Africa and for whatever reason UK’s South Africa infantry and air can’t do anything and US didn’t do anything, then again, IF all that happens, then if UK builds a tank late it’s going to be too late; Japan can drop to Africa to secure German income even if that means bypassing India, then Germany is just impossible to dislodge. If you have a lone tank racing west, maybe it doesn’t get cut off by Germany from Caucasus because Germany didn’t capture Caucasus yet, maybe Japan doesn’t blow it up because Japan’s still developing at Yunnan and the Asian coast - but late? Late, Japan will be in the area or even if Japan’s dealing with KJF, Germany will have secured the early income. Late is too late.

" transport goes to Borneo with 2 infantry. It’s a suicide mission for all concerned, but it succeeds about 75% of the time"

4. Less than 68%.

http://calc.axisandallies.org/?mustland=0&abortratio=0&saveunits=0&strafeunits=0&aInf=2&aArt=&aArm=&aFig=&aBom=&aTra=&aSub=&aDes=&aCru=0&aCar=&aBat=&adBat=&dInf=1&dArt=&dArm=&dFig=&dBom=&dTra=&dSub=&dDes=&dCru=&dCar=&dBat=&ddBat=&ool_att=Bat-Inf-Art-AArt-Arm-Sub-SSub-Des-Fig-JFig-Cru-Bom-HBom-Car-dBat-Tra&ool_def=Bat-Inf-Art-AArt-Arm-Bom-HBom-Sub-SSub-Des-Car-Cru-Fig-JFig-dBat-Tra&battle=Run&rounds=&reps=10000&luck=pure&ruleset=AA1942&territory=&round=1&pbem=

Also there’s other considerations. You drain two infantry out of India which seems to be compensated for because Japan has to use its Japan transport to recapture Borneo. If you get super lucksack with UK1’s attack maybe you have two defenders on Borneo and it can get awkward for Japan, but there’s no guarantee at all that you can use those planned 5 UK fighters on India to hit Japan at Borneo, and regardless J2 recaptures.

Maybe you’re thinking that the load of UK power has got to mean something, but it doesn’t work out that way against decent Axis. Think about the pie-in-the-sky projection, you capture Borneo, mass UK fighters on India, Japan doesn’t hit the US fleet at Hawaiian Islands, US captures Solomons. Even off a stock J1 opening that ends its turn with 4 transports, Japan has a counter of 8 ground 4 air and bombards easily against Borneo against perhaps 8 defenders, UK and US trade their whole air for cheap Japanese ground. But that doesn’t happen, and UK doesn’t buy an IC on Borneo as it can’t defend it? All right, Japan recaptures Borneo with little trouble, defending with two battleships, two carriers, four fighters, destroyer, and cruiser; US can ramp up pretty fast but hitting Borneo sea zone on US2 is still too fast, so that doesn’t happen, right? And if US doesn’t press a hard response to Borneo, then Japan can commit less fleet, J2 can still start building 2 subs a turn against KJF, etc.

What I’m getting at is, Allies can have a load of power in the area but it’s very hard to leverage against competent Axis. Especially with 1942 Online’s rules changes. Remember also, if US1 builds Pacific fleet, Germany probably has a load of freedom at Europe and Africa, and that’s going to be trouble.

Anyways you start looking at the pros and the cons and it comes down to UK has less at India, UK’s India stack makes less impact when it pushes into Europe as it retreats from Japan, the loss of UK flexibility contrasted to ease of Japan’s response - my opinion is Borneo shouldn’t be the “stock” UK move. Even if UK1 capturing Borneo without using a cruiser bombard was 75%, even 80%, I would question it.

Don’t get me wrong. I like playing greedy, even when it’s mathematically wrong. So would I hit Borneo? Sure, yeah, I’ve been known to do it. Yay UK income. But that’s not the same as recommending it.

But if someone says to park the UK transport east of Africa I’m not going to say that’s wrong either. There’s reasons for that too.

“Whatever you do, though, don’t camp your India/Egypt fighter on the Indian Carrier,”

Considering you said to send UK’s Indian Ocean carrier and cruiser against Japan’s destroyer and transport off Kwangtung, sure.

But players - especially UK players - need to THINK, not just accept, but to think, run the numbers, etc.

Such as? Say Germany parked its battleship and transport south of Italy and built a Mediterranean carrier. Depending on other Germany moves, maybe UK doesn’t have any good options to hit the German Mediterranean fleet. So then what does UK do? Probably UK still wants to destroy Japan’s Kwantgung destroyer / transport, but now UK can use air to do it, as UK doesn’t have any other good targets for its air near India anyways.

So then what happens with UK’s India carrier and transport? If Germany didn’t hit Egypt or Trans-Jordan then you can potentially have east of Africa UK destroyer, carrier, and fighter. Japan can only hit that with two fighters. But does Japan do that? Probably not. So there’s a decent chance that UK can preserve some fleet to head around South Africa to join up in Atlantic.

Which doesn’t seem like such a big deal maybe but as I’ve written elsewhere, I think Japan should push big air to Europe against KGF, then believe me the Allies are scrambling through the couch for pocket change. A destroyer and a carrier even late is pretty nice.

“The Aussie fleet has a choice in round 1- grab an aussie and a kiwi infantry and head for Africa, or try and sink the Japanese sub”

Or hit New Guinea. Usually I would say UK Aus fleet heading towards Atlantic and eventually Europe (not Africa) is the way to go. Specifically, if UK can capture Morocco UK3 and push east, that’s ideal; UK wants all the income it can get. But normally I expect UK to make a play for Morocco on UK2 anyways. As to dropping to southwest Africa, I think US is better for that. Yes, UK air in the India region means UK ground in India has better options, but UK fleet in Atlantic is so much better I don’t know that I would want to delay. But anyways though UK Aus to Africa is something to keep in mind, I think UK Aus often ends up northeast Atlantic.

“Meanwhile, in England, other than the 3 infantry going to India, it’s Destroyers and a Carrier in round 2 if it’s safe enough, otherwise a bomber and a few infantry/arty for the eventual attack on Europe”

That sounds pretty optimistic to me.

A lot of players say “yeah you can just buy whatever!” but if you’re really looking to squeeze the last bit of efficiency out of every IPC, think on this.

UK is starving for income, always. London can place 8 units, India 3, combined 11 units, pure infantry buy requires 33 IPCs. Yes, UK transports in Atlantic can drop to any number of territories but still, infantry aren’t terribly flexible. You want some artillery in there to free up your air to hit other targets of opportunity, you want air, you want transports, you want naval escorts. 33 IPC will not be enough, and if you’re looking at UK income after India falls, you’re still looking at 24 IPC just for infantry. If UK wants any sort of tactical flexibility at all, it needs more than just infantry, so UK is absolutely starving for income, always.

You do UK1 3 fighter buy, then follow up with excess navy and bomber buys, and UK’s going to be low on unit count. You really have to think about the tradeoffs. If you go a bomber (just one) I’d say probably you could make something of that between Asia, Africa, and Europe, but you throw in a bunch of fighters and destroyers too? UK fighters and destroyers don’t have much tactical flexibility, throw in low unit count and I expect it to be an issue. Well, against decent players.

“By round 5, the Germans should be knocking on Moscow’s door and the Japanese will probably be poised for an all out assault on India (which England won’t win in all likelihood)”

That doesn’t happen with competent Axis players.

See what you think.

G1 infantry/artillery buy, G2 infantry on Berlin, then depending either G3 infantry to start building stack defense against Allies (Germany doesn’t want to endlessly trade) or G3 tanks to push the timing on USSR. The G2 Berlin infantry/artillery build push into Ukraine on G4, if Japan is running late it grabs India right around then (it isn’t “poised” to start threatening India on J5, that’s just way late), and Japanese fighters reinforce German stack pressing in towards USSR and/or Karelia.

From G4 capture and hold of Ukraine, both West Russia and Caucasus are threatened; probably the Allies can’t defend both so fall back from West Russia, Germany moves into West Russia in force on G5, then USSR has to defend Russia or Caucasus so defends Russia, then Germany presses into Caucasus on G6, and only on G7 does Germany seriously threaten Russia. And in that there’s some threats and timings I didn’t detail, like Germany moving its Western Europe stack into Berlin to defend it while moving its Berlin stack into Baltic States, freeing Germany to build bombers to hit Russia with, German tanks on Karelia threatening to hit Russia immediately provided certain things, any UK/US pressure into Karelia possibly being crushed by Germany’s stack on West Russia.

OK? Everything makes sense so far?

So the question is if the Axis player is competent, then why is Japan screwing around with India? First, why is Japan so late with its pressure against India? Second, if Germany is developing pressure against Russia, that should be obvious to Japan, so Japan should be trying to bleed off USSR units and income in the east. If UK has a stack at India that gets cut off after Germany grabs Caucasus, too bad for UK, it can’t unite with Russia. Then after Russia falls, Russia has 8 local production and Caucasus 4, plus Japan’s 8, 20 units against about 3 units a turn on India, India falls for sure.

What I’m saying is the Axis know all this, so if Germany is SERIOUSLY threatening Russia, then Japan is NOT seriously threatening India, because that’s like Japan being off picking flowers and watching the pretty birds while the war is lost or won in Europe. And Japan should not do that.

If it’s a G5 threat against Moscow, probably that came off a G1 West Russia break, which was all calculated before Germany’s first turn purchase phase. So Germany is racing to choke Russia out, and if Japan is on its back foot screwing around with India - you see?

So I’m saying with competent Axis, either you probably see G7 pressure against Russia at earliest and Japan capturing India J5 (if not earlier), but J5 is kinda late. But if you have G5 pressure against Russia, Japan is trying to choke out Russia ASAP instead of sitting uselessly near India. And real talk, if G5 pressure against Russia was all calculated and projected, then probably UK lost India anyways early because UK had to abandon it early to send reinforcemetns ASAP to Russia. That’s why I’m saying that scenario where G5 is going to hit Russia but ends up failing while Japan is screwing around against India, none of that remotely should be happening.

==

Don’t get me wrong, if the Axis aren’t competent then it all plays out as was described; UK air is a hornet’s nest against Japanese navy because Japan plays completely incompetently, Germany overcommits to early tanks and air and runs out of steam against Russia, Japan makes a late and bad attack against India. Sure.

Or even if the Axis are competent, considering different player decisions and dice outcomes, some of that could happen. Kind of.

But if making the case for usage, you can see where I’m saying it’s appropriate additional details be provided. Instead of simple and dogmatic “always do this”, it ends up being more “under specific conditions XYZ and ABC, THEN you do this”

But even if you attach conditions to the actions, UK1 3 fighters on India followed by UK pure infantry on India is, I think, going to be tough. Like yeah you can get away with it against the meta, maybe, but I don’t know that I would say it’s “solid”.

Thought I’d responded to some points in this thread but maybe not.

Anyways seeing how the thread is necro and there’s a lot of stuff floating around - going to write some for some of the more “advanced” players I suppose, though I don’t like that term.

1. UK is for the most skilled player.
2. In a decent game without aberrant dice, UK abandons India to help hold Russia. If the Allies position stabilizes, UK can reclaim India in time.

So I read some stuff through the thread like players saying this happens or that happens. But this is just the same oversimplified hash that I’m always saying new players shouldn’t fall for.

Examples?

Suppose Germany blew up UK’s East Canada destroyer and had two submarines and all its air surviving against the UK battleship battle northeast of London, losing the cruiser. The combination is not super likely, but as each action individually has decent expectations of success, there is good reason for Germany to undertake both, and Germany can get lucky.

(As to WHY Germany does those actions, I won’t get into that here as this is a UK thread but anyone can start a Germany thread or whatever.)

Then let’s also say Germany lands its air in range of the UK sea zones, which is also not necessarily the case but can reasonably happen (if Germany doesn’t try to hold Ukraine using German fighters, if Germany doesn’t land fighters on a new Mediterranean carrier).

So then Germany has two submarines five fighters against UK destroyer, cruiser, carrier, and two fighters. It’s not a fantastic battle for Germany, but Germany does have the advantage that it doesn’t really care what happens to its submarines, but every UK fleet loss has to be replaced. (Well, not the cruiser so much, but still). And there’s some complications, like UK potentially losing a very expensive carrier early, or losing its cheaper fighters and thus losing defense power early.

Then there’s also the question of what UK’s transport fleet looks like and its planned usage.

Yes, this is all a bit involved, I know. But I did say UK is for the most skilled player. The stuff I’m talking about so far isn’t even the complicated stuff, it’s not even the basic level, it’s the stuff you know before you even get to basic level.

So let’s say you drop destroyer and carrier and Germany can’t punish. Somehow. But there’s no guarantee of that either. Because Germany air purchases and moves may have left USSR-controlled West Russia in danger of being broken on G2, so UK may not want to keep its London fighters back to land on a carrier, they might want to land on West Russia instead.

And inevitably some silly person speaks up saying “but if Germany breaks West Russia then Germany loses all its tanks”. But first, we don’t know that happens, second we don’t know what happens even if that does happen, third that doesn’t consider the possibility of Germany attacking then retreating, fourth that doesn’t consider the two-peak model plus the aforementioned uncertainties which mean Germany may attack with intent to retreat but keep its options open to simply crack West Russia like an egg, withstand any USSR counter, then crush Russia and Axis go on to win handily.

And when I say that Japan lands two fighters on a carrier south of Persia so they have range to reinforce any G2 push to West Russia or Karelia, and/or Japan pushes a bomber to Europe as early as J1, maybe you start getting an idea of what I mean by UK basic level. UK basic means you’re watching the USSR stacks, the German stacks, USSR ability to defend against Germany, Japan’s reinforcements, you know all of that, you know all their little tricks for both sides, and you know how to use UK to thread that needle. And even then you’re not advanced, you’re just basic.

So how do you know when you’re a little advanced? Well, when you start to understand the applications, and by that point you’re no longer following dogmatic simple advice like “always buy two fighters two infantry one artillery”, but instead you’re looking at the board and in your head it’s like the Matrix. Except of course by the time you’re actually there you don’t think of it as being complicated.

So let’s say Germany lost all its subs on G1, then you’re considering a UK1 buy of carrier and transport because you’re trying to threaten against 1) any German fortification of Norway and/or Finland, 2) threatening capture of BOTH Norway AND Finland if Germany does NOT defend both (which it can’t comfortably do), 3) thinking about what you do if Germany and Japan land mass air at Karelia threatening any UK2 landing, 4) how German fighters at Karelia have limited range opening up a possible UK/US landing at France and NW Europe, 5) US’s builds and fleet timings and how Germany and Japan actions and UK actions may or may not make landings possible as part of an overall strategic plan. Then there’s some other stuff I won’t get into, but even all this stuff doesn’t mean “master” level thinking. That’s just barely the basics level.

All I’m doing there is making the point that playing UK involves more complicated decisions and a better understanding of each other power in the game, and a better understanding of the game itself, than any other single power.

If someone wants to oversimplify for newer players, okay. But even newer players should understand when it is being oversimplified.

To answer the OP, what do I do?

Roughly, it goes like this:

1. I think about the opposing team, any play experience I have of them in the past, any guesses I have as to how they’ll play based on what they’ve said or what they’ve done. I try to figure out their risk preferences, their play preferences, and their familiarity with different lines.

Then it’s important that one remember one’s own risk preferences, familiarities with lines, and weaknesses.

For example? I’m risk averse; when I carry out an action I want to have a good backup plan in case the dice don’t work out. So I try to use superior calculation and long-term planning, wait for an opponent to drop the ball and/or screw up, then I just grind them to death.

But when I play against Craig, I can’t afford to do that, because Craig uses what I call threat multiplication (an unfortunate personal term that bears only passing resemblance to the term as it’s used properly in current military parlance). In fact Craig’s the one that TAUGHT me that. So when I play against Craig, I have to remember I just can’t afford to play it “safe” because that play style doesn’t work, and he’s strong enough that he probably won’t just fall into a grind-to-death trap. He WILL have his chances at reversals, and I have to let him take them, because trying to beat him easy raw power and raw calculations just doesn’t work against his play style.

2. UK1 you have to look at West Russia, Szechuan, the UK East Canada sea zone, the UK/German position in the Atlantic, including whether the UK cruiser survived, Germany’s actions in the Mediterranean. You also have to look at USSR’s actions, USSR1 dice outcomes, Germany’s actions, Germany1’s dice outcomes, Germany’s buys, Germany’s air placement, and you should also have asked US what its plans were.

Why? Roughly it’s something like this. If Germany has a good attack on West Russia there’s a good chance it takes it. And why? Not because Germany intends to capture West Russia, but simply because Germany is trying to kill a load of USSR units to weaken USSR’s threats. Why does trading make any sense to Germany? Because USSR can use a SINGLE W Rus stack to threaten BOTH Karelia AND Ukraine, both of which are points Germany wants to push to. But Germany does not have to worry so much about its ability to press and hold against USSR, because a German push can be followed by Japanese fighter reinforcements, and Germany’s advancing has less to do with raw power single stack offense against raw power multiple power stack defense, and more about Germany simultaneously threatening multiple territories which the Allies can’t both defend so Allies give way at one so Germany presses. OK?

