Posts made by habs4life9

But how would you define “the start of the game”? The first round? The first three rounds? Or longer? The rule is okay if it’s for the first three rounds or less, especially since Japan can’t build up heavy stacks in Novo/Kaz until about rd8 or 9, by which time the Eastern Front is a lost cause for Germany since it has to fall back and hold/trade its three high-value territories. I really like the other suggestion you made though, of Russia being able to collect IPCs for liberating territories origninally controlled by the other Allies, because as it stands now, there is no motivation for Russia to walk/blitz into an empty Sinkiang, Persia, India, China if the opportunity is there.

This is a question more for Krieghund than anyone else. Let’s say I am UK and I want to hit Indochina in the first round. I have a cruiser in the India sea zone, but in order to use it for bombardment, I need at least one seaborne land unit to land in the territory. There is also a transport in the India sea zone. So if I wanted, would I be able to load one inf onto the trn and say he’s going across the Bay of Bengal, (thus allowing me to use the cruiser to bombard) while the other two inf are crossing overland? Because it says nowhere in the rulebook that if you CAN go overland, you HAVE to. So what is stopping me from saying my tranny is bringing one guy across the Bay of Bengal?

Also if you truly believe UK will build up navally on UK1, but you do not want to attack the Z2 BB, then why not opt for two more Baltic U-boats on your G1 buy? Then place two ftrs in Norway and two in W.Eu. (assuming 4 German ftrs are alive at the end of your turn). This way, you will pose a threat to every sea zone into which UK can build. The Allies will inevitably control the Atlantic by the 3rd or 4th rond of play, so the best bet for your Kriegsmarine is to score a tactical victory against the UK fleet with a joint Kriegsmarine/Luftwaffe attack (retreat as soon as your U-boats die, hopefully you’ll have decimated the UK fleet). For this it is essential that your ftrs are on the Western front. Remember that if UK has indeed put destroyers in the water, you CAN choose your subs as casualties of UK ftr hits for as many rounds as at least one UK DD is alive.

@Granada:

And Do you do the Bom, fig attack on the UK SZ2 then? Because if you do, the trade is to get both planes killed and still run a approx. 1/3 risk of not sinking the battleship. And as a German player I would prefer to have a allied cruiser in SZ8 to having there a battleship (together with the loaded AC and 2dd the UK may buy R1).

I would definitely use the SZ 8 sub on sinking the SZ2 UK fleet.

I used to do the Z2 attack on G1 against the UK BB and the Russian sub, but I’ve found this is entirely too risky. It is big if it works, but if the dice go bad for you you will pay dearly for it for the rest of the game. It’s similar to the R1 Norway attack, extremely high reward but much too high of a risk. I see the Z10 attack as also (too) high-risk, high-reward. 2/3 times you won’t hit your surprise strke, and then you have a 50/50 chance of losing your sub for absolutely nothing. If the Americans want to take Algeria on US1, I say let them, usually as Germany I move my Algeria units into Libya for a 2nd offensive into Egypt (I always assume UK will counter Egypt) and deadzone Algeria as bait. If I’m playing US, I usually do not go to Algeria on US1, deadzone or not, because only the cruiser would be able to accompany the shuck. This is not good if Germany has Luftwaffe positioned in Western Europe. Instead I build a proper navy and move them all out at the same time to Z12 on US2. Algeria may be an important base of Allied operations throughout the course of the game as they set up to hit West and South, but Egypt is MUCH more important for the Axis, and you can’t divide your forces so much to control both. Germany spreading her (his? Fatherland lol) forces thin is a recipe for disaster.

“1. Partisan Resistance
When the Wehrmacht rolled into the Soviet Union in World War II, it got more than it bargained for. Soviet citizens fought fiercely against German occupiers, engaging in raids, sabotage, and intelligence gathering.
Once per turn you may end a battle after first round of combat and stay in the same territory as the enemy, whether on attack or defense, in any territory with existing Soviet control symbols shown on the game board”

Why does it say “whether on attack or defense” and then say “in any territory WITH EXISTING SOVIET CONTROL SYMBOLS.” Isn’t this rule ONLY for defense then? You cannot attack a territory that you control, and if there are enemy units there, you don’t control it.

Hmmm, true. Back to the drawing board for me then…the more I think about it, the more difficult it seems to be to play Germany effectively.

So based on what I’ve been reading on these boards, the most popular G1 buys seem to be 10 inf 2 arm, 8 inf 4 art, 10 inf 1 ftr, and 7 inf 1 art 3 arm. But how about a buy of 6 inf 3 arm 1 trn? Place 2 inf 2 arm and the trn in SE/Z14 and put the rest in Germany. This way, when UK counters Egypt (assuming KGF) you can counter on G2 with 1 inf 1 art 1 ftr from Libya (having moved up from Alg on G1, the Balkans ftr having landed in Lib) and 2 inf 2 arm from SE, plus a BB bombard. UK cannot conduct the same counterattack as it did on UK1, Germany has 2 tanks to blitz Africa starting on G3, and Egypt is quite secure for the Axis for the next few rounds. Do you think this move is good? The only flaw I can see is that there are initially less land units than there could be to devote to the fight in Europe, but then again, you could always outspend Russia on subsequent turns if you have Africa’s IPCs.

