I did a quick skim and I don’t think anyone mentioned it so I’m gonna chime in. If you ever are in a game and want to figure out odds in a battle you don’t need a fancy odds calculating website or iphone app.

All you have to do is figure out the low luck odds in your head or with an old  fashioned pocket calculator. Just add up the total attack value on one side and divide that number by 6. That’s the number of hits you’ll have in round 1 and then just anticipate what the opponent will remove as casualties (likely lower def/atk values first) and then repeat.

For example, you attack Russia as Germany with 6 infantry, and 3 armor vs their 8 infantry. Your infantry attack at a 1, and the tanks at a 3. That means your attack value is 6 for the infantry (61) and 9 for the tanks (33) for a total of 15. You divide that number by 6 and you have the number of hits you’ll do on average in the first round. 15/6 is 2.5 hits. So you should kill 2 or maybe 3 units. To play it safe I always round down. So lets assume you kill 2.

Then you’ll figure his odds of hitting you in round 1 the same way. He has 8 inf defending at 2 each for a total of 16 defense. He will get 2.67 hits. Again, I always round in my opponents favor so we can assume he hit you 3 times.

So that’s round 1. You can then repeat that process to figure out round 2 and so on until you win or lose. So in round 2 you will have 3 inf and 3 tanks vs 6 inf. Your attack value (AV) will be 12, his will be 12. The odds are dead even in R2. If you divide both by 6 you get 2 hits each.

Round 3 will be your AV of 11 vs his AV of 8, now you’re winning! The more rounds you fight the more the odds are in  your favor since you have higher attack values on your tanks.

Hope that’s helpful, I just hate it when I’m in a game and people want to figure odds and the next thing you know 5 grown men pull out their smart phones and try to race to see who’s $6 odds calculator app will figure out the answer first when you can do it in your head faster… :roll:

I agree that if you play at a level where you’re playing tournaments or lots of play by email games then you’re at a level where this might not work, but I think that even if you don’t take India on J3 moving to SZ36 and putting a NB there is a good idea for J1. It just gives you many options. I’m sure a crafty opponent wouldn’t fall for this a lot. BUT if you’re playing friendlies occasionally, (as I assumed MightyPol was when I posted based on his original post) then this strat or variations of it can be very effective. I feel as though all of these India defenses that people are bringing up are out of the greater context of an actual global game. I feel like they are defenses that are possible to theorize when you know exactly what’s coming because I just brought it up to you, but that in an actual game wehre you didn’t announce ahead of time that you’re going for a J3 crush that no actual real life opponent would do half that. And if they did then you have other benefits, like a weak egypt.

Also, if by me simply putting my fleet on SZ36 in J1 is such an obvious J3 India crush to so many of A&A players than its even better. Then you can easily fool an opponent. Axisplaya, if you would stack exactly what you said on India based simply on me moving to sz36 on J1 then you would be easier to feint than anybody else since you are so sure I’d attack India. It’d be easy to hit the allies somewhere else while you sit on India with 2 turns of builds and most of your starting units.

And Clyde, you Ninja’d me. Thanks for the kind words and I also like your take on it too. Its like I was saying originally. Other than moving your fleet to SZ36 and the planes down to Kwangsi, the rest is salt to taste. It should be a bit more reactionary and can be anything you like to do and think would best thwart the Allies whilst shoring up your own position. I think the transports vs IC is just two sides of the same coin so we’re really on the same page 

I don’t know for sure, but I feel like any strong aversions to my post are from players who play many more games, and/or do lots of theory gaming, and/or play a lot of online A&A. I do none of those. I play a regular game with very good opponents every 3 weeks for real in person. I have tried this in a real life game 3 times and it has worked all three times, but all 3 times it has been against a different real life player as India. I find that if I played against Noll dozens of times on TripleA or something he would beat this as i just told him what I’d be doing, not to say he wouldn’t if I didn’t tell him.

