Posts made by Amalec

@Arthur:

Art built on G2 reach Belarus on G5.  By that time the Russians have an extra full turn to reinforce the front and you might not be able to push back the defenses if they had been sufficient to hold the previous turn.  G4 vs G5 is a huge difference in benefit.  Depending on the Russian’s decision on the Siberian forces, they might be back in Moscow by G7 and G8.  A single round of delay will allow 6-20 additional defenders in the Capitol.  Add in a further 3 or 4 allied fighters landing in Moscow and the slight delay will turn a good chance of dominating victory into an unreasonable risk. Each game is different but this scenario happens quite frequently.

For clarity:
If the Russian far east infantry head straight home, 6 INF arrive on R6 and 12 INF + 2 AA on R7.
INF/ART built on G2 in Berlin can reach Moscow by G7 - a turn ahead of the bulk of the far east units.

Germany is incredibly powerful offensively, between it’s armor and it’s air, but somewhat weaker on defense. My experience with Barbarossa is that it is, oddly, primarily a defensive struggle for Germany. Germany must figure out how to push forward continuously and apply pressure in several directions without opening itself up to Russian counter attacks that delay it or destroy vulnerable armor while it’s airforce is landed elsewhere and it’s forces are split.

Plenty of attack power can be achieved for Moscow (with a 10 inf G1 buy):
For a G6 attack: G2-3 armor/mec purchases
For a G7 attack: G2 10xART build in Berlin followed by armor/mec purchases on G3-4.

In the turns leading up to Moscow, however, the extra infantry are more helpful than artillery in making Russian counter attacks unattractive or exchanged in Germany’s favor.

My issue with LL is that it changes the game balance in ways I don’t completely understand, particularly for small, air supported battles.

For example: there are 3 infantry are in a province. I know I can send just 2 units and sufficient aircraft to land 3 hits, always be successful and always take the province. Depending how important both winning and taking the province was, without low luck I might have to send 3 or 4 units. This will be especially problematic in amphibious assaults, because knowing I only need to send one transport can make a huge difference.

I think this will further tilt the game into Axis hands. Germany and Japan both have large starting air forces, take part in many small battles, and guaranteed outcomes will free up Japanese transports for other tasks. Maybe it’d even out elsewhere, but I’m just not sure what all the ripple effects will be.

Thanks for the responses! I’m still not quite convinced…

On spending the 30IPC on ground forces against Russia:
While I agree that ART/MEC/ARM are better ground forces against Russia - I think INF are a better first turn build. ART can be built on G2, arriving in time for Moscow but kept safe from the small attack/counter attack battles that take place in pushing Russia out of Leningrad and Ukraine. ARM and MEC are best built on G2-5, since they can catch up. I digress though: the important aspect here is spending on land forces against Russia vs spending on naval units.

On projecting power out to Gibraltar:
I think this is, in effect, a pipe dream. When the US does move to Gibraltar it will do so with a navy that is simply too large for Germany to hit. Even if it doesn’t, the Allies can easily place blockers in SZ110 or SZ104. Even if THAT doesn’t prove true, losing German ships and aircraft against Allied ships and aircraft - even significantly in German’s favour - is hugely costly for Germany and plays into the Allied goal - to siphon resources from the Russian theatre. Worse, you’re almost certainly going to have to retreat behind the straits after US4 or US5 because the US Navy will be large enough to take you out and the Allies would love to get a chance to trade American fighters for German ones.

On projecting power against the UK Sea Zones:
I still think this is best done with the German air. With 8-12 starting aircraft in Germany plus occasional SB builds, UK already has to put a huge fleet in place to defend it’s transports. A few German ships forces that to be slightly larger, sure, but aircraft can be redirected against Russia when it’s time for Moscow while ships aren’t much more cost effective against the UK and represent resources permanently removed from the Russia theatre. Forcing the Allies to build fleets to protect it’s transports and then ignoring those fleets, leaving huge amounts of Allied IPCs floating in the Atlantic, costs Germany next to nothing.

