The Money Grab, revisited

OK, this may be a fluke, but I just tried a variant of the “money grab” and had some amazing results.

Russia went defensive, pulled back to Yakut in the east, and strafed Ukraine and consolidated in Karelia.
Germany also went defensive in Europe, but floated an additional tranny in the med, blitzed open territories in Africa, and blew away the openning UK navy.
UK consolidated air forces in Caucuses.
Japan took Australia and China, building tranny’s for the Asia push, consolidating air forces in Manchuria.
USA built trannys and INF in Eastern US.

That was the openning… but it got WEIRD fast.

UK was NOT able to keep a fleet in the water.  They built a tranny and carrier, and US sent 1 fighter to defend (other went with carrier, carrier based fighter, and sub to blow away the Japan transport fleet, which worked:  mutual destruction) and had this second fleet blown out of the water by German Airforce.

Germany was staring down Russia between Eastern and Karelia, neither side able to make a move on the other.  But Germany was running wild in Africa.  US sent troops to assist, but Germany was able to keep sending some troops to Africa after WINNING against the UK airforces in UK2 (I think this was the linch pin:  Germany still having some med navy after destroying the RAF.)

Meanwhile Japan, faced with overwhelming defensive forces in Yakut, spread out in southern Asia, the Aussie force taking India then moving to Madagascar and South Africa, and Sinkiang falling while a nice sized force hit the beaches of Soviet Far East.  Japan’s fighters were too much to risk a Manchuria attack, and splitting up the Yakut defense to re-take SFE was NOT looking good.

The US began to harass Germany in Africa, but a sizable German force was already working into the Middle East.

The battle raged on for many turns, but the crux of it seemed to be this:
With UK being “taken out” in rounds 1 and 2, and with both Germany and Japan going after UK IPC’s, by round 3, UK simply had no income.  Even with US and Russia doing all they could to counter Germany and Japan, UK still only had 3 tranny’s by round 4, and could never build up enough of an income to increase beyond that (fill 3 tranny’s, nothing left over).

Meanwhile, Japan, despite having lost their first tranny fleet (and a Battleship) to the US incursion in US 1, was still landing forces in Asia at a prodigious rate with their subsequent fleet, supported by their AF for attack and defense.

Eventually, Germany WAS able to position a sizable force in CAUCUSES and hit Russia HARD once.  Japan, while they had few land forces, STILL had 4 fighters and their bomber (which had been bombing Russia pretty regularly to keep their IPC’s down) and was able to TAKE RUSSIA.  (the two hits were Germany 6 tanks, bomber, 3 INF on strike 1; Japan had 2 INF, 2 tanks, 4 fighters, 1 bomber for strike 2)

At this point, US was solid in Africa, had taken Western Europe, and UK had minimal forces in Norway, Eastern and Karelia.

But it did not matter.  Germany was able to build enough INF to hold on for another 2 rounds while Japan built tanks in Russia, and re-loaded tranny’s for Alaska.  Japan kicked UK out of Europe, Germany focused on the Americans and finished booting them out of France.

At this point, Axis IPC’s was 102!  I quit at this point, with major Japan forces in Western Canada, a tranny fleet of 9 heading for Western US, and 5 Japan bombers in Russia and Karelia.  Japan also had a fleet in the Carribean!

So, while I know we discussed counters to this elsewhere, I used many of the moves previously posted to counter a “money grab”, but it just did not work for the Allies.  It was touch and go for Germany the last several rounds, but with the UK being a "non-entity) at only mid-teens for IPC’s, that seemed to be the saving grace for Germany to allow Japan to kick some serious butt.

@aaFiendish:

I think you just got lucky in your game, and should be analyzing what is most likely to happen, instead of what did happen. While it is certainly important to realize worst-case scenarios, relying on a gameplan that centers around low percentage wins is not a reliable way to win.

I agree.  The odds of Germany’s Navy  surviving an all-out hit from the RAF with tranny’s is VERY slim.  Obviously that aspect cannot be counted on.

The reason I posted on it was the net-effect of the strategy (a strategy that can still be executed by other means w/o the Med Navy).

Strangling UK economically seems to be a viable option IF Japan can step up to the plate with a sufficiently strong offensive push to go along with it.

Obvious monkey wrenches to this strategy would be a very aggressive Russia which would force Germany to focus more in Europe; or the US doing more (or perhaps as someone mentioned above even LESS) against Japan.

In answer to a few of the earlier inquiries:
No Japan did NOT attack Pearl in J1.  They took Australia instead, and lost their initial tranny fleet to the US forces from Hawaii plus the Western fighter.

Germany did NOT take Egypt on G1, they blitzed open territories and took Egypt on G2 after more forces were moved to Africa.  Western US fleet went to UK.

And the actual UK/Ger naval battle was 3 figs on 1 Battleship and 2 tranny’s.  And I agree, the loss of those fighters combined with survival of German navy was a major skew (an almost 80 IPC shift).