Posts made by The Janus

@FranceNeedsMorePower said in France's role in Global 1940 SE:

@The-Janus You got a lot of good ideas by chance did you every watch his video I made. It talks about France.

Here’s the link: https://youtu.be/I0nxyB3JwAk?si=K0GHmYXuijhuSVDA

I just went back through this thread earlier today, so I had copied the link, and watched it just now. Here are my overall thoughts:

1. UK fighter: Generally I don’t scramble planes, ever; in a recent game I saw the Ai send some undefended transports, so I took the option to scramble, then. In the early naval battles around the UK, it just never seems worth it, because the scrambled planes can’t retreat from combat so they’re basically doomed to die.
2. North Africa: I tend to see the Ai axis take Tunisia but then back off; as I mentioned earlier in the thread, it seems like the thing to do as France is back off as far away from the Italian transports as possible, and add French units from the UK there as well; this basically means defending Morocco until the US/UK can land to reinforce the position. If you push everything into Algeria (assuming the Italians leave Tunisia alone, at first) I worry that they’ll get dogpiled by an amphibious landing; Morocco is a lot safer.
3. Egypt/East Africa: I don’t typically see the Italians break into central Africa, but just in case they do, I always move the French infantry from West Africa to Nigeria, rather than to French Central Africa. This might be a little bit superstitious of me, but basically, as a general rule I want to leave French territories undefended, so that they can potentially be reclaimed by my Allies, if Italy captures them.
4. Madagascar: As I said, I tend to send the destroyer to the Atlantic; I don’t find much use in keeping a large fleet in/around Suez. If the Allies can’t challenge the Italian navy in the Mediterranean, they’re best off hiding behind the canal; you only really need enough navy to fend off any planes from sniping UK transports. If there aren’t any Axis planes within range, then I just run the transports naked. What I tend to see happen in my games is that the US and UK built up around Gibraltar, and if the Italian fleet is in range of both those fleets and the Suez fleet, then the UK fleets merge up for an attack. (As I’ve mentioned in this thread: https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/post/1696439 I know it’s popular for the UK to use their planes for a Taranto attack ASAP, but I tend not to.) I also tend not to build ships off of South Africa, aside from a transport or two – sometimes more, if I get in a position to start shuttling guys from the middle east into Greece.
5. Indochina: I think the obvious reason there isn’t a French infantry there to start the game, is because the Pacific game on its own can then easily have no French pieces, no? I think if it makes sense and/or makes the game better balanced, I don’t see any objection to adding it for the Global game. IMO that’s basically the same idea as how the Global game adds ANZAC infantry to Egypt. (I think if you wanted to represent the French in Indochina when using just the Pacific game, the obvious thing to do would be use an American infantry; they’ll be long dead before any “real” Americans show up, anyway.)
6. Mediterranean: Now, perhaps because I don’t do the Taranto raid, I see my French ships in the Mediterranean usually get wiped out on the Italian turn – so i tend to discount them from my planning. If any of them do survive, I treat it as a bonus (likewise for the Channel ship) and just try to merge them up with my other destroyer. To me, Gibraltar (SZ 91) is the obvious rallying point for the allied fleets. (edit: That being said, on the first turn I oftentimes send the UK fleets to sz 106, off of eastern Canada, to rally up and drop down a new carrier for existing fighters to land on. That way they’re well out of range of the Luftwaffe.)
7. Paris: I tend to play pretty old-school, so when I make a landing in Europe as the US, it’s generally all infantry with some planes; not that I expect France to have much to do at that point in the game, but I don’t agree that adding more French infantry for defense is the obvious move. I think if you want France sniping as much territory as they can manage when the opportunities arise (particularly if US/UK are doing can-opener type moves, for them) you might want to mix in another offensive unit, to go with your starting fighter. Generally I don’t change the default 4 inf in TripleA, but once I get France up and running, I always immediately feel like I need tanks or artillery, or else I’m just going to be sitting around defending – like France has been, all game.
8. Psychological Warfare: It depends on your opponent; if it’s someone who’s running every battle through a calculator, they’re probably not going to be fooled or have any surprises pulled on them. If you’re playing “live” and people are just eyeballing things, then sure.
9. Can-opening as France: I think the trouble is that most of the time, you’re going to (at best) be attacking with 2 infantry and a fighter. So you’re only really going to win a battle vs. 1 defender. And if you get hit back, suddenly you’re completely out of steam for basically the remainder of the game. I honestly feel it’s better to have French units as a mixed defending force, than trying to use them offensively, particularly since taking territory (even by accident) as France is a detriment to the Allies. (For example: it’s better to have the US land a 50/50 tank/inf force in Morocco, if it’s defended by a handful of French infantry + a fighter; otherwise, the US would want to go heavier on infantry and not risk exposing their tanks.) You make a valid point about opening up Tobruk for mech/tanks to break through; do you often see the UK push coming from that direction, with those types of units? I tend to see everything flowing in from Morocco.

