@FranceNeedsMorePower I think having them as a 3rd player for a game of this scale would cause more harm than good. Giving the minor axis autonomy to act freely would make them seem more competent than they actually were IRL and would let the Axis player set up can-opener type plays, which would be difficult to balance around.
If it were a broader Eastern Front game where the Western Allies are represented somehow (lend lease troops, partisans? I don’t know), I could see it.
I don’t see any value in going after Scandinavia with the Soviets. Leave that to the UK. They need income/a base of operations and they’re more suited to take it than the Russians anyway due to their navy (once they rebuild it, anyway…)
Any Soviet unit that goes to Scandinavia isn’t going to make it back to Moscow in time for the final battle, period. They’ll be cut off as the German/Italian can-opener rages by.
The 'Spread of Communism" bonus is nice but it may ultimately not end up being worth it if you have to devote too many units to obtain it in the first place.
It’s a popular strategy in games like Classic/Revised where you actually have a Chinese Territory that’s worth 2 IPC.
In this version, not so much. It takes way too long to get your units setup and with the pitiful rate of reinforcement of 1 Unit/Turn Japan can really eat you alive whenever they want.
Normally, you use a few Russian units to help beef up the Chinese defense, but in this version the Soviets are so weak OOB that they really do need everything (bar maybe 1 or 2 INF) to keep the Germans at bay.
You’ll find that the best approach to the Allies is a slow burn. The Axis start off with way more stuff than you, and the 41 scenario just takes that divide to the extreme. It’s best to stay back and slowly accumulate advantage before making your big push. In most cases, defense is stronger than offense in A&A (i.e. INF attack at 1, but defend at 2, and FTRs attack at 3, but defend at 4), so try to use that to your advantage when possible.
One more note for USA. Rather than go straight for Japan’s jugular, try parking the fleet in the SZ that contains the “Solomon Islands” Territory. It’s a nice territory to camp out in with your fleet, as it:
Puts you within 2-moves of Australia, New Guinea, Borneo, Dutch East Indies, and Philippines, the Pacific territories that are either worth a lot of money, are part of NOs, or both.
Keeps you within 2-moves of West US, your spawn point for new units, so new reinforcements will always be on the way and you always have a safe point to retreat to if Japan is too strong for you.
Keeps you more than 2-moves away from SZ63 (Japan’s spawn point for new units), so Japan will never be able to send a large amount of units your way without first spending a turn moving their units towards you (and thus, giving you a hint that Japan is planning on attacking you).
Just food for thought. Of course, Japan has ways to play around you basing your fleet in the Solomon Islands, but that mini-game of fleet positioning is part of the fun of A&A’s Pacific Theater.
Oh, one last point about balance/playtesting, etc. Especially compared to the older games like G40, etc.
From what I understand, playtesting pre-Renegade was done by some combination of Larry, his private staff/team (most of whom went on to form Nightingale Games and are now working on War Room, Imperial Borders, etc.) and internal Hasbro/WotC staff. I don’t know the names or skill levels of any of those people, or how the names/faces changed over the years, but I think that may be part of why you saw games like 42SE, G40 and 1914 (which all seem balanced enough at a low level but becomes lopsided once you start playing more seriously) come out over the latter part of that era of A&A.
Currently, Renegade open-sources its play-testers. Most of us are pretty hardened players with a lot of experience but that may be why, at least in this case, the experience from the casual/entry-level point of view doesn’t reflect the experience from people racking up 50+ games each.
There’s actually a sign-up thread on this very site ( https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/40917/open-call-for-play-testers-for-renegade-a-a-games/13 ) if you’re interesting in trying to help make a difference for future games. They ask a few basic questions about experience level with A&A, etc. but generally as long as you’re willing to put in the hours + contribute to discussions they’ll be happy to take you.
tl;dr Try turning NOs off. Personally I find that it balances the game much better than a bid for the Allies does.
