Posts made by newpaintbrush

Don’t you like being Darth Fury?  :?

Anyways . . . it’s too late.  :evil:

Bwaaaaa hahahaha hahhahah  :lol:

@Zhukov:  Low luck is not like dice in much the same way that a hamster is not like a large moon rock.  :lol:  Also, Granada specifies not buying a R1 fighter.

The validity of a strategy in low luck is completely irrelevant to its validity in dice, and vice versa.  If you propose a Russian triple in dice, your preferred excitement and/or sanity level probably includes things like bungee jumping naked from a suspension bridge to meet your in-laws for the first time.  If you propose a Russian triple in low luck, your penchant for excitement probably extends to Meatloaf Thursdays at the retirement home.  Which is not to say that Meatloaf Thursdays are not exciting; I am personally quite fond of meatloaf.

Saying the strategy “works” if it works in low luck means nothing for its validity in dice.

Another way of looking at it is this - let’s say that we have a six sided die, and decide to ignore 1 and 2 as being “low” and 5 and 6 as being “high”.  Basing our predictive model on this, we find that when we add the sums of these “low luck dice” when, say, 1000 dice are thrown, is approximately the same as the sums of regular dice.  That said, we smile and say that we are now Scientists with an Accurate Idea Of How Things Work.  Low Luck involves less of those evil, evil numbers, but gives us about the same results - right?

However, 66% of the results are being ignored in any throw of a REAL dice when compared to one of these “Low Luck” dice.

Besides that, Axis and Allies games in dice tend to go down extremely different paths when you get the equivalent of a 1,2,5, or 6.  From that point on, you start going down a whole new road that you never even see in the Low Luck scheme of things.

Suppose you have a door on your left, a door on your right, and a door in front of you.  Behind each of these doors are another three doors; beyond each of those doors are yet another three doors, and so on.  Low Luck says you’ll always go through the door in the center.  Actual dice say you pick the door randomly every time.  As you can imagine, the sort of view you see when going through a few doors in low luck and going through a few doors in dice tend to end up very differently.

@Granada:

I really cannot get over my amusement of people whining

Much anger I sense in this one.

Welcome to the dark side of the Force.   :evil:

from now, your name will be . . .

DARTH FURY

!!!

@Granada:

But does not the debate evade an essential question: why would someone send troops to africa, when you need them in Europe?

Gez Gran, you know why!

First, let’s say Allies went Kill Germany First.

Germany-controlled Africa means UK has lousy production - it may not be able to produce 8 units a turn, and what it does produce will mostly be infantry that are lousy on attack.  Added to that is Germany producing 3-4 units extra a turn.  End result is UK attack down, Germany defense up, and Allies have a pain in the ass breaking Europe.

Besides that, US can’t just insta-build transports, it needs a defensive fleet first, or its transports get wasted by German air.  So US does NOT have a fat transport fleet to begin with, so it doesn’t have enough to maintain a East Canada-London/London-Europe chain, nor is Germany probably weak enough for US to start a 1-transport chain between East Canada and Western Europe.  So US drops to Algeria while it builds up extra transports.

So much for the basics.  You drop to Africa because you don’t really have any place else to go with US at first, and you need to stop Germany from overrunning it anyways.

“Advanced” stuff - there are things Germany can do to extend its control over the Atlantic and Africa, which I won’t get into at this time, but maintaining drops to Africa can be the right thing to do in SOME games, at least.  Basically, in KGF, you don’t want Germany controlling Africa, period.

Playing chess, you may move a single piece, in which case there may be four or five likely counters, to which you may have three or four counters, in which there may be two or three counters, and so forth.  Even then, some of those counters may not directly involve the piece you moved, but other pieces elsewhere on the board.  What this means is that you may gain an advantage now only to lose that advantage five or six moves down the line.

Properly speaking, of course, you never gained an advantage in the first place.  You only THOUGHT you gained that advantage; had you calculated correctly, you would have realized there was no advantage there in the first place.

Playing Axis and Allies, you know pretty fast whether you screwed up or not.  If you lost a lot of IPCs worth of units, you had better have a pretty immediate counter.  If you can’t counter immediately, your opponent can reposition his/her units, and if you didn’t have an opportunity to exploit before, you almost certainly won’t after your opponent moves.

That’s why programming an Axis and Allies AI should not be such a big deal.  I mean, yeah, it ain’t like a walk in the park.  But it sure shouldn’t be some kinda task that requires a few millions of dollars in AI research and development.

It’s like saying Marisa Miller farts flowers.  Like, she is awesome and hardworking and all, but let’s not go overboard eh?

