This topic has been moved to House Rules.
Just What Was Bunnies Thinking? Russian Roulette (Triple) Game Ccmmentary
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How long is this J1 taking!!!:-)
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How long is this J1 taking!!!:-)
Don’t question Master Windu’s wisdom… we’ll see J1 when he thinks we are prepared ;)
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J1 (Japan’s first turn):
The Story So Far: Our Hero Bunnies playing the Allies decided on a reckless Norway/West Russia/Ukraine attack and lucked out big time in Ukraine. The Axis player built 10 infantry 2 tanks with Germany so couldn’t immediately exploit Russia’s lack of units (lack relative to a Ukraine/West Russia attack), and had awful luck in two small but important battles, particularly Anglo-Egypt, restricting Germany’s income, and Belorussia, which allowed Bunnies to dodge a potentially nasty German take and hold of Ukraine. (But note that if the German player HAD gone super aggressive with an 8 tank build, there were pitfalls along that path as well). Bunnies decided to play very aggressively with UK and made some noncombat move mistakes with UK, but successfully exploited Germany’s poor dice at Anglo-Egypt. Once again, it is the Axis player’s turn, and since Bunnies was not Axis, we are engaging in speculation as to What Might Have Been, What Should Have Been, before going into What Actually Happened.
Looking at the board, Germany was in pretty bad position thanks to spectacularly bad dice, and with UK having whacked the German battleship/transport, that position was probably only going to get worse with Germany locked out of Africa income. UK had been careless, but the openings might not be particularly easy to exploit with all the high priority targets. Germany had produced 10 infantry 2 tanks and was pursuing a defensive trading strategy, rather than trying to slam tanks into Caucasus/Russia ASAP.
The first question Japan had to ask itself was whether it could exploit any existing openings. Specifically, were there any particularly vulnerable targets? Were there any territories that Japanese fighters could fly to to inconvenience the Allies? The answers were yes and no respectively. India was potentially vulnerable, but taking it would risk a lot of Japanese air and there was a Russian counter. Trans-Jordan was in range and could yield a valuable UK bomber. As far as using Japanese fighters to reinforce German territories, up to 1 Japanese fighter could reach Ukraine, which would bring its defense to 2 infantry 4 tanks 1 fighter. However, Russia could potentially ignore Karelia and Belorussia to hit Ukraine with up to 12 dice, many of them tanks and fighters. 12 attackers hitting 7 defenders is not a good trade; even if most of the defenders are mid (defending at 3s) and high (defending at 4s) dice. Russia could even chance to hit Ukraine with slightly less, choosing to strafe Ukraine and retreat to West Russia.
At any rate, committing the Japanese fighter to Ukraine would not yield a decisive advantage. Russia had a lot to counter with, and Germany did not have a build that could immediately pressure Russia.
The second question Japan had to ask itself were what threats could be incoming. Russian control of Buryatia could be a problem as it left the US with a sub and fighter attack to the sea zone east of Japan (the importance of which I will get to in a moment). UK had a carrier in the area and had moved its fighters so if the UK carrier were left alone, and Buryatia left alone, UK could hit the sea zone east of Japan with up to 1 carrier 2 fighter 1 bomber. UK also threatened the French Indochina sea zone with 1 sub, 1 fighter, and 1 bomber. There were UK transports at New Guinea and Borneo that could be a problem for Borneo later on (Borneo being inconvenient for the Japanese to get to), and a UK cruiser at Borneo that also threatened both the sea zones east of Japan and at French Indochina. The US fleet at Hawaii could be a serious threat to a Japanese fleet east of Japan, and the US fighter on China could hit any transports west of Japan and/or be used to trade valuable territory later on. (Without the US fighter, the 2 US infantry in Sinkiang aren’t much of an attack threat). Finally, UK had 2 infantry 1 fighter and 1 bomber in range of French Indochina, and Russia had 6 infantry 1 fighter in range of Manchuria.
All of these potential threats were immediate and could not be dealt with by buying a few cheap units with Japan. But some threats could be neutralized by neutralizing other threats. For example, taking Buryatia would not only eliminate the Russian threat to Manchuria, it would also eliminate most of the serious threats to the sea zone east of Japan, since Buryatia would be eliminated as an Allied landing zone.
As an experienced player, I figured that none of these threats was particularly a problem for Japan. In particular, UK had failed to take Borneo, and UK had not flown the India fighter to Buryatia. UK control of Borneo is a big chunk of Japan’s income, and would normally be considered a high priority retake target. A fighter on Buryatia would make taking it super expensive. (Normally the India fighter cannot be used to hit the Kwangtung transport and to fly to Buryatia, because it is needed to retake Anglo-Egypt. In this particular game, and reflecting on the situation, I think I would usually have used the UK India cruiser against the German battleship, used the India fighter to hit the Kwangtung transport, landing on Buryatia. The Anglo-Egypt fighter could have landed on the India carrier east of Kenya, and India infantry could have been used to lock up UK control of Africa. Of course, I didn’t do all that because I was playing very aggressively.
Since there were no pressing issues that demanded unusual attention (there were some issues, but nothing particularly a problem that couldn’t be dealt with by existing forces), the third question was what strategy to pursue?
Japan has two strategies. Strategy one is building two industrial complexes immediately and pumping tanks like crazy, combined with a super attack into China. This would pressure Russia quickly, but would limit Japan’s ability to trade Africa later on, and would be very expensive in terms of units traded. (Russia could trade cheap infantry and artillery for Japanese tanks). Strategy two is building transports to grab Japanese infantry off the islands, and to pressure Africa later on.
The strategies can be mixed up a bit, by producing a few infantry early on at the industrial complexes and building a transport with the IPCs saved, or building a destroyer along with the transports to fend off Allied sub attacks. But either greatly cuts the efficacy of the strategies.
Looking at the board situation, if Germany HAD hit Russia and been lucky, and had built 8 tanks on G1, a Japanese double industrial complex build with subsequent tank builds would have put a lot of early pressure on Russia, allowing Japan to claim territory uncontested and possibly pushing Russia back into Moscow quickly, forcing abandonment of Caucasus. But Germany did NOT build 8 tanks on G1; it went conservatively and built 10 infantry 2 tanks, and had poor luck on its eastern front, allowing Russia to counter and slow its development in Europe even more.
If Germany had built 8 tanks and had been lucky, then a Japanese strategy of double industrial complex and tank build would have been the right thing to do. But Germany didn’t build 8 tanks, and wasn’t lucky in its counters. Still, early pressure on Moscow could be useful.
Still, Germany had lost its Mediterranean fleet, and had only two units in Africa that would quickly be overrun. The Allies would be getting fat off income from Africa, which could be a problem, as UK would be able to use those IPCs to build artillery and tanks instead of simply infantry for its transports to drop off. Artillery and tanks add a lot of power to a UK ground attack.
So in this situation – Germany without the ability to reinforce Africa and with only 2 German units there, and Germany not being able to sustain any sort of quick and powerful attack towards Caucasus and Russia – I think I would have used either a transport build or a transport/IC build on J1, but definitely not a double industrial complex build.
To Be Continued! Same Bunny Time! Same Bunny Channel!
