Posts made by Weezer 410

A best strategy is always dependent on a situation and the counter strategy your opponent is using.

personally I think a German strategy of sealion or strangling britain through convoy is the most effective.

I also think A USA strategy of 100% pacific is very effective but not if germany goes sealion.

Italy should always focus on control of the med. africa and the middle east (in alpha +2) if you are playing oob I think the best thing italy can do is can-open for Germany. Russia strategy is pretty straight forward.

Japan is extremely complicated as there is so much to be done, it really depends on the situation on the board. India smash, Kill america first, kill australia first (less of an option in alpha +2), all out China/Russia etc.

Anzac needs to be as annoying as possible, usually done with lots of subs.

An Indian fleet always seems to be the best for Uk Pac. at least early in the game but only if there will be at least a moderate sized american fleet.

China needs to be annoying by spreading its forces out and keeping the fighter alive.

Uk London is tricky, I have experimented with building planes each turn and it seems to be pretty effective but assuming there is no sealion threat the best thing to o is probably build ground units in S. Africa and a fleet in canada.

the brit rule sounds fun

After 3 turns France should be allowed to collect half of the ipc value of the territories it controls on the European board. It then would be allowed to place units on London or until a french factory is captured, they would not be allowed to build their own factories until Paris is retaken. This would represent the free french forces that were very active during the war.

These are some rules that I think could add some new balancing elements to the game while also keeping with historical accuracy.

1. I think that for every turn that the allies control northwest Persia, persia and eastern persia russia should get +3 ipc’s per turn. this represents the allied movement of supplies through Russia.

2. This is not my idea but I heard of a rule where you can use artillery that are adjacent to a complex/airfield/naval base to attack them like a strategic bombardment

3. For every turn that Karelia and archangel are controlled by Germany they get +3 ipc’s. representing the stopping of the murmansk run.

4. Tech dice reduced from 5 ipc’s to 4 ipc’s per roll, represents the technological achivements made with jet fighters and radar etc. seeing as noone uses them at 5ipc’s perhaps even reduce the cost to 3 ipc’s.

5. Battleships reduced cost to 18 ipc’s, Aircraft carriers reduced to 15 ipc’s. When a ship is damaged it costs 1 ipc to repair when adjacent to a naval base.

6. If Germany is +30 ipc’s and italy is +20 ipc’s without national objectives Spain and Argentina Becomes pro axis, if the allies control all territories adjacent to Turkey for one full turn Turkey becomes pro allies. If spain becomes pro-axis Portugal becomes pro allies, representative of the political climate in 1940-1945.

7. If the allies take finland they get +4 infantry immedeitelly, representative of political climate.

8. Allied bombers strategic bombing Japan proper will do +4 damage instead of +2 , representative of the fire bombings.

9. Japan gets +5 ipc’s for every turn it controls all Chinese territories, representative of national prestige.

10. +2 ipc’s to Italy and Germany for control of Romania (only available once all allied powers are at war) representative of Ploesti oil fields.

11. after 3 turns France collects half of the income of its combined territories (european board only) and may place units on London, represntative of the free french forces.

I understand the implementation of all of these rules may unbalance the game but I believe that some of them are viable and should be implemented

I voted invade japanese islands but honestly you should be building mostly subs and the occasional transport/destroyer. I just played a game where America and India really dropped the ball on containing the japanese fleet and the 3 or 4 subs that anzac was able to produce per turn kept the Japanese fleet in check and basically saved the dutch east indies and everything in that area.

