• Ok, so now we have played 3 times (with 4 players and with the players switching out sides). And so far it looks like Japan has a tremendous advantage in the game. We’ve never actually played to a ‘real’ conclusion, but the writing was on the wall. (Honestly playing this game out to a ‘real’ win looks like it would take 10+ hours with competitive players).

    Japan simply seems to have too much disposable combat power at the beginning of the game (as well as superior position and political constraints). Unless we are missing something in the rules (quite possible given the state of the rules…), it looks like the US can do almost NOTHING to Japan that she cares about for at least the first 5-6 turns or so. Truk is a tough nut to crack with the Scramble rules and Japan itself is nearly impregnable for most of the game. That pretty much means that Japan is free to pour almost her entire combat power into crushing the Chinese and the Brits. Japan’s navy is sufficient to easily crush anything the Brits or Anzacs can manage while sparing plenty to standoff the US for quite some time.

    We just are not sold the game at this point. It seems to lack the elegance that A&A50 had and replaced it with an attritional slugfest. I just dont see how this game can be played to conclusion in a reasonable amount of time. The Victory Conditions completely throw any form ‘history’ out the window and because of that, they’ve had to artificially inflate Japan’s capabilities to ridiculous levels to allow her to actually compete against the Western Powers. I think an alternate ‘time’ victory where Japan can spread out and then stall back to survive would be preferable to this system where the Japanese are turning out masses of combat power that she never could have DREAMED of producing in reality.

    But reality aside, we really dont see too much that the Allies can do at this point. In our 2nd game, the Japanese rolled HORRIBLY (like beyond bad) and the Chinese/US player was rolling insanely well and STILL Japan won (although it was a close game due to the BS dice-rolling). In the 3rd game, Japan just played safe and steady and although the game technically wasnt over, Japan definitely had the upper hand.

    A&A50 was so well done and so refined that we feel like we must be missing something here. Then again, the production quality of A&AP40 is so lacking that I suppose it’s possible that the game just wasnt developed properly either and it’s possible that there are some glaring holes in the gameplay as well.

    So what have people managed to do with the Allies? How did you defeat Japan if you have done so? Was it luck? Was the Japanese player taking risks that burned him? Barring any of that we are pretty stumped…


  • How many rounds did you play in these 3 games?

    The Allies come back later in the game.

    Try playing with 2 people.  Splitting the Allies into three minds vs. one mind of thought puts the Allies at a disadvantage.

    Are one of the Allies getting their NO?

    What turn in Japan declaring war?


  • I dont have the game yet myself (still waiting for delivery), but looking at what I have seen and read, I think there should be a fair enough chance for the Allies to win.

    Agreed, Japan has the advantage at start with their massive fleet and airforce, but they seem to lack ground units. With a defensive posture at start for the Allies, and a USA building up slowly to a vast force, it seems to be possible to start hassling Japan from turn 3 onwards.

    I could be utterly wrong offcourse, seeing I have yet to play a game.


  • In this early stage of playing a new game, people always claim its unbalanced and biased. Remember Battle of Bulge ? First people complainet that Axis always won, but later the Allies turned out to be the strongest. If you lose, then you play it wrong.

    First of all, the Allies get a lot of bonus NO’s at the start. USA get 5 IPC as long he controls the Phillipeans, China get 6 IPC for Burma Road, UK get 5 IPC for control of Kwangtung and Malaya. And in the first turns, ANZAC will easy gain control of friendly Dutch New Guinea and gain 5 IPC in bonus, and UK will do the same with Dutch East Indies, and this is a lot of money if you dont collect it because you neglected the Rulebook.

    As the strategy is conserned, just play aggressivily and always attack when possible. USA can place bombers on Wake, Guam and Midway and always threaten lonely trannies, and send subs north to threaten Japan convoys. In fact, the Allies can do a lot. This is in fact a very balanced game, man.


  • @Razor:

    In this early stage of playing a new game, people always claim its unbalanced and biased. Remember Battle of Bulge ? First people complainet that Axis always won, but later the Allies turned out to be the strongest. If you lose, then you play it wrong.

