whats kgf?
When the Allies ignore Japan more or less completely in order to rush Berlin as fast as possible. Typically Japan will take most of the USSR but now Moscow because the Allies will stack it. When berlin falls, the Japanese player will likely throw in the towel.
not lol dotn wrry i dotn spell as well ty but normally i see that happening i think it sucks when germany gos down japs lose if japs go down 1st axis still have a shot ty for telling me ignoring japs if japs wants beef with usa then usa wont ignore japan lol :mrgreen:
@Rakeman:
@Cmdr:
You don’t have to provoke me to go Pacific with USA. It’s my preferred attack plan.
Really? How does that work out for you?
So far this year my KJF (in AAR no NAs) is 32 wins, 7 losses with one loss on the way so let’s just say 32 Wins / 8 Losses.
What makes it viable? Most players do not know how to handle Japan. They either buy too much navy and Russia ends up owning Manchuria, Kwangtung and French Indo China or they don’t buy enough navy resulting in America owning Borneo/E. Indies and landing 8 ground units a round into French Indo China and complete dominance of the Pacific Ocean.
What makes many players think KJF is not viable is they don’t know how to build a Navy for America. It’s not all submarines in hopes you can eventually out dice the Japanese by round 5 or 6. You really need to think about what you are doing. You need enough defensive punch that any attack would by at best 50/50 against you and you need enough air power in range that you can exchange fighters for overwhelming punch. (2 Carriers can support 8 fighters if you are stationed correctly. that’s a LOT of damage potential.) But surface ships are also needed. Sure, your theoretical best bang for the buck is the submarine, but in reality, 4 destroyers > 6 submarines, even though they have the same punch. They both have the same punch, and the same cost, but the submarines have a significantly smaller chance to hit than the destroyers do. (33% vs 50%) and, one would hope that your fleet would also contain at least one or two battleships and one or two carriers.
Now, I’m not saying don’t buy ANY submarines. Just that 1 destroyer for every 3-5 submarines is a good bet, IMHO. Also, 1 transport for every 5 submarines is an absolute must! What good is a navy with no transports??? (More transports = greater threat to neighboring islands forcing Japan to consider how they would liberate said islands if it came to it.)
KJF is all about the right mix of equipment placed in the right place. KGF is all about brute force. Do you want to be the Surgeon or the Barbarian?
And a KJF strat is building ALL units in WUS from rnd 1 (until Japan is taken or surrounded), and moving them towards Japan from sz 55?
That means that only the starting units in EUS can be used against Germany…!
I’m not saying I dont believe you won 32 lost 8 games, but we have to define KJF. UK DD attack at sz 59 rnd 1 doesnt make it KJF alone…
I just wonder why I almost never see the KJF in the lobby, whats makes www.axisandallies.org a suitable place for KJF games?
First, z59 attack should be done even in KGF.
Now, let’s define KJF. I don’t like that acronim, but it’s widely used so it will work. KJF means that you don’t ignore Japan as in KGF. A z55 fleet is needed in all KJF strats, sometimes aided by ind + sin ICs, sometimes only by aus or saf ICs and sometimes the fleet alone. You don’t have to send USA’s Atlantic fleet to Pacific, her place is Atlantic ocean supporting Royal Navy. Your aim with z55 fleet is, as Jen said, taking East Indies or Borneo, putting a IC there and start creating havoc for Japan. As opposed to KGF, Germany is not ignored in KJF, even if UK builds ICs, because some token forces will be landing at alg, nor or kar
Subotai:
No. SZ 55 is not the only location and America is not limited to ONLY attacking Japan.
1st: The goal of KJF is two fold. First: To eliminate Japan from moving ground units from Japan to Asia. Once you accomplish this, Japan is dead for all intents and purposes.
2nd: The goal of KJF is to eventually take Japan itself in hopes of a Victory City win.
That stated, I have gone KJF successfully building everything in SZ 10. Trick here is to unload into Africa, securing Africa while building up your navy. While the Axis believe you are just building a fleet to defend against the Luftwaffe so you can attack North and South, you are really building a seed navy to move into the Pacific. (Which from SZ 22 is one turn away, two turns from invading IPC valued islands.)
Another method is building in SZ 55 (or SZ 54, everyone forgets SZ 54.) If you go this route, Japan will be spending a lot more in naval equipment and you’ll in turn have to have less transports and more submarines to counter this.
hhmm good thought make japan not biuld naval units by tricking them by biulding them in eastern then western.
even i know this and if i was japan i would nto see it coming :-)
Tis one of the ideas.