@The-Janus said in France's role in Global 1940 SE:

(I find rallying the French into Northwest Persia as sort of an obvious helpful deterrent to the Germans.)

To expand on this a little bit…
I tend to try and get my French infantry from London down into Africa, ASAP (usually using a UK transport, but sometimes US – just depends on what happens in the game.) After that, I try and rally French units towards Egypt, and basically just defend the port until the other Allies clear the Mediterranean.

If you’re trying to support the USSR without putting units in their territory (and thus infringing on their national objective, if they still hold Archangel) Northwest Persia is the obvious place to park 6(ish) French infantry + 1 fighter. They can also be moved up into the Caucasus territory, if that N.O. is not longer a consideration.

If the USSR is in a really bad way, what I’m finding is that the best way for the UK to bail out that situation is to secure the Kazakhstan front; if France is defending the Caucasus (with maybe US tanks racing in, to help) this makes it a little easier. As the UK, you can do this by having 2 transports in the Indian ocean and a harbor in Persia, or by cycling 3 transports between Persia, Egypt, and South Africa (assuming you only want to move 2 infantry at a time; if you want to ship a 3rd unit from South Africa, then you’d need more transports, obviously. If I’m not using that factory to put out transports, I typically just place a tank there and have it drive north, towards Egypt.)

By landing in Eastern Persia, the British are able to insulate India a bit, as well as march up the back wall of the USSR; this is important because of the national objective for controlling Novosibirsk (in 2nd Edition, anyway.) Then the USSR can focus on their core strength, which is trading and defending territories adjacent to Moscow, while holding onto Volgograd for as long as possible. If the UK is also funneling troops into Scandinavia, you can eventually link these up with forces coming through Kazakhstan, to help push the Germans out of Novgorod.

Regarding the French destroyer at Madagascar (I should mention, only in the Europe game, rather than Global) I’ve tended to move this to the Atlantic rather than the Indian Ocean or Mediterranean. If the US is going heavy on carriers or the UK is going more for submarines, having that one French destroyer in the mix can help ensure you can target enemy subs – I’ve occasionally mis-bought as the US while German subs are still lurking around, so being able to move this destroyer to the US east coast for defense can be handy.

Is an allied harbor in Norway as strong as I think it is?
This enables US forces to effectively be 2 turns away from Norway/Denmark/Western Germany – which feels huge.

Marching guys from Norway to Leningrad is a bit of a slog, but honestly the ability to land units in Denmark and put pressure on Germany that way, might be even more helpful to the USSR in the long run.

Also, does anyone do the more conventional “Classic” shuck-shuck, i.e. routing US forces through eastern Canada and then to the UK? IME it seems like “east US to Gibraltar” is always the way to go (although admittedly the Ai is probably putting way less pressure on London than an experienced Germany player might.)

I had mentioned it upthread, but bombing harbors to disrupt the allied naval supply lines might be one of the more underrated use-cases of tactical bombers; I don’t think I’ve seen the Ai ever try it, FWIW.