    Good point, and this is the only part of your post I fully agree with.

    @Razor:

    First of all, the Allies get a lot of bonus NO’s at the start. USA get 5 IPC as long he controls the Phillipeans, China get 6 IPC for Burma Road, UK get 5 IPC for control of Kwangtung and Malaya. And in the first turns, ANZAC will easy gain control of friendly Dutch New Guinea and gain 5 IPC in bonus, and UK will do the same with Dutch East Indies, and this is a lot of money if you dont collect it because you neglected the Rulebook.

    Now you are talking out of your ***…. The Allies will only get the 6 IPC for the Burma Road (if they retake it), and nothing else. On J1 you can eliminate all the other NO’s. And as far as I know Anzac taking DNG is not a NO. So this is a lot of money that you don’t collect because you neglected common sense…  :wink:


  • Yes, taking DNG is enough, because the other three ter are already ANZAC.

    I have played five games so far. Three times the allies won and twice Japan. I agree with the comment that the allies come back later in the game. I think one of the strategies you could use is giving multiple targets. The three bombers on the three island with an AB is a good example. Japan can only take one and it will give him logistical headaches. Because the tran he uses needs protection, and stuff like that.

    Yesterday I won as the allies while I was getting my ass kicked in the first 10 rounds, or something. India had fallen and Japans naval force was extremely large. I did a very daring move to the Japanese coast and took Korea and Manchuria. I put two destroyers in the seazones to block of the big Japanese fleet, so I could hold Korea for another turn. He wasn’t able to get it back and I build a minor IC on it and landed every single plane that could reach it, thus sacrificing my fleet. Elsewhere I attacked a smaller Japanese fleet with three trannies in it with my ANZAC subs and planes.

    I build three tanks in Korea and upgraded it to a major IC. He lacked trannies so he could only land 4 land units and get all his planes in action. But with the captured AA (Manchuria) I had a force of about 7 land units, an AA and about 10 planes. He lost that battle and in the mean time ANZAC was capturing DEI and China was recapturing the Burma. China still lived while they were once only two ter left. But with some luck and my fig intact and with the help of Manchurian IPC they could reclaim their lands steadily.

    Japan gave up and the allies won their third victory. So I think to state that Japan is overpowered is a bit exagerated. You can gain a lot of ter and income fast, but to keep a hold on them while the US is growing and the other three (or in this case two) are harassing you with small skirmishes and a lot of ANZAC subs to kill lone ships and raid vonvoy boxes, that’s the difficulty!


  • China’s ability to place new units on newly taken territory makes it an extremely annoying adversary.  It reminds me of a cockroach.  One stamp of the foot is not going to kill it.  In my few games as Japan I made sure I killed as many Chinese as possible even if it meant sacrificing a few air units unassisted by land units.  I used my two trannies and loaded up the mech and tank to Kwangshu or which ever territory next to Yunnan along with extra inf and the tranny from the carolines with inf from there and Peilieu.  The tank and mech really helped in out flanking the chinese and rounding them up in their north western territories.


  • @Tavenier:

    Yes, taking DNG is enough, because the other three ter are already ANZAC.

    I have played five games so far. Three times the allies won and twice Japan. I agree with the comment that the allies come back later in the game. I think one of the strategies you could use is giving multiple targets. The three bombers on the three island with an AB is a good example. Japan can only take one and it will give him logistical headaches. Because the tran he uses needs protection, and stuff like that.

    Yesterday I won as the allies while I was getting my a** kicked in the first 10 rounds, or something. India had fallen and Japans naval force was extremely large. I did a very daring move to the Japanese coast and took Korea and Manchuria. I put two destroyers in the seazones to block of the big Japanese fleet, so I could hold Korea for another turn. He wasn’t able to get it back and I build a minor IC on it and landed every single plane that could reach it, thus sacrificing my fleet. Elsewhere I attacked a smaller Japanese fleet with three trannies in it with my ANZAC subs and planes.