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J1 (Japan’s first turn): (speculation continues)
For a new player – what are the important sea zones around Japan? If you put units west of Japan, they’re generally safer, but from there, can only pick up units from Japan itself. Even there, you have to watch out for, say, Russia taking control of Manchuria, and UK hitting the sea zone west of Japan and landing in Manchuria, or the US fighter from China. If you put units east of Japan, they’re usually in attack range of subs as well as some air, but from there you can take infantry from Phillipines, Wake, and Okinawa. (Typical would be to take 1 transport from the sea zone east of Japan, move to Wake and pick up 1 infantry, then move back to Japan and pick up another infantry, or an artillery or tank, and offload into Buryatia).
I think in this situation I would have done something like 2 fighters from East Indies carrier vs infantry/bomber at TransJordan, East Indies battleship versus Borneo, Japanese sub, cruiser, Caroline Islands fighter, and bomber vs US fleet at Hawaii, and Japan battleship vs UK carrier at Kwangtung. I would have sent 1 infantry 1 fighter from Manchuria, 3 infantry from Kwangtung, and the Japan fighter to China. You will typically want to hit China with at least two air units and 4-5 infantry in a dice game; any less risks taking extremely heavy losses.
This would leave free the French Indochina fighter and 2 infantry, the transport from the sea zone east of Japan, and the carrier from Caroline Islands, as well as 1 infantry from Manchuria. What threats have not been addressed? Buryatia, meaning both that the Russians could threaten invasion of Manchuria and threaten the sea zone east of Japan with more power.
How could Buryatia be addressed? With Japan’s power spread so thin, at least one other attack would have to be given up. Just how much would have to be given up? The most that could be brought in on Buryatia would be 3 infantry 1 tank 4 fighters 1 bomber. Even then, there would be a fair chance for Japan to win with only 1 tank and its air, or only its air, surviving. Considering the Russian threat to Manchuria, would it be a worthwhile tradeoff?
Let’s consider the other attacks.
The US fleet at Hawaiian Islands is one of the major threats to Japanese shipping. From the carrier, a US fighter could hit the sea zone west of Japan. Also, an additional 2 units and a potential safe landing zone would bring the minimal threat to Japanese shipping east of Japan to 1 sub 1 carrier 3 fighters. That’s a LOT to deal with.
The China fighter gives the US infantry in Sinkiang some early bite, so can be very inconvenient to early Japanese plans in Asia. (Specifically, say Japan moves 1 infantry into Sinkiang. If US can counterattack with 1 infantry 1 fighter, it has a good chance to destroy the Japanese infantry and gain 2 IPC from the territory. But if US has no fighter, it would have to send both infantry, and even then its odds aren’t great. Even if US did send both infantry, they would both be destroyed by the Japanese counter, ending the US threat later on. Could the task be delegated to Russia? Russia has its hands full with fighting the Germans, but it could still hit a lone Japanese infantry at Sinkiang, to protect Kazakh and Novosibirsk if nothing else. But if Russia hit Sinkiang and captured it, the Allies would never collect income from that territory. It would be after the US collection phase, and Japan could reclaim Sinkiang before the next US collection phase came around. Again, 2 IPCs seems trivial, but it can and does make a real difference.
Considering that those attacks are considered fairly important, that leaves just a few units left unassigned. The East Indies fighters could lend their power to the China attack, but destroying the UK units on TransJordan would both eliminate them as a counterattack force to Anglo-Egypt, and would destroy a valuable UK bomber that could pressure Germany.
Why commit the Japanese battleships to fighting the Borneo UK cruiser and Kwangtung UK carrier, respectively?
Find out in our next EXCITING INSTALLMENT!
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J1 (Japan’s first turn): (speculation continues again)
The UK Borneo carrier/transport and UK transport at New Guinea (with the 2 UK infantry on New Guinea) could either help UK in India, or attack Borneo. So Japan would best destroy those units, or at the least park a battleship at Borneo to prevent UK from attacking it (and in doing so destroying the units on Borneo).
But leaving the UK carrier alone would allow UK to hit the Japanese battleship at Borneo with sub/carrier/fighter. Losing the Japanese battleship would mean a lot more difficulty in hitting targets like French Madagascar (island southeast of Africa), Hawaiian Islands, Australia, New Zealand, and Alaska, as Allied subs ran around.
So to protect Borneo, a Japanese battleship is desired; to protect that battleship, the UK carrier is attacked by the other Japanese battleship.
What of the attacks that were NOT considered?
India is the one juicy bone left unconsidered. But taking India would require a serious commitment of power, and would risk a lot of Japanese air, first because of the AA gun, then because Japan only would have 2 infantry to soak up the hits from 2 infantry and a fighter. If UK had build an industrial complex on India, and Russia didn’t have a counter to India, then India would be a high priority target. But all India’s doing at the moment is threatening French Indochina, a temporary inconvenience.
Furthermore, using the East Indies fighters and the French Indochina infantry and fighter against China would mean leaving the UK bomber alive. As already mentioned, the Buryatia attack is off for the moment. But leaving Buryatia and the UK bomber alive would allow UK bomber to hit the sea zone at French Indochina, or at Kwangtung, or east of Japan. Given the other considered Japan moves, this would not be a problem; with a Japanese battleship at Kwangtung, a lone UK bomber would have poor odds, and the sea zone at French Indochina was left unguarded anyways. Nor would a lone bomber have a lot of hitting power to the sea zone east of Japan (although it would have to be remembered).
The other juicy bone left unconsidered is the UK transport at New Guinea. With that transport, UK could move units to India next turn, posing a serious invasion threat to French Indochina. But using a fighter on the UK transport would mean giving up an attack on TransJordan. Hitting TransJordan would allow Germany to gain IPCs from Africa, which would both increase Germany’s power to defend and cut into UK’s power to attack.
With all that said, we’re starting to get a picture of the speculation I would have formed for the Japanese turn. Along with a transport build, the picture would look something like this:
Since the Buryatia stack will not be hit, US can hit the sea zone east of Japan with 1 sub 1 fighter. UK will be able to follow up with a bomber but NOT a sub (very important). This assumes the Japanese attack on the UK carrier will be successful. However, if the Japanese attack on the UK carrier fails (say Japan gets a miss and UK gets a hit), the Japanese battleship could retreat to the sea zone east of Japan. This would leave UK with an additional threat of carrier and 2 fighters, but would mean the US sub/fighter threat would be much less important.
The Japanese attack on Borneo may or may not want to retreat depending on the results of the TransJordan battle and the Kwangtung carrier battle. If TransJordan fails, UK will have a bomber and a sub to hit the Japanese battleship with. If the Kwangtung carrier battle fails, though, UK will be able to obliterate the Japanese battleship with ease.
Japan wants to build transports in the sea zone east of Japan, but will have to deal with threats, particularly the ones dependent on the UK carrier at Kwangtung and the US sub/fighter attack. The US could potentially hit with a lot more depending on whether or not the Japanese attack on the Hawaiian Islands fleet was successful or not. Supposing the Japanese attack on Pearl to go very badly, Japan might want to consider a contingency plan for building units west of Japan for safety, but there it could be hit by the China fighter were that battle to go badly, and the US fighter from Hawaii were both carrier and fighter to survive there. The UK bomber would also be able to hit following a Russian capture of Manchuria, giving UK a safe landing zone.
