Posts made by Granada

Stratbombing looks really cool on the first sight. Only I have not seen it worked. I actually have based the post on my personal experience. I have played many players who stratbombed me and almost all of them complained bad luck in the process. I recalled the old CaspSub paper and decided to check out whether what they say was still relevant for Spring 1942.

And my conclusion was that “bad luck” is nothing that happens to a stratbombing player but something he should expect, bad luck is what stratbombing brings. If you are happy with 0.5 damage inflicted per a raid, than you better think twice about what are the damages you are not inflicting because of strat bombing.

As for the build of bmbs on WUS, I cannot see a calm Japanese player to be forced into buying anything, maybe a dd just to remove even the faintest hope of succes. 4bmbs would stand just 28 % chance of winning against bb, AC, 2 figs; with a dd it drops to 8 % (assuming the first dd killed the sub, in case the sub has retreated there is even less need for building an extra dd). And some people buy two dds J1 anyway. So the southern fleet would not be even necassary to add to the forces on the japanese sea on turn 2, and they can make it there usually turn 3 leaving any air attack on japanese fleet all but impossible.

@HolKann:

@Granada:

Sorry, I think my logic is correct here, since while the first bmb dies on the 3rd-4th roll of dice, it will take 6 more rolls to get you to the 3rd-4th roll of the second half dozen of rolls. Of course, we work with averages because average is what is likely to happen most often: there is no mean when rolling a dice; and it is exactly between the 3rd and 4th roll when the cummulative likelihood you roll 1 exceeds 50 %.

Mathematics doesn’t agree:
“average” != “what is most likely to happen”. What is most likely to happen is an event with the biggest chance, given a set of events and a probability function over the events. For instance, let’s take the set of chances of a bomber dieing in raid N. For N=1, this is 1/6. For N=2, this is 5/6 (not dieing raid 1) * 1/6 (dieing raid 2). For N=3, it is 5/65/61/6. So the chance of dieing in raid N = 5/6^(N-1)*1/6 = the probability function. Dieing in raid 4 has a chance of 9.6%. As told, dieing in raid 1 has a chance of 16.7%. So according to your own definition (“most likely to happen”), it should be the first turn, which contradicts your conclusion of 3rd/4th turn.
Ofcourse, you can use other sets of events. I’ll indulge you, and define the set you mean, which is cumulative: chance of getting shot down before raid 5, and chance of getting shot down on or after raid 5. Not getting shot down before raid 5=(5/6)^4=48%. Chances of getting shot down before raid 5 = chances of opposite = 1-48% = 52%. The result we can extrapolate is it is more probable to get shot before the 5th raid than after the 4th raid. But also: it is almost equally likely to get killed before the 5th raid as after the 4th raid (52%~=48%). Anyway, this is probably what you mean with “between 3rd and 4th”, only it should be “between 4th and 5th”.
The problem with this definition of the set of events however is that it doesn’t tell you at what raid the bomber will probably die (you need my first definition of the set to do this). It only tells you before or after what raid the bomber will probably die. Which is utterly pointless in the purpose of determining average damage. As is the first definition too…

Fair enough. I have suspected there was a catch in my primitive math and thanks for correcting that. I am sure there must be a way how to count in such a sophisticated way what is the relative damage the bomber causes before dying. I am pretty sure the balance stays negative but definitely less then 3.5, so the burden on the bomber is lower, perhaps much lower, could be around 1 IPC, I guess.

@HolKann:

Anyway, enough chit-chat, strategy talk.

USA 1: buy 3 bmr. Gives 4 bmr total. After that, buy 2/3 of a bmr every round. This way you’ll always have 4 bmrs pounding Germany from round 3 upwards.
Germany has an income of about 40. Let’s assume it needs 10 units each turn. So its best bet is to only repair Germany fully, giving you 20 IPC’s a turn to shoot at. With 4 bmrs, this will seldomly (=in less than 1.5% of cases) be overkill (chances of getting >20 are (5/6)^4 -getting past AA with 4 bmrs- * 2.7% -throwing 21 or more, see http://anydice.com/-  < ~1.5%).

Using this strat, your land troops arrive one turn later, with 1 inf 1 arm (=8 IPC’s = 2/3 of a bmr) less each turn. This is the drawback.
What do you get in return? From turn 4 onwards (3rd turn you’re shooting at Italy, which doesn’t get repaired) Germany is denied 12 IPC’s worth of units, or 4 infantry. You always have 4 bmrs to support an invasion. You need less transports (remember, 1 less inf+arm means less units to shuttle). You start hindering Germany from turn 3, which is faster than you can do with any newly built land army + fleet (the invasion of Africa is done with the starting army + fleet). Lastly, Germany cannot use Italy as a building point (for instance to build fleet or troops for Africa).

