Posts made by newpaintbrush

Yeah, but I suck at playing the Information Age.  Mostly because I rule the world by the end of the 6th age at latest.

Would you believe I favor using the French for their military?

Thanks, trihero.

Because I just realized that the most important decision in life is what you decide to do, RIGHT NOW.

The condom.

The people that are smart enough to use it are the people that are not procreating.

What is the natural consequence?

Why, that you will have the priviledge of eating sliced bread in your chair while watching television, while the government grows due to uncontrolled spending.  And perhaps you will enjoy some condom-free secks later.

And is that REALLY so bad?

Or . . . is it . . . (dun dun dun)!

Yep.

It sounds like both of you might be from the Chicago area . . .

Look at your board.  You see Russia/Mosow.  Look northwest of there.

If you see “Karelia” touching “Russia”, you have the Classic version.

If you do NOT see “Karelia” touching “Russia”, but see something called “Archangel” in between, you have the Revised version.

Tsk, tsk, spankings?  Think of the children!  Won’t someone please think of the children?!

OK, so the USSR will be spanked.  But if it’s a choice between London or Karelia, Belorussia, AND Ukraine, it’s still an easy decision, isn’t it?  I can’t see any other way to defend against the G1 invasion of London (assuming, of course, that tech is immediately effective and a G1 invasion of London is not barred by the local ruleset, and that Germany didn’t go absolutely mad on tech dice and purchased a couple of transports, I think it’s very possible that the German player can take London and get a lock on London by G3 at the latest with only two or three transports purchased first turn, while Japan pushes on the USSR from the east.)

If there is a better way than 2 Russian fighters in London to help defend, I can’t think of it.  German infantry, tank, six fighters, and bomber going up against UK bomber, two infantry, artillery, tank, two fighters, and AA gun, is favorable for the attackers.

I suppose you might be saying that if Germany invests minimal IPC on tech, it has a greater chance of failure, and if it invests more IPC on tech, it still has a moderate chance of failure.  For the case of a moderate instead of minimal IPC investment on tech, I can see that the slightly favorable German attack will be outweighed by the fact that a 52% absolute requirement to win (spending 20 IPC on tech dice which must succeed) followed by a 75% absolute requirement to win is overall only a 39% chance of success, meaning Germany will self-destruct if it uses 4 or more tech dice, sure, I can see that, especially since 20 IPC spent on unsuccessful tech is a huge investment.

What I have in mind, though, is specifically the 16% investment of a single tech dice, or possibly the slightly higher investment of two tech dice, followed byGermany’s purchase cycle dependent on whether or not the weapons development research was successful - and the consequent and straightforward win of Germany in perhaps 31% of its games using an investment of only two tech dice to attack an underdefended London.  If the tech succeeds, Germany builds transports and hopes for a successful attack on London, followed by an almost certain lock on London.  If the tech fails, Germany can still build ten infantry and go either for the KGF stall, or the KGF push on Caucasus if the Allies decide to go KJF.

In the latter case, isn’t 2 USSR fighters in London a reasonable investment on security?  Maybe not.

@newpaintbrush:

In the scenario you mentioned, with only slight changes to the German plan, I can see that there is a decent possibility of Germany taking London on G2 with infantry, tank, five to six fighters, (depending on whether or not USSR did the Ukraine attack, I presume no German air was risked against the lone UK destroyer at Anglo-Egypt) and bomber going against a bomber, two infantry, two artillery, two fighters, and an AA gun.

Hm.  I see that Chocolate Chip cookies are apparently a weapon of mass distraction.

Either I’m right about this, but posters chose not to read that horrible text block  :|, or posters were distracted by the cookies in the subsequent posts, or maybe I was distracted by cookies and misread something resulting in a faulty analysis.

Yes, cookies are clearly to blame here.

Or it’s Jen’s picture doing its work again.  :evil:

weapons of mass distraction . . .  hm . . .

@ncscswitch:

Off topic folks.

Technically, you could call these illegal/legal moves.

Beer helps this visualization.

:mrgreen:

Wooow, NAs.  No wonder Germany could be successfully contained.  Superfortresses = SBR death.

There is a simple definitive guide to Japan.  Japan wants to have a stronger navy than anyone else in the Pacific, and wants to use that navy to the best effect possible.  The Allies either neutralize the Japanese fleet by simply ignoring it and concentrating on Germany, or by a gigantic US fleet buildup.