If it’s so easy why don’t I do it?

I can write algorithms, but I can’t code them.  Heh heh.  :wink:

@Subotai:

Not NASA, not NSA, not Google or Apple or anyone, can make an AI that is close to being as good as decent human players, not even with computers that costs billions of dollars.

Would you care to stake $10,000 US on that?

AND YOUR SOUL?

@MrMalachiCrunch:

I am asking what other players’ feelings are on similar stupid initial rolls

Play on.  Dice is what makes it interesting.

'course let’s say Russia tripled successfully vs Eastern Europe, Ukraine, and West Russia, and Germany hit the UK battleship with sub/fighter/bomber and totally failed, tried to hit the UK cruiser with 2 fighters and totally failed, and say Germany tried Anglo-Egypt with 2 inf/art/tank/fighter and lost all ground leaving the UK fighter alive.  Then let’s say UK took Borneo and New Guinea with 2 infantry surviving at each, killed the Kwangtung transport, killed the German Meditteranean fleet with no air losses, and whacked the German Baltic fleet with no losses.

At that point, it IS over.

But failing UKR with 2 tanks 2 fighters (plus sundry)?  I sure wouldn’t quit at that point, especially not before seeing how West Russia went, and considering I could retreat that tank.  2 tanks 2 fighters is a bit of a greedy attack, if you want to take the chance, you should be willing to pay the blood price in case of failure.

You could house rule low luck or allow attackers to reroll 1 dice on the first go around.

@Hobbes:

It’s all about numbers people

Bah, numbers!  There’s too many of them!

@Col.Stauffenberg:

Almost never. In fact, one of my specialities is the widdle. I will attack a superior infantry stack if I have enough hardware that can retreat to a safe position.

Aw.  Cute widdle infantriez.

(This is in response to the clarified situation of a R1 UKR (Ukraine)/WR (West Russia) attack with 2 tanks and 2 fighters at UKR being called “held back” as opposed to the UKR/WR attack with 3 tanks and 2 fighters at UKR.)

If you attack UKR with 3 tanks 2 fighters, you have a great chance of capturing UKR.  But you will lose about 1 more inf at West Russia, and your tanks at UKR will die on G1, being traded for German infantry.  The 2 tanks 2 fighters has a lower chance of capturing UKR, but a bit of good luck results in capture of UKR, and preserving an extra infantry at West Russia, and saving a tank from the German counter.  That’s 8 IPC of units.  On the other hand, Russia capturing Ukraine with 2-4 units puts pressure on Germany to kill Russia’s valuable tanks, so usually will drain additional German ground units on G1, vulnerable to the R2 counter.

By the way, you sometimes see 3 tanks 1 fighter at Ukraine.  The idea is that it’s similar in attack power to 2 tanks 2 fighters, but Russia can afford to “stay” longer (i.e. if there’s 2 Russian fighters and 1 German fighter remaining, the Russians will probably best retreat, but 1 Russian tank and 1 Russian fighter vs 1 German fighter allows Russia to keep going).  The second Russia fighter hits WR to increase hitting power there to help preserve an extra infantry.

That’s the SHORT version.  For the LONG-WINDED version, see below.

3 tanks 2 fighters at Ukraine can leave Russia with 2-4 ground units surviving, which puts a lot of pressure on Germany.  Probably Germany’s best response is to send 2 fighters to the UK cruiser, battleship/transport/infantry/artillery to Anglo-Egypt (fighting UK destroyer on way), fighter/bomber/sub vs UK battleship/Russian sub, fighter to Anglo-Egypt.  The fifth fighter is often sent to UK cruiser in dice games as a “safety” (Germany’s gambling with expensive fighters, and losing both fighters would be awful), but with a R1 build of 2 inf 2 art 2 tank (leaving 4 inf 2 art 2 fighter on Cauc, plus surviving West Russia forces plus 2 tanks from Russia), whatever Germany counters UKR with will die on R2 (even if Japan flies what fighters it can in).  Since Germany won’t have cheap artillery at Ukraine, that means sending expensive tanks, or committing a fighter.  Probably Germany will do best to send a tank and fighter, plus infantry (as opposed to sending a couple of tanks plus infantry, saving Germany a 5 IPC tank).  So in sum, Russia hits hard R1 and loses a few extra IPC worth of units on the German counter, but Germany will probably have to take a few chances on G1 to counter to best effect, and will probably have to drain out 1-2 extra infantry or a tank.  The Russian recapture of Ukraine on R2 will kill those German units, compensating for the loss of the third Russian tank.

