Best posts made by DoManMacgee

Round 3
This round happened at 9AM on the third day of the convention, so everyone in the hall was very tired at this point. My opponents were experienced players, but brought up at one point that they preferred other versions and were just playing AA50 because it was the “world championship”. Despite this, they played a solid game once we got out of the opening phase (which as you will see, was almost identical to the round 2 game).

Side: Allies
Bid Die Roll: Won
Bid: Axis +4, placed an ART in Burma
This is the same bid as the previous game. It was here that I was told my bidding strategy of trying to get a lower bid by starting high was considered backwards now, due to the perception shifting to “Axis are stronger”.

J1:
Buy: CV/2 TT, banks 3 IPC
This team opened nearly identically to the previous team. For brevity, I am only going to highlight the differences in moves:
-CA brought to Pearl
-BB/CV/2 FTR (DEI SZ) attacks India fleet.
-3 INF/ART/FTR (Burma+FIC + bid) + 1 FTR (Formosa) attacks Yunnan (Chinese FTR)
-3 INF (1 from Kiangsu, 2 from Man.)/FTR (Man.) attacks Suiyuan
-2 INF (Kiangsu) + FTR (Japan) attacks Hupeh

Compared to the previous match, China rolled very poorly here, to the point where Japan did not take many land unit casualties at all. This will cause China/the Allies a great deal of trouble in the midgame, as mainland China will become very difficult to clean up.

The only questionable play by my opponents here was that Manchuria was left empty, which allowed USSR to walk-in during R1 and immediately start causing an annoyance for Japan to slow them down elsewhere.

Collects 35, ends on 38

R1
Buy: 2 INF/2 ART/2 TANK
My opening was 100% identical to the previous game. My luck was very good here, with no losses in Belo and minimum losses in E. Ukr.

Collects 26

G1
Buy: CV/TT/TANK/ART/2 INF, banks 1 IPC

This variation of the Carrier plan is more blunt about threatening a Sealion, with at the expense of drastically reducing the number of land units built. This could be bad for the USSR Vs. Germany front if things aren’t played carefully in that part of the board.

Unlike the previous game, this Axis Team played the Carrier strategy more straight. They attacked the UK Battleship fleet (but had a lower-end result, only the German Bomber survived) and made more conservative plays across the board (the only real action was a mid-sized push into Belo + attacking the UK Africa fleet). They did make a minor error by moving the Finland INF into Karelia instead of pulling them back to cover the German air that attacked the UK Battleship. This let UK hit Norway on B1 as you will see.

In Belo, the Germans had very good luck, winning a perfect fight with 0 losses.

The German Sub from the Baltic moved out to SZ7 (English Channel) with the intent of threatening any loose UK fleet buys.

Collects 38, ends on 39

B1
Buy: 2 DD/CV, banks 1 IPC

The UK battle plan from me was more or less the same as the previous game, although without the UK Battleship surviving I think in hindsight that placing my units in SZ3 (where the Cruiser is) might have been the better play. Regardless, the British took Norway successfully by sending a loaded TT from Canada + all air. The Axis Team refused to take the Bomber as a casualty first (correctly guessing that I would have just retreated my air had they done that), but making that decision with only 3 INF present meant that they only ended up getting one hit during the combat, making UK’s job easier.

Collects 34, ends on 35

I1
Buy: 2 TANK

Walk-in @ Egypt. Europeans move up to cover E. Poland and Bulg. Nothing special here. The buy suggests aggression on the Russian front but that wouldn’t end up being the case.

Collects 12

A1
Buy: 2 CV/1 FTR

My opening is the same as the previous game, with the only exception being that the DD/2 TT from E. US move up to UK to drop the 2 INF/ART on London. This is to block a potential Sealion in case the Axis try it. It’s also to bait the Axis into attacking the American fleet instead of just dealing with the main Royal Navy stack that’s starting to form.

China gathered up in Ningxia (northern territory). They got to place 2 INF because USSR took Manchuria and those 2 INF went to Manchuria. This caused a rules dispute, as my opponents incorrectly thought China’s piece placement limitation applied to territories where there are 2 or less friendly units (it doesn’t. It only applies to Chinese units already-present in a territory).

Placing the 2 INF in Manchuria was important because it created a 5 INF stack on the territory (with another Soviet 3 INF stack behind it in Bury). This poses a significant challenge to Japan despite the fact that almost all of their land units survived J1.

Collects 38

J2
Buy: DD/2 FTR/ART/2 INF
As hoped, Japan turned around to hit Manchuria, meaning India would not be in any danger for a while. They also pulled a battleship from India to deal with the UK boats off of Africa. Other than that, it was more advancing in China with surprisingly poor dice from the defending Chinese.

Collects 37

R2
Buy; 2 TANK/4 INF/1 ART
Faced with overwhelming odds in China, I actually have the 2 Soviet INF there back up to Novo and link up with the last Siberian INF who started the turn in Urals. The hope is that, if Japan walks forward next turn, the 2 INF can come back with air support to clear out the territory and restart the China fight.

For the German front, all I could really do was shuffle my stack into Belo to counter the German presence there. The battle had perfectly average luck from what I could remember.

NOTE: This actually means that I missed the chance to snipe the German TT that’s sitting un-escorted in the Med at this point (the Italian Fleet moved to SZ15 last turn). I attribute the error to fatigue (this is the 3rd day of the tournament and 4th day of travel, and this game took place early in the morning. I usually work late shifts and wasn’t really used to be up earlier in the day). This wasn’t a fatal mistake, but it’s a premonition of some larger errors that will cause problems for me later in the tournament.

Elsewhere, I sent the next wave of Siberia stack into Manchuria with a Bomber for support. This set up the following fight:

4 INF
1 BOMB

Vs.
3 INF
1 ART

Calc’ing the battle after the fact revealed that it was a 75% chance to win. This was good as Japan was starting to run low on land units and I was hoping to ramp up US Naval pressure to force my opponents to choose between building fleet to stave off the Allies Vs. trying to keep up the shuck into China.

Soviets won here with 2 INF/BOMB remaining, which was good enough to make sure China can place another INF during USA’s turn.

Collects 24

G2
Buy: CV/FTR/2 INF/ART/TANK

Rather than charge the Baltic fleet into the UK fleet, the Axis team instead opted for a defensive naval buildup. They also committed to making aggressive trades across the Russian front, which might be a bad pair with the naval buildup strategy, since they aren’t building many land units to replace the ones being lost to trades.

They did, however, send the SZ7 SUB + the 2 German Fighters from the Carrier to sink the US fleet off UK. This effectively marooned the American land units on UK, which is fine, since making that play meant that the main Royal Navy survived.

Collects 41

B2
Buy: 4 DD/1 INF

This is the same buy as last game because the situation has become more-or-less identical to that game. I am building more navy to compel the Germans to spend a disproportionate amount of their income on navy, which will give the Soviets enough breathing room to eventually start winning in Russia.

To that end, the British fleet united in SZ6 and traded Norway (only with 1 INF, since I am trying to stay way of the looming menace of Sealion should the Axis roll well).

