@General:

With the USA  I like to build a massive bomber fleet and send to Russia as well and some to uk to bomb the Germans back to the Stone Age bomber fleet strategy is a blackelk strategy credit to him

Yeah, I think reading Blackelk’s posts on bombers is what got me started thinking about the use of Bombers for the US, so definitely a tip of the hat to them.

Why do you send some bombers to Russia and some to the UK? They would both be conducting SBRs on Germany, right? Or do you use the ones in Russia to threaten Japanese naval units/SBRs?

Thanks for the detailed reply! I have a few follow-up questions:

@MarineIguana:

3. what can I profitably do with my destroyer and transport off of Eastern Canada?
Generally take out the german subs off UK with dest and move trans off US east coast. This is to prevent Germany from deadzoning the SZ off morocco. Those 1-2 subs make the fighter, bomber, and battleship much more threatening to the US atlantic naval fleet. Assuming germany subs attacked EUS, those can be mopped up by the US fleet bought in R1.

If Germany didn’t use their subs in the attack on the UK ships on G1, would you then attack the US subs? Also, I’m a bit confused about the “US mopping up the subs off the US east coast” - the units they place there on US1 wouldn’t have a chance to fight them after being placed, correct? And then on G2 the subs would be allowed to sail back across the Atlantic (into range of the Luftwaffe and therefore being safe from US attacks) - or am I mistaken about this?

@MarineIguana:

4. Would UK/US focusing on Strategic Bombing be enough help to keep Russia in the game vs. Germany?
Yes, but land and trans apply more pressure to Germany at similar cost. I speak from experience rather than an easy way to quantify it. UK and US can start trading france, nortwest eur, italy, southern europe, baltic. Russia can trade belo, ukr, and sometimes karelia. This forces germany to expend 2 land units to counter and quickly exhausts Germany. Overall though, you’re right that SBR is more profitable in this version, and it’s not clearly inferior to trans and land.

What do you think about building bmrs on UK1 and US1 in order to conduct SBRs until such time as the UK fleet makes it to England, so that you time your purchasing of transports and ground troops to synch up with the fleet arriving (and buy fighters/bombers prior to then)? In other words, UK starts with a focus on air power and switches to land/navy only when the Australia/India fleets arrive?

@MarineIguana:

5. Would it be sound for the US to just ignore the Atlantic altogether?
I think it’s viable to ignore Germany. If so, you need a strong Russia. It’s absolutely key to deadzone Karelia if you try this. Without a bid, only attack Wrus round 1 and buy exclusively inf and art. Doing this, russia can hold off germany alone for about 5 rounds before ceding the important Wrus or cauc territory (Russia produces 7 land units vs 10-13 germany).

This sounds interesting - would this approach involve a strafe attack on Urkaine, or is it more like all forces from Russia/Caucasus/Karelia go to W. Russia and Caucasus is held by reinforcing troops? Basically I’m not clear on what should be happening with the troops in Caucasus for this move (how many should be comitted to the W. Russia attack vs. left in place)

@OutlawUnForgiven:

[…]

• All of this cemented my thinking around 3 Key Points:

(1) Any KGF strategy must involve Allied landings in multiple locations. In prior games when I consolidated USA and UK navies, he simply put 20+ infantry stacks on either Western Europe or Northwestern Europe, supported with 7 fighters or so, with tanks in reserve, and dared me to land on one of the two obvious choices, knowing he’d throw me back into the ocean immediately. So, to do it right, requires separate Navies, both able to fully defend themselves, and further, there is no hope of affording a reasonable UK Navy that can do so anytime within the first 4-5 rounds. To save up for such a Navy requires essentially a wholesale abandonment of India and virtually zero spending on anything for multiple rounds, which is not viable.

(2) Bombing Germany with 5+ bombers total a round, provided the dice hold up, takes a big toll. The economic value becomes obvious - 6 bombers against a die roll of 1 mean you’ll statistically lose 1 bomber per round. But the remaining 5 should hit for an average of 3 IPC each, which is 15 IPC damage. At a loss of 12 IPC to the Allies (the cost of the bomber). That’s +3 IPC impact to Allies, -3 to the Axis. Hmmm……

(3) Failure to apply any meaningful economic pressure to Germany prior to Round 4 or 5 will result almost certainly in Russia being overrun. There are only three ways to apply economic pressure - take German territory in big chunks (impossible for first 4+ rounds), win decisive battles that cost Germany more than the allies (impossible against a player like him that will never engage a battle that he does not have a large advantage in, and who cannot be attacked on your terms for quite some time), or deprive her of IPC’s through heavy bombing.