I think it is an interesting point to add a dutch faction, but a little unneccesary as the game is complicated as it is. We could also see a bulgarian faction, finnish faction, Romanian faction (which I would actually like to see), belgian faction, polish faction, Czech faction…etc. but seeing as the only countries of these that had a colonial presence at the time of the war were the belgians and dutch perhaps we could incoporate the two into one faction. I think the idea of giving them brazil is a little too far fetched. I think the territories owned by the belgian/dutch should be:

1. Angola
2. West Indies
3. Dutch east indies
4. Belgian congo
5. Suriname
6. Sri Lanka (on lease by the british)

delpoyments would be
Angola: 1 infantry
West Indies: 1 infantry, 1 airbase
Dutch east indies: 1 submarine off of Java, naval base on java
Belgain Congo: 2 infantry
Sri Lanka: 1 Destroyer, 1 infantry, 1 naval base
1 transport on a sz bordering London

Special rules:
the dutch forces can only deploy units on India or London, their income will be half of the value of the territories they control (7 ipc’s at the beginning)

National objectives:
The dutch will gain 2 ipc’s for every territory of the dutch east indies that the allies liberate or commandeer.
the Japaneses lose 2 ipc’s per turn every turn that their is a dutch sub within 4 spaces of tokyo representing admiral Helfrich    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conrad_Emil_Lambert_Helfrich

Germany: takes control of Bulgaria and yugoslavia during setup 1infantry on yugo, 2 on bulg.
italy: takes control of greece and places two infantry there during setup and adds one infantry to their forces in ethiopia (anti-dutch congans)
Japan: add 1 DD and TT to SZ 6, National objective +3 ipc’s for no dutch ships in the pacific (east of malaya, west of new zealand)  (seazones that include areas west of malaya/east of NZ are not included)

I think this is a better  balance, I firmly believe that the dutch should not have control of Brazil or any industrial complexes, I think Sri Lanka is a more suitalbe addition then brazil because the Dutch had a small colony there and the British may have accepted a deal where they leased it to the dutch in place of the british taking ownership of the east indies.

I figure that if Britain is turtling back everything they can into London then they will not be able to reinforce any of their colonial possessions, every time I have played the cruiser off Gibraltar is destroyed by a German sub so I would suggest doing this with your sub that can reach. Then the Italians should be able to take the british and french fleets out piecemeal since the combined Italian air and naval capacity is greater then that of the combined british/ french. I also assume that you bring to german planes down to assist in S. Italy since they can do nothing against the british fleet. This will dissuade the brits from attacking the Italian fleet, and even if they do they will get hammered. by turn two I think no matter what happens (unless your rolling is terrible) the Italians should have the med. all to themselves. This may require you taking Trans-jordan to keep the destroyers from S. africa out. I have seen this whole operation done a couple of times now even without a sealion threat and with a brit ic in egypt, it is actually fairly easy.

So I have been reading some threads about a strategy of America devoting all or most of its resources to destroying Japan first rather than focusing on the Western Axis. I have used it once before and done very well in destroying my opponent. Unfortunately I have not seen any people posting about a way to counter this “invincible” strategy, so here goes, bear in mind I have not tested this at all and I prefer to give general outlines victory rather then specific buys and movements.

Germany turn 1:

do standard turn one moves killing France and taking Yugo, allow Italy to take Bulgaria and southern France and allow Normandy to live. Use all available aircraft and ships to kill the British fleet entirely, it is very important that they are destroyed. Everything is secondary to destroying the British fleet and of course taking France. Create a somewhat strong defensive barrier on the Russian Frontier and build standard SeaLion units.

Japan turn 1:

If you have the fortune of knowing in advance that your opponent will be using a Kill Japan first strategy then I would advocate attacking the first turn but seeing as this is most likely not going to be the case (the German first turn moves should always be the way I described them, I believe Russia is a secondary target) then I would do some standard attacking moves into China and perhaps attacking russia if he presents a good opportunity. Leave French Indo china alone and move a strong but minority of your fleet south to be prepared to engage the Brits and take the money islands.

build ships

Italy turn 1:

Assuming Germany sent a couple of planes to defend your fleet (the one’s that cannot engage the British fleet) then you should have a good fleet left after Britain attacked, and if they did not attack then you will want to consolidate your fleet and attack the British or French fleet but not both. move forward in Africa taking Alexandria and Tunisia (try and take Tunisia with as few troops as possible) If it is possible to invade Malta or Gib. do so but it is not extremely important to do it this turn. attack any territories that you border that are weak, perhaps Greece. Build a fighter or save your money.