    I build three tanks in Korea and upgraded it to a major IC. He lacked trannies so he could only land 4 land units and get all his planes in action. But with the captured AA (Manchuria) I had a force of about 7 land units, an AA and about 10 planes. He lost that battle and in the mean time ANZAC was capturing DEI and China was recapturing the Burma. China still lived while they were once only two ter left. But with some luck and my fig intact and with the help of Manchurian IPC they could reclaim their lands steadily.

    Japan gave up and the allies won their third victory. So I think to state that Japan is overpowered is a bit exagerated. You can gain a lot of ter and income fast, but to keep a hold on them while the US is growing and the other three (or in this case two) are harassing you with small skirmishes and a lot of ANZAC subs to kill lone ships and raid vonvoy boxes, that’s the difficulty!

    you smash all Allies round 1 (phillipines, kwantung, british fleet and such.
    you place IC in kwantung of 10, move entire fleet to carolins and waith 5 more rounds = victory of japan
    US can never defeat the 30 japanese air units and the kwantung IC will overpower chinsese and India


  • It would be impossible at this point to do a blow by blow playback but the general trend has been that Japan can simply mass up a fleet in the DEI area and have a hardpoint at Truk and a hardpoint in Japan and spend the rest of her time mopping up the Chinese and Brits. Japan has so much airpower that she can throw it away for time. Once she reaches the tipping point for the econ, the game is over. There is no ‘late game comeback’ for the Allies if Japan is making as many or more IPCs and has more forces surviving in the field (as well as superior position and coordination).

    Unlike AA50, Japan is not totally dependent on getting her bonuses. They are nice, but not required IMO. That means she has little need to spread out to defend. The ‘scramble’ rules mean that take to a defended island airbase requires massive overkill of firepower. It’s VERY easy to stall for time as Japan vs the US and that means the Brits/Chinese are pretty much on their own. We still havent seen much that the US can do to annoy Japan for quite a while in the game. In one game the US tried to move into the SoPac area and was quickly killed off (he exacted a toll, but then he was back to square one rebuilding). In another game, the US player took Iwo and put an airbase their with which to threaten Japan’s home waters in an effort to drag the Japanese fleet away from the DEI area. This failed because of the ‘scramble’ rules. In previous A&As, you needed CVs to have airpower defend a navy. With Scramble, that is not necessary for Japan. A pile of plane (which she starts with plenty which rarely die if the Japanese player has an IQ above room temperature) can make any attack prohibitively expensive.

    Dont get me wrong, we obviously have not explored the game fully enough to make a 100% judgement call on balance, but given the length of the game (due to ridiculous win conditions) it’s going to be tough for this game to see repeated play. Without repeated play it’s tough to see if simply bad luck was the cause early on of the Allies’ demise or if alternate strategies might have helped. Yes, the Allied players have made mistakes in our games but so have the Japanese players. The difference is that the Allied mistakes are usually fatal whereas Japan has a very large cushion to play with.

    To answer one of the above questions I think we played between 10-12 turns in the games and player fatigue was becoming a factor towards the end of each game. Everyone saw that a comeback might have been possible before the end, but it would have required a lot of luck, some mistakes by the Japanese, and about another 4+ hours of play.

    To me, something needs to be done to force the game to a conclusion earlier. In A&A50 we never actually played it out to a ‘real’ win either, but it was easy to see the writing on the wall after a few hours. A&AP40 take a LOT longer to get to that point. The incomes are so high and the individual territory contributions are so low that the game becomes an attritional grind-fest. There is little that the Allied players can do to force the Japanese into a bad spot since there are VERY few places on the board that are worth defending at a disadvantage. This leads to a lot of jockeying but not a lot of outcome. To me, the game needs more decisive areas where the Japanese MUST make a stand. Currently there are not enough of them to stretch Japan out (which is what historically happened). In A&AP40, Japan simply seems to have enough combat power to meet all of her needs for quite a long time. This is the exact opposite situation of what she really faced and leads to the inability of the US to mount a counter-attack that Japan cannot crush out of hand (for at least the first 5-6 hours of play).