2 tanks 2 fighters at Ukraine risks failure.  If successful, Germany can still counter as listed above.  But failure to capture Ukraine on R1 can be a real problem, with Russians possibly losing West Russia, Ukraine, and Caucasus, particularly with bad dice at West Russia and/or Ukraine (esp if a fair number of German units survive at Ukraine).  The easiest Russia contingency plan is probably Caucasus AA gun to West Russia, and 1 Russian infantry at Caucasus to prevent the 1-German-infantry walk in.  The remaining Russian forces stay in Russia.  UK can sometimes recapture Caucasus from Persia (with UK air), and Russia can probably counter decently too.  (But with a German build of 8 tanks, things get nasty fast, and 4 Jap fighters can land on a German-held Caucasus on J1.)

@MtnGoatJoe:

Don’t mind me. One of my failed New Year Resolutions is to not deal in absolutes.
. . . (signature follows) The Perfect Axis & Allies Strategy: Position your forces to fight the enemy where and when you choose. Make the enemy react to you, and make tactical decisions based on strategic goals. Don’t fight battles that you can’t win, or gamble where a loss guarantees the likely loss of the war. And pray everything doesn’t go to s&!t with bad dice!

:roll:

1.  You used the tank for something.  What was that?
2.  Re:  Your Siggy:  Bleahhahahaggahhh!

A.  You can’t fight the enemy “where and when you choose”, or I’d choose to hit Berlin on R1 and end the game.  Do what is appropriate.

B.  “Make the enemy react to you” is more of that empty talk people use to sound impressive.  If your opponent left an opening for you to exploit, you SHOULD react to that and exploit that opening.  That is, you should be smart, not dumb.  If you mean “make your enemy act stupidly”, I’d like to know exactly how you’re gonna do that.

C.  Saying “make tactical decisions based on strategic goals” is more emptiness.  Tactics are one thing, strategy another.  Or are you saying you should base your strategy independent of knowledge of tactics?

D.  If a battle was really pointless, then doing it would be stupid, so what is this about fighting battles you can’t win?  I’d say if a battle looks to be poor odds, but the gains are great, you may or may not choose to engage depending on the position.

E.  There are appropriate times and places for gambling.  If you have a 35% chance on Berlin, with Moscow about to fall, and Japan about to land fighters in Berlin plus German control of Africa feeding infantry production cutting Allied chances of taking Berlin to 20% the following round (and less on later turns as Japanese tanks rush forwards), you SHOULD TAKE THE GAMBLE OBVIOUSLY!  If it’s the best chance you have, you SHOULD TAKE IT, GEEZ!

F.  To sum it up, the proper strategy is to THINK and LEARN.  (Learning makes proper thinking easier).

G.  What is this whole fixation on this “enemy”?  My only enemies are those that grab the last pork bun.  :x  Those people have to die.  But you should play with FRIENDS, ya, people that will help you learn and grow and all that nurturing stuff.  Call them opponents.  “Enemy” is just too . . . evil sounding.  :evil:

When I write about operations, I usually just make up silly names when I can.

like Operation Cat’s Meow, or Operation Pizza Delivery.  Or my favorite, Operation Roll a Lot of 1’s.  (the last is SUPER good if you can get it to work, like SUPER good.)

So when you get crusty vets that talk about Polar Express, I just start talking about Cat’s Meow, and use a lot of really vague pronouns, like “when I hit that thing with the attack dudes, the thing will happen then the other thing.”  then I keep it real with comments like “with lots of income” or “I get four more units this way than the other way” - not COMPLETELY vague, mind you, just specific enough to make it sound like I know what I’m talking about, but vague enough to piss off anyone trying to understand me.  Then if anyone asks me questions, I use Operation Call U A Nub.  :roll:  Yo, EVERYBODY knows Operation Cat’s Meow, yo.  EVERYBODY.

But SERIOUSLY, using names for operations just screws with people a lot, so I try consciously not to do it.  Like “Operation Goatf**k” which is what I use to refer to the German counter to a failed Russian Triple.  How is anyone else going to know that means?  I mean, obviously there’s a goat, and obviously there’s some f’ing involved, but exactly how does it happen?

So in summing up, I say don’t use funny names for operations or gambits.  It just confuses people, and nobody’s going to know what the f* you are talking about most of the time.  If you don’t agree, just remember Operation Cat’s Meow.  There will be a quiz on it on Thursday.  :evil:

Re:  Russia opening attacking West Russia, Ukraine, and Norway or Eastern Europe or Belorussia.

With dice -

If you get real lucky, you do very well.  If you have bad luck, you get toasted super fast.  If you have bad luck in some places and good luck elsewhere, you can still get toasted super fast depending on what happened where.

