The Spanish Beachhead: American Strategy


  • used this build order twice as america last weekend, worked both times.  Against different players so none of them knew what was up.  Both times Germany went sealion too which was weird but fine with me as i’m used to germany doing barbarosa…  We were able to defend UK(barely) both times and allowed the US to drop into spain turn 4.  Thanks for the tips YG! :)  (this is Billthecanuck from youtube)

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    @Ehpic:

    used this build order twice as america last weekend, worked both times.  Against different players so none of them knew what was up.  Both times Germany went sealion too which was weird but fine with me as i’m used to germany doing barbarosa…  We were able to defend UK(barely) both times and allowed the US to drop into spain turn 4.   Thanks for the tips YG! :)  (this is Billthecanuck from youtube)

    Awesome Bill, and welcome to the forums.

  • '19 '17 '16

    I think that this strategy is worthwhile even if you don’t get into France. What it does is forces the Axis to come west towards USA and take pressure off USSR. If USSR survives a lot more turns, that helps the Allies massively.


  • I think there’s a lot of value in taking Spain with America, but I think this should always be a situational strategy rather than one you dedicate yourself to from the beginning.

    Some thoughts:

    I’d stage my forces in Gibraltar, rather than landing them directly into Spain. Taking Spain and moving your transports home at the same time will allow your transports to hit Spain again  immediately if the Germans manage to take it from you. You do not want to let the Germans attack you in Spain with their air force behind them and then withdraw their vulnerable units before you can kill them. It also keeps Swedish and Turkish men and money out of Axis hands for an extra turn for no real cost to you.

    I also think you’re underestimating the devastating impact you’re having on the rest of the map:
    Japan easily has the resources to kill your subs in the Pacific for nearly no cost, and defend their destroyers afterwards - their fleet has very little else to do with your near complete Atlantic commitment. I’d be very surprised if a good Japan didn’t take Hawaii the turn after you move your fleet to the Atlantic, and I’m not sure you could kill Germany before they win on VCs.
    The Swedish forces given to Germany will pretty effectively secure it’s hold Norway and it’s NO there, and may be turned against Russia - which has plenty of problems already.
    The Turkish units, backed by a couple of Italian tanks driven through Greece, will be very hard for the UK to contain without it having defeated Italy decisively and while trying to hold off an unbridled Japan. I’m not sure you can count on that by turn 4.
    Russia will be in a very rough place, since Germany has no immediate need to redirect forces to Spain nor hold much back.

    Suggestions:
    Keep your starting fleet in the pacific, and build it up a bit sooner. The Cruisers and BB in the Atlantic just isn’t worth it for the softenings and an intelligent Germany is simply going to ignore your incredibly expensive flotilla and redirect it’s resources to smashing Russia and building infantry to keep your landings at bay.
    Split your TT flotilla in two. 10 units every turn is better than 20 every other, because you can always counter attack. It also keeps Germany and Italy honest by keeping constant landing threat on W. Germany, Rome and Norway. If Germany does decide to build bombers or even ships to try to hit your (no longer invulnerable) Gibraltar fleet you’ll only lose half your TTs, but you should be able to see that coming and reinforce as necessary. If Germany attacks anyway that’s a feature, not a bug - Germany building bombers and having them killed off the coast of Gibraltar keeps pressure off of Russia.

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    Great post Amalec, you have made some excellent points.

  • '21 '20 '19 '18 '17 '16

    @Amalec:

    I’d stage my forces in Gibraltar, rather than landing them directly into Spain. Taking Spain and moving your transports home at the same time will allow your transports to hit Spain again  immediately if the Germans manage to take it from you. You do not want to let the Germans attack you in Spain with their air force behind them and then withdraw their vulnerable units before you can kill them.

    To my thinking the whole point is to relieve pressure on Russia as fast as possible. If the Axis accumlates a stack big enough to attack your landing, pressure on Russia is effectively relieved. So you actually want the German player to hit your stack because if he’s hitting Spain he’s not hitting Russia effectively. Furthermore, Axis logistics being what they are, it’s difficult for him to keep hitting Spain without continuous builds that have to walk a long way, so hitting your forces in Spain would actually make it easier for the US to advance in Europe.

