Posts made by DoManMacgee

While I’m certainly not a fan of the concept of adding something as absurd as Zombies to Axis and Allies (Or, God Forbid, have the Axis and Allies work together to fight them) I don’t understand the surprise. Let me elaborate from the position of someone from a younger generation:

There is a popular series of first person shooter video games called “Call of Duty” where (for the most part) you play as a soldier on the front lines of World War II.

One of the most popular multiplayer game modes in later editions of this franchise is something called “Nazi Zombies,” where you and your friends fight against Zombies that are implied to be the creation of some absurd wonder weapon project.

My Point: I think all Wizards is trying to do here is cash in on a popular game mode in a trendy video game in order to appeal to a younger generation. Insulting to the hardcore base? Perhaps. Stupid? I think not, but time will tell.

I’m with djensen on this. The game might very well suck and I probably won’t buy it, but if this game does well and it might lead to the creation of a game that can surpass even G40, then more power to Wizards.

@Argothair:

To really boil down your advice, you’re saying to skip the attack on the British Home Fleet and the American Pacific fleet in favor of sending maximum Axis air toward the center of the board

Center board pressure, yup.
Only exception to the whole “not hitting the UK Home Fleet” bit is that I make sure to dive on the SZ12 Fleet (The DD/CRU pair). Taking that out gives the UK one less bombardment, gives Italy a chance to get its “clear the Mediterranean” NO, and might make the US think twice before storming Morocco US1.

Anyway, onto the nitpicks/discussion:

@Argothair:

Britain can pretty easily bring 4 land units + 3 air + 2 bombards to attack France.

That’s true, but think of the typical Allied strategy in AA50. Most players try to land in Norway and drop an IC there. If UK is spending its time diving on France it delays this factory until they decide to divert the resources needed to occupy it.

Additionally, devoting everything 100% to a France landing B1 implies letting the Baltic Fleet and surviving German Subs live. If UK does this and Germany landed its air force in-range you could be looking at a pretty bloody G2 attack on the UK Fleet (unless UK buys like a CV or some other big naval force B1).

I’m not saying that leaving France in shoddy shape is necessarily a good idea either, and I definitely see the downsides of having to tether a 10+ INF/1-2 FTR stack to France for most of the game.  It really does take away from the Russian front if I can’t cripple the Soviets economically in the first 2-3 turns.

Holding France isn’t 100% necessary either. It sucks if I don’t have enough punch to retake it on G4/G5, but if Moscow falls round 5 and the Allies are in France/Italy, that still should come up an Axis win once either:
A: Germany takes Russia’s lunch money and builds a massive land force in Europe.
B: Japan’s tank stacks flood into Europe to save Germany’s bacon.

@Argothair:

Second, it’s not clear to me that you can kill the British Indian fleet J1 AND shut down China hard AND and take India on J2.

Fair warning before I describe my order of battle here, bids change this strategy completely. I probably wouldn’t recommend something that’s basically a cheese in a tournament setting with bids because an experienced player would definitely recognize that India is a key position that the British need to hold at all costs if they want to keep Japan’s income from exploding.

Fair warning #2, the image I’m looking at for the setup is blurry, so forgive me if I get the SZ #s wrong (I try to describe the physical location).

That being said:
J1:

• Most of the East Indies Fleet (CV/BB/1 FTR, the other FTR is going to Yuunan), FTR from SZ51 (Caroline Islands) Vs. India Fleet (DD/CV/FTR), idea is to do this battle last and take casualties based on how other battles go (i.e. if everything else went perfectly take the ships as casualties to maximize available planes, if things went poorly elsewhere keep the navy around to transition into a normal Japan game.  Calc says 92% chance of attacker win with 1-2 casualties expected for attacker.

• Manchuria INF, 1 Kisangu INF (2 leftover), Japan FTR (it can’t reach Burma anyway) (Total: 3 INF, 1 FTR) Vs. Suiyuan (2 INF).  Calc says 94% chance attacker wins. At least one INF should survive. Yes, I know this means completely abandoning Manchuria to the USSR for a turn, but unlike older versions of A&A the Soviets gain 0 IPCs from attacking Manchuria, just one extra Chinese INF and the temporary deprivation of Japan’s NOs if they fail to counterattack the following round. In fact, I want the Russians to come at Asia as hard as they can because it means those 6-8 INF (possibly more if they funnel troops into Persia or Western China) won’t be in Moscow/Stalingrad when they’ll be direly needed rounds 3/4.

