I totally agree with treating Japan and Germany as a single entity. I’m not a fan of building an IC right away, for me it’s 2 transports and 3 inf. My reasoning is that you build and IC for tanks only so assume 15 IPC/round to supply it. With 3 transports and the IC you should be building 6 inf for the transports and 3 tanks for 33 IPC. Japan won’t have this coin until about R3. I build only enough inf for the 4 transports, taking the free inf off local islands. Once I save 8 IPC then it’s the 5th transport, 10 inf/round at 30 IPC. Again, I only spend 30 IPC and once I have about 10 IPC saved I think about the first IC, maybe an extended voyage with a transport or two causes me to build it then or I wait until I have 15 IPC. Having an IC early sometimes hampers you as you must defend it. As always it depends on what the allies do, if it works for you then it’s right for you :-)
The lure technique has it’s advantages for sure. A wise russian player might keep a tank to drive in and out, if not I’d always put an infantry on Manchuria but no more. Again, knowing what you can hit me with I won’t just put all my units in one spot for you to smoke them. I know a slow withdraw with the russians is better.
One stumbling block with building transports and doing Pearl Harbour is if the Brit or Ruskie puts a plane within striking range of the Japan home waters. If the brit player always does IC in India you most likely don’t face this.
Our group always does the Brit grand fleet, saving until they can build fleet big enough to defend against the luftwaffe. The US sets up a supply line via Canada and both allies pump 8-10 transports/round worth of land equipment into Norway. The brit India fighter moves to the territory west of the soviet far east (I must be getting old!). This little move is such a prick shot……
If the US navy does 2 hits you might have to take off the bomber if no transport was brought in. With only 1 ftr I think the US should hit the jap fleet assuming it does not have to put it’s ftrs on a newly built brit carrier on T1. If you take only 1 hit or less then as the Jap, I’d hit any newly built US navy in the pacific. I can do this because I don’t retreat from Manchuria. I’ll take out the US fighter in China, not bother with India (unless open or 1 inf). With overwhelming firepower on China the battle is over quick, you don’t need to commit too many Inf, 3 if you are brave, 4 if you are conservative. I mass my air in Manchuria, 3 fighters with at least 4 inf is usually enough for defence. With this I can fly 2 ftrs to the US west coast, the 2 ftrs from the carrier land at Wake island with the bomber. That’s 4 3s and 3 4s, toss in the carrier’s 1 for good measure and you’re likely to do 4 hits on the first round. Even if the US player built 4 subs (the best navy for the money for T1) he’s only gonna do 2 hits on average back and have a lone BB and sub left against 2 ftrs, 2 BBs and the CV.
Dang I gotta get this CD playing over the net…
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