Down the analytical rabbit hole.
OK so there I am writing about generalities. But let’s look at some specifics, in the .tsvg, then I’ll move to the screenshot I put up.
TSVG:
R1: 5 inf to Yakut implies unprepared player. On the other hand, they put inf at Sinkiang, 2 fighters on Archangel, and didn’t just dump artillery on Caucasus, which as G1 could capture Caucasus makes sense.
But then, why not 1 fig Archangel 1 fig Caucasus, see if G wants to roll unfavorable dice on G1 Cauc? Because R is committed to countering G1 Baltic? And we see on G1 that R submerged submarine, which would be consistent.
From R1 I’d say R isn’t going to take big possibly unsafe gambles (if they mobilized 3 art at Cauc and no fighter for example). But also, they’re possibly very risk-averse to losing fighters, they’re willing to let their Europe game suffer to fake a counter against Japan (I don’t imagine for a moment they’re seriously going to try to fight Japan early and solve Japan’s logistics issues for them), and inf/art build indicates they don’t think G will misplay into a fat R2 counter, (as opposed to R1 inf/tank build which punishes bad play and overextension).
So basically noncommittal, won’t say R good or bad, but they’re playing a bit greedy and a bit conservatively.
G1: 7 inf 5 art perhaps overconfident (because it implies Germany’s going to be using artillery to break down R’s door instead of using infantry to establish a front then tanks for hitting power), then 2 inf to Gibraltar bleeds out Europe, 2 fighters to Africa. There’s no real G2 London invasion threat but probably there wasn’t meant to be; looks like G is going for a mid-long game with Med control for Africa/southeastern Europe threats.
Here, I’d say G isn’t exploiting a weak UK India/Africa, and G is really playing a mid/long game despite a heavy artillery opening. I wrote “overconfident” but G’s position is pretty good, so there’s some good chance it makes good on all its threats.
Again, noncommittal. I don’t like G’s tank placement; I prefer Baltic States to Poland and France. Seems pretty ambitious to me to keep tank at S Europe for Med transport pickup, and the AA/art at Italy as well, but on balance I like it more than the R1 turn.
UK1: Committed to Atlantic fleet, but flew air east.
They didn’t like UK1 destroyer/bomber against G Med fleet. Maybe they’ll like fighter/bomber against G Med fleet but my guess is maybe not.
At any rate, they bought ground to defend against G invasion of London, and only placed 1 unit at India, plus committed to a navy in Atlantic. That’s big signals. Theoretically they could build a decent sized fleet at India on UK2, but fundamentally they just don’t have the wherewithal to stave off Japan and Germany both pressuring India/Africa.
So now I revisit earlier advice. I wrote you shouldn’t fight US IPC for IPC, shouldn’t sink IPCs into ICs which are immobile targets, and you should go transports. Make more sense? If UK commits to Africa, Japan gets India. If Japan gets India in the KJF, Japan has a rear position to mobilize carriers, destroyers, and attack Africa (and if you fought IPC to IPC early on then you won’t have the weight of numbers to add to cheap subs to punish US overextension, or if sinking IPCs into ICs the same. And if US hangs back to build up strength, fine, Axis grab Moscow then consolidate, Japan’s 50ish IPCs battle US’s 40ish plus US has to come to Japan, that is, US must come in range of Japan’s cheap subs.)
Returning to the OP, “pressure on sz 60/62” - absent other considerations, sure. But? Germany has a pretty good threat on Africa income, India’s 3 infantry down compared to what it would be in LHTR setup, and UK1 dropped an Atlantic fleet. Sure, UK has an offensive threat, but if they don’t keep up on ground count (which they didn’t), then either Germany gets early Africa income (hooray) or Japan eventually pushes UK out of the naval zone or Japan grabs India because UK has loads of navy/air in the region but not much defending Calcutta; if R helps India then G can push faster in Europe, especially with G Baltic fleet intact. Make sense?
That is, there’s a UK threat, sure. But when you think about how that UK threat really needs to develop, and how to leverage Axis current position, well, I’d say transports.