The initial investment is high (3 bmr turn 1, 1 bmr turn 2 etc.), but what strategy with USA hasn’t got a high initial investment? After this investment you trade 8 IPC’s for 12 IPC’s each turn. It is a decent trade-off, possible in 1942 because bmrs are cheaper. Can you show me a strategy with US that trades IPC’s faster?

All I am saying it is a “prayer” based method, not a strategy.

It is not a prayer, but a decent strat, the quickest one I know to trade American IPC’s with Germany. I hope my point is more clear now.

I am glad you have come to these specifics, because I say this strategy is doomed to fail unless you are exceptionally lucky, and maybe even in such a case.

1. You cannot assume Germany needs 10 units a round. It may easily build a fig a round and less inf/tnk.

2. It will always use up its capacity on SEU, so it will only repair to 3-5 production capacity on Germany.

3. Thus you would be sending 4 bmbs on 13-15 pray, reducing your 0.9 damage per raid to about 0.7.

4. US is not loosing just tnk/inf, it is not that easy.

Let us look at the proceedings more closely:

R1. US builds 3bmb and 2 inf most likely, collects 40. R2 US builds bmb, AC, 2trn, collects 38. R3 US builds a bmb, 2trn 4inf, collects 38. R4 US builds a bmb, trn, art, 5 inf, collects 38. R5 (first round when it can likely safely not build a bmb and a trn, since it has 8 already) so it builds 4tnk, 4inf and 2 extra inf, collects 38. R6 US builds bmb, moves 8 units EC, 4trn SZ 1, merges fleets SZ6, may try to offload on Norway which has been trading or taken already. But then it comes to get really interesting.

What if Germans seeing the strategy try to make the most of it and after an all inf buy R2, from R3 on they build a fig a round. If they have build a bmb on R1 which many people including myself usually do and they lost 2 figs R1 they will have 2 bmb plus 8 fig on R6. If US leaves something on SZ 2 to protect the transit to UK (and it must be the bb plus a dd to be safe), the Allies can only move SZ 3/6 with 2 AC, 4 fig, dd, cru (if UK bb died R1, build AC, 2 dds R1 and lost none ). This would get killed.

OK, UK can build more ships and figs for cover. But than if the Japan air has been flown in it fixes your fleet on one spot unless the US decides to invest more on ships.

So here is the choice. With your strategy you get your first regular offload with a good punch (4tnk, 4 inf) on Norway R8, and you will have a stack able to present a threat on Germany R11 the earliest. Or you will protect your ships so that they can manouver seperately and thus get to the very best SZ5. But then you will most likely not be coming with 8 units a round, but rather with 6 units a round, thus most likely bringing Germany into a danger even later.  And we are not taliking about US trying to contest Africa or doing anything in Pacific, so after it will lose Hawaii (around R6), it can even be on 37 for a few rounds.

cause for all that chit-chat it is neither the air, nor the ships that win the war. Infantry and tanks do. US needs tanks in Europe and cannot afford them with the bombing strategy.

Now what is going on in the bombed Germany for all that time? It uses approx. 10 IPCs a round to offset the bombing, stacks KAR if feasible to deter any early NOR landings, otherwise trades it together with bel and ukr, stacks WEU with plenty of air, keeps just enough on ger, sends a couple of inf on ee for trades every round. Produces 6 on SEU, 2-5 on Germany and most likely never drops under 40 in income unless it is too late for Allies to exploit.

While Japan is round by round making sure that R and UK income drops steadily while building up (and building up infantry and tanks for that matter) to take Mosc.

Thank you, come again.

@HolKann:

@Granada:

Moreover there is another important factor coming into play omitted in the CS analyzes. The truth is that your first bmb is killed on average on the 3rd to 4th roll of dice for the AA gun and on every sixth roll only from then on.

If we follow your reasoning, every bomber built will fall after 3/4 bombing raids, because there is no inherent dice difference between the starting bomber and the newly built bombers. The former is, ofcourse, a false statement.