• 2 Kisangu INF (the other went to Suiyuan, see above bullet point), Manchuria FTR (Total: 2 INF, 1 FTR) Vs. Hupeh (1 INF). 98% Attacker.

• Transport from Japan picks up INF+Tank, BB from Japan, CRU from Philippines -> SZ61 (South China Sea), Kwangtung INF + Transport + bombard (Total: 2 INF, 1 Tank, 1 BB, 1 CRU) Vs. 1 Fukien (1 INF). 99% Attacker.

• FIC (2 INF, 1 FTR), Japan Bomber, Formosa FTR (Formosa->SZ61->Fukien->Yuunan->NCM to Burma), SZ36 (East Indies, the rest of the fleet engaged the Indian Navy) FTR (SZ36->SZ37->Burma->Yuunan->NCM to Burma) (Total: 2 INF, 3 FTR, 1 Bomber) Vs. Yuunan (2 INF, 1 FTR).  Calc says 99% chance Attacker win with 4 units surviving. If I get lucky I won’t lose 2 units but I’m not afraid to sacrifice a FTR or two to keep China down.

End result (key territories):

• Burma: 1 INF, 5 FTR (one from Manchuria, one from Formosa, one from FIC, two from SZ36 (East Indies), 1 Bomber.

• SZ35 (India): 1BB, 0-1CV, 0-1FTR (the FTR from SZ51 (Caroline Islands)).

• Manchuria: Empty.

• SZ61 (Off China): 1 TT, 1 BB, 1 CRU, potentially other ships.

• Fukien: 0-2 INF, 1 Tank

• FIC: IC from buy.

J2 you’re looking at 1 INF, 5 FTR, 1 Bomber Vs. whatever UK brought to India. If UK swings absolutely everything in range like you suggest (3 INF/1 AA from India, +1 INF from Persia, +1 FTR from Egypt, +1 FTR from Australia), then India will hold until J3 (1 INF from before + 2 tanks from FIC (J2 buy) + the IJN transporting the land units from Fukien + bombard will overrun whatever UK can possibly bring).

So it may have been a bit bold of me to suggest that India will “definitely fall by J2,” but it is possible if UK’s priorities lie elsewhere.

As for the strategy being “unstoppable,” I’d hardly call my plan unstoppable, but it does have a certain appeal to it if the first 2 rounds go smoothly.

IMO Allies have the edge in Revised and Classic. Especially Classic.
AA50 (both scenarios, although IIRC 41 is a bit closer) is tough for the Allies in most cases unless you turn NOs off and/or close the Dardanelles.

Of course, if you really hate yourself just play 42SE or G40 with Allies no bid.

Replying because I employ a variant of this strategy in my own games.

Apologies in-advance for hideous post format.

While I agree that Desert Rat’s perfect game report is a fantasy, I still advocate a less extreme variant of E. Ukraine stacking strategy. I think my take on things addresses some of your concerns:

I’m only going to discuss round 1 in detail or give 100% exact declarations of moves (although we can discuss that if you’d like), because it becomes impossible to predict the exact gamestate after round 1 due to dice:

• J1 - Use air power against Chinese territories and the British India Fleet. Ignore US Fleet entirely.
  Yes, this dooms Japan’s long-term prospects in the Pacific, and the money islands will certainly fall to the US, but it will take the Americans about 2-3 round to assemble a navy capable of killing the IJN and sail it all the way to the South Pacific.

  Opening this way, assuming your opponent did not place a heavy build in China (they shouldn’t have), gives Japan their usual initiative in Mainland Asia and almost certainly spells doom for India J2, barring a miracle.  The only real thing you’re sacrificing here is the IJN’s long-term prospects, which can potentially be remedied later in the game if you’re willing to sink IPCs into it.

  As far as builds go I usually just stick with a Factory in FIC and some extra navy.  This gives Japan it’s usual tank-rushing capabilities while also forestalling the inevitable destruction of the IJN at the USN’s hands.

• G1 - This is where things get a bit tricky/technical. I do the following:
  -Use Subs (2) + FTR from France to take out SZ12 (Gibraltar) Fleet (DD + CRU) - 81% Attacker
  -Use DD from SZ13 + FTR from Bulgaria to hit SZ15 (Egypt) Fleet (DD) - 92% Attacker
  -Strafe Egypt with Afrika Korps. You’re not expected to win this one, just to damage Egypt enough that Italy can waltz in I1.
  -Slam some combination of Russian territories, depending on what USSR did R1.  You must hit E. Ukraine the hardest.  You have 2-3 tanks (depending on if Soviets hit Ukraine R1), 3 FTRs (Norway/Germany/East Poland), a Bomber, the Blatic Fleet, and a decent number of INF to work with, so you should be able to snipe at least East Ukraine + 1 territory.