But the odds of the Hawaiian Islands fleet attack failing is very low, considering the forces committed. The attack on China is also unlikely to fail, even if China cannot be captured, the US fighter on China will almost certainly be destroyed.
So Japan’s build will not leave a safety factor in case one or more of its naval battles goes poorly.
What of the land defense situation?
A fortified Manchuria would come at the expense of an attack into China. Russia could still hit a fairly well defended Manchuria, at the expense of a Russian fighter after the J2 counter into Buryatia and/or China. But Russia does not have to hit Manchuria, it could just pull back. In that case, if Japan did not hit China, both US and Russian fighters would have escaped.
So we will allow Russia to invade Manchuria, but we will leave 1 infantry there. If Russia sends its fighter to hit Manchuria, the J2 counter will wipe it. If Russia sends 2 infantry to capture Manchuria, it does not have particularly good odds (decent), but not good. Russia could send 3 or more infantry to capture Manchuria, but regardless, whatever units Russia leaves on Buryatia and Manchuria will easily be recaptured by Japan next turn (barring extreme dice allowing the Allies to destroy all the Japanese transports). That would mean killing however many Russian infantry stuck around, and no reduced Japanese income (since they recapture Manchuria and capture Buryatia anyways). True, Japan would probably hit a slight snag in a smoothly running transport operation into Asia, but the tradeoff to Russia would be however many infantry lost to 3 IPCs in the bank.
Leaving Manchuria unguarded would allow Russia to just march 1 infantry in with no problem. Then the gain would be 3 IPCs in the Russian bank in exchange for light positional pressure on Japan’s logistics into Asia, plus at least a 33% shot to kill a Japanese infantry, a clear win for the Russians.
The situation in French Indochina against invasion from India is similar, but there UK has enough air movement to hit and run. Furthermore, early UK income often means additional transports to pressure Germany faster with. Defending French Indochina with just 1 infantry would allow UK to hit with air and 1 infantry for a high probability capture. But if French Indochina was defending with 1 infantry 1 fighter, UK could send 2 infantry 1 fighter to try to kill the Japanese fighter; even 1 infantry 2 fighters defending could see UK making a play for two Jap fighters instead. Probably the best thing to do, then, would be to defend with at least 2 infantry 1 fighter, which is why the infantry at French Indochina are left idle – they are being used for defense. This DOES mean China is a higher risk battle, particularly with a Japanese infantry staying out of the fight at Manchuria.
The fighter from Japan will only have 1 movement left, so will land on French Indochina.
With Japan hitting TransJordan with 2 fighters, there is a question of the UK counter. Suppose Japan loses a fighter, or even both fighters. UK has 2 fighters in range of the Japanese carrier, and since the Japanese carrier is not adjacent to any friendly territories, any fighters on the carrier would have to be destroyed first. So UK could hit a Japanese/1 fighter fleet with 2 fighters, and force Japan to lose the fighter first. Or, UK could attack an undefended carrier and try to sink it. This is why the French Indochina fighter was not used. The French Indochina fighter is the closest fighter, but even it cannot participate in any combats and also reinforce the Japanese carrier if need be.
Finally, we look at the sea zone east of Japan. All the other Allied counters to Japan’s J1 moves can only be answered with existing Japanese forces. But any threatened Allied attack to the sea zone east of Japan can be met with new Japanese builds.
Of the fighters that Japan has, the fighter starting on Manchuria that will hit China has range to get to the sea zone east of Japan, as does the fighter from Caroline Islands that hits the Hawaiian Islands fleet. The French Indochina fighter could also reach, but it may have to be used to land on the Japanese carrier at the TransJordan attack. Both fighters are fairly safe; even if the China attack goes badly, the fighter from Tokyo could be taken as a casualty, leaving the Manchuria fighter free to fly back to the sea zone east of Japan, then French Indochina could be abandoned if necessary (or perhaps the French Indochina could be left on French Indochina). If the Hawaiian Islands attack goes badly, there’s still a sub and cruiser and bomber that can be destroyed first. This fleet can be joined by the Japanese carrier from Caroline Islands for a moderately powerful defensive fleet.Considering all this, the most likely outcome is that US will be able to hit the sea zone east of Japan with sub/fighter, and UK will have no follow-up. If US attacks with a sub, and Japan has no destroyer, then the Japanese fighters will not be able to defend, so it will be a US sub against a Japanese carrier with a lot of Japanese transports on the line.
So Japan will have to build at least one destroyer.
A defensive fleet of 1 destroyer 1 carrier 2 fighters will probably be able to fend off an attack from 1 sub 1 fighter, particularly if the carrier is taken as a casualty first in case of a sub hit, and Japanese fighters are taken as casualties in case of a US fighter hit. The worst case scenario would then require TransJordan to fail, then for the US sub to get an early hit, forcing Japan to sink the destroyer in the hopes that the Japanese would inflict at least two this to destroy both US sub and US fighter (but even then, the odds would be with Japan). If the Japs only got one hit, the US could continue its sub attack to destroy the AC then and Japanese transports. (If the Japs sank the carrier first, then the Jap fighters would have to land at the end of combat, leaving just 1 Japanese destroyer defending the Japanese transports at best. That would leave UK with 60% odds to destroy the Japanese destroyer and the Japanese transports and land safely on Buryatia.
But this chain of events is sufficiently unlikely that I would not worry about it too much.
For the rest of the build, I would anticipate winning at Kwangtung, allowing me to use the Japanese transport to move units from Philllipine Islands to Kwangtung. This would leave me with 6 units on Japan and 2 on Wake and Okinawa. The Japanese transport ending the turn at Kwangtung would take 2 units from Japan to the Asian coast, leaving 4 on Japan and 2 on Wake and Okinawa.
After a destroyer build, Japan would have 22 IPC left, enough for 3 transports. Those three transports could be used to move 2 units from Japan to French Indochina next turn (to help defend against an anticipated 4 infantry plus assorted air UK attack on UK3), and to pick up Wake and Okinawa infantry to offload into Buryatia along with 2 more ground from Japan. Early infantry to the Asian coast mean early pressure against Russia.
So I would build 1 destroyer 3 transports, and perform combat moves as described.
What actually happened, though, was rather different!
In our next exciting installment! What the Axis player ACTUALLY did!
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J1 (Japan’s first turn): (actual move)
Japan purchased 2 destroyers 2 transports.
Sub/cruiser/fighter/bomber vs US Hawaiian fleet of sub, carrier, fighter.
Battleship/carrier vs UK cruiser and transport at Borneo
Fighter vs UK transport at New Guinea
2 Manchuria infantry, 3 Kwangtung infantry, French Indochina fighter, Manchuria fighter, East Indies fighter, Tokyo fighter vs US 2 infantry and 1 fighter at China
Battleship and carrier vs UK carrier at KwangtungInstead of targeting the vulnerable UK bomber, Japan decided to whack out the Borneo/New Guinea threat, leaving 2 UK infantry stranded on New Guinea. The additional fighters were used to increase the odds on the China battle, which would leave Japan with a powerful force to hit into Sinkiang (5 infantry 4 fighters is a LOT more deadly than 4 infantry 2 fighters that I proposed). Otherwise, Japan had taken care of almost all the potential threats I mentioned earlier, although its defense for the sea zone east of Japan would be rather weak, depending only on 2 destroyers. (As it turned out, Japan ended up placing its build WEST, not east of Japan. After Russia took Manchuria leaving UK with a legal landing zone, it would have been 1 UK bomber vs 2 Japan destroyers with a prize of 2 Japanese transports as a bonus if the UK bomber survived. This is a pretty poor odds battle, and is almost certainly what the Axis player planned when purchasing the 2 Japanese destroyers in the first place.