Sorry, I think my logic is correct here, since while the first bmb dies on the 3rd-4th roll of dice, it will take 6 more rolls to get you to the 3rd-4th roll of the second half dozen of rolls. Of course, we work with averages because average is what is likely to happen most often: there is no mean when rolling a dice; and it is exactly between the 3rd and 4th roll when the cummulative likelihood you roll 1 exceeds 50 %.

@HolKann:

The only thing I’d like to add that USA executing a bombing campaign against Germany -buy 3 bmrs the first few turns to bomb the greycoats back to the stone age- is a viable strategy: it is a swift way to use American IPC’s to hamper Germany’s war effort. It’s faster than stacking up in UK and invading Europe mid-game. It’s about trying to fully utilize USA’s IPC’s, which often is not trivial to do.

Lets say you buy 3bmbs first 2 rounds with US and then 1 bmb a round to replenish what was lost. it means US is every round 2 units lighter in what it sends to europe and starts to come there 2rounds later; getting there with first 6 units only R6 or 7.

The three bombers build R1, hit Germany R3 for the first time and start to be effective R4, inflicting 17.5 damage a round. So what does Germany seeing this coming do? First of all he would definitely produce all inf for rounds 2 and 3, so that he can switch to tanks and air when the limit on production comes in place.

Second, he would repair always in such a way to have only 1 production on SEU and the rest on Germany. Lets say Germany that has 12 damage on Berlin and 7 on Rome and 42 IPCs decides to repair 2 on Rome and 9 on Berlin. It has 31 IPCs for 8 production, so produces 3tnk, art and 4inf.

Now it really gets interesting. You have 6 US bmbs and 7 possible damages in SEU while 17 on Berlin. Most likely you would send 1-2 bmb SEU, 4-5 Germany. But what we see here is that the bombers cannot inflict the maximum statistical damage since if they are lucky enough to roll all 5-6, they still can only inflict maximum 7 and 17 damage. This in fact reduces the effectivity of strat bombing even further (and CS policy paper deals with that aspect too).

You may still think this is a good thing to do, because you do not know how to make the US dollars felt in Europe in time. CS paper calls that transfer of dollars. They can understand it, I can understand it too, but it still does not make me think this is an effective strategy.

In the aforementioned example sending 4 bombers on Germany means that they do not inflict the average 3,5, but all the cases when they would inflict combined damage exceeding the limit of 17 are cut just to that number (right, all the 18s, 19s, 20s, 21s, 22s, 23s and 24s would come as 17s only).  I am too lazy to count what that does with the average damage, but it will be reduced to something like 0.7 damage per raid and a bmb.

In SEU where the 2 bmbs are capped with the limit of 7 the situation is even worse. In this case the effectivity of the raid drops almost exactly to 3, so you inflict a damage of 0.5 IPC with the raid. And you would not help yourself much by sending only one bmb SEU, and five Germany because then you are grossly overdoing Germany instead.

The best way to stay cost effective perhaps would be sending just one bomber bellow the maximum damage (1 SEU, 2 Germany), but then hey, why did you build all those bombers at the first place.

I am not saying it cannot ever work. All I am saying it is a “prayer” based method, not a strategy.

There is a great old policy paper of the famous Caspian Sub Crew called “The Civilians Bellow” analyzing strat-bombing for the Revised edition. Their conclusion was that strat-bombing was a counter-productive strategy. But how about with the changes of rules in the Spring 1942 (V4 edition)?

Although the math has changed clearly a bit in favour of strat-bombing because of the lower price of the bombers in Spring 1942 (they now cost 12 IPCs as opposed to the 15 IPCs in revised), another change of rules (not hitting the pay-check directly but reducing the production capacity of the industrial complex) favours the object of bombing.

Let us look closely on the math of the SBRs as provided by CS Sub.

You inflict an average damage of 3.5 production capacity (1+2+3+4+5+6/6).

But the AA gun changes the math significantly. It will kill the bomber on average every six rounds. So it has to be included in the costs of the raid. 12 IPCs / 6 raids, makes it for 2IPCs per SBR.

On a top of that since the bomber gets hit periodically it completes only 5 raids, so you get 3.5 damage only 5 of six times, which makes it for 2.9 damage on average. Thus a strat bombing raid inflicts an average 0.9 damage.

Moreover there is another important factor coming into play omitted in the CS analyzes. The truth is that your first bmb is killed on average on the 3rd to 4th roll of dice for the AA gun and on every sixth roll only from then on.

So your starting bmb dies after inflicting an average damage of 8,75 (dies on the 3rd or the 4th roll of dice which makes for the 7+10,5/2 damage). So you actually lose 3.25 IPCs value on that bomber, while only every following bomber will start to bring you back this loss by inflicting the 0.9 damage per raid.