  Doing all this totally ignores the UK Fleet, which will cause problems for you late-game when UK sinks your fleet, lands en-masse in Norway and drops an IC.  But as with the USN defeating the IJN, this will take the Allies about 2-3 turns to setup.  By this point you should already have basically neutralized the Soviets.

  Build can be more-or-less whatever you want, within reason (i.e. no absurd all-bomber buys, ICs, Battleships, etc.).

• I1 - Not a lot to say here. Roll into Egypt for easy progress towards the NO (barring a disaster you should be able to take Trans-Jordan I2 to finish it out (France/Egypt/Trans-Jordan).

Quickies for Round 2:

• J2 - Continue in China, Capture India, NCM the surviving Air Force to E. Ukraine. Continue shoring up fleet and/or tank spam.

• G2 - Take Caucasus if possible. Continue stacking otherwise.  Attempt to cleanup Allied landings and satisfy Italy’s NOs.

• I2 - Prioritize NO Completion.

I specifically mention Italy’s NOs because they’re more-or-less mandatory if Italy wants to contribute to the Axis in any meaningful way.

There’s no way to calculate what the final IPC Incomes would look like in my extremely vague scenario, but a rough outline of the board-state at the end of Round 2 would be:

US: USN Assembled in Solomons (or wherever they’re staging).  USN ready to strike Africa if they haven’t already.
UK: Fleet assembled in North Sea, Norway locked down, successfully destroyed Baltic Fleet, lost Egypt/India, may or may not have destroyed Italian Fleet.
USSR: Holed up in Moscow.  May or may not still have Stalingrad.
China: Should be down to their last 2-3 territories.

J: Occupied India, significant progress in China, still hold Money Islands, do not own Australia, fleet in sorry state compared to USN (if US is going KJF).
G: Should own East Poland/Leningrad (but not for long with the UK starting their Norway stack)/East Ukraine/Ukraine. May or may-not hold Belorussia and Caucasus. Should still be holding France.
I: Occupied Italy/Trans-Jordan. May or may-not hold Ukraine and additional African territories. May have lost Morocco-Algeria already.

So overall a much more well-rounded position for the Axis.
The gameplan to take Moscow (if the UK is playing badly and not sending any air support to Moscow) would be to suicide the German Army into Moscow as a can-opener for an Italian attempt to take Moscow followed by the Japanese Air Force to clear out any survivors. After the triple can-opener, the Soviets can build 6 land units, which shouldn’t be enough to survive a second German offensive. Of course, if the game devolves into a stack-off in Russia the Japanese are free to move their Air Force elsewhere (possibly back to the Pacific for support or to mop up in Asia).

That’s all I’ve got, generally speaking. Granted, I don’t play AA50 a lot and definitely don’t consider myself to be a high-level player.

Side-Note: Kudos to you for using common sense and closing the Dardanelles. IMO, that simple act does infinitely more to balance AA50/42SE than any bid can.

Looks like I missed the boat while trying to mentally process that they weren’t kidding about the Zombies.

If you send a follow-up question, can you ask:

1. Will the game be distributed in retailers, like 1941, or to hobby shops only, like the G40 line?

2. What is in the game that will appeal to long-time fans of the series?

Context: 1941 gets a lot of flak for not bringing anything new to the table (not counting sculpts, of course). Revised, on the other hand, managed to import the Destroyers/Artillery from the spin-offs while remaining mostly on the same level of complexity as 3rd Edition.

A better way of asking my question is a variation of the one you made in your first post. Where will this game fall on the spectrum of 1941/Revised/AA50/G40?

3. Alternatively, is this game even going to be a strategy board game? (Midnight_Reaper raised the possibility of a card game on the last page).

4. Longshot, but MSRP/Release Date would also be nice, but I’m sure we’ll be getting that regardless.

No Revised so I’ll go against the masses and vote for AA50.

You can try playing without National Objectives, although I guess that’s technically a “rule change.”

I say this because the National Objectives give the Axis a huge advantage, as they’re able to keep/gain theirs easily while the Allies tend to lose/fail-to-gain theirs.

My issue with bringing the UK Bomber into Egypt is that it’s 5 moves (UK->SZ8->SZ12->Lybia->Algeria->Egypt), leaving you with only one move for the Bomber after the battle.