What I’m getting at is it’s not enough that USSR defend West Russia against a German capture action. USSR’s defense at West Russia should be strong enough that Germany can’t even get good results off a planned attack then retreat action. Often that means UK wants to land its London fighters on West Russia, NOT on a newly built carrier in Atlantic. (But it’s a little complicated so read on).

So then you start thinking about G2 attacks into West Russia. Besides UK fighter reinforcement what else can reach? The US fighter on Szechwan. Even without any USSR reinforcements on Szechwan, Japan attacking Szechwan is still risky. USSR can move in an infantry, UK can maybe land a fighter from its Indian Ocean fleet (more on that later). But if UK doesn’t do that, if USSR doesn’t do that, then the Allies have to think about the possibility that Japan makes even a bad attack against Szechwan, just to kill the US fighter, just so it can’t reinforce West Russia, just so Germany has better odds against West Russia on G2. OK? When I say UK needs to look at West Russia, I don’t mean UK can just take for granted that US has can fly in a fighter from Szechwan, UK needs to be aware that Japan has options that may prevent that.

I mentioned that UK may not land a fighter on Szechwan and there’s complications regarding UK fighters on a new UK carrier in Atlantic.

First, suppose Germany gets territory in Africa. In some ways that’s nice because it pulls German units out of Europe, but quick German tanks running through Africa cuts UK income quick and increases German income quick. Germany leverages that income into superior unit count in its Europe factories, then that becomes a problem for the Allies down the line, whether they’re trying to break down Berlin/Europe, or whether Germany’s trying to beat down USSR’s door. More money gives Germany more options, and though there IS that tradeoff of Germany committing resources to Africa, a skilled Axis player leverages that advantage in the midgame to the Axis advantage. So to prevent exactly that, UK may (it also may not) have the opportunity to destroy Germany’s Mediterranean fleet, then use its Union of South Africa infantry along with UK air to destroy any quick German incursion into Africa.

UK will almost certainly lose Africa after Japan captures India for various reasons, but the point is to keep the income out of German hands. But if UK uses its air in the area (and the London bomber) to hit Germany’s Med fleet then there isn’t a UK fighter available to land on Szechwan.

See? It’s all connected.

As to early Allied landing in Finland/Norway, it’s not so simple. Yes, in some scenarios the Axis can beat up any premature UK fleet. But in other scenarios the Axis can’t beat up any UK fleet, for example suppose Germany landed all its fighters in Ukraine and/or Africa (to choke off early USSR income and push UK out of Africa, so there’s reason for Germany to do this, I’m not just saying it just randomly happens). But if that happens then maybe UK can try for some early greedy grabs of territory because it can’t be punished - and UK will WANT to be a bit greedy, because UK is going to take losses elsewhere that it can’t reasonably prevent because of Axis actions. OK?

Then there’s all the other things I mentioned earlier too.

So you have to think about all those things. Sometimes you’ll go three infantry for India and two fighters for London, sometimes you’ll go two infantry one artillery for India and two fighters for London, sometimes you’ll go two infantry one tank for India and save the rest, sometimes you’ll pop in a UK1 bomber to help out in Africa and/or pressure Mediterranean early.

Even off the same board position, what you choose can and probably should be different based on what you think your opponent will do.

@0verki11 said in Troops/Artillery on Transports:

but it would be really slick to add an error handler. If a user tries to put too many artillery/tanks onto a stack of transports, see if there is an open spots on any of the transports and check if any transport has two troops. If so, then just move that troop over for the user and add the tank/artillery to the transport.

I like that you broke it down step by step. Procedure’s correct too. Good post.

@0verki11 said in Back Buttons for Phases:

On the software side, you just need to do two things. First, disable the back button in the combat phase as soon as the first attack is made. Second, disable the the back button during the entire noncombat phase.

The developers gave tremendous lashback over the suggestion that defensive profiles be able to be turned off, saying not that it would be inconvenient or costly (which I’d agree with) but literally impossible.

So when you say here’s a feature, ought to reasonably be implemented, and “just” xyz, well, realistically, just don’t expect anything.

As to disable “back” during noncombat, nah. Don’t know if you misspoke and it isn’t going to happen anyways, but I’d say rewind should be:

1. Until first combat rolls are made, can rewind to any previous part, including purchase to change purchases.

2. Addition of confirmation for each battle before dice rolled as battle order does make a difference and 1942 Online UI handles awkwardly

3. Post-battle rewind when a retreat action taken, allowing retreat to a different territory / sea zone than initially selected or cancelling retreat (provided dice weren’t rolled for remaining attackers/defenders). Again, 1942 Online UI is awkward. Even if you jumped through all the hoops and were attentive, if you misclicked, dead.

4. After combat finished, allow rewinding to any post-combat point with additional rewind as described in 3 if retreat was the last action chosen.

Why disable rewind function during noncombat? Then players take triple the time to try not to make mistakes and end up making mistakes anyways? IRL someone forgets to noncom their stack it’s not great, lot of stuff to keep track of so maybe something gets messed up. But in a computer game, the program keeps track so things don’t get messed up. And if it’s sloppy for someone to do takebacks in IRL, you don’t want people trying to do takebacks all the time, waste of time? Considering 1942 Online literally compromised the gameplay to accommodate casuals, better think it through. Call something chess and use checkers rules, then shout it needs to be touch move because it’s serious? Come on! Serious game is serious, casual game is casual.

@snoil said in Game Imbalance massively obvious:

Fun fact, I notice a lot of custom games are the imbalanced version where the game creator is GER and JPN! LOL

No shame in knowing your limits.

About contingencies:

I mentioned contingencies a few times in passing. If Germany can’t break USSR from Karelia into West Russia with raw power, Germany can go in through Ukraine to push USSR / Allies combined stack back. If Allies can’t break Axis defense at Karelia with one power, it can do followup attacks with another.

Or when contingencies are absent; if Allies commit to France but can’t do much off the position, if Axis pressure Russia then the Allies may not have any outs. If Allies are committed to France, a partial pullout means Dunkirk except Germany doesn’t hold back, and anything sent to try to help Russia may not arrive in time anyways. If Germany tries a stack defense of Karelia and it fails, well, probably all Axis air is dead, most German tanks are dead and Germany can’t recover.

So you’re looking at this and maybe thinking “well, if Axis are in danger at Karelia why don’t they just pull back? isn’t aardvark always saying not to assume players are brain-dead?”

Right. But that gets to what I want to lead off with when talking about contingencies.

Some other players say things like “there are always things you can do”, or “if you’re smart you can always figure a way out.”

Usually, yes. Always, no.

If players want to play accurately, they need to think about things mathematically. Not romantically, not movie hero defying the odds, but coldly, mathematically, objectively.

So the problem with going right into how to use “contingencies” is when players build up a little confidence in their abilities they think maybe they can fudge things, get a little lucky, maybe small things won’t make a difference. Then it’s all about the romance and movie hero escapades, except now there’s a Scientist (fancy) that says Dramatic Things and is a Genius that Figures A Way Out. There’s always a Contingency Plan.

But really? What if your opponent is just better at running the numbers? And/or what if your opponent just got lucky?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFRCTeQtNdU

So the first thing to remember about contingencies is you won’t always have them.

The second to remember about contingencies is sometimes you SHOULD NOT have them.

Wait, what? How can NOT having a backup plan be a good idea?

“Put all your eggs in one basket, and then watch that basket” - Andrew Carnegie

If the Axis stack Karelia, what does that really mean? The strength is, UK/US ground reinforcements are cut off at Finland (there’s some Allied outs but they’re not great), Japan and Germany both have air that “locks down” UK and US fleets. (If UK and US fleets are together, maybe Axis don’t want to take the combined defense down. But the moment UK moves off, Japan can hit UK and/or US before US can move to reinforce UK. If US moves off first, Germany can hit UK and/or US before UK can move to reinforce. Even if Germany doesn’t have a huge air force, if Germany kept just five fighters that can be pretty nice if there’s a big transport payoff.)

Say the plan is Germany tries to force an Axis-favored battle against the USSR/Allied combined stack near Russia, while Japan pressures trades and grabs Africa income.

Suppose Japan tries to have a “backup plan” of pushing mass units through Asia to challenge Russia.

Then what happens? Probably Japan still doesn’t have the unit count to challenge USSR head-on. It’s still absolutely necessary that Germany get an Axis-favored battle against the USSR / Allied combined stack.

But how will Germany do that, when Japan has less units at Karelia, so Germany needs to commit more units there to defend? Japan also has less air near Atlantic, so UK/US don’t need as much naval escorts and can just keep building then dumping ground which in turn pressures Germany.

That doesn’t mean Japan building mass units is categorically wrong. Maybe dice and player action make it clear it’s unlikely Germany will ever be able to get any sort of decent battle against the USSR/Allied combined stack near Russia. Then the Axis need to try something else, if the current plan is unlikely to have any success.

But for this example the point is building a backup plan can cut the chances on the primary plan.

Watch out for whenever a “backup plan” requires significantly different buys and/or moves to a “primary plan”. When that happens, only switch plans if the primary plan has already succeeded or if the primary plan is unlikely to succeed. (If the primary plan already succeeded, mission accomplished and time to set new objectives and means of accomplishing those objectives. If the primary plan will probably fail, better not throw good money after bad and adapt a new plan.)

Do contingencies exist, are they of practical use? Sure. If Germany wants to choke off USSR income at Ukraine, if USSR has a bit too much at West Russia and Caucasus (which could hit any German push to Ukraine), USSR can deny income to USSR at Belorussia instead. The USSR infantry/artillery at Caucasus can’t reach, probably anything Germany could have pushed to Ukraine can reach Belorussia instead.

Yes, if Germany can’t capture and hold Ukraine that won’t push USSR into having to decide between defending West Russia and Caucasus. But Germany can still try to force a major stack battle favoring Axis at West Russia, perhaps by building air. In turn that could mean Germany’s defense of France collapses, but if the Axis can still get a tolerable position out of it, that may be what has to be done. (Though there’s no guarantee even allowing France’s defense to collapse would give the Axis a decent position, depending on the position.)

Third thing to remember about contingencies is you can’t do them if you don’t have what you need. When you leave a resource where it can be destroyed, whether it’s an expensive bomber or an inexpensive infantry, that means you won’t have it later.

Consider if the Allies try to pressure Japan. If Japan tries to pressure Asia and Africa (which I’d say usually it should despite the oncoming USA navy), US can advance in the Pacific, threaten any new builds in Japan sea zones, and push Japan’s navy away. Then US can start grabbing high value islands and set up industrial complexes and the Axis game can get pretty awkward.

But there’s a difference between “awkward” and “deadly”. If Japan loses control of the entire Pacific coast, if US is taking high value islands and setting up ICs, that’s tough for Axis. But if simultaneously Germany is about to crush Russia and UK has nothing happening in Europe, then Japan can wait for Germany.

But then what happens? Suppose Germany has a small fleet, moves it into position, then Japan uses its fleet to reinforce. The further US pushes into Pacific / Indian Oceans, the harder it is for US to protect its lines of reinforcement. So it’s possible that even if US had good odds against a Japanese fleet, just a few German naval units could tip the scales. And it’s very easy for Germany to, say, produce two carriers and a destroyer at Italy, then move through the Suez if Axis have control. Then Germany can land four fighters on, and that’s pretty hefty defense, especially if Japan still has a good-sized fleet.

But if Japan has no fleet left to reinforce, if Japan tried some (unnecessary) losing-odds battle for nonessential territory that it couldn’t hope to hole for long anyways, then Germany has no backup. And if Japan took a bad-odds battle then US won’t even have been severely weakened.

That doesn’t mean Japan shouldn’t try to fight in the Pacific even without German reinforcements, it doesn’t even mean Japan shouldn’t try some bad-odds desperation moves. It depends on the position. But if Japan loses a chunk of navy and air force for no good reason, that navy and air force won’t be around later to make a difference.

So to recap, for this section on contingencies. Rather than trying to have some complicated clever plan with a lot of parts moving in different conflicting directions, stick to the basics. Consider the numbers, consider your strategy, know when something’s not working as well as it needs to so you know to switch to something else. If you must spend units don’t hold back, but think about whether you really need to spend resources. You may, but you may not. Also remember even if your opponent plays completely correctly mathematically (they may not, I don’t), there is still dice variance so there may be an opening.

Earlier I went into how stack building and bleeding is just one of these really fundamental things to strategy. Other stuff that’s important, contingency planning, understanding multipeak models, how to filter what shortcuts are or are not effective without needing to run through full mathematical models.

Understanding stuff like multipeak models will improve performance, but I don’t know that it’s really “basic”. Contingency planning is a part of stack building and bleeding, but as that’s not apparent from the descriptive term I suppose I should get into that separately. How to build shortcuts, hm. I guess that’s kind of basic?

So I’ll go into shortcuts a bit, get into contingencies a bit on the way, then loop back to some of the more interesting applications of stack building and bleeding.

Okay, so shortcuts.

Attacker builds infantry and artillery, defender builds two infantry. Same attack, same defense, but attacker costs more. Simply, attack is more expensive than defense. If the game goes to a stalemate, defender is favored.

Defense is actually attack. Attack is actually defense. Crazy eh? But previous post I described how subs that are an attacking unit are used by a navy that’s on the defensive. The “defender” mostly stays where they are, which is the definition of defense. But since the “attacker” must move, the “attacker” moves into range of the "defender"s attack before the “attacker” can attack in turn.

But that’s not true on ground? But it is. Abstractly you could say defense is favored on ground, but in practical terms that’s only going to happen if territories are lined up end to end in a string and that simply isn’t how the board is.

Suppose Germany has a massive defense on Ukraine. USSR can’t defend both West Russia and Caucasus. Suppose USSR decides to abandon West Russia and defend Caucasus. Then Germany moves its massive defense into West Russia. Germany advances, not through weight of superior attack, but from position; USSR must protect two territories to prevent an advance, Germany need only move into one.

Then with Germany defending West Russia, USSR must choose between defending Caucasus and Russia. USSR defends Russia, Germany moves into Caucasus.

Holding Caucasus allows Germany to produce units on the front line, a huge time savings compared to trying to move units over from Berlin, and even a time savings compared to Karelia.

Yes, Germany eventually wants to take on the Allied combined stack. But it’s defense, not offense, that gets it there.

What about defenders being attackers? Supposedly USSR wants to “defend” Russia. So why should USSR build infantry and artillery, or sometimes even tanks? Aren’t infantry the better buy?

But as already described, Germany marches up then USSR can’t defend two territories. Even barring that, if USSR can’t push Germany off, then Germany just marches right up to USSR anywhere, sits down, then what? USSR can’t push Germany off, that’s a territory that USSR can’t contest for income, that’s more guaranteed income for Germany.

But what if instead of just cowering with infantry, USSR can punch Germany in the nose? If Germany wants to withstand USSR’s blow, Germany wants cheap infantry. Which are slow. Which gives USSR more time to build defense. Meanwhile USSR is contesting territory.

So when you’re planning shortcuts, remember it’s not just about numbers in the abstract. The map is a factor, as is the starting setup, player choices, and dice outcomes. Often if you dig just a little you find that statements like “USSR should defend Moscow therefore infantry are best” just don’t work out in practice. Not because the numbers don’t work, but if you’re assuming a brute-force attacker must plow through a brute-force defender at a single territory, well, that’s just not an accurate model for how the numbers actually apply. You have to use a model that accounts for how Germany can simultaneously threaten two territories, how USSR doesn’t have the numbers to stop both, and how Germany thus advances.

Another rule of thumb for shortcuts, look at raw unit counts. It’s NOT a really good shortcut, don’t think it is. If 30 German units attack 30 USSR units it’s probably going to be a blowout. Why? Because in practical terms probably 14+ of those German dice are going to be tanks and/or fighters and/or bombers attacking at 3/4. Most of the USSR units will defend at 2, only say four will defend at three, and two at four. So where Germany initially is peeling off 1s off its attacking infantry, USSR is peeling off 2s off its defending infantry. Most of Germany’s attacking power remains intact while USSR is fading fast. I think Don referred to this as “skew” in his essays. But anyways, remember even accounting for skew, there’s the two-peak model, well, that’s all a bit complicated. Let’s just say unit count can be useful but it isn’t everything.

That said, why do you often see players say Germany should start with 11 inf 2 art buy? (Which obviously shouldn’t be the case if there’s a G1 W Rus break / tank dash but I digress). OFTEN 11 inf 2 art is good, though, but why?

What are you giving up? I don’t want to get too far into this, but let’s say you probably aren’t really going to be able to use G1 tank build to lock USSR out of Ukraine income on G2+. You could maybe do that by giving up Karelia but then you’d be down production on the front and USSR would have a 2-value territory income anyways, plus a gateway into Finland/Norway.

What about Karelia? That’s a little different. If R1 gets good dice then choking off USSR income at Ukraine early is too ambitious, but Germany wants to secure Karelia anyways. Depending on R1 dice and buy, maybe USSR has a load of units on West Russia that can crush any G1 press into Karelia. Even any G2 press could be favorably attacked; USSR might not want to stick around (it will lose most of its ground attack power to the German counter) but an attack into retreat is certainly possible.