Japan had put some blockers (1 INF/1 ART) in Burma to apply light pressure to India during J2. I tried taking the 3 INF/2 FTR available in the ME to do a strafe, but it went extremely poorly (lost everything except 1 FTR, which failed to take the territory. This would cause problems for my timing on killing the German Baltic Fleet. I really should not have taken this battle. Instead I should have repeated my strategy from the previous game, which was to make one cohesive ball in Persia and counterattack India in-force on B3.

Collects 31

I2
Buy: TT/TANK

Italy completely changed course from what they were originally doing and made a run at Gibraltar. They appear to be setting up the same Brazil attack from the previous game. The only difference here is that the timing of it combined with the lack of an Atlantic American fleet may make defending the play harder than it was in the previous game.

Other than that, Italy seemed primed to make a push for Africa IPCs and helping Germany stack up in Europe.

Collects 13

A2
Buy: 2 TT/2 BOMB

I elected to go for an air strafe against the IJN based in SZ62:

4 FTR
3 BOMB

Vs.

1 DD
2 CV
4 FTR
1 BB

My plan was to get 3 hits during the first round of combat to sink both carriers, then retreat to force Japan to waste 28 IPCs to rebuild and, with any luck, not attack the advancing US Fleet @ Iwo Jima. However, due to a combination of fatigue and rushing, I neglected to respect the fact that the Japanese had most of their navy in-range to counterattack the USN (2 FTR @ Fukien, CV/2 FTR @ SZ36 (FIC), FTR/BOMB on-land in Japan). This would prove way too much for the Americans to handle at this point. Strafing the fleet I think was the right call, as the attack itself accomplished its objective, but I should have just landed all the air in Manchuria and put the USN @ Midway instead of going all the way to Iwo Jima. As-is, Japan gets to unleash a nasty fleet counterattack that you will see right now (although it may have worked out for the best in the grand scheme of things).

China places in Manchuria to continue annoying/slowing-down the Japanese by threatening Kiangsu.

Collects 38

J3
Buy: 2 CV/DD, banks 1 IPC
As hoped, Japan spent their entire round of income rebuilding their losses from the US Strafe. However, as feared, they were able to move out with most of their available fleet and air power to attack the USN @ Iwo Jima. This battle was roughly:

1 SS
1 BB
9 FTR
1 BOMB

Vs.

1 SS
2 CV
1 DD
1 CA
1 BB
3 FTR

A retroactive battle calc shows that the Japanese had a 92% chance to win, but they only average about 6 surviving attackers. This detail will matter as we continue into the late game, since Japan will have to keep replacing their losses at the expense of land units.

In China, they actually began to turn around most of their forces to defend the coast against the Soviet incursion (save for 1 INF that walked into Chinghai). With their amphib, the Axis Team actually opted to attack Buryatia (to snipe the Soviet Bomber) instead of Manchuria. Their explanation at the table was that they assumed the Soviets in Manchuria would turn around to counterattack Bury instead of simply walking forward to get deeper into China.

Both attacks were wins for Japan, but the land battle in Russia went badly for them (only 1 ART survived). The Axis team didn’t seem happy with how many units they lost killing the American fleet but looking at my report Vs. the Battle Calc forecast it was more or less the expected result (1 BOMB/1 BB/5 FTR survived, so 7 units total, which is actually one better than the foretasted 6 survivors).

Basically all air landed on the newly built carriers + the one that came up from FIC. The Battleship that had killed the UK Africa fleet was now back at India.

Collects 36, ends on 37

R3
Buy: 2 INF/2 ART/2 TANK

The Red Chinese in Manchuria continued walking south to take Beijing, while the group that backed up to Novo last turn went back into Chinghai to retake it from Japan.

On the Russia front, Soviets committed to trades wherever they could, but moved the main stack from Belo back to E. Ukr. to get away from the section of the German army that was in Karelia. Soviets ate quite a few unit losses on their trades but got the job done everywhere. They also used their FTR to snipe the Italian Transport built during I2 (it was alone).

Collects 25. My report says it was 28 but I have no idea how USSR could have been making that much money given the board position in my attempted recreation.

G3
Buy: CV/FTR/3 INF/2 ART

This is the 3rd Carrier the Germans will be having on the board. They moved all available land units into Belorussia to threaten a Moscow K.O. They started making small land grabs in Africa as well.

Collects 38

B3
Buy: IC/2 DD
The IC buy was a response to the destruction of the USN. The idea is to lock down India so Japan can’t take it. Nothing more/nothing less. In hindsight it probably was not necessary but only about 1.5 hours of game time (out of 5.5 hours) had elapsed at this point, so I knew this game was going to be a lot longer than just 6 turns.

The Persia stack relocated to India to defend the newly built factory. The Tank blitzed on through to Burma.

Collects 31

I3
Buy: 2 TANK/INF

Italy runs to Brazil, and moves up to Persia to get some extra income. Italy is making their big play to force America to build in the Atlantic for a turn.

Collects 17

A3
Buy: 2 FTR/2 DD, banks 2 IPC

I am forced to deviate from my original plan of bomber spam due to the fact that my fleet got wiped out during J3 earlier. Additionally, I need to cover US East Coast in case Italy really does try to move up and take Washington. FTRs will cover both goals as they can be in Washington on the turn their built before flying to the Pacific to land on newly built Carriers out of W. US during the following turn.

America’s remaining Bombers destroy the remnants of the Japanese fleet that attacked @ Iwo Jima and NCM to join the allied stack forming in Shanghai.

China also moves forward to Shanghai and places its INF there.

Collects 35, ends on 37

J4
Buy: 3 INF/ART/2 TANK/2 TT

Japan sends all of its new carriers out to destroy the US Fleet I built during the previous turn. This at least draws them away from China, which is an acceptable result, but Hawaii is now in danger.

The lack of land resources in China is tarting to show at this point, as Japan lost almost all of their remaining land units retaking Shanghai, but they did just start building a new land army, so that will help them as we move towards the endgame.

Collects 37

R4
Buy: 5 TANK
I am forced to turtle in Moscow for the turn due to the fact that the Belorussia stack backed by air power is actually an extremely powerful force capable of ending the game in Germany’s favor.

Meanwhile, Russia sends a small force from Ukraine into Bulgaria-Romania as a distraction, hoping to draw Germans away from Moscow for a few turns. They also continue to be annoying in eastern China, putting China back to two territories again (meaning they’ll be spawning yet another INF later in the round).

Collects 27

G4
Buy: 4 TANK/3 INF/2 ART, banks 1 IPC

At this point, the Axis Team made the same miscalculation mistake regarding the UK FTR in Caucasus that the team from the previous match did. They believed the Atlantic was a stalemate and that they did not have to build more navy because of UK’s pivot to India.

To that end, they retreated the Belo stack to Karelia, as at this point it accomplished its objective of making the Soviets retreat to Moscow. However, they also started taking aggressive trades in Russia again. It’s possible that due to the stress of playing early in the morning (and at a relatively fast pace for F2F, as only about 2.5 hours had passed by this point), they didn’t realize that their main land stack would actually be quite fragile without air support, and thus the stack should stick together as much as possible to preserve HP. Then again, they didn’t realize the Baltic was lost, so that’s probably why they were comfortable playing aggressively on-land to a point.