@PGsquig
I’ve had a game or two where the USSR get’s KO’d and the UK/US have to try and pry a victory out of the jaws of defeat.
In that context, I could see a scenario where Germany is going so hard after the USSR and the middle east that the Allies manage to actually prop up France and get her back into the game.
But if USSR is still alive when France gets reactivated, I would agree that Germany is probably already cooked; in that case, I’d still be curious to see if France could do anything interesting on the Pacific board :)

@FranceNeedsMorePower
So one interesting thing that happened in my game is that the UK and Italy managed to kill each other off, in Italian Somaliland; just for yuks, I had France take the territory, since it’s not worth any IPCs anyway – so it wouldn’t be a detriment to the Allies.

Anyway, maybe France should get an extra 1 or 2 IPCs for any Axis territories they hold? Or a bonus for controlling all territories surrounding Switzerland? Maybe bonuses for France controlling or having units in pro-Allied territories? (I find rallying the French into Northwest Persia as sort of an obvious helpful deterrent to the Germans.)

One thing I’ve also noticed in my games is that there seems to be a tipping point, where once the Axis can’t really reach any of the ‘true neutrals’, the Allies are better off gobbling them up – Spain and Turkey (at least positionally) come to mind, in particular. Maybe give France a bonus if Spain and/or Portugal are still neutral?

So I did a test run where I actually focused on liberating France, and even tried to feed them some extra territories once I did so (rather than have US or UK take everything.)

Oof, even when France is back on their feet, they don’t have enough income to really do much. Would it help to give them some national objectives, to pad their economy (not unlike what Italy gets)?

@SuperbattleshipYamato
I’ve only poked around with the Europe game, hence this thread being in the Europe subforum ;)

I definitely agree that you want carriers (with planes) along with destroyers – and not just purely destroyers. But my point mainly is that, in the European theatre (and particularly as the allies) you need destroyers (and planes) to attack enemy subs, and you also need destroyers (and planes) to defend against enemy aircraft.

What I tend to see the Ai do, is basically once the allied navy sticks its neck out too far (if it isn’t strong enough) the German planes will just suicide attack them. It’s easy enough to “out-defense” the Italian navy, and just box them in, but it requires a lot more of a surface fleet to fend off Germany’s air force. My point is essentially that submarines can “out-offense” the Italian fleet, but they don’t do anything about the latter problem, of German air power.

Like, I appreciate the validity of the math you’re putting forward, but to me the problem is that if my job (as the allies) is to kill 288 IPCs of submarines…? Guess what, I still have to use destroyers (and planes) because the game literally doesn’t let me use any other units to do that job – including other subs!

A game I talk about a lot on these forums (East & West) has a similar problem, whereby the submarine tech that makes it so subs can’t be attacked by planes is actually a tech nobody wants – because everyone more or less wants to use subs as cheap fodder, so that transports (which aren’t picked last, in E&W) and other units can be spared.

So, as I’ve said up-thread, destroyers are hogging up too much of the design space:

1. They do all the fun ASW mechanics, on their own AND shoot at planes
2. They facilitate planes shooting at submarines (making carriers only facilitate planes’ movement – never mind carriers just being a weaker combat unit all-around, than in other versions)
3. They fulfill the “cheap fodder” role (which was basically taken away from subs/transports) while still being necessary for everything mentioned above

So the only thing cruisers have over destroyers is that they can do shore bombards – but a cruiser costs more than a fighter that you could throw into the same amphibious assault for multiple rounds of combat, whereas a cruiser only fires once.

Another thing E&W did was have it so that units hit by shore bombardment actually do not fire back, which makes this ability much more useful. It also makes this mechanic functionally the same as submarine or AA gun hits; I think unifying these outlier mechanics for combat is indicative of good design, personally.

My immediate hunch is that, in order to make cruisers useful, you’d need to start by (probably) making shore bombardment be insta-kills – particularly if you’re still (for some reason) limiting the number of shots to the number of units being landed. The other thing that jumps off the page to me is that there’s no way a cruiser should cost more than a fighter.