BUT this strats strength and weakness comes from many more variables and contexts than I think Null is looking at. I feel as though he’s looking just at the battle in India and bad or worst case scenarios. If you take the whole game Global1940 mind you, not just Pacific, then all the players behave in certain ways, especially in games with 4+ players. Again, in a real world game, that you play with live opponents, who may have driven over an hour to get a game in and likely all have a new strat to try out based on performance in their last game…  So with that in mind you have to think about what the allied players and the UK player especially is thinking. Most of the time they are thinking (in our group at least) that they will fly their air over to Egypt. Move at least 1 land unit through the middle east to activate Persia and (our group) attack Iraq before the Italians ever get a chance to activate it. Then they send their one transport to slowly take DEI with ANZAC and then start a Infantry Push Mechanic of some kind one territory at a time up the Burma Road. Not all players do this, but many do, their larger focus being on Europe where in previous versions of Alpha London often fell, Egypt was important and Japan usually has players that play more conservative so a Calcutta crush is often later than Moscow… They tend to take it slow.

Also a lot of UK players don’t like the idea of starting the war in the Pacific, especially not on UK1 or UK2. If they do it might be a wrinkle, but if they don’t you’re still green. Then there’s losing Yunnan on turn 2. This can happen, but usually you are crushing China to the point where they cannot do it, and only a UK2 DoW on Japan can accomplish this. And if they do, thats a whole stack less that can retake India if you do pull it off.

As for the US concern, They can be a worry… However they’re not in a position to actually TAKE Japan. with only a handful loaded transports and maybe 6 planes they likely wont be able to crack that nut. You will have all of your starting land units minus 2 plus any builds. I recommend a few planes as the first 3 turns go by. Hopefully by you J4 purchase you’ll have India’s money as well as yours, that should deter or repel any US4 invasion of Japan. But what the US does is highly dependent on the game, the player, and all manner of other events unfolding, to predict their behavior game to game is not really possible, so just react to what they do, with the Destroyers and Subs hanging back for rear-guard action and any builds in Japan and the mainland, along with some clever gameplay, and you should have the tools to keep the US at bay.

And as for India having all planes and all of their builds on India in UK3, I doubt it will happen often. At least in my experience (which is not the thousands of simulated games that many folks have around again!). I find that in a global context, what is happening in Europe far outweighs what’s going on in the Pacific in terms of attention and importance. The Allies main concerns are there and this strat, no matter how successful it is will be worthless if Germany is doing poorly.

And finally, if things do go bust, and I’m playing against say, Noll, and he’s playing the best 2 turns of his life with UK and thwarting me at every step, and making taking India a near impossibility, then not all is lost! If things seem impossible from J2, don’t move to India, instead play a normal game where you plod around the Pacific doing what ever it is most Japanese players do. You’re still in an excellent position from SZ36 to either threaten multiple key targets, or relocate anywhere you want (you are within 3 of the India, DEI, Carolines, the Philippines, and Japan). If it seems you are off of India and all the sudden its stacked to the heavens with defense units, then you still have options. You can head back the way you came, taking the DEI and Malaya, you can go the other way and throw your opponents for a huge loop when you land in the middle east and build factories there, or go straight to Egypt and prepare to make the UK’s Mediterranean plans go down the tubes. With the Japanese fleet plying the Med and Indian oceans the Japanese player can be a serious threat even if everything else when haywire and you lose your capital, you still control a powerful fleet that is in a place where the allies are weak. Also, in Noll’s worst case scenario, the UK is just sitting in India twiddling its thumbs with nearly 100% of its starting resources and subsequent builds. That’s GREAT for the Axis! You’ve effectively checked India. While you aren’t taking the place, they aren’t doing anything with it either. Meanwhile if the US is going pacific heavy you already won! Even if they eventually clobber Japan it doesn’t matter, ever last IPC that the US drops into the Pacific Ocean is a godsend for the Germany and the Axis overall.

I would posit this based on my experience with this game, and with playing Japan. The game of global is really just playing Europe with an interesting side story. The Pacific board doesn’t really matter. Japan’s job isn’t to win, its to pull as many Allied IPC’s onto the pacific board as it can to make Germany’s life easier on the real board. If the allies totally ignore you then you can help the Euro Axis eat away at Russia and maybe even get your 6/8 VC’s for a surprise victory, but you won’t. Its the Allies job to spend exactly enough IPC’s to prevent Japan from taking 6VC’s and not a penny more, and moving the rest to the Euro board, and its Japans job to pose a big enough threat to fool the allies into spending that penny more, and then some. So measure Japan’s success not in how many capitols or VC’s you capture, but in how many IPC’s you make the Allies waste by putting them on your half of the world.

