First Game: Axis Wins

[Rocmistro]

Hello all!  just played my first game with me (Axis) against my brother and friend. (Brother playing Britain, ANZAC, France and friend playing USA, Russia and China).

Just a few highlights that I thought I’d touch on:

-I captured Egypt with Italian forces in turn 1 or 2 (can’t remember), and built a MnIC in the following turn.  This was probably the best move of the game for me, and allowed Italy to lock down Africa and also enabled me to start pushing Italian tanks up through the middle east and put pressure on Russia.

-Other than that, I thought I did a good early game job of deploying only what was absolutely necessary to lock up Western Europe, and diverting all my tanks east to take down Russia. Germany attacked Russia on turn 3 and put Russia constantly on defensive for remainder of the game; they never were able to put any pressure on Germany for the rest of the game, Germany always had the initiative and momentum.

-One of my best moves was when my brother in South Africa, had amassed a considerable force to retake Cairo on his UK turn after the Italians had taken it on the turn prior (with little left to defend), Germany flew 5 fighters from Western Germany (I think), as it had an airbase, 5 spaces to land them in Cairo for defense of the territory on Britain’s turn. This broke my brother’s heart a little bit :-)

-I did not play Japan in the conventional manner.  On my 3rd Japanese turn, I assaulted the Northern most territories of Russia, then read the rulebook to see that any attack on Russian space adjacent to Mongolia got everyone bent out of whack.  I would not do this again.

-I built 2 MnIC on the Asian mainland to pump out tanks and mech inf as fast as possible. When the game ended on turn 6, I did not have what I thought was enough to every seriously consider taking out the British buildup in Calcutta. This might be because i diverted too much against the Russians.

-My plan involved feinting considerably against the US to make them put much more resources into the pacific than europe and it worked. In a very risky and expensive feint, I invaded Alaska with japanese and was able to build a MnIC there and land a crapload of planes.  I was only ever able to build 3 infantry men there before he retook it, but USA dumped so many resources into this that they were never able to assist ANZAC or Britain in the pac islands/asian mainland, and they were not able to help with the reinvasion of Europe.  America never got any naval vessels south of the Philipines East West line, which let me divide and conquer.

In a rematch, however, i don’t know how I would win.  My brother will never again let me take cairo long enough to put a MnIC there and build troops, and I know the USA player will do a better job of balancing East/West stuff in the future.

One gripe: I almost feel that the bonus income stuff forces you to play the War exactly how it played out in reality. That’s a bit of a bummer, as I would like to see different scenarios play out.  Oh well.

[Tall Paul]

Rocmistro,

––It sounds like you were involved in a game that was balanced on the brink for several turns. Seeing your strategy fought out to victory while fending off your enemies counter-strategies. Now that’s what I call Excitement!
Excitement = FUN!
––IMHO the most interesting aspect of this wonderful game is the continuously evolving strategy/counter-strategy that is always happenning. Someone develops a new strategy, then someone develops a counter. It goes on for YEARS! That’s what can make this game so fantastic every time you play. It’s always new and fresh.
––Now you should play the rematch as the Allies and develop a counter to your previous strategy,…that is IF they follow your previous strategy. Fun is where you Kill it,….or find it as some would say.

“Tall Paul”

[knp7765]

@Rocmistro:

One gripe: I almost feel that the bonus income stuff forces you to play the War exactly how it played out in reality. That’s a bit of a bummer, as I would like to see different scenarios play out.  Oh well.

Yeah, the national objectives are based more or less on historical objectives of the actual war. Think about this though; you had Japan capture Alaska, Italy captured Cairo and Germany conquered Russia without having to face an Allied invasion of France. You DID play it differently from reality.
Plus, believe it or not, a lot of Allied strategies end up being vastly different from the real war. Most successful Allied strategies I have seen involve the US taking out Japan first, then dealing with Germany/Italy. In one game, Germany took London then went on to attack Russia. The US managed to take care of Japan then took Rome and liberated Paris. Germany used so much to take London that they didn’t really have enough to take on the Russians and did very poorly in Russia. Berlin fell to the US and London NEVER GOT LIBERATED!