Since I think I have a really good chance to win with Allies, I usually won’t take a chance on blowing the game on R1 with a triple attack.  Usually, I’ll just hit 2 territories and engage in what is for me conservative play.  Why risk the game when I think I can usually win normally?

Why do you get toasted super fast?  Worst case scenario sees Ukraine, West Russia, Caucasus, Karelia, and Norway all in German hands at end of G1, with 8 tank G1 build.

More generally speaking, the Germans have a logistic problem of getting cheap cost effective infantry to the front to absorb hits.  (Tanks are 166% the cost of an infantry).  The German units at West Russia, Ukraine, and Belorussia are at the Russian/German front.  Hitting these territories with Russia depletes Germany’s infantry reserves, meaning Germany will have to start losing tanks pretty quickly.  BUT the German units at Norway are analogous to the units at Eastern Europe/Balkans, which are NOT at the front.  SO what happens with a West Russia/Ukraine/Norway attack is that you send the Russian units to hit Germany’s REAR reserves, which makes Germany’s logistic problem of getting cheap infantry to the front EASIER on those initial important turns.  So if things go a bit wrong, with a WR/UKR/NOR attack, Germany can make a fast and deadly counter.

WR/UKR/Belorussia is a bit “safer” in terms of the German counter, but a few bad dice still see Germany in awesome position to counter.

So my thought is - a triple is flashy, but not “sound”.  If you don’t think you’re going to win in the first place (say you’re sure your opponent is more skilled), you can try a Russian triple and hope to get lucky, since you don’t think you can win without getting lucky anyways.  Or if you just like being flashy, sure, go ahead.  Or if you think you’re a lot better than your opponent, you can try it for fun, maybe give your opponent a better chance to win.

But if you’re trying to win, and don’t know your opponent’s skill level, I’d say just play conservatively and watch for opponent errors.  Why risk blowing the game with a few bad dice rolls early on?  Play conservatively, and watch for an opening.

With Low Luck, the triple isn’t bad, even recommendable (esp WR/UKR/Belorussia), because you simply can’t suffer the sort of bad luck you can with dice.  For example, with dice, you can use a fighter and an infantry to attack 2 infantry, but it’s risky - if the defender hits twice, you’ll lose a costly fighter.  With Low Luck, you will NEVER lose the fighter.  This sort of thing adds up.  But with dice, triple is just too risky IMO.

@football2006:

The most common example that I’ve encountered is when Russia holds back a tank against Ukraine R1.

This is a good Monster in the Toilet example.  What’s the Monster in the Toilet?  Well, this plumber gets a call from his mom, see, and apparently the nice old lady can’t get her toilet to flush.  So he says did you try this and did you try that and she’s like “yep, did that, did that.”  So eventually they can’t figure it out over the phone and he comes on over.  So the plumber opens up the toilet tank and discovers a small gremlin inside that keeps screwing with the tank so it won’t fill up and flush.  The plumber asks his mom why she didn’t mention the gremlin, and she says he never asked.

So in this case - when you say “Russia holds back a tank”, what exactly does that “held back” tank do, what are the combat moves, what are the noncombat moves?  Why didn’t you ask whoever held back the tank why they did it?  If you did, why wasn’t that answer sufficient to explain “why people do what they do”?  If you didn’t, why didn’t you?

@MtnGoatJoe:

The only buys I can guarantee on J1 would be a destroyer and a tank

What do you use the tank for?

@mtngoatjoe (whose Japan plan follows):

• J1: Buy IC for FIC; take and hold India.
      * J2: Buy IC for India, 2 infantry + 1 artillery for FIC.
      * J3: Buy 2 infantry + 1 artillery for India and 3 tanks FIC.
      * J4: Buy 6 tanks India/FIC; take the territory west of India with 9 units; Stage bombers and fighters for J5 attack.
      * J5: Buy 6 tanks India/FIC; Knock on the Caucasus’ door with up to 4 infantry, 2 artillery, 6 tanks, the pre-staged air units, and whatever else could make it’s way there in time (though any stragglers are probably better spent going through Northern Russia). . . if Germany is having a hard time of things, I’d lean a little more your way, build more infantry and artillery, and wait another round to hit the Caucasus. It just depends.

J1 securing India is preventable by 2 Russian infantry at Persia (that’s “the territory west of India” you refer to in the J4 step) with Russian fighters at Caucasus.  UK should also have 2 infantry on Persia at end of J1, with 2-3 fighters and 1 bomber in the area.

J3+ lots of tanks can be premature, particularly if UK has managed to establish a Karelia/Archangel drop.  You did mention if Germany is having a hard time, that you might do otherwise.