The best part of it, if Japan does counter, you just don’t go invade and you really do run your navy into the Med to tear at the soft belly of Germany. Win/Win for America and you don’t really need to spend too much on navy. (2 carriers and that’s hardly more than most. Maybe flesh it out with a couple of submarines which could be considered fodder.)
that works but i would throw in a destroyer or 2
How do you “support 8 fighters” if “stationed correctly,” may I ask?
I think she’s basically saying that, for example, if you have 2 carriers with 4 fighters in one sea zone stationed with your navy, and you send your navy 1 sz away for an attack, you can land those 4 fighters on a nearby land zone that is up to 3 moves away. This allows you to bring in 4 extra fighters from 3-4 moves away that would normally have nowhere to land but can now land on the freed carriers. Thus, your 2 carriers allowed 8 fighters to partake in the naval attack.
It would also work with moving the carriers+fighters 2 sea zones instead of 1, but there would have to be a land zone within 2 moves for the fighters. And, while generally in that situation you’d be able to station the extra fighters from the land zone if it’s that close, there are times when you can’t and need to extend the range of your extra fighters as in the example above.
i think it is the other way around 8 fighters help navies
Send your fighters out from your carriers and land them on a land mass. Send your other fighters out from a land mass and land them on your carriers.
for instance. 4 Fighters stationed on Wake and 4 Fighters stationed in SZ 51 can all attack SZ 61 since the fighters on Wake can land on the Carriers and the fighters in SZ 51 can land on China or Buryatia.
quote from com jen
That stated, I have gone KJF successfully building everything in SZ 10. Trick here is to unload into Africa, securing Africa while building up your navy. While the Axis believe you are just building a fleet to defend against the Luftwaffe so you can attack North and South, you are really building a seed navy to move into the Pacific. (Which from SZ 22 is one turn away, two turns from invading IPC valued islands.)
this tactic sounds devestating, especially if you build men the same round as you unload into africa. the next round you can then move your navy from algeria and the men from eastern us to panama, without building anything. if japan does not repond, you move you navy to sz 54 and place 76ipc worth of navy there in the same round. if they do respond, you just go mediteranean. could you link to a game where you have used this approach?
Yes, I do advocate building men for Africa, but I don’t recommend bringing them with you into the Pacific. I actually like going under S. America with the fleet and building more in W. USA instead of going through Panama.
It can be very devastating. Most players don’t have a clue how to defend against an aggressive Allied attack in the Pacific. Those that do may not realize what is happening until it is too late to stop it. Those that see it coming, and act accordingly, can be caught with their pants down if you just don’t go for the Pacific causing them to have slowed their progress and built up a navy that will not be needed while you have built a strong enough navy to allow you safety in SZs 12 and 14.
so you would rather take a longer time to get to the atlantic from the pacific
I never see Tokyo fall against an experience Revised player.
Actually let me rephrase that; I’ve never seen a game where the Allies managed to take Tokyo, without also losing Moscow in the process. If you stick around to finish off Japan, then the Germans will almost always break Russia. This throws you into the typical KJF endgame of a super-Germany (Eurasia) vs. a super-USA (Pacific). With income roughly split between Germany and the remaining Allies, it turns into a production/logistics game which tends to favor the Axis.
This is why many people think that KJF (‘kill Japan first’) is a misnomer, because if you actually invest the resources to kill off the home island it invariably comes back to screw the Allies during endgame. Instead what you will usually see (if anything) is a quick smash and grab maneuver, with the Allies just beating Japan into a position where they can be contained, before redirecting all resources to the defense of Moscow. The strategy is all about ‘timing’, and more specifically ‘keeping time on your side’, because you don’t have to take Berlin to win this game, you just have to prevent Moscow from being captured.
If you removed the production limit on Tokyo, I think it would make a KJF strategy even more difficult than it already is, because the Jap player could just start inf stacking the home island. By the time the USA built up enough production to match Japan’s, chances are the German tanks will already be sweeping down from Moscow to recover the Axis position in Asia. If you removed the production limit on all starting factories (and not just the capitals), I think it would also give a strong advantage to the Russians, since they could drop 8-10 units a turn into Caucasus, which would be a total nightmare for the Axis.