Ignoring Japan is straightforward enough.  You just ignore the he** out of it.  Let Japan land in W. Canada or Alaska; that’s less infantry that will be pushing west on Moscow.  Let them grab Hawaii, Australia, New Zealand, and New Guinea.  You whack Germany into a pulp and reinforce Moscow through Archangel and the Caucasus if needed, force Japan’s attack to come to a grinding halt near Moscow, and deal the killing blow to Germany.

Why do you want to have a massive air and naval buildup?  Because as long as Japan’s fleet is superior, it can land forces anywhere from Western Canada to French Indochina in a single turn from Japan, so Japan is very difficult to contain.  Once Japan’s fleet is inferior, though, those landings become more difficult or impossible, making Japan’s attacks in Asia very predictable and far easier to contain.  Also - once Japan’s navy is no longer the strongest, the Allies can start grabbing those 1 IPC - 4 IPC islands in the Pacific with the investment of only a couple of transports and a few infantry; the US already has a massive load of fighters in the area on aircraft carriers.

@Jennifer:

Just did three games, it’s a bit harder then expected, but in every game Japan’s been successfully kept at or below 30 IPC income.  In two games they turtled.  In one game he successfully sunk both American and British fleets, but in the process reduced himself to 1 BB which was easily smashed by the American counter.

Net Result, with the full offensive blast into the Pac he successfully delayed the loss of his high priced islands by 2 turns.  In both turtling instances Borneo and East Indies fell before round 3.

Germany was successfully retained by Russia without even breaking a sweat in all 3 games.  However, they did manage to get Africa and that took a while to take back due to having to walk English infantry through Africa.  (England generally had 3 rounds to fill Africa before they had to retreat from German naval superiority.)

America ended with 3 full carriers and a battleship after annihillating the japanese fleet in the first two games, in the third America had no need to build an offensive fighting force as there was no Japanese navy of which to speak.

In all cases, there was an indian IC.  Once there was also a Sink IC.

However, it seems to be the best bet to have East Indies and Borneo in control of either ENgland or America, not split.  This way you can build 8 land units in range of 4 transports and have continual landings into Asia Minor.

A note to Japan:  If this is happening, make sure to build units to defend your capital!  Remember, Sea Zone 59 is connected to sea zone 61!  You cannot have your only fleet in both places and if you split them, you’re ready to die quick.

Say, you wouldn’t happen to have game transcripts or files sitting around, would you?

(If you had played on TripleA, you could just View History of the last save game file)

I can’t imagine all that stuff in the Pacific, and USSR not even having to break a sweat defensively against Germany.  I’m interested in seeing what the Allies and Germany did in the Atlantic.

@Jennifer:

@Schlag96:

@Jennifer:

Could always just do a right click save as?

Can I get the Hi-Res version plz?  :evil:

Used to be one on my website.  Wait til I get my site back up then get one.

hubba hubba  :-D

1/6 chance of losing a 15 IPC bomber.

5/6 chance of doing average damage of 3.5 IPC (the bomber can only hit the industrial complex if it survives the AA shot)

+35/12 IPC damage, a little less than 3 IPC damage expected
-15/6 lost bomber, or 2.5 IPC loss expected from building bombers.

For 0.5 IPC net expected gain, I would rather use the bomber to help on an attack against naval or ground forces.  Say you attack a territory with some infantry, fighters, bomber; say that territory is defended with an AA gun and some numbers of infantry.  You have the same probability of losing the bomber, but now with each round of combat, you inflict 2 IPC expected damage (2/3 chance of destroying an infantry worth 3 IPC).  So with just two rounds of combat, you will have done more damage to units that had to spend time getting to the battle front than economic damage to units that have not yet been produced that would have to march from an industrial complex to the front.

An attack on naval forces is far more rewarding, at 5+ minimum IPCs expected per round of combat, and no chance of being shot down by an AA gun.

Of course, this assumes that there is no battleship in the naval territory, and in both cases that the defending forces would not be stronger than the attacking forces, but I think that there are enough ways to ensure attacker superority in numbers that bombers are better saved for use against other targets.  (Subject to change if there’s no AA gun defending, or if superior attacking power cannot be brought to bear)

Well, if you came knocking with 2 extra Russian fighters in London, that’s

1 bomber, 2 inf, 1 art, 1 tank, 4 fighters, 1 AA gun vs
1 infantry, 1 tank, 6 fighters, 1 bomber.