FWIW, I also think the reason that in Classic you have carriers at A1/D3 and transports at A0/D1 (and not chosen last) is precisely because there isn’t a destroyer unit. So that version does a better job of spreading the design space around, to have those other ships fulfill the role that destroyers play; even letting subs get hit by planes is useful, if your goal is to preserve transports (as mentioned with the E&W example). It allows subs to be cheap fodder, while still packing an offensive punch; transports can do the former, but not the latter, so you still need a good mix.

Edit: (to add)
I can see a case for limiting shore bombardments in the Pacific, where nearly every land battle is going to be an amphibious battle. Again, I feel certain mechanics lend themselves to one theatre and not the other (naval and air bases for example, seem fairly shoe-horned into the Europe map.) It might be the case that each theatre only really needs one “middleweight” surface ship and not two. From a realism perspective, sure you’d want both – but from a mechanical and gameplay perspective? The unit balance is clearly busted.

Stupid question of the day:

In the TripleA version, after France loses their capitol, any French territories liberated from the Axis by the other allies become controlled by that ally (i,e. not liberated to French ownership.) FWIW, I’ve seen this happen with the USSR territories if Moscow falls, too.

Is this intended, in the out-of-box rules? or is this just a TripleA-ism?

I mention it here because my strategy as France involves trying to balance out, “How can I maintain as many of my infantry as possible/inflict the most casualties/take the fewest losses?” with “Actually, just let the Italians have the territory, so the Americans can get the IPCs for it later.”

Like, if I know the Italian transports are in a position to just dogpile me if I push all my infantry east, I’ll pull them west instead, for sure. If the transports are too far away, I’ll try and move up – but I don’t actually want to move too far east…?

And this mechanic actually dovetails into the fact that it seems better for the US to try and hold the factories in coastal France (to place units immediately on the front line) than it is to give all that land back to France – or possibly just bypass France altogether and try to land in Greece (a favourite of mine, for example). You could argue that this simulates the “Battle of the Bulge” (or something… I guess…) but it does just seem to reinforce the fact that having France as an active ally isn’t really a value add, and is actually a detriment in the later game.

@AndrewAAGamer said in Warfare Principles of Axis & Allies (By AndrewAAGamer):

FRANCE is, well, ummm… does not really have a role in this game except to die on G1.

The way that 2nd Edition 1940 is structured, I’m inclined to think the role of France is “give the US player something to do, before their actual country joins the war.” ;)
I could see pairing up France with USSR, but France with USA makes the most sense to me.

Having just fired up the game again, for the first time in a long time…
Looking at it from the American perspective in particular, it feels like destroyers are just too good(?) If they were a little more expensive, it might feel more worth it to mix in submarines; likewise, cruisers feel too expensive for the value they provide. Is there a consensus on how cruisers should be re-balanced?

Also, I forgot to mention it earlier, but submarines defending on a 1? That’s a hard sell for me. It makes them feel too much like battleships, in that they’re more of a “unit that exists on the board” rather than something anyone actually buys.

FWIW I have been poking around with the Revised game, and I feel like it really nailed the unit balance; destroyers still feel like a “must have” but the higher price-point is a better fit for such a quality. Subs still probably needed to be cheaper, if anything. For the scale of the game, I think the tanks costing 5 works out fine, too. I think battleships auto-repairing at the end of every turn is a bit much; without naval bases, I think the obvious way to handle it is “once per round” either at the start of the owning nation’s turn, or at the end (…probably the former).

@barnee
re: E&W in TripleA

I sent a message to @Argothair but I got no response… So I figured I might as well ping you and post in the thread, to see if that helps.

Recently I’ve been poking around with the TripleA version of Revised (a map that’s much closer to E&W than most other ones) and an idea occurred to me:

Would it be at all worthwhile to just bolt the “rules” from the 3rd Edition/Iron Blitz version in TripleA onto a different map (such as the Revised map) to get something approximating E&W? Is such a thing even possible, or is it harder than just doing it all from scratch and getting it exactly right?

Likewise, would it be easier to start with the Europe 1940 map, and rewrite the mechanics to fit E&W? Or is there too much code baked into the maps themselves, already?