Combat Results:
Japan used 1 submarine 1 cruiser 1 fighter 1 bomber to hit the US fleet of sub/carrier/fighter at Hawaiian Islands. At this point, I knew the Japan build, and was salivating over a chance at hitting the sea zone east of Japan with sub/fighter and following up with a UK bomber to annihilate 2 Japanese transports. But I wouldn’t get to do that unless I submerged my US sub, so I submerged it.
Unless Japan attacks with almost nothing, it’s usually best for US to submerge at Hawaii. Sub/cruiser/fighter/bomber is probably enough to wipe out the US fleet if they stand and fight, while taking perhaps at most two to three casualties in return, given really great dice from US. If Japan attacked with 1 sub and 1 fighter, I think I would perhaps stand and fight, though.
Japan hit with the sub, killing the US carrier before it could fight back. Japan got two more hits between the rest of its attack force. The US fighter missed. So this was lucky for Japan, but it was not particularly important. If the Japanese sub and cruiser both die, that hardly inconveniences Japan’s progress in Asia, where the income is. Even losing an air unit doesn’t slow Japan a lot.
That is, Allies had fantastic luck at the important battles and Axis had lousy luck at the important battles so far. Getting great luck at a relatively unimportant battle was not even close to decent compensation. But it’s what we had to work with.
Japan used 1 battleship 1 carrier to attack at Borneo, probably using the carrier as fodder in case of extreme UK luck. Both carrier and battleship hit, and the UK cruiser gave up without doing anything in return. (Even if it had hit, it wouldn’t have mattered in the slightest).
Japan wiped out the UK transport at New Guinea automatically.
Japan attacked China with 5 infantry 4 fighters against 2 infantry 1 fighter. China got three hits on the first round, killing all defenders. US missed everything. China had a stack of 5 infantry on China, which usually ends up being a Serious Problem. Going after the UK bomber as I proposed with 2 Jap fighters would probably have ended in Japan perhaps taking China with 1-2 infantry, not nearly as much of a problem for Russia to deal with.
Japan sent a battleship and carrier to hit the UK carrier off Kwangtung too. They got one hit on the first round, and the carrier sank without inflicting a hit.
On noncombat, Japan moved a Tokyo tank and a Phillipines island infantry to Kwangtung. The surviving fighter from the Hawaiian Islands battle landed on Wake (this is why you usually don’t pick up the Wake Islands infantry, so US doesn’t have an easy shot on a Japan fighter with its battleship/transport from Western US)
At the end of the turn, after placement, Japan had 2 destroyers 2 transports west of Japan, 4 infantry 1 artillery 1 bomber 1 AA gun on Japan, China with 5 infantry, 2 infantry 4 fighters on French Indochina, infantry and tank at Kwangtung (threatening 2 infantry 1 tank and mass air to India next turn). There were a sub and cruiser at Hawaii, a battleship, carrier, fighter, and transport off Kwangtung, a battleship and empty carrier off Borneo. Manchuria was open, ready for Russia to walk into.
With two destroyers built, Japan was ready to fend off Allied sub harassment, and with 5 ground on Tokyo and 1 on Phillipines, Japan was ready to use the Kwangtung transport to pick up a Phillipines Islands infantry and move to the sea zone east of Japan on J2 to take Buryatia, using the four ground on Tokyo and 2 transports east of Japan either to drop to Buryatia, Manchuria, Soviet Far East, Kwangtung, of French Indochina as appropriate. That is, Japan was all set with a plan to fill up all its transports to capacity.
Not what I would have done, but definitely not bad, and very possibly superior (except possibly the Russian walk in to Manchuria which I am unsure about). Japan had a strong force in China ready to make a serious threat into Russia very quickly, and had shut down the New Guinea UK transport threat. (If Japan had just parked at Borneo, UK could have still used the New Guinea transport to reinforce India or attack French Indochina; if Japan had killed the transport at New Guinea with a battleship, UK could have hit with sub/cruiser/bomber to try to kill some valuable Japanese ships). Maybe if I were pursuing a similar strategy, I would have parked a battleship/carrier/1-2 fighters at New Guinea , but leaving the UK cruiser and transport alone would just have meant Japan would have to hunt them down later (or at least that Germany might have to deal with them, particularly with UK controlling the Suez canal.)
Japan collected 31 IPCs, ending its turn.
In our next exciting installment! Bunnies thoughts as he plans the US/Russian turns! More hare-brained exploits await!
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US1: A March Hare (a pun on the March Hare from Lewis Carroll’s “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, as well as of a bunny marching to war, and tied in to the closing “hare-brained” reference from the last post. Ain’t I cute.)
The Story So Far: Russia went Norway/West Russia/Ukraine and lucked out like mad. Germany could have had a fairly vicious counter, but got lousy dice, and also failed Anglo-Egypt miserably due to more awful dice. UK blew up the German battleship and transport. Japan could have moved to grant Germany continued access to Africa IPCs but didn’t, instead choosing to make a powerful early push towards Moscow.
As US, I had to plan ahead both for both US and Russia; as they go right after one another, so there’s nothing the Axis can do to stop a planned US and Russian move. (As opposed to, say, Germany depending on Japanese moves, which could be disrupted by UK, or UK depending on Russia moves, which could be disrupted by Germany.
Also, I had to make a few plans as far as what the likely German, UK, and Japanese moves would be. I’d have to look at the board to see what US and Russia could do, what positions they could set up, the risks involved in doing so, and what immediate positions I could take advantage of with either US or Russia. Then, I’d have to plan a long range strategy based on existing board position, and build appropriately.
First, I looked at Japan. Did the US want to go KJF (Kill Japan First)? The key here was to look at Japanese battleships, carriers, fighters, and bombers, as well as other Japanese fleet. Japan’s navy and air is what can push US off. If Japan’s navy was or could be horribly weakened somehow, US could consider an attack on the Pacific.
Looking at the situation, though, none of US, Russia, or UK could really do anything of importance. There was 1 Japanese fighter on Wake that could potentially be destroyed, but at poor odds considering it was protected by an infantry. The Japanese cruiser at Hawaiian Islands could be destroyed, but at a decent chance of losing the US sub in return, and thus the ability to harass Japan.
So really, at best, Japan would have a force of 2 battleships 2 carriers, 2 destroyers, 1 sub, 6 fighters, and 1 bomber, without building a thing. US had at the moment 1 battleship and 1 sub in the area, plus up to three fighters and a bomber. Counting battleships as 2 hits, that would be a Japanese force of 16 hits against a US force of 7 hits. I mean, seriously now. At an income of 40 IPC (US starts with 42, but with Sinkiang and China lost pretty quickly, it hovers around 40), that would perhaps be enough for a carrier, 2 destroyers and another fighter, bringing the US to 11 hits. Sadly Japan still would overwhelm the US 17 to 11.
