wotcha.
good game red.
if i’d known you’d started a thread on our game i’d have joined in earlier…
i rather think dezrtfish wasn’t used to playing such an aggressive opponent. i’m not usually quite so aggressive but he made it more tempting than i’m used to…
incidentally my winning bid was 16 ipcs: 3 inf in manchuria and 2 inf in libya with 1 ipc save for the germans later use - like getting the 11 inf first turn.
quick note on my notation: if i say 0.x i mean x/6, not the perhaps more logical x/10. i’m just too lazy to convert…
i wasn’t sure i’d take karelia solidly enough but i also wasn’t used to seeing such a small force there [15 inf,1 arm,1 fit, aa defending against 9 inf, 7 arm, 1 bom attacking. 6.0 def hits avg to 5.4 hits avg at start, same number of units at start but my hits would lose him more firepower than his hits on me - the first few anyway ] - i figured i was being baited but i went in anyway, figuring that if it looked bad i could always run away before losing my tanks. the battle went fairly well [for me anyway] - i took it with 1 inf, 7 arm to defend it and the bomber heading to france to threaten the atlantic. too much really for him to take it back. i also took caucasus with the italians to add pressure from the west - he took the bait and diverted valuable defenders to take it back.
i figured for sure he’d pile everything he could into russia, but surprisingly he didn’t - instead he seemed intent on sending forces to help impede japan’s campaign - including his sole remaining russian fighter [all the air support in russia was british and american] which if he’d sent back to russia with his remaining adjacent forces would’ve held my hand and i’d have never dared attack russia… i can only assume that he didn’t expect me to continue to be so aggressive - even to the point of losing all my top units…
moscow awaited [ 8 inf, 2 fit, 2 bom, aa defending against 1 inf, 9 arm, 4 fit, 1 bom attacking. 4.2 def hits vs 7.2 hits if i got lucky with the aa - more likely 6.5 assuming one downed fit. this time i’d be losing firepower faster but the initial advantage seemed enough to me - that and i was willing to take it all costs - i’ll gladly sacrifice all my armour and air to take russia - especially so early]. i knew i didn’t have to take it with much as i could reinforce it with japanese fighters. the battle went well for me [ taken with 3 arm, 3 fit, 1 bom] and suddenly i’ve got russia and 75 ipcs to burn!
japan did go pretty slowly, but they took the important indian factory - that’s probably what stalled them - i was really intent on getting india on the first turn because he built the factory there and so left myself a bit more daring in other battles - i got raped in china and pearl harbour… but even though i lost many units in asia i killed most of his forces regardless - so after taking russia asia was mine. 84 production and thus economic victory were inevitable.
i’ve noticed that a number of people dislike the economic victory rule. i must admit that i and indeed the rest of my initial playmates hated the rule at first - but it really is neccessary for an axis victory - i’m not sure how likely they are to win otherwise without a higher bid and without the game really dragging on. the game as it stands unmolested is just to heavily slanted in favour of the allies… i wonder if these same people have the same problem with the victory points in a&a: pacific…
regardless, i’m thankful for the game and will gladly accept a rematch! the wonderful thing about playing complete strangers is the completely strange ways they play! it’s far to easy to slip into a rut when playing incestually within the same gaming group… i’m just lucky i managed to change my style accordingly… or maybe i was just plain lucky and my tactics had nought to do with it…