Say you’re using Low-Luck (I’m not an advocate of Low-Luck, but I recall that you posted a few posts using those projections), and got about average luck and lost a fighter.

Now you have attack 23, defense 26.  Assume four casaulties by each side (with slightly favorable Low-Luck dice), then you have attack 10 defense 19, with a tank, fighter, and bomber going against four fighters and a tank. The next round inflict two casaulties for Germany and three for the Allies, and you have a tank going against three fighters, at which point the tank will die with a 50/50 chance of killing a fighter.  Since I would far rather lose UK than USSR fighters, that means that the 2 USSR fighters will both certainly be alive at the end of any Low-Luck battle.

Basically, Germany needs to have quite good luck to kill those last remaining Russian fighters.  Even a bit of bad luck with rolls, though, will mean that the UK and the USSR will both keep their fighters, and the entire German Luftwaffe will have been destroyed at the cost of a few ground units and a bomber.  Germany will also suffer from not taking Anglo-Egypt, the cost of weapon development research, and early Russian pressure on the German front.  It’s very much all or nothing, in a battle that does not favor Germany by any means.

ALTHOUGH I have to say that a G1 attack on London is always fun, even if the odds are not favorable.

@Jennifer:

@Infantry:

Now that you can target tech rolls IT would distort the game. Too much would rely on whether Germany or Russia got IT first.

Well, if they had left it in and not altered Hvy Bombers except to limit then to best of 3 dice on SBR runs, it would have evened out.

I think the reference was to the tech that allowed you to save 1 IPC per unit.

Spend 20 IPC on tech, get a slightly better than 50% chance.

Now you need to buy 20 units to make that back.  20 infantry now cost you 40 IPC.

Simple.

@DarthMaximus:

Chocolate Chip?

Oh yes, you can choose from regular Chocolate Chip, Macadamia Nut Chocolate Chip, White Chocolate Chip, Chocolate Chunk, or any of our 132 exciting varieties of Chocolate Chip!  The British Empire feels this is simply one of the courtesies that should be provided to its noble Russian fighter pilots, along with afternoon tea, of course.

@DarthMaximus:

Oh, okay.
Yeah, I’d never send the Russian ftr to Ind or Ind/sz or wherever.

What if I gave you a cookie?

A really NICE cookie.

@DarthMaximus:

For Jen’s initial scenerio there, I agree with Switch, I think Germany should place in Lib.

However, I think Russia should be much more aggressive on Rd 1 (within reason), if you think you might be doing a UK unification on UK 1.

You’ll notice that Jen’s post (I’m not sure if it was the “initial scenario” or a later posting) mentioned sending the USSR fighter to the UK carrier off India.  Given that, USSR only has ONE fighter usable in combat.

A 3 inf 1 fighter attack on Germany’s 3 Belorussia infantry would still be somewhat favorable.  But Ukraine would probably be right out, even without any German bid placement there.  If you want to only use 1 fighter in the attack on the Ukraine, that means you have to send everything you’ve got (i.e. three tanks instead of two), and Germany will certainly kill those tanks regardless of the USSR bid.  You could counter with four inf two art from Caucasus and two tanks from Moscow, but then Germany could counter with transported units from Southern Europe plus an E. Europe stack.  With the Russian fighter sitting on the UK carrier, Russia is stretched pretty thin.  With the loss of three tanks, USSR would be stretched out even more.

Anyways, as Germany, I never worry about a USSR Ukraine stack.  It’s inconvenient, but if the stack is thin, I can threaten it with the Med transport and air.  If the stack is thick, I could possibly take an underdefended Caucasus.  In either event, I can go north to Karelia then Archangel, forcing the USSR to retreat to W. Russia to prevent a German infantry and tank stack in W. Russia or an attack on Moscow through Archangel.  Not great, maybe, but USSR can hardly afford to go west from Ukraine.

@cdassak:

Good one ncscswitch. I like the way you handle Japan. The key for a KJF defense is to be confident.

However, how would you respond to the same + the UK bomber in Novo or Sinkiang?

I know Jen used it for SBR but let’s assume she hadn’t…

Would you do the same battles and buy that destroyer on J1?

I’m not sure I would call it a KJF without an Indian industrial complex, even though the commitment of a Russian fighter is pretty important.  It’s a KJF if the US builds a big Pacific fleet, but the Japs wouldn’t know that until after the US turn.

Nice post; very detailed.