    Anyways, thanks for the input. I’m realizing in typing this that due the ‘unscripted’ nature of the game it’s going to be very hard indeed for players to relate to each other about how to play. There are simply too many variables involved and once luck enters in at this scale any attempt to relate will be nearly impossible. Ah well. ;)


  • @Uncle_Joe:

    It would be impossible at this point to do a blow by blow playback but the general trend has been that Japan can simply mass up a fleet in the DEI area and have a hardpoint at Truk and a hardpoint in Japan and spend the rest of her time mopping up the Chinese and Brits. Japan has so much airpower that she can throw it away for time. Once she reaches the tipping point for the econ, the game is over. There is no ‘late game comeback’ for the Allies if Japan is making as many or more IPCs and has more forces surviving in the field (as well as superior position and coordination).

    Unlike AA50, Japan is not totally dependent on getting her bonuses. They are nice, but not required IMO. That means she has little need to spread out to defend. The ‘scramble’ rules mean that to a defended island airbase requires massive overkill of firepower. It’s VERY easy to stall for time as Japan vs the US and that means the Brits/Chinese are pretty much on their own. We still havent seen much that the US can do to annoy Japan for quite a while in the game. In one game the US tried to move into the SoPac area and was quickly killed off (he exacted a toll, but then he was back to square one rebuilding). In another game, the US player took Iwo and put an airbase their with which to threaten Japan’s home waters in an effort to drag the Japanese fleet away from the DEI area. This failed because of the ‘scramble’ rules. In previous A&As, you needed CVs to have airpower defend a navy. With Scramble, that is not necessary for Japan. A pile of plane (which she starts with plenty which rarely die if the Japanese player has an IQ above room temperature) can make any attack prohibitively expensive.

    Dont get me wrong, we obviously have not explored the game fully enough to make a 100% judgement call on balance, but given the length of the game (due to ridiculous win conditions) it’s going to be tough for this game to see repeated play. Without repeated play it’s tough to see if simply bad luck was the cause early on of the Allies’ demise or if alternate strategies might have helped. Yes, the Allied players have made mistakes in our games but so have the Japanese players. The difference is that the Allied mistakes are usually fatal whereas Japan has a very large cushion to play with.

    To answer one of the above questions I think we played between 10-12 turns in the games and player fatigue was becoming a factor towards the end of each game. Everyone saw that a comeback might have been possible before the end, but it would have required a lot of luck, some mistakes by the Japanese, and about another 4+ hours of play.

    To me, something needs to be done to force the game to a conclusion earlier. In A&A50 we never actually played it out to a ‘real’ win either, but it was easy to see the writing on the wall after a few hours. A&AP40 take a LOT longer to get to that point. The incomes are so high and the individual territory contributions are so low that the game becomes an attritional grind-fest. There is little that the Allied players can do to force the Japanese into a bad spot since there are VERY few places on the board that are worth defending at a disadvantage. This leads to a lot of jockeying but not a lot of outcome. To me, the game needs more decisive areas where the Japanese MUST make a stand. Currently there are not enough of them to stretch Japan out (which is what historically happened). In A&AP40, Japan simply seems to have enough combat power to meet all of her needs for quite a long time. This is the exact opposite situation of what she really faced and leads to the inability of the US to mount a counter-attack that Japan cannot crush out of hand (for at least the first 5-6 hours of play).

    Anyways, thanks for the input. I’m realizing in typing this that due the ‘unscripted’ nature of the game it’s going to be very hard indeed for players to relate to each other about how to play. There are simply too many variables involved and once luck enters in at this scale any attempt to relate will be nearly impossible. Ah well. ;)

    I 100% agree.


  • In this early stage of playing a new game, people always claim its unbalanced and biased. Remember Battle of Bulge ? First people complainet that Axis always won, but later the Allies turned out to be the strongest. If you lose, then you play it wrong.

    I’ve been on both sides of it (and another game as an observer after teaching the others how to play). This isnt some whine because I cant win. Even playing the Japanese I felt I had a tremendous advantage that the Allies were going to need a LOT of luck of overcome.