Lengthy, opinionated rant by someone who doesn’t play on ladder below. Take it for what it’s worth
As someone who doesn’t play G40 competitively, I find that removing NOs goes a great deal towards balancing the game, actually. Half the reason Axis is perceived as being overpowered by a huge margin (30+ bids OOB), is because:
Germany’s NOs are laughably easy to obtain, granting them bonus income when they already dwarf the USSR in terms of income by as early as the end of G1 (when you factor in the money seized from France for conquering Paris). This causes games to snowball hard, as there is no serious chance that the Soviets will be able to hold several of the German NO territories (specifically, Volgograd and Novgorod) against the common Italy-Germany can-open style of play.
The USSR’s largest NO actively punishes the Allies for playing the game correctly (i.e. moving UK/US Air Units into Russia to bolster defensive positions, allowing Russia to spend its buys exclusively on expendable land units like INF/MECH).
These two are the main offenders in terms of NOs. The completely lopsided power dynamic between the USSR and Germany in the Nazis’ favor warps the entire rest of the game around it. The UK/US are forced to spend almost 100% of their incomes on the Europe Map just to keep the Soviets alive long enough to see the Mediterranean and Scandinavia cleaned up (which is required in order to turn off a few of Italy/Germany’s NOs). Even when the Mediterranean and Scandinavia are cleaned up, and even when US/UK are spending 100% of their income in Europe, by time the Western Allies can actually build up a force sizable enough to either liberate France or perform a crush on Berlin (usually by means of US takes Denmark -> UK takes Berlin in back-to-back moves, not giving Germany time to react), the European Axis will already have Moscow and be well on their way towards Cairo to take the last VC needed to win on the Europe board.
And even if, despite all of the disadvantages for the Allies I listed above, if the US/UK manage to arrive in time to stop Germany, or if the Nazis’ big all-in battle against Moscow G5/6 goes haywire because of dice, you still haven’t dealt with Japan, who has likely used the absolute lack of US presence in the Pacific to run amok, crush Calcutta, neuter China, and reach within striking distance of either Honolulu or Sidney to win on the Pacific Map. The Allies can start pumping money into the Pacific once the momentum has finally shifted against the European Axis, but left unchecked Japan will be raking in 60+ IPCs/turn (thanks to the high number of territories in China, the high value of the Money Islands, and their similarly easy to obtain NOs). Good luck fighting against that and the terrifyingly large Air Force they started the game with.
Even if Berlin and Rome are Allied-occupied, because of the absurd OOB Victory conditions, the Axis still win if they win on the Pacific Map.
Now, assuming we turn off NOs, suddenly the Axis are making 10-15 less IPCs/turn, which means 1 less Bomber, 2 , less tanks, or 5 less INF to deal with every turn. The Allies will be hurting for some of the extra money too, but not to the same extent as the Axis will be. Without NOs, the Soviets don’t need to waste their early stacks guarding their borderline-indefensible position in Novgorod, and the US/UK can pump air units into Russia without having to worry about reducing the Russians’ ability to defend themselves. The Axis still have the edge without NOs (due to their strong starting positions and more central map location), but they won’t be able to replace expensive units like Tanks, Boats and Planes nearly as easily.
This is probably a much longer explanation than you probably wanted, so gratz if you read the whole thing.
EDIT: Spelling.
@Imperious-Leader said in All the Russian openings: For Begginers:
Don’t like taking UKR, Rather i hit and run. I value the 3 tanks et al with more value to USSR then killing a German Fighter/Bomber.
I don’t like taking Ukraine either in a F2F game, but in AAO most people stick with the default “defense profile” which means you kind of have to take the territory if you want to kill the Bomber. Killing that Bomber impacts a lot more than the USSR Vs. Germany front, so I think losing the Tanks is worth killing the Bomber for.
I’ve already argued with you in a different thread about Karelia. Since we’re talking about LHTE/42.3/AAO/whatever, I agree with you that attacking Germany’s fleet with the FTRs/attempting to defend Karelia is pointless.