I think points 2 and 3 are very interesting as a possible route to victory for the allies. I think that applying the US’ economic power as quickly and efficiently as possible is essential, so US bombers conducting SBRs on Germany seems like a good way to essentially turn US income into a tax on German income - a net win for the wealthy allied powers.

If on my turn as US I could spend IPCs to just directly destroy an equal amount of IPCs for Germany, I think I would do so. On average die rolls, this is basically what sending bombers does (in fact, excepting for 1 turn travel time, bombers are better than 1-to-1 efficiency). I’m going to pursue a bomber-based purchase plan for the US for my first allied game for sure.

I find the concentrated bomber strategy very interesting as an approach for the US, for the reasons outlined here - the cost of getting US infantry into the action is incredibly high, so much so that Air power compares much better vs. land forces  for the US than for other nations.

How many bombers is too many? I was picturing maybe 2 US bombers on US1, but for the purposes of strategic bombing, the early IPCs denied will be magnified throughout the game, so perhaps a US1 buy of 3 bombers makes sense?

Unless Japan was posturing in range of a US attack, I imagine I would build the bombers in western US and then send them directly to the UK for use in SBRs vs. Germany (or sinking/deterring a German fleet). Would you agree?

I’m a relative novice in A&A, having only played two or three games of older editions up until now (and not doing particularly well, either   :-) )

I’m looking forward to trying out 1942 Second Edition, and I’ve been reading up a bit to try to improve my opening. I think I understand how to play R1 (strafe Ukraine, all-in West Russia and abandon Karelia) and G1 (sink everything, planes go west to deter allied navy, ground forces go East for Russians) are fairly well-established. Where I am stumped is what to do for UK1 and US1 - or for those two powers in general.

The main difficulty as I see it is getting land forces onto mainland Europe or Russia as the UK and US. Previously strong Shuck-shuck routes no longer exist, and with transports no longer boosting defense, building a landing force is a very big investment. Landing infantry in Africa, Western Europe, or even Finland requires a very large investment to avoid the transport fleet being sunk by German air power.

Here are some questions I have for those of you with more experience with this edition:

1. Is pulling the Indian fleet back into the Mediterranean a viable course to take? This seems a lot more appealing to me than a suicidal smash into the Japanese forces, as it preserves a lot of UK material that will be worth its weight in gold if it can defend Africa by removing or blocking Germany’s med. fleet.

2. What should be done with the Australian fleet? Attempting a landing anywhere in range doesn’t seem like a particularly profitable move to me. I’d rather sail them around South America and join a larger UK fleet in a couple of turns. (In fact, would pulling the Indian fleet under Africa to meet up with the Australian fleet be worth trying?)

3. Assuming the two German subs in the mid Atlantic both go to sink the western US fleet on G1 (leaving my DD and transport outside Canada alive), what can I profitably do with my destroyer and transport off of Eastern Canada? Should I attack the subs? Move into that space but ignore the subs? Land the tank somewhere and sacrifice the fleet?

4. Would UK/US focusing on Strategic Bombing be enough help to keep Russia in the game vs. Germany? The 12 IPC bombers in this version seem like a great deal to me as a player of older editions. How would a UK1 Bomber/fighter/3 inf opening followed by a US Bomber (or 2 bombers!) + something else opening work? My thinking here is to base all of the bombers in the UK and SBR Germany relentlessly starting on T1, possibly purchasing another pair of bombers on Uk2/US2 if possible. This gets “help” to Russia faster (and cheaper) than landing ground troops, but I don’t have enough experience to know if this is viable in the long run. I just know that compared to landing ground forces, this is a lot cheaper and faster.

5. Would it be sound for the US to just ignore the Atlantic altogether? Even disregarding the Honolulu VC, it just seems like leaving your (strong) fleet in the pacific together and pressuring Japan to help keep India alive (and thereby indirectly protect Russia) while using 2-3 US1/US2-built Bombers to attack Germany early (as opposed to bringing over any kind of navy/ground forces to the Atlantic) might end up being a more efficient use of resources.

Any thoughts on any of these points would be much appreciated - or just general insights on how to play UK and US in general.

Edit: Said “Egypt” when I meant “Africa” - embarrassing.