    First of all, the Allies get a lot of bonus NO’s at the start. USA get 5 IPC as long he controls the Phillipeans, China get 6 IPC for Burma Road, UK get 5 IPC for control of Kwangtung and Malaya. And in the first turns, ANZAC will easy gain control of friendly Dutch New Guinea and gain 5 IPC in bonus, and UK will do the same with Dutch East Indies, and this is a lot of money if you dont collect it because you neglected the Rulebook

    Yes, we know how to read the book for bonuses. At least THAT part of the rules is pretty straightforward. But each of those ‘easily’ controlled areas comes at a price in transports and precious troops. The UK cant defend her TRs if she takes those islands so the Japanese can easily kill them negating a decent chunk of that ‘extra’ money. Ditto for the Anzacs. If they commit to getting their bonus, they’ll lose their TR and strand their INF which negates that bonus for 2 turns. The Burma Road is a crapshoot. Twices we’ve seen the Japanese able to hold it against the Chinese counter-attack on C1 and that spells doom for China right there IMO. Pretty much EVERY Allied bonus is going to be gone within a turn or two of a Japanese DoW and they are unlikely to get any back except possibly for the Kiwi control of the Coral Sea area.

    As the strategy is conserned, just play aggressivily and always attack when possible. USA can place bombers on Wake, Guam and Midway and always threaten lonely trannies, and send subs north to threaten Japan convoys. In fact, the Allies can do a lot. This is in fact a very balanced game, man.

    And why would the Japanes have lonely TRs up there? There is NOTHING there that they care about. And US bombers on those islands can easily be killed unless defended by units the US doesnt have. And if they DO pile defense there then the Japanese ignore them and pound the Brits/Chinese while the US player sits on his islands. There arent even any convoys in the area. Sure the US can build subs but without fleet support the Japanese detail a DD and a handful of planes to kill them to no gain (except a 1 in 6 luck shot of killing the DD).

    I honestly can’t even take your suggestions seriously because I see nothing there that seems even remotely thought out in the face of a Japanese opponent who is playing to win rather worry about a handful of otherwise useless island in the Central Pacific. Japan’s money is in the south and in China - two places where the US player has nearly ZERO power projection until it’s too late (at least from what we’ve seen so far).


  • Something just occured to me while writing the thread on US options. It really wouldnt surprise me AT ALL if the Japanese DO have a tremendous advantage in the game at the moment. After all, I believe this one was designed from the ground up to be mated with the Europe version due this summer. When that happens Japan will have more ‘responsibilities’ than she has now.

    For example, the Japanese can COMPLETELY abandon her backfield borders with Russia giving her a lot more disposable ground forces in Asia. Similarly, once the Brits are down, they are OUT completely in the stand-alone. There is ZERO threat of Brit harassment from Africa which always existed in AA50. Finally, Japan is under no pressure to hit the Russians from behind (a prime goal of the Japanese in AA50).

    Taken together, I’m going to guess that Japan has a lot easier time in stand-alone than she would have in the global game. Unless the global game changes the set up for the Pacific I dont see how it’s possible for this NOT to be the case. I guess time will tell on that but I would wager that the idea was to accept less than optimal balance in the individual games in exchange for a better balanced global game…


  • I have done the preliminar maths

    While AA50 economic system makes axis get economic advantage  from round 2-3 (due sparring China and no chance of holding India if Japan plays right), resulting into a default massive advantage to axis, this is not the case for AAP40

    If Japan conquers all China and India plus all Dutch East Indies saving N.Guinea, the economics are 78 for Japan and 70 for allies. So if at least one of China and India can hold enough to make USA and Australia come into the rescue, the game at that point could be balanced: if Japan goes quick, they won and if not, they lost. Any case, I doubt Japan can smash both India and China before those 6 rounds you say with easy

    So the economic system is indeed way more balanced than the one in AA50. The question is if the setup is well balanced for this task. Again, AA50 setup failed miserabily doing this, and that’s a thing that can be seen at first sight (specially in 1941 scenario, seeing how poor are China, India and Atlantic allied fleets). For AAP40, there are so many units spread for all the board that is difficult seeing it at first sight. So I’ll give benefit of doubt to this setup for Pacific game

