Posts made by ItIsILeClerc

The allies can (and usually will) still win the game if being 30-40 IPCs behind, IF they can correct this pretty soon. Let’s say in ~5 turns max., they must at least get a total equalization of both economies.

Having said that, if there is no visible possibility to (at least) equalize, the allies will have lost the game even if their shortfall is only small. I have no exact figures here but I bet the allies will have lost the game even if their shortfall is 5 IPCs per turn only, if they have no possibility to repair this.

Sometimes every IPC (per turn) counts…

I agree with Cow and Variance both. Some additional overall strategic notes:

1. If USA goes (K)JF (either only the first few turns or even >6 turns), killing London will (should) start an intense fight with Moscow, that Germany is not certain to win/Moscow can hold out very, very long and may give Italy a chance in Africa/ME in the long run because reinforcements from the UK dry out. Meanwhile the USA has an almost unlimited free focus on Japan. In total, not healthy for the Axis combined economies.
     Going after Moscow instead (leaving London alive) forces the USA to not focus a nearly unlimited amount of time on Japan and divide its income sooner rather than later because Germany can grab Moscow easily and way before Japan is in real trouble, threatening a subsequent fall of London or Cairo (or both, even)…

2. If USA does display a certain ‘focus’ on Germany (only first 2 turns because KGF is absolutely impossible in the 2nd edition and especially with a J1DOW), Germany has all the more reasons to go after Moscow first.

It seems to me that it is much more trouble for the axis (as a whole) to achieve victory if Germany takes London first, even though it looks like much less trouble for Germany to take London in the first place. With the exception of Germany spotting the allies making certain mistakes:
->Giving london away too cheaply;
->Throwing away US resources (spending on units/theatres that will not get the allies started anywhere).

If this happens, taking London first will just result in a stunning success! I have seen this once because the USA focused on Germany indefinately but did not get anywhere because they built a wrong unitmix. Germany was able to take London, hold off both the USA and Russia, giving Japan an unlimited and absolutely free reign in the Pacific… But I think even with the right allied unitmix the axis would’ve won because allowing Japan free reighn in the Pacific for an unlimited amount of time will just win the game for the axis: Japan can win the Pacific way before Germany is in real trouble.

Ai, and here I was thinking Angry Bird was just another name for Dark Skies.
Apparently memory failed me there ;-)

@General:

Someone needs to crunch the numbers to see what kind of offensive force Germany can get to the Caucasus by the 4th or 5th turn.

I did this once and if it is of any help, this is roughly the force I mustered to march into Calcutta(through Afghanistan to speed up the game 1 turn):

30INF + 15ART + 25ARM + 30 MECH + 5FTR + 5TAC + 2STR.

Like Cyanight stated, with a very bomber-heavy German build this could be like 15/15 and probably 20-30STR, 5FTR and 5TAC.

Note that these are rough numbers (out of scratch). Basically, it is the entire ‘eastern front’ army that marches on, bypassing Moscow. Obviously this means Russia will break out but that does not matter much if they (or any other ally for that matter) cannot throw a spanner in the works anymore.

Considering an allied non-KJF approach:

If Japan can keep India isolated + grab Sydney/Hawaii, the Germans can(and should) take India without much Japanese help. Taking Australia/Hawaii is such a heavy drain on Japanese resources (even if they make >>80IPCs/turn), that the Japanese will be weaker against India/Russia (and perhaps China too). Unless the USA goes full KGF (which is a mistake, but that’s another thread).

But that is the idea anyway, the reason why Germany takes India (as far as I know). Japan cannot take India, keep it, and at the same time take Hawaii/Sydney on time.

Russia must be watched closely though, as they will regain strength with this approach. If the axis timing is right, all Russia can do in Europe is to knock on the doors to Berlin, but those doors will remain shut. The danger lies in Russia liberating China and also exorcise Japan from one or more VCs on Mainland Asia…

Hello Timelord, welcome to the forum!

Against a seasoned/strong axis player, Russia cannot survive on its own. Period.
They need massive aid from their so called ‘allies’ and they can give it in more than one way.

The most obvious way is to channel some allied FTR into Russia (anywhere is possible, but most notably Moscow). By the time Germany can attack Moscow, the allies can have >10FTR there (so, on top of the 2 Russian ones).

The other way the allies can help Russia is to (threaten to) open that 2nd front asap (US/UK5 at the latest), while also threatening to 1-2 Berlin (USA grabs Norway + Denmark, then the UK and/or France lands in Berlin). This may require some to a lot of practice but it is very dangerous for Germany so they cannot be ill-prepared here or the axis loose the game instantly.

The allies must carefully balance their resources in 3 areas:
1 Western Europe
2 The center (Russia/Moscow)
3 Against Japan in the Pacific
Many allied players have a lot of difficulties with exactly this balancegame, which is the culprit for lots of lost allied games. If they allocate a little too much resources to one of the above areas, a seasoned axis player will more often than not exploit the resulting weak spot in (one of) the two other areas and create an axis victory.