While this still might not look that bad, further analyzes shows it is seldom a smart effort. Because it is not direct damage on IPCs what you inflict as it was in the Revised edition, it is only a burden on the production capacity.

For example if the strategy is used against Germany, as we see most of the times, it is usually not before the third raid Germany needs to spend the first IPC on repairing since it can produce units on SEU. So usually, only when the first bomber is gone, the strategy starts to bring effects. The sheer fact that the first two raids are most likely in vane and that Germany can tune its reparations so that it exactly matches what it is going to produce, makes out of the SBR against Germany a total non-strategy.

You lose 3.5 IPCs value on each of your starting bombers. And you start to bother Germany only after you reduce its combined producing capacity under 11. So that is 7 IPCs to include as a burden on your SBR strategy on the lost bombers and 6 IPCs on the German production, Germany does not use really. That makes it 13. You divide that with 0.9 and you find that strat bombing Germany becomes a cost effective enterprise only after the raid number 15!

Now let us look on the other aspect of the strat bombing. To quote the insuperable Caspian Sub: “So if we know we’re not getting a lot of value for that bomber on an SBR, how does it compare to the other things we could do with that bomber? Great question. I’m glad I asked.“

I am not going to reproduce the elegant analyzes showing that the bmbs inflict much more damage against ground units then they do in sbrs. (Basically as they kill 2 inf out of every 3 attempts they do 2 IPCs damage on any roll of a dice against an infantry, provided no AA gun is present).

Moreover you might also need the bombers in the later stages of the game when they really can prove to be absolutely crucial in 1-2-3 attacks that can decide close games. They are a great deterrent too. Their reach is immense and can hinder movement of trannies or give support to the most surprising attacks on the far away places of the map.

And every bomber you have built to be inflicting this lousy 0.9 damage has cost you also 4 infs you have not build. Now if you do SBRs while you have not killed the med fleet or have not taken Norway you are chasing 0.9 damages and letting Germans freely collect many IPCs in Africa or Norway…

If you do not totally compromise on building inf and navy, you are not going to be able to start performing 2 sbrs a round earlier then R3. It means you are getting the SBR campaign against Germany on the sum of zero only on R10.

It might make more sense to stratbomb UK with Germany when it is on tight budget since it really needs to use up both its production capacity and all income to be effective in Europe. Still it remains the 0.9 damage, and all the opportunities lost: reducing your air power against the allied fleet, reducing your punch in trading with russia.

The conclusion: as a rule, do not strat-bomb.

There are few exceptions to the rule. Bomb if there is no aa gun and no better target. Bomb UK if you are turteling with Germany and have no better use for the bombers. Bomb Japan after successful Contain Japan First. US is above 50, buys bmb a round in range and 3-4 bmbs a round should make it sure Japan has not a remotest dream of recovering while you can rush everything you have with the US against Germans.

I cannot resist quoting the last exception in the list of Caspian Sub: “And lastly there is Sweet Mother Luck (the unStrategy). Some guys like to take their chances. If the AA guns are cold, you can rock a paycheck pretty badly. But this isn’t exactly a ‘strategy’; it is more of a prayer.“

To wrap it up: because the changes to the rules in the Spring 1942 (cheaper bombers, indirect damages) tend to balance themselves, the Caspian Sub conclusion still holds in my opinion: „Although there are a few instances where SBRs are useful, you’re better off saving your bombers for military engagements. Leave the civilians alone“.

I see, thanks for correcting me. I do not have the game here with me, and I could not find the rules on the net so that I could not double check.

@Zhukov44:

Officially, Spring 42 didn’t come with tech.  I think you could use either Revised or AA50 tech systems and it would work well enough.

TripleA’s version should give people the choice of either AA50 and the Revised techs as an option–tech lovers would dig that.

Correct me if I am wrong but I really think there is as much as a dozen of techs in Spring 1942. You buy tech development tokens for 5 IPCs. And a token equals to a roll of dice. You can buy tokens for either land/production or naval/air developments. Then you say which kind of tech you would like trying to develop, you exchange your tokens for dice, you roll and you are either lucky or you have just given your opo bid of 5, 10, 15, 20, 25  :-o.

