What's the consensus on a standard bid?

[frood]

Good thing I gave you +1 for the Card reference!

Interesting about the high bids - do you have any restrictions re: placement?

[Guest]

It is NOT me giving out the bad Karma.

[Mazer Rackham]

Heh heh.  Honestly, it never crossed my mind, Switch  :-D

By the way, I was poking around Daak a couple weeks ago and I saw you had climbed pretty high in the standings.  Nicely done!

For Ender: The bid system we use is the Caspian Sub system, 1pc/territory, cash allocated however you want.  We have four common things that happen with the bid: break the Russian Triple by putting a unit somewhere in Europe, N. African piece or two, Med Transport, or Frindo/KWA combo.  It depends on what gambit we’re trying out.

Peace

[Guest]

I had reached 7th, about this time last year, then had a run of bad luck in a number of games.  And losses hurt a lot more than wins help at DAAK.

Since most folks here no longer play or record games at DAAk though, it is even harder to gain points there, since most players on this site are not recording all of their wins there and thus have lower point totals.

[frood]

@Mazer:

Heh heh.  Honestly, it never crossed my mind, Switch  :-D

By the way, I was poking around Daak a couple weeks ago and I saw you had climbed pretty high in the standings.  Nicely done!

For Ender: The bid system we use is the Caspian Sub system, 1pc/territory, cash allocated however you want.  We have four common things that happen with the bid: break the Russian Triple by putting a unit somewhere in Europe, N. African piece or two, Med Transport, or Frindo/KWA combo.  It depends on what gambit we’re trying out.

Peace

What’s the Russian Triple?

[Guest]

I am guessing Belo/WR/Ukraine… a hell of a risky triple though…

[Mazer Rackham]

Switch on Daak: Quite stout nonetheless.

Russian Triple: The Russian Triple is attacking WRU, BEL, and UKR all on R1.  You should win all three about 52% of the time, with the worst outcomes being mitigated by either occuring in WRU or occuring in UKR where you can withdraw.

Typically in our group, Axis players are quite happy to break a Triple possibility with a bid, and Allied players are quite happy to have it broken so they don’t have to risk the dice  :-D  It’s a pretty big wild card early in the game.

Most often it’s broken with a unit in BEL, occasionally in UKR depending on some minor factors.

Peace

[Lucifer]

The Russian triple is R1: Norway, WRU and Ukr. Removes 2 G ftrs about 50% of the time.
I tried it twice, both in LL games. It worked in the first game, not in the second, just ask Bean :P

This brings back the subject of this thread, what’s the consensus on a standard bid?  :?

[Guest]

6-8, depending on the players.  unrestricted placement.

[Mazer Rackham]

@ncscswitch:

I am guessing Belo/WR/Ukraine… a hell of a risky triple though…

You know, it’s not quite as bad as it looks at first glance.

Set it up like this:
BEL: 3inf 1tnk vs 3inf => Take land 72%
WRU: 6inf 1art 1ftr vs 3inf 1art 1tnk => Take land 85%
UKR: 3inf 1art 3tnk 1ftr vs 3inf 1art 1tnk 1ftr => Take land 86%

Take land in all three = .72 * .85 * .86 = 52%

Your worst risk is BEL, but that’s also the least important fight.  UKR is a fight you can pull back from with no problem.

Really you care most about taking WRU and UKR in that setup, which is .85 * .86 = 73% of the time take land in both critical spots.  The 52% overall success rating is misleading; the opening is better than that.

Not to mention there are several non-land taking options that are fine.  A mutual kill in WRU is ugly, but quite survivable.  And there are many permutations of retreating from UKR.

Succeed or fail, it has the effect of hollowing out Europe.  If the Allies are coming to Germany quickly, that’s a great thing.

In our group, if the Triple is open we take it.

Peace

[Mazer Rackham]

Of course I said little about the benefits.  Suppose you have Russia collecting +$7 with 1inf 1tnk in BEL, 3tnk in UKR, and 2inf 1art in WRU with both fighters alive.  That is an UGLY R1 for Germany.  Hitting all that gear is tough with any German opening.

And that outcome happens plenty often enough.

Peace

[Lucifer]

I’ve seen a few games with R1 –> Wru, Ukr, Belo. G took Moscow rnd 4-5 in the two games i watched.
G didn’t even bother with AE or the UK BB in med.
Seemed like G changed from a wolfpack to a swift and efficiently big feline, going straight for the neck,
instead of tearing the animal down (the Russian bear).  :evil:

[axis_roll]

@Lucifer:

I’ve seen a few games with R1 –> Wru, Ukr, Belo. G took Moscow rnd 4-5 in the two games i watched.
G didn’t even bother with AE or the UK BB in med.
Seemed like G changed from a wolfpack to a swift and efficiently big feline, going straight for the neck,
instead of tearing the animal down (the Russian bear).  :evil:

It’s a bit counterintuitive, but the best German response to a very agressive Russia opening is to reply in kind… go for the throat.