As a follow-up, this might be a slightly controversial opinion:

I think tactical bombers are okay

Now, in terms of actually bombing? They seem useless on the Europe map (although bombing Gibraltar’s naval base as Italy can really screw with the allies.)

That being said:

1. As the US, you’re going to be using a combination of destroyers and carriers. I find these carrier aircraft are meant more as a deterrent, rather than expecting them to actually be attacked, and needing to score hits on defense; having a tac. and a fighter paired up comes in handy, since you know you’ll be using those planes offensively over and over again. In this case, the trade-off of 1 defense for 1 attack isn’t that detrimental (although arguably it still doesn’t justify the extra 1 IPC cost.)
2. As the UK, pairing the tac. with the tank in East Africa in the early rounds of clearing out the Italians can be really handy, allowing you to put fewer infantry into those battles, and preserving them for defense or for attacking 2 territories instead of only 1, on the same turn.

Generally speaking, my go-to move for building fleets is to just assume 2 fighters for each carrier, but since pivoting to 1 tac. and 1 fighter with the US, I don’t feel like I’m losing out on anything. If there is a downside, it’s when you try and split up your carrier group, sending each of the 2 planes to attack different territories, rather than attacking 1 territory together.

But if you have a carrier in SZ 109 and another in SZ 110 or 112, you can easily use all 4 aircraft in attacking Norway, Denmark, Holland/Belgium, or Normandy. This is particularly powerful when sending minimal landing forces, and just wanting to strafe the enemy down.

I’ve toyed with the idea of going all bombers and destroyers as the US, but it definitely leaves your convoy escort fleet feeling a lot weaker, despite the extra “HP” worth of destroyers (relative to the same cost for a carrier + planes.) I do find the bombers come in handy for neutralizing Germany’s income and production, but also just for their movement; being able to get into theatre on the 2nd turn after being purchased is very valuable.

I’m kind of an old skool, Classic-ish grognard; I’ve been poking around with the Europe 1940 game (in TripleA, against the ai) mainly as the Allies, but a little bit as Italy.

I guess my question is, which units should each country purchase?

For example, I’ve found that the UK can make use of subs against Italy’s surface fleet (although I guess I’m a n00b for not just YOLO’ing and blowing them up with all of the UK’s planes, on rd1.) But generally, it seems like no one should really want/need to build any navy other than destroyers, transports, and carriers (with aircraft to go on them). Destroyers just do everything…

Is there any sense in bringing along extra carriers, i.e. more than just enough to hold your planes, in case one gets sunk? Why are carriers 2-hit anyway, if they’re effectively useless after the first hit? Are there any good spots to put down new airfields, or is scrambling underused in the Europe map, and really only applies to the Pacific?

I don’t find artillery all that helpful; if you’re the US for example, you have the cash to build tanks, and if your intention is just to send as much stuff as possible to the USSR, then you want units that can race across North Africa quicker. I think for poorer countries, artillery makes sense but even as Italy I tend to go all infantry, and as USSR I maybe crank out 1 artillery per round; if you can get your income up, tanks seem way more helpful for counter-attacking in and around Novosibirsk, while using your planes to clean up along the main front line.

What circumstances do people use mech. infantry in? Honestly, I rarely buy it other than to place at an Allied factory in Persia, Norway, or similar/nearby territories (Greece, Turkey, Finland). I particularly can’t justify putting one on a transport, instead of a tank (or even possibly an artillery.) I’ve heard that it’s a good unit for the Axis, on defense…

I guess I just feel like there’s a lot of chrome/cruft to this version of A&A, and I believe it could improve by being stripped down a little.

Opening Purchases for Western Europe / Overall Strategies

I’ve been thinking about this topic a bit, and have used a few different options in recent games, so I decided to lay things out.