But though a lucky R1 open and proper followup could leave even G2 into Karelia questionable, sometimes it’s a bit ambiguous. Suppose Germany builds 7 infantry 2 artillery 2 tanks on G1. Then Germany’s G2 press into attempted hold of Karelia adds two tanks. (Any G1 infantry/artillery simply won’t reach). Yes, Germany will always be down two units somewhere; 2 tanks have an opportunity cost of 4 infantry. But if Germany holds Karelia on R3, at least Karelia can put out 2 more units, contrast to if Karelia is not secured on R3 then Karelia can’t put out two units. So there’s certainly compensation, though I don’t know that I would say Germany going low on unit count into USSR that’s high on unit count would be best.

So it seems I’m saying maybe Germany doesn’t go 11 inf 2 art on G1 after all, just looking at raw unit count near Karelia after a lucky R1 open. But that’s not all there is to it.

We expect Germany to push out 12+ units a turn for a while, only going below if Germany feels it can afford the luxury of buying expensive stuff (i.e. Germany’s position is stronger, not weaker). USSR we expect 7 or less units a turn. Germany also wants to defend against UK and US landings, but it takes a while for UK/US to build up, and, well, I won’t get into that much.

So maybe it seems Germany can expect to catch up against USSR. If a player doesn’t run the numbers, maybe they think, maybe Germany doesn’t need that much against UK/US, engages in wishful thinking.

But actually, it’s much worse for Germany.

UK and US can fly in fighters. Then there’s UK production at India. Germany can’t really cut off a UK stack from India from joining up with USSR if UK moves in time to beat Germany’s eastern Europe stack advance.

So actually, even if you’re not running the numbers in detail, if you just vaguely eyeball it - in the opening, if USSR gets lucky dice, USSR has a real chance contest even Germany’s entire ground defensive power at Karelia at least as late as R3. German fighters can’t land on a territory Germany just captured; you can get up to 2 Japanese fighters at Karelia on J2 (two fighters in the sea zone south of Persia on a carrier at end of J1 can make it to Karelia on J2) but Japan really wants those fighters against India when the UK stack gets pushed off (otherwise maybe the UK stack does NOT get pushed off) so that won’t last long. (Maybe long enough to allow German fighters to land though). If UK and US build fighters then they can stall out Germany in Europe in the short term. But if UK and US aren’t building fighters to fly to Europe, Allies are building transports and escorts to dump cost-effective ground in Europe. Meanwhile UK is pumping out units at India, probably UK has to abandon India to Japan, but that means that UK India stack moves up through Persia into Russia. So if Germany can’t break into USSR on G1 or G2 as USSR just stalls it out, if later turns run into UK/US air reinforcement of USSR’s position as well as a UK stack moving in from India, can we really expect Germany to break USSR with raw brute force power?

No. We can’t.

We can see there’s a window of opportunity; while UK and US are racing to produce naval escorts and transports UK/US won’t have much fighters to spare for Europe and UK/US won’t be able to get much if any ground to Europe (not being able to protect transports). But though there’s a window, it’s not necessarily a window big enough to do anything with. If USSR’s defense holds up in Europe while UK/US get set up in Atlantic, then the Allies can try to put the squeeze on Karelia.

Yes, there’s plenty of Axis counterplay. I’m just saying there’s no guarantee Axis can slam raw attack from Karelia into West Russia and expect a good outcome. It could happen, but it also might not happen.

But if you remember that Germany’s advance doesn’t necessarily need to break USSR with raw power, instead Germany can just march up to Ukraine and make USSR pick between defending West Russia and Caucasus, then you see how Germany doesn’t need to rely on just brute power. Yes, there’s still problems going to Ukraine; if Germany simply leaves UK and US free to march into Karelia, Germany loses Karelia’s production on the front lines (it really makes a big difference), then can march cost-efficient ground into Russia. So actually it’s a little involved. But you can see where if the Axis simply can’t break USSR’s stack defense with raw power, how the Axis still have an option to push USSR’s combined stack backwards. And though even that still might not happen, you can see how if Germany works towards making it happen, the Axis don’t need nearly as much force to pressure USSR/Allied combined stack to retreat, as it does to break the USSR/Allied combined stack with raw power.

So, returning to raw unit counts and shortcuts. If you use raw unit counts, remember - it’s not just about one power trying to brute-force another power, using the map and positions properly changes how the numbers apply. If you’re calculating a German brute-force attack from Karelia into West Russia, that ignores Germany moving up to Ukraine and making USSR choose between defending West Russia and Caucasus (then later Caucasus and Russia). Germany might not be able to get a good attack against a multinational defense, but Germany and Japan together will probably be able to defend against a single power’s (probably USSR) attack. Remember also nations can work together; UK and US can fly fighters to West Russia (provided it held past G1) to reinforce, Japan can fly fighters to German-occupied Karelia to reinforce. You can’t just say “I want to think about Europe, only Europe, so I’m going to ignore India”, because UK’s India stack might (and probably should) march into Europe. If you’re totting up raw numbers and ignored fourteen UK units in your projection, well, you can see how that projection just isn’t going to work.

So when you use raw unit counts as a shortcut, or any shortcut really, remember. It’s not just about mathematics in a vacuum. Maybe your raw unit count based projection at the end of R1 predicts R2 can set up to hit Karelia with 30 units, where it’s anticipated Germany can only defend with 24 units. Maybe you even thought so far to eyeball skew, with a projection having ten USSR 3’s against nine German 3’s. But if that projection’s based off a prediction of G1 11 inf 2 art, is that really what Germany is going to do? What if Germany builds two G1 tanks and J2 flies in two fighters? Then Axis defends Karelia with 28 units, including eleven German 3s and two Japanese 4s. If Germany has an AA gun at Karelia, how does that affect USSR’s risk evaluation; even attempting the attack could see a USSR fighter lost to AA gun fire. Etc.

1. There’s a difference between strategy and tactics and wishful thinking. The more concrete your numbers, the more detailed your projections, the more possibilities you consider, the better your strategy and tactics. The less numbers, the less specifics, the more you’re just blindly hoping.

2. Mathematics isn’t everything, even for Axis and Allies. But for a game with limited rules, a static map, and probability distributions, without hidden information, without trade, without diplomacy, without - big list I won’t get into - anyways mathematics. It’s real. Players can ignore it but that doesn’t make it go away.

3. Stack building and bleeding is about understanding in detail how major stacks can move forwards or be pushed backwards, not just for one turn or another, but over the course of an entire game. It isn’t simply about theory, nor is it a magic wand. There’s a lot of real mathematics involved, and this can be difficult especially for newer players that are trying to build projections from scratch. Players can use shortcuts that greatly reduce computation; though accuracy suffers and options a player ought to have considered may not have been considered with the shortcut, over time a player that pays attention to how actual games differ from projections understands what shortcuts do or do not work. However, a player needs to remember shortcuts and personal experience do not compare to to mathematics. If a player bases their play simply on personal experience, assuming their range of experience applies to all games. If they are used to playing against a weak meta, their shortcuts and projections will be wildly optimistic. But simply the presence of lots of numbers is no guarantee of accuracy either. Even very intricate and detailed mathematical projections can miss important points if those considerations weren’t built into the model.

4. If you understand stack building and bleeding you know it’s not just an abstract concept, it’s always about practical application. Abstractly, a competently played game is going to have players that consider and predict stack movements, that try to influence stack movements. But how does that manifest, exactly? What is the practical application? The more realistic and fully fleshed out scenarios you construct on a detailed and mathematical basis, the more scenarios you see where defensive profiles are a problem for Allies with multinational ground defenses, and that the same is not true for the Axis.

But no? That’s just an empty claim? Think on it. Suppose the game plays out mostly as I described. Suppose you take exception to the idea Germany may attack West Russia with intent (even a backup plan) to retreat to Karelia. I’d say that’s very questionable, because with dice outcomes that’s exactly what Germany has as its contingency plan. Remember, Germany has the largest starting stacks; if it has the opportunity to cut Allied stacks down at reasonable cost, it must do so, especially if Japan is to have any hope of challenging an Allied stack on any reasonable time frame.

But even if that’s denied, think on this. UK holds India for as long as possible, if for no other reason to produce three units each turn that can move into mainland Europe. But when UK moves out of India, where does it go? Persia. And when does this happen? Again, we know it happens quite late. So there’s every chance if it’s on later rounds Germany has pushed a stack to Ukraine to throttle off USSR income. Then what happens? Germany has a combined attack from Karelia and Ukraine into West Russia. From there, USSR must decide between protecting Caucasus and Russia. But how is that relevant? Because where is the UK India stack during all that time? Did it move from India to Persia? Then where? Did it move to Caucasus? When? When that happened, what was the balance of USSR and UK forces? Could Germany, who again, has major forces in the area right about this time, carry out an attack with an aftermath where defensive profiles would prevent the Allies from taking the appropriate casualties? Very possibly. If UK pushed from Persia to Kazakh, what of Japan’s position in China? Could UK even move to Kazakh without being completely destroyed? Perhaps, but perhaps not.

Even if the Axis don’t get an opening at Caucasus, Kazakh, or Persia, what of Russia itself? If USSR gets backed up all the way to Russia, if UK and US are building pressure (and why wouldn’t they), Germany and Japan will try a sequential attack to break Russia before cost-effective UK and US ground units can arrive. Can it really be said that there will be zero possibility of any USSR counterplay, that the turn order of USSR-Germany-UK-Japan will not be an issue? With US units still cut off, mind. No. If the issue is somehow dodged at West Russia, if it is somehow even dodged at Caucasus, it comes up at Russia. Eventually the Allies make a multi-power defense of a territory with ground units from different powers, and defensive profiles screw the Allied response.

Or let’s talk about Allies in Africa. Suppose, as I’ve seen some “top meta” players recommend, Germany sends all its submarines to the UK battleship fight, and leaves the UK cruiser near Mediterranean alone. Very well, UK drops 1 tank to French West Africa and moves its infantry at Union of South Africa up; US moves four units in. How does the position then develop? Perhaps UK blows up Germany’s Med fleet, perhaps not, but let’s say Germany can expect to contest Egypt and if UK doesn’t pull some units away from reinforcing India to contest Germany in Africa, then Germany runs through Africa with tanks. Meanwhile say USSR held West Russia past G1 and UK landed fighters on West Russia. What happens then? UK has air in the area of West Russia that it later moves to help defend India depending on Japan’s threat. But UK fighters are not limited to defending India. With UK’s India stack they pose an added threat to Japan’s control of Burma, and they can swiftly move over to Africa. Why isn’t US’s fighter used the same way? If the US fighter survived, still there’s simply no US infantry to back up the fighter. If US didn’t use its US infantry immediately to try to slow Japan, US infantry still normally won’t make it to India; they get cut off. Instead, US infantry typically head west towards West Russia, and if they make it towards India it’s not through China and not any time soon, it’s only very late and then through Persia, and that’s only if the Allies can spare the units in Europe. So a US fighter in the Asia region has no tactical flexibility or real threat, and moving a US fighter to Africa means it can’t help out in the Atlantic or Europe, which is where all the US ground and navy are. It’s simply inefficient, even a US bomber in Africa has sharply limited options if it wants to help out the rest of US’s forces in Finland/Norway.

Does US air end up in Africa and/or India? Sure, eventually, but that doesn’t make things better. It makes things worse.

I explained that with UK/US in Africa, early on it’s better to preserve UK units. But later on the reverse is true. So I forget whatever the developers said somewhere about whatever automated casualty assignation - whether it depends on who the original controller, who moved in first, etc. Bleah. They never put up a sticky thread either.

But that aside, suppose US units would always be taken first. Okay, not the US tanks or US artillery before UK infantry, and I already mentioned how that was an issue, and if you looked at what US1 drops to French West Africa, sure enough, US artillery and tank (as well as infantry). Oof.

But what about late game? Suppose defensive profiles were changed (but they’re not) so all units of one nation were taken as a casualty before another? (still not good, still too many edge cases where you want to split, but it’s not happening anyways). But suppose, just theoretically, maybe all US units were removed as casualties before UK, always. Would that be good?

But that’s not good. Because what happens late game? Think about the turn order. Suppose the Allies break through at Karelia. Who goes after Germany? Who goes after Japan?

Suppose UK goes after Japan. Say UK recaptures USSR or US territory. UK gets no income off those territories. But when Japan recaptures, Japan gets income. Japan goes right after UK. So US never collects the income from territories UK captures if Japan recaptures; USSR never collects the income from territories UK captures if Japan recaptures.

Then there’s other things, like UK having good logistics from London to Europe. If there’s enough defensive naval escorts, one UK transport can offload one transport’s capcity of units to any of Finland, Norway, France, NW Europe (for badly needed income), but also Karelia and Baltic States, and also Berlin. UK also has the option of dropping to Archangel, though it means the next drop has to be to Norway. UK just has really great flexibility, provided the Allies have enough defensive fleet. And even if not? UK goes immediately after Germany. If a target in Europe needs to be hit before Japan can fly in fighters to reinforce. ONLY UK can get it done. So loads of UK units headed towards Europe. Make sense?

Suppose US goes after Germany. Suppose US captures a territory then USSR reinforces. That’s not good. UK never has a turn to reinforce; you see how if UK captures then USSR and US can both land fighters, but if US captures only USSR can land fighters? But even if not, if US captures territory in Europe, that’s bad. The best Allied logistics and stack sizes come from USSR; it’s best to give income to USSR if possible. If not, the next is UK. The absolute worst is US. Even when US has enough transports to offload its income capacity in infantry every turn (which I don’t recommend, that doesn’t leave any flexibility) - but anyways even when US reaches saturation, US is still limited to Finland/Norway if it wants to maintain drops from East Canada. Maybe US diverts to France, maybe not, but regardless US is always going to have very limited options until it has massive navy, like the Allies have three defensive fleets and three transport fleets operating in the Atlantic, that kind of massive. Probably not happening on any relevant timescale.

But contrast to if US goes after Japan. Well, US does go “after” Japan, just in terms of turn order. And as with UK going immediately after Germany, again, all the advantages are with going immediately after the target.

So later in the game, US air is in range of Asia/Africa, then US wants to preserve its units, and it’s UK units that should be lost first.

No matter how you build out the projection, defensive profiles are always going to mess with the Allies in particular. Even if defensive profiles are “improved”, the Allies still get the short end.

Even if you claim defensive profiles change somehow, they’re just never going to be “the complete experience”. They just won’t.

No? Surely there must be something I’m overlooking?

Think about this.

Suppose Germany attacks a multinational Allied defense. Let us agree there is dice variance, not too controversial I trust? So sometimes Germany will be lucky, sometimes unlucky.

Say Germany’s lucky. In that case, maybe a projection run after accounting for attacker hits requires Allies to get their “best defense” together. AA guns die first, then infantry, then artillery, then tanks, regardless of controlling power, just going for raw defensive power, because the Allies are trying to hold on by their fingernails.

Suppose Germany’s unlucky. Then, maybe projections have the Allies easily surviving the attack and USSR lining up a vicious counter. All UK units die before any USSR units, maybe it’s 10 IPCs worth of extra losses, that swings the major stack battle by 30 IPCs expected, plus collapse of the German position with expectation of won game.

And how does the defending player know in advance if Germany’s attack is lucky or unlucky? Well they don’t. So they have to specify in advance what happens if Germany is lucky, they have to specify in advance what happens if Germany is unlucky, they have to define precisely what “lucky” means, what the difference is, if there’s any additional scenarios - you get the idea. Oh, and of course maybe Germany doesn’t even do a major attack at all and they just do something else entirely, so you have to account for that too. Etc. etc.

If defensive profiles are made incredibly complex, that’s good for control, but very bad for ease of use. And there are still going to be possibilities that are not covered.

Imagine playing the board game. You don’t have to say “if they get one hit to three hits do this, if four to seven hits do this other thing, if eight plus hits do yet this other thing, except differentiate depending on attacking composition and opening defender AA gun results for the four plus and eight plus hit scenarios” etc. etc. You’re there live, you see what is rolled, you say what to take as casualties, you don’t spout off about might have beens going on and on, you just see what happens, say what happens, done.

But if defensive profiles are left terribly simple that’s bad for control even if it’s good for ease of use. All the problems I described and more.

So to wrap up this bit about defensive profiles. It’s not just that defensive profiles fall short as it is. A recent announcement says they’re going to increase defensive profile count to 15. But it’s still not enough, defensive profiles are always going to come up short. Properly, you are going to make different decisions based on

1. Attacker composition and count. E.g. Allies send everything to hit Berlin then Germany should take AA guns first, it’s going to be a major battle, Axis wants all the defense it can get. But what if Allies send just an infantry and an artillery? There’s no serious threat to Berlin, so why would the Allies do that attack at all? To destroy German AA guns on the cheap. I think I did exactly this in a recent game with TTG. It’s not anything to be proud of, it’s just taking cheap shots at defensive profile limitations, you never do something like that in 1942 Second Edition but that’s the point. You don’t ever do it in 1942 Second Edition. You do do it in 1942 Online.

