Axis victory by Turn 5?
First off, I’m a newbies–played only 4 times. Board game, 2nd ed rule with Russia Restricted and no other variants.
I’d read many many comments that Allies always win. While I agree that the Allies have a strong advantage (eg USA, UK, & Rus IC are 1 turn away from Germany whereas Jap IC are lightyear away), I believe that advantage only translate to an Allies victory 60-65% of the time.
This is the strategy I used to get an Axis victory by Turn 5 (which works about 40% of the time–I won 4 out 4 that I played, the 40% odd was roughly estimated by on odd of the individual battles).
Germany Turn 1 (G1):
Buy: 1 Tran 7 Inf (29 IPC) w/ 3 IPC in bank.
Attacks:
- BB Tran w/ 2 Inf attack Brit sub in Iraq sz and then invade Iraq with additional bomber.
- Arm & Inf from Libya and Fighter (Ukraine) blitz and attack Egypt.
- Sub (W Eur) & Fighter (E Eur) attack BB (Gibraltar)
- 3 Fighter (Nor, W Eur, Ger), Sub & Tran (Baltic) attack North Sea Fleet, usually Brit BB & Tran and Rus Sub and Tran.
- Blitz Spain (hence the 3 IPC saved) & capture Gibraltar – reason, if Ger capture Gib, Iraq, & Egypt, Brit can’t attack Ger fleet because there’s no place to land.
Probability of winning all battle with min loss is 42%.
Depending of what Rus does on R1, either min attack Caucasus or else curl up into a ball (eg if Rus put 7 Inf in Cau & 13 Inf 3 Arm 2 Fighter in Kar, withdraw from Ukraine and defend E Eur; if Rus put 1 Inf in Cau and 19 Inf 3 Arm 2 Fighter in Kar, attack Cau and withdraw from BOTH E Eur & Ukr–reason, that 19 Inf have 50% to 90% of killing off everything in E Eur even if Ger put 8 Inf 8 Arm 2-4 Fighter).
Non-Combat: move the Egypt bomber & fighter into Libya (bomber is now in range of both India & S Africa). Land remaining fighter in W Eur and/or E Eur.
J1:
Buy: 2 Trans & 3 Inf (25 IPC, none left)
Attack:
- The REAL Pearl Harbor, 2 Fighter (Philippine & CV) 1 Bomber & 1 Sub vs US Sub CV & Fighter
Prob of success 90+% (you’ll lose 1 fighter & sub in pearl harbor).
- Depending on Rus & Brit moves, attack one or 2 ter. (eg if Brit move tran to red sea, attack that with fighter from IndoChina to clear path for G2 invasion of S Africa or India). If Brit build India Factory, attack south. Else attack the weaker of US or Rus.
NonCombat: move both BB & the CV into invasion range of the attack route.
So in any case, the idea between this strategy is to grab Africa & Asia & Pacific by Turn 3/4 to get to 84 IPC victory. The T1 move essentially knock the allies out of them. Ger will concede Europe and build up Inf to recapture in Turn 3 to 5. Ger fleet is now safe until Turn 3 with an extra tran to land some more inf into afr. Jap is safe from US and can concentrate on massing an attack and capturing asia/pacific. Since Allies have no IC in Asia/Africa, it’ll be hard for them to defend. If Rus try to defend both front, Ger (with its buy of all Inf) will be able to control E Eur/Ukr/Cau and possibly Kar. In fact, Axis does not have to capture Kar nor Russia to win. They can get to 84 IPC without them. The only chance the Allies have to is land armor in Africa or to do Normandy by Turn 4.
With this strategy, Axis should win 40% of the time by Turn 5.
Obviously, I have limited experience, so would like to hear the expert on how they can defeat this strategy.