    @Amalec:

    I also think you’re underestimating the devastating impact you’re having on the rest of the map:
    Japan easily has the resources to kill your subs in the Pacific for nearly no cost, and defend their destroyers afterwards - their fleet has very little else to do with your near complete Atlantic commitment.

    The issue is that Japan does not have enough destroyers to annihilate subs faster than the US can build them. If Japan is building lots of destroyers, then it is sacrificing somewhere else and not achieving victory. Also, if Japan is reacting to the US it may lose strategic focus – it’s very easy to do when the US is sucking away your Japanese income.

    @Amalec:

    The Turkish units, backed by a couple of Italian tanks driven through Greece, will be very hard for the UK to contain without it having defeated Italy decisively and while trying to hold off an unbridled Japan. I’m not sure you can count on that by turn 4.
    Russia will be in a very rough place, since Germany has no immediate need to redirect forces to Spain nor hold much back.

    Agreed.  Turkey is very hard to contain if you give it to the Axis this way. The UK cannot be in a position to kill Turkey before Italian activation and also be in a position to properly defend Egypt unless Italy has really messed up.

    @Amalec:

    Split your TT flotilla in two. 10 units every turn is better than 20 every other, because you can always counter attack. It also keeps Germany and Italy honest by keeping constant landing threat on W. Germany, Rome and Norway.

    Yes, this is a much better plan than alternating waves with a turn between reinforcements.

    Marsh


  • @Marshmallow:

    To my thinking the whole point is to relieve pressure on Russia as fast as possible. If the Axis accumlates a stack big enough to attack your landing, pressure on Russia is effectively relieved. So you actually want the German player to hit your stack because if he’s hitting Spain he’s not hitting Russia effectively. Furthermore, Axis logistics being what they are, it’s difficult for him to keep hitting Spain without continuous builds that have to walk a long way, so hitting your forces in Spain would actually make it easier for the US to advance in Europe.

    In retrospect, it should be pretty obvious from the state of the board whether Germany can counter a 20 division drop into Spain on their upcoming turn. But I would argue that if those units are already in position to attack Spain on the following German turn the pressure against Russia has already been relieved - no reason to let them actually attack you. Still, most likely Germany won’t be in position to counter and so a direct landing in Spain will make sense 9/10 times. My bad.

    @Marshmallow:

    The issue is that Japan does not have enough destroyers to annihilate subs faster than the US can build them. If Japan is building lots of destroyers, then it is sacrificing somewhere else and not achieving victory. Also, if Japan is reacting to the US it may lose strategic focus – it’s very easy to do when the US is sucking away your Japanese income.

    Japan starts with 4 destroyers, and has had no reason to use or commit them elsewhere up to this point. It also has an enormous fleet that is effectively unchallenged. It should be able to kill 3-4 subs per turn with those destroyers and protect them afterward, with little to no loses to itself. I don’t think that’s going to work for USA unless it has a large enough fleet to counter attacks on it’s subs in range - and I don’t think it’ll be able to do that until turn 5-6 after moving the Pacific fleet to the Atlantic. Plenty of time for Japan to go crazy.

  • '21 '20 '19 '18 '17 '16

    @Amalec:

    Japan starts with 4 destroyers, and has had no reason to use or commit them elsewhere up to this point. It also has an enormous fleet that is effectively unchallenged. It should be able to kill 3-4 subs per turn with those destroyers and protect them afterward, with little to no loses to itself. I don’t think that’s going to work for USA unless it has a large enough fleet to counter attacks on it’s subs in range - and I don’t think it’ll be able to do that until turn 5-6 after moving the Pacific fleet to the Atlantic. Plenty of time for Japan to go crazy.

    It would be foolish of Japan to detach all its destroyers from its fleet if the US is playing sub swarm though. Furthermore, if Japan is protecting its destroyers Japan has definitely got its priorities wrong and is not using its fleet to achieve victory but to stave off defeat. Allied victory this is!