2. Opening defense rolls. Defending AA guns fire, wipe out a chunk of attacking air. Think that doesn’t make a difference in projected outcomes? (It does). You’re not peeling 1s off the attackers, you’re going straight to their 3s, and attackers using simple calculation tools are using projections based off “average” AA gun hits. Yes, the projection the attacker started with was accurate before the attack started, but after the attack started and 5 out of 6 attacking air got shot down, the original projection only weighted that possibility or worse at around 0.06%. But after the fact of the dice, the weight on that projection is no longer 0.06%. It’s 100%, because it just happened, and the remainder plays out from there.

3. Opening attacker rolls. The defender doesn’t know what the defenders will roll, but they know what the attackers rolled. If the attackers roll amazing hits the defenders may have to give up on any possibility of counterattacking and go for raw defense. But if the attackers rolled lousy hits, maybe there’s a vicious counterattack in the offing so the defenders should preserve units of the power that’s going for the counterattack.

4. Everything above, modified for later rounds, along with remaining defender composition. Each and every round of remaining combats there’s a question about what the defenders do, dice outcomes can change the optimal response at any time, so defensive profiles - if trying to give all options as possible with live play - have to allow for all optimal responses as well. Things were already complicated with specifying every possible combat option for the attackers, but not only do the raw attacks need to be accounted for, each round of each potential attack needs to be fully detailed.

5. The outcome of other battles. Suppose Japan controls India and has a fleet in the India sea zone. Now suppose the Allies attack India from Persia (not an amphibious assault) and the India sea zone from wherever. Suppose that all the battles are close, that the Allies don’t have great odds, but consider the rewards if the Allies get a bit lucky and if defensive profiles are set a certain way.

Suppose the Axis player didn’t think Allies would even attack India from Persia as there was only a 40% chance for Allies to win and Japan had followup units at Burma. Suppose the Axis player thought their Japanese fleet off India was safe as it had a load of carriers and fighters.

But then say the Allies did attack India from Persia and did capture. Then say the Allies attacked the India sea zone. For close-fought naval battle defenses, often you lose carriers before fighters because you want to inflict maximum casualties on expensive attacking naval and air units. Carriers are expensive to replace, but so too are attacking units, and the attacker had to mobilize their units way out. So what happens here? Defender drops carriers first then attacker retreats. Defending fighters have one space to land, but there’s no place to land, say no other carriers in the area, and of course they can’t land on India. So boop, bunch of expensive fighters lost.

6. Territory / sea zone attacked. Suppose a power is maintaining a defensive naval position. That can mean that power wants submarines, not because submarines are good on defense, but because they’re good on attack. Before the “defending” power can be hit, the “attacker” needs to move into range, where the “defender” can whack them with cheap subs, air, whatever else is handy.

Now say the “defender” moves away from nearby “defending” industrial complexes. It’s entirely natural and expected; Japan hanging out at Japan’s sea zone only gets to Manchuria, which isn’t a great dropping-off point to pressure India; probably Japan maintains its fleet at Yunnan for a while then shifts to India or Africa to support transports that are grabbing for India’s IC and/or Africa income. Also US may be pressuring the Axis fleets off position.

So if Japan’s fleet shifts off nearby supporting ICs, what happens? It still wants to produce submarines at its mainland if US isn’t preventing it, and it wants to move those subs to join its main fleet where they’ll be safe from being picked off by US later.

But the sea zones between Japan’s sea zones and the Japanese fleet (especially if it’s at India) may be threatened by US fleet. Also Japan may be threatening Western US’s sea zone.

What it comes down to is, any submarines with Japan’s main fleet may want to fight. If there’s a major naval engagement, submarines aren’t great defense, but you add in two battleships, two loaded carriers, a cruiser, a couple destroyers, maybe a third loaded carrier, the attackers are not going to get off lightly.

But submarines not with Japan’s main fleet want to submerge. They’re all alone and surrounded by enemies. But the attacker will just have destroyers? That’s the expectation. But destroyers cost 8, submarines only 6. If the attacker sticks to destroyers, carriers, and fighters they’re hard pressed to keep up with Japan’s sub plus starting navy plus starting air, especially if they have to leave destroyers behind to protect lines of reinforcement. But if the attacker builds submarines, then those can’t stop Japan from moving submarines around freely. It’s not that the Allies have no answers, it’s that whatever the Allies do, Japan can do something different, and it’s not going to be easy for the Allies to get in. Anyways, Japan’s subs not with Japan’s main fleet submerge.

But defensive profiles don’t let you submerge some submarines yet fight with other submarines. It’s one or the other. And just moving a submarine out of position isn’t a “solution” either. You lose position, why? Because 1942 Online changed the rules.

Some readers will notice, everything I’m talking about is the same as what I’ve been writing going on two years. You have to look at the specific numbers. This is nothing new.

So you’re following along and nodding your head, yes yes, numbers, we all like the numbers, respect and love, yes yes.

But then you must understand how horrible defensive profiles are. No?

Suppose UK and US quickly set up transports to Finland/Norway, USSR has a stack on West Russia, Germany has a stack on Karelia, Japanese fighters have landed on Karelia after India fell, UK has a chunk of units on West Russia that escaped from the India region.

This is not me making wild claims to try to get cheap points. As I’ve written elsewhere, USSR fights for 2-IPC territories in Europe or 1-IPC territories in Asia. If anyone runs the numbers, they will see for themselves the balance in Europe is VERY tight. UK cannot race 3 units at India versus 8 from Japan for long even considering Japan’s weak starting stack sizes in Asia, any USSR units sent to India are far from the conflict in Europe so allow Germany to advance faster. This is just mathematics, game rules, and the board.

You think there’s some inventive way around it? Okay, show me how USSR tanks defend West Russia and also counter any Japan push to India, except West Russia is three spaces from India. Or show me how USSR tanks on Caucasus defend West Russia, except obviously they don’t; they can help counter a German push into West Russia but they can’t help defend West Russia if they’re on another territory. Etc. No matter what “smart” thing you try, you run up against those hard limits, not because I say so, but because they’re there.

And maybe I’m wrong about how it plays out? Sure. And when someone builds out a detailed projection that withstands close scrutiny, I’ll say welcome to the player’s club. But until then.

So again, UK and US quickly set up transports to Finland/Norway, USSR has a stack on West Russia, Germany has a stack on Karelia, Japanese fighters have landed on Karelia after India fell, UK has a chunk of units on West Russia that escaped from the India region.

Now what?

First, USSR is really eyeing Karelia. If Germany can be pushed off Karelia, a chunk of UK and US ground forces march in. From there UK/US can go to Archangel, West Russia, then to Russia itself. If Japan doesn’t have significant stacks (and everything I described can happen well before Japan has significant Asia/Europe stacks), then the Allies have a combined defense against any Axis attack. Germany will not get a good attack against that gigantic combined stack, nor will Japan, and the Axis MUST break the Allied stack sometime.

There’s other Allied options, like going for Italy or grabbing France. But those are either hard to sustain and/or have bad contingencies. If Italy is contested, the Allies must have a defensive escort fleet in the Mediterranean or be blown up by Japanese air. Yet UK must also have a defensive escort fleet in north Atlantic, or likewise be blown up. If UK pushes to Africa, then UK’s transport lines are inefficient. As to France, if UK/US can hold a beachhead that’s nice. But Germany can afford to hold at Berlin while hammering USSR down in the east. Once USSR is fatally weakened, Germany can reverse all its units out of east Europe, let Japan clean up (if Germany didn’t claim Moscow itself), and UK/US stall out in the attrition battle. In those scenarios, that doesn’t all necessarily happen, maybe the Allies get a bit lucky, or maybe the Allies don’t even need luck. But if the Allies get some bad luck, then UK/US can’t just reposition out of France to try to help out near Russia; it’s Dunkirk except this time Germany doesn’t hold back. As to Italy, let’s not try to blow things out of proportion, probably Japan doesn’t just blow up the entire US fleet or even the UK fleet. But two separate defensive fleets for two separate navies, with both Germany and Japan’s air force able to concentrate on either, with neither defensive fleet having any flexibility to reinforce the other - the Axis should be able to make something of that. Yes, Allies may well want to go to Italy and/or France early, yes the Allies can get stuck at Finland if they go that route, but you can see how UK/US to Norway/Finland has its benefits.

But back to Karelia, UK/US landing at Finland/Norway and stack building/bleeding.

Russia starts with 36 units in Europe, and can expect to build 7 a turn for a while, going down to 5, then even lower. I won’t bother to run an exact projection but let’s say by R4 58 units isn’t crazy to think about.

UK, on the other hand, counting the units in north Africa and Asia, and even the UK fighters on London, has 17 units. It’s sloppy and unrealistic but let’s add 3 units a turn for India, and say by UK4 that’s 29 units. UK can have some units at Finland too, let’s say by UK4 that’s another 15 units, which again is perhaps unrealistic, but just for argument’s sake.

Now let’s fudge some more numbers and say there was some trading involved, cut USSR’s count by 10 units, UK by 5. USSR has 48 units, UK 39.

So even with assumptions against the point I’m arguing, you get the idea. One Allied nation has more units than the other. You say UK has more units than USSR? Sure, doesn’t matter. But let’s just agree US doesn’t have anything close to 39 units in Europe by US4.

So remember again the essential issues around stacks. How do they grow over time, exactly, how can they be prevented from growing, what about logistics, counterthreats, and so on? And you realize, Germany has to crack the USSR/UK/US stack, USSR wants to break the German/Japanese stack. Each wants to fight, but they want the battle on their terms.

And if you have a major Axis stack, how do you think the Allies can best challenge that stack? With 48 USSR units? Or 39 UK units? There’s other considerations, but often it’s just better that the bigger stack attack.

Obviously? But what I see is posters often don’t think it through. Even if they know abstractly that the bigger stack attacks, they don’t understand the practical application, that the bigger stack doesn’t just pop into existence, it has to be carefully and deliberately built up, sometimes over several rounds.

Suppose Germany did an attack/retreat into West Russia, killed a load of units, withdrew to Karelia. I’m not saying the Axis were stupid, or that the Allies were stupid, let’s say there were calculated risks all around.

But then what?

USSR wants to preserve its units to hit Karelia on USSR’s turn.

When Germany rolls into West Russia, in 1942 Second Edition, for this example UK units are lost before USSR units, why? Because USSR knows it wants to line up a counter next turn. USSR wants all the numbers it can get. The Allies player takes deliberate action to make sure that happens. If it’s UK infantry, it’s removed before USSR infantry. But if it’s UK artillery? Even UK tanks? Depends on the numbers, but those too may be chosen as casualties before USSR infantry. When you have a major stack battle coming up, you do NOT skimp. If you save an IPC, if you save 5 IPCs by skimping, remember major stack battles change the IPC value of units on the board by hundreds, not just money in the bank but mobilized units that spent time getting to the front lines. Yes, you want to save 5 IPCs if you can, but not if that “saving” costs you 30 IPCs in projected outcomes elsewhere.

But with defensive profiles in 1942 Online what happens? Order of loss is poorly documented so who knows whether UK or USSR loses infantry first but regardless you’re going to lose USSR infantry before you lose any UK artillery. And again, that may not be what you want.

Often the details are different. UK has more units, or it’s late game so US has more, or Germany plans to attack/retreat from Finland into Karelia, or Japan reinforced Germany at Caucasus so it’s about loss of fine Axis control rather than fine Allied control. But what doesn’t change is defensive profiles rob a player of the control they need.

But it’s the same for both sides? It isn’t.

As I pointed out with the use of allied carriers in a Google document I wrote up going on two years ago, symmetric rules changes applied to asymmetric conditions are naturally going to have asymmetric changes to balance. If you must have an analogy, you have a very fat person and a very thin person, if they both lose 50 kilos, the very fat person gets healthier, the very thin person gets dead.

When do you get multinational Allied defense? Every game, and with competent play it’s not just pure UK/US fighters that die last anyways so the defensive profile “didn’t make a difference”. No, it’s UK/US ground in Africa where there’s only UK air cover so you want to preserve UK ground, it’s USSR/UK ground in Europe challenging the forward Axis Europe stack where you want to preserve one but not the other depending on the board position; if the Allies manage to contain Germany then it’s UK/US pressing from the northeast and USSR from the south. I’ve already written elsewhere how 1942 Online not allowing carrier use destroys Allied KJF, and how not allowing transport use messes with UK’s income in northwest Africa so obviously I don’t recommend KJF. But if KJF is attempted, even then there’s a preference to preserve USSR units over UK, for turn order if nothing else, not to mention potential income and logistics in Asia and Europe. Defensive profiles are always going to be bad for the Allies.

And for the Axis?

Yes, the Axis do multinational defense but it’s not the same. Unless the Axis are wildly incompetent, lucky, or facing an incompetent Allied player, any multinational Axis defense in Europe consists of German ground, possibly German air, and Japanese fighters. Yes, it could be that order of loss screws Axis over, but when Axis air is at stake the Axis will normally leave strong enough a defense that any Allied attack will probably fail and screw the Allies over much harder than the Axis needing to worry about whether Germany or Japan lost air. If it’s a multinational Axis ground defense at Caucasus or West Russia, again, the Axis are likely to win regardless.

Do not think to reinterpret and spin my words to try to argue that I’m saying defensive profiles don’t have any bad effect on the Axis. Don’t try to play this off as some sort of “win”, don’t say it “doesn’t matter”. Anyone that actually understands the first thing about stack building/bleeding understands defensive profiles screw over the Allies, in addition to the Allies being screwed over by inability to use allied carriers, in addition to the Allies being screwed over by inability to use allied transports. If someone wants to say it was thought necessary to make horrible compromises in the name of asymmetric play, I could go with that. But to pretend 1942 Online is “The complete Axis & Allies 1942 Second Edition experience” as described on the Steam store description, to market 1942 Online like it is actually supposed to be something like 1942 Second Edition, well, it’s just not.

Yes, not being able to use allied carriers cuts Germany’s Baltic fleet options. But Germany doesn’t have to build a Baltic fleet. But on the other hand, do the Allies do KGF or KJF? Take your pick, they’re screwed both ways.

But about the Steam store description. Cut and pasted from today, 22 May 2021:

==

What the developers have to say:
Why Early Access?
“For years, fans of Axis & Allies have been asking for an online option for their favorite board game. We want to ensure that Axis & Allies 1942 Online is a satisfying experience for veteran fans and new players alike.”
Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access?
“We expect to stay in Early Access for a few months with regular updates.”
How is the full version planned to differ from the Early Access version?
“Right now, Axis & Allies 1942 Online is fully playable against human opponents, AI, or a mix of the two. As we work towards launch, we’ll be adding new features, making user interface changes, fixing bugs, and incorporating feedback from Early Access players.

We’re working towards a number of Steam features such as friends list, trading cards, and achievements as a part of launch.”
What is the current state of the Early Access version?
“Axis & Allies 1942 Online in Early Access is fully playable as a single player experience against AI, local hotseat play, or online multiplayer.”
Will the game be priced differently during and after Early Access?
“No, Axis & Allies 1942 Online will be priced the same during and after Early Access.”
How are you planning on involving the Community in your development process?
“We’ll be actively reading and responding to comments and reviews posted here on Steam and in our Beamdog forums. We’re interested in player feedback and bug reports.”

==

About This Game
German tanks mobilize in the west, blitzing into France and pushing back the Soviet Union in eastern Europe. The United States rises in response to Japanese aggression in the Pacific. The United Kingdom rallies allies as bombers menace the skies. The year is 1942, and the world is at war!

Axis & Allies 1942 Online is an official adaptation of the beloved strategic board game, Axis & Allies, and includes the 1942 Second Edition game board and rules.

Axis & Allies 1942 Online accommodates 1-5 players, each controlling one or more of the Axis or Allied powers in Online Multiplayer, Hot Seat, or Single Player mode against the computer AI. Players command both their country’s military forces and its war-time economy.

Victory goes to the side that conquers its opponents on the field of battle and occupies the greatest cities of the world. Will the Axis continue to spread across the globe unchecked, or will the Allies rally to push back against imperialistic tyranny? Challenge your friends and change the course of history!
Many ways to play!

Hotseat play for 2 to 5 players
Online multiplayer allows you play with allies and enemies across the world
Challenge yourself against AI

Features

The complete Axis & Allies 1942 Second Edition experience
Play online with your friends
Optional computer AI players
Learn to play with introductory tutorials
Asynchronous gameplay with custom defense profiles
Selectable victory conditions
Keep informed with the action log and war diary
Over 20 minutes of all-new period appropriate music

==

Jesus wept.

Go on, look where it says the gameplay is compromised. It doesn’t, it’s just “The complete Axis & Allies 1942 Second Edition experience”, going on two years not even any announcements about intent to change 1942 Online to actually play like 1942 Second Edition.

Two years on.

Well, back to stack bleeding / building, recap / rewrite:

Stack building and bleeding is strategic level thinking. It is not a tactic, except incidentally, and it must be understood, if you think stack bleeding and building is about elementary cost-benefit calculations, then you don’t know what stack bleeding and building is.