Collects 40, ends on 41

B4
Buy: 2 INF/TANK/2 DD
The land units are for India. The navy is for Europe, in case the sea battle is going badly and I need to retreat.

Anyway, the stats for the Baltic fight were:
1 CV
8 DD
1 CA
3 FTR
1 BOMB

Vs.

1 DD
3 CV
1 CA
6 FTR

Calc’ing this retroactively puts UK’s odds at 73%. Not a great fight but given that up to 6 German Fighters could be killed, it was too good of a chance to pass up, especially since I have another wave of Destroyers behind the build anyway.

UK won the fight, but only the Bomber and the Carrier + FTRs survived. This allowed a UK Transport to send an INF/TANK combo to take Poland from Germany, which messes with their logistics for the turn.

In the ME/India/SEA area, the India stack had to go back to Persia to deal with some Axis troops that stepped forward the previous turns.

The 2 INF from E. Canada also NCM’d to E. USA to prevent any attacks from Italy.

Collects 30, ends on 32

I4
Buy: 3 TANK, banks 2 IPC

The destruction of the German Baltic fleet sent the Axis Team into panic mode. In a bid to end the game, they charged the Italian navy at London. To be fair, they had 17% odds, and victory would have ended the game outright.

The other Italians went to go counterattack Poland and Bulg.-Rom… They had poor dice everywhere except Poland.

Collects 16, ends on 18

A4
Buy: CV/2 DD/SS, banks 1 IPC

As discussed previously, the FTRs from E. US go to land on the new carrier. This is basically a passed turn by USA.

Collects 35, ends on 36

J5
Buy: 2 FTR/2 INF/2 TANK, banks 1 IPC

The IJN moves up to Hawaii and takes the city, but does not engage the 3rd USN. Japan stacks up in China but is mostly focused on establishing a shuck line, so does not set up any potential attack on India (they landed in Fukien, the Transports + the Battleship that is finally now back in-position are in the China Coast SZ (SZ61).

Collects 36, ends on 37

R5
Buy: 6 INF/ART/TANK

With the Baltic fleet dead, Germany is no longer a serious threat, so I start taking trades far and wide and move the main stack to Belorussia with the hopes of getting Karelia to move back.

Collects 26

G5
Buy: 4 INF/2 ART/2 TANK/FTR, banks 1 IPC

Germany take some more trades in Russia, but is falling back in general. The Axis Team wants to hold Karelia at all costs.

Collects 38, ends on 39

B5
Buy: 2 TT/1 DD/3 INF, banks 1 IPC
The entire build is for the Atlantic. It’s time to power up and start destroying Germany, since Japan is pretty secure in the Pacific.

UK starts attacking everywhere they can to cause problems for the Axis. TJ, FIC and Poland all go down.

Collects 34, ends on 35

I5
Buy: 3 TANK/1 INF
Mostly a passed turn. The fleet starts falling back towards the Med.

Collects 15

A5
Buy: 4 DD/1 INF, banks 1 IPC
At this point, there was still plenty of time left on the clock (only about 3.5 hours had passed of the 5.5 hours time limit), so I was in no rush to build up for a last-second VC grab. I instead pushed to scare the IJN away buy building a large navy again. This did once again mean that America’s turn was basically a pass.

China continued to step forward and recover lost ground.

Collects 34, ends on 35

J6
Buy; 3 INF/3 ART/BOMB, banks 4 IPC
The IJN runs to Australia. Japan starts using its shuck to fight back in China.

Collects 36, ends on 40. My notes say the only collected 33, and ended on 36, but that doesn’t line up with my recreation. It’s possible the Soviets survived with more when they attacked back into Chinghai and were taking Chinese territories at a faster rate than what ends up being shown in the TripleA recreation I put together

R6
Buy: 3 INF/2 ART/2 TANK
USSR moves everything in-range to Belorussia to truly deadzone Karelia. No need to make the attack prematurely and risk losing.

Collects 25

G6
Buy: 2 FTR/2 TANK/2 ART/2 INF
Germany begins falling back in general, consolidating their stack at Karelia as much as possible.

Collects 38

B6
Buy; 3 TANK/5 INF/ART, banks 1 IPC
Not much to say. UK just starts landing everywhere they can to rack up IPCs. I also made sure to land 1 INF in Baltic States to block German tanks in Poland from reaching Karelia next turn.

Collects 36, ends on 37

I6
Buy: 3 TANK

In another desperation move, Italy goes to Caucasus to try a lucky landing. They also fanned out and made attacks with their Russian front units anywhere they could think to do it. All attacks except Caucasus succeeded.

Collects 19

A6
Buy: 2 TT/2 DD/INF, banks 2 IPC
The naval buildup continues. 1 INF/1 TT go to US East Coast to get Brazil back (in case the game ends up being a VC Tie).

China continues to do its best to stay alive and inconvenience Japan.

Collects 34, ends on 36

J7
Buy: 3 INF/2 ART/TANK/DD/FTR

Japan finally clears out China, and has set up a force to potentially crack India on J8 (the IJN is now in Borneo, and all Japanese air is in/around SEA).

Collects 39

R7
Buy: 7 INF/1 ART
The Karelia battle was:

4 INF
3 ART
18 TANK
1 FTR

Vs.

7 INF
1 ART
12 TANK
2 FTR

As with all the other major battles, I calc’d this one after the game was over and learned that it was a 89.5% chance for a Soviet win. My opponents seemed convinced that it was “dead-even”, but I think they forgot that all the German Fighters were killed when the Baltic Fleet was sunk (their presence would have made the battle pro-German, of course).

Collects 23

G7
Buy: 2 TANK/4 ART/4 INF
The Axis Team decided to play on despite the situation being more or less hopeless at this point. I think they were under the impression that Japan would be able to grab India and then hold it against a Soviet counterattack.

At this point, all they can do is shuffle units forward around the map trying to get what IPCs they can.

Collects 34

B7
Buy: 3 TANK/3 ART/3 INF, banks 1 IPC

At this point, everything in-range is pulled to India to try holding the incoming Japanese attack. I do use the Bomber I sent to Africa to help pick off one German unit on its way out, though.

In Europe, UK takes Poland again to keep hammering the German logistics chain.

I7
Buy: 3 TANK/ART

Everything turns around to save Poland. Elsewhere, the last Italian INF in Russia takes 1 IPC of territory.

Collects 20

A7
Buy: 3 BOMB

Retakes Hawaii and Brazil. With Bomber pressure the Americans now have the advantage in the Pacific again.

Collects 38

J8
Buy: 3 BOMB, banks 3 IPC

At this point, we both agree that Round 9 will be the Final Turn.

Japan goes all-in and attacks India with everything in range. I do not have the exact calc from Gen Con because I didn’t calc the battle.

AA hits rolled extremely well, getting 2 hits on FTRs. This let the British hold, but Japan kept enough stuff around to make a second attempt on J9 feasible.

Collects 41, ends on 44

R8
Buy: 4 TANK/1 INF
The Tanks are for Caucasus in case I need to do a last-second India save.