[Jennifer]

@axis_roll:

@Lucifer:

I’ve seen a few games with R1 –> Wru, Ukr, Belo. G took Moscow rnd 4-5 in the two games i watched.
G didn’t even bother with AE or the UK BB in med.
Seemed like G changed from a wolfpack to a swift and efficiently big feline, going straight for the neck,
instead of tearing the animal down (the Russian bear).  :evil:

It’s a bit counterintuitive, but the best German response to a very agressive Russia opening is to reply in kind… go for the throat.

And your recommendation for a Balls to the Wall response would be?

[DarthMaximus]

A 5 inf/5 arm buy might work well in this case.

You still take Egy (with bid unit help), but you can take Kar/Belo and Ukr (with SE forces if nec).

Allies still need a token force in Egy since you can still counter on G2 if they take out your two armor left over.

If you’re trading German for Russian in rds 1-3 you can really hamstring Russia’s offensive capability then Japan’s job is extremely easy.

I can see the potential for an early lurch here as well.
Trading German units for Russian while offering WE as bait to keep the allies seperated.  Germany may have to eventually turtle themselves but if they inflict enough damage on Russia early on, Japan may be able to finish off a very weak Moscow.

[Guest]

That was my thought also Darth.

Also, with Russia expending itself so hard early, and with the near 50% chance of at least one of the battles going south for Moscow…  Germany should be able to capitalize and make some massive gains, forcing Russia into Turtle Mode starting on R2.

[DarthMaximus]

I’d be much more worried about the Triple in LL, where you can pretty much guarantee favorable results. 
In ADS, I don’t know why any Allied player would go with a 52% play to start the game.  Even with a bid (whatever amount and bid style), there is still a bit of an advantage to the Allies b/c the Axis still have to do something to level the playing field which either means superior economy for several turns (and total unit value) or superior position.  Both take time, at least a couple of rds.

Why give the Axis the 48% chance to get some good dice in rd 1?

I can see the usefullness of an extra inf to Belo (if you got a 9+ bid) regardless of the R1 Triple threat which could make it a moot point anyway, since it is always nice to have some extra G troops in Europe to start.

[Mazer Rackham]

Yoper: Yeah, the first time you face a successful Triple you feel like you got hit by a truck.  It’s much worse than it looks because when you start to figure out your counterattacks you realize how thin the Germans have become.

Darth: The 48% is a bit misleading.  The majority of that 48% bad luck is just BEL, which can happen in any essentially any opening.

But you raise an interesting question: Why give the Axis a chance to get lucky?

That’s the core of the debate I have with MightyAirforce.  I tend to be conservative, he is more aggressive, and he came up with the Triple.  When I asked him your question about why go for a 52% attack when you have only a 2% margin of a fully successful outcome, his reply was this: Against a good player, how many favorable battles can you afford not to fight?  Against a good player, if you have a 50.1% edge, you take those odds.

Now of course that is GREATLY simplified.  Is the battle really only 52% successful?  Will the attack open up cascade failure?  Can Germany capitalize on exposed positions?  What is the overall likelihood of winning the game with a Double vs a Triple?  It’s a tough question with many factors.

But MightyAirforce raises a very good question: How many favorable battles can you afford not to fight?

I answer that question by putting a bid unit in BEL  :-D

Peace

[Lucifer]

I’ve seen the triple attack 2 times, in both games Moscow fell rnd 5 latest, to Germany, and it’s not often that I see Russia captured by Germany. In the first one Russia had great luck, but it didn’t help. This was ADS.
Germany did the lightning blitz both times, and also placed all bids in Europe…
The German player is a decent one imo. He also tried the German blitz attack against me, Wru G1 ++ etc. but it failed
miserably even if G didn’t loose more ftrs than with average dice. I did not do the triple attack though :)
The German blitz only works if Russia throws away all units to the much stronger Germany early in the game.
This discussion reminds me of some remarks i got from a couple of f2f players who claimed axis was stronger in revised.
They also claimed “Vegas odds” is the best A&A strat that is known to man  :roll:
Vegas odds means the Lady Luck is with you all the way  :mrgreen:

[Jennifer]

The triples i normally see are E. Europe, W. Russia and Ukraine, not Belorussia.  No idea how that effects the resulting percentages, but I do have a thought:

Take the riskiest battle, run it first.  If you win, then the other two are less risky, even if they don’t go textbook.  Then take the second riskiest and run it.  In this way, you are only committed to one round of battles in the other engagements if the first goes poorly.