Axis turn two:

okay so Germany will continue to build a fleet to threaten Sealion assuming the Brits shored up on London to prevent your turn 2 invasion. Take whatever remains of France and continental Europe, DO NOT ATTACK RUSSIA. and send a few planes to help destroy any British ships within range. Japan will continue to build ships and a large fleet, if Hawaii has been reinforced by the US then now is the time to attack! otherwise bide your time a little more, you want them to present you with a tempting target. continue your work in China but keep losses to a minimum and do not overextend yourself, if you went for russia then keep some pressure on them but dont devote too much, build more ships. Italy will hopefully finish off the british fleet in the med. if they are still left and have gib. by now, if Egypt looks more inviting then take it but be sure that you can have Gibraltar by the end of italy’s 3rd turn. move forward in Africa. Italy want to be able to have Egypt, Greece and Gib. and the med. clear of enemy ships by turn 3, this should be simple with Germany threatening Sealion.

Axis rest of the game:

Germany will control London by turn 3 and continue to build a large fleet, build a few tanks also to keep Russia from attacking you and keep them building defensively. build a llarge fleet and threaten America along with Italy, Itlay will dominate Africa and pressure Russia and India through the middle east making lots of money. Japan will trade ships with America and AnzAc and India while keeping them out of Japan proper, this is how the axis need to play. Then Germany can threaten America enough to take Washington or force them to divert forces.

NO way! This game is just becoming interesting! I have played many games where London has been taken and retaken. The most detrimental effect it has on the war is in Africa where the Italians will clean up. With Russia pounding on your back door and America only getting stronger you will not be able to compete in naval strength, within one or two turns the american player will have a bigger fleet and have the ability to take back London whereupon the German player will have to shore up his defenses on the atlantic wall, letting Russia have a field day.

The simple fact is that Germany is far from victory if victory is to be attained at all, in fact it will be up to Germany’s allies to distract the American fleet and Harass Russia if Germany is to be able to survive and win this war.

You need to go balls out to kill the british fleet, and the scotland fighter cannot scramble to sz 110. You might be able to spare the eastern europe planes to attack paris but I would prefer to send those to S. Italy to protect the italian fleet.

As for Japan and Italy, I like to leave the strategy specifics to the player because a lot can change with regards to what the allied players do for the first few turns and where they will be spending their money. This is especially true of Italy due to their 8th position in the turn order. The main thing Italy needs to do the first turn is keep their fleet alive, which is difficult against an experienced British player.

As for southern France. It is not a big deal of Britain/France retake it, the germans could easily take it back on their turn, and by then Normandy should be a cake walk. Also the British will probably want their fighter in Normandy back in england after the beating the RAF and RN will have taken by the germans.

I would send 2 tanks and 1 mech to S. France, two 3’s and a 1 should be sufficient to take out two 2’s. The rest go to France. You have to take some risks as the axis to win this game. Also I believe that the british/french can only scramble 3 fighters for the battle in sz 110, still giving me an advantage.

I generally do not like telling people how I think certain things should be destroyed because the allies could do a number of different things. As for the how to kill the british fleet. You need to commit all available subs, ships and airplanes into the fight, ans send 1 sub to attack the Gib. cruiser. I cannot remember how many planes the German start with that can attack the british fleet but I am going to assume it is around 7. send 2 subs to attack the SZ 109 fleet, 1 sub to attack the sz 111 fleet and 1 sub to attack the sz 110 fleet. Send BB and CC to sz 112. Then send 5 planes to the sz 110 battle and 2 planes to the sz 111 battle. Under normal rolling circumstances you should be able to win all of these battles. You want to knock out Britain’s air and naval supremacy in one swift blow.

I think it is important to take Southern France because it gives Germany some options in the med. Especially since the Italian fleet will probably be pretty battered at this point.