@Imperious-Leader said in All the Russian openings: For Begginers:
Exactly. and the sub does not stack with the UK fleet. Germany wont buy a Destroyer early in the game and that sub can do alot of damage…Latter
I do actually stack the sub with the UK Fleet, I just have it submerge and avoid combat so it can potentially pick off the Cruiser Germany leaves behind or Transport in SZ5 (if Germany didn’t buy navy G1) later.
@theskeindhu said in All the Russian openings: For Begginers:
The point for Germany being that with 2 Bombers and the luck to never lose one, and 2-3 from Japan, they can completely destroy Russia’s income. This takes away any opportunity to counter strike, or build a big stack on West Russia as with both Japan and Germany knocking at the door of Moscow and no money, they crumble fast.
I don’t agree with Japan doing SBRs. If you’re committing your Bombers to that they need to be based in one of the Chinese territories, which puts them too far inland to pose a threat to an advancing USN. I see a lot of Allied Players making the mistake of sending the USN directly towards Japan. They really should be camping out in the Solomon Islands, then striking at Borneo/DEI/Philippines. That way they can drain Japan’s income and potentially land in India to bail out to UK if Japan’s stack in Burma is getting too big.
@Krieghund Fair. The desire for the Renegade playtest staff to not be unfairly criticized is why I’ve been replying to these threads in the first place (like I said before, I don’t like back-seat gaming for others in most cases, as I think strategies/metagames should develop naturally as folks experiment).
Like you, I think there are other reasons that the current batch of games are seeing reports of issues with balance/etc. from new/low-level players, and I am privy to keeping my opinions to myself (probably for the same reason(s), if I had to guess).
EDIT: fixed some grammar flubs.
@Argothair said in Why is Global better than Revised?:
Can you elaborate a little bit on how or why these rules opened up new strategies? It looks like almost every territory worth 2 IPCs or more is a Victory Territory. How does playing with this list of Victory Territories change the strategy compared to just saying “whoever has more money after 6 rounds wins?”
Basically, the idea behind the alternative WBC rules is that you’re adding more variety in win conditions beyond “Germany stacks INF in Germany/France/Italy”, “Japan builds Tanks and walks into Moscow”, and “US/UK build a death-fleet and try to land in Germany/France/Italy”.
tl;dr Strategic Variety is key. Every country (not Faction) has at least 2-3 different viable ways that they can play the game. Even Russia, to an extent.
Specifically:
Germany goes after USSR, so if Russia simply spends the whole game swapping Ukraine back and forth, Germany is going to end up winning the VT there. This encourages the Soviets to play more aggressively in the later rounds.
Norway and Egypt are designed as “freebies” for Germany and UK to steal from one another in the initial rounds. The difference is that later in the game (assuming a 5-6 round time limit), USA is probably going to land in Africa and take Egypt back. This encourages Germany to be aggressive in either attacking Russia to make up the difference, or building a Baltic Navy to reinforce Norway/keep UK out of it.
The Money Islands (Borneo/East Indies/Philippines) + Australia/Hawaii are made into VTs to force Japan to actually build some sort of navy to pursue them, and to encoarge USA to play in the Pacific. In OOB rules Philippines is the only VC in the Pacific, and as it’s right next to Japan it’s laughably easy to defend. This totally discourages USA/UK from even trying to contest the Pacific, since there are more VCs to be gained by attacking Europe.
On a similar note, Kwangtung is demoted from it’s OOB VC status, while Manchuria and FIC are promoted to VC status. These territories are situated right next to Japan’s borders with Russia and India, meaning that they become tempting options for early game aggression, or even a US Factory in China.
The Russian VC in Archangel is completely and totally off the standardly accepted “beaten path” for Germany to take to get to Russia (that being Germany -> East Europe -> Ukraine -> West Russia/Caucasus -> Russia). This can expand the Russian front to include all of the territories between Germany and Russia, rather than just the usual 3-4.
None of UK’s African territories are VCs. This gives the Axis the choice of either attacking Africa for IPCs to win a potential tiebreaker/fund later turns or just gunning straight for VCs.