Soviets start mopping up in Russia.

Collects 27

G8
Buy: 8 INF/ART/TANK, banks 1 IPC
All Germany can do at this point is stack Baltic States as much as possible and hope for a last-second win.

Collects 32, ends on 33

B8
Buy: 4 INF/2 ART/3 TANK
All UK needs to do is keep stacking India, make Karelia un-killable, and set up for a last-second VC grab in Europe.

Collects 30

I8
Buy: 2 TT/2 INF
Italy’s last-ditch effort is to make a play at Caucasus next turn.

Collects 14

A8
Buy: 3 BOMB, banks 2 IPC

The US Fleet walks across the Pacific, mowing down the blockers set up by Japan. Now America can grab an extra VC (Australia, Philippines, Hong Kong, Shanghai) on the final turn unless Japan does something.

Collects 38, ends on 40

J9
NO BUY
Japan throws everything they have at both India and the USN. The attack against the navy failed and at that point the Axis gave up (because USA will get an extra VC).

Allies Win

I mostly won this game because my opponents matched my rate of play, meaning that Allies had more time to come back from their initial setbacks in the Pacific. Had I played USA better on turn 2 I think this game could have had a much earlier and much more decisive conclusion, but that’s not how things played out.
(4/6)

Cruisers are useless. 2 SUBs beats a Cruiser every time. 1914 is the only game where a Cruiser is even something close to resembling being worth it.

EDIT: That being said, Cruisers you begin the game with are valuable assets that should be guarded carefully, due to their ability to bombard.

@8d88 admittedly I don’t play this version much but one idea I’ve seen floating around is to not build INF outright as a way to dodge the zombies. That does kind of forestall there being a point where zombies occupy enough IPC value to prematurely end the game but it’s very resource inefficient as INF are generally the best unit (as with all A&A versions).

I’ve also toyed with the idea of just house ruling the entire zombie mechanic out of the game and play the map as a sort of “41 +1” edition but that kind of defeats the point of the whole game…

Was the email I got this morning advertising a July 31 (Wednesday) Early-Access go-live date real?

@The_Good_Captain I had to do B2 first.

Semifinal
This round happened immediately following Round 3, with only about 2 hours for a break. This meant that everyone involved was utterly exhausted before even sitting down to play. My opponents were none other than this website’s own Dave Jensen and his partner Mike, so I was playing someone I actually know semi-personally. It made for an interesting, but blunder-filled match, as you will see below:

Side: Allies
Bid Die Roll: Won
Bid: Axis +0
Dave wanted Axis. I was hoping to get Axis +3 so I could show the strategy I used in round 1, but no luck.

J1:
Buy: CV/2 TT/INF
This team opened nearly identically to the previous two teams. For brevity, I am only going to highlight the differences in moves:
-A second FTR (From Japan) brought to Pearl, but they DID NOT bring a DD
-3 INF (Burma+FIC) + 2 FTR (FIC, Formosa) + BOMB (Japan) attacks Yunnan (Chinese FTR)
-Suiyuan not attacked (normally they try to hit all Chinese territories, but this team did not attack Suiyan).
-3 INF (Kiangsu) + FTR (Man.) attacks Hupeh.

In China, the rolls were average here. However, at sea, the Allies rolled high. Japan lost 1 Fighter in the Indian Ocean attack and another at Peal (although that one was an intentional loss because it flew in from Tokyo).

One interesting thing that was tried was that the Axis Team actually retreated from the Pearl Harbor attack after one round of combat (sparing 1 US Fighter). It was an attempt to save the Japanese Cruiser, but you will see later that this does not work.

Collects 34

R1
Buy: 2 INF/2 ART/2 TANK

I made the same play as the other two games where I was Allies. However, looking at the board state again, it might have been good to try pulling a Bomber and going for Manchuria, since the Chinese @ Suiyuan could have NCM’d forward to join whatever Soviet INF survived + place the free Chinese INF there as well. That would made made a very painful position for the Japanese to navigate. However, I will stress again that both teams were exhausted from 3 consecutive days of playing + a very early morning start, so big misses like this will come up often.

One such big mistake is that I completely forgot to NCM the Soviet Sub to join the British Battleship. Given how both sides rolled on the following battle (more on that during the German turn recap), this wound up causing problems for the Allies that cascaded all the way to the very end of the game. Very unfortunate.

We also found an issue with the board setup (USSR was missing a Tank that was supposed to be in Caucasus, I think there was a missing piece for Germany as well), which caused some delays. This was not the reason I missed the sub move though. It was just fatigue on my end.

Luck-wise, E. Ukr. went well. Belo was about average.

Collects 26

G1
Buy: CV/TT/4 INF/ART

It was yet another Carrier opening. This time however, the Axis Team was better prepared, making sure to also put the 2 INF from Finland in Norway to deter any attempt by UK at killing off the German air units.

My mistake with the Russian sub placement cost me terribly here, as the Axis Team only got 3 hits on the first round of combat (1 from Subs, 2 from air, so the Soviet sub could have soaked a hit). Both British units hit during the same first round of combat, meaning the German subs were dead. Had I not neglected the Soviet sub, my Battleship would have had one more chance to shoot down a German Air unit (probably a Fighter), which could have fundamentally changed the course of the game (basically, without the extra Fighter, UK has a chance at punching through Norway and getting the Bomber during B1, which would deny net 2 air units to Germany for the G2 fleet battle, meaning UK would have a faster timeline to getting naval supremacy in Europe and busting the Carriers).

So all-in-all, very bad mistake from me with the Soviets. A near-fatal one, as you will see in the coming turns.

Elsewhere, luck was mostly average, but the Germans tried a strafe against Belorussia that has absolutely awful luck. Something like 1 hit on the attackers’ roll Vs. ~4-5 hits on the defenders’ roll. Very bad luck for the Axis Team that screwed up their momentum Vs. USSR for a fair amount of the game.

With their NCM/placement, Germany primes itself for a potential Sealion if the Allies get too complacent, much like the previous opponent.

Collects 37

B1
Buy: CV/2 DD, banks 1 IPC

Despite the poor odds, I made an attempt at strafing Norway anyway. My hope was that the Axis Team would take the Bomber as a loss during the first round of combat, which would let me just retreat the air units and let the land units (if any) die (I would have also sacrificed the UK Bomber here if needed).

Ultimately, neither side got what they wanted. The Axis Team only took INF as casualties, but only got 2 hits on defense, so all of UK’s air units survived the battle.

Collects 31, ends on 32

I1
Buy: TT/INF

Like with the other Axis players who spent I1 building a TT, Italy is forced to play slow here and keep its fleet stationary. This slows their momentum but given how the rest of the game played out it, they will end up getting a lot of mileage out of this second transport.

Collects 12

A1
Buy: 2 CV/1 FTR
The same buys/moves I did for the rest of the tournament. Mostly similar to last round as the E. US forces need to step up to block Sealion.

The only notable difference, of course, is that I sent 1 SUB + air support to kill the stray Japanese Cruiser from J1. That unforced error was probably just due to player fatigue.