This means you’re either:
A: Killing the Bomber in the battle, which means you lose the bomber.
B: Landing the Bomber in Trans-Jordan, where it will probably be killed by Germany on G2.
C: Landing the Bomber in one of the three African territories adjacent to Egypt, where it will be safe (as long as Germany didn’t bring any air when it attacked Egypt), but will be mildly out of position UK2 (unless you plan on sending the Bomber to the Pacific).

I just prefer keeping the UK Bomber in or around the UK/Moscow area at the start, so it can be used in clearing out whatever navy Germany may-or-may-not be building (the people I play with generally tend to build a Baltic Carrier G1 and land FTRs on it).

Granted, if I’m not seeing any attempt at a German Naval build I’d have no problem with sending the bomber into Africa.

@Kreuzfeld:

Depends on what you do. If you want him to attack borneo, instead of pearl, you do the move i said. If he is going to do pearl, he will need his only TT left here. If you want to make it impossible for him to take borneo, you can place your CV at the philipines. As long as you kill his TT with your cruiser, he will not be able to reach borneo on J1. At this point, it is quite miserable being the japanese. It is a decent backup plan to taking egypt.

I’m familiar with the “block” of Borneo on UK1, yes.  It’s a solid move if you can win both fights and it can crush players who aren’t experienced with Japan.

I’m just personally not a fan because of the odds associated with the battles.

You need to win two battles for the plan to work:

• 2 UK INF Vs. 1 J INF (Borneo), ~70% chance to win

• 1 UK DD Vs. 1 J TT (SZ 59), ~70% chance to at least sink the TT.

• It’s worth noting that you can greatly increase your odds in the SZ59 fight by also bringing the FTR, but that means it can’t reach Hawaii, which defeats the point of this plan.

Two 70% fights looks great on paper, but your chances of winning both are (.70)^2= .49 = ~49%, just shy of 50%.

You can’t afford to lose either of these fights for the plan to sufficiently strangle Japan either. If SZ59 is not occupied by the British DD, Japan can sail to FIC J1 and project power across the Pacific and if Borneo isn’t captured than the entire plan fails outright.

@zooooma:

We might throw some fun variants in there as well. I want to to make new games. I want to make variants of existing games. What about Axis and Allies and Zombies?

• Chris Cocks,
  WotC president and CEO

https://www.rollingstone.com/glixel/features/how-the-company-behind-dd-magic-and-avalon-hill-innovate-w514703

Obviously Zombies was a throwaway hypothetical, but be prepared for a total bastardisation.

And I though A&A: WWI was a stretch…

You all might be missing a more important detail here.

Quote from the same article. It’s the sentence right before the atrocious “zombie” comment:

@Author:

But why, I ask, hasn’t Axis and Allies come to tablet yet?

@WOTC:

“I think we will be correcting that in 12 to 18 months,”

If they’re serious and we’re actually getting an official software release of A&A, that could potentially be huge (or a disaster, if WOTC decides to shut down TripleA),

@Kreuzfeld:

I used to do this move, with the addition of landing two  indian infs in brno.
If japan then goes for pearl, he has to use his TT, which will die. If japan builds 3 TTs, he will be vulnrable to the UK bomber. This means that Japan will have real trouble getting brno back before turn 3.

The place I played, we usually added a german Tank and a german inf in libya as a bid. Because of this, Germany would often take Egypt with about 3 units surviving on G1.

I used this strategy for many games, however , I switched to taking egypt back on UK1. Retaking egypt, combined with landing in Morocco on UK1 (reinforced by USA), would completely criple germany permanently in africa. Germany would be left with 2 landunits, and have trouble reinforcing it. In most of those games, UK would collect all of africa for the entire game.

Agreed for the most part. I don’t like diving on Borneo though. Too risky (only like 70% chance to win, with my rotten luck that’s bad odds for an early game engagement, plus Japan can parry it and retake Borneo if they play smart).

I also like retaking Egypt B1, provided that Germany didn’t win too decisively (if they have > 3 land units left I don’t bother).

I might post in this thread again in a week or two. I’m starting to practice Revised again for a tournament I’m going to over the summer and it’ll be good to dream up new openings for UK.

Necrobump I know.

Don’t know if you’re still out there TripleA, but I’ve been practicing with your strategy and have found that it works pretty well as a bait for a J1 Pearl Harbor.