    Undediced yet, waiting playing some games to say if this is balanced. At least is a better situation than in AA50  :-)


  • I guess a trick will be moving USA fighters to Australia and later to India to help gurkas survive a bit more (probably abbusing of ACs). This move was pretty good both in Revised and AA50, 42 scenario. I guess the same will apply here


  • If Japan conquers all China and India plus all Dutch East Indies saving N.Guinea, the economics are 78 for Japan and 70 for allies. So if at least one of China and India can hold enough to make USA and Australia come into the rescue, the game at that point could be balanced: if Japan goes quick, they won and if not, they lost. Any case, I doubt Japan can smash both India and China before those 6 rounds you say with easy

    Japan has a few other things going for her:

    1. MASSIVE advantage in IPCs in starting forces. Japan has aircraft to burn - many many to burn, in fact. And in naval forces, Japan also starts with a sizable advantage. The spare aircraft means that Japan can freely hold onto Truk and Japan with little to no naval forces. And if naval forces ARE necessary, Japan needs to spend merely 16 IPCs for a ‘fully loaded’ CV while the US has to spend 37 (Japan has more than enough planes floating around to arm 3-4 CVs with little problem).

    2. Coordination. All of Japan’s combat power moves at once. She can attack with 100% of her strength in one phase. The Allies, even if they reach naval/air parity cannot use it offensively as easily because it’s going to be split between 3 turns.

    3. Interior lines. Japan is centrally located. With the new Naval/Air base in PI, Japan can centralize her strength and deal with any incursions with the vast bulk of her fleet/air arm. The Allies are scattered into 2-3 different power bases. This dramatically weakens there ability to close in with the Japanese as they can be crushed piecemeal.

    4. Economic security. Japan’s econ is based as far away from the primary threat of the US as possible. It’s a minimum of 3 turns for anything based in the US (ie, that the US is buying) to reach anything that Japan truly cares about. Holding the Central/Eastern Pacific islands is no longer necessary for Japan. In AA50, Japan got a bonus and the US lost a bonus if the Japanese fought there. Not so anymore. The Japanese DO get a bonus for the Coral Sea, but it’s small beans on this scale. And if they allow it go to the Allies, it goes to the Anzacs, not the US, meaning that’s not a problem to let the Allies have it. The Anzacs make so little money that they will rarely be a major threat.

    I dont have the time to do it at the moment, but I would wager that a quick ‘realistic’ econ count of starting units puts Japan SO far ahead that the Allies would need 6+ turns of max production to begin to equal it. That means that Japan has a LOT of free time before she has to start worrying about economic parity at all. It certainly doesnt help the Allies to engage in penny-packets and lose more than they kill (which tends to happen in massed naval battles since the expensive stuff dies last).

    I guess a trick will be moving USA fighters to Australia and later to India to help gurkas survive a bit more (probably abbusing of ACs). This move was pretty good both in Revised and AA50, 42 scenario. I guess the same will apply here

    So far, our games have ended without the Japanese needing to take Australia. Sure if we wanted to play for 4+ more hours to achieve the ‘book’ win it would have to happen but the games were decided before Japan ever had to set foot on Australia. Once Japan has near economic parity with the US and a clear backfield, the game is over. Everything else is just mop up or hoping for ridiculous luck to turn the tide.

    Undediced yet, waiting playing some games to say if this is balanced. At least is a better situation than in AA50

    We thought that AA50 was fairly well balanced. The better players tended to win regardless of which side they played. Was it perfect? Maybe not, but none of us ever felt like we won or lost based solely on which side we were playing.

    So far in AAP40, the Allied players have been left scratching their heads thinking “Gee, I dont really see what more we could have done except rolled better” and that is not exactly satisfying. I personally think that if the Japanese player is methodical and doesnt take risks that they will win the vast majority of the time barring horrible luck (and I’m not even convinced of that due one of our games WITH horrible Japanese luck still being a win for the Japanese).