Building 7 subs with US would bring its hits up faster, to `4 hits against 17 hits, but most of Japan’s hits would be of higher quality (3s and 4s), plus it had destroyers to fend off subs, plus subs are lousy defenders that additionally can’t hit air. If US grouped its subs together, a single Japanese destroyer with mass air could kill lots of them, trading a single Japanese destroyer for four or five US subs at a time. If US spread its subs out, Japan could still snipe them out with destroyers, and US would not be able to concentrate its forces to threaten multiple sea zones. (If you spread US subs out, then you could focus on surrounding a single sea zone, but then Japan could just run away from the attacked sea zone to a sea zone that most of the subs couldn’t hit.)
Finally, building subs wouldn’t help protect US transports, and it’s taking Japan’s island income away, killing its navy, pushing it out of Asia, and restricting Japan to the island of Japan itself that really define a KJF.
Given that Japan could build cheap subs to keep the US fleet away, while maintaining a flow of units into Asia, I decided not to go KJF. Instead, I would try to push on Europe, along with UK and Russia.
The first thing I looked for was a safe US landing zone at Archangel. Bringing the US bomber to Archangel is usually very handy. With that, I will take a break from comments from THIS game and introduce a Bunny Reference Guide! (On hunting the Germans out of Africa, specifically trying to target the German battleship/transport early)
Why depart from the game commentary, but mention this German battleship/transport hunt plan? Because you will have to worry about the German battleship/transport in most games. Usually, UK does not luck out like mad at Anglo-Egypt.
(next up – Bunnies lays aside comments on actually planning the US1 turn for speculation on what US1 might have had to plan to do!) Think of it as one of those episodes in which the protagonist visits alternate realities of What Might Have Been.)
US1 (speculation on what MIGHT have happened, but totally did NOT happen this game)
If you’re going KGF (Kill Germany First), you want to keep UK’s income high so it can build transports and escorts. After that, you will still want UK’s income high so it can produce artillery and tanks to hit Germany with. But more importantly, you want to restrict Germany’s income. Every IPC Germany has is a bit more it can build infantry with, and Germany taking in income from Africa is extremely difficult to stop, with it pumping mad amounts of infantry from Berlin and Rome.
So one of the high priority targets for early game is the German battleship and transport.
How can you whack it, and how fast?
R1 build of sub/fighter threatens Germans landing at Anglo-Egypt. Doing so saps Russia of ground units, leaving it potentially vulnerable to a heavy tank build. Caucasus must be held with Russian fighters on it to threaten sea zones up to Southern Europe, in case the German battleship stays south of Southern Europe/north of Libya. Even if Russia attacks and destroys the German battleship, its ability to trade territory in Europe will suffer as Russia is potentially forced to commit valuable tanks to trade territory.
UK1 can destroy the Germans landing at Anglo-Egypt with UK fighter from Indian Ocean and UK bomber from London, followed up by a Russian fighter from Caucasus (or as from Moscow if willing to land in TransJordan, probably only best if Russia sent infantry to Persia on R1 and/or has tanks on Caucasus, to prevent Germany from hitting that pile with mass air. But the UK fighter/bomber attack could easily fail, leaving UK two valuable air units down with the German battleship left intact. With the German battleship left intact, the Russians would almost certainly find a one or even two fighter attack on the German battleship/transport to be bad news. Again, Russian fighters are valuable, but building more can leave Russia vulnerable to a heavy German tank build.
UK2 can destroy the German battleship by using a slightly elaborate plan of flying 1-2 UK fighters to West Russia (depending on how its attack on the German destroyer goes), and bomber to points within Russia. The Indian Ocean fighter can be used to help retake Anglo-Egypt, and land on the Indian Ocean carrier southeast of Africa, to the east of Kenya. If the Germans drop to Anglo-Egypt/TransJordan on G2, UK2 can destroy the German battleship with 2-3 fighters and a bomber, a fairly safe battle that will probably only lose 1 UK fighter, 2 UK fighters at the worst. But this is only if Germany drops to Anglo-Egypt/TransJordan on G2. (Hobbes used this cuteness on me, after which I was ever wary for it.)
US2 can destroy the German battleship by sending a US bomber to Archangel, and flying 2 fighters to a UK carrier northwest or southwest of London. (one US fighter from Eastern US, one US fighter from Western US). On UK2, the UK carrier can move to Algeria, leaving US fighters able to hit much of the Mediterranean, as well as the US bomber from Archangel, which can land in Caucasus.
Between the UK2 and US2 plans, the German battleship can be destroyed before G3 rolls around unless Germany does something clever. If the Germans hit Anglo-Egypt / Trans-Jordan on G2, 2-3 UK fighters and a bomber can hit, with UK fighters landing on the car rier. If the Germans do not hit Anglo-Egypt/Trans-Jordan on G2 and stay at Southern Europe, US fighters and the US bomber can threaten 2 fighters 1 US bomber, with additional US fighters flying in on noncombat to the UK carrier if need be to protect the Allied fleet.
Wouldn’t leaving the UK carrier northwest or southwest of London mean giving up a UK1 attack into Europe? (Assuming the UK player doesn’t want to sacrifice transports, and wants to keep its fleet together). The answer is no. UK will probably not be able to attack or reinforce Europe anyways.
Typically you’ll see Germany hitting the UK battleship with sub/fighter/bomber and destroying the UK cruiser at Gibraltar with air, leaving UK with no defensive fleet to work with. The Russian sub may still be alive. But with German subs from the Baltic coming west of France, Germany will usually have something like 1 fighter 1 bomber on Norway, 2 fighters on France, and 1 fighter on Libya (in Africa), plus of course the subs.
If UK decides to invade Norway, the defense will at best be 1 sub 2 destroyers 1 carrier 2 fighters, for 6 hits. Germany, though, will have 2 subs, 3 fighters, and 1 bomber to attack with, possibly even 2 subs 4 fighters 1 bomber.
If Germany does decide to attack, Germany has a fair number of fodder subs that it can lose. Germany will have an advantage in attack, with both superior numbers and higher dice on the attack, as well as sub strikes in case the UK destroyers are lost soon. True, Germany may lose some very valuable air on the attack, and Germany doesn’t have much to gain with only a single UK transport at stake. But if Germany gets lucky, it may destroy a few Allied air units, and destroy the destroyers and carrier before retreating. UK would then have to build another destroyer (for air fodder against the still powerful German air) and carrier (to hold fighters), meaning more delay in building transports, taking pressure off Germany.
Moving the UK fleet northwest or southwest of London, though, will leave the UK fleet out of range of either the German fighters on Norway or the German fighters on Western Europe. This reduces the danger of the German attack on the fleet. Even though UK may not be able to drop to Europe early, it preserves its power to potentially land much harder on UK2, especially since the German subs will have to run from the Atlantic or be destroyed by UK destroyers and air (after which UK can build new destroyers to protect its fleet, supposing a UK2 drop to Norway).