    Marsh


  • @Marshmallow:

    It would be foolish of Japan to detach all its destroyers from its fleet if the US is playing sub swarm though. Furthermore, if Japan is protecting its destroyers Japan has definitely got its priorities wrong and is not using its fleet to achieve victory but to stave off defeat. Allied victory this is!

    Marsh

    Sub-swarm is a bit of a misnomer here. YG is advocating no Pacific build until A4. That leaves 2 DD 1 SS 1SB in the Pacific until the end of A4, and 4 DD 5 SS 3SB at the start of A5. A5 those can move to Hawaii - if America stills controls it (big if) and Japan doesn’t have enough ships staged in Japan or the Carolines to kill a handful of 1s and 2s parked off Hawaii (bigger if). A6 they can begin to harass Japan, supported by America’s A5 Pacific builds now in Hawaii - which will be at best 2 more subs because of the 60+ IPC needed to build 20 units for the Atlantic transports on A5.

    By J7 when those subs have their first chance to raid Japan the Dutch money islands will be securely Japanese and the British/ANZAC fleets will be destroyed or contained.

    I’m not saying sub-swarm is a bad idea, or that KGF is a bad idea. But if you send most of the Pacific fleet to the Atlantic and don’t build anything else until A4 then you’re simply praying for the Japanese player to be terrible, because if he isn’t he’s going to win the game on VCs before Germany even starts to sweat.

    Keeping the Pacific fleet intact and adding 2-3 SS/DDs a turn is absolutely necessary to keep Japan honest. Without it they barely have to defend their builds in the Sea of Japan, so they can go all out elsewhere. They can easily take Hawaii. They can split their fleet into pieces to move against India and Australia at the same time, instead of having to choose.

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    By no means is my Spanish Beachhead strategy video a finished work, I have already seen many posts with much better modifications to my initial ideas. The sub sprawl ideas were in their infancy when I did the video, since than there have been many great concepts by others to make it work better. Thanks for all the participation on this topic.


  • I agree with the other commenters, the pacific board need more development. You need a plan to prevent japan from taking more than 1 of Hawaii, Sidney and India.  There is a few ways of defending it.
    Hawaii:
    If you really want to defend hawaii, you need to stack it. That can be done by TTs and infs. They are well placed there and can be used later when you go on the offensive.

    India:
    3 UK mIC in Egypt, Iraq and Iran should allow you to produce a lot of mechs and some planes in that area. It is vital to keep them close enough, so that you can send them to india in time to defend india. This does not work against an india crush ofc. If enough preassure is taken of USSR , then the red airfoce is a nice addition to the indian defence while waiting for some USSR mobile forces and other british support. Some of the US/UK fighters on the CVs in the med could also make an appearance.

    Sidney:
    BUILD ALOT OF troops, help isnt coming :/. This means that you probably should make sure to build 3 units every single turn, and none of then should be naval or bombers.

    @Amalec:

    @Marshmallow:

    To my thinking the whole point is to relieve pressure on Russia as fast as possible. If the Axis accumlates a stack big enough to attack your landing, pressure on Russia is effectively relieved. So you actually want the German player to hit your stack because if he’s hitting Spain he’s not hitting Russia effectively. Furthermore, Axis logistics being what they are, it’s difficult for him to keep hitting Spain without continuous builds that have to walk a long way, so hitting your forces in Spain would actually make it easier for the US to advance in Europe.

    In retrospect, it should be pretty obvious from the state of the board whether Germany can counter a 20 division drop into Spain on their upcoming turn. But I would argue that if those units are already in position to attack Spain on the following German turn the pressure against Russia has already been relieved - no reason to let them actually attack you. Still, most likely Germany won’t be in position to counter and so a direct landing in Spain will make sense 9/10 times. My bad.

    After watching the youtubevideo of bulawdog  I could see that he did exactly this mistake.

    It seems like YG should have stated it in his script.

    US4: look at the map;
    If you look at the board and conclude that germany will kill your beachhead comfortably, then you have to land in gibraltar on US4.