The extra casualties Japan suffers due to the second FTR (the one that flies in from SZ35 to help with the Solomon Islands Sub) renders them vulnerable (pretty good odds, depending on how the dice went on J1) to a counterattack from the USA (with the BB+TT from W. US, the FTR from W. US, the FTR from Hawaii, and the BMB from E. US.).

Thanks for the great strategy! I’ll definitely be giving it a try at the next tournament or face-to-face game I play in.

WBC (World Boardgaming Championships) in Seven Springs, PA has an A&A Revised Tournament (with modified victory conditions to fit a Over-The-Board Tournament) yearly as part of its con. Not 100% sure of the date for next year (it’s a two-day event at a week-long convention), but judging by the first few years A&A is on the first two days. This year the tournament was on July 22-23.

boardgamers (dot) org is the website iirc, but you can also just search “Boardgame Players Association (BPA)” and it should come up in the first result or two.

We had about 20-ish people show up this year with next-to-zero promotion/hype, which was a pretty good number considering how niche Revised is compared to G40.

Side-Note: Larry Harris and crew were at the convention to demo War Room this year, so if you’re looking forward to that expect a push for it to be an event at future WBCs.

Wasn’t able to get the time off work to go myself but I watched the YouTube streams over the weekend.  Massive kudos to YG for putting on such a terrific tournament.

I saw the win ratios for round one posted on GeneralHandGrenade’s channel and earlier in this thread, but couldn’t find anything for round 2/the medal rounds.  How did those games go?

@TripleA:

Yes, Pearl Harbor is always possible. Japan can muster enough ships to convincingly destroy the fleet at Pearl Harbor. But the question is: what are the consequences after round 1?

I agree with you, but for totally different reasons.  I simply don’t think the J1 Pearl Harbor attack is a good long-term strategy period, as it’s basically trading half of your irreplaceable fleet for 2/3 of the highly-replaceable USN on the first turn on the game.

Either way, I’m going to reply to your points and continue to play Devil’s Advocate, because we’ve got to show Revised the love it deserves!

@TripleA:

You can not attack both the UK fleet and the US fleet with convincing odds if you lose the sub.

Sure you can!  Assuming the British Fleet went to the Kwangtung SZ B1, just send the East Indies SZ BB + CB + 2 FTR.  If you’re feeling super paranoid about Pearl you can send one (or both) or the East Indies FTRs to Pearl and use the FIC/MAN FTRs on the Brits instead.  This weakens your mainland campaign to an uncomfortable degree (you’ll lose a lot of INF taking China this way), but you’ll totally win the naval battles in a convincing fashion.

@TripleA:

So, Japan need to choose in that case to do either one. From a tactical point of view the US fleet is the better choice. But if you let go the UK fleet, you can not buy transports! In combination with the bomber, the UK can wipe out all Japanese purchases in UK2 in SZ60 and 61. If Japan can not buy transports it need to buy IC’s or other suboptimal purchases! Either way the Allies have a certain gain. Or the Allies keep the US carrier with planes, or Japan is forced to delay their push into Asia.

As someone who never does a PH attack J1, I agree with your assessment (although I’d argue that killing the British Fleet + making faster gains on the mainland > killing the USN).  Letting the British Pacific Fleet live past J1 is just asking for trouble.

@TripleA:

The UK bomber is important in this strategy. Without it you’re threat to SZ 60 and 61 is not so big. However it is not essential! You might get the same result without it. It will especially help indeed if you want to switch to an KJF strategy. It can double in threatening FIC, but it can do that too from Caucasus or Moscow.

If the Bomber is in Moscow it can make it to SZ60 via Moscow->Novo->Yakut->Bury->SZ60 with 2 moves left to escape back to Yakut (hopefully the Soviets are holding the line there).  Unfortunately they would take 5 moves to get to SZ61, so I can see your point in wanting to keep it in Novosibirsk instead.  I guess the exact position of the Bomber is something you’d have to vary depending on how G1 went.

@TripleA:

Egyptian Blurb

OOB I have no problems with letting Germany go hog-wild in Africa, because given enough time the Americans will force Germany off the continent.  I typically play under WBC rules which, among other things, limits the game to a 5-6 turn (4.5 hour) time limit and heavily modifies the Victory Cities (Egypt is a Victory City, which matters in this case).  Me retaking Egypt B1 (assuming Germany lost at least 2 INF attacking it, otherwise I just write-off Africa in the same way you do) is just a way to delay the German IPC explosion by a turn and a means of forcing them to commit at least one more TT’s worth of reinforcements to Africa (diverting them from the all-important Russian front).

That probably explains the difference in our approaches.  As I said before this is a pretty convincing strategy, especially if you want to play a heavy KJF game.

