Posts made by Zombie69

Battleships have always been an unattractive buy in all versions of the game.

However, when I first read the rules of this edition, the first thing that struck me was that cruisers should cost 10, not 12 IPCs. As it stands now, for 24 IPCs you can get 2 cruisers or 3 destroyers. They have the same total attack and defense, but the destroyers give you one more unit and also help against subs. The only thing cruisers have going for them is coastal bombardment to help with amphibious assaults, but even that is better accomplished with a carrier and two fighters, since fighters will come into play during every combat round of the amphibious assault, while cruisers can only fire during the initial round.

The way things stand, the only reason to ever buy a cruiser is when you have precisely 12 IPCs to spend and need all the anti-air defense you can get (for anti-ship defense, two subs will do a better job for the same price). That’s so limited, it makes the mere presence of the option redundant and cruisers might as well just be taken out of the game without much impact (other than the starting ones). At 10 IPCs, they’d be much more common and the question of whether to buy them or go for destroyers would be much more interesting.

I don’t hate it. In fact, it’s my favorite A&A!

I looked at it again and Germany can actually defend everything with just a carrier. Here’s how. Attack SZ17 with 2 fighters (landed on the carrier), attack SZ 14 with 1 fighter and 1 bomber, use your subs as you normally would, use the other 2 fighters to attack SZ 7 as usual. Transport 2 ground units to Libya. This leaves you with 1 battleship, 1 carrier, 2 fighters and 1 transport defending against 1 sub, 2 fighters and 1 bomber. You’ll win that battle 86% of the time. You’ll probably lose one fighter in one of the two battles to clear out the Med but everything else stays intact, while spending only 14 IPCs. I’m still not sure that’s the best option for Germany and it’s still not great, but it’s out there at least.

Consider that if there’s no sub bid, Germany still has tough choices for its Med fleet:
1. Attack Egypt at low odds, if no bid placed on it and no Russian fighter landed there, but at low odds and if it fails, the fleet gets destroyed.
2. Take Gibraltar, attack the destroyer with the bomber (with a 3 in 7 chance to lose the bomber).
3. Take Gibraltar, leave the destroyer alone, risk losing your med fleet to a bomber and a destroyer.
4. Take Gibraltar and buy a destroyer to block the opposing destroyer, lose your new destroyer to a destroyer, a bomber and a fighter (or two if Indian carrier coming to the Med).
5. Buy a carrier and do as described above.

None of these options is very appealing. Better for Germany than with the sub present, but not so much better that the sub bid seems warranted over say, 2 infantry units.

@Black_Elk:

If you bid a sub for an attack on 37 you are pretty much locked in, but with a fighter in Egypt you could decide after you see the German opening.

I have to disagree about this. A sub in SZ 37 doesn’t have to attack Japan; you can just as easily take your whole Indian fleet and bring it to the Med. You’re still able to threaten pretty much all the same theaters as with a fighter. Therefore I would definitely take a sub and a ground unit over a fighter.

And since I don’t consider a sub and a ground unit to be all that great either (I think 3 ground units are far superior, unless you really want to go KJF), then the fighter bid is out of its league against its competitors. It’s an intriguing concept (especially if placed in Egypt), but in the end it’s just not worth it.

A fighter bid is suboptimal no matter how you look at it. Take the example of the Russian fighter. Instead of bidding that, give the Russians 2 extra INF and 1 extra ART, then buy the fighter on round 1. These three units will help you more in round 1 then the fighter would, and by round 2, you’ve got the fighter either way.

The same can be said of a UK fighter. You can achieve the same result for cheaper with a sub and an INF. You’ll keep that INF for a long time, while the sub will be taken as a casualty, probably keeping a cruiser alive, and you just buy two fighters on round 1 anyway.

I’m sorry, I thought the German reply to a sub bid would be to stay near Italy, but I looked again at the map and that would spell certain doom, even if the two UK boats get sunk by planes. So yeah, that sub is a real pain. Now I see only 3 ways to reply to it:
1. Lose the med fleet, lose Africa and concentrate on Russia.
2. Buy a destroyer and a carrier.
3. Attack Gibraltar and buy a destroyer to block the sub and destroyer.

None of them is very appealing, so yeah, the sub bid is pretty annoying.

I don’t see how that’s the case. The way I see it, with all the air power at Germany’s disposal, the UK can’t get anywhere near the Med fleet with anything other than subs (which can be kept away with a single destroyer) or planes (which will require a big investment and many turns to set up). I can see the one sub on the bid making quite a difference early on, but I wouldn’t consider the Med fleet threatened, just paralyzed early on (which is already a big plus for the UK, mind you).

I see the point of the Egypt fighter (defending Egypt AND helping crush the Japanese fleet) but I still think that it’s not optimal. Given a 10-IPC bid with Allies, I would either get a sub for KJF plus an artillery in Caucasus, or spread it out with an ART in Caucasus, an INF in Egypt and an INF either in China (to defend the American fighter) or in Moscow (for a better attack on West Russia). Because of this, I don’t see that much of a difference between 9, 10 or 11 for the bid. In either case, it’s 3 units on the ground.

As the Allies, I would love to see Germany go for Trans-Jordan and successfully take it, because that would allow me to easily take out the battleship and transport using a fighter from Egypt, a fighter from the Indian Ocean and a bomber from the UK. Because of this, defending Trans-Jordan with Russia isn’t only pointless, it’s counterproductive.

South Africa is the same distance from Egypt as it was in Revised. Alaska is actually in a better position: it can reach both Japanese sea zones in one turn, while in Revised it could only reach one. Brazil can still reach all the African territories that it could before, the only difference being too far away from France (but why go through Brazil to go to France anyway?). East Indies is the same distance as before and can actually reach more territories, because of the division of the East Asian coast.