So you better be sure your tech would inflict more demage before the game is over…  :-D

@LMD:

One follow-up question, however, is how in the world the UK maintains 32 IPCs?  By the time the UK is able to trade EE/WEU territories, it has already lost India, Persia and French Madagascar (-5 IPCs), and usually also New Zealand, Trans-Jordan and other territories in Africa (-2+ IPCs), and has only gained Norway (+3 IPCs).  So, even with EE, UK might get up to 28-29 IPCs, but never gets close to 32 IPCs.  Of course, WHEN Japan takes the Africa in the later rounds, UK’s income is often in the low 20s.  We’ve never been able to take WEU and hold it without substantial losses, so those 6 IPCs never get factored in.  So, it seems like 32 IPCs for UK is unattainable in the mid to later rounds when UK needs them to send units to Europe.  Also, G frequently strat bombs the UK, depleting much needed IPCs.  As a result, I really never have enough to fully utilize UK’s 4 transports.

Well, you usually dont lose india for good till R3 most of the games, the same holds for AE, but then you already land on Africa to compensate. Most of the times I try for New Guinea R1, which gives me 1 more IPC if succesful. And then you have Norway. So you really should have no problem be above 30 R1-4 if not for the rotten dice. You build AC, 2dds R1, 3 trns and some land units R2, You might consider buying actually one more trn R3, because, you can threaten to hit WEU, Germany, EE with 10 units which will make it more difficult for gerrys to hold.

You can also overbuild the inf here so that you will need to buy less on the later rounds when the UK income will start to drop. If you have 6 starting land units with the 2 in Canada, you have build 3 more trns on UK2, you can build trn and 7 inf UK3 which would give you 2 tnk, 2 art, 13inf plus 5 trn at the end of R3 with some ipcs remaining. The combined fleet consists of bb, 2 ACs, cru, 1-2 dds, 3-4 figs, so the gerry really cannot sink that.

YOu would most likely have some units on Nor already, but still you can use the cache of extra infs to go with the new build tanks. US cannot come earlier anyway, and the synchronicity of the 16 units a round drops is what really matters.

Once you hold kar with allies, UK can trade other European teritories and you should not have problems with the income anymore even if you still dont trade WEU.

And if you are really short of income, you can always adjust the buy. Lets say 4inf, 2art, 1tnk are for 25 and still give you reasonable punch.

I find this really weird since I more and more tend to think Allies are the stronger side in the game.

It is good you do Norwegian gambit. But if you do NG, it puzzles me even more how you can have problems with the German air. There is no way Germany threating the Allied fleet and keeping pace with Russia on the land at the same time.

I analyzed this issue in the SZ5 Allied strategy tread you, LMD started. It is almost an impossible task to sink the allied fleet after a succesful Norwegian if the Allies dont screw things up.

You can find the post here: http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=23093.0. The conclusion was that if the Germany player wants to stand an over 50 % chance to sink the combined Allied fleet R4/R5, he would need to invest around 70 IPCs R1-3 on air, in other words he would have less 20+ inf or some 14 tnks. There is no way such a German player can keep pace with Russians on land. Most likely he would have Russians trading Balkans or E. Europe, possibly both. At the same time, there is no need for the Allied player to rush things then. He can just build an extra loaded AC and then any remotest chance of Germany sinking the Allied fleet is even more out of question.

The rest is the question of the effectivity of the Allied transports. You are looking for 2 sets of 4 US transports and one set of 4 UK transports. Once that is established and save from air hits, you send 16 units to Europe. There is nothing Germans can comptete with for too long. If they turtle like mad, you can always send your Allied units to go to punish japs first which would make for much longer game, but Allied win should be guaranteed since the Axis income would drop significantly for an important period of the game.

I have a league game going against a very good oposition when i failed norwegian (which was offset by Germans failing SZ13 R1) and R7/8 I am stacking EE, WEU, Balkans. Germany in spite of a formidable stack on WR has only the slimest hope of getting Mosc this round and Berlin will most likely fall. And I think the Germany player did not spend a single IPC on ships or air.

I think there are three factors to succesful KGF:

1. Make sure Allies are in Europe ASAP. If the Germans try to slow you with air, punish them with Russians. For that you really need to buy some tanks with Russia in the early rounds. Try to have 10 tnks R3.

2. Stay focused. Dont let japan distract you by her manouvers in Pacific or Africa; if you keep pumping 16 units a round to Europe you should be grilling Hitler before the income from Africa or Pac islands for Japan makes any impact.