But I cannot say that the standard German moves in your area are the same as the standard German moves where I play.  I usually see placement of German units in Africa to aid in the attack on Anglo-Egypt without forcing the Mediterranean fleet to support.  Anglo-Egypt is taken, preventing the UK destroyer there from escaping, and preventing the Indian fleet from reinforcing in the Mediterranean.  (No German air is risked against the UK destroyer, since the UK destroyer can hardly do anything if Germany takes Gibraltar, which prevents 1 destroyer, 2 fighters, and bomber attacking the German Med fleet). The German sub in the Atlantic is very likely preserved instead of being taken as fodder to the UK battleship.  A UK/US attack on Algeria is far less likely with the German transport, sub, 5 fighters, bomber, and battleship in range.  (I presume that USSR took the Ukraine as well as West Russia, which is a reasonable possibility in most games, and that I landed fighters in Western Europe to discourage landings in Algeria, to threaten the sea zone west of Algeria, and to threaten invasion of London).  NOTE:  I don’t usually use a German bid in Africa myself; I typically run two Mediterranean transports these days and attack Anglo-Egypt with overwhelming force, but I am leaning in favor of the old German Africa bid again these days).

The USSR attacks I usually see are either West Russia and Belorussia (with 3 infantry and 2 fighters), or West Russia and Ukraine (with assorted ground units, two fighters, and usually two tanks tops, although I suppose some players might use three tanks instead)

In the scenario you mentioned, with only slight changes to the German plan, I can see that there is a decent possibility of Germany taking London on G2 with infantry, tank, five to six fighters, (depending on whether or not USSR did the Ukraine attack, I presume no German air was risked against the lone UK destroyer at Anglo-Egypt) and bomber going against a bomber, two infantry, two artillery, two fighters, and an AA gun.

–

As far as Japan goes - the proposed move is to unify the UK fleet of 2 transports, sub, destroyer, carrier, fighter, and USSR fighter at sea zone 38, not 30.  That means the UK fleet is in range of the Solomon islands next turn, or the waters off East Indies, Borneo, India, and French Indochina (opening up a strong possibility of a combined attack of Australian and Indian infantry against French Indochina).  The Solomon threat can be made a lot stronger with a UK bomber at Western U.S…

The sea zone 30 alternative can only be hit by a carrier, 4 fighters, and a battleship.  The sea zone 38 alternative puts more pressure on Japan, but can be hit by two carriers, a sub, a destroyer, 4 fighters, and a battleship.  Seeing that this could become very expensive for Japan, I would probably not do it.

Both sea zone 30 and sea zone 38 are far out of range of Japan’s western and eastern sea zones, so the UK cannot hit any Japanese transports there, even with fighters from carriers (since the fighters have to land), unless UK has Long Range Aircraft.  Of course, if UK puts its bomber in China (also fairly common where I am), it can hit any isolated transports, assuming the Japanese battleship intiially in Japan’s eastern waters moved off to protect against the Solomon threat.

Typically, I put a battleship and two carriers at the Solomons, and hit the US fleet with sub (if it survived), destroyer, 4-5 fighters, and bomber, losing the sub and the destroyer and perhaps a fighter or two tops.  This assumes no UK reinforcement of Pearl with the UK Indian fighter.  If the UK did reinforce Pearl, I might well go for a naval/air attack instead, bringing along an additional transport for fodder, and try to hold the waters around Pearl instead of standing off at the Solomons.

If the UK unified at sea zone 38 with a Russian fighter, if there was an Indian IC, I think I might forgo Pearl Harbor, attack the unified UK fleet, and keep a Japanese battleship to escort transports west of Japan.

–

With the given scenario, though, I think I might purchase two transports and an industrial complex (given a Japan bid of 1 IPC), or two transports and a fighter, send the Kwangtung transport north to take Soviet Far East, send Jap air, sub, and destroyer to take out Pearl, and unify the rest of the Japan navy at the Solomons, for two battleships, two loaded carriers, and transport, ready to attack Western U.S, Australia, or New Zealand.  I’d split newly built transports between eastern and western Japan sea zones, if there were a UK bomber in China (I know there wasn’t one there in the given scenario, but if there was), or put both transports in western Japan to protect against Long Range Aircraft attack from the U.S.

@Jennifer:

@ajgundam5:

From your original post you are saying that you are uniting the entire Indian Fleet … does this mean you are not going to attack the Japanese Trn in Sz 59 … I thought this was a pretty standard move why aren’t you doing it?