China tried taking 4 INF Vs. 2 INF @ Hupeh (a 77% exchange), but I had to retreat after China missed the first roll and Japan got a hit. This would cause problems for China in the short term due to the large number of Japanese land units on the board (although it wasn’t nearly as bad for China as most of game 3 was).

Collects 38

J2
Buy: FTR/3 TANK/3 INF
The buy is so land-heavy because the Axis Team actively believed the US Air Stack (1 FTR/3 BOMB) in E. Canada was a bluff, and that it was actually meant to fly east and counterattack whatever German Navy was left in SZ6 (Scappa Flow) in the hypothetical where Germany attacks into the Royal Navy and wins.

Japan sent 2 Fighters to go kill the UK Africa fleet with no Battleship to escort. I got a lucky hit so that marked 3 dead Japanese Fighters since the start of the game, a very good amount of luck for the Allies that should have made America’s job much easier. The other Fighter has to NCM to Egypt and slowly make its way back to the Pacific later.

That aside, the rest of the turn was mostly standard. Japan killed the American sub from A1 and made major progress in China. The entire IJN (except the 1 Destroyer who killed the American Sub) piles into SZ36 (SEA) to prepare for a J3 India takedown.

Collects 36

R2
Buy: 2 TANK/4 INF/ART
Same buy as the other games.

This time, I made sure to move the Soviet sub to join the main UK Navy.

I considered trying to take Karelia, since it was actually relatively lightly defended at this point, but faced with 2 German Transports + all the air + the small German stack in Baltic States (the one that did the botched strafe on Belo during G1), I was too afraid of being counterattacked. In hindsight, it may have been better to force the issue, since if Germany attacked the Soviets at Leningrad, they wouldn’t have been able to hit the Royal Navy, which would have given me enough time to build up to a point where Germany couldn’t kill it anymore.

However, in the game, I moved my stack back to E. Ukr. and took aggressive trades in E. Pol. and Ukr. Hoping to lull the Germans into another game where they spend too much money Vs. UK’s navy and eventually get overwhelmed by the Red Army.

I also moved up the Siberians as usual, and sent my Bomber + 2 INF into China to get a territory back for China.

Collects 27

G2
Buy: CV/INF/2 ART/2 TANK, banks 2 IPC

Germany blasts the British fleet (at the cost of a DD/SUB/FTR), but otherwise plays passively, stacking up E. Poland and slowly walking forward in Africa. 4 more land units (3 from Norway, 1 from Germany) are funneled into Karelia to lock down the territory.

Collects 35, ends on 37

B2
Buy: 4 DD

I trade Norway and unite the India/TJ stacks @ Persia to dodge all possible attacks. The British Fighters from the Pacific half of the board are also ready to go in E. Ukr. in case an opportunity to attack or land on a newly built Carrier comes up.

Collects 32

I2
Buy: INF/ART/TANK

Italy rams as much stuff as they can into TJ to keep the pressure on.

Collects 13

A2
Buy: 2 TT/2 BOMB

I continue my normal plan, bringing the fleet up to Iwo Jima (and also snipe the stray Japanese DD with air power). This scares the Axis Team as, since they bought almost all land units last turn, are mostly unprepared to fight the USN at this stage (and are out-of-position to try any counterattack due to being in SEA for their own attack @ India).

In Europe, the US DD/2 TT go to SZ6 to join the rest of the British fleet (1 CA/4 DD, now 5 DD thanks to the Americans). I also put the extra US Fighter in Bury to force Japan to bring more things there to deal with the Soviet stack (I am also hoping that the Fighter will deter an attack and allow the Soviets to break into China as they did in the other matches).

China had nothing to do but unite its remaining stack with the Soviet one and hope to hold on.

Collects 38

J3
Buy: CA/3 DD
The point of the buy is that the Axis Team wanted to bet the game on the outcome of a naval clash, rather than allow the Americans to deadzone the Japan SZ for the entire game with Bomber spam buys. Dave was the first one to correctly intuit what I was doing with the Allies, so kudos to him for figuring it out under the pressure of a live tournament game.

Japan made more gains in China, set up next to India (which I left open, but there is a large British stack on Persia threatening a counterattack), and moved the entire fleet back to Japan SZ, where they attacked the Siberian stack. The US Fighter put in work, and made sure all Japanese land units died as well. Tokyo is now basically defenseless, and on America’s turn I will consider whether to attack.

Collects 36

R3
Buy: 3 TANK/4 INF

I forego the chance to snipe the German Med. Transport to send both Soviet air units into China to make another play there. It works again, and now Japan is starting to finally get thinned out in China after their very good early game.

On the Russia-Germany front, I made the decision to stack up in E. Ukr. and send a force south into Bulgaria-Romania. In hindsight, this was a positional error, just like last turn. Not stepping to Belorussia is allowing Germany to keep making attacks against the Royal Navy without any threat of a counterattack from USSR -> Karelia. My strategies with USSR and UK are not in-sync like they were in the other two games where I was Allies, and it is costing me badly here.

Collects 28

G3
Buy; CV/DD/FTR/INF, banks 2 IPC
Germany attacks the British fleet with everything in-range except for their Cruiser, as the Axis Team thinks it would be better to keep at least one boat back in case the attack somehow fails.

The fight was, from what I can recall:

2 CV
4 FTR
1 BOMB

Vs.

5 DD
1 CA

Calc’ing this now as-written says it’s a 88% chance win for the Germans, but that they should expect to have 3-4 attacking units survive. It was smart of the Axis Team to bring the Carriers to soak hits, as without them the odds drop to a miserable 49%, a virtual coinflip.

At the table, the Axis had a middling first round of dice, and we were left with something like:

3 FTR
1 BOMB

Vs.

2 FTR

The Axis Team considered retreating at this point, not wanting to lose more air, but ultimately decided to press on out of a desire to kill the Allied Transports and not give the 2 FTR/1 BOMB a chance to counterattack the Baltic Fleet and wipe everything out. This ultimately proved to be the correct decision, as the Germans got all their hits on the next round of combat and the British got 0 hits back. Luck aside, it was right to lose the air to ensure the British fleet was 100% killed off for a second time, as this slowed me down significantly during the transition from mid -> late game.

In Russia, the Germans tried to take advantage of how out-of-position I was in E. Ukr. by walking their main stack into Belorussia. Their hope was that I would retreat the Soviets to Moscow in the face of his numbers. However, I think the Axis Team accidentally counted their air power in with the Belo Stack, as they diverted a large number of troops from the potential stack to go retake Ukraine, Bulgaria-Romania and Norway from the Allies there. You will see on R4 that the Soviets would have an easy time killing the German stack.

Elsewhere, the Germans in Africa ran south to gobble up IPCs.

Collects 40, ends on 42

B3
Buy: 1 CV/2 DD, saves 2 IPC

I leave a blocker in Persia but move the main stack to India (to hold it now that the Japanese fleet is out of position). In retrospect it may have been wiser to repeat my strategy from Round 3 and make now the time to try for a UK IC in India. That plus the stack would have prevented India’s fall to the Axis, which could have made a huge difference in the outcome, as you will see.