3. Trade smartly. Dont do strat bombing. You dont have bombers to spare if you build 16 land units a round and they can prove crucial in a possible can-opener manouver in the closing phases of the game. If you trade EE/WEU or whatever other European teritories with Allies, distribute the income in such a way that the UK has optimally 32 ipcs to spend every round, the rest should go to US to build air, or a tranny to drop to Africa from time to time or even a sub in pacific. Send always just enough: typically dont do trades with fig and inf against the lonely unit, you have 1/3 not getting the territory. If you dont need the teritory then it is better not to trade then to send just one land unit. Always have some artillery ready with Russia and if you are over 30 IPCs R3 buy the second fig. Never risk your air if not necessary, remember that figs defend better than they do attack and Allied air can buy Russia a round or two when the things start to turn ugly for her.

There are techs in spring 1942, but most people don’t use them. Bishops with swords, anybody…?  :-D

There is a catch in the poll. Some units are really usefull, provided they are not destroyed before they can do anything, like G fig on Norway or US fig on China or UK SZ2 fleet…

Genius.

@Hobbes:

@Advosan:

I just tried the Gambit in dice and I think I like it, since I m a rather defence-oriented russian player.
There is also IMHO a positive side-effect in it: With the UK BB in the Atlantic, the US can spare a few IPCs and slowly buy itself a small Pacific fleet just to prevent J from cheaply snatching AUS and NZL by R4 or 5.

There 's also a spin-off, “The Norwegian Gambit: Stalin goes to Vegas”. A 3-front attack in NOR (1 ftr), WR and UKR. If it works, the psychological damage to the Axis player will surely make it up for the russian ftr.

G can retake all 3 territories and destroy most of the Russian army in the process. And losing WR on G1 is bad for Russia.

:-D This is surely not a spin-off of the NG. If it was a move with japanese I would call it a seppuka move. Don’t believe in any psychological demage in AAA. The difference to real war is that the player can plainly sea all of the battlefield all of the time. So against a cold-blooded experienced player any attempts to do a “I-Will-Kill-You-Like-Hell-Before-You-Say-A-Word” move are likely to end up in a “I-Will-Kill-You-Like-Hell-Before-You-Say-A-Word” on the wrong side of the table. Never do a triple attack in V4.

@MrMalachiCrunch:

I must be missing something with the TripleA software, it does not seem intuitive.  I can load the saved game but then what?  I’m guessing I press the ‘Play’ button?  When I do, I get a window that pops up:

‘An error has occured’

java.lang.IllegalStateException: Could not find file for map:World War II v4
at games.strategy.triplea.ResourceLoader.getPaths(ResourceLoader.java:67)
at games.strategy.triplea.ResourceLoader.getMapresourceLoader(ResourceLoader.java:33)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.UIContext.internalSetMapDir(UIContext.java:189)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.UIContext.setDefaltMapDir(UIContext.java:162)

etc etc etc

MrMalachi, I think you do not have the V4 map installed. You have to download and install it first. It is the very last button on the TripleA opening screen “Download Maps”

This is the complete game Hobbes vs. me including the last rounds.

HobbesMay0611.tsvg

@Hobbes:

@El:

Hobbes, I agree with everything you said. However, if 1) the 2nd fighter is so important, 2) you usually buy extra armor with Russia, and 3) Norway Gambit saves extra armor for Russia; then it’s just as easy to replace the 2nd fighter as to replace the 2 armor, right?

Yes, yes and yes.

But with the Gambit now G also has an extra art+arm on Ukraine, most likely can stack Ukraine and force Russia to keep its armor stack on Caucasus on turn 2 and abandon West Russia. What do you prefer?

I think it really is a bit more complicated then that. You certainly do not need to abandon WR to keep Cauc R2. In our game Germany R2 could not take WR by any means. It could take cauc of course but did not do it because it could possibly create a situation when all Germany units both ukr and cauc could have been anihilated. Moreover if I did a bit more offensive buy R2 with Russia Germany could really have been compelled to leaving UKR R3 as you suggested earlier. And with UK/US having 19 units on kar at the end of R4 there was really no question of russias need of trading three teritories with G anymore. The thing was I did not protect my US fleet aginst the japy air properly but now I see it was possible to leave it SZ 7 US3 and the pressure would be ongoing from then on.

