Posts made by Unknown Soldier

2 ftr, 4 bmr v. 2 dd, 1 ca, 1 cv, 2 ftr –> attacker wins 69.1%

Americans mop up if the dice don’t break UK’s way.

If instead of the DDs Germany buys a second carrier G2 and lands it fighters there, there’s an 85.3% chance that Germany will have AT MOST 3 units remaining after the UK attack. If you keep fighters, the TPs die and the threat has been eliminated. If you choose to keep naval units, the US kills them on US2. Again, threat eliminated.

So the additional naval builds don’t really help Germany’s cause, and now they’ve wasted 2 turns on the eastern front instead of 1.

Wow thanks! Very handy little program.

Any other thoughts on a South Africa IC?

I agree that this is probably the only viable IC if you’re playing experienced players, for the reasons you point out. Honestly I have no idea how people are building Indian ICs, for example. This just simply cannot work if Japan has any clue. The Australian IC could be viable in some games, depending on the J1 opening moves. 2 figs and a bmr from the US reinforce, and the DD in sz41 blocks the transports in the Philippines sz from hitting on J2, giving you time to build and get a couple more fighters down there. The problem is, it’s really not all that useful even if you can hold it. Unlike the Indian IC, you can’t really threaten Japanese territory by building tanks, and Japan can simply ignore you for the most part if they want, whereas they CANNOT ignore an IC in India.

I’ve only seen the S. Africa IC a couple times, but in both cases Italy eventually overwhelmed it. You really need US help in Africa immediately if your going to do it, I think.

G1: Build 1 Carrier and [3 Tanks] or [1 Cruiser, 1 Tank] or [2 Destroyers]

UK1: build 3 bombers

G2: Build 6 Transports and an Infantry

UK2: buy 8 tech rolls

You can afford to waste your money now since the German navy is dead and the Soviets will own Berlin in a few turns  :-D

J1: Build 1 Fighter, 1 Transport

US1: buy 13 infantry

Laugh as the Japs try to outproduce you with their 17 IPCs.

Wodan, your navy will be annihilated by the end of round 2. End of story. If you disagree, please explain how you plan keep your navy when any UK player worth his salt will buy bombers on UK1 and blow it out of the water before it can do anything.

As for the Karelia bit, the Soviets simply retreat from there and dead-zone it on their first turn. If you move your big stack of German in, it gets strafed to the ground and the Soviets can relax because you blew your infantry wad, with no reinforcements in sight because you bought all navy G1. If you take Karelia light, you will end up trading it back and forth each turn, making no forward progress since you won’t have the ground units to hold it, because again… :drum-roll:… you bought navy instead of those would-be ground units.

The end result is that Germany stalls out early, and the Allies have an easy victory in Europe.

Yeah, I don’t see how the rules are ambiguous here. ICs can’t be destroyed, and China doesn’t collect income and so can never use the IC.

Seems pretty clear that the IC would remain in the territory but would be unusable to China.

@bbrett3:

but can’t you just as well"assume" that one of the fighters will be shot down?

Every fighter has to have a way to land, whether you think it will be shot down or not. If you can’t come up with a way for it to land, it can’t attack.

Pretty simple really.

My ships can enter any adjacent seazone I choose right?

Correct.

Can I sortee more US fighters than I could feasibly land on my two Aircraft carriers, thinking, I may lose some in the fray, or even choose to take some hits with them?

No. There must be some possible way for EACH fighter to land. Even if it is rather unlikely that a fighter would be able to land, that’s fine, it just has to be possible.

For example, in the scenario you describe you could attack the island of Japan with, say, 2 fighters, planning to land them on a carrier moving into sz62 (sea of Japan). Even if Japan has 10 battleships sitting there, you are allowed to assume the lone carrier will win the battle so that the fighters have a place to land, even though this scenario is extremely unlikely. The fighter mission is effectively a suicide run, since you “know” the carrier will not survive, but its not against the rules since its at least possible (in terms of the rules) for it to be there in the non-combat phase.

It would not be permissible, however, to send a third fighter to attack Japan, since there is no possible way that fighter could land, regardless of what happens during combat.

So you’re hitting Philippines with 1 TP only??

Is AA50 a further development of AAR?

You could say that, sure.

Is AAR outdated now?

Yes.

Why to play AAR rather than AA50?

I don’t know why anyone would play AAR if they could play AA50 instead.

Is AA50 the “better” AAR then?

Most definitely, yes.

What happens to the Kriegsmarine when the US shows up with a nice stack of bombers out of England on turn 4 or so?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iy_72yGCuwI&feature=related

And turn 4 is quite optimistic for the Germans. I’d be surprised if they still had a navy on their 3rd turn.

If you can kill Britain with 3 Infantry/Tanks, a Cruiser, and your Airforce, DO IT.

Well, only an idiot would leave Britain undefended after Germany buys 2 TPs. Just with starting units, you’d be looking at 2 inf, 1 art, 2 arm, 4 ftr (2 from US), 3 bmr (2 from US), which already has odds to win even if somehow all German aircraft are within range of attack (which they won’t be if you’re hitting sz12 AND sz2 on G1). That’s without a UK build.