In case Germany builds a few bombers and has good luck in the Atlantic and with its German air, UK may be better off building no navy at all, saving IPCs for a gigantic fleet drop on UK2. This can be joined by the US1 fleet build for a formidable navy that can then move together to threaten targets. Although the Allies are slower to get to Europe in that case, Germany can’t threaten a take and hold as easily against Russia (although the bombers allow Germany to trade territories very efficiently)
Once the German battleship and transport are destroyed, the Allies will want to destroy the German forces in Africa. After the Allies have landed at Algeria, US (better US than UK, as US needs lots of transports anyways; UK moving to Africa is seriously inconvenient as it removes UK transports from the picture that could otherwise be moving units every turn to Europe. Each single UK transport can move two ground to Europe each turn. Two US transports are needed for the same job, one moving two ground from Eastern Canada to London each turn, another moving two ground from London to Europe each turn.)
But even for US, moving units to the south of Africa is very inconvenient. Transports sent there are not able to threaten Western or Southern Europe, and take a full two turns to get to a position from which they can be used to transport units from Eastern Canada to Africa (or from London to Western Europe). Still, if Germany is in Africa, and the Axis aren’t pressuring Russia enough to force the Allies to run to Europe early, it is best to try to restrict Axis income from Africa, particularly in a KGF (Kill Germany First) plan. Every IPC the Germans have is more infantry they can build, which makes it much more difficult for the Allies to make real progress.
How can Germany counter all this?
Germany could capture Gibraltar on G1. Or, Germany could build a carrier and possibly a transport in the Mediterranean. There are disadvantages and advantages to both. The advantages, of course, being that Germany keeps its battleship alive. The disadvantage being giving up African income as Germany runs to Gibraltar and allowing the UK Anglo-Egypt units to live (very inconvenient), or buying an expensive carrier and possibly transport.
Even with a Mediterranean carrier build on G1, Germany can only dump a maximum of four units to Africa a turn. US can easily dump eight to ten units. Meanwhile, Germany will have a harder time pressuring Europe, with so many IPCs spent on fleet instead of ground units. The lack of pressure may allow the US to transport units to the south of Africa.
But even then, with two German transports, Germany can control the Suez very quickly and easily, allowing a Japanese battleship and carrier to move through the Suez to further protect the German fleet. In the event that Japan moves a lot of fleet into the Mediterranean, US could make a lot of trouble with a few subs built at Western US. (A Japanese destroyer close to Western US, plus two fighters on a Japanese carrier threaten newly built US subs, but Japan may not be easily able to keep fighters on a carrier east of Japan when the battles in Asia move into the interior near Moscow.
At the same time, though, a lot of Japanese fleet could severely disrupt Allied landings at Algeria, particularly with Japanese air in the area. But the Allies could just switch to Europe drops instead.
What’s the verdict? I’d say a Mediterranean AC build is a defensive build for Germany aimed at maintaining African income, although it could be useful for trading Balkans and Caucasus later. I haven’t analyzed it to the point that I consider it a bad risk (like I do a Russian Norway/West Russia/Ukraine attack in dice).
So ends the speculation for what MIGHT have been. Back to what Bunnies ACTUALLY thought, in our next exciting installment!
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US1 (Back to What Bunnies Actually Thought, rather than What Bunnies Might Have Thought Had The Game Gone Rather Differently)
How Does Bunnies Find The Time To Write All This?
Ninety plus words a minute typing speed, and very little editing. Were I to make this a professional presentation, it would probably be shorter and funnier, with an accompanying technical manual with extensive index. That sort of editing would require going back and thinking about things, and being more thorough, and editing for clarity and conciseness. Although I like to think I’m decent at organization, and decent at writing, somehow combining the two into one time-efficient package evades me. So welcome to my stream of consciousness writing. Bunnies P Wrath . . . stream of consciousness . . . hm . . .
What about the time? Got a laptop, and I ride instead of driving myself around. So . . . bwa ha!
When Our Hero had last left off, he was looking at the board and thinking about what US and Russia would do together, as well as the general shape the game would take. Allies were going to try to KGF (Kill Germany First), Germany had lousy dice in the opening and the Allies were in position to severely limit Germany’s income in Africa. The question was how to make it all work.
Looking at the board –
Fortifying Sinkiang in Asia probably wouldn’t work what with all the Japanese fighters around to lend those 5 infantry in China hitting power. Even with a stack of Russian tanks it still wouldn’t look good.
I wanted to fly a bomber to Archangel, because it’s useful to trade territory along with the 2 US infantry that would be retreating from Sinkiang. If the Japs sent a lot of infantry to Sinkiang, 2 infantry 1 bomber couldn’t do much to stop it, but maybe the Russians could destroy the whole stack. If the Japs just sent 1 infantry in, I could use 1 infantry 1 bomber for a high probability recapture of Sinkiang, gaining income and denying the Japanese the opportunity to use the Japanese infantry on Sinkiang to attack into Kazakh or Novosibirsk next turn.
If Russia had not fortified Buryatia on its turn, Japan would have far less to worry about. But also, Russia would have had 2 infantry on Novosibirsk and 3-4 on Yakut at the end of R1. That would mean on R2 we might see as many as 5 Russian infantry there, ready to trade a stack of infantry with Japan. This is why Russia may often choose to run from the Asian coast; the infantry that run are ready to fight against Japan in Sinkiang later, and besides, a stack of infantry on the Asian coast can’t do much on R2. (As it was, I didn’t run; I stacked Buryatia.)
I knew Russia would have to think about that fat stack of Japanese infantry pretty quick, and that Buryatia stack wasn’t going to be in a position to do much. Furthermore, if I wanted to counter quickly, I’d have to think about it immediately. Moving cheap infantry to Novosibirsk would have to be done immediately on R2, so if on J2 Japan moved in force to Sinkiang, I could counter with the cheap infantry, perhaps some tanks, and fighters.
As it was, I decided to ignore Japan’s progress in Asia for the moment to focus on Germany. So even before I made the purchases on the US turn, I knew that Russia was going to build mostly tanks to pressure Germany.
That decided, was it feasible to land a US fighter on Archangel? Leaving Karelia in German hands would mean that Germany could hit Archangel with air and tanks and perhaps a couple Karelia infantry. But I figured I had 4 infantry on Moscow. If things went very poorly at Karelia, I could move up 4 infantry and an AA gun and hope for the best, as Germany sent its expensive air and tanks to Archangel. Doing that would risk Germany instead going for West Russia, and preventing Russian access to Belorussia IPCs on the next turn. (Again, it’s only 2 IPCs there, but every little bit really makes a big difference.) Still, I would be able to get a bomber to Europe, making the 2 US infantry a threat, that much sooner. I decided to go ahead and fly a US bomber to Archangel, to try to hit Karelia, Belorussia, and Ukraine, and hope for a lot of luck.
Japan did not have two fighters on a carrier at Hawaiian Islands. So US could run its battleship and transport towards Panama without needing to join the US destroyer there. I moved the US infantry from Western US to Panama on the US transport. (If Japan did have two fighters on a carrier, US might want to either risk the 2 Japanese fighters, or leave the US destroyer at Panama there to help protect the US battleship. Japan might risk the fighters were the US battleship and transport left unprotected; that would be a lot less pressure for Germany to deal with, would strand 2 US infantry on Panama, and would also kill a US transport that US would have to buy. (It isn’t an “extra” transport; I usually want around 8 transports with US very quickly, so it’s a transport that I didn’t want to have to buy).