There’s a lot of confusion with some players that think “tactics” and “strategy” are interchangeable terms. It’s a bit more confusing as in his essays Don wrote about elementary cost-benefit calculations (tactics), but referenced infantry as part of solid overall play (strategy). So some players think, if you get elementary cost-benefit calculations, that IS strategy. But no.

Suppose you have a load of infantry, artillery, tanks, and fighters with Germany, and you can hit Archangel, West Russia, Belorussia, and Ukraine.

Suppose you consider sending 1 infantry and 1 artillery to attack 1 infantry for control of Archangel. Thinking about elementary cost-benefit calculations, you invest 7 IPCs to destroy 3 IPCs of units for control of a 1-IPC territory. Suppose USSR has plenty of counter power and you believe if USSR counters, you will have a bad-odds defense. Then suppose you calculate your counter to USSR’s counter, etc. And then suppose at the end of the day you figure, it’s just not worth sending 7 IPCs of units.

The back and forth, the projections run, the hypotheticals, the estimation of “worth” over projections running multiple rounds seems to be advanced cost-benefit? It’s a lot more detailed than a lot of players do, but that’s still elementary.

No, when you think stack building and bleeding it’s not just about “what is the immediate counter” or “what is my counter to their immediate counter”. It’s more like:

" Exactly what is the mathematics of ALL options I have, not just now, not just next round’s counters and counter-counters, but EVERY battle, EVERY outcome, not just now, but possible consequences seven turns from now, which is the earliest I may capture Moscow, and even then not limited to seven turns but what are my contingency plans and the mathematics and projections for well beyond that in case THIS specific does not go as reasonably likely and desired, and/or THIS specific and/or THIS? And not “mathematics” in some “let’s impress the kids that don’t know what’s happening, I’m fancy math!” but specific numbers on exactly what we can reasonably expect to see on Russia in seven turns, specific numbers on exactly how we plan to defeat that, and numbers everywhere, plans for everything "

You see the difference. It’s not just one calculation, or even a bunch of calculations and a bit of speculation. The whole thing is calculated, start to finish.

And for those that say “building a complete mathematical model of an entire game, of course, who doesn’t do that? What do you mean not elementary cost-benefit, it’s all elementary” - look. For the one player I know that builds better mathematical models than me, yes, I know, it’s all a big joke to you, but look around, players saying defensive profiles don’t make a difference. You know what that means.

Anyways, back on. I wanted to give players some idea of the scale of what’s going on behind the scenes, and it seems very crazy and complicated, but it’s not really. Like any big complex thing it breaks down into little pieces that can be examined.

So about stack bleeding / building. It’s big picture stuff, but without looking TOO closely and being blinded by details, what does that mean?

I’ve been referencing this for over two years in passing but I don’t think I’ve ever addressed it directly, as a discipline of its own rather than an application.

Suppose Germany has a big stack of ground units. It pushes those units to Russia, where it has to face a combination of USSR ground, UK ground, maybe some US ground, USSR air, UK air, US air.

How does that happen, exactly? Leaving off a LOT of details, it’s still a bit complex. Germany can produce two units at Karelia. Otherwise, it’s limited to transporting units from Italy to Ukraine/Caucasus (if the German battleship/transport survive which they probably won’t), and marching units over from Berlin and Italy.

Infantry are cost-effective, sure. But they’re also very slow. Also, later in the game Germany has to deal with UK and US. Tanks are fast but expensive. Air is faster but even more expensive.

. . . and?

Germany starts with a big block of units, but that block isn’t big enough to crack a unified Allied defense any time soon. Germany needs a big chunk of units to break the combined Allied stack, but it can’t just pop units out of Berlin right into the eastern front. No, by the time German infantry march from Berlin to the front, the Allies have had much more time to fly in reinforcements to Russia, and develop UK/US ground reinforcement to Europe as well. If Germany rushes tanks, that can help in the short term but Germany still has to deal with UK/US landings and tanks being so much more expensive than infantry, Germany may lack the numbers for a favorable attack against a unified Allied stack.

Given most reasonable expectations, it’s absolutely imperative that Germany preserve its units, because Germany can NOT expect to get over that combined Allied defense at all easily, even perhaps at all, if the Allied player is decent.

But? But also, if Germany tries to simply preserve its units ignoring other factors, that means Germany isn’t contesting territory, Germany isn’t getting that income, probably USSR is getting that income, which USSR uses to make more units.

So it’s simultaneously horribly important that Germany not lose any units, yet also horribly important that Germany use its units to contest territory in Europe. Germany is trying to “build” its forward stacks so it can credibly threaten Russia, even if not to capture, at least to weaken the combined Allied stack so much, on favorable overall terms to Axis, that Germany can reverse out of USSR to defend against UK/US while Japan finishes USSR. This means massive massive German stack, as big and as fast as possible.

But of course UK, US, and USSR know all this, and are trying to stop just that.

So you think about how the positions develop over time, the realistic expectations. What are UK, US, and USSR’s tools in this fight?

One of the big tools USSR has is punishing German overextension. USSR pushes mass infantry/artillery then perhaps followup tanks depending on the position. If Germany can be pushed off Karelia for a while, UK and US ground reinforcements can stream towards Russia and probably the Axis can’t pull off a win.

Notice that isn’t the usual definition of “overextension”, as in Germany parks all its tanks in one place where USSR can blow them up on the cheap, for no good reason. No, when I say “overextension” here it’s far more subtle. If Germany builds a load of early tanks it doesn’t look like an overextension, everything’s defended, everything looks fantastic. But in time, Germany has to deal with UK and US landings, and it has to protect Karelia. It can be that the Axis position cannot be recovered after G2 (despite looking fantastic for the short term), but that doesn’t become clear until G5 or so. But during that time, if Germany can’t capitalize on its position, then what? Then Germany is pushed back. And grabbing too much too early, that’s what overextension is all about. Whether the consequences are obvious and immediate or delayed, the idea is the same.

Understanding how positions develop over time, having a proper plan, having REAL estimates (with numbers and everything) for what exactly is projected to be needed, that’s what stack bleeding and building means. You’re trying to build your stacks in one spot, your opponent is trying to prevent you, you’re trying to prevent your opponent’s prevention, in the meantime your opponent is also building their stacks and you’re trying to counter while your opponent is trying to pre-emptively counter your counters etc.

And again, it’s very much about the practical application, and about understanding the real numbers in the big picture. It’s not about now, it’s not about next round, you have real expectations about what happens seven turns from now. And yes, you do NOT think everything happens EXACTLY as predicted. If anything, you KNOW they will NOT happen as predicted, even if you and your opponent all play exactly as predicted there’s still dice variance.

But that doesn’t mean you just throw the numbers out the window because they’re “incomprehensible” either.

A lot of things happen behind the scenes that I don’t write about. Even if it’s interesting, even if it’s funny, sometimes I’m like hey. Let’s just not open that can of worms.

So there I was, I had a magnificent multi-post rant in another thread going (exceeded character limit so I’d have to split it into multiple posts), and I was like . . . you know what? I’m going to let this one go. So I deleted the whole thing before even posting.

But there was one part that I realized when reading over it that I really shouldn’t just let go. If players think defensive profile limitations are a small thing it’s not just about a minor disagreement. It says something about how players understand (or don’t understand) stack building / bleeding.

Stack building / bleeding is the absolute foundation of strategy. It is the alpha, it is the omega, literally as well as figuratively.

So I figure I’ll start in on it, give a few conceptual examples, edit and rewrite, stick a strategy thread in 1942 Second Edition boards, maybe submit it as an article, then for this thread bring it around to defensive profiles.

First, what do I mean by “strategy”, what do I mean by “tactics”? Everyone uses their own terminology, but what do I personally mean when I use those terms? I use “tactics” to reference effectiveness small actions with limited consequences. I use “strategy” to reference knowing how and when to combine individual small actions into an effective whole.

Suppose I have a “tactic” of “you love me and buy me pizza”. I say that’s not a real tactic, that’s just wishful thinking. There’s no plan for how to make it happen, no thought of opportunity cost, just boop, pizza. (That’s not real tactics!)

Suppose I have a “strategy” of using my “tactic”. Since everyone is buying me pizza (or so the reasoning goes), I can open up my own pizza chain and sell all these donated pizza. All the pizza and money I want, amazing strategy and tactics! But again that’s not real strategy!

For tactics and strategy to be real, you have to know what specific actions to take and why. That “why” not based on some vague “feeling” but specific mathematical assessment.

And if you choose not to use mathematics? There’s a difference between real life strategy and tactics, in which there are unknown variables, misinformation deliberately spread by opposition, quantities that cannot be assessed with currently available information, yet there is a need to act.

But in AXIS AND ALLIES strategy and tactics, you can know all there is to know - provided you trust the dice (which I’m not saying you should), but IF you do then it’s just a matter of calculating probability distributions and knowing how game possibilities collapse in on one another instead of infinitely diverging, as a function of game map and game rules. That’s just how it is.

No? Axis and Allies is so complex, surely there must be some wiggle room for inventiveness?

Suppose there are infantry on Eastern United States. How do you get them to Europe as efficiently and quickly as possible?

You could take a transport to French West Africa, then Union of South Africa, then double back? That’s not about being tricky or clever. We’re talking about Europe specifically, if US takes the scenic route it’s just wasting time.

Morocco to France / NW Europe? But again, think about the practical aspects. If Axis have a good-sized air force on France or NW Europe, they’ll threaten any transports sent to Morocco. So there needs to be a defensive fleet there. If there’s another transport fleet at France, the Allies need another defensive fleet there. If you only have one defensive fleet and move it between off Morocco and off France, then you’re going to be missing drops to Europe half the time.

So it comes down to, time and again, if you don’t want to build multiple defensive naval escort fleets, you walk US ground from East US to East Canada. Full transports move from an East Canada sea zone to offload in the sea zone northwest of Norway/Finland, ground units get to Norway/Finland. Empty transports move from sea zone northwest of Norway / Finland to off East Canada. US has to protect Alaska and Western Canada against Japan or the Axis get some cheap attack options, but that’s still fastest, easiest, and cheapest.

(Or you can have the Allied fleet northwest of France, depending).

But regardless, you see how it is. There isn’t endless romance and mystery, the possibilities collapse on industrial complex locations, optimal routes, and so forth. Can things turn out differently? Sure, you can get early US incursions at Southern Europe, but that too depends on “optimal” play depending on the conditions. No matter how you play, it comes down to the numbers, sooner (actually immediately), rather than later.

Before getting to the next part, understand. I’m not saying mathematics is EVERYTHING in Axis and Allies. Knowing how to read and assess opponent risk preferences, trying to influence opponent reads on your own plays, a lot of nonmathematical stuff is part of it too. But I’m saying, probability and mathematics is a real factor, and constantly ignoring the odds doesn’t make someone a genius.

Fast recap, basic terminology covered, math is a thing, I’m not trying for the feel-good movie treatment here; math isn’t everything but it certainly isn’t nothing either. Next up, what is stack bleeding and building?

Lane rolling isn’t necessary to asynchronous play.

DoManMacgee isn’t really trying to say 1942 Online should play like Classic. He knows 1942 Online isn’t even based on Classic, it’s based on 1942 Second Edition. I expect he simply expects others to understand.

J1 Pearl Light. 1 sub, 1 cruiser, 2 fighters, 1 bomber vs 1 sub, 1 destroyer, 1 carrier, 1 fighter.

US submarine submerges, Japan gets 1 hit taken on US destroyer, US gets 1 hit taken on Japanese cruiser.

Next round of fire Japan gets 2 hits (all remaining defenders destroyed). US rolls a hit on carrier defense roll (say Japan didn’t get a submarine hit).

Under 1942 Second Edition, US rolls fighter. The attacker then knows the total casualties inflicted by the defender for the combat.

Under 1942 Online, US does not roll fighter. The casualty must immediately be assigned.

If Japan takes the US carrier hit on submarine, 2/3 chance US fighter rolls a hit taken on Japanese fighter from Japan. Japan then does not need to commit its carrier to where US can easily destroy it. But then there’s also a 1/3 chance the US fighter misses. Then Japanese carrier must commit, and Japanese carrier and fighter both die to US counter.

If Japan takes the US carrier hit on fighter, 2/3 chance US fighter rolls a hit. The US fighter cannot hit the Japanese submarine as there is no longer a defending US destroyer (remember it’s been removed on a previous round). A second valuable Japanese air unit must be destroyed. 1/3 chance the US fighter misses.

You see the difference. It isn’t just limited to Hawaiian Islands. Counting the opponent, I expect 1942 Online’s changed implementation just with regards to “lane rolling” to be a problem at least once a game, if not more.

It isn’t about perception. There’s a real mathematical difference.

Also it isn’t “balanced”.

You get a pizza and it’s a slice short. You say “oh no”, the delivery person says “don’t worry!” and eats the rest of the pizza. Now you have a perfectly balanced empty box.

@boston_nwo

For the lead-in, nicely said, and fair enough.

But discussion and actual play games don’t make my views clear.

With discussion, it’s something like

“Why did you leave an infantry at Buryatia?”
“To pressure Japan”
“Sure, but why won’t Japan just hit Buryatia with infantry from Manchuria and a fighter?”
“But that’ll tie up Japanese air”
“What else is Japan going to use it for?”
“Hawaiian Islands, cleaning up UK’s fleet”
“What does UK plan to do with its fleet?”
“I don’t know, you tell me.”
“What do you want?”
“I hadn’t thought about it”
“So you left an infantry at Buryatia without really thinking through the details. But if UK does this, and this, and this, then Japan cleans up UK’s fleet, hits Buryatia, and can counter any US1 push to Iwo Jima”
“Iwo Jima? Why?”
“US can interdict both of Japan’s sea zones from there, destroying any new unprotected submarine builds. Japan can unite its fleet at one of Japan’s sea zones to protect newly built subs but that locks Japan’s navy to that sea zone, meaning its transports aren’t free to develop Japan’s position in Asia. So Japan doesn’t want that to happen, but Japan can prevent it anyways.”
“But then US has a carrier and fighter and sub at Hawaii, that’s worth 30 IPCs”
“Yes, but Japan doesn’t care because 1942 Online’s altered mechanics mean UK and US can’t work together for KJF properly at all. Here, I’ll give you a link”
“This is a lot, I can’t . . .”
“It’s okay. So anyways, what was your projection on G4’s attack into West Russia?”
“What?”
“I mean, you just completed USSR’s combat phase; we’re in noncombat now. What were the expected percentages and contingencies off Germany’s expected responses?”
“Germany’s fourth turn?”
“Yes, you know how many USSR units were lost at West Russia and Ukraine. You can project Germany’s builds and counter. It’s okay, you don’t have to do full builds, but you do need to have at least the most probable and an estimation of risk.”
“Why?”
“Germany knows you lost four units at West Russia and did badly at Ukraine. USSR’s defense is tight given regular dice, with unfavorable dice we know Germany will try to choke off USSR’s income quite early, because why wouldn’t they? If you keep that infantry at Buryatia, it’s not going to be able to reinforce West Russia on R4, which means you must have calculated the G4 projections.”
“I didn’t.”
“What I think happens - Japan has no reason not to hit Buryatia, so it does, with enough that probably the USSR infantry dies and even if lucky doesn’t inflict significant losses to Japan. Germany tries to choke off West Russia, and who knows how the dice will go, but right now, just off what we’re seeing, we expect Germany to do well. The USSR infantry is wasted on Buryatia, and though infantry are cheap, it’s still 3 IPCs worth of unit that you won’t get back, in a bad-odds defense, for no positional advantage.”
“But I have three infantry at Yakut”
“All right, so let’s say you commit 12 IPCs of units to slowing Japan from conquering 1-2 IPCs worth of territory for perhaps one turn. You weaken your stacks in Europe for later, and you will want those numbers when the time comes. Even then, what is the opportunity cost of the units you commit to the east? Do you just keep that infantry on Yakut? If Japan drops more units to Soviet Far East and/or Buryatia, and again why wouldn’t they, how do you fight off even three Japanese ground units plus three air units? 3 IPCs of infantry were already lost at Buryatia, now another 9 IPCs of infantry at Yakut, and again, we expect Germany not to hit West Russia right about then because . . .?”
“Oh, I remember, you mentioned this, UK and US just fly in fighters.”
“Yes, and I also mentioned the more fighters UK and US build, the less transports and escorts they have in the Atlantic.”
“So I retreat from West Russia”
“Yes, so USSR’s position collapses, Germany gets more income to feed into its superior stack sizes and logistics, you used 12 IPCs of units to protect 3 or 4 IPCs worth of territory for 1 or 2 turns against Japan whose stack sizes weren’t the immediate threat, granting Germany which is the immediate threat 4 IPCs of solid income as Belorussia is no longer contested and West Russia is contested. I don’t say that’s wrong, but you see how that’s against just about every principle I explained about stack building and bleeding, the expected projections of KGF and anti-KGF, so what is it that USSR gains, precisely, with that infantry at Buryatia?”
“It can’t make that much difference.”
“Well, here you see in the sixtieth percentile it makes a twelve percent difference in expected outcomes for a major stack battle of 250 IPCs. Now you see how close this is to what I said was the general tipping point, and how the two-peak model and Germany’s being able to retreat then move up reinforcements is not the same as USSR’s having to defend a major stack and if losing it probably lose the game outright. The projection supports Germany attacking, even if Germany gets bad dice it can still retreat and expect to win the game, if Germany gets good dice then the game basically ends right there. So why would Germany not attack? What advantage do we gain from leaving an infantry in Buryatia that offsets that twelve percent swing in projected outcomes?”
(Fudging the numbers, but it can actually be calculated.)
“I’ll move that infantry out of Buryatia.”

