Japanes IC on J1?

@ShadowHAwk: Australia and NZ can be good locations if you can get there without expending to much troops. It is easy IPCs and they wont take it back. Also it cuts away 1 of the allied powers concentrated. If you focus on 1 power it helps more efficient then on all powers. Especialy the turn you build an Ic you might not be able to build enough troops to use all 4 trannies if you move 2 south then ( to enforce FIC ) you can take Australia next turn without losing much transport power but cutting in 3 more ipcs from the UK who at that point has verry little IPCs and is losing afrika making it completely dependant on the US to do anything at all. Sure they’ll take it back . . . but only if it’s a KJF.  I assume this whole thread is pretty much based off a KGF assumption, because otherwise Japan should go inf/fighter turtle. My typical Aus/NZ/Hawaii plan uses ONE transport, BB support shot(s) and a carrier.  I use the infantry from the southeastern islands to replenish. Sometimes I can’t afford to go Aus/NZ/Hawaii depending on the India/Ssinkiang situation.

Yes.

@merkle: Tri and NC. You 2 should play each other. Tri, you be the Allies and show 'em how it’s done. NC, you be the Axis and demonstrate Japan’s crushing power. We did… And Japan played VERY well, but my Germany was NOT up to par… There are 2 threads in the Games section (the first game you can disregard, it was my first ever game of Revised, and I lost Berlin in Turn 2).  Then second shows better how I use my Japan forces…

1. I have tried it. 2. I usually try to have 6-8 Russian infantry defend Sinkiang. You need about that much and sometimes the Russian fighters to deter a full push from Japan if his goal is to knock it out. 3. I’ve done that a few times. It scares the crap out of newer players. However you have to understand that you’re letting the Kwangtung transport and the Solomon Islands sub to live. 4. My friends have done both. Personally I think it’s a mistake to gun the British fleet down in the first turn in that scenario. Letting Pearl Harbor survive is a big mistake as it allows the US to accumulate a significant naval force 1-2 turns faster than usual. 5. Well, what do you mean by work? In the short term doing all of those things (both ICs, combining British fleet, sending us fighters and russian infantry) will indubitably control Japanese expansion. But past that it’s all up to what the US does. The ICs alone won’t stop Japan for long; if you look at the math Japan can overwhelm India on turn 3 even after doing Pearl Harbor. Japan simply has too many fighters to stop early on if he is focused on his targets. If the US continues to gun after Japan then you will stop Japan from being strong permanently, but then Africa will fall to Germany quickly. You always also have to keep a very careful eye on the UK because a tricky Germany player will pop out 6 transports in one turn and try to overwhelm the UK since he’s been building troops in India and is down all those IPCs in Africa. 6. A tough question no doubt. Like I said, I think it’s asking for trouble if you let Germany take over Africa, which means it’s a good idea to have the US liberate it early on. However, if the US doesn’t follow up on those ICs, then Japan will overwhelm them if he’s good. I’m not really an expert on this as I haven’t tested it extensively in a while (I tried KJF a few months ago but I didn’t know a few tactics I know now). I would say though that if the Japan player is excellent, then nothing short of all 3 powers going after him will hinder him permanently. I have personally broken free of the sinkiang/indian IC very quickly without US naval support bogging me down. Good Japanese players realize that it’s OK to empty the mainland territories to charge straight into China; although it lets Russia/UK take a territory, this lets you completely and utterly bone the Sinkiang IC turn two, and you can always easily regain the coastal territories using your fighters and battleship bombardments. Your strategy is very good against perhaps low-mid level Japanese players though, looking at that combined British fleet and all those ICs on the mainland it bound to panic him. I have some additional tips for KJF: 1. Take a good look at where the Japanese player is placing his first turn transport buys. If he is silly enough to place them in the outer Japan seazone, then blow them out of the water with the Hawaaiin fighter + Washington Bomber or just one of them. Believe it or not, the bomber can reach that outer seazone and land in Buryatia; fly up to eastern canada, then to western canada, then to that seazone bordering the north of western canda, then I think from there it’s 2 spaces to that seazone then 1 space into Buryatia, making for 6 spaces. It’s an almost instant game win if you destroy the 3 transports he builds there, and is very clever the first time you see it, although probably past then it will never work. Also if China somehow survived then the fighter there is in a great position to strike at either seazones that the transports deploy in. It takes an observant and clever Japanese player to protect his transports carefully. 2. Somtimes you can panic the Japanese player by consolidating 6 infantry into Buryatia as well as sending 2 tanks in Moscow to the east 2 spaces. Against good Japanese players this probably won’t affect their strategy but against people who haven’t seen it, they will usually panic and not attack China first turn because they’ll look at Manchuria and panic. 3. You can consolidate the British fleet into sz30 as well as sz38. Sz30 is much more out of the way of the Japanese navy than sz38, though if your intent is lure them into attacking your fleet with a lot of units then this isn’t the way to go. Putting them in sz30 though really forces the Japanese to keep an eye on it since it’s in a position to invade some islands. Load full infantry into both transports when you converge them into sz30 will make the Japanese player sweat a bit. He’ll have to keep his bship/car in west indies or you’ll invade it, and he’s not in a good position to attack your fleet with just that because he’ll probably take at least 2 hits and lose a fighter or so. He may be tempted to strafe you with all those infantry aboard but thats’ pretty much what you want because your navy will make him pay for the strafe (1 car + 1 or 2 fighters if the anglo egypt one survived, 1 sub, 1 destroyer, 2 trans). Also Britain can send their bomber to sinkiang on turn one. This puts an additional monkey wrench in Japanese logistics if they’re used to buying all transports turn one. Now they have to protect their transports wherever they mobilize them, which means buying a destroyer or something which they normally wouldn’t do. Another alternate monkey wrench move is instead of consolidating the fleets, do this: send the destroyer, carrier, and transport to attack the Kwangtung transport. Send the fighter and sub to attack the solomon island sub. The fighter will land on the US carrier Usually you’ll end up destroying the enemy sub before it can submerge. Now you have presented the Japanese with some thorns. Pearl Harbor is a little harder to attack now since he lost a sub and now that there’s an additional fighter defending there. Also now there’s this quirky fleet sitting next to Kwangtung which is poised to strike as new naval units being built if it isn’t instantly targeted by the Indies fleet. Sometimes you can incur a fighter casualty with this fleet when Japan strikes it (2 hits total). 4. When your US fleet is gunning after Japan, I personally believe that the best tactical maneuver is not to charge straight west into the Japan seazone (2 turns), but to drop down to Solomon islands. This puts Japan in a bind, because from here you can attack his money islands (boreno, philiippines, west indies) as well as the Japan mainland. He is going to be forced to attack you there, giving you the defending advantage, or risk you grabbing his money islands because he can’t defend nearly all of them and then deploying an IC there, which totally throws things out of whack for him. There are a number of Japanese strategies to help counter these tricky KJF strategies, but I don’t want to go into them right now because I’m lazy. Besides a few tricks the basic goal is to wait for Germany to overcome Africa, take some Russian territories, and then either crush Moscow then go to India or surprise attack Britain.