Why move infantry to Panama? Because that frees them to move to Brazil on US2, via the sea zone northeast of Brazil. Why move them to Brazil on US2? Unless Germany had a couple bombers on Western Europe or a Mediterranean carrier, a US2 battleship north of Brazil would be pretty safe. From there, it could drop units to the south of Africa on US3 without having to worry about any light Japanese or German threats, or it could move to Western Europe on US3 to threaten a bigger drop there. In contrast, moving the battleship/transport to Eastern US at the end of US2 would only allow the US3 battleship/transport to hit Algeria. Much slower and less efficient.
With the US destroyer freed, I could send it to Eastern US immediately for a threatened US2 landing on Algeria. The planned US fleet was 1 destroyer 1 cruiser 1 carrier 2 fighters. This was very light, but again, I was playing extremely aggressively and taking a lot of chances, just because I felt like doing so. Considering this might have to stand up to 2 subs 4 fighters 1 bomber, for 7 attack dice, and considering that were the German sub northeast of Canada to move to the sea zone west of Algeria and get a hit, I might be down to 1 destroyer 1 carrier 2 fighters; 4 defense dice against 7 attack dice! Even with the addition of a Russian sub, the odds would still be wretched, with a stack of US transports as the prize. UK was NOT in a position to reinforce US at the sea zone west of Algeria. If Germany stacked Western Europe, US would be on its own.
Could I prevent Germany from stacking Western Europe? Typically Germany can be discouraged by a threatened UK landing to Germany. But UK had only one transport. Just a few infantry and a stack of fighters could have kept the US away.
Still, I went with a minimal fleet. With the German units in Africa probably dead very soon, a quick US landing was not, I thought, essential, especially since there was a good chanced that were Germany to move into Anglo-Egypt, I could use the UK Trans-Jordan infantry along with assorted UK air to try to whack them before they caused any damage. Besides, I could probably in the worst case move the US fleet to the sea zone northeast of East Canada on US2. The German subs probably wouldn’t be in range after having been chased away or destroyed by the Allied destroyers, and a lone German bomber on Western Europe wouldn’t be a problem. (since Germany hadn’t built any bombers on G1, it wouldn’t be able to have any but its starting bomber on Western Europe on G2).
The rest of the US income went towards transports and units to put on the transports.
US built 1 carrier, 2 transports, 2 tanks, and 1 infantry. Usually I build a lot of infantry and/or artillery, setting up a situation in which US has more than its transports can move around. The extra ground units move to Eastern Canada, then the US transports start offloading from Eastern Canada to Algeria every turn, or moving from Eastern Canada to London, as the case may be. But in this game, I was pushing the envelope. I wanted a lot of tanks in case Japan decided to get cute in Africa, and tanks were something that I could use to aggressively push around Europe, and I was all about the rabid attacks this game.
At the end of the turn after placement, my units looked like this:
Infantry on Midway and Hawaiian Islands. Too much bother to retrieve. US sub at Hawaiian islands. I “attacked the Japanese sub and cruiser there, but submerged immediately. I could have destroyed some Japanese hardware, especially using the Hawaiian Islands fighter, but taking a hit would mean losing the US ability to harass Japanese shipping, or losing a valuable US fighter, and I wasn’t going to do either. Nor was I going to move closer to Japan, considering its destroyers west of Japan; sneaking closer would just get the US sub blown up by Japanese destroyer, sub, and cruiser. I used the US sub to exert pressure from the east, and the UK sub to exert pressure from the south. Neither were anything to worry about, but they were inconveniences that would force Japan to stay aware.
Just losing the US and UK subs quickly means Japan can send its fleet through the Suez Canal, from the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean. Lone Japanese transports can go to Caroline Islands and Solomon Islands to pick up infantry. They could also start screwing around with Australia, New Guinea (which UK had captured), New Zealand, French Madagascar – basically, the Allied subs couldn’t kill anything if Japan stayed defensive, but doing so locked up Japan’s fleet. Using a 6 IPC sub to affect the movement of a 20 IPC battleship is good news. Making Japan want to build 8 IPC destroyers is good too.
Infantry from Alaska and fighter from Hawaiian Islands in Western Canada. An infantry in Alaska doesn’t do much; if Japan tries to land on Alaska, it will bring at least 2 ground units and kill a lone infantry anyways. From Western Canada, though, it could move to Eastern Canada, which is where most US transports would be trying to pick up and drop off from. The Hawaii fighter couldn’t get to any more useful places; from Western Canada, it could at least reach London next turn if need be, or various sea zones, including the sea zone west of Algeria. Western USA had 1 AA gun on it (for no reason, usually I move the AA gun up towards Western Canada).
Battleship, transport, and 2 infantry at Panama.
2 US infantry at Kazakh. 1 US bomber at Archangel (unprotected at the moment). The infantry wouldn’t survive if left at Sinkiang, and would inflict almost no casualties in return to the Japanese. Kazakh is closer to Persia and Caucasus, where the US infantry might be of some use. Novosibirsk is pretty useless. Usually if Japan lands in east Asia, they have power to spare; a couple US infantry probably couldn’t do much of anything. Japan usually can’t take Persia with a lot very early, and at Caucasus, US could watch for an opportunity to hit Germany.
At Eastern US, 4 infantry, 2 artillery, 3 tanks, 1 AA gun, 4 transports, 1 cruiser, 1 destroyer, 1 carrier, 1 fighter.
On UK carrier northeast of London, 1 US fighter. Before the US fighter landed, Germany could try for a lucky shot on the UK fleet. After the US fighter landed, Germany would need a LOT of luck to whack the UK fleet. They probably wouldn’t even try.
America collected 40 IPCs and ended its turn.
In our next thrilling episode! Bunnies charges in with Russia again and gets suspiciously lucky dice results again! As ROUND TWO starts, Russian tanks ROAR INTO ACTION! (rahhrr!)
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I reckon I will let this go a while though eh. Lotta reading.
Maybe I’ll write a nice short focused series for beginning players.
Someday . . . :roll:
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Impressive, in particular as it was done sans editing. With your US builds you mention “US built 1 carrier, 2 transports, 2 tanks, and 1 infantry”, of course you meant artillery, gotta hate it even with 90 wpm your fingers lag your mind as you were thinking about what you usually build.
It almost a pity that this scenario started out in a generally atypical state after R1. If you were to do a tutorial then perhaps laying out a typical, perhaps a poor choice of words, an idealized game with more statistically average dice rolls. Of course when the first dice are rolled all planning often goes out the window and one should never lock into a plan. There would be a combinatorical explosion if too much attention was given to statistically less likely scenarios so what to do?
I’m having troubles getting TripleAA to work so as to review spring 42 games there and worse, the older games played here are gone. Our local group is having a tough time against the ‘Fortress Europe’ strategy Hobbes outlined here.
I feel bad for my Allied opponent, last night in game 1 of 2, the typical R1 2 attack into Wru and Urk 2 tanks each, the russians cleared Ukr with only 1 Ftr remaining the rest of the rolls were slight axis favoured up until the end of G1. Game 2, Ukr was hit with 3 tanks in the usual R1 2-attack mode, great, he won with 3 tanks, inf and art. Then next was Wru….in with 9 of 11 possible units, captured with 1 of 9 attacking pieces left. I open with a 5 Inf 5 Tank build for G1 usually and generally follow Fortress Europe and while I am not in the top 25% I don’t make too many mistakes playing the Axis. But I also don’t play the allies that well nor do my friends we don’t know what to do to beat how we play the Axis.