Long and meandering, yes. But it’s all relevant (and by the way, far from complete). And that’s if you have a player that already knows all the basic theory and some simpler applications.

If it’s not discussion but actual games, players only see what happens after the fact, not the reasoning. That game where US bought six battleships and blew Japan out in the Pacific, people don’t understand battleships are bad, they don’t think about Japan spending 60 IPCs on industrial complexes it didn’t even use, they judge by results. “Wow, battleships”. I don’t like calling it post hoc as that comes off as dismissive, and how else can players judge results except through their experiences? But it is what it is.

Keep it short? But that leaves things unaddressed.

Suppose I just kept it short and said UK1 eleven ground units, no consideration of UK2, G3, whatever. Just boop, G2 London probably doesn’t happen, left it at that. Short. Simple. But also inadequate.

What if I then say UK1 eleven ground units, UK2 three ground units save 19 IPC, UK3 fleet drop carrier, destroyer, transports, US3 reinforces, UK4 the Australia transport makes joins the rest of the fleet. Then I say UK transposes out of excess land units on London with five transports offloading from London a turn into a slightly altered version of the same basic KGF used against a 11 inf 2 art buy, only of course now Germany’s down a load of ground units. Doesn’t that seem plausible?

But it’s not. Because when UK doesn’t put the pressure on Germany, Germany has any number of options including Baltic fleet reinforcement and unification of the Baltic and Mediterranean fleets. G2 control of the Atlantic means the Allies cannot be certain they can hit the Baltic sea zone with destroyers, as Germany has a load of navy and air in range to blow up any destroyers in range. So Germany can safely build cheap subs at the Baltic sea zone which prevents the UK3 fleet from being built, because even with US3 reinforcement it’s still a losing stack battle for UK/US. And yes, Germany doesn’t want to trade with UK/US, yes, Germany wants to bleed out USSR’s stacks, but where in this projection are the Allies slowing Japan? They’re not. There’s no easy obvious Axis victory, but at least the game proceeds exactly as the Axis could reasonably hope for; UK/US are delayed in Europe, Germany continues to fight off USSR in Europe, though USSR has more income in Europe, Japan starts bleeding out USSR and grabbing income from Africa and the Pacific and masses its air in Europe. We can’t say the Axis win, but they’ll certainly have an opportunity. We can’t say the Allies lose, they’ll have counterplay, but it’s by no means assured Allies will win either. Eventually UK/US can overpower Germany in the Atlantic. But when Japan flies in a monstrous air force with Germany maintaining a fair-sized air force of its own, the Allied fleets get locked unless the Allies lock themselves to the Finland/Norway sea zone (preventing UK from trading Baltic, NW Europe, and France) or UK/US build even more defensive escort, both options work for the Axis. It’s not that the massive Axis air armadas are cost-efficient against USSR ground units, but with UK/US cut off, USSR is alone. Using Axis air to threaten UK/US at sea while also beating down USSR on land is ideal for Axis.

Why give the Axis the possibility of winning in the long game when you can crush them in the short game? I’m not saying the Axis have fantastic chances in the long game, everything I wrote about Japan not being able to help Germany properly with 1942 Online’s altered mechanics still applies.

Must all details be explained? If not, why would a player think a UK1 infantry buy should be avoided? A player might think they can just cleanly transpose out of excess infantry on London, except they don’t know that maybe they can’t.

But though you’re absolutely convinced there must be a counterexample, you can’t come up with one? Okay. But the farther you get from using actual numbers, the more nebulous things get. It’s no longer a discussion, it’s just people venting their personal opinions in others’ general direction. No change, no growth, just people firmly convinced they’re right.

If someone said UK1 all infantry buy means Germany successfully captures Washington, I’d say that was wrong, but absent evidence, and respecting everyone’s opinion, that opinion has got to be given equal time. And if only top platinum players can talk the discussion is limited, and who’s even to say that the top platinum players are really good anyways?

==

Better outcomes and more wins. Details detracting from insight.

The obvious analogy is an engineer that explains actual practice to an academician. The “simple” guide being less confusing.

But engineers don’t disagree with academicians on principle. They have real practical reasons or they wouldn’t object.

How do you get “more wins”? In a weak meta? You know your opponent will mess up. All you need is wait it out, they overextend over and over, you smash their stack or bleed them out, the game ends. Easy. Just go for 99.999999% defenses all the time, you’re still going to win. And if you go with 95% defenses? In theory that means you lose more because your opponents were either smart enough to realize at least they had one chance and they took it, or the opponent is so bad they didn’t understand the odds and took a bad attack but won, but whatever, you lost. So just go 99.999999% all the time, every time. Unless you can stick more 9’s at the end.

But what happens if you have a strong meta? Your opponent isn’t going to mess up. You can’t wait it out. Your opponent is going to try to choke out your income, they’re going to threaten a win by attrition, or they’re going to block off your stack unification and ram stack building / bleeding mechanics down your throat until you choke. If you try to go 99.9999%, or 99%, or even 90%, you’re committing a load of units to one area; your opponent WILL drive into the opening that leaves elsewhere, and you WILL lose as income and attrition put the squeeze on, 90% becomes 85%, then 75%, and so on, until retreat, then the position keeps deteriorating. So instead of trying for 99% all the time you have to do things like 85%, 71%, look at the tempo of the game, the projections, think about your best chances. You just don’t have the luxury of surety.

If you want to focus on wins, all right. But what’s the target audience? What’s the expected scenario? If a genuinely strong player plays a scrub, is the game really decided by a scrub’s bad-odds reversal, like the “theory” might say? Or in practice will the strong player probably punish a scrub’s overextension first, then the scrub’s position deteriorates, then the stronger player wins in the end anyways?

If players want better outcomes and more wins, should they train to handle stronger opponents, or not?

When I put it like that, the answer seems pretty clear. But -

The simple guide being less confusing? Simple is good.

But what insights are really gained from keeping it simple? If it can be kept simple, okay, but what if it can’t be kept simple?

You saw the complications I addressed about just one infantry in Buryatia, but I could go on for fifty pages explaining the exact significance of that single Buryatia infantry, and when I say fifty, I mean that’s just where I’d stop, feeling I made my point. No need to actually write out another five hundred or even five thousand pages.

By the time you really understand the significance of a single infantry on Buryatia, you understand Axis and Allies itself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxCR2bFWHxM

But if I make references like “judge a lone infantry on Buryatia by its IPC value, do you? And well you should not.” “I don’t believe it.” “That . . . is why you fail.” - simple, memorable, even funny. But is it entertainment or insight? What of that tells you to leave the infantry at Buryatia or not?

“Hypotheses are empirically tested through actual games”. Sounds impressive, and true to boot. So why not.

It sounds impressive, the same sort of thing professionals write. But cutting and pasting phrases from a professional document doesn’t mean whoever’s doing the cut and paste job is a professional on the cut and pasted subject. Yes, they might be. But they might not be.

Who’s formulating the hypotheses? How does the process of formulating hypotheses work? What are these hypotheses, exactly? Why is it those hypotheses and not others? What is the acceptance or rejection process? What is the procedure for testing hypotheses? What are the acceptance criteria? The rejection criteria? What is the system for peer review?

Top platinum players? That presupposes platinum players have high competency. But I question that. What of high initial k-values and low k-values later? What of the 24 hour limit on ranked games? What of the awkward UI that means player skill doesn’t necessarily directly translate to performance? What of players that drag out their turns trying to get an opponent to miss a login? Or what if a platinum player decides simply to lie, and not only lie, but to get others to lie, to spread disinformation that weakens the meta - not necessarily because they’re pathetic losers that place too much importance on rank, but just for the fun of it because they’re trolls.

How are hypotheses formulated? People just come up with whatever idea? Players will disagree over what is and what isn’t a valid hypotheses. For one player they’d say “it works, therefore end of discussion”. Another would say “but what of opportunity costs”, yet another “what happens to the position four turns from now”, and yet another “nothing of value is being tested because this should never happen in the first place”. Then say four others will agree with the first player because they’re “friends”, four others disagree with the first player because they’re “enemies”. No method, just madness.

When is something accepted, when is it rejected? Is everyone responsible for their own findings? No pretense of quality control, everyone rules over their own personal fiefdom of empirical truth? Or is it a matter of votes so a popularity contest?

Or say everyone’s trained, everyone agrees to abide by a code, everyone agrees to record proper documentation, there is regular peer review, no corruption - how does that happen?

Dealing with numbers has issues, but so does not dealing with numbers.

@boston_nwo said in Why Sealion Doesn't Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online):

Back to the original topic. Germany “sealion” attempting to take UK capital early (rounds 2-4) is a weak strategy that has a low axis win rate. This is because germany pays a high opportunity cost of less pressure on Russia and because Allies can powerfully repel this line. Starting with buying 8 inf into UK round 1 and following up with merging us and UK fleets round 3. By round, germany’s fleet is dead barring extraordinary circumstances.

By what round Germany’s fleet is dead? Which? The Baltic? Mediterranean? Both?

Also would you care to specify USSR’s first round?

Yes, I know :face_with_rolling_eyes:

If USSR first round is specified then it goes against “keep it simple”.

But if USSR first round isn’t specified I can have USSR do whatever stupid thing. I probably wouldn’t leave two fighters sitting alone on Karelia or build a USSR battleship, but USSR triple attack, bomber buy, Buryatia fortification, all fair game.

Similarly, I can do UK and US battleship buys. I can have the Allies abandon Africa, I can bleed USSR units to the east.

Straw man army? Not at all.

Suppose we’re talking “highly skilled” players, whatever that means. Germany could capture London, the player at least notices that much and defends. But then you don’t need to tell that player to build on London. They know. Merging UK and US fleets on UK3/US3? Again, they know. If Germany gets lucky or does Atlantic shenanigans that’s just when the Allies unite their fleet in KGF, hard for the Axis to stop but not impossible.

So we’re not talking highly skilled players as they didn’t need to read that in the first place. We’re talking intermediate players that have some idea of what’s happening? Raw beginners?

Intermediate player pulls a USSR triple attack. Why not? Maybe they heard about W Rus / 9 to Ukr and don’t like it. Doesn’t USSR have to weaken Germany’s stacks? Doesn’t USSR want income? A triple attack can secure that income. They’re not thinking about USSR producing 7 units a turn and Germany 13, how a triple attack into failure or even German counter simply cuts USSR’s numbers to threaten off Germany’s stack on later turns. Stack building and bleeding, timings, projections with numbers, they’re not there yet. Heck, maybe even “advanced” players aren’t there yet. Who says when someone’s advanced? Me? You?

Or the beginning player sends units into China and east Asia. Hopefully not. One would hope. But why not? Nobody said they shouldn’t. And let’s face it, Flying Tigers, pretty cool, yeah? Don’t want to just let Japan walk all over east Asia unopposed. So why not.

Battleships? I put up a couple guides on Steam, in one I wrote don’t get battleships, there were so many helpful players that popped in to tell me how GOOD battleships really were. Have I ever considered you can absorb hits with battleships round after round? Saves a lot of IPCs, you know. (They can naval bombard too.) In a way, it’s touching. It’s a testament to the faith people have in themselves. And it’s always nice to see sincere players wanting to help one another. Doesn’t that just make you feel more positive about life in general?

(continued)

Convince anyone? Why bother? Even if it were TripleA in which player options aren’t crippled, who’s serious enough to run projections and do mathematics? You don’t have the first idea of what serious play even is.

But you do, because you’re top platinum? Please. The “don’t think about things” champion.

Nah, if the game was serious enough, if you even wanted to be a CONTENDER, you need a team. I’m not even talking CHAMPION, just to be in the running.

Like what?

1. You need a numbers team. People that understand the mathematics and methods of a system, that can run proper analyses and make recommendations. Experienced industry professionals too.

You don’t need a “team” if you can take advantage of already researched information. You can look at books that tell you the odds if you don’t want to work them out for yourself, but you need technical expertise from somewhere. But Axis and Allies? Nothing like that out there.

But you’re an experienced industry professional? Show me the experienced industry professional that says you don’t need to think about details; I’ll kick that ass so far, Earth will have a new satellite.

2. You need a breaker team. People that understand how the system can be broken, that look not to the intent of rules, but how they can be exploited, and not just the “rules” that are written, how systems can generally be exploited.

Kiddie stuff like trying to draw out the game in 1942 Online so an opponent misses a log-in, sure, whatever. I’m saying you have a team that monitors inputs and outputs to the system, determines for real how 1942 Online’s PRNG can be exploited. Not because you’re interested in trying to exploit the system, oh no. But you need to know what to look out for. You play a pickup poker game for a few thousand dollars, you have people walking around behind you while you’re looking at your cards and you let it happen, then you just have no business in that game, better get out before you’re plucked. That’s just how it is. You have a real team, a good team, that team is prepared.

3. You need a support team. People put serious time in, you can’t expect them to handle that load and also be doing all the cooking and cleaning plus never mind their work and family obligations on top. Doesn’t matter you have the top analytics team in the country, whatever time they’re spending on cleaning up or cooking or picking up the dry cleaning is time they’re not performing their role.

4. You need financials. You can hire support staff, you can order delivery instead of cooking, you can cover travel expenses or whatever else, but only with money. If you have a pretty serious group they might foot the financials themselves, just eat the cost, do their own support, etc. But if not, you have to look to sponsorships, prize winnings (which often aren’t guaranteed), and supplemental income. And of course that means possibly another whole load of responsibilities ranging from marketing to facilitating communications to networking.

5. Hierarchical command. Because we are not wasting time in a committee. And command is not going to be someone that’s too stupid to understand the importance of details.

But you say the meta is so good and smart? We can dispense with most of that because you just don’t need any of that?

Let’s go with that fairy tale for a moment. 1942 Online’s been out for going on two years or whatever. So we know it was demonstrated mathematically, covering all contingencies, why Allies are or are not disadvantaged against Axis. We also have a final answer to whether or not 1942 Online’s PRNG is, in any way, broken or exploitable. We have documentation and mathematics, and I don’t mean BAD documentation and BAD mathematics, I mean GOOD documentation and GOOD mathematics, right down the line. These are topics that are naturally going to be of interest, these are the first things that the first and second teams I spoke of would look at, just naturally.

Except it’s been two years and none of that’s happened. You hear of either of those being done? Should give you a clue about how “serious” the game really is. But there’s this fantastic secret team of next-level players and who knows what they’ve come up with? Right. By the way, I’m Batman.

But you don’t need a team for 1942 Online like that because . . . oh wait. Because it’s NOT A SERIOUS GAME. I don’t mean the compromised gameplay, I just mean people don’t take it seriously. They really don’t. Don’t take my word on it, think about how things would be different if players were serious. If you can’t picture that, my bad for assuming you could.

I see some players talk about “top ten in the world” or “blah blah whatever”. And I think some really sold themselves so hard on this idea, they really think the game is serious or whatever.

But to me? I see a lot of players shouting “serious!” but ACTUALLY serious? Talking out the details is a “waste of time”? You know who says that? It’s not anybody on any part of a good team, and I mean ANYONE. Even if someone’s just there to clean the toilets, they know better than to say stuff like that.

No, the sort of people that say that are the losers that never learned to understand the importance of details, or people that are trying to sell you something, take your pick. They’re the ones that fight against understanding details. They demand my time? Whatever.

Or wait, there’s a secret Team Evil, and someone’s spreading disinformation, trying to undermine potential good players . . . but wait. If they were actually competent at being evil they would know better than to put out a bunch of weak stuff like “don’t think and you’ll be a champion!” So even if there IS a secret Team Evil, if that’s what they’re up to it’s still nothing to be excited about. Little sad, actually.

Now me, I take my time and write out some of the details, math, and projections, get told it’s a “waste of time” or whatever, then what? You think I have to running after people, hat in hand, please respect me? You kidding? Oh you’re not kidding, it’s just that I can’t take it seriously. I suppose you expect me to apologize now. Maybe share some of my cookies. Look pal, get your own cookies. My cookies are for me and my buddies only, and you’re not my buddy, pal.

Tell me about how I should be “convincing” whoever. What do I get out of it? The respect of players whose acquaintance I want to cultivate? Who? Money? Where?