Here’s the basic premise, and i’m going to assume standard German moves.  I realize that you cannot count 100% on the outcome of the dice or the German’s move or the location of bid units, so please take into consideration that those objects could drastically alter the game!

Bid: 7

2 German Infantry in Ukraine
1 IPC to Japan.

Buy: 8 Infantry (This is the most conservative Russian build.  However, 4 Infantry, 3 Artillery works well, or 3 Infantry, 3 Armor work.)

11 Infantry, 4 Armor, 2 Artillery, 1 Fighter to West Russia.
*  2 Infantry, 1 Fighter from Karelia
*  3 Infantry, 1 Armor from Archangelsk
*  3 Infantry, 1 Artillery, 1 Armor from Caucasus
*  3 Infantry, 1 Artillery, 2 Armor from Russia

LL Results are: 2 Defender Kills, 5 Attacker Kills.  1 Round of Combat.

NCM:

1 Fighter from Russia to Kazahk to Persia to India to Sea Zone 35, land on English Carrier
1 AA Gun from Caucasus to W. Russia
1 Submarine from Sea Zone 4 to Sea Zone 2
1 Fighter from W. Russia to Yakut SSR
2 Infantry from Kazahk to Persia
2 Infantry from Novosibirsk to Kazahk
2 Infantry from Evenki to Novosibirsk
2 Infantry from Yakut to Novosibirsk
2 Infantry from SFE to Yakut
2 Infantry from Buryatia to Yakut

Place:  8 Infantry in Russia

Germany: Buy 1 Aircraft Carrier, 8 Infantry

BB/TRN from SZ 14 to SZ 15
1 Inf, 1 Art from S. Europe to Egypt
1 Inf, 1 Arm from Libya to Egypt
1 Fig from Balkans to Egypt
1 Fig from Ukraine to SZ 15
1 Bmb from Germany to Egypt
1 Sub from SZ 8 to SZ 13
1 Fig from Germany, 1 Fig from W. Europe, 1 Fig from Finland to SZ 13
3 Inf from Finland to Karelia
1 Inf from Ukraine to Caucasus

LL:

SZ 15 cleared with damage to battleship
Egypt 2 hits for attacker, 2 hits for defender on R1; 2 hits for attacker, 1 hit for defender on R2
Karelia no hits for attacker or defender R1: 1 hit for attacker, one hit for defender R2
SZ 13 2 hits for attacker, 1 hit for defender

NCM:

Bomber/Fighter from Egypt land in Libya
Infantry/Artillery from Algeria move to Libya
2 Fighters from SZ 13 to W. Europe
1 Fighter from SZ 13 to SZ 5
1 Fighter from E.Europe to SZ 5
2 Infantry, 1 Armor from E. Europe to Ukraine
2 Infantry, 1 Armor from Balkans to Ukraine
2 Armor from Germany to Ukraine
1 Armor from S. Europe to Ukraine
1 Fighter from SZ 15 to Ukraine
2 Infantry from Belorussia to Ukraine
3 Infantry from Germany to W. Europe
1 Infantry from S. Europe to W. Europe

Place AC in SZ 5; 6 Infantry in Germany, 2 Infantry in S. Europe

England:

30: Buy 2 Infantry, 1 Artillery, 2 Fighters

combat:

TRN SZ 1 with Armor to SZ 8 get Infantry to SZ 12
TRN SZ 2 with Armor/Infantry to SZ 12
BB to SZ 12 from SZ 2

• 2 Armor, 2 Infantry to Algeria

SBR Germany (3 dmg)

NCM:

Bomber lands in England
2 Fighters move to W. Russia
DD, TRN, AC, 2 FIG (1 UK/1 USSR) move to SZ 38 from SZ 35
TRN, SS move from SZ 40 to SZ 38
Infantry from Trans-Jordan to Persia
3 Infantry, 1 AA from India to Persia
1 Infantry to Alaska from W. Canada

Place 2 Infantry, 1 Artillery, 2 Fighters on England

It is now Japan’s turn, what do you do?

(note, I went with low luck and I biased it against the attacker and for the defender.  Meaning that if the attacker didn’t have a remainder of 3 or better he missed and if the defender had a remainder of less then 3 he missed.)

Japan’s in a quandry, navally.  He has 2 transports, 1 submarine, 1 destroyer, 2 fighters and an Aircraft Carrier in SZ 38, in prime position to snipe islands.  Meanwhile, the Americans are sitting there begging to loose a Carrier in Hawaii.