As a very simplistic rule of thumb, you can say that the more Germany focuses on Russia, the more FTR the allies need to send to Moscow, but not so much that their Western front will suffer.

@regularkid:

Have you done any more play testing of the USA econ bid?

Don’t know about the others (looking only at Nerquen’s sheet it doesn’t look like it), but I haven’t.

My FtF games aren’t for much playtesting (other than strategies with the ‘official’ rules) and in TripleA, people just want to have more playtime than I can afford. To better think over their moves, for example, or to spend more quality time with their families during the weekends (very understandable). Since I have to spend much more time on my job since recently, my availability to TripleA has become even more questionable… I don’t want A&A to become my first priority after my job and my daily need for sleep ;-). Alas. But who knows if/when that changes again!

Just to be clear:

No worries, Elk :-). But you are right: this would be a better discussion without the prejudices. I see lots of good reasons why people like LL or Dice, but we should realize this sort of discussions often lead to people interpreting things being said that are not really meant that way. I definately don’t think a dicegame is for simpletons. Drunks may be another matter ;-).

About the apologetic attitude; I guess it comes from an empathic ability. It’s not like my opponent’s dog just died, but still. I’m talking about games that take at least 10 hours to play and some of us don’t like to play for 10 hours, knowing for certain that victory is beyond any possibility. Sure, the dice may resurrect you, but that is something I personally have never seen. May be a personal experience, but -I- rarely see (though it’s not completely absent) that critical luck averages out in a game. A&A is too delicately balanced for our group to allow for that.

Granted, in a dicegame you may make a come-back from your grave, where LL most likely will not give you that (assuming equally good skills on both sides).

Which hits the nail on its head, I s’pose.
Some people just don’t like it when their opponent makes an idiotic move and gets away with it… only because the dice helped.

And speaking of bad sportmanship, overly cheering about lucky (smelly) dice, or worse, being cheerful about someone else’s bad dice is also not very fun to play with. If I roll very lucky, I always apologize. Especially when I feel I just won the game unexpectedly because of this particular dieroll…

Having said that, I like to play an A&A dicegame particularly with beers and lots of banter, but I must admit that I do not take these games very seriously. After all, who can drunk good make decisions when playing and being strategical  ;-)?
Beyond that (when sober), I just like LL better. I don’t like to depend on luck during the next 10 hours of playing, if the dice screw up my opening round.

Interesting thoughts, CWO. I’ve played a couple of times with a mix between normal rolling and LL, which was also quite good.
Before each battle (but not each round) both players decide whether they fight with normal dice rolling, or LL. So if your Major IC is being raided by 5STR, you can decide to roll 5@1 or 1@5 with your AAA.

I can understand why people want to play with dice, but playing with LL is ofc the best way if you want to play the opponent (or a certain tough strategy), and playing no LL = playing the dice.
Just consider the opening battles, playing with dice. I have seen it way too often that Germany looses the battle of Paris (or gets a Pyrrhic victory there) and/or the same with SZ110. Just for the nitpickers: NO, Germany has not been a fool sending in too few units to these battles. If this happens to Germany, they have lost the game already unless a similar catastrophe happens to the allies, which is completely out of the player’s hands. Assuming two players of a reasonable level. Iow: the dice dictates the winner of such games and not the players. And there are many more examples.

I remember a funny topic on this forum but I can’t find it right now. I believe it was called something like ‘tales of the worst dice ever’. If you read that topic, you will understand how a complete idiot can defeat the A&A god (whoever that is) if the dice decided so.

The bottom line: yes, it is ‘all in the game’ (well, in A&A anyway), but dicerolling only means that you are playing your opponent if dice roll within the normal range. The extremer the deviations, the lesser your opponent matters. And, knowing statistics, very extreme results do not necessarily mean that they happen only very rarely. I know people that roll very, very bad. Always. It is just no fun being them and play a game (any game) with dice…

What you may be missing, BulwFi, is that the German plan is to build land units by the dozens later on (when they need them more urgently) among others at the ICs they take from Russia. Germany has enough starting land units to push Russia back into Moscow, and it is not that they are producing 0 land units prior to taking the Russian ICs.

At the same time, the bombers make it harder for the allies to focus on Japan, because they will need a bigger-than-usual presence in the Atlantic to achieve anything there.
On the upside (for the allies), I think that if the allies do this, the bomber strategy means that Germany shoots in its own foot.

And still, this may be a very hard strategy for the allies to counter, because the USA can very easily overdo it in the Atlantic so that Japan can win in the Pacific…

I usually prefer India to fall above Egypt and/or the Middle East; very similar and linked to preferring Japan getting to a huge income above Germany + Italy doing so. As far as I know, the allies usually face these dilemma’s. The allies need to have placed a high bid in the med/Africa to neutralize the axis there without weaking India. Or they need to get very lucky. At least against a ruthless axis opponent ;-).

What the allies gain here they easily loose there or the other way around…

About the mICs, I prefer just the one in Egypt and/or the one in SA, but it really depends on what the plans are. If another mIC is built in Persia, there are usually 2 ICs producing (Persia and Egypt most likely) with the 3rd one falling silent. Also a Persian mIC is in danger of being captured by the axis and the SA-Egypt combo is just as good as the Egypt-Persian one, with the exception that you need to think ahead one more turn.