I have been a long time player of the oob setup in 1940, which is alright except for that when two equal players are pitted against each other the axis will lose 90% of the time. So I began to play with the alpha +.2 setup and here are some things that I believe must be done as the axis to ensure victory.

Germany-
As germany you need to grab the balkans (bulgaria, yugo) along with Southern France and Paris the first turn. Most importantly though, you MUST completely annihalate the British Isles Fleet (also the gibraltar cruiser). If the British fleet is allowed to survive, even a small portion of it, then the british player has some breathing room and can rebuild. Use all available aircraft and ships to destroy them no matter what the cost, perhaps send a couple of aircraft to Paris but I dont think this is neccesary if you ignore Normandy (which I highly suggest), you may even be able to spare a few planes to knock out the french ships in the med. But above all else germany needs to destroy Britain’s ability to wage war starting with its navy. Turn 1 and 2 builds should be mainly transports and ships to defend your invasion fleet. If nothing else this keeps the British from building a fleet or building in Africa, which is extremely important. Put alot of your tanks and infantry on the russian front but DO NOT attack until the fourth or fifth turn, Russia can be dealt with once Britain is hopelessly crippled.

Japan-
As Japan you want to do 4 things
1. Kill India
2. keep America/Anzac at bay
3. Harass Russia
4. Move fast
To do these things you must send a sizable fleet to india and either take it directly or seize so much of its islands and land that India is useless. Then convoy whats left. To keep America at bay you need to keep a sizable fleet back at Japan/Caroline islands probably half your fleet at India Half in Japan. Also you should be building ships ever turn adn do not attack Uk/Anzac/america until the 3rd or 4th turn. Japan should leave the far east Russian Posessions alone, in fact leave very minimal forces in Korea/Manchuria to try and bait him into attacking you first. If Russia does not do this, you must race through Northern China as fast as you can and  hit russia with as much as you can while also keeping pressure on INdia with ground forces. Probably build at least one minor complex in china to help speed up the process.

Italy-
Little Italy…So much to do…Italy’s prime objectives should be to
1. Seize Egypt
2. Harass Southern Russia via Caucases/Persia
3. Keep allied ships out of the Med.
To do this Italy must be constanly bulding ships and Germany has to fulfill its obligations, otherwise the brits will drop a complex in Egypt and when this happens Egypt it VERY tough to kill. Usually the Italian fleet is battered pretty bad the first turn. So it will be tricky to predict what the buys should be so play it by ear. Gibraltar is nice to have but egypt first, and try to take Greece as fast as possible. Italy needs national objectives to get any amount of income to start rebuilding her fleet. Mare Nostrum!

How could the British attack it? most of the time I do not send any infantry from india towards Persia.

If you are planning a J4 attack, it is completely feasible that you could send a Japanese fleet form the Caroline islands to Persia in that time. From there you could basically do what others have been talking about with using an american IC there. This is of course assuming that the british don’t take it. And I do realize that Japan is strapped on cash but the consequences it could have on the Russian and Indian fronts could be disastrous for these factions, I Imagine the Germans with Leningrad and the Japanese with Stalingrad moving in for the kill.

Does this sound too improbable? Or a possible surprise maneuver?

How about instead of building a huge fleet you build a bunch of transports and infantry in W. US for the first two turns and turn hawaii into a fortress with like 10-15 infantry and station your begining fleet off of hawaii, For Japan to be able to take Hawaii with all of those infantry would require huge transport fleets that are impractical for a limited budget such as Japan, and still allow it to take Sydney and Calcutta. Also after turn 3 you can send the transports back to E. US for the european invasion fleet.

My friend mentioned that perhaps to make strategic bombing more appealing and to encourage people to use airbases more, especially in the pacific, that all aircraft get a +2 movement from airbases, so fighters and Tac bombers would be able to move 6 spaces and bombers would be able to move 8. This would really help in the pacific where it seems it is almost impossible to strategic bomb Japan or even move aircraft around very well from islands.

Thoughts and comments appreciated!

