Poll: Bids for Spring 1942, 2nd Ed.

We’ll no one has put any OTB victiory satistics down so had to tell if a bid is granted

This poll would be more informative if the bid numbers weren’t grouped. The difference between a bid at 7 and a bid at 9 is substantial, 10-12 is even more dramatic.

Against an evenly matched opponent, I wouldn’t go lower than 9 for Allies.
As Allies 10 is optimal because it allows you to bid a British Fighter in Egypt, which does triple duty… it covers Egypt on G1, it frees up a Russian fighter, and can be flown to join a sz37 attack (or elsewhere depending on the situation, like to reinforce W. Russia.)

At 9 I think Axis can still feel reasonably confident, and Allies won’t feel like they are just getting mowed over completely. At 10 the situation starts to turn the other direction, since you can do a lot more (in terms of breaking Japan) with a fighter than you can with 3 infantry, or 1 inf and a sub, or a pair of artillery pieces.

You can still break the sz 37 battle with just a British sub, but for only 4 more ipcs, you can get a lot more long term out of a fighter. Otherwise, I’d just distribute it on the ground. Britain seems to be more effective with the bid, than Russia or USA in my experience. A sz 11 destroyer bid is interesting as a way to springboard KJF, but even with a second destroyer, I would still attack using both subs as Germany at fairly even odds, so I’m not sure the 8 ipcs can’t be spent more effectively elsewhere. The bid for this board seems very narrow though.

As I said above, I wouldn’t go lower than 9 for Allies against a skilled opponent, but as Axis giving up anything more than 9 is really rough, for the exact reason outlined above. 11 ipcs on the bid is basically the same as 10 in terms of gaining an air attack advantage, but 12 is just nuts for the air attack advantage, because a British bomber attacking and landing in the right place can totally wreck the Pacific game for Japan. I don’t suggest that sz37 is essential for the Allies to win, but it is probably essential for a Kill Japan First strategy, or a stall Japan and redirect strategy, or any strategy that involves the US making it across the southern Pacific. It’s too easy for Japan to manage their naval defenses otherwise. Also someone mentioned Borneo on UK1 for the KJF game. Every time I have done this I end up regretting it. USA just really needs that territory under their control to make the pacific endgame worthwhile.

If the idea is to give a more inexperienced player a reasonable chance playing the Allies against a more experienced Axis player, I would go much higher on the Allied bid, or maybe remove tanks from Germany. Or try an alternative bid for production. If for example, you allow the Allies to move the Karelia factory to safer location, or the India factory to a different location. Or you could just allow players to destroy factories on the retreat and scorch the earth (Advantage to Allies in most situations.) Otherwise, when the scales are balanced…

If you really want to play allies I would open the bid at 11, so you can probably get them at 9. If you’d rather play Axis but might consider Allies, then open at 12, so you have a shot at 10, and if it goes lower then you can pass.

I see the point of the Egypt fighter (defending Egypt AND helping crush the Japanese fleet) but I still think that it’s not optimal. Given a 10-IPC bid with Allies, I would either get a sub for KJF plus an artillery in Caucasus, or spread it out with an ART in Caucasus, an INF in Egypt and an INF either in China (to defend the American fighter) or in Moscow (for a better attack on West Russia). Because of this, I don’t see that much of a difference between 9, 10 or 11 for the bid. In either case, it’s 3 units on the ground.

Probably depends on your playstyle. Ground gives you an edge on attack/defense in up to 3 territories. Doing anything else is only to get an overwhelming attack advantage in one battle. I think if you want to magnify the attack advantage in a particular place, then you might consider the advantage of say an artillery piece somewhere rather than infantry, or perhaps even a tank over 2 inf. The only thing that recommends a fighter over the sub is that it is free to move/land somewhere other than just the sea, or for the movement/defense advantage it has in subsequent rounds (this in addition to the extra attack pip at 3 instead of 2) though the sub does have the opening shot to recommend it. If you hit the double deuce you can sink the carrier deck in 37 before normal combat even begins! China is interesting, if letting USA grab a piece of the Bid, it probably makes more sense here than putting the whole bid into sz 11.