The long and short version:
I think that engaging the Allies in the Atlantic is a mistake. It plays into Allied economic strength. Even if you’re very successful, air and naval battles are incredibly expensive, Germany can’t really afford dead aircraft, and the Allies will win eventually. Building up infantry in France and W. Germany, on the other hand, and using them to attack allied landings covered by a dozen German aircraft is very cheap, preserves your aircraft for the critical battle against Russia, and plays against the Allies’ poor logistical position while still forcing the Allies to spend huge amounts of IPCs in the Atlantic.

For G1, I seem to always hear CV + 2xTTs recommended as a build. I’ve tried to work it over, or play it out in TripleA, but I just can’t make myself into a believer. Still, the seeming consensus on this issue has me questioning myself.

Would anyone care to sell me on this build?

My typical G1 builds are either:

a) 10xINF, headed immediately for Russia. Since Armour and Mecs can catch up later, early turn infantry fodder seems essential.

b) No build. ~92 IPCs for my G2 build forces Britain to prepare for a huge Sea Lion, since it’s on the table for G3 and can’t be stopped with with UK2 builds/deployments alone. It also doesn’t give Russia enough information to make an aggressive build, since it can easily turn into tanks and men.

I just can’t see how invading Russia with 10 INF less than usual wouldn’t be crippling. And it seems to me that the best (cheapest) way to deal with Allied landings is to simply smash them with your Air with a handful of infantry to soak hits. It takes ages for them to build up a big and secure transport fleet and drop enough units to become a real threat. At that point, the carrier isn’t going to be more helpful than a couple of subs, and you can build those later - while early slow moving Infantry can’t be built after turn 3-4 and expected to be useful against Moscow.

Our games seem to run at an incredibly slow pace; usually 10-12 hours for 6-8 turns.

Does anyone have suggestions on how to fairly and reasonably implement some sort of turn timers?

No build G1. G2 you’ve got ~90IPCs to spend. G2 finish the allied fleet and put 10-13 transports. Without substantial defense build on UK1, even a 10 unit build in the UK on UK2 won’t be able to stop the G3 German Sea Lion. If it doesn’t look viable on G2 for some reason you can always do a 10 infantry 10 armor build and go Barbarossa.

From your examples, France is really the only attack I can see that both must be done and that I would consider game ending under most circumstances.

From that alone we can say that some portion of games are going to be lost on dice alone. It’s just the nature of probability.

That said, most people who think they lose to dice simply don’t understand dice. Yes, you lost a battle you “should have won”, since you had a 90% chance of winning, and it cost you the game. But if you fight a half dozen critical battles at 90% that will cost you the game if lost in a particular game, you’re going to lose half the time outright.

I generally think people who go into France light are insane for this reason - sure, you’ve still got 90% chance of winning but that means you’re going to lose 1 in 10 of your games on the first battle. That’s insane. But most people don’t consider that a “real” loss, despite the fact balancing minimizing your risk vs reward of spreading yourself out is literally the entire point of the game.

But this is also why I don’t think the other battles are strictly game enders if they go poorly. When the board is against you you simply up your tolerance for risk. A 10% chance of winning a Hail Mary that will decide the game now is entirely preferable to losing with certainty in a few more turns.  A 90% chance of in a game deciding battle is entirely too low if everything is going your way.

@Marshmallow:

It would be foolish of Japan to detach all its destroyers from its fleet if the US is playing sub swarm though. Furthermore, if Japan is protecting its destroyers Japan has definitely got its priorities wrong and is not using its fleet to achieve victory but to stave off defeat. Allied victory this is!

Marsh

Sub-swarm is a bit of a misnomer here. YG is advocating no Pacific build until A4. That leaves 2 DD 1 SS 1SB in the Pacific until the end of A4, and 4 DD 5 SS 3SB at the start of A5. A5 those can move to Hawaii - if America stills controls it (big if) and Japan doesn’t have enough ships staged in Japan or the Carolines to kill a handful of 1s and 2s parked off Hawaii (bigger if). A6 they can begin to harass Japan, supported by America’s A5 Pacific builds now in Hawaii - which will be at best 2 more subs because of the 60+ IPC needed to build 20 units for the Atlantic transports on A5.

By J7 when those subs have their first chance to raid Japan the Dutch money islands will be securely Japanese and the British/ANZAC fleets will be destroyed or contained.

I’m not saying sub-swarm is a bad idea, or that KGF is a bad idea. But if you send most of the Pacific fleet to the Atlantic and don’t build anything else until A4 then you’re simply praying for the Japanese player to be terrible, because if he isn’t he’s going to win the game on VCs before Germany even starts to sweat.