Sinkiang is a VC for the same reason Ukraine is. If Russia just swaps them back and forth with Germany/Japan the Axis will win the VCs in the end. Russia is forced to decide whether to aggressively pursue one or both of these VCs, or forfeit them to the Axis.
Hope this ranting and raving helps. It’s similar enough to Siredblood’s G40 rules, when you think about it. The difference here is that you’re playing to simply determine who has more VCs by end-of-game, rather than trying to prevent the Axis from meeting some arbitrary goal.
Use a battle Calc before committing to big fights. You can find one on this site at http://calc.axisandallies.org/
That being said, I’ve been burned tons of times by AAO’s RNG. I lost a 98% chance to win battle for Moscow the other day, having to retreat after the defenders basically got 100% of their units to hit me.
@The_Good_Captain Yeah that’s fine. I have a game in-progress with VF with the restrictions:
No Special Cash Advance (SCA) for Germany
One German sub from Bay of Biscay removed from starting setup
One German infantry from Germany removed from starting setup
I am currently on-track to lose but had some critical battles not go my way. I also tried deviating from the game-plan I had previously set up so that may also be part of it.
99% sure open communication is allowed. The extent to which it’s allowed is up to you, though. With my play-group we cut it off at “talk of general strategy is allowed, anything more specific is not.” We do it this way because of bad experiences where multi-player games would devolve into the “good” Axis Player and the “good” Allies Player forcing their teammates to obey their orders on what to do each turn, effectively turning the game into a 1v1 with a peanut gallery. That’s not much fun for anyone.
@dylan64 Are you playing with the original (Out Of Box) rules, or with the Larry Harris Gen Con setup? The original setup of this game is seen almost universally as very Axis-favored, which may be why you are having issues finding success with the Allies.
For the Larry Harris setup, go to this thread: https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/29339/larry-harris-semi-official-tournament-game-patch?page=1
You can also play with this setup in both TripleA and Beamdog’s official client for 42SE.
If all of this is irrelevant to you, here’s some generalized UK tips:
Alternatively, you can ignore the Atlantic altogether and just buy 3 units a turn in India. If doing this, focus on more expensive/mobile units like FTRs.
Try to build ~3 units a turn for India until you reach a point where it is no longer sustainable to hold it against Japan’s advance. If Japan is going to successfully take India, withdraw to Persia and then either try to retake India or retreat further to Caucasus depending on how things go.
Long term your plan is to either build an Atlantic fleet and save USSR/defeat Germany OR build up in India and fight back against Japan on the Asian mainland. You cannot do both simultaneously unless your opponent is playing poorly.
As for your specific issues:
@dylan64 said in Help-Cannot play with the UK:
I am seriously struggling to either stop advances from the axis on Africa
Generally speaking, US is the one who has to relieve any pressure on Africa + kill the German Mediterranean navy. UK doesn’t have the resources to stave off a dedicated German attack on Africa and trying to build ICs to do so is not feasible as they are too slow to get going.
the middle east
The Middle East in 42SE is just Persia and TJ. These are not territories that should be seriously fought over until you reach a much more stable point in your game. They can probably be retaken if you end up either retreating from India or stabilizing the situation there.
or even Britain itself
UK should never fall. You can just build 8 land units anytime you see Germany beginning to build navy. Additionally, if Germany is building navy then Allies should win the game easily via USSR winning the land war in the Eastern Front + sending US naval assets to prop up UK.
can almost never hold India for more than a few turns
Unfortunately, if Japan is making a dedicated attack against India as their core strategy, you are not going to be able to hold it. You will need to withdraw to Persia and then further to Caucasus (alternatively, you can send the fleeing Indian army to Africa to wipe out the Germans there).
any attempt to build a Navy is swiftly dealt with by German bombers etc.
