Sorry, what’s a CV?
Posts made by Speusippus
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RE: I've no clue what to do with UK in first round
I once played against a UK who waited three rounds before he even bought anything. I now understand he did this so he could lay down a massive navy all at once.
Well, what is going to be left for G to attack SZ2, the safest place to put your fleet in?
As LMD said, normally (if he did mot lose any planes against the UK BB on G1): 2 SUB, 1FTR, 1BMB (the G DD will have been destroyed by either UK or US planes).In a game I’m playing right now, he’s got three subs, two bombers and a fighter ready to go against SZ2. I don’t recall whether this is usual, but I do recall having this same feeling of “well crap, UK simply can’t build a fleet anywhere” in every game I’ve played lately.
He could have more, but then he’s crippling his G1 attacks, and crippling his options for G2.
I probably just don’t have enough experience to know how to take advantage of this. I guess you guys are saying that the bomber he bought is going to be a problem for him in the East?
That being said, even if you have to wait until UK to put your fleet down, you’r not losing a lot.
Why? Because you don’t have anything to do with that fleet without any Transports (TRN). You might have 1 TRN in SZ1, but that’s it. You could land in Norway, but it’ll be destroyed anyway (it’s worth it if you can capture Norway). You could also just send it to SZ 8 on UK2.
On UK2, you can lay down your fleet in SZ8, where it’ll be joined by US 1 CRU and 1DD. At that point, G will have to pull all of its planes back to W EU. to threaten you. If it does so, don’t worry, that means the Russians are having a field day… Just build an additionnal DD with UK and you’ll be fine.
So buying nothing in R1 is viable? Or are you saying buy something else in R1 then buy a fleet in R2 to be reinforced by the US?
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RE: I've no clue what to do with UK in first round
In a game I’m playing right now, G has a fighter and bomber on Norway, a sub in sea zone 2, two subs in sea zone 7, and a Bomber in Germany.
(Also two fighters in Western Europe, so SZ8 is covered as well.)
That’s in round just after Germany’s move.
Is there something I can put in SZ2 that can’t get killed by all that? It’s 17 attack points, 6 pips.
If I’m doing the math right the best I can do is a carrier (land the two fighters on it*) and two destroyers. But that’s not enough–not even close.
To be clear: as is usual, UK has no navy whatsoever at this point other than a transport off the Canadian coast.
*Is this legal? I haven’t been sure. Gametableonline’s A&A 1942 allows it, but I know they had to play a little lose with fighter landing rules because of some earlier bugs. I THINK it’s legal because the rule is I have to be able to show how my fighters could land before the end of my turn. If I put my two fighters in SZ2, I can show it’s possible for them to land before the end of my turn by pointing to my bought carrier and saying “I can put that under them during my new unit placement phase.” If it’s not legal, then things are even worse for UK!
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I've no clue what to do with UK in first round
Germany is able to completely shut out the UK’s ability to build a navy. Sure I can put boats out there, but no matter where I put them Germany will have enough planes and subs to take them out.
How is the UK supposed to do anything?
Factories in Africa or Australia seem like desperation manouvers at best.
I once played against a UK who waited three rounds before he even bought anything. I now understand he did this so he could lay down a massive navy all at once. But this is a gimmick, not a strategy (isn’t it?) since a Germany who understands what is going on will match the unbought forces with bought forces of his own, ready to go once UK lays them down.
What is UK supposed to do in R1?
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How do you keep your pieces organized?
How do you guys keep your pieces organized?
I just bought A&A 1942 and now I see that each nation’s pieces are just mixed together in bag–nothing with compartments to separate battleships from destroyers from infantry etc.
Do you guys just keep everything mixed together, or have you come up with some means by which to keep the different unit types separate?
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I'm Selling My 2nd Ed Set
I’m having an aggravating time setting up an ebay account–apparently I already set one up a long time ago and ebay and paypal are having issues interfacing around my identity because of this fact.
While that’s going on, I thought I’d give it a go here.
For Sale: One Milton Bradley Axis and Allies Classic 2nd Edition game, almost complete, in box.
“Almost” complete because it’s known to be missing:
The German setup card (which happens to be identical to the setup printed out in the manual so this causes no real problem)
One Japanese BattleshipAll ICs and Artillery are intact. If there are other pieces missing, I am not aware of it. I don’t think there are any other missing pieces, but if a prospective buyer wants me to count it out, and can tell me how many of everything there is supposed to be, I can do that.
If you think you may be interested, please PM me with an offer.
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RE: Does anyone still use paper money (ipc's)?
Does a monopoly game have enought 10s 5s 1s and 20s to work for A&A?
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RE: Russia Round One–How to justify anything but inf?
Thanks for the advice so far.
I always play low-luck. Does this affect your Russia strategy?
Does low luck simulate the average normal dice roll pretty well? Or does it tend to skew in a particular direction relative to the average dice roll?
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RE: Russia Round One–How to justify anything but inf?
Hrm… I’ll do my best to try this again in my next game, but it seems like I just get steamrolled if I do anything but pump infantry to the front… Russia doesn’t have any money.
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Russia Round One–How to justify anything but inf?
If Germany pursues an Eastern advance from turn one with any seriousness, then I can’t see how it’s possible for Russia to do anything but buy inf only from round 1 til Germany stops being able to effectively attack. But is this not the consensus? If not, why not?