When it comes to trades and the second R fig, I am not convinced that in the classic set up of G/R trades (G sits on EE, R sits on WR and trade KAR, BEL and UKR) Bel is mandatory trade for R. If G is on real defensive you can trade a terriotry sending 3 inf on 1 but definitely not mandatory to trade all three territories if you only have 1 fig and 1 art ready. But this really occures very rarely. And I also do not think Russia should trade inf for inf on the 2IPC territories with japan. IMHO 2 IPC territories are not a good trade for Russia even if it had 3 figs. Since you are lighter on air in any case, you have a higher likelihood of losing more inf then Jap on those trades and it really is not worthy of the 2 IPC shift unless there are more stretegic concerns involved in such a trade.

@Sweet:

They can strike anywhere and everywhere on the front, never in harms way, and when Moscow burns, they help defend it till the bitter end. :cry:

You see, playing Norwegian gambit I do not have that much experience with Moscow burning to the bitter end; no offence intended. I really hate to see Moscow burning and do not want to expand my experience in this way if not necessary. I have found out that the best way to avoid that is make Berlin burn a little bit sooner. This is what the UK bb helps me to do much better then the R fig because without the bb UK movements are restricted and Allied D-day is slower at least for one round but rather two (talking about KGF; but in KJF the UK fleet’s capability operate independently is of just the same importance) and also hitting much more fomidable Germany.

If I should elaborate more on the style of play without the russian air I have adopted a style of defensive play which really can avoid the second fig without much trouble most of the time. In my last game with a player who is imho one of the best around I have won although I did not have any russian fig at all for last 3-4 rounds and Russia still was not coming into serious trouble buying 7 units a round. The reason is simple I do not trade R inf for J inf cause it is not favourable anyway. I rather focus on moving the tnk stack around in such a way that i can take and hold the territory for a round without russia coming into trouble.

I would buy some arts for trades and occationally use a tnk especially if I bought another one that round and the situation is favourable (like trading cauc or ukr, killing two enemy tnks in the trade etc).

If you have the allied stack on EE you do not have to bother with trading with the germans. You just keep the teritories west of Mosc. And if you need the air cover at last in mosc it is always easy to drop an allied fig. The Russian tnk stack is more important defensive unit for me then figs.

If I thought R figs are so important I would buy one or even two, because in a typical NG game Russia has 10 tnks R3, so you can always decide to have just 8 tnk and buy the second fig instead. That is in fact a possible set up after R3 in the standard UKR/WR R R1: 2 fig and 8 tnk and  some inf (if you have bought 3 tnk R1 and 4tnk R2 what not many people do in fact, but I do when playing NG). So there is really no such a big deal in losing the R fig round one. I do not buy it back just because I simply believe 2 tnks are stronger than a fig for russia. Figs are fancy but tanks win the war. I tell you: Tanks are strong. :mrgreen:

@El:

The chess analogy is interesting but might not be entirely correct. To say it’s like …d5 or …Nf6 is saying that the options are roughly equal in value and that it’s a matter of taste and experience which one you like better. However, since the Norwegian Gambit is a more risky opening and probably less well known, I would be more inclined to compare it to a move like 1… f5 (as a response to 1.d4): statistically the opening has a lower winning percentage, but in the right hands and against unprepared opponents it can be a real weapon. This is not to say the Norwegian Gambit (or 1… f5 for that matter) is strictly worse than a conventional opening; it just has different properties.

Thanks for developing the amusing chess analogy. You are correct in fact. I do play 1… f5 but only against 1. c4. And your are also correct that from me to say 1… Nf6 did not say that much actually to an informed chess player because only the further moves start to be telling. So for me to play 1… Nf6 after 1. d4 makes sense because I love the opening 2. c4-c5, 3. d5-b5, which makes it for the Volga (Benko) gambit that would perhaps constitute the best chess analogy to the Norwegian gambit. If your opponent knows it well and plays best moves you might get into serious troubles, while if he does not know it well it is one the better openings for the black pieces.

However the analogy in any case cannot be precise since no dice is fortunately involved in chess. Just imagine rolling 3 dice against 1 when trying to take a pawn with a bishop. Everybody could play kasparov then.

So here it really is a question of whether you value UK bb and a stronger UK pressure on Europe from the early rounds higher then the one russian fig a and a more solid position of cauc and UKR but without the UK bb and 2 of your starting russian tnks.

@Hobbes:

@ragnarok628:

my real question for you, hobbes, is this: how significant do you feel was the norwegian gambit’s success at saving the UK BB?  was it worth the opponents sacrifice/opportunity cost in this case?

I consider that the 2 Russian fighters are amongst the most valuable starting units. The UK BB is not as important as they and the UK can build more ships easily than the Russians can spare money to build fighters.