I worry that we’d be trading one set of circumstances that favors KGF, for another set that favors KGF.
so you would rather take a longer time to get to the atlantic from the pacific
No, it does not really take “longer.” Bear in mind that I am working from the standpoint that you have 2 transports feeding units into Brazil and 2 from Brazil into Africa with the lion’s share of your fleet in SZ 22. From here you can move into SZ 13, down to SZ 42 or up to SZ 19 giving you quite a lot of flexibility with that fleet.
I’m also assuming you are spending those first three rounds focused on fleshing out the fleet a little (2 carriers at least, a few submarines to go with it wouldn’t hurt in addition to the destroyers and battleship you start with. You’ll only need to purchase one transport to get the 2 by 2 going anyway.) and liberating Africa (since a free Africa is paramount to a good KJF.)
I prefer to go from SZ 22 to SZ 42 most of the time because it’s in line with liberating Africa while I am building ships in SZ 55 where I can easily send them up to the Bearing Straights and liberate Russia if Japan races down to E. Indies or something.
Black_Elk raises a valid point, one I have tried to always make clear when I talk KJF. To “kill Japan” really means to remove his ability to send ground troops into Asia. That can be accomplished by taking Japan itself, but it’s almost always easier to take his mainland complexes and sink his navy. After that is done, it’s a matter of racing tanks to Russia to assist England and Russia against the Germans if at all possible.
Why you should take Tokyo? With Japan reduced to her home island (8 IPCs), USA is a super monster of 60+ IPCs, more than Germany can collect if they take Moscow. Even then, with indians, chineses, south africans and south Pacific ICs poping guys to monster Germany and any forces allies can bring from England and East USA, Germans will have a world of pain against western allies collecting about 90 ipcs (strat bombing Tokyo with a token bomber aids Japan never recover). If soviets are alive, it’s even worst, allies gaining more than 100 ipcs
Then only chance germans would have is if they can somehow try Sea Lion, but UK should be very careless for this, and probably USA could retake England easily.
Trading Berlin for Moscow sometimes is not enough for allies, but isolating Tokyo is victory for allies 99 % of times, even if germans take Moscow.
@Cmdr:
But surface ships are also needed. Sure, your theoretical best bang for the buck is the submarine, but in reality, 4 destroyers > 6 submarines, even though they have the same punch. They both have the same punch, and the same cost, but the submarines have a significantly smaller chance to hit than the destroyers do. (33% vs 50%)
Wow, just do some calculations, 6 submarines beat 4 destroyers really badly, the chance that there are remaining subs after the battle with all the destroyers destroyed is 75 %.
I’m strongly against the whole KJF thing, not because it doesn’t work, but because it doesn’t work 99% of the time. The single time i’ve lost to this strategy was a triplea ladder game a few days ago, where the following things happened:
UK1: I lose my SZ 59 tranny, SZ 45 sub, New Guinea and Borneo, UK fighter reinforces Pearl.
J1: I go to Pearl with 3 ftrs, BB, AC, DD, bomber, and get spanked, BB, AC, 2 fighters remain (bomber also dies). The SZ 59 DD of the UK proves to be invincible, butchers my carrier and fighter.
US1: US counters Pearl with BB tranny 2 figs and the bomber, loses the transport and a single fighter in the process.
UK2: the UK DD and sub kills 4 trannies of mine.
At this point, the IJN consists of a single battleship, and this is before J2.
In this case, and only in this case, i say it is preferable to attack Japan. Thinking about it the chance for all this happening is far far less than 1%. Maybe without a bit less biased dice for the allies, it can still work, but the overall percent of games where it will work is less than 1% for sure. And it doesn’t matter what the Allies do if they don’t get extremely lucky. The US can eventually build a fleet which can compete with Japan, but if he moves out of SZ 55 before turn 4 or so, then it will get really badly destroyed, while Japan happily hops on the Soviet Union. Of course, because of this, Germany will have africa, even worse etc. If the US waits for turn 5, then his fleet can stand against Japan’s but Japan will just sail away, and don’t care about losing ehmm… about 12 IPCs of islands? Which he will lose on turn 7 the earliest, by the time everything is under Japanese control to Novosibirsk. So, Japan just won’t care about that.
So, if the Japan player has some clue about the game, this strategy (US taking a 4 IPC island for a turn or two around turn 5 then gets his fleet obliterated OR US builds up and moves out but the war is over) won’t work unless the dice are extreme.