Far as I’m concerned, if there’s ever going to be players that can operate as part of a real team, they’re going to need to understand the numbers, and how things really work. I’m doing my part to build that future, a future in which there’s actually a strong meta and competent players. And if I’m not “simple” about it, if I’m not dogmatic, if I don’t kiss ass, so what? I’m not trying to sell players on joining my team or whatever stupid thing. You really think I want to network to try to build serious prize money and sponsorships for a niche interest market, you better think again. If there’s going to be a team, it’s going to be like-minded players drawn together by mutual interest that have a strong interest in working together. Or if it’s corporate and a corporate sponsor wants me to earn top platinum a bunch of times, I’ll just do it then.

You want me to spend hours a week playing ranked . . . for what? Prop up the legitimacy of a bad rank system that I don’t even believe in? I already said k-values were too high for provisional and too low for regular, and don’t even get me started on rank degradation, 24 hour clocks, never mind all the UI shortcomings, and I’m not too hot on the developers either. For you, maybe ranked is a big deal. For me, it’s nothing.

I understand what I’m saying right now, it’s probably totally incomprehensible to you. I wouldn’t usually want to lay it out like I’m about to, but here we are.

Suppose, in just one week, I could have every single platinum player say aardvark is a god. Don’t argue with aardvark, don’t waste aardvark’s time, aardvark is always right. I imagine maybe that’s what you want for yourself, but I don’t need that, I don’t want that.

For me, that would be one week of not baking cookies, or cleaning, or doing chores. Miss out on some TV programs. A movie or two. I know you don’t care. But I care. That’s the point. I care about stuff you don’t care about. I don’t care about stuff you care about. Different priorities.

You think it’s worth a week, two weeks, whatever? For me it’s not even worth one minute.

No amount of flaunting rank would help me build the sort of community I want to see. None of it would produce players that I thought worth being on a team with. I don’t need to deal with kids trying to “challenge” me or whatever thing because I’m on top. I don’t need any number of mindless drones nodding their heads with whatever I say. I want thinking players, if they disagree that’s fine, but I want to know why they disagree, I want to dig into the details, pull out the numbers. That’s what I think is fun and interesting.

Do I care about top platinum? I don’t. Look through my posts. Where do I ever say rank is important? I say rank is NOT important a lot, and I mean just that. Other players are like “what’s your rank”? Or they lead supposed reasoned arguments by saying they’re top rank. But not me. Never. You may remember when I was on Discord (ugh) I deliberately deranked from platinum to wood to get the wood badge, and why? It was a pain in the butt, took a load of time, but that’s how I do, and I wanted to make it clear to anyone. I don’t respect titles, I don’t respect rank, I don’t care about your experience, I don’t care about your history. Can you perform here, today, now, can you think, can you operate as part of a team, can you communicate? That’s enough. If you’re a wood league with a good mind, you won’t be wood for long if you don’t want to be. Then you see silver or gold players that are strong but never bothered to rank up and you really realize how little rank actually means. Then you see the “top platinum” players saying “don’t think! thinking about details is a waste of time! this is how top platinum players are!” It’s enough to make you, I wouldn’t say sick. Bored. Indifferent.

So there you are, going on again about top platinum, like you actually think I’m interested in all that. So how do you explain me being platinum in both Axis and Allies to begin with, then deliberately deranking to earn the wood badge in Discord? Queuing all those games, ugh. Did I mention I don’t like 1942 Online’s UI? I had to WORK for wood, and I did it. Can you even comprehend that sort of thinking? Probably not.

If I wanted to boast of having high rank I could just have sat there and said “check me out, I’m platinum!” But I wanted wood to make a statement. And when whoever was on Discord said I couldn’t just HAVE it, I had to EARN it, that I needed to show a screenshot of actual wood rank, I actually spent my own REAL TIME to EARN THAT WOOD BADGE. Doesn’t sound like something you’d ever do? I get that. I’m saying you don’t get me. That’s what I’ve been saying right along.

So you kids can go on about how I need to “convince” whoever. You put up a few thousand dollars guaranteed and/or show there’s players that can actually operate as a team, then I’m interested.

@quintin said in Why Sealion Doesn't Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online):

the only documented case of what he’s advocating against a decent opponent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiqzpuBQPEQ

Thread title is "Why Sealion Doesn’t Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online) "

“Doesn’t Work” =/= advocating.

If you miss the details because they’re a “waste of time”? In the title of the thread, “Doesn’t Work”, at least get that much.

@quintin said in Why Sealion Doesn't Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online):

waste of time

@quintin said in Why Sealion Doesn't Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online):

Same as in your example where the US player would reactively defend W-USA, only buying stuff after J sends troops in range.

Except that wasn’t my example, I wrote US1-3 fixed infantry buy. You’re the one that’s slapping on straw-man “reactive” non-arguments that has entirely nothing to do with anything I’ve been saying ever, just like you’re saying I’m arguing FOR Germany Baltic fleet, and whatever other nonsense.

@quintin said in Why Sealion Doesn't Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online):

Luckily for allies UK doesnt need to get any inf until after G commits and flushes his G1 buy down the toilet. You reactively get the inf. Same as in your example where the US player would reactively defend W-USA, only buying stuff after J sends troops in range.

At that point its fine if UK doesnt get a navy until UK2/UK3 since G isnt progressing with the actual axis wincondition: pressure on Russia.

The posts would be a lot more convincing if you had tried and won with this against plat rated opponents.
If anyone is curious there is a match on youtube where aardvark tries this. Not exactly a fair example since he failed SZ7, but its the only documented case of what he’s advocating against a decent opponent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiqzpuBQPEQ

Let’s see.

1. Misses the point of UK building air. I already addressed it. No counter. No engagement. Nothing. Just totally misses the point.

2. Oversells Germany “flushing down the toilet”. Again with the hard sell, Quintin, seriously. But as I already explained in the body of this thread, if UK placed less at India, has no pressure in Atlantic, Germany has better logistics to Karelia. It’s not fantastic. But it’s not awful. And if UK has no pressure in Atlantic, Germany has more freedom. If the Allies don’t think about the position at all other than kneejerk mass infantry overprotection of London, then you get all sorts of stuff like Germany uniting off France.

But I said that didn’t happen in this thread? But why? Because the Allies do certain things - which doesn’t include UK just blowing all its IPCs on infantry in some non-thinking kneejerk response. I gave the details.

3. Again, there was no “my example” where US is reactively defending against Japan invasion. Just a straw man.

4. “At that point its fine if UK doesnt get a navy until UK2/UK3 since G isnt progressing with the actual axis wincondition: pressure on Russia.”

Which again completely ignores natural development.

If you assume Germany is incredibly stupid and self-destructs, great, Allies control Africa, Allies control Europe, Allies control Pacific, fantastic, uber, supreme.

But if you assume Germany is not incredibly stupid, if the Allies don’t apply pressure, then the Allies get stalled out in the Atlantic while Japan builds up. And to TRY to be perfectly clear, I’m not talking about this boring brute force brainless stupidity buildup that some players apparently assume is the only thing their opponents are capable of. Japan takes Asia, it takes Africa, it builds a fat income while Germany stalls in Europe. “Pressure on Russia” is not a timed stack pushing with Germany trying to choke off Russia’s income; Germany accepts Russia has more income in exchange for controlling UK/US in the Atlantic; Germany’s naval costs in the Atlantic are offset by Germany not needing to build nearly so many ground units to defend. It is not the same as the 11 inf 2 art G1 buy into timing pressure at all; it is a longer Axis game that wins on attrition, and if the Allies don’t play accurately in Africa and Europe, if they misallocate forces, the Allies will NOT recover the timing, and the Axis WILL win.

And if I didn’t explore exactly how that happens in this thread? Excuse me if I say that spelling out all the details is not my job. Because it’s not. If someone’s interested, sure, if it’s relevant, sure, but my point to begin with was competent Allied play prevents that from happening.

5. Posts would be a lot more convincing, platinum whatever, already been over it. Don’t care, not interested. But I’m just saying that because I’m scared? Right, so I hopped in a time machine and posted on various forums saying hey let’s play out some analytical games weeks ago, so I could point to those threads now and say “hey look, I really AM interested in discussing and analyzing mathematically good play”. Whatever.

6. Not exactly fair? Sigh. This is how you think. There is “fair” there is “platinum” there is “rank” there are all these hierarchies and things that have nothing to do with anything in actuality but in your perception shapes everything.

Look. I bought the German carrier to begin with because I thought it would be a fun line for viewers. Not because I thought it was mathematically sound. Just as I did a R1 retreat from West Russia to mass-fortify Karelia with a Baltic attack - not because I’m scared of losing. But because it’s FUN, you know? I refused to use calculation tools for the match, and I didn’t write out any projections either. Why? Because I’ve throttled players with numbers before. It’s just as exciting as watching paint dry. For the players that watch and understand exactly what’s going on, I play a line they’ve seen a hundred times before and if I play it more accurately, so what? Still boring.

And do I say Sealion works? Read the title of the thread. (Answer is no). Do I say R1 Baltic attack and retreat from W Rus to Karelia works? I sure as hell didn’t. Probably I wrote a book in the comments saying “this isn’t a solid line, don’t try this at home”.

So I got bent at the sea zone, and what? Then I had a shortage of brain cells and placed the carrier in the Baltic, which was obviously dumb because the UK battleship was still alive. I mean, really, that was just bad. Obviously I wasn’t thinking. And you know? TTG was such a good sportsman, he said do you want to do over? And I said no.

You know why?

Same reason I’d fight with two hands and a leg tied behind my back, which is exactly what I’m doing if I’m not using calculation tools or running projections. Because it’ll be fun, to watch and to play. And I expect ol’ TTG found, even in concurrent games where he could replicate my tech from one game to another, I didn’t just roll over and die.

The real fact of the matter is - there’s no use in someone complaining things weren’t “fair”. If they got the 6% result, if they got the 2% result, it happens. A player has got to be able to handle that stuff in stride and not worry about “fair” or whatever. (And if it’s weird to the point that maybe “fair” IS a question, well, I did talk about having analytics and breaker teams. But I digress).

And if I failed the UK battleship battle? So what? It’s the risk I took. Probably I kept the cruiser back, sent all the subs, played greedy and took subs before fighters. I don’t remember what it was exactly, but I’ll bet it was greedy, and you know why? Because I usually play greedy, I think it’s fun. If it works, great, fast game. If it doesn’t work, great, interesting game.

And if I felt the games were played out and resigned both instead of playing it out? So what? I like to play things fast. Do I really need to run Japanese air all over Europe, AGAIN? Do I really need to throttle Axis with attrition, AGAIN? Once the position’s developed to a certain point, whether it’s “winning” or “losing” or “uncertain”, the key decisions are made and it’s just a matter of accurate play along predetermined lines based on game mechanics. Eurgh.

7. A decent opponent? By your standards? I know, we all have to judge the world through our personal lens, of course I can’t expect you to have the same standards I have. It’s not about “higher” or “lower”, just different. But if you must (shrug)

I keep a record of the 1942 Online players I’ve played. Out of I think 780 or so players on my record, I found less than 0.5% interesting enough to consider it worth my time playing them again.

It’s very rare, that I find players I consider competent, and the list shrank over time, not grew. How could it shrink? If I played with someone again, I’d watch their plays and look at the notes I took from previous games. Was it really that they understood the German-Japanese cooperative timing? Was that Buryatia fortification a lucky fluke or a calculated gamble? If they’re good at slow-stack mechanics, are they also good at fast-stack mechanics? You can tell by their play, and it’s not just one thing. You look at the pacing, you look at their contingencies, you see how the parts of what they do interact with other parts, how they interact with other players, and you get a pretty good idea, especially if you’re paying attention.

TTG’s a content creator, and I respect that. I think generally games should be entertaining to watch, I think a lot of players in the meta have this really stolid boring (and wrong) idea of what “good” play is. Being a (self-proclaimed) nice aardvark, of course I want interesting games for the viewers.

But I’d watched some of TTG’s games on Youtube before he played me.

So here I am (self-proclaimed) nice aardvark. On the one hand, let’s give them a show. But am I so nice that I’m going to throw away an opportunity that comes in less than 0.5% of games? Am I going to come out of retirement to install 1942 Online whose altered mechanics I don’t care for, for a community that really hasn’t been supportive (or even comprehending), to play against TTG, and waste not just one, but two games, refusing to use calculations or projections against a player, not pursuing the mathematically correct lines of play, giving up taking a closer look at opponent responses under mathematically correct and fully analyzed lines of play, possibly getting, from an “interesting” opponent, something I’d never considered? Perhaps (and probably) not, but would I give up on that possibility?

To you, maybe that was a game where I was trying my hardest against a proven opponent to demonstrate German Baltic fleet is viable. But that has nothing to do with reality.

You can dig through old posts on Steam, I’ve been saying Baltic fleet isn’t good for almost two years now. Like what, suddenly I forgot all the mathematics and projections I’d ever explained, and thought German Baltic fleet was a great idea?

I remember TTG saying on Reddit that I just wanted to be “different” or some such. I believe I replied that I don’t claim to be different (I don’t), I don’t claim to be original. I’ve said before, I’ll say again. you look at Don Rae’s essays, all the same stuff, the same approaches, same ideas. Different application maybe, but Don’s essays were for an earlier version. And if I wanted to say but I haven’t read anyone else write what I do? Nobody goes into the details like I do? So what? Crack open a mathematics textbook. It’s all there. Tactics, strategy? That too.

All I say is players should build on the basics, understand the mathematics, understand the principles, then simply apply. And often, the application is not what supposedly “top platinum” players say, it certainly isn’t “a waste of time” to look at the details, because that’s simply not what the mathematics supports.

Sure, for real-life applications, you’ve got to understand the importance of observational versus theoretical, but for an abstract construct with a very limited ruleset, the applications are simple, and you can’t and shouldn’t ignore them any more than you should ignore the odds when playing cards or dice or any such thing. You try to claim “a winner is a winner”, see how long that holds out in Vegas. No system, just ride that raw luck, see how long that lasts.

And I think I made the point on Youtube comments too; it’s not even R1 Baltic attack and retreat from West Russia to fortify Karelia is “new”. Nor is German Baltic fleet “new”. Maybe it’s exciting for the kids, but for those that understand the game mathematically it’s simply another application of core principles that transposes into very much the same lines over time.

Sigh, people saying what I’m trying to prove, or what I’m trying to do, or what I’m whatever, without any regard for what’s actually happening. And if I were #1 ranked platinum, there would just be so much more of it. And if people said shut up, don’t backtalk aardvark he’s #1 platinum, even worse. Then I have to explain how thinking is important, the shortcomings of the ranking implementation, how the last thing I want of anyone is that they just “shut up” (so long as they can actually follow and maybe even contribute meaningfully to a discussion anyways), players get angry that I’m asking them to be nice to other players, and just so much whatever.

@Quintin

If you read this thread, you would know how silly you were being.

Also saying I “tried” anything is a complete mischaracterization. Go ask TTG if I was playing seriously. Ask Tahweh about the 35-page writeup I did for less than two rounds of play, and for the record I wasn’t taking that game terribly seriously either.

Maybe you feel you have a bone to pick because I flesh out my arguments with details and you never ever have any good response. Going on two years now, that’s how it’s been. So maybe you want to flex on me, assert your authority or whatever.

Hey, I get it. That’s the world we live in. You want to misrepresent me as “advocating” literally the opposite of what I believe, sure, whatever, you do you. No hard feelings.

But here we are again, I’m saying “think”, you’re saying “don’t think”, I’m saying “look at the numbers, the real numbers”, you’re creating straw men. Is that the legacy you want to build for yourself?

You can’t take thirty minutes to read and another thirty minutes to write? Okay. But then you say anyone that wants to be taken seriously should spend whatever hours a week, for how many weeks, playing a busted game, to achieve whatever rank before their opinions are worth considering. Come on now.

@quintin said in Why Sealion Doesn't Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online):

You reactively get the inf. Same as in your example where the US player would reactively defend W-USA, only buying stuff after J sends troops in range.

It’s not that I have high expectations of you, but we’ve been here before and you should know better. How have these things ever played out?

1. You make some vague claim that I disagree with. I explain why I disagree; I lay out the mathematics and the projections. You reply you’re top platinum, I say the meta is weak, and the undercurrent is you’re saying you’re a champion, I’m saying the field’s so weak the title’s meaningless. I try not to make a big thing of it, but it’s there.

2. You never reply with any details, just saying that it “works”, I say “but it shouldn’t work”, and in so doing I write a lot of details, a lot of numbers. You never engage. You never reply. You just set up straw men and bad examples and claim absent any real projections or preconditions that what you say comes to pass. You engage in wishful thinking, not serious discussion.

3. But then, was it you that had what I said was an optimistic opinion about Allies advancing in KJF? Whatever it was, Philippines or Borneo on round 5 or 6 or whatever? I said that didn’t happen. And of course “top platinum” says it does happen (no details, just it happens). So I took my time, I wrote a LOT of documentation showing this is the German timing, this is the Japan timing, this is how the pieces connect, here is the reasonable range of Allied responses, here is what happens when the Allies do this, here is what happens when the Allies do that. And I don’t say I’m right about everything. That isn’t how I operate. But I say if I am wrong, where am I wrong? What unreasonable assumption have I made? What is it that does not logically follow, at any point? And no response. And that wasn’t the first time.