The Fighters from E. Ukr. NCM to SZ6 to land on the newly built Carrier. This probably should have been at least partially set up earlier to boost UK’s odds Vs. Germany as much as possible.

Collects 26, ends on 28. My notes say UK collected 33 and ended on 35 but I’m not sure how that could have possibly happened unless I got something wrong in setting up my recreation board. Please refer to whatever video gets posted on YT later to see how this happened.

I3
Buy: 3 INF/ART

Using Ukraine (captured by Germany earlier) as a can-opener, the 2 Italian Tanks in Russia blitz to Caucasus, joined by the Italian Navy picking up everything in-range from in/around Italy. This brings an impressive 2 INF/ART/3 TANK stack into Caucasus to crush it. The blocker in Persia is also crushed by the TJ stack (in hindsight, it probably would have been smarter to either stack Caucasus with the British (and accept that India is lost/needs to be retaken on the final few turns), or build the India IC and let the Soviets/Italians trade Caucasus for the rest of the game).

Regardless, the Italians get Caucasus, and thus reach a strong/stable income level.

Collects 18

A3
Buy: 3 BOMB, banks 2 IPC

At this point, I make the grave mistake that costs me the entire match (and thus the tournament). According to my notes, the fight for Japan’s SZ was:

2 CV
1 DD
1 CA
1 BB
5 BOMB

Vs.
3 DD
2 CV
1 CA
4 FTR
2 BB

This fight, of course, is suicide, with 1% odds to the attacker.

But if you read that spread again, as I did while typing this report, you’ll notice that THE FIGHTERS ARE MISSING FROM THE US SIDE

Yes, as it happened, I completely missed the 4 American Fighters (from the Carriers, of course). Adding them back in boosts USA’s odds to outright win the game to 76% (well, 76% chance to win the fleet battle, then 70% chance for the American Tank off Iwo Jima to successfully 1v1 the lone Bomber in Tokyo, for a grand total of .76 * .70 = 53% chance to outright win the game on the spot, and if the Tank failed to win in Tokyo, it was fine, since the other transports could have moved up from W. US to force Japan to spend a turn building all land units while the Americans sped off to win in China/Philippine.

But, in the actual game, I panicked when I saw the calc, and tried moving the Bombers + extra transports up while sacrificing the first Transport (with a Tank loaded) to take Shanghai (in an attempt to draw Japan’s few remaining land units to move away from the front lines). Even this was a bad play, as the fleet should have at least retreated to draw the IJN away from coastal China for another few rounds.

The American bombers all landed on Iwo Jima as well, when they should have at least gone into China to continue the task of cleaning up Japanese land units for China’s sake (there was still one Japanese land stack + a few blockers roaming over there).

As for China, all it could do was attack a blocker and continue trying to keep its last stack alive.

Collects 38, ends with 40

J4
Buy: IC/BOMB/SUB, saves 3 IPC
The build is to account for the American bomber spam, as the Axis Team deemed it too expensive to keep building escorting boats for the Transports while USSR/China had made massive inroads in that part of the board.

Japan, of course, massively capitalizes on my indecisiveness as the Americans during A3, and wipes out the entire USN for the cost of most of Japan’s ships. To complicate the issue, the Axis Team decided to split their transports into 3 separate SZs, none of which were the one that contained the surviving IJN. This meant that America would need to choose between cleaning the Transports and cleaning the IJN during A4, which made America’s bad position infinitely worse.

They also played in China, continuing to swap land territories there.

The IC goes to Manchuria.

Collects 33, ends on 36. My notes have them lower than this. That, coupled with UK’s income being lower than expected suggests to me that UK sneaked a Tank into SEA at some point. You’ll have to see if that was the case in whatever video of this game gets uploaded later.

R4
Buy: 5 TANK/1 INF
The build is forced because USSR only has 6 production slots due to Italy taking Caucasus.

The battle for Belorussia was:

9 INF
1 ART
11 TANK
1 FTR
1 BOMB

Vs.

13 INF
1 ART
6 TANK

Like all the other major battles, I calc’d this after the fact and ended up with 83% for USSR. This proved accurate, as the Soviets won big here and crushed through the German stack (although Soviets lost all their INF/ART, so were left with only tanks at this point).

Soviets also continued doing their best to keep playing in China.

Collects 18 (as you’d imagine, losing Caucasus hurt)

G4
Buy: DD/3 ART/TANK/5 INF, banks 2 IPC
The buy was a reaction to losing the entire German land stack. The Axis Team’s priority has shifted to defense in Europe and letting Italy win the game via Caucasus/India.

To that end, Germany’s turn is passive, shoving as many things as possible into Caucasus/Karelia as possible while slowly/carefully advancing in Africa.

Collects 40, ends on 42

B4
Buy; 2 TT/1 CA, banks 2 IPC
My notes say I also bought a Destroyer. It might have something to do with whatever extra money I had from playing in SEA (which I didn’t record here sadly).

I had the India stack attack the Persia stack, because I wanted to make sure it didn’t get to Caucasus during I4. This proved to be a bad idea because I ended up retreating with a Bomber left Vs. his Tank. This would prove to be the last mistake I’d be allowed in this match, as you will see shortly.

Collects 25, ends with 27

I4
Buy: 6 INF
The specific placement is 3 to Caucasus, 3 to Italy. This is so Italy can get all possible bombard shots during I5.

Italy diverts 2 Tanks to smash into India and capture it, the final punishment for the combination of:
-USA’s failure to kill Tokyo or at least destroy the IJN during A3.
-UK’s failure to build an India IC after the Sealion threat was neutralized (The time for this would have been B3, after the second wave of German air/navy was sacrificed to destroy the second UK Fleet).

-UK attacking Persia and retreating the bomber during B4 instead of either holding the ground or staying to win the land battle (which would have forced the Italian navy to amphib India to take it, or spare India for the time and have Japan do a walk-in, which could be dealt with more easily for reasons that will become clear towards the end of the game).

Axis now have a large enough VC Lead that Allies would need to recapture 2 before the end of the game to be able to win.

Collects 23

A4
Buy; 3 TT/1 ART/5 INF
Out of desperation, I attempt a last-second Europe switch to try sneaking into France on A6. This is something that worked occasionally in-practice, but under the stress of the situation I forgot the critical detail that this last-second switch was only helpful in positions where Japan was already dealt with (this was not one of those positions, seeing as Japan still had navy alive + an IC in Asia that I had no way of taking).

In retrospect, even if I did insist on going down this path, I completely neglected to factor in the 3 US Land Units (2 INF/ART) that were already in the UK from the A1 anti-Sealion buy. That’s 10 IPC I could have spent on a FTR instead, which would have been one more HP for the final battle. Not relevant given the much bigger mistakes that lead to this moment (up to and including this entire buy!), but it’s an efficiency thing.

I fell for the trap laid by the Axis Team badly here. Thinking their objective was Australia (another VC), I sent two bombers to kill 2/3 Japanese Transports (the two that were in range of Hawaii), and sent the rest to attack the remnants of the IJN. This was a miserably poor move for multiple reasons:

1. I spared a Japanese TT, which will cause issues immediately that will cascade for the rest of the game.

2. The IJN Remnants (2 BB/1 CA) were harmless in their current position, as there were no accompanying transports. They could (and should) have been left for later.