The turn 1 builds I gave at the start of this post should help with this. If Germany is adding a second bomber on their first turn you probably need to go with the option where you buy no fleet turn 1 (saving IPCs) -> building a larger fleet turn 2. That being said, if Germany is buying a lot of air units to threaten your UK fleet then it means that they are not building as many land units to send against USSR, which makes it easier for them to stabilize their poor starting position and eventually start striking back against Germany.
This is probably a longer post than you were expecting but I tried to be thorough. Let me know if I can follow up on anything.
@Conni_Hu This is a different sort of thread, but there have been instances of user of this site using A&A as a teaching tool before, here’s some actual answers to your questions:
@Conni_Hu said in Learning History With AA Europe (1999):
My question is this:
When you play the game, how do you feel?
Depends on the faction:
Germany: Powerful, but boxed in and on a time limit to win before the full might of the Allies overcomes you.
Soviets: The old saying “trade space for time” applies here. You are desperately weak, and need to stall for time until your allies can help you build up enough strength to resist Germany.
British: In this game, you feel like a minor partner, constantly in-danger of losing the homeland to a potential German invasion and not particularly able to do anything of importance right away. By time the threat to the homeland is gone, you feel like your presence is irrelevant compared with the Americans and Russians.
USA: Weak initially, but with unlimited potential due to its economy not really being threatened by Germany in any way. However, you feel like you are on a very strict time limit to win, as Germany will overpower the Soviets quickly if nothing is done to defeat the Nazis.
Second question:
Do you think it makes strategic sense to invade the Soviet Union at the beginning of the game (as a German) and to do a D-Day Reloaded as an American/British?
As others have said, the entire point of this game is the “Operation Barbarossa” campaign of Germany Vs. USSR. Attacking the British is not recommended.
General Points:
Europe 1999 is not a very balanced game, but that should not matter for your use of the game as a teaching tool.
This game may only cover the 1941-1945 period of the war, but the game board does contain fairly accurate 1930s borders for Europe. With this in mind, you can create your own starting setups for this game to simulate earlier periods in the war, or even the prewar period, with players like France, Czechoslovakia, Italy, Poland, etc. It won’t do a good job of handling more minor incidents like the German seizure/re-militarization of the Rhineland or the affairs over the Sudetenland, Danzig, etc., but it’s better than nothing.
The geography of the map does a good enough job of showing why the UK/France had dismal prospects of actually following through on their commitments to guard Czechoslovakia, which was totally landlocked and in central Europe, and Poland, which was surrounded by the hostile Germans and even-more-hostile (at the time) Soviets, with the only naval access point requiring passage through the German dominated Danish Straits.
There is a “successor” of sorts to this game which begins with the Battle of France in 1940 and includes Italy and France as playable characters in addition to the four from this game. The title is, as you may have guessed, “Axis & Allies: Europe 1940”. As with other games in the series, the swastika/imagery of Hitler are not depicted, so you should be able to import it into Germany without issue. One point in 1940’s favor is that the earlier starting date gives all of the players more flexibility in deciding their overall strategies. Specifically, a German attack on the British Isles is feasible in this version, although it can be countered by a UK player who knows what they’re doing.
The trade off for the Europe 1940 game is that, for the most part, individual countries are no longer explicitly given their own territories on the map. Some of central Europe and the Balkans are compressed in this way, with Austria/half of Czechoslovakia becoming “Greater Southern Germany”. and Romania/the other half of Czechoslovakia becoming “Slovakia Hungary”. Additionally, a full map of the Middle East, Africa and South America are included in addition to Europe/North America/European Russia/North Africa. This can be distracting, but could also help illustrate the massive colonial empire the British and French had, as well as highlight the importance of the North Africa campaign.
One last thing: This is beyond the scope of the initial question, but there is another game in this series that covers World War 1 that isn’t very well known. The title is “Axis & Allies: 1914”, and it boasts a very detailed map of Europe/North Africa for the World War 1 period. For example, “Germany” is broken up into “Berlin”, “Prussia”, “Silesia”, “Munich”, “Ruhr”, “Alsace” and “Kiel”.