It can be read that the “in Europe” qualifier applies to both original axis territories AND neutral territories, as you interpret it, meaning its only original axis territories IN EUROPE. Or it can be read that the “in Europe” qualifier applies only to the neutral territories since its after the word “or”. So it would mean all original axis territories on the entire board, in addition to only those neutral territories IN EUROPE!

Could be read either way in just that one sentence you quoted. And the Soviet Union certainly wanted to spread Communism in Asia just as much as it did in Europe so there’s a historical precedent for it to be interpreted the opposite way that you do Guargantua. Just sayn’

@MightyPol:

In all games with Japan, i’ve never really succeed with them. What is the ultimate strategy that you guys use with Japan, what do I need to do in order to become a beast at this game?

I didn’t bother to read the rest of this thread so I hope I’m not repeating anybody, and I don’t often post here or spend too much time reading so if this old hat or common then forgive me, I’m ignorant to the Interwebz ultimate win strat.

BUT I always open the same way. J1 I build a Naval Base in Hainan (and 2 research but this is discretionary). I then move every ship the IJN has except for 3 destroyers and the 2 subs to SZ36. I leave a defense force of 4inf in both Manchuria and Korea in case the Soviets leave a big force, but I will reduce that number over the game as they do if they pull them back to Moscow/Timguska. I never invade the Soviet Union in the Amur region as it takes up too much resources and yields little benefit. I instead focus heavily with my starting units into China. Don’t take French Indo-China either. Just attack Chahar, Anhwe, Hunan, and of course Yunnan. Use as much of your air power here as possible. Landing all of it that you can either in Kwangsi or SZ36 on your carriers. Load all 3 transports and move them to SZ36 as well, dumping them on Kwangsi until you reload them on J2.

At the end of J1 I have 3 Destroyers off Japan, they will serve as blockers for the US on later turns. The 2 subs are off of the Caroline Is. to serve as I see fit later on, they can often cause some kind of mischief. The rest of the IJN are in SZ36, the carriers loaded, the transports empty, and the land units in Kwangsi until their pickup the following turn. All the air should be in Kwangsi or on carriers in SZ36, there can be a few stragglers around China after your J1 push into China, but get them there by J2! You should collect 40 IPCs, 26, +4 for the 4 Chinese territories you took, and +10 for your NO of not being at war with the Allies (aside from China ofc)

On J2 build whatever you like but I prefer a Small Factory in Manchuria, (much more effecient than going all transports, but always have a few around). I also will build an Air Base in Kwangsi as a form of insurance in case things don’t go well this turn. I then attack more in China using the Air force to make all the battles last only 1 round, thereby taking as few casualties as possible, but also ensuring I land every last air unit I have in Kwangsi or on the carriers. Next I non-combat move all the ships from SZ36 (and your new Naval Base) 3 spaces to SZ39 just off India. The Allies can’t block this move because you’re not yet at war (at least I doubt it lol) You don’t attack on J2 you just move the whole fleet next to India for some nice sight seeing. You should have 2 battleships, 2 cruisers, a Destroyer, 3 loaded carriers and 3 loaded transports (ideally with 3inf, 2 art, and 1 arm, but 4inf, 1art, 1arm is also acceptable). Now your plan should be obvious to the allies (you’re going to take India by J3) but I bet until you make the move they will assume you are trying some crazy sack Australia strat… This will also through them off and likely many of their units will already be off of India moving up the Burma Road or towards Egypt. Lastly don’t forget to Non Combat Move a destroyer to SZ25 to block the US fleet buildup on Hawaii from hitting you too soon in Japan.

On J3 you attack India! If the Allied player is caught totally unawares by this you can hit India with 4 shore bombards from your fleet, 6 land units, and every single plane Japan starts with (you should not have lost any yet!!!). I don’t care what the UK player builds, he cannot stop this, he can only make it more painful for you to take. But likely they will be caught at least somewhat unawares and you will take it while only losing a few planes. Note it might be neccessary to hit any combat units they have adjacent to India with excess planes if there is a force substantial enough to take India back after you sack it. I’ve done this before with 1 transport and some planes on occasion.