3. There was another loaded carrier beyond the fleet I was targeting. My attack on the fleet was meant to stop them from uniting during J5 but I failed to account for the sheer amount of attrition I’d be taking + the fact that I did not build another wave of Bombers, meaning attrition losses would not be replaced. This means that despite destroying this fleet, I would not be able to destroy whatever navy Japan follows-up with on J5, which is exactly what ended up happening in the ame.

4. Because I got tunnel vision on Japan’s various ships, I lost focus on the potential to do something about the Japanese air ball, which was currently defending the Manchuria IC (if I remember correctly), and thus in-range for a high-value piece trade.

These misses would have fatal consequences as the game nears its conclusion. To top it off, the bombers attacking the IJN have horrific luck and are all shot down (the battle was a tie). The survivors NCM to Australia to prepare a possible strafe against India to remove the defenders there.

China has nothing to do but place blockers everywhere to contain Japan’s stack. They have no way to stop the Manchuria factory as it begins to pump out troops.

Collects 38

J5
Buy: 3 TANK/4 INF/TT, banks 2 IPC

One of the Transports I let live (@ Wake Island), runs back to SZ61 (China Coast) and starts ferrying new troops to the mainland. In general, Japan begins to dominate China due to how thin the numbers of both sides are.

I don’t realize it at the time, but all Japanese air units are currently in-position to NCM to India during J6. This is why I said it was important for UK to stay there or otherwise prevent Italy from being the one to capture it earlier in the game.

Collects 35, ends on 37

R5
Buy: 6 INF

The Soviets technically had the option of taking Karelia, but because Allies need to get 2 VCs before the game ends, they’re instead forced to smash all their tanks into Caucasus and Persia (and enough Tanks in Persia to prevent and Axis blockers from getting into position). This is why UK needed to kill the Persia stack during B4 earlier, to prevent Italy from locking down Persia and preventing USSR from taking it on R5, after which they could have just left a blocker and locked down India for the guaranteed win.

As it happened in-game, Soviets got both territories easily, setting up a final battle over India on I5/J6/R6 that would determine the fate of the game.

Collects 24. My notes say USSR was down to 19, so Germany must have made progress in the northern part of Russia (Archangel/Urals/etc.) that I didn’t notice during my recreation attempt. Like the other inconsistencies, please refer to whatever video gets uploaded for 100% accuracy

G5
Buy: SUB/2 DD/5 INF/SBR Repair
Apparently I did a SBR against Karelia at some point during the game. I didn’t note that I did one but I did note that Germany repaired the damage at this stage. It makes sense, given that Germany’s goal now is to lock down the European VCs as much as possible and win with India.

Collects 46

B5
Buy: 2 DD/2 INF/ART

All UK can do at this point is make a desperation play in NWE to try tricking Germany into over-comitting there during G6 (and dropping their guard on France).

Collects 25

I5
Buy: 4 INF/2 TANK, banks 1 IPC

Italy throws everything they have at Caucasus to reduce the Soviet Tank Count. The bombards do massive damage, and the Red Army is crippled (but Caucasus does hold).

Collects 17

A5
Buy: 3 BOMB, banks 2 IPC
The buy is for E. US. If UK can take NWE next turn the Bombers can support the 3 TT/5 INF/ART play from last turn as they attack from Canada -> France as a Hail Mary pass.

The only thing America can do at this point is use the Bombers from Australia to clear out India. They succeed at this.

China lunges forward with the last of their INF. They’re one tile away from a VC, but they’re not going to make it.

Collects 38, ends on 40

J6
We declared this as the final turn after a brief debate (in retrospect, given the board state, I should have argued more strongly for a 7th turn to give Soviets time to amass enough force to take India, as the Western Allies had no prayer of breaking into any of the German VCs at this point).

Buy: Irrelevant
In the “checkmate” move of the game, Japan kills the last Chinese holdouts that were in-range of any VCs then NCMs their air ball to India to lock down the VC.

R6
USSR’s odds at India are only 12%, so I use the last turn instead trying to gobble up as many IPCs as I can in case I get lucky with UK/US. If I’d stopped to think I would have realized that their odds of success were much MUCH lower than 12%, and just taken the shot @ India.

G6
Buy: 2 FTR/3 SUB/DD
Their buy is to lock down the Baltic as much as possible so UK can’t sneak in and take Poland.
The Axis Team didn’t fall for my plan. They min-maxxed NWE and France to mix defense and offense.

B6
The only way out I can see at this point is taking 1 INF + air to hit NWE and some spare units to try rigging a hit in France (since the other 6 Italian land units are going to move up during I6). In retrospect I should have just sent the air to France and all land units to NWE, even if the effort is futile at this point anyway.

I lose the NWE fight and then give up, since now the American Bombers can’t help fight in France during A6.

Axis Win

(5/6)

@thrasher1 Best I can come up with is something that starts at Napoleonic Wars (or even further back).

Then based on winner of that you get an alternate setup for Crimean War for your next game.

Then you get an alternate WW1, alternate Interwar Period, alternate WW2, etc. Seems like you’d run out of possibilities eventually though.

@DoManMacgee BUMP: There was a “low turnout” for last year’s event (we had like 12 people, which is a fair size for an A&A tournament, but a low size compared to other tournaments held at this event (i.e. Ticket to Ride, Smallworld, and other “popular board games”), which draw in 30+ competitors regularly). Due to this, Revised is on the “chopping block” for this year’s WBC Tournament.

I would greatly encourage anyone who enjoys Revised to make some attempt of attending this year’s tournament, as it would be a shame if one of the only Revised events in the country were to close its doors.

Woo! Looking forward to rolling out tomorrow.

@domanmacgee Game History

Round: 2

    Puchase Units - Americans
        Americans buy 1 submarine and 3 transports; Remaining resources: 0 PUs; 

    Place Units - Americans
        1 submarine and 3 transports placed in SZ 1

    Turn Complete - Americans
        Americans collect 20 PUs; end with 20 PUs

Combat Hit Differential Summary :

1914-game-4-usa2.tsvg

Have a family gathering today so might not get to R3 until super-late tonight/tomorrow.

@Argothair Others already brought up the US prewar Naval Doctrine so I’m not going to beat a dead horse on that one. Only other thing I wanted to discuss was:

@Argothair:

I think it’s an interesting question whether a Prime Minister Halifax would have actually ordered a massive redeployment of modern fighters – the primary instrument protecting the UK against an otherwise triumphant Germany – to Singapore, which is literally at the opposite end of the globe. That seems like a ballsy move for a relatively conservative man.

I guess that decision comes down to a few extra factors I hadn’t though of before, such as:
1. The deployment of German forces in Europe - Would a British-German armistice/truce/ceasefire accelerate Germany’s plans for Barbarossa? Surely the UK wouldn’t attempt to support the Greeks (or Yugoslavians, but I don’t recall if they had any direct help from the British) while trying to pacify Germany. Would a lack of British support for Greece facilitate the Italian invasion? Even if Italy still failed miserably in Greece, would Germany still be willing to delay Barbarossa to help Italy without the fear of the British sending forces to the Balkans/using Greece as an airfield to bomb Romania?