I need to get over the learning curve of TripleA I guess and see what occurs there, but then so would all my friends in our local group, not going to happen too easily I am afraid. It was hard enough to get them to start visiting here, imagine that!
Perhaps an emulation of how the games play out here including maps but keeping ‘dice rolls’ outside the statically unlikely range.
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Our local group is having a tough time against the ‘Fortress Europe’ strategy Hobbes outlined here.
I’ve seen ways of countering it…
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Well I have yet to see people talking about requiring a bid for the allies so there is obviously something we are missing.
I seem to be missing some map files or something for the tripleA software. The files you guys have provided I can load, but then…… I try play and get a screen full of errors:
I can load the file “HobbesMay0611.tsvg”
The UI for TripleA says Game name World War II v4, game version 2.6, filename HobbesMay0611.tsvg
The play command button is not active but quit is. So…I can press Start Local Game and I see a list of 5 players and all Human so…I can now press Play and a text window pops up displaying:
"ava.lang.IllegalStateException: Could not find file for map:World War II v4
at games.strategy.triplea.ResourceLoader.getPaths(ResourceLoader.java:67)
at games.strategy.triplea.ResourceLoader.getMapresourceLoader(ResourceLoader.java:33)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.UIContext.internalSetMapDir(UIContext.java:189)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.UIContext.setDefaltMapDir(UIContext.java:162)blah blah blah
So, I am missing a map somebody said…tried googling for maps and ugh… tried a few and gave up without success.
So what am I doing wrong?
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Well I have yet to see people talking about requiring a bid for the allies so there is obviously something we are missing.
Well if you guys want some pointers I can give them but it should be more fun to discover them for yourselves :)
I seem to be missing some map files or something for the tripleA software. The files you guys have provided I can load, but then…… I try play and get a screen full of errors:
I can load the file “HobbesMay0611.tsvg”
The UI for TripleA says Game name World War II v4, game version 2.6, filename HobbesMay0611.tsvg
The play command button is not active but quit is. So…I can press Start Local Game and I see a list of 5 players and all Human so…I can now press Play and a text window pops up displaying:
"ava.lang.IllegalStateException: Could not find file for map:World War II v4
at games.strategy.triplea.ResourceLoader.getPaths(ResourceLoader.java:67)
at games.strategy.triplea.ResourceLoader.getMapresourceLoader(ResourceLoader.java:33)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.UIContext.internalSetMapDir(UIContext.java:189)
at games.strategy.triplea.ui.UIContext.setDefaltMapDir(UIContext.java:162)blah blah blah
So, I am missing a map somebody said…tried googling for maps and ugh… tried a few and gave up without success.
So what am I doing wrong?
When you start TripleA one of the options on the menu is: ‘Download Maps’. Click on it and then copy/paste the following url on the window and click List Games:
http://sites.google.com/site/tripleaerniebommel/home/mods/TripleA_Quality_Mods_EB.xmlWhen the map list appears, you’ll want World War II v4
PS - You’ll need version 1.2.5.5 to open the saved game. However that version has just been discontinued and replaced with 1.3.1.0 but you may still download it.
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Thanks for the help Hobbes. This is not moving along easily. So, I loaded the file, selected the map as per instructions. Had to restart TripleA as per its instructions, now when it loads but before I touch the user interface I get another text box listing a few pages of errors:
"Could not parse:jar:file:/C:/Users/Randy-Tv/triplea/maps/World%20War%20II%20v4.zip!/games/WW2v4%20Six%20Army%20Free%20For%20All%20v2.xml
games.strategy.engine.data.GameParseException: No setter for attachment option. Setter:isAirTransportable Class:games.strategy.triplea.attatchments.UnitAttachment
at games.strategy.engine.data.GameParser.setValues(GameParser.java:1181)
at games.strategy.engine.data.GameParser.parseAttachments(GameParser.java:1101)
at games.strategy.engine.data.GameParser.parse(GameParser.java:125)
at games.strategy.engine.framework.ui.NewGameChooserEntry.<init>(NewGameChooserEntry.java:27)
at games.strategy.engine.framework.ui.NewGameChooserModel.createEntry(NewGameChooserModel.java:163)
"I am running version 1.3.5, is that incompatible with:
http://sites.google.com/site/tripleaerniebommel/home/mods/TripleA_Quality_Mods_EB.xmlI see I need 1.2.5.5 to open saved games, but what about tripleA all by itself?
We should probably fork this thread off……</init>
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I am running version 1.3.5, is that incompatible with:
http://sites.google.com/site/tripleaerniebommel/home/mods/TripleA_Quality_Mods_EB.xmlI can’t find any version with that numbering. Can you confirm it?
You actually should try to get 1.3.1.0 first. Their lobby isn’t working at the moment but the lobby for 1.2.5.5 has been closed today.
You might be running a older game version that is conflicting with one of the new v4 scenarios for 1.3.1.0. Looks that way from the error message. Are you sure you were running 1.3.1.0 when you tried to load it?
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I just recently installed the software, about 1 week ago. I start triplea via start menu and right away the error message list is displayed, the user interface shows Game Version 1.3.5. I wonder if this is a newer version based on version numbers, perhaps a beta?
Ah, the properties for triplea show it as 1_2_5_5, I wonder what the discrepancy is about?
I see, the game version was for the version of the map the 1.2.5.5 software was running, by default the triplea software is using World War II Revised version 1.3.5 game to run, I can select one of 5 games under Choose Games
World War II v4 is not an option, unless I goto download maps, select that site you mentioned and press list games and re-Install World War II v4, it says I have version 2.7 installed and to replace it with the same, so I press Yes. It starts to download and…its stuck downloading for the last 5 minutes…OK, successfully installed, restart tripleA before playing so…OK, Quit, Restart and list of errors along with the tripleA software running with the same 5 default games available to play…Ugh
I used to write software that ran/runs on fortune 500 computers, I’m not the same since an accident but I should be able to get this to run.
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Game Version 1.3.5. refers to the version of the scenario currently loaded
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Thanks for pointing that out to me :-) So the newer version of the software works fine, didn’t have to download maps to get the V4 map but of course it won’t run those saved games. The older version continues to have issues so I will uninstall it and reinstall it.
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Well, I un-installed both versions of the software, deleted the folders, reinstalled 1.2.5.5 and it works fine. I then followed the listed instructions, downloaded maps, used:
http://sites.google.com/site/tripleaerniebommel/home/mods/TripleA_Quality_Mods_EB.xmlSelected World War II v4, it downloaded, installed fine, instructed me to restart the software and I did, and now I get the same errors again since I downloaded that map. I guess i will have to ask in the forum at http://triplea.sourceforge.net/mywiki.
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Well, I un-installed both versions of the software, deleted the folders, reinstalled 1.2.5.5 and it works fine. I then followed the listed instructions, downloaded maps, used:
http://sites.google.com/site/tripleaerniebommel/home/mods/TripleA_Quality_Mods_EB.xmlOK, I think I figured it out. You need to remove 1.2.5.5 and install TripleA game engine 1.3.1.0 - the World War II v4 scenario available for download has already been updated to version 2.7, which is not compatible with game engine version 1.2.5.5
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