One thing you didn’t mention in your new “evil plan” post was your preference for a J1 destroyer.  I don’t know if that goes hand in hand with your old strategy or your new one, but it does mess with you.  I’ll post again in a second.

@Hobbes:

@mtngoatjoe:

If, If, if, if.

Famous last words :)

As famous as “Oops”?

@nutbar:

Buy tanks. They work well with offense and defense, and they move 2 instead of 1. I also reccomend buying 1 fighter per turn to stock up and destroy Germany. Stay defensive until you have a monster military and then attack Germany.

Another nutbar quote:
http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=22573.15

Yes, Japan’s setup needs to be changed in order to weaken them. Germany’s setup should be weakened OR the allie’s setup be strengthened.

No wonder you think Japan and Germany need to be weakened if you think a plan of 1 Russian fighter a turn is a good one.  If I could make the Russians spend 10 IPC on a fighter every turn, I’d agree Axis have an advantage.

@Nomarclegs:  I’m not going to dig through another thread to look for “Iron Horde”.  You want comments, give good details.  Like my saying Japan should use the “Voltron” strategy probably isn’t going to help you understand what I’m talking about.  (Clearly you could ALSO use “Macross” or “Robotech”.)

@nutbar:  You’re claiming Japan should be weakened, and that Germany should be weakened or Allies strengthened.  Please provide specific reasoning if you can.  Otherwise, the discussion devolves quickly into one side claiming apples are better, and another side claiming oranges are better.  Of course, maybe that’s what you want, a show of hands.  For my part, I preferred apples a couple years ago, but I like oranges a lot more these days.  Tomatoes are also very nice for chicken dishes, or for throwing at angry young gophers.  Perhaps the gophers are angry because I’m throwing tomatoes at them, but I digress.

@Biggg:  Claiming it’s a Moscow vs Berlin race is, I think, correct.  Particularly given Japan’s large starting navy and air force, with US having little to match, plus difficulty for UK and Russia in getting reinforcements to that area, plus the difficulty of 1) UK maintaining control of Africa, and 2) of UK threatening a West Europe invasion without US support (threatening West Europe forces Germany to either add a lot of units to Western Europe to defend, removing units from attack on Russia, or has Germany abandon West Europe, giving Allies a much easier time moving fleet in the Atlantic.  (For example, German bombers on Western Europe threaten a lot of the African coast, can hit points in Africa, can hit any number of territories in Russia, threaten all sea zones around London, and threaten any US transports maintaining a East Canada-London transport chain (forcing Allies to build additional escorts for such transports).

BUT I’d say that’s just the nature of the game.  If you want a different experience, try looking for something like Pact of Steel (it’s a version of Axis and Allies on the TripleA platform).  There, Australia and Union of South Africa are worth 3 IPC, and China and Italy are added as powers, changing the game dynamic to the point that Kill Japan First strategies are (in my opinion) feasible.  You could try house rules too, but strengthen Germany to compensate.

Hobbes already mentioned the sub/cruiser/fighter/bomber Pearl attack.  The Caroline Islands fighter can land on Wake.  This is what I almost always do.

You can try the risky sub/fighter vs US Pacific battleship, with everything else to Pearl.

Or the even riskier (almost suicidally bad odds with very bad consequences in case of failure) attempt to take Hawaiian Islands.  The only reason this is even worth considering is if US kills your Japan fleet at Hawaii, you can take the carrier as a casualty before fighters.  But it’s still not great.

Or you can just go Pearl super heavy (bring all the fighters you can), and take fighters or even bomber as casualties when you can.  Your remaining fleet should be sub/cruiser/battleship/carrier/2 fighters.  That’s rather a lot to deal with.

–

Re:  your question what would I have done differently?  Probably mix in infantry with tanks, and buy a few subs in addition to those bombers.  Probably a destroyer or two at some point to chase away enemy subs and act as air fodder.
But then I can’t say infantry would definitely have been the right thing to do.  If Russia was getting rocked, it would be best to use pure tanks to press home the advantage.  There’s times and places for different strategies.

–

Re:  Taking advantage of Pearl fleet still alive as US:

I don’t care much if Pearl is alive or dead with US (except for the fact that if Pearl remains alive, US can often pull interesting tricks with its fighters attacking Japan’s fleet that it normally can’t).

To me, the REAL question on whether or not to attack Pacific is - what happened to Japan’s fleet?  If Japan was careless, and lost 2 capital ships (battleships and/or aircraft carriers), maybe some air, and US still has its battleship, then it’s worth thinking about fighting for the Pacific.