4. But for that PARTICULAR back and forth about anti-KJF on Steam forums, what happened? I explained how others used “shifting goalpost” arguments trying to claim after the position had developed to a certain point, that supposedly the conditions leading to that position changed, to such a degree that a player would actually have to go back in time and change what they did on previous turns for their line to play out the way that those others were claiming they played out. And I explained how my arguments were not the same, as it’s simply that I hadn’t taken the time to detail every last branch and contingency, but reasonable play by both sides had the board position developing roughly on the time I said it would, with the consequences I’d said would happen, right along. And if I didn’t spell out every little detail in the first place? Haven’t I always said that I’m just trying to cover the basics, that I’m not even trying to fill in the details? I have other things to do, I give others the basics but let them work out the details for themselves if they’re interested, they don’t need to be spoon-fed all the way and even if they wanted spoon-feeding, that’s not my job. But back to KJF and anti-KJF, I explained how turn order led to exactly the scenarios I specified, how J1 didn’t typically need pre-emptive subs (and I mentioned the East Indies attack scenarios as a branch and broke down the risks and projections), how J2 built two subs a turn - no more, no less, and only AFTER a US1 Pacific fleet drop, and how even despite this Japan simultaneously developed pressure in Asia - and how no matter how you sliced it, if the Allies did one thing, the Axis simply responded after the fact, and all the scenarios simply looked bad for the Allies. I showed the Allies CAN pressure Japan, but pressuring Japan and getting the results others were claiming simply meant high likelihood of sacrificing Russia early, and I showed how that in turn ended up with Axis winning, I showed how various transpositions and variations of various branches all played out with Japan not needing to commit to more than 2 submarines a turn until quite late in the game, and how different variations all played out. I explained how and why Japan transitioning to bombers was only natural and expected, how trying to say Japan sticks to ONLY two subs, EVER, is NOT a reasonable understanding of the points I had made, how exactly the German and Japanese timings interacted with one another, how the Axis recovered from Allied pressure in the Pacific, and all sorts of scenarios, ranging from Allied transports from Alaska relieving in Asia (too slow) to Allies pushing southeast Pacific (too slow), how Japanese ICs on the mainland locked Japan down so shouldn’t be built, how Japan used its economy, units, and developed its position to pressure Russia then reverse to Allied pressure - I didn’t get into EVERY detail, but I put a lot out there. You can see just from my recollecting a few of the salient points, there was a lot. Yes, ol’ aardvark do put in that time and the details. And what was the response? That I was wrong. Then I gave even more details, showing how I wasn’t wrong. And then? Ghosted.

And of course, again, I wasn’t thanked for laying out the details. I wasn’t credited. I was attacked, hounded, etc. Sure, okay, whatever. And of course, there was never EVER any response. Just the opposition suddenly didn’t have any response, oops, everyone takes the day off, nobody says “why aardvark, you laid it out so well, I have to agree with you.” Nope, just woops, nobody’s in, can’t accept your call. Heh. If it happens once, sure, a few times why not. But every time, everyone just suddenly left for lunch. You can imagine I’m skeptical by now. My, they were all so spirited just a little while ago, so fierce about “aardvark is wrong!” I wonder what ever could have happened, dear me, didn’t even leave a forwarding address.

But I imagine the points I made did register somewhere, and the points I made rankled. Someone maybe remembered that I demonstrated that reasonably, you take the turn order and take reasonable projections and still arrive at a certain line . . . and now, someone is trying to explain the same process, to me, who pointed out the importance of properly considering turn order in the first place? Really?

I mean really. This just happens again and again and again. I say there’s such thing as a “timing”, I’m roundly attacked for it, then some kid that was shouting timings don’t exist I’m not a top player whoever heard of such stupid nonsense, same kid has the nerve months later to try to explain, TO ME, what a timing is! And now you’re trying to explain turn order to the same person that explained the importance of turn order. Then there’s players trying to explain the timing of Japanese development against India and Africa, TO ME. Explaining how Japanese subs work, TO ME. Explaining Karelia pressure TO ME. Again and again, kids pulling out half-assed versions of stuff I’ve explained, not even to others, but to them, personally, months back, they distort it, reverse it, ignore most of it, then throw it in my face and say they have some new ground-breaking line of play and have I, aardvark, ever thought about this? I mean, honestly! The absolute cheek!

I’m like, you were there months ago when I made these points, you told me I was an idiot again and again for saying exactly these things you’re so proud about “discovering” now, and now you’re beginning to come around only you’re still ignoring more than half of what I wrote because you didn’t understand it, and now you’re trying to explain to me how it all works? What about X and Y and Z and A and B and C for that matter? What about them? No answer? “Waste of time” or “I’m overthinking it”? Hey okay, let’s see what the next “breaking meta” is in six months, again I’ll see people doing a half-assed version of stuff I wrote a year ago and saying it’s groundbreaking. Sorry if I can’t be too excited about that process.

It’s not that I’m claiming to be some big original thinker. I don’t think anything I’ve been saying the past couple years about Axis and Allies is new. If I’m just applying the same concepts Don wrote about to new editions, what’s the big deal? Don kept his stuff simple and didn’t get into the details, read between the lines and you see Don probably didn’t want to overcomplicate it, never mind writing about versions of Axis and Allies that didn’t even exist at the time. And yet, as simple as Don kept things, you can see obviously some people had a big problem with him too. Oh no, someone actually being methodical, better have a witch-burning! “Numbers”, “thinking”, what is this sorcery?!

http://donsessays.freeservers.com/essay1.htm

BUT FIRST…HERE ARE SOME CONCEPTS TO CHALLENGE YOURSELF WITH:

I will first ask you to not to negatively challenge the statements mentioned forthcoming, which I naturally accept as verbatim for all of my upcoming described strategical play. I’m also going to be asking you to suspend any skepticism or any immediate disbelief for now"

Don had to put up with so much nonsense he wrote out an address in his first essay, I get it, it’s not personal, Don had to deal with it, I deal with it, whatever.

But that doesn’t make it right.

I’m going to try to make this as plain as I can. Yes, I’m going to repeat myself, but as there’s no engagement or sign of understanding, that’s how it is.

I don’t mean you DISAGREE with what I’m saying. I’m okay with people DISAGREEING. I mean fundamentally no response to what I’m saying, arguing with straw men. So here we go again.

1. “Simple” advice only helps to a point. You try to keep things too simple, you end up with players doing bad plays like US1-3 all-infantry builds, pulling out of everywhere and trying to “defend” US, because “defending US is good”. You want to say defending US is good? Go on, explain how US1-3 all-infantry builds are good, explain how you just can’t go wrong with simple advice. I’ll wait over here to avoid the rush.

Except you can’t, except I’m setting up straw men? There’s a difference between a straw man and an analogy. Saying I’m claiming Germany should build Baltic fleet is just . . . literally you haven’t read the thread. Saying bad play is bad is, well, it’s bad, what more do you want?

2. UK1 all-infantry buy plays right into German Baltic fleet. Oh, it’s not like Germany has some big obvious stupid counter to it, which is the level of thinking that you and some others are applying. If you can’t drive a houseboat through a strategy, it must be solid, that’s what I’m getting from you and some others. Not just on this topic.

3. The problem is, UK1 all-infantry and turtling London is passive on other parts of the board. New players turtle London, they give up in other areas. Yes, you can transpose out of too many ground units on London with excess transports, but you simply can’t apply pressure to Germany, you can’t restrict its options like you can if you cut it tighter and go for some UK air, which I did explain in this thread. You don’t counter-pressure Germany early, you leave Germany open to options like uniting its Med and Baltic fleets. Explain how just infantry on London deter German freedom in the Atlantic, except you can’t because it doesn’t.

You’re used to playing against weak players, and if they’re platinum so what? Again and again you get away with overbuilding to 99% or 99.9999% margins of safety because the opponents wreck themselves by overextending. So you get away with sloppy play, you don’t need to look for wins in the margins. In fact, in a weak meta you shouldn’t take risks assuming players will play optimally because if they never do, then you just risk eating a counter; better for you to wait for an opponent to screw up, does this sound familiar? Because it’s exactly what you and others keep saying, except you also claim players shouldn’t think and that the meta is strong, you can see how you could go with one or the other but saying it’s all true at once, I’m saying that’s not just hard to swallow but actually contradictory.

When I write, I’m talking about solid play. I’m always talking about solid play. Why? It’s fun to talk about R1 and R2 battleship buys, but why would I seriously waste my time on that? Now I should explain why players should calculate the percentages and look for wins in the margins instead of trying to go 99.99999% on everything? Seriously?

So I wrote that then I thought about it. Okay, so some kid yelling at me on Discord about how “timings” don’t exist. Same kid trying to explain “timings”. They don’t understand the importance of allocation. So when have I ever explained why you take the percentages, when have I dug into “best chance”, when have I talked about projections? All right, ALL THE TIME, but when have I talked about it in detail, and ONLY about that?

Obviously it’s incredibly arrogant for me to think “well, if I haven’t explained it then for other players it might as well not exist”. But perhaps I can be forgiven, considering all the bloody precedent with everything else!

So sure, anyone that wants me to dig into it, just pop me a message. I’ll create a whole new thread about it on the 1942 Second Edition boards.

Not that I expect anyone to REALLY message me but (shrug), if they do, hey, why not.

4. And AGAIN, I emphasize, new players that are looking for simple advice are not going to know what to weight correctly. They are going to be sloppy, they are going to mis-allocate, and vague advice is not going to fix that. You need a 99% on London? New player thinks let’s just be safe, let’s just make it 99.999%. Never mind that probably Axis take Africa, Axis have plenty of time to develop in Europe and Asia, USSR gets cut off, Russia falls, then the Axis have an expected easy win off position and attrition. And why? Because newer players don’t understand they can’t just play it “safe” all the time. It’s exactly players that should know better giving them bad advice that makes things worse.

5. To make it REALLY simple, I’m saying, plainly, I think UK1 pure infantry response is wrong. And let’s be clear, when I say “I think”, there is an actual thought process. That’s no empty boast, look through the thread, you see the math, you see where I outline contingencies, is that thought or not? It’s a lot more than “I’m a top player so this is right”.

Sure, you could say SOMETIMES UK1 pure infantry is necessary. Depending on the dice, depending on the moves made to that point, it MAY be the appropriate move, but you do not WANT to do it, it is not your go-to answer, it is something you want to try to AVOID if at all possible. And as I detailed through this thread, it is often possible with accurate play to avoid UK1 all-infantry. And as I also detailed, there is good reason to avoid it if you can.

Do you really not understand that a passive UK1 response of all infantry does not necessarily threaten Germany’s Baltic fleet? Do you not understand how that passive response restricts UK’s development options on later turns? Do you not understand the importance of single units even in battles of near a hundred units or more? Because that’s what I’m getting from you. That you don’t understand.

But I do understand. So just as I wrote about KJF, just how I wrote about KGF, just how I wrote about Karelia, just how I wrote about timings, just how I wrote about turn order, here’s another thing I’m saying. Maybe if I was right all the other times, I’m right this time too? You think?

But this time maybe instead of disagreeing with me now, then six months later quoting back at me a half-assed version of what I wrote in the first place - maybe this time we can just skip all that and we can agree all-UK infantry is not usually the best response to German Baltic navy.

Why? Because aardvark said so? You would think maybe on account of all the times I said things and was right, maybe you could take my word on it. I mean, REALLY.

But I’m NOT just saying take my word on it. The basic numbers, contingencies, and branches are all in this thread. If you do all UK infantry, then you just don’t have the numbers to restrict various German options AND YOU CAN CONFIRM IT YOURSELF, AND WOULD ALREADY KNOW THIS, IF YOU HAD LOOKED AT THE NUMBERS IN THIS THREAD. NOT JUST ONCE. MULTIPLE SCENARIOS. IF YOU UNDERSTOOD AT ALL, YOU WOULD NOT MISS IT. BUT YOU MISSED IT.

Except you weren’t looking for the possibility there was something you hadn’t considered. Do you ever?

Could I miss something myself? Sure. But as I ever say, show me where I missed something. Point out the scenario, pull out the numbers. Show how a UK1 all-infantry response is superior. Explain how the line transposes. Every time I say go on, show me the details, show me WHERE I am wrong, every single time, every time I ask to be shown the work, no response. You think I didn’t notice?

(I noticed.)

And don’t try to say that I didn’t explain myself. I used the exact example, I used the simplification, I even built out an analogy. No response to anything, just refusal to engage and straw men. I am saying it is not that simple, you just keep repeating that it’s simple, I’m saying show where it’s simple, show how the lines transpose, give me an example, give me numbers, give me a projection, ANYTHING. But nothing.

I expect you won’t even go as far as acknowledging that an all-UK infantry build is useful under certain contingencies. Me, I have no problem acknowledging validity of points I disagree with, so long as there is some validity.

No? You think not? Just read through the thread. I never have to dig far for an example, I always use fact-based methodology, so an example is always ready at hand. Even in this thread, I say Board Game Nation may be coming out with a German Baltic navy video, I’m saying I don’t think German Baltic navy is good against solid play, but what? Do I say German Baltic navy is garbage? That Gary’s an idiot? No, I say if the Allies play sharply, I think Germany’s disadvantaged, but if the Allies do NOT play sharply, there are possibilities. I try to acknowledge what validity there is in others’ arguments. And why not? I think it’s true.

And exactly what those possibilities are, I already went into. If you simply read through the thread, reading about the branches I discount with accurate Allied play, then you should understand what happens if the Allies DON’T play accurately. Then of course the branches aren’t discounted. Then the Axis have all sorts of nice options. Must that be spelled out? Really?

So here we are, think or don’t think? I say think. You say don’t think. I say if you don’t think problems. You say if you don’t think no problem. I don’t have to chase after that argument because it isn’t going anywhere.

For Quintin, I suppose acknowledging “contingencies” would go against him and other supposed “top” players repeating that it’s simple and players don’t need to think. Acknowledging “contingencies” would go exactly with what I’ve been saying going on two years, that Axis and Allies is MOSTLY simple, but players do still need to think and know what they’re doing.

I could say ulterior motives, maybe some players are trying to sabotage the community and anyone trying to build out resources for players seriously looking to improve themselves. There are a lot of ways to get top rank, you draw out your games and maybe your opponent misses a checkin, lie to other players about what strategies work, whatever.

But whether there’s whatever silliness going on or one-upmanship games, so what? Bottom line, someone says think, someone else says don’t think, someone lays out the details all the time, someone else doesn’t. You think people don’t notice? They notice.

@quintin said in Why Sealion Doesn't Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online):

The posts would be a lot more convincing if you had tried and won with this against plat rated opponents.

Son, I don’t need to convince anyone of anything. I can sit right here and in six months to a year or whatever the meta will have some new “groundbreaking” nonsense and I’ll just point to an old thread of mine that already covered the whole line, as well as possibilities the “pioneers” never considered but should have. Then I’ll point to various articles, textbooks on mathematics, Don Rae’s essays, and explain how everything I ever wrote was just natural development. Nothing special, nothing exciting, just applied mathematics, and not much of it at that.

Y’all kids can run around and have a good time, rediscovering the wheel. Me, I’m just gonna bake some cookies and have a nap. By the way, that thing that goes round and round, maybe you should poke a hole in it and make an axle . . . don’t look at me that way. I know all the “top stone rollers” never heard of such a thing, but I think it could work . . .

(continued)

Thought about it, decided to add this part on after all.

As ever, I imagine some are going to pick on pieces of what I wrote and completely ignore the actual point. So I’m going to lay it on a little thick now.

Suppose you have a new player that gets the advice “you can’t let either of USA’s victory cities be captured, if that happens game over”.

So what does this new player do?

Why, the SMART thing of course. They know, from other “advice” that infantry are a good defensive buy.

So for the first three turns as US, that player does nothing but buy infantry for East and West US.

They are doing their job as an Allied player! There is NO WAY the Axis are going to capture US any time soon!

BEST ALLIED PLAYER EVER AM I RIGHT

:relaxed:

(In case it isn’t clear just from context, that’s really bad US play.)

. . . so now you have a UK player that sees a possible threat on London, and they dump a load of infantry on.

So simple!

:relaxed:

I’m not going to dig deep into it because I’m sure neither Quintin or BostonNWO/MarineIguana wants a numbers-based discussion. Look through their posts anywhere, look through mine anywhere, that’s how it is.

But a couple basics:

1. It’s exactly the Allies pushing for “extreme safe” lines of play that can make the German Baltic navy viable.

2. Oversimplify the “advice” and the Allied player plays right into Axis hands.

==

As to Baltic navy bomber / subs, apply the same stuff I wrote in this thread and adjust it for reasonable Allied action. When you look at the numbers, should be pretty clear it isn’t any more “interesting” than Sealion.

Which is not to say it isn’t interesting.

@quintin said in Why Sealion Doesn't Work (Maybe) (edit - in 1942 Online):

Thinking about strats that get easily and consistently refuted is a waste of time

Readers will decide for themselves whether thinking things through is a waste of time or not.

Just because you’re not personally planning on reading a book doesn’t give you the right to burn all the copies.