  • Look at the Amap module (slightly wrong but a good start) TUVs are:

    JPN: 464 land / 177 naval
    US: 180 land / 91 naval
    China: 46 land
    UK: 136 land / 54 naval
    An: 59 land / 21 naval

    Allies total TUV: 421 land / 166 naval

    Income: 26 to 55

    I don’t know, doesn’t look all that one sided to me.  Perhaps if someone would show me a game online I could gain a, clearer understanding.


  • Yeah, that’s EXTREMELY one-sided considering all of the advantages Japan enjoys in coordination and position. On top of that, many of Allied assets are going to be killed quickly to little cost for Japan. Finally, the econ, while 2 to 1 at start will not stay that way for long. The Allies will outproduce Japan for a while, but the margin becomes slimmer and slimmer with which to counter that initial advantage.

    A quick example would be the UK forces. There is no way to ‘save’ the UK navy if the Japanese want to kill it. That means that the UK will be out 54 IPC worth of ships at a likely cost of under 20 for Japan (losing subs, DDs, or Fighters and less if they take hits on the BBs).  Once that happens, the UK econ becomes virtually non-existent as Japan can quickly secure the DEI and then leave a few subs to blockade the bulk of the rest. Unless the US can mount a credible threat in that region (which I dont see how), Japan WILL kill the Brits as a combat-effective force within the first 4-5 turns with minimal losses. And a 2 to 1 loss ratio for the Allies is not acceptable when they already are trying to play catch-up.


  • There is nothing in range other than bombers of the UK fleet turn 1.  After turn 1 UK could have purchased a carrier, an AB on ceylon, or many other things to keep her boats alive.  And no matter what the econ spread becomes even larger after turn 1.  Japan can get at most around 7 extra without declaring war.  China gets 6 from burma road, UK can gain 8, plus 5 from her NO, or get ANZAC there NO for an additional 5 there, plus the US gets 5 for her NO.  If she does declare war US income goes up by 40, compared to an extra 5 or so Japan gets.  Japan cannot gain eco advantage until turn 3 at the latest, more than likely turn 4 or 5.

    And the US can load 2 more carriers with starting plans if desired.


  • There is nothing in range other than bombers of the UK fleet turn 1.  After turn 1 UK could have purchased a carrier, an AB on ceylon, or many other things to keep her boats alive.  And no matter what the econ spread becomes even larger after turn 1.

    Yeah, we thought the same thing. The UK even bought TWO carriers over 2 turns and had 4 planes, an additional DD and 2 subs. In the end, it cost the Japanese a bit more, but the UK was finished and China was doomed too (since a lot UK money was going to the sea, not the land). Japan was able to bring 4 CVs, 2 BBs, 2 CAs, 3 DDs, 2 SSs and some LBA to the party. The UK rolled well and Japan was really hurt, but still nothing compared to the Brit losses (which were total) and then from there the UK ceased to be a factor. Japan can afford a trade like to for a knock-out blow to the Brits.

    Where was the US you might ask? Well, Japan still had a few other CVs and a LOT of LBA to deal with the US forces (which were largely pinned outside of the Carolines). The Allies thought they had an opening when the Japanese fleet was so far West and so damaged, but in the end the US simply couldnt dent the Japanese money without risking annihilation.

    Was is perfect play from the Allies? No, not hardly but it certainly proved to us that there is NO WAY the UK can keep the fleet alive if the Japanese are intent on killing it. BTW, the Kiwis had 2 CVs fully loaded supported by a few DDs and SSs, but again, the lack of coordination between the Allies is a KILLER.


  • Well, it looks like you are a very good player of A&A.

    I had asked how many rounds, because some have said they played 4 rounds and think they know the outcome of the game.

    With so many more territories, this game will take longer.

    Just think, if there were 5 territories and 3 sea zones, and only 100 IPC of units on the game board–-the game would be shorter. If there were 500 territories and 250 sea zones with 4000 IPC of units the game would be very long.  It looks like now that we will have Papa Bear, Momma Bear, and Baby Bear (1940 Global, AA50, and AA42) to choose from.

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