I agree with making industrial complexes cost 12, but this has nothing to do with SBR and doesn’t protect against it since the new complex could be bombed just as well as the original ones.

@Baron:

From what you tell is within 1942.2 SBR rules, so if someone try to play 1942 according to SBR rules from G40 (like in triple AAA version of 1942.2), wouldn’t it be unbalance for defender because all fighters defense is halfed: D2 becomes D1?

No, because in 1942.2, planes hit by the attacker don’t fire back. This doesn’t completely compensate for the defense of 2, but it does make an impact.

In G40, do attacking bombers also get to fire? If not, then that’s a huge difference.

@Baron:

Another question:
Where those numbers are coming from?

USA could bomb 26 IPCs worth every turn, crippling the Germans. They could also bomb 16 IPCs worth every turn against Japan.

The rules say that you can bomb an industrial complex up to the point where it has received as much damage as twice its IPC value. If the industrial complexes in Germany and Italy are both in perfect condition before you bo for SBR, you can do 20 damage on the Germany complex and 6 damage on the Italy complex. If Germany wants to produce 13 units, they’ll need to spend 26 IPCs to repair them. If they don’t mind too much producing only 10, then they only need to spend 20 on the complex in Germany. If that’s the case, then you can only bomb 20 IPCs worth per turn, which is still quite considerable.

The Japanese industrial complex is worth 8 IPCs and so can be bombed for 16 IPCs per turn, which Japan is likely to repair because it’s their only complex and they need to produce as much stuff as possible.

If safe landing zone for fighters is a problem, don’t buy a carrier, just don’t send any fighter. You’ll lose 2 more IPCs worth of planes (12 vs 10) for every 3 defending planes that didn’t get shot down. For 3 bombers vs 2 fighters, that means losing 1 more IPC per raid on average, but it also means bombing an extra 1.4 IPC worth of stuff per turn (since you only get a bomber shot down by a fighter every second turn). So in that situation, it’s actually even more advantageous to send only bombers.

I’m not saying that the SBR rules are broken with the interceptor rules added. I think they’re perfectly balanced with those added in, and they also add a lot of choices for the defender, meaning more strategy. However, without interceptors, I do believe SBR would be overpowered. USA could just buy nothing but bombers all game and there’s nothing Germany could do about it. USA could bomb 26 IPCs worth every turn, crippling the Germans. They could also bomb 16 IPCs worth every turn against Japan. This is both highly effective and very boring. The interceptor rules prevent that and make the game much more interesting.

9 battleships would kill on average 6 infantry. By buying 5 infantry, you’d be a man down compared to buying 2 destroyers, however you’d have 5 more infantry shooting in the first round, so your opponent would likely be 2 men down himself by round 2. So even against 9 battleships, you’re better off buying infantry.

You’re just proving my point. If I send 5 bombers and 1 fighter against 4 fighters, or 2 bombers and 1 fighter against 2 fighters, and the defender chooses not to intercept, then all the interceptor rule did was force me to send one fighter with my bombers (and force the defender to keep fighters at home, otherwise I’m not even sending my fighter). The SBR still remains a good option, with every bomber sent costing you on average 2 IPCs (i.e. a 1 in 6 chance of losing 12 IPCs) while doing on average 2.9 IPCs of damage (i.e. 5/6 of surviving and then rolling 3.5 on average).

Especially for a rich nation that has trouble getting its money into the action (e.g. USA) against a nation right in the thick of it (e.g. Germany), that trade is highly advantageous for the attacker.

You don’t need to send that much. As per the rules, bombers are used both in the air to air combat phase and in the bombing phase. So to counter 2 fighters, all you need is 2 bombers and 1 fighter.

For example, against 4 fighters, you bring in 5 bombers and 1 fighter. With 6 planes, you hit one defending fighter. With 3 planes left, the defender shoots down your fighter. Then the anti-aircraft fires, probably shooting down one of your 5 bombers. The remaining 4 bombers survive and do 14 damage on average. So you’ve traded fighters and lost one bomber at 12 IPCs to bomb down 14 IPCs. Totally worth it and only ties up one fighter on the attacking side.

I think it’s a cool idea, but I think an Egypt factory bid swings the game too much in favor of the Allies. I’d rather see an 8-IPC bid for the Allies personally. The factory bid idea would be nice for one game to see something different, but ultimately I think it helps the Allies so much that you would then need a 3-IPC bid for the Axis or something along those lines.

If I were given that as the Allies, I’m pretty sure I’d place it in Egypt and send a Russian fighter there on R1. With 2 extra units being added to Egypt from round 1 onwards, Germany will be hard pressed to take it. Japan will be able to, but only after a few rounds and if played well, UK will be able to retake it easily.

Sure you risk losing a bomber or a fighter, but there’s also a good chance of destroying a defending fighter. Basically, as long as you have 3 planes or more for every 2 defending planes, you’ll cause more damage on average than you’ll receive. If your planes aren’t needed anywhere else that turn, it’s a good move to SBR.

Personally, I find that SBR is overpowered without the interceptor rule (now that bombers only cost 12 IPC) and that 1942.2 interceptor rules are perfectly balanced to give the defender some options while increasing the tactical aspect of the game : do I want to keep my fighters on my industrial complex to defend it or keep them closer to the front for offensive purposes, or do a mix and then how many should I keep in each place?

Basically, with these rules it’s worth it to go for an SBR as long as you can bring 3 planes for every 2 defenders. You can go with a ratio lower than 3:2 if you really need to lower that nation’s production capacity and you don’t mind losing more money than they do (e.g. Americans bombing Germans or Japanese bombing Russians).

In our games, we play with these rules and there are still plenty of SBR going on.

I noticed, yeah. Pretty cool indeed.