Hobbes, I have tried a bomber purchase on G1 and by G3 I was already feeling the heat from Russia and my territory was shrinking rapidly. I coudn’t help but think that if I’d bought the 4 inf instead it would’ve slowed that down. 4 inf can make all the difference when Russia is going all land.

Are they really Krieghund? I have been playing assuming they are not adjacent. My impression was if two territories/sea zones touch on a corner, they’re not adjacent. Well this certainly makes playing UK much easier if they can build into 5 different sea zones.

WE and EE are trading zones by round 7/8 and Germany still holds SE and the Balkans. I also usually send around 1 inf liberating the eastern front territories as Russia is concentrating on Japan. Too little too late though. Maybe I will try hitting Africa with Japan mid-game if it’s clear Germany won’t get gains on that continent.

Well no I haven’t tried contesting Africa with Japan until the very late rounds, after Germany has been captured, by which time it’s too late. I just try to get as many troops across Asia to Russia and it still doesn’t seem to work on time. It is round 8 or 9 before I can stack Novo/Kaz with a good amount of Japanese units. Germany is limited to its 3 key territories around round 7 as the UK and US pinch them, by which time Russia is focusing solely on holding back Japan.

I don’t quite understand Scorched Earth. Does it mean that Russia can remove the Moscow and Caucasus factories at the end of EVERY turn, while they are mobilizing units? Then doesn’t that effectively mean that Russia can build without complexes? So why wouldn’t you just keep them off the board for the entire game?

It’d be awesome to play a game with all of these national advantages in effect. It’d be difficult to keep track of, though.

Suppose that you play a game in which everybody knows what to do. Everybody buys exactly the units they need, everybody moves to exactly the right territories/sea zones, and the dice more or less come out in synchrony with the odds. In such a scenario, I believe that an Allied victory is inevitable, which means that the only way the Axis can win a game is (1) if the Allies make major positioning/movement errors, (2) if the Allies get shafted by the dice in a few major battles, or (3) a combination of these two. Obviously reading up on strategy will prevent the Allies from making blunders in the positioning of their units, but an equally strategically-savvy Axis player is still bound to lose as long as the Allies are moving to the correct positions and not getting extremely unlucky die rolls. I don’t think it’s right that the Axis must rely on lack of skill of Allied players and/or pure luck with the dice to win a game. Does anyone else feel the same way? This was the major design flaw of the original version, they’re supposed to have balanced it more but whenever I’ve played test games, the Allies win unless they make huge errors like switching to KJF mid-game after a KGF start.

Let’s say you moved the Moscow ftr to China on R1 and you won Indochina with the 3 inf 1 ftr plus crusier bombard attack on UK1. That means you did not counter in Egypt, which means the German are totally free to blitz Africa. This will do the Allies in in the end. In addition, even with the Indochina forces taken out, Japan can still hit China with 5 inf, its bmr, the Japan ftr and the Manch ftr. Japan can still set up its shuck. Only now they will have to choose between giving up Manch to the Russians or surrendering Shanghai to the British. They’d probably save Shanghai and send their shuck over there instead of to Manch, so they can’t hit Buryatia. But Manch is a small price to pay for the sake of Japan advancing through China regardless and working to protect Shanghai, because Germany is strong as hell now. Japan’s navy is sufficient to keep the Americans at bay in the Pacific for a few rounds. I think a skilled Germany can reach Moscow quicker than the Allies can break down the Japanese defenses in E.Asia and/or the Pacific, and at that point it’s game over. I just don’t like KJF because it seems entirely too risky.

I tried a test game of total victory in which the Axis had 11 cities and I just kept building Japanese bombers in LA trying to take down Washington as quickly as possible. It got extremely tedious and I scrapped the test game lol. Standard is better.

Hmm ok, but that change in the UK starting setup impact the game significantly. In AA42 the only units that can reach the BB, trn and Russian sub on G1 are the Norway ftr, the Z8 sub and the bmr. This makes for a much more risky battle. Is it better to leave the BB alone then in AA42? I have been attacking them on G1 regularly, because the odds are in Germany’s favor to win that battle but Germany is screwed if the dice don’t go well. Same wth the Z13 cruiser, I could send 3 ftrs at it in a separate battle and I’ll most likely hit it in the first round but then there’s a 50/50 chance of losing a ftr…is either battle too risky in AA42 and should I just keep the UK navy alive?

I double-checked the rulebook and it turns out it is better explained than I thought. Decisions on whether or not a sub will surprise strike or submerge are made before any dice are rolled for the surprise strike round. The attacking player decides first. So the German player will obviously want to conduct the strike, but will not roll any dice until the Russian player decides what he’ll do with his own sub. If Russia chooses to submerge, the sub will be put back in Z2 and out of the battle. The German player will then roll his surprise strike, which means that if it hits the BB will have to take the hit. So the smart thing is for Russia to opt for the surprise strike when he has to make his decision. And since the decision not to submerge but to fire has already been made, I think Russia’s sub still gets a die to roll even if the U-boat hits and the sub is assigned as the casualty. But I’m not entirely sure about it…

You didn’t put how many units are left in Norway after G1. Are you implying that Norway should be left undefended? Then the UK could float that Canadian tank over and take Norway uncontested straight away. That doesn’t seem like good strategy to me.

There’s no UK battleship in Z13, it is a UK cruiser. The UK battleship is in Z2.