My guess is that the UK will simply build something like 2 inf, 3 bmr on UK1 so your fleet is dead on their next turn, or failing that, on US2.

And you can forget about running over the Soviets like you describe if your buying that much navy.

Japan has 5 Transports.  Why would they need more?  They’d be better off buying 3 Infantry and 2 Artillery, so that they have more stuff to land next turn.  Also, Japan already has enough ground units to take Eurasia if it is using its air support properly.  They should attack East Asia with 12 Infantry and an Artillery, and hitting Philipines, Borneo, and East Indies with 2 more Infantry apiece, of which the Borneo and East Indies drops can be transported to India or Australia the following turn, while the surviving Infantry in the Philipines can take New Guinea.

Why do they need more? You answered your own question. They need the additional TPs because the ones they start with will be in the south pacific, not in the sea of Japan shuttling your unit purchases to asia. 5 TPs just isn’t enough to do everything quickly enough. In fact, I’ve bought an 8th TP in many games, which allows you to set up a 4x4 chain to Alaska once the south pacific TPs return home.

At the end of J1, you should have 3 inf on Japan plus either the starting artillery unit. So you drop 2 more TPs and an inf, now you can move all 5 units on Japan plus the Iwo Jima inf with the help of only 1 starting TP (which is probably in sz61). The other 4 TPs will be in use elsewhere. With an all tech buy on J1, these extra units don’t get to asia next turn, since you won’t have the capacity to move them on J2.

Buying 3 inf, 2 art on J1 would be pretty pointless, since they’d just be sitting idle on Japan doing nothing because you can’t get them into Asia for the reasons already mentioned.

Thanks, I would be interested in the list of changes you made.

I’ll post my complete setup in the House Rules section once I’m satisfied with it. I’m still testing it for now. As you said, it’s very similar to what you have done in the Pacific, but Europe is a bit different. The main difference is that I gave Germany control of East Poland and Baltic States, so the game starts a few months into Barbarossa (late summer or so), while the German still had momentum.

The Axis SHOULD be winning more than the Allies right now imo. Axis playout is much more linear (relative to the Allies), and requires much less coordination. The best Allied strats simply take longer to “figure out” than the Axis ones. In time, the Allies will no doubt look stronger. I’d be worried about play balance if the Allies were already winning 50% of matches.

As for the original question, we’re seeing about 60-70% Axis wins in my group (I didn’t record the exact numbers). Playing with tech and NO’s, of course. The Allies are steadily getting better, however, as we’re discovering how to properly coordinate them. I suspect it will be very close to 50/50 once the Allied playout has been further optimized.

@Heavy:

Actually in that game, it all started with a Russian AA Gun in Round 4 with 100% accuracy against about a dozen German aircraft resulting in a loss for Germany in Moscow

whaaat?!?! :-o  get the front door…you rolled twelve ones? that is incredible!! that is pure luck and will never happen again in your lifetime!! :wink:

LOL. All 12 were 1’s huh? Riiight…  :roll:

That’s about a 1 in 46 BILLION chance. For reference, the odds of getting struck by lightning is only about 1 in 576,000. So, uh, don’t go golfing in the rain I guess.

Interesting idea, wodan.

The thing is, I’m not sure this would be better than the 2 trans, 1 inf buy or even a first turn IC in Manchuria. Japan needs to get boots on the ground quickly to expand its income base, and buying all tech J1 does not achieve this. You’re sacrificing speed to get a tech a turn or two earlier, a tech which may or may not be immediately useful. Its not like you can’t buy tech on J2 or J3.

ok, don’t arrive to 66% (more like 40%, right?)

No, he’s correct. It’s about 66% that you will have a tech after rolling on J2 if you buy 3 tokens on J1 (and none on J2).

It’s about 42% to get one at the start of J1.

Hey Bluestroke, that link doesn’t appear to take me to the right page…  :? I can’t find the files you’re talking about.

I’m interested to see what you’ve come up with, as I’ve been working on my own alternative setup as well. It seems to me that, in the official 1941 setup, the European and Pacific theaters seem to be out-of-sinc with each other by about 6 months.

For example, the Germans launched Operation Barbarossa in June 1941 (this is supposed to happen on G1), but then in the same round in the Pacific Japan launches its attack on Pearl Harbor, which of course didn’t happen until December. So it seems to me that the Germans should be well into Barbarossa on their first turn, at a minimum.

What I’ve done is update the Eastern Front to reflect this, giving the game a starting date somewhere in the late summer/early fall of 1941 instead of spring. I’ve also fixed some big annoyances, like the lack of a  German BB in the Baltic, no subs in the Pacific, China’s impotence, etc. There are some other minor tweaks here and there, of course. The overall idea is to slow Japan’s expansion slightly to counterbalance Germany’s stronger position. I’m still playtesting it, but the results thus far have been promising. There also seems to be many more viable openings for each power with my setup, especially for the Japs and the Brits, but perhaps this is simply a consequence of not having played it enough (yet).

If other people are interested in trying it out, I can post the complete list of changes.