Keeping the Pacific fleet intact and adding 2-3 SS/DDs a turn is absolutely necessary to keep Japan honest. Without it they barely have to defend their builds in the Sea of Japan, so they can go all out elsewhere. They can easily take Hawaii. They can split their fleet into pieces to move against India and Australia at the same time, instead of having to choose.

@Marshmallow:

To my thinking the whole point is to relieve pressure on Russia as fast as possible. If the Axis accumlates a stack big enough to attack your landing, pressure on Russia is effectively relieved. So you actually want the German player to hit your stack because if he’s hitting Spain he’s not hitting Russia effectively. Furthermore, Axis logistics being what they are, it’s difficult for him to keep hitting Spain without continuous builds that have to walk a long way, so hitting your forces in Spain would actually make it easier for the US to advance in Europe.

In retrospect, it should be pretty obvious from the state of the board whether Germany can counter a 20 division drop into Spain on their upcoming turn. But I would argue that if those units are already in position to attack Spain on the following German turn the pressure against Russia has already been relieved - no reason to let them actually attack you. Still, most likely Germany won’t be in position to counter and so a direct landing in Spain will make sense 9/10 times. My bad.

@Marshmallow:

The issue is that Japan does not have enough destroyers to annihilate subs faster than the US can build them. If Japan is building lots of destroyers, then it is sacrificing somewhere else and not achieving victory. Also, if Japan is reacting to the US it may lose strategic focus – it’s very easy to do when the US is sucking away your Japanese income.

Japan starts with 4 destroyers, and has had no reason to use or commit them elsewhere up to this point. It also has an enormous fleet that is effectively unchallenged. It should be able to kill 3-4 subs per turn with those destroyers and protect them afterward, with little to no loses to itself. I don’t think that’s going to work for USA unless it has a large enough fleet to counter attacks on it’s subs in range - and I don’t think it’ll be able to do that until turn 5-6 after moving the Pacific fleet to the Atlantic. Plenty of time for Japan to go crazy.

I think there’s a lot of value in taking Spain with America, but I think this should always be a situational strategy rather than one you dedicate yourself to from the beginning.

Some thoughts:

I’d stage my forces in Gibraltar, rather than landing them directly into Spain. Taking Spain and moving your transports home at the same time will allow your transports to hit Spain again  immediately if the Germans manage to take it from you. You do not want to let the Germans attack you in Spain with their air force behind them and then withdraw their vulnerable units before you can kill them. It also keeps Swedish and Turkish men and money out of Axis hands for an extra turn for no real cost to you.

I also think you’re underestimating the devastating impact you’re having on the rest of the map:
Japan easily has the resources to kill your subs in the Pacific for nearly no cost, and defend their destroyers afterwards - their fleet has very little else to do with your near complete Atlantic commitment. I’d be very surprised if a good Japan didn’t take Hawaii the turn after you move your fleet to the Atlantic, and I’m not sure you could kill Germany before they win on VCs.
The Swedish forces given to Germany will pretty effectively secure it’s hold Norway and it’s NO there, and may be turned against Russia - which has plenty of problems already.
The Turkish units, backed by a couple of Italian tanks driven through Greece, will be very hard for the UK to contain without it having defeated Italy decisively and while trying to hold off an unbridled Japan. I’m not sure you can count on that by turn 4.
Russia will be in a very rough place, since Germany has no immediate need to redirect forces to Spain nor hold much back.

Suggestions:
Keep your starting fleet in the pacific, and build it up a bit sooner. The Cruisers and BB in the Atlantic just isn’t worth it for the softenings and an intelligent Germany is simply going to ignore your incredibly expensive flotilla and redirect it’s resources to smashing Russia and building infantry to keep your landings at bay.
Split your TT flotilla in two. 10 units every turn is better than 20 every other, because you can always counter attack. It also keeps Germany and Italy honest by keeping constant landing threat on W. Germany, Rome and Norway. If Germany does decide to build bombers or even ships to try to hit your (no longer invulnerable) Gibraltar fleet you’ll only lose half your TTs, but you should be able to see that coming and reinforce as necessary. If Germany attacks anyway that’s a feature, not a bug - Germany building bombers and having them killed off the coast of Gibraltar keeps pressure off of Russia.