Starting with 32 IPCs, here are your basic options:

• 10 inf [save 2]
• 9 inf, 1 arm
• 8 inf, 1 trn
• 7 inf, 1 spy [save 1]
• 4 inf, 4 arm

Spying Game (7 inf, 1 spy [save 1])
Generally the reason to buy a spy as Western Europe, is to essentially give the NATO team one more bullet in the cylinder, in terms of countering whatever they presume the Soviet spies are trying to do – whether that be counter-intel, influencing China, or trying to get minor neutrals on-side to beef up Soviet attacks (particularly in Europe). Now, this last one is, IMO, the worst use for the WE spy in particular.

Think of it this way: if WE gains Spain, that essentially means they get enough IPCs to place 1 more infantry, per round; if the US or UK gets Spain, that means they can place 3 more infantry directly onto the continent – never mind adding an industrial complex, if they so choose. I could potentially see WE influencing spaces like Thailand or Ethiopia in order to give a tiny, safe income boost and to better facilitate the movement of UK troops towards India, but those still wouldn’t be my first choice on a spying success, as WE.

The other issue is that once that spy gets killed, WE doesn’t really have the means to replace it; after rd1, you’re generally only putting out 7-8 infantry per turn, and I feel like placing 3 less than that to replace a killed spy just isn’t worth it. YMMV.

Mare Nostrum (8 inf, 1 trn)
My opinion is that you can play WE in two broad ways: as France, or as Italy. (If there’s a 3rd option, it’s basically “playing as Indochina” and supporting the UK in India – more on that later.)

Playing as Italy essentially means trying to dominate the Mediterranean – in close co-operation with the UK. You want your infantry in Italy for defense, but also so you can amphibiously assault Greece or Turkey, using a shuck-shuck. If you move your transport from Indochina to Pakistan on rd1, it can then reach the Cyprus SZ on rd2, potentially adding 2 inf from Indochina to an amphibious assault into Turkey, coming from the other direction; if the USSR attacked/influenced Iran, you can also fly your fighter from Indochina over, to add to the attack.

With 4 transports in the Mediterranean, WE can pack quite a punch – and because they own Greece and Turkey, liberating these territories themselves means more cash on hand. It’s also worth mentioning that, as a 4-IPC territory with an industrial complex, Italy can put out 8 infantry every round (enough to fill 4 transports) as long as you have the cash to do it. (Worth noting, if you are only down Norway, West Germany, and Greece, your income will be 24 – exactly enough for 8 infantry. This is why liberating Turkey can be so potentially lucrative, in addition to opening new lanes of advance.)

The reason to not go this route is if the USSR positions planes close to the Mediterranean, at the end of their first turn. In this case, it’s my preference to scatter the fleets out of range of Soviet planes; the riskier alternative is to send the lone WE sub with the planes from France to try and take out the Black Sea fleet (the fighter having to land on the UK carrier, afterwards.)

If you choose to gather all of NATO’s navy around the Algeria SZ or Italy SZ to beef up your defense against a Soviet naval attack, the problem is that either your transport from Portugal will be out of position, or the UK carrier won’t be positioned to help with the Turkey attack – meaning on WE2 you might have to settle for attacking Greece, or not attacking in the Mediterranean at all.

Spend it All! (9 inf, 1 arm)
As the name implies, the reason to go this route is that it allows you to spend all of your money. The tank gives you a little extra offense on land; ultimately, what you need to quickly determine is whether your tanks should be in Italy or in France, to counter-attack Yugoslavia or West Germany, respectively. If the Soviets have a bad S1, they may be weak enough in West Germany to be counter-attacked right away, but generally Yugoslavia will be the easier target on WE1. However, because of its central location, often the USSR will opt to drop their stack down in Yugoslavia after the first round, so WE needs to make sure their tanks are positioned where they can actually strike back, long term.

Armor Doctrine (4 inf, 4 arm)
Since WE is generally not ever going to be richer than they are at the start of the game, WE1 is when you need to make your expensive purchases – if at all.