EDIT: Added some more info about the Europe 1940 game and another game you may find helpful. Hope this information helps.
@vodot Funny coincidence. Revised is my #1 and AA50 is my #2 (so I just voted for AA50 in the poll). The real crime is no Classic representation though as that seems to be the 2nd most popular version other than G40.
I think you’re focusing on the wrong thing here (if you’ve gotten far enough along to be in Northern Italy and USSR hasn’t died yet, you’re probably going to win no matter what you do), but for the sake of argument, I’d vote for US to take the factory. US has 40+ income for the entire game, so being able to build 4 FTRs immediately on the front lines every single turn is way better than anything the UK can manage. The US also has the much longer supply line to reach the front lines, so it’s more beneficial for them to be allowed to seize a factory that’s closer to the action than it would be for the British.
I’ve actually been working on a similar idea involving getting something resembling an “official” tournament system set up by Renegade at the various board game/hobby conventions they (probably) attend across the US/EU. I tried fishing for support for Renegade but got nothing back from them on my own. Shoot me a DM if you have time or want to exchange ideas. I can post it here instead but I don’t want to derail this thread with a wall of text.
@MasterMark26 said in Kill Italy First - An Alternative Central Powers Strategy:
I really like the strategy! It seems very well thought out, and would probably have a pretty high success rate. Its very logical to go after the weakest Ally power. I have one concern, Russia. My question is how would you deal with a Russian army that has been strengthened by 3-4 turns of buys. I would expect that Russia has also already attacked Austria or Germany, severely weakening that defense force that was sent on the first turn. That would be my only question about the strategy
See my response to @jonathan-meyer84 . Most if not all of Germany/Austria’s buys from round 1 on are heading towards Russia, so it’s not just that first batch of guys trying to hold off Russia all on their own.
@barnee Alright. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
I think the ideal system actually would be something like the following:
NOTE: This is ludicrously ambitious
0.) 1v1 format. Team-based formats artificially lower the player count in a series that is already extremely niche and struggles to find enough players to host live tournaments.
1.) Create a list of “tournament legal” A&A games
my preliminary list would be, in no particular order:
AAC 2nd Edition (i.e. the Milton Bradley Gamemaster version without the extra rules added in the PC game).
AAR - LHTR
AA50 - 41 scenario
42SE - LHTR
G40 (Possibly. Mostly need an odd number of games)
2.) Create tournament rules for each of those games that are more sane than what is currently available, as the On-The-Board VCs are limited by the fact that they’re historically relevant locations rather than strategically relevant ones.
Classic has no VCs to begin with so either VCs would be need to be added or there would need to be some other way of determining a winner once time has expired in such a way that can assist with tiebreakers in a Swiss tournament (more on that below).
OOB VCs in Revised are terrible, which has led F2F tournaments to implement custom VCs
IMO the VCs in AA50/42SE are not particularly great, but that’s heavily negotiable.
G40 has a lot of VCs so that game may possibly be salvageable. Not sure as I have never been particularly good at G40.
3.) Have Renegade work with a combination of online events, local conventions (like the ones specifically mentioned by djensen in his OP) and board game conventions they attend across either the planet (or just the US/Canada if money is an issue), and set up regional-level tournaments where 1st place gets a free trip to worlds (which can be at Gen Con or some other location) and 2nd-4th get an invite to worlds (but they have to pay their own way). Alternatively, rather than having players qualify for a world finals, league points can simply be assigned to strong finishers as per djensen’s idea in the OP.
4.) Have the World Championship have actual cash or merch prizing for top X finishers (and not just free copies of games everyone already owns as was done at Gen Con last year. I would like the merch to be special like the custom trophies than Greg makes for the Gen con winners, to give just one example.).
5.) Tournament structure would be as follows:
A. Enough Swiss rounds to be relevant to the number of entrants to actually determine a Top 4/8 (depending on number of entrants). If you don’t know what a Swiss tournament is, just ask and I will elaborate
B. Cut to said top 4/8, who then have a basic playoff for the championship.
6.) Match procedure would be as follows:
A. Die roll. Winner of the die roll gets to determine one of the following:
i. First game to strike/second bid offer in-game.
ii. First bid offer in-game/second game to strike.