Agreed  perhaps I should have left France as I did in the first post

France-poor economy, fights mostly land battles, easy to play

Germany-Medium economy, needs to be very aggressive, fights mostly land battles and medium to play as.
Russia-Medium economy, needs to be defensive, fights mostly land, and easy to play.
Japan-Medium economy, needs to be very aggressive, fights a balanced mix of land and sea. Hard to play as.
London UK-Medium economy, needs to be defensive early and offensive later in game, mostly sea battles and medium to play.
India UK-poor economy, needs to be defensive, fights a mix of sea and land battles depending on builds and medium to play.
ANZAC-poor economy, needs to be aggressive, fights mostly sea battles, and easy to play
Italy-Poor economy, needs to be aggressive, fights a mix of land and sea battles, medium to play.
China-Poor economy, needs to be defensive but attack whenever possible, fights all land, medium to play.
USA-Rich economy, needs to be very aggressive, fights mostly sea battles (especially in rounds 1-5) medium to play.
France-

Overall I like this new set of rules, it makes the game more historically accurate and will change many strategies.

This i what I noticed:
-Japan is much stronger in this version
-Russia and U.S. are slightly weaker
-UK and Germany are slightly stronger
-very rarely will Russia or japan attack each other early on
-A Yugo minor will become standard
-Russia will most likely pull a lot of its infantry back to Moscow from the east
-The US will have a more balanced approach to the war
-Japan will be more Aggresive against the U.S.
-Sealion will be scrapped in most games in favor of heavy Barbarossa

For the first few turns as japan I generally go all out on China, sending most available units into Chinese territories, I also tend to buy one or two minor complexes maybe even a major just for taking out china, although it also comes in handy against India and pumping tanks into Russia when China is dead.

If you are looking for an economical way to contain China (there is no cheap way to kill China) Take and hold Yunnan (land planes in it), kill the flying tigers, and keep them at least two territories away from any ocean. You can usually do this with your starting ground forces and a bunch of planes which can easily be used against the fight for India. But beware that even a contained China is potentially hazardous.

ultimately I believe this strategy is doomed for failure, America only needs to build 10 inf. in central and western USA to make this strategy useless, and though it takes time and money away from the European front, it leaves the japanese in a bad strategic position and allows India and ANZAC a long respite, even with a small fleet off of malaya the british can spend a couple of turns building ships and easily grab the money islands. Pretty soon India will be getting 30+ Ipc’s a turn and ANZAC will probaly have at least 15 if not 20+  while Japan will probably be somewhere between 30 and 35 and thats assuming no convoy raiding and no russian attack.

I believe that this strategy is a waste of Japanese potential and is just using them as a distraction to give germany more time rather than allowing Japan to turn into the monster it can become by turn 5 or 6. By then it can attack the US or Russia and really change the game instead of delay the Americans one turn.

Italy could definetily use the economic boost, but it makes much more sense to give it to Germany. Germany is only given 30 ipc’s to start the game out, putting it virtually on par with the London Brits and far behind the Ruskies. Germany is also the most critical and important axis player (japan is a close second) as they start  out right in the middle of the fight and face the full brunt of the British and Russians and often times the Americans like to go for Germany too.

Therefore the Germans need France, it is a crucial part of the axis strategy, if the Italians were to take it they would probably either spend it all on a fleet, which would not be able to raise a finger against the american/anglo fleet, or spend it on ground units to take the fight to russia but would still be playing the minor role on the eastern front.

Germany also makes more sense strategically in taking france because they can afford to spend 3 infantry a turn in Paris to build up the atlantic wall while fighting the russians in the east, where as usually the Italian player is spending all of their money trying to take Cairo/africa, which under the direction of an experienced british player, can be very hard to take.

I think the Taranto raid is just fine, it gives the Brits a chance in Africa instead of having to rely on the Indian airforce. It is also historically accurate but more importantly it forces the Italian player to be efficient and creative. The Italians can often times preserve their fleet, or part of it, with German air support. all they really need is a transport to survive.