    US5: Look at the map;
    3 options; 1, no attack,2 attack spain, 3 attack somewhere else
    If germany can still kill you, and have enough units to defend against your counterattack, then you cannot attack spain. If you see a good target of opertunity (N/S italy or W germany) you can attack there.  Otherwise, keep your army in GIB.

    US6: Look at the map;
    If you sendt your fleet back, your attack on spain should now be at least 44 units strong, and you hsould have 40ish units left. Germany should never be able to counterattack that. If he is, then USSR is having a great day, and should have reinforced india a long time ago.

  • '19 '17 '16

    The only turn I allow Sydney to build less than 3 units is the first - 1TT 1inf.


  • @simon33:

    The only turn I allow Sydney to build less than 3 units is the first - 1TT 1inf.

    Even if a full KJF is in effect, or specifically for a Spanish Beachhead?

  • '19 '17 '16

    Any time.


  • I was wondering whether you decide from the outset to do the Spanish Beach Head or if there are Axis cues that make it a viable strategy?

    This is firstly a q posed to YG but would of course greatly appreciate others input as well. :)


  • Even tho I am not YG, I will make a suggestion (with any strategy). You should always reconsider your strategy.

    In every turn, you should decide if you will continue with the strategy or do something else.  For example, If germany tries for sealion, but has to stop because he loses too many planes in G1, then you really don’t need that many boats. If germany drops 10 subs on G2, then you need more boats, perhaps, you should bail out and do a KJF instead. What you should not do is to continue with your Spanish beachhead, only to see your fleet get killed by the german navy.

    Any strategy worth considering is a strategy that keeps enough options open to react to enemy moves. In the Spanish beachhead, you don’t have to commit until shifting your pacific fleet to the atlantic (US3). until then, you have just bought a little bit extra for the german front early and can still switch to a full KJF. You can even switch your atlantic fleet to the pacific if you like.


  • @Kreuzfeld:

    Even tho I am not YG, I will make a suggestion (with any strategy). You should always reconsider your strategy.

    In every turn, you should decide if you will continue with the strategy or do something else.  For example, If germany tries for sealion, but has to stop because he loses too many planes in G1, then you really don’t need that many boats. If germany drops 10 subs on G2, then you need more boats, perhaps, you should bail out and do a KJF instead. What you should not do is to continue with your Spanish beachhead, only to see your fleet get killed by the german navy.

    Any strategy worth considering is a strategy that keeps enough options open to react to enemy moves. In the Spanish beachhead, you don’t have to commit until shifting your pacific fleet to the atlantic (US3). until then, you have just bought a little bit extra for the german front early and can still switch to a full KJF. You can even switch your atlantic fleet to the pacific if you like.

    Thanks for your reply, Kreuzfeld. I agree wholeheartedly with your opinion that strategies need to be flexible. It asbolutely depends on your opponent and the outcomes of different battles. I haven’t played much G40 but have been playing A&A since the early 90’s and have a hard time seeing Spanish Beachhead as a net positive move for the Allies. (This might change with a bid or Victory objectives of CB)

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    @Bass:

    I was wondering whether you decide from the outset to do the Spanish Beach Head or if there are Axis cues that make it a viable strategy?

    This is firstly a q posed to YG but would of course greatly appreciate others input as well. :)

    All strategies should take a back seat to reactionary play, however, reactionary play alone is a lazy way to approach a game IMO. There’s nothing wrong with having 1 or 2 well thought out plans prepared ahead of time.

  • '19 '17 '16

    I think once you’ve converted the true neutrals to pro Axis you’re pretty committed to this play though. And who would position all those forces and not follow through with something. I guess you can use them to hit Norway as an alternative although that is an enormous back down.

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    @simon33:

    I think once you’ve converted the true neutrals to pro Axis you’re pretty committed to this play though. And who would position all those forces and not follow through with something. I guess you can use them to hit Norway as an alternative although that is an enormous back down.

    Agreed, if you turn the neutrals with a Spanish beachhead, you’re all in at that point.

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