My two cents.

Well said, Argothair. I like it.

I voted ‘other’. Reasons:

1. Personally I like LL when I/we feel that the effects of a strategy matters more than the ‘who wins the game’. LL can indeed  be more rewarding in that you are sure you won, unaided by the dice. I can win more games with LL because usually I am the unlucky guy that gets screwed over by the dice ;-) (most likely during the opening round already). Or I was, 'cause itis a long time ago since I played normal dice. But most of all I like LL games better when I want to playtest the effects of a certain plan against a known ‘hard nut to crack’ strategy of the opposing side.

2. I do understand the desire for a lot of players to play dice, so that is definately not a ‘no go’ zone for me. Especially in team versus team games, and games that need to be determined (one way or the other) in one day of playing.

Is this (Global 40) the first iteration of the A&A series where time works in favor of the Axis over the Allies?  If so, that is strange both from a gaming standpoint and a historical one….

Very strange, yes.
It is my personal experience that an axis rush is much easier to defeat with the allies. I was even beginning to think the allies were unbeatable because all I ever saw was axis rush strategies (which I found rather easy to defeat). So yes, imo the axis will be much stronger if they take their time with taking VCs, provided they do work on progressing their combined economy.

I’m not an American but I believe people then say “happy 4th of july!”.
A little belated but hey, I live thousands of miles away ;-)

@Gamerman01:

(…)
Zhukov and JDOW have already said so I will merely echo - it is dang tough to win with the Allies.

It makes me so sad, but Amen to that. I’ll sadly join the echo.

The axis are so much harder to defeat if they stop seeing time as their enemy and instead use it to first (try to) get their total economy overpowering the allied one.

Hmhmmm, if going for Moscow first and as fast as possible, land units are much better.
If Germany wants to reduce Moscow to an economic non-factor, but is not interested in taking it as fast as possible but rather expand their economy first, the bomberstrategy offers great flexibility!
With it, Germany can take the Middle East, threaten all of London, Cairo, Moscow, Calcutta, the allied fleet in the Atlantic and any landing sites mostly at the same time during the mid- to late game. Very clever positioning of the bombers may even result in threatening all these targets all at once. Something I don’t think Germany can do if going for Moscow first (more land units) asap.

But, I think you have a point in that it doesn’t really matter in what order Germany builds its units anyway, if largely ignored (first bombers or first land units). The effects are probably really the same.

I wholeheartedly agree, Gamer.
It indeed seems like buying bombers early is suboptimal, untill you play Germany against a USA that ignores you during the early 3-4 rounds. Try it out yourself with the condition that the USA ignores you. It is a good laugh :lol:. Ofc, if the USA does not ignore you it is a whole different story…

Some things in this game are just very conditional, being anything between very good or very bad depending on what the oppostion is doing against you.

So let me get this right;

If a major IC with 2 damage on it is downgraded to a minor IC, there will be 6 damage on the minor IC???

I always thought that >=6 becomes 6, and <6 stays <6.
Worth memorizing that one.

Aber nein, mein herr JDOW, I am not confused :-D.
I agree with you for a very big part, ofc. But I still do think that Germany is more dangerous with the bomberstrategy unchecked (because the USA goes JF), than it is with a ‘land units only’ barbarossa strategy unchecked.
The ‘unchecked’ part is very important as far as I’m concerned. Hence my remark about the bigger need for the USA to put stuff into the Atlantic (not necessarily an abnormal amount of stuff)!

Excellent analyses Herr and knp!

I too wouldn’t bother buying an AB for Holland GE1, as it is only serving to (possibly) save the BB that 1 turn and buying it will be completely useless if the UK gets bold and/or lucky, scrambled and destroyed the BB anyway. If Germany wants to keep the option of Barbarossa open, they cannot loose too much of their airforce in an effort to keep that BB alive.

If you buy the AB you buy it in the hope the BB will survive but that is not a certainty. Hope is what you do for the best, but planning should be done for the worst, is my humble opinion ;-).

If the opportunity presents itself, choosing to sink the BB or the sub is indeed a tricky one. If Germany has submarine(s) surviving in #106 and the UK only has one DD left in #109, it may be worth Germany’s while to choose to sink the BB, as that one UK DD cannot be in two places at the same time, as submarines can only be attacked with the help of destroyers. Therefore, especially if the UK decides not to go ‘Taranto’, sinking the submarine will subsequently see Germany loosing their BB and their sub(s), whereas sinking the BB will keep at least one of the wolfpacks alive…
Note that this doesn’t work if Germany attacked and killed the Cruiser in #91, as this most likely means the UK will have 2 DD left (#109 and #106), enough to kill two separate wolfpacks.

Anyway, if the goal is to maintain a German naval presence, I’d much rather buy 2DD or 1CV GE1 instead of that AB. Only 1 more IPC, but those units will remain usefull for much longer than that AB.