(Specific nations used for easy illustration)

If America is at war with Axis and American submarines are present in a SZ with Japanese ships (no destroyer present), do those submarines have the option to participate in the attack if that Japanese fleet is attacked by the British?

Do American ships on British CVs participate in offensive attacks made with that CV on the British turn?

I would argue strongly for a 3 TT buy Turn 1. This is informed by what I think Japan’s goals are:

1. Marginalise China by pushing them back and cutting the Burma road.
2. Control as many IPC as possible/deny as many to the Allies as possible
3. Take India
4. Take VP cities
   (Not necessarily in that order)

Option 1: a Turn 1 MIC buy:
Turn 2 spend 12IPC on 3 Mecs.
Turn 3 result: You’re at war with the Allies. You’ve got 3 Mecs ready in Kiangsu. They’re unlikely to be in range to attack even single unit Chinese holdings. It’ll be at least Turn 4 before they become useful in accomplishing any of Japan’s goals. Probably it’ll be Turn 5 when they can, potentially, apply pressure to India.

Option 2: a Turn 1 TT buy:
Turn 2 Spend the 5 IPC you saved on T1 and the 12IPC you saved on Mecs on 2 more TTs. First TT drops 2 units in Kwangsi.
Turn 3 result: 2 extra units and an extra TT in Kwangsi, you can attack Yunnan/Burma/Malaysia/Dutch Islands as necessary. 2 extra TTs in Japan who can threaten Russia/Hawaii or take the Philippines. 3 Extra TTs who can threaten a drop in India Turn 4, forcing the British to deploy (and lose) irreplaceable blockers or pull it’s forces all the way back into India.

Certainly, it’s not entirely black and white. And I’m being specific about extra TTs or units. Option 1 could still afford TTs on Turn 2 - but not as many. Option 2 can still afford MIC on Turn 2 - at the cost of something else. Generally speaking though, I think A&A is won by ensuring all of your choices get you further to your goals or give you options in the future. In my opinion, Option 2 supports that best. I also think Turn 4 is far too long for buys on Turn 1 and 2 to be useful, and that if I’m going to built MIC I’d rather have them in Kwangtung, French Indochina or Malaysia.

I like to threaten Sea Lion by simply saving Germany’s first turn income. If the UK doesn’t then build substantial land forces on UK1 in response, then a G2 buy of up to 14 transports will all but guarantee a successful Sea Lion, regardless of the UK2 build. If the UK makes Sea Lion too costly at this point, Germany can simply do an infantry and armour built on G2.

@UltimateChaos:

Yea you are correct. I guess POWs would never really work in this game because unlike real war it does not matter how many men you lose

I’m not convinced the idea couldn’t work, only that the current idea of it wouldn’t work.

How about a situation where, for every 3-5 infantry you kill, you gain a PoW that can be placed anywhere. PoWs need to be protected from liberation and every PoW in a province over it’s IPC value costs you 1 IPC/turn in support.

Results:
You don’t muck with the balance around attack/counter attack and amphibious assaults.
You’ve got incentive to distribute the PoWs you capture and risk their liberation, rather than stock them in your capital.
The Axis, generally considered the stronger side, will take brunt of the downsides since they are killing large numbers of Russian and Chinese infantry. Might actually balance the game.

It would change the way the game plays drastically. Some examples:

It would basically allow you to freely march stacks of infantry up the front without risk. Picture 10 unit stacks of German infantry strolling through Russia - made invincible through surrendering and being liberated on the following turn by German armor and followup infantry if the Russians attempt to defeat you in detail.

It would make amphibious invasions incredibly difficult. Send a small force? Defending infantry beat you back. Send a large force? Defending infantry surrender. Your large force is destroyed on counterattack and the defending infantry are liberated.

Air power would become even more powerful. Japan can hit you with a few infantry and 20 planes, surrender his men when you counter attack, and liberate them on the following turn.

Overall, I think it would push the game even further in favour of the Axis powers.

Ruling captured PoWs could immediately move during the non-combat phase would solve some of this, but then you’d have the opposite problem - they’d reliably make it to the nation’s capital, and the game would likely be over by the time they were liberated.