I think we need to look at the England complex in a different light. If England gets a FREE complex, where should they put it? (Prior to Russia 1.) Why?  Because that’s the majority of complexes England gets.  Not many people are buying Complexes for England until much later in the game when they can put them up in W. Europe or Norway. So, to me the choices are: S. Africa (2) E. Canada (3) Australia (2) India (3) And that’s pretty much the order i would put them in.  Unless there are some neat things going on with America and Russia that can help reinforce India faster.  Then it might change. I like E. Canada over Australia because you can invest in a 5th & 6th Transport (something some of you want to do ANYWAY) with England and be landing 10 troops a round in Asia. 2 From E. Canada to England. 10 From England to North Europe.

i have thought about a us atlantic presence of 4 divisions per round to assist and the uk being european focused with russia, the problem always becomes how to tangle with japan as the usa without getting stuffed

@tenth8sphere: Trying to make the switch to revised. My fist game as Russia I lost Russia on G2. First game as UK, lost UK on G3. Believe it or not, I was moderately competent at Classic. Now I’m being set to play as japan in an upcoming game. I desperately need a crash course in some of the important opening moves. Is it better to kill the UK fleet, or the AMerican one at pearl? Is my goal still to shunt infantry and planes to the mainland? What if the UK fleet unifies? What should I absolutely 100 percent do, and what should I absolutely NOT do as Japan? Any help is most welcome. Hopefully I’ll keep Japan until at least turn 4. "Is it better to kill the UK fleet, or the AMerican one at pearl? " - depends on the board position. "Is my goal still to shunt infantry and planes to the mainland? " - Mostly.  Depends on what they do, but mostly. “What if the UK fleet unifies?” - depends on the board position “What should I absolutely 100 percent do, and what should I absolutely NOT do as Japan?” - Always build as many transports as you can on J1 (Japan 1, or Japan’s first turn = J1).  You need at least 4 transports to shuttle infantry between Japan and Asia, plus probably minimum 2 more to take infantry off the Pacific islands (where they aren’t going to do you much good) into Asia.  That means you will also need to build more transports on J2. If the Allies go KGF (Kill Germany First), you will want an industrial complex at India as soon as you can.  If the Allies go KJF (Kill Japan first), instead of producing industrial complexes, you should think about fighter production along with your infantry.  (Even if you only produce 6 infantry at Japan on a turn, you will still need 5-6 transports; you have a LOT of infantry on those Pacific islands). Don’t build infantry on J1, build a tank.  An additional early tank helps a lot because of the early mobility in Asia.  You don’t NEED any more infantry. –

Put it this way: as the Allies, are you more concerned about a) 2 Inf 2 Arm that can land in Persia or Egypt next turn or b) 2 Inf 2 Arm that can be in FIC or Bury next turn or c) 3 Arm that can be in Caucasus next turn? Maybe c), but a) is at least a close second. Ideally, I’d like FIC, India and EI ICs - I don’t care if I’m not utilizing Jap’s IC to the max, all that does is strand units in a backwater (unless it’s KJF of course). But once the Allies are well into KGF, it’s not so bad to tempt them into switching strats with a provocative little IC in EI. Right now I face NO allied units in the Pacific or the Indian ocean, so I just want to be able to bring units to Russia/Africa with maximum speed and responsiveness. Responsiveness often gets overlooked as a value - if you have to build your units three turns before they arrive for combat, you have to guess what you might need then. If instead you can deliver in one round, you have much more flexibility. So I like to build ICs - people think it detracts IPCs from building actual combat units, but it can actually bring more units to the front more quickly if that IC is 1.5 turns closer to the front than the units you would have built back at your starting IC.