B. Players are allowed to gentleman’s agreement a version to play if so desired. If no agreement is reached, “Striking” begins:
i. Player A chooses a game from the list of “tournament legal” games (see Step #1) to NOT play.
ii. Player B does the same from the remaining games.
iii. Player A and B do this one more time. At this point only one game is left to play.
iv. Begin bidding on the specific game version selected after striking.
C. Bid rules are same as you’d normally expect.
D. Implement some sort of time limit for players’ turns to prevent intentional slow play. This would be something concrete like a chess clock or a hard-timer for specific parts of players’ turns (purchase, combat move, NCM, placement) with the goal of stopping players from artificially slowing the game when they are in an advantageous position with the intent of winning when time is called.
Okay rant 1 of 2 over.
I put this nightmare of a system together because I attended Renegade’s world championship at Gen Con last year and, while there is potential there for a grandiose, officially sponsored tournament, I had issues with a few aspects of the event:
1.) It was an open tournament, so really only people in and around the Indiana, USA area could attend. I tried asking several people I know in the community to be my teammate (since it was a 2v2 format) and all of them said no for the extremely obvious reasons that the drive was too far and they did not like the version being played (42SE).
2.) The version for the event was 42SE. Even with the LHTR adjustments 42SE is not considered a top-notch game by most peoples’ standards in the community (unless opinions have drastically changed since I was last super-active). Furthermore, I think giving the ambitious title of “world champion” based on who’s the best at just one version of the game is absurd. My favorite version is Revised (another unpopular edition) and I consider myself quite good at it, but I know for a fact that I am far from the best at Classic and G40 in particular. Other people have different tastes, and a system where multiple editions of the game are “legal” would create an environment where a “Champion” would have to prove their skill across multiple game editions instead of just one.
Again, this is extremely ambitious and I doubt the idea would take off but it’s worth a shot. Sorry for clogging the thread lol.
EDIT: Added some details I forgot in the first run. Copy/Paste was not my friend here.
In my opinion, if you’re going to go heavy Kill Russia First, you’re best off either hitting Poland or stepping up to Galacia with as many of your units as possible. Hitting Poland is more viable OOB than in tournament rules, as Russia can’t 2-move its entire army to reinforce.
Hitting Romania in particular is pointless IMO, as you’re trading a lot of units for it and saving Russia the trouble of walking an INF into Romania to activate it. you’re better off stacking Galacia heavily, as that territory borders both Ukraine and Poland (rather than Ukraine and Sevastopol). The idea behind this is that you’re trying to force Russia out of position, over-extending into Romania or Ukraine/Poland while ignoring the other front. Then, on turn 2, you can hit Romania with the Serbia guys, Ukraine with the Galacia stack, and Poland (assuming Russia counterattacked) with the Germans.
I would also advise against simply ignoring Italy. If you dilly dally there too much, Italy will establish itself and start seriously pressuring you in Venice. If you drop Venice for even a moment, Austria’s economy will be in great danger, as Tyrolia (4 IPCs) and Trieste (4 IPCs) are both adjacent to Venice.
So, specifically, I would make the following changes to your overall strategy:
Either hit Poland with the Galacia guys, or have them hold position.
Have the Budapest guys split up. ~4 INF/2 ART from Budapest to Serbia, everything else to Galacia to stack.
Everything from Trieste to Venice, instead of just the INF.
Everything from Bohemia to Poland, or have them go to Galacia as you said.
You might want to divert some of the Vienna guys to go towards Italy instead, but that’s on you. I admittedly have a bias towards killing Italy first as the Central Powers.
Just trying to give some constructive feedback. Overall the idea of hitting Russia fast and hard is a good one, but if you go in too hard you’ll lose more AH INF than it’s worth.