Looking at the cost both attacks are close considering the total gains/losses for both sides, which of course is highly dependent on dice. But either attack is a slow bump for G. The major difference is that Norway helps the UK at the sea, and Ukraine helps Russia on land.

Exactly. This is were our opinions differ. I do prize the UK bb higher then the second R fig. While I think R can buy a fig if it considers it really important (i don’t most of the times), UK will never be able to buy the bb. But I do no think this dilemma is ever going to be resolved. I think it is like in chess the debate whether you answer 1.d4 with 1.d5 or 1. Nf6. It will never be decided. It is a matter of taste and different players styles perhaps.

@Bunnies:

The way I figured it, Granada would eventually make some kind of mistake somewhere, and Hobbes would drive a truck through the opening.  I don’t know why Granada sometimes does silly stuff, but he does.

Agreed. I think it is just a lack of experince. Give me a couple of years on Triple A and I hope to become a relentless machine too.

@Bunnies:

Hobbes, though, is like a relentless machine.  He might make a small error now and then, but I never see anything that I consider to be glaring errors like I do in other players’ games.

I do agree with that.

@Bunnies:

Both Russia and UK had a glaring lack of offensive power around round 12.  I haven’t viewed the game history to see exactly why that was, but it was quite noticeable, particularly given UK"s final few turns.

The reason was I did some silly stuff earlier in the game.:-D Specifically I believe I let Hobbes to sink my US ships SZ6 R4. Since that moment I believe it really was an uphill battle. And definitely Hobbes is much defter in manouvering his stacks around Europe. So while I think I would still have a solid chance after my mistake R4 with a player of similar abilities like mine (like you Bunny for instance :lol:) I really did not feel I can turn the tide with Hobbes after R4.

@Bunnies:

I mentioned a G1 Ukraine stack a while ago as one of the possible responses to the R1 2 fighter attack on Norway as described by Granada. The typical Russian game revolves around control of West Russia, trading Karelia, Belorussia, and Ukraine.  It’s my opinion that a German Ukraine stack slashes Russia’s power.  Russia is permanently denied the 3 IPCs from Ukraine, and with its stack locked to Caucasus, it cannot maintain control of West Russia.  Meanwhile German reinforcements at Eastern Europe can trade Karelia, and without Russians at either Karelia or West Russia to hit Belorussia, Germany locks in that income too.  So theoretically that puts the Germans up at 5 IPC per turn, and Russia down 5 IPCs per turn.

This seems pretty trivial.  Oo, Germany can afford one more fighter after two turns!  But it is NOT a trivial difference.  A single unit can mean the difference between a 60% battle (reasonable but risky) and a 80% battle (a pretty good shot).  Once you consider that the Germans have perhaps 2 more units a turn, and the Russians 2 less a turn, it becomes VERY nasty very quickly.  The Ukraine stack alone is MUCH nastier than the German Karelia stack. The German Karelia stack only swings 2, not 5.

That’s one of the big pluses to Russia hitting Ukraine on R1.  If Russia takes Ukraine, Germany can’t land fighters on it.  If Germany can’t land fighters on Ukraine to help defend it, Russia can probably retake Ukraine, and so on and so forth.

I believe there is no way in succesful Norwegian gambit Germany can hold UKR and WEU at the same time after R3. And Germany is shorter of the income from Nor which compensates for the Ukr income.  Moreover its forces are tied by the quicker growth of the UK threat. So you really cannot see the control of Ukr as an advantage compared to standard Russian opening but rather as G best chance of holding on for just a bit longer before G is forced to retreating and confined to turtling.

@ragnarok628:

i don’t get granadas joke.

Well, what the joke says is more or less the same what MrMalachiCrunch said. You cannot say what fleet would you build unless you know the purpose of the fleet. For instance in a typical large fleet you have some trannies too, beacuse the real purpose of controling seas is to conquer lands.

Nevertheless back to my buy: my 16 subs would literally massacre any of your fleets on attack. Why do I know i would be on an attack though? Because you would not be able to hit my subs unless you come to the striking distance. Why would you come? Well why would anybody build a fancy 100 IPC fleet to let it sit as a lame duck? But if you come to the striking distance of my subs, any of your aforementioned fleets would be annihilated before saying a little prayer.

The Spring 1942 rules make subs not only marvellous attacking unit but also the most cost effective buy for what I would call the dynamic defence. They cannot be hit by air and keep the 2SZ radius deadzoned for the best money.