I like Egypt for a lot of reasons, so I would probably try to get an infantry unit there at least if nothing else, even if I only had a bid of 3. The difficulty with Russia’s bid battle options is that most of those come down to what the defender is rolling, so there is not a whole lot you can do anyway, other than to put up more fodder to increase the odds on defense from G counter attack. Though its hard to argue against anything that provides a larger stack in W. Russia, or cuts down Germany’s ability to counter attack it. If you go on the ground, its possible to set up a hit on Belo or Baltic with the bid, or to give better odds on a Ukraine strafe, or just to stack W. Russia so deep that G has no shot on it. It is hard to say that one bid is best for every game.

Its not quite like in Revised, where everyone just used the bid for north Africa, or maybe saved a little of that to buy the extra J transport, but in terms of breaking battles, I think the fighter in Egypt is potentially the most damaging, so that’s why I put the focus there. It can do other things besides just the hit on 37 too, it can cover the Med, fly to W. Russia or Caucasus, fly to India etc. Otherwise, as you pointed out, 3 ground is pretty similar whether its 9, 10, or 11 ipcs. Above 9 is optimal, because it gives you the option on a fighter. Whether to actually bid a fighter is another question. Some like an extra Russian fighter, though I think Britain can do more with it.

That said, whether you prefer dice or low luck, may recommend the advantage of one bid over another. I am a dice man at heart, but even 1 extra attack pip in LL could take a battle from a swing to a sure shot. So that might be worth considering too, depending on what style of play you prefer.

Also, its worth pointing out that you have to place your bid before you will know the results of Russia’s opening battles. This can present certain challenges. Say for example, that you bid a sub with the intention of KJF, but Russia gets totally hammered by a German defense. With a fighter you have an option of backing off sz37 and going for something else instead. A sub to attack sz37 also requires that you protect the British fighter in Egypt, (either with the rest of the bid, or with a Russia fighter) which might not be a great option, if Russia got screwed in their opening attack and can’t afford to send a fighter south. That’s why I like the British fighter over the British sub, but it is true, if you spread ground you can accomplish a fair amount with 9 ipcs. 3 ground across 3 territories. 7 or 8 ipcs on the bid is a lot tougher though, since then you can only spread 2 ground across 2 territories.

I just saw this post, and was surprised that so many people voted for 0 bids. Based on my experience, I personally think the Allies need 7-9 bids but apparently, majority of people think the game is fair without any bids.

Is this poll too old and outdated? Or is the game really balanced at 0 bids and I am just playing terrible Allied players (or my Allied strategy is bad)?

The poll is outdated.

My best guess is that a bid of 10-11 to allies is appropriate. Compared to revised, germany feels significantly less pressure from the UK and US due to more atlantic navy destroyed R1 and increased travel distance from US. Germany is expected to be able to stack Karelia by R3-5 if both players play optimally. If germany producing from karelia greatly increases the Russia pressure.

Russia needs a bid to contest Karelia more effectively.

12 is probably too large because it allows a bid of two UK subs to very profitably sink the japan fleet of east indies.

Ideal bids any combination of:
infantry/art for rus
uk sub in med
egypt uk inf
maybe uk sub off india

I like 11 bid a lot. Giving US a DD and UK an infantry for Egypt is very nice. I see what people are saying about Russia taking part of the bid, but I really like US getting that DD.

To be honest recently I’ve found that a 3 bid is all you need if you play LL and play a certain strat as allies. I might have to post a game against myself on here so you can see it.

Now I have seen people say that no bid has trumped all . Not true bid votes out do no bid votes in all . So most people feel the need for a allied bid . Also the fact that no one ever post a topic do the axis need a bid ever come up on any threads for 1942.2 and how many time do u hear people talking about a allied bid .