Hello!

I’m not an advocate of a J1 Pearl in Revised myself, but let me play Devil’s Advocate for a bit just to get some discussion going.

Sub attack is fine.  I don’t know how I feel about giving Egypt to Germany for free in this scenario (and dooming your Africa IPCs), but if you really want that Solomon Sub dead + to reinforce the USN this is really the only way you can do it.

New Guinea attack is good and usually what I do with the Aus. INF+TT.

Sniping the Kwang TT is also good.

Weird Bomber movement but I guess it can work if you’re planning on transitioning into a 100% KJF.  Personally I’d prefer landing in Moscow so you’re at least in position to go after the Mediterranean Fleet if the opportunity presents itself.

Everything else looks good.

For Japan, I think the J1 Pearl attack is still possible/feasible if they really want to go for it.

The US/UK Fleet at Pearl is:
1 SUB
1 CV
2 FTR (1 US/1 UK)

Japan can bring:
0-1 SUB (depends on if it survived the hypothetical B1 attack)
1 TT (from Japan SZ)
1 BB (from Japan SZ)
1 Bomber (from Japan, can NCM back to Tokyo)
1 FTR (from Japan, will have 1 Move left to NCM onto a Carrier
1 CV (from Caroline Islands SZ)
1 FTR (from Caroline Islands SZ)
1 DD (from Caroline Islands SZ)

Which means the battle will ultimately something like:
J: 8-9 HP, 18-20 Power
US/UK: 4 HP, 13 Power.

So the British FTR lets combat go on for a second round and the Allies probably get 3 hits off, taking out the BB tip, 1 TT and 1 DD (or an air unit, I guess it depends on who you’re playing against).  That gives the US a slightly easier time pulling off a huge counterattack if that’s the way they want to go A1.

Pretty good plan actually.  I’d have to test it to see if the extra damage on the IJN is worth losing Africa over.

@Slip:

WBC Rules

These are the rules my group plays with too.  It gives a much better playing experience than playing normally IMO.

It prevents the typical “stack heavy” style that dominates OOB Revised at the highest levels, although obviously you still need to stack heavily to win.

Unfortunately, 42 (1st Ed) is caught between a rock and a hard place.
The game has Revised’s Map/Setup but with Anniversary’s Rule Set (sans China and Italy).

This succeeds at alienating both the “old school” players, who prefer the rule set of Classic/Revised (Transports that can defend themselves, subs that defend on 2, old AA rules, etc.) and the “new school” players, who prefer the larger and more involved maps like 42SE and G40 (and its many variants).

It also doesn’t help that defenseless transports combined with the small scale of the board make the following tasks absurdly difficult:

• Establishing a US/UK Navy in the Atlantic capable of landings any earlier than round 3/4

• Establishing any sort of German Fleet capable of holding Norway/taking UK

• Establishing any sort of meaningful (i.e. capable of threatening the Pacific Islands) Japanese/American Fleet

Not that this doesn’t leave a balanced game (it sort of does, in my opinion anyway), but it severely limits the diversity in strategies that can be employed by both sides.  This leads to the conclusions that Wibe has made about the “optimal” strategies being relatively stale (compared to other versions of the game, anyway.  Even in the fairly static Revised there’s a few variations in strategy available to both sides).

In my opinion, you might be better off going one of four ways:
1. Keep playing 42 1st Edition.  Don’t let some pessimists on the internet get you down!
2. Try playing with the Revised setup/rules on the 42 1st Edition Board.  The setups for the games are identical (just swap out
3. Try buying 42SE (or make the leap to G40).  All the rules (for the most part) are the same as 42 1st Edition with bigger and more detailed maps/setups.
4. Any combo of 1, 2, 3.  Don’t limit yourself to just one version of A&A!

@thetruegriffin:

I guess it’s the difference between re-discovering WW2 and examining alternate outcomes (Revised) versus just straight up reenacting WW2 (G40)

I think you just hit the nail on the head for both Axis and Allies and the wider debate within the wargaming community.

Personally, I favor game balance and simplicity over historical accuracy, which is why I prefer the smaller maps like 42SE and Revised.  Global is fun, but what’s Axis and Allies without Japanese Tank Stacks, German Aircraft Carriers, and Rio de Oro?

Never Fear.  There’s actually three of us still playing Revised.

Can’t watch the video right now but I plan on checking it out as soon as I can (I’ll leave feedback on Youtube since it’s easier to know when someone’s replied to a comment).