This is a post from Gamerman01 from Allweneedislove VS JJ’s game.
"As far as playing you(JamesAleman), I am mildly interested, but trying to focus my A&A time on league games
I don’t doubt that buying bombers is very effective for Germany, and I wouldn’t enjoy facing them
The large increase in territories over previous versions of A&A makes movement even more valuable than it was before. Also, before Anniversary, bombers cost 15 and now they are only 12, as you have also pointed out. The +2 bombing damage is also nasty. And the tactic of mostly bombers is sneaky because most players are used to not worrying too much about all air because traditionally, all air strikes against ground (and air) forces is a bad trade. Traditionally. When incomes were around 20-30, fighters cost 12, and bombers cost 15. And you could get increased production and produce men for 2 IPC’s each. You know, for those of us who have been playing for 20+ years, the things we learned from Classic still stick with us, I think, and sometimes to our detriment.
Now you have 12 IPC bombers that can often fly 7 spaces instead of 6. You have transports that are auto-kill, so you’re not losing 15 IPC bombers to ace rolls, with the defender’s transports sometimes even surviving.
Perhaps you have found an exploit to Larry’s rule changes (I think on multiple occasions our revered game designer has failed to accurately anticipate all the ramifications of his changes - Global 1940 is Exhibit A) and bombers are too cheap.
After all, when you play tech there are also 2 technologies that boost their capabilities even further. (Thank goodness Larry finally saw the light and reduced LRA to +1, as I used to house rule it in AA50)
Sorry, this is in a game thread - I’ll quit now."
-Gamerman01
It appears that he understands why its a nasty strat and he pretty much summarized it for us in a nutshell but what got me is this comment:
“You know, for those of us who have been playing for 20+ years, the things we learned from Classic still stick with us, I think, and sometimes to our detriment.”
This is the truth. Operation Hollywood. Crush Europe/Ignore Japan. I remember when Dennis and I devised the original 1984 game counter to Germany by building the british Carrier and landing US planes on it. JJ added on the Russia Norway crush with the tanks. We all went to Gencon and mopped up everyone at that tournament. Unfortunately, I got beat by a ten year old who could only roll ones. I swear to God, he only rolled ones…/facepalm. Then I went to sea for a very long time. Punishment I suppose.
Regardless, JJ and I make a point to challenge each other with crazy crap. When we tried the bomber idea(with the allies) against Alsch91, it was a bit of a hail mary. I mean we were playin the allies and it was dicey…I mean crazy dicey, and without a doubt one of my favorite games. What floored me was Alsch91’s inhuman response time. He would make a move literally within an hour of our post. JJ and I would hash it out over a day or 2 trying to figure out how to put the hurt on. But if you really want to view a great game…it is there, I will post it if I find that thing.
I think the comment is insightful because we are all guilty of getting struck in a rut, but kudos to Allweneedislove…he may have provided insight to delaying…maybe stopping the German bombers. Just needed a fresh angle to see some play I had neglected to see.