There are few problems with this if the UK player is clever. He could declare war first on UK1 and thereby block your naval movement. If he does it throws this out the window, but you’re in a prime position to fan out and take all the DEI without bringing the US into the war on J2!!! OR they might declare war on UK2 to try to re-take Yunnan and thereby prevent you from having a landing zone for your fighters. Even if they do this you can still attack with 14 planes. that’s 6 fighters, 6 tac bombers and 2 strats. This is done by 3 fighters, 3 tacs, and the 2 strats taking off from Kwangsi and the fighters and tacs will land on the carriers while the 2 strats go back to kwangsi. Then the 3 tacs and 3 fighters from the carriers hit india and then land in kwangsi. So by them switching places they can double their attacking air units. Any excess air that can’t hit india from Kwangsi cuz they’d have nowhere to land can hit any counter attacking force in Burma instead. If there isn’t one they can retake Yunnan and/or go into China. Also take FiC on J3. And lastly, since its J3, if you can snipe any US targets of opportunity with your subs and destroyers, or have to take SZ25 back from them, do it since they will get their money this turn anyways.

There you have it. By J3 you should have wiped out the UK in the pacific, hold India, and have a working factory in Manchuria. China should be near death and you should be ready to churn out tanks to go into Russia via China and the Middle East by J4. (I find a mix of tanks out of India, and Mech Inf in Manchuria is best as its cheaper) The IJN should sweep back and take the DEI on J4 and J5 and your economy should explode. Then just spar with the US in the pacific and avoid a major confrontation, delaying them while hammering Russia until Germany can Take Moscow (if your German player is good this will happen around G6 or G7 at the latest, and you will be well into Russia by then helping)

@Frontovik:

sorry to burst yout bubble, but taranto (killing italian 2 transports) is still easily done, even with 2 extra german fighters.

Lol no bubble bursted… I know the odds… I certainly wouldn’t say “easily” and after that you still have half your fleet and the UK likely has little left to stop it, I welcome that attack. If nothing else it helps clear some pieces off the board, I never like when players start stacking up and playing ultra conservatively, makes the game really drag out…

We have been having a lot of trouble with Italy too… Then we stumbled on a brilliant move. In G1 send 2 ftrs from West Germany to the SZ with the french and british cruisers, for 1 movement point, then Non Combat Move them another 4 back to Southern Italy to scramble with the Italian ftr when the british attack, the additional 2 ftrs make a big deterrent for any attack on the fleet.

For a few games we had the Italians run rampant with 40 IPC economies, however this was short lived as the british came up with a counter that is basically a small factory UK1 with all their fighters heading over from india via an attack on Iraq (with indian tranny and troops) and landing in syria, then moving to egypt UK 2. Then they build 3 ftrs UK2 to defend cairo for good and from there can actually flat out defeat Italy from the med since its economy never got a chance to take off…  (This is usually combined with a KIF heavy US move to the med)

That strat worked for 2 games as SL was not viable in either for some reason or another… But I finally defeated it last game with a successful SL, but Italy was still blunted by the manouvre and left relatively useless.

S. bombers are better than being automatically sunk!    Thank you to everybody for the replies, didn’t meant to doubt you, I just have a skeptical crew, and they were very set against us doing this move at the time.

Yay! I was the player who attempted to bring the planes. It was… controversial… in our group so we decided to not make the move to move the game along. It seems in the spirit of the rules, if not in RAW, that you can protect transports with planes… just like you would with non-bombarding surface warships… I have a feeling this issue will still not be decided unless Krieg weighs in…

In my opponents defense it did look fishy. It was 4 german transports with no other ships conducting an amphibious assault on empty Archangel and Nenetsia from empty SZ127. There were 3 Russian Fighters in Novgorod that could scramble to auto kill the transports before they landed. So the German player brought up 8 planes to SZ127 to protect against the inevitable scramble and they would land in Axis Finland. It was an odd move and looked silly with no surface warships and just planes, something that our group isn’t used to seeing, but it seemed no different in terms of the rules than sending destroyers up to the SZ to protect them…