Allies need a bid because of how screwed russia is from the start. The bid saves egypt.

According to this poll, the average bid is 5

@arwaker:

According to this poll, the average bid is 5

The problem is that a lot of people on here don’t believe in bids because they want the true “Out of the box” experience. So while it might look like the average is 5, the real average bid is more like 10. With most bids going from 9-11.

New to the board and this is my first post, so apologies in advance if this has already been covered elsewhere, but what do others think about – instead of giving the Allies a first round bid – the start location of Germany’s Atlantic wolfpack of two subs is moved one seazone to the east so that on G1 Germany no longer has the option of wiping out the US East Coast DD and 2 TR?  Germany would still have the subs, of course, and they could go after the Brit DD and TR off of Canada, the Cruiser in the Med, or join the Baltic fleet attack on the Brit Navy off the UK, so it’s not as if Germany suffers overly much, but it does allow the Americans to have the core of a deployable amphibious force starting from the very get-go.  And the Nazi U-Boat pens were located in the French coastal areas that border that very Sea Zone I’m talking about, which would add a dash of historical authenticity as well.  I’ve only tried this a few times with a crew of players who are fairly inexperienced (myself included), but it does seem to make our games a lot more competitive than the typical Axis cakewalks we had endured when simply playing the opening set-up.

Welcome and thank you for your opening post and thoughts.
The American European set up is dreadful and needs rectifying. I play on these boards and with friends and we often give the US a Cruiser, which is enough to put off this German move.
Your suggestion would also work, but the Allies would still have to wait a turn before they could land in Africa, needing a European Carrier buy and possibly another warship.
If you are against giving a bid, then I can see how your idea would help.
I do, however, think the Allies need more help.

Isn’t this in the wrong forum.

I put 10-12 bid. This gives the Allies some options, depending on who I’m playing. I usually go one of 3 ways.
1. Give Russia 4 infantry to use as fodder for the Ukraine strafe and the W. Russia attack. It gives Russia about 1 or 2 extra turns to live.
2. Giving Russia 3 artillery for its Japanese front. This seriously screws the Japs in J1 if they want to make an assault on Russia.
3. Giving 2 infantry to Russia and 2 infantry to India. The two Indian infantry I use on an attack on Borneo on UK1. I can get away with this depending on who I’m playing.

Even with the U.S. east fleet gone I still think allies can win with no extra help.  I really like the idea of the Russian fighter in Egypt though! I will have to try that next time I play.

It would be interesting to see the results of a new poll to reflect the experience gained over the last 3 years since that poll was initially set up.

I realize bidding is an accepted form of balancing A&A and has a long history, but it would be nice to see a standard revised setup to address the bulk of the concern over balance; bidding could then be used for those that think the revised setup doesn’t go far enough or for different skill levels among players.  There is precedent for this with A&A 1941 which I think was the right decision by Larry, Krieghund and Hasbro.

I’m always happy to play either side, so I just let my opponent choose

We are currently in the process of doing a tournament and we are down to the last semi-final game, but we’ve had 13 completed games so far.  Here are the results:

Allied bid (winner)

16 (Allies)
12 (Axis)
10 (Axis)
9 (Axis)
21 (Axis)
9 (Allies)
11 (Allies)
5 (Axis)
9 (Axis)
15 (Allies)
22 (Axis)
12 (Axis)
20 (Allies)

So we’ve had 8 Axis winners and 5 Allied winners.  The Avg is 13.15.

Obviously, this is a small sample size, but it gives you an idea where bids are coming in for some competitive games.  The Allies have some wins at 9 and 11, but in the more competitive type games your probably going to want to go 13,14+ and get near or above 15 if you can.  The Allies scored 2 more wins at 15 and then 16.
Axis were 6-2 with bids 14 and under.  And then 2-3 with bids 15+.