Going with this option essentially gives you 2 less units on defense than if you go with all infantry, but the offensive power can be particularly potent against a weak West Germany position for the Soviets. Ultimately, the trick is to inflict as many casualties in as few rounds of combat as possible, and to spare as many of your own infantry from your attacks as you can manage. That’s how you gain the economic advantage in this dead-zone management microcosm. Now, you could position your armor and infantry in Italy (particularly in a strategy where the US and UK are bankrolling France’s defense) but overall I view this strategy more as a “playing as France” type of move.

The other consideration when playing as France, is what is your secondary target (if your primary target is West Germany)? Two distinct options present themselves:

• Greece
• Norway

Now, either territory can easily be within shuck-shuck range of France (either in the Mediterranean, or in the North Sea / Barents Sea, respectively) however, a fighter stationed in France is more easily able to hit Norway, and return back to France for defense – which is why I would recommend this tact, when playing as France. In either case, you will need to coordinate naval coverage with your allies, so make sure to take that into consideration. Also, a single US transport can feed 2 infantry from Iceland into Norway every round, in addition to any support the UK can quickly provide, from their capitol.

Read and React (10 inf [save 2])
Obviously, this is the generalist approach. I would argue that if you plan to support the UK in India by placing 2 (or even 1) infantry in Indochina, this is probably the build you’re going to use – not to say that you couldn’t use one of the other high-inf options. With that in mind, you can also use this build if you’re just going to focus on defending Europe; maybe the Soviets don’t give you a good read one way or the other, but you know (for example) that you don’t want to drop down an extra transport because there are too many planes circling around.

If you are going for an India focus as WE, my suggestion is to use your transports to immediately route your tanks through Africa. From Algeria to Sudan is 2 spaces, so with the right planning and maneuvering of transports, you can get a tank from France to Pakistan or India by WE3. Sending the starting tanks from both Italy and France (plus getting the infantry from Africa over to Pakistan) will keep your transports occupied for a while.

As such, you need to decide what you’re going to do with your transports afterwards: are you going to pivot to “playing as Italy”, or do you want to use Mozambique and Madagascar to shuck 2 additional infantry to Pakistan every round? You’ll need to have a good read of the map, and know what options will work for you. (Alternatively, if you went the “Spend it All!” route, shipping a 3rd tank over might give you an extra round to decide on your next move.)

One thing I like to do when I focus on assisting India as WE, is to send the bomber (with a paratrooper) to Pakistan on WE1; you can then send the bomber to New Guinea on WE2, and bring the infantry from there, as a paratrooper back to Pakistan (or India) on WE3. This might not be the best use of your bomber (so feel free to do something more aggressive, if the opportunity arises) but it does free up your transport from trying to pick up that lone infantry, FWIW.

What sorts of elements would you want to include, from Diplomacy in particular, but just in general?

@HHFrenchRepublic12
The conceit in “East & West” is that minor powers just bond to a major power, once they become active in the war. So, what I had suggested was that France would become part of Western Europe, and the Arab League would become part of the UK, if/when they’re at war with the USSR.
It just keeps things a lot cleaner, in terms of not having to reinvent the turn order, and other stuff which might add overhead.

I had been kinda workshopping the same idea, over in this thread (strictly using the Europe 1940 map, rather than Global)
https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/39450/brainstorming-east-west-cold-war-scenario-for-europe-1940/1

@General-Day
re: Napoleon’s Imperium
I heard of it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=965bToMUps4

Uses d10 instead of d6; from what I recall it probably could have utilized that a little better (not a lot of variance in terms of att/def values on units) but it’s a standard A&A-type dice-chucker, with fixed alliances.

Ever heard of the Game Napoleon’s Imperium?

One adjunct to this strategy that I would like to mention is the notion of what I generally refer to as “double duty”

What I mean by this, is getting maximum defensive value out of your units, while also having them in a position to be an offensive threat.

For example, WE infantry placed in Italy serve the purpose of defending a frontline territory when it is not their turn, but can also be used to attack amphibiously around the Mediterranean when it is their turn.

Compare this with a strategy such as WE placing infantry in Madagascar and Mozambique, to shuttle into Pakistan; the territories these units are being placed in generally aren’t under threat, and therefore are not getting that immediate defensive value.