I bring these points up because as soon as the Nazis enter the Soviet Union it basically gives the British a green light to redeploy their resources to Asia, even if they distrust Germany’s intentions. It’s just a matter of whether Barbarossa kicks off before Japan reaches Southeast Asia, IMO.

2. Does Italy call off its war with Britain/Egypt? And, if they don’t, does Germany withdraw the Africa Korps as a sign of good faith to Britain? This thread is about a UK/German (temporary) peace/ceasefire but we’ve never gotten into the terms of said hypothetical surrender. If it’s just a ceasefire that’s one thing but as eaerly as August 1940 the North Africa campaign is already underway, and by mid-September Germany is already in Libya propping up Italy’s lackluster efforts.

I bring this up for two reasons:
A: If Britain was forced to cede Egypt to Italy (and probably Jordan and Sudan as well, to ease Italy’s supply route to Ethiopia/“Abyssinia” and for Mussolini’s PR stunt of “recreating the Roman Empire”), it would seriously hamper the British supply route to Asia, since I assume the Axis would not allow the UK to freely move resources (civil or military) through the Mediterranean/Suez Canal. This would mean reinforcements bound for Singapore would have to waste valuable time circumnavigating Africa, which brings back memories of Russia’s debacle at Tsushima in 1905.

B: If the war in Africa continued, the UK would not be able to send 100% of its free resources to Asia, as they would need to go out of their way to cripple the Italian Navy (Taranto would probably still occur here) and defeat Italy’s armies in North Africa/Ethiopia to end that war. As pathetic as the Italian army was in North Africa, mopping up would still be a time consuming process that may take long enough to allow Japan to strike before adequate British reinforcements reach Asia.

As for everything else, I think we can agree to disagree on the more minor points since our general conclusions are similar. Thanks for the good discussion.

@CorporalClegg said in Are Cruisers for Losers? A video discussion:

@DoManMacgee
I agree with maximising use of existing cruisers.
Also I haven’t played 1914 so I cant really comment. But looks like cruisers are 9IPCs, attack/defend @3 and can move 3 spaces. Seems reasonable, but then again Battleships are only 12. Interesting! 1914 is definitely on my wishlist

1914 is different than the other games in that naval units are actually sort of balanced:
All naval units have 2 base movement, but can move 3 if their move originates from a Naval Base that’s owned by it’s original controller and is friendly to your faction.

Transport - Cost 6, do not make SZs hostile, do not participate in combat
Subs - Cost 6, do no make SZs hostile, 2/2
Cruisers - Cost 9, cannot bombard, make SZs hostile, 3/3
Battleships - Cost 12, can bombard, 2HP (but need to begin a turn on a friendly Naval Base to repair), 4/4

Interesting changes to the system to be sure. The math actually works out so Battleships are extremely useful if you can keep them repaired, and Cruisers/Subs are about even (although having more HP/dice-rolls is typically better than having fewer).

EDIT: There’s also the whole business of mines, but that’s way beyond the scope of this thread.

@Conni_Hu Because you asked for a non-specific answer:

Overview: You need to make a beeline for Moscow ASAP, but also make sure to scoop up Leningrad along the way, as it is the main point the Western Allies will attempt to land in to reinforce the Soviets. Making any effort to attack southern Russia or North Africa (beyond just using the units you began the game with in those areas) is ill-advised, as capturing Moscow will effectively end the game due to the USSR no longer being able to collect income or field an army.

Round 1: Attack East Poland and Baltic States with everything that can reach. More should go to Baltic States.
Round 2: Attack Belorussia and Leningrad with everything that can reach. Most of your troops should go to Belorussia.
Round 3: Attack Moscow with everything that can reach.

What you do in other areas of the map is outside of the scope of your question, but you should be taking steps to slow down the USA/UK Navies.

If this answer is too in-depth for you, I apologize. Please refer to just the “overview” for the shortest possible explanation.

@JuliusBorisovBeamdog Sweet. Looking forward to another go at things later tonight.

@the_good_captain It’s a favor from one stats/math nerd to another I guess. The history tab gave the total punch/hits so getting the averages from there was pretty easy.

@SuperbattleshipYamato Yeah I get you 100%. Alternate History is a niche interest in the first place so finding other people willing to go down the rabbit hole is always tough.

@Topmat I usually stick with OOB Rules + Bid for serious games. OOB only for friendly games with the playgroup.

I heavily house rule games for my own amusement for solitaire play, mostly. It helps create zany what-if scenarios, mostly.

@Suppressmeajumma The Western Allies should certainly be landing in the same spot, and Northern Italy, since it has a factory, is certainly a good place to land (France is also good, since it’s two spaces away from any German Factories, so harder to reinforce). My point was more that defending the USSR should be the main objective of the US/UK, not making some kind of grand D-Day Style Landing. You might want to prioritize landing troops in Leningrad before making any landings in France/Italy, so that they can liberate the factory there for the USSR and defend Moscow from the German onslaught.

Not going to be as extensive as my initial report, as the hotfix itself was pretty minor. Did discover a new bug though that’s pretty important.

• The gameplay feels a great deal faster now compared to before, thanks for listening on that one.

• The issue with the zooming I think is gone? Haven’t noticed it today.

• The God-awful “offline mode/online mode” prompts are gone as well, which is great.

• No changes with the AI, so that’s something that will need to be dealt with later.

• I totally forgot that you’ve slightly altered the core ruleset to not allow Allied Carriers to house your Fighters. It’s mildly annoying since a large part of my Allied strategy is to have a Fighter Conga Line from US East Coast -> one of the UK Sea Zones -> Moscow/West Russia/wherever. If you’re sticking with the ruleset change it’s whatever, but I’d prefer a 100% accurate simulation of the OOB Rules, since we’re not changing the setup to help the Allies at all.

Anyway, the bug I noticed:

I play as USA and try to buy 2 carriers. During the Noncombat Move Phase, I have moved Fighters to the Sea Zones off the US East and West Coasts. During the Place Units phase, I attempt to place my Carriers, one in each Sea Zone. However, upon placing the first Carrier, the Sea Sea Zone that wasn’t the one I initially placed in greys-out as if I can’t place units there anymore (but the Sea Zone I just placed the Carrier in remains eligible). What this means is that I am prevented from making the perfectly legal move of placing one Aircraft Carrier in each of the Sea Zones that USA can place in. Bizarrely, this doesn’t seem to happen for other unit types, just Aircraft Carriers in particular. Additionally, placing the first Aircraft Carrier, closing the game, reopening the game, undoing my first Aircraft Carrier placement, and placing it again fixes the issue for whatever reason. I suspect there may be a bug in the code that defines which territories a power is allowed to place units in, but that’s just a guess.

Still haven’t played that PVP game yet, but will get back to you on that shortly I hope.

Again, going to post this over on steam for additional conversation.

Thanks for pushing out an update on such short notice.

@the_good_captain NP. Fixed it in the middle of the British turn, which I’m gonna be a bit on as it’s less autopilot than the French turn.