It seems to me that if Germany begins with pressure against Russia and keeps it up, then the US and Britain can’t really get an invasion force up fast enough to make much of a difference to Russia’s chances in the east of Europe. Russia must simply defend against Germany’s advance, and the best unit for the job is infantry.
This is especially so if Japan is pursuing naval dominance in the Pacific, as the US must then divert resources to her West, making an invasion of Germany take even longer. Germany’s advance on Russia, ISTM, makes a Russian attack on a Japan infeasible.
But how little am I showing I know?
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RE: How to know when to buy air as Germany
Isn’t 80 inf plus 30 art worth 360 IPCs, not 310 IPCs?
ETA: I see they all total 360–probably 310 was just a typo neh?
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RE: How to know when to buy air as Germany
Not all players have the same vocab for these factors.
I learned this stuff from the Caspian Sub Papers and for them the relevant terms were 1) count (total number of units involved a battle) 2) punch (total attk or def values) and scew (the degree to which the odds in a battle are likely to change over the course of a battle). For example, if I attack 2 bbs 1 dd with 4 figs, then the attacker has 4 count, 12 punch and the defender 5 count, 10 punch. The punch favors the attacker, but the count and the scew favor the defender (the scew is favorable because with average rolls the defender will acquire a punch advan by the 2nd round). Overall, the defender is more likely to win.
1:1:1 is not optimal, even on offense.
Let’s say you’ve got 4 inf 4 art 4 arm (48) up against 16 inf (48 ipc). Attacker only wins 14.6%.
I can get 7 inf 3 art 3 arm for the same price. Not as many attack units, 3 less punch, but the scew and count are more favorable. With this combo, my odds increase to 16.5%.
Not a huuuggee difference but a palpable one…bottom line is either 2:1 or 3:1 inf/art is closer to optimal efficiency than 1:1 on offense, and on defense there’s no contest which is better.
Scew! That’s what I’m missing!
Thanks for explaining this to me.
In my previous message, I’d had a confused passage where I said probably my system doesn’t work in all cases because the distribution of attack points over “hit points” changes as the course of the battle changes. I wasn’t sure what I was trying to say there so I deleted it. But now I ssee what I needed to understand was the concept of scew.
Things are getting better. ;) Thanks again for your replies in this thread.
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RE: How to know when to buy air as Germany
Thanks, your posts are making a lot of sense to me.
I was figuring out ratios in a way that presupposes (though I didn’t mean to presuppose this) that I’ll be buying the units and then be immediately placing them into a battle. In that case, as far as I can tell, 1:1:1 is very nearly optimal. (Maximizes the sum of hit points and attack power, anyway.) But in the game, of course, your units move at different speeds and this means you need to load your front with infantry to buy you time to bring an optimal amount of armor (and perhaps artillery) to the front when it’s time to attack.
As for where my math came from, if you’re just trying to determine how two standing armies compare against each other in a single battle, I think you should look at both their “hitpoints” and their “attack value.” Hit points I determine simply by totalling up the number of successful hits it would take to destroy an army. (2 infantry would have 2 hitpoints. A battleship and a destroyer would have three hitpoints.) Attack value I determine by adding up all of the individual units’ successful attack die requirements. Infantry on attack has 1 attack value. Armor has 3 attack value on both attack and defense. Etc. It seems to me that the armor with the greatest total of attack value and hitpoints is the one most likely to win the battle. (Defining winning here as completely destroying the opposing army no matter the cost–which of course is not always what you want in an actual round of play!) I’m not completely certain of this, though. But it’s how it seems to me at the moment.
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RE: How to know when to buy air as Germany
Thanks for the advice–I can see that you might want planes because they are a double threat (and you might want all tanks because of their movement speed).
Regarding optimal ratios, everything’s situational of course, I was just saying the 1:1:1 ratio is what I generally shoot for when I’m advancing my troops forward.
Your ratio (6:1:2.5) gives 9.5 hit points with an attack value of 16.5. My ratio (1:1:1) gives 8.7 hit points with an attack value of 20.8 for the same amount of IPC. Vs my ratio, yours gives 4/5 more hitpoints at the cost of about 2/3 of a kill. It depends on what you’re trying to accomplish exactly, and I’m not sure how to weigh hit points against attack value in general, but I don’t think either of those is clearly any more optimal than the other. I guess against smaller armies with more powerful units (fighter heavy for example) 6:1:2.5 might be a little better, while 1:1:1 might be a little better against larger army with weaker units (infantry heavy for example)?
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RE: Collaboration between players
I can’t see what could possibly be wrong with discussing strategy in detail with your partners while playing. What would be the objection to this?
Indeed, years ago when I used to play this game much more often, it was pretty common for all five players to discuss strategy for all five nations. We were teams competeing against each other–but in a sense we were also just trying to come up with the best game possible. So even if I was playing as Germany, the guy playing Russia might butt in while I’m talking to Japan to say “but if you do that, the UK might do such-and-such!” :D
On the opposite extreme, I can imagine some serious players retiring from the room between turns to discuss strategy in secret. Can’t see anything wrong with that either.
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How to know when to buy air as Germany
I am seeing a lot of references to buying some air units in turn one as Germany.
I am always afraid to buy anything but equal numbers of tanks, infantry and artillery. (Which I think I’ve figured out is the best ratio to get if you’re just thinking about advancing over land with land units–most attack and “hit points” for the buck.)
How does one know when it’s okay to forego a bit of your basic ground attack stuff to get a fighter or a bomber or two?
Yes, my name is Speusippus and I am Completely New To This Game.