The Red Tigers

[Afrikakorps]

Oke, it will be too easy for Japan to ignore and focus on India + money islands without consequences while the USSR is greatly weakened on the atlantic side. So not a good idea.

[taamvan]

Trying to stack Yunnan is a GREAT idea, but doing it at the very beginning of the game, or regardless of the J-plan, isn’t.  If you leave Burma, (as UK), you cant get back to the base if needed.  All Japan has to do to send you running home is threaten to invade India, which was the standard plan anyways.

It might be good to put 2 stacks where he cant attack both, but he doesn’t have to attack anything, if he doesn’t want to.  The allies in the East are all divided and lack strking power units like armor and air.  Individually, they’re weak and defensive.  Together, they can hold territory, but what’s at stake here is a $6 bonus that you may have been able to get ahold of without all that help.

Yunnan < India < London
This is an order of operations.  You can’t hold Yunnan at the cost of india and you cant hold india at the cost of a major capital.  Since Moscow is directly threatened starting G5-7, a plan to move resources away from Moscow, or even NOT TOWARDS Moscow, can be fatal.  The UK has 2 fighters and ANZAC 3, the rest are too far away in time to get there.  They can only do 1 job per turn because of the distances required–all 5 moves are needed to position for the rescue.

[Ichabod]

What everyone says about how Japan can bring a ton of planes and kill whatever it wants in any one location is correct. However, the planes cannot be at all locations at all times. If Yunnan is stacked and Moscow simultaneously walks into Korea either location will probably be held for a round while the US is beefing up a huge Navy to threaten something somewhere. Japan is the easiest Axis country to overrun and trash.

On triplea live, in Kill Japan First strategies, more players are now just shoving everything and letting Japan kill a stack somewhere, but the other locations grow too strong and the allied stacks killed deplete the amount of ground (fodder) that Japan can produce and get in position on the board.

When I face those Allied players’ strategies, Germany is under pressure to get Moscow as soon as possible. Getting Moscow is not victory still when Japan is trashed by round 6.

For Japan, I’m forced to pick one location and target that area because they can’t do all by turn 5-6.

I’ll play a PBEM game as the Allies with anyone in this thread who commented against stacking Yunnan at any point because of how much air Japan can bring. I got that. The point is to try to get Japan to run out of ground. It doesn’t always work, but it does many games I’ve played.

I’ll play no-bid for Demonstration purposes. If you insist on me taking a bid of like 15-17 IPCs (small but not uncommon), I will use it against Japan. Most of the time I don’t use my bid with UK Europe anymore except an occasional sub to support the Taranto raid.

[Ichabod]

When I first started playing G40, I thought the Axis were ridiculously advantaged due to their starting air power.

My opinion has changed a lot.

I think the Kill Japan First strategies have been revolutionized significantly on triplea live. Once a player gets over the fact that Japan can easily kill ground stacks with minimal fodder due to their huge air force, plus you’re willing to counter attack ground (smartly, like picking off 1 or 2 inf, not 3+) with your air; you’ll see that eventually Japan gets overrun. Japan often runs out of fodder before China gets so strong that Japan has no chance of VC win.

This is with Russia sending a few mechs, using the 20 Siberian units effectively and the US coming strong and hard wherever makes the most sense.

[larrymarx]

@Ichabod:

Getting Moscow is not victory still when Japan is trashed by round 6.

Let’s say Germany and Italy overrun Moscow on turn 6, but the Allies are almost in control of the rest of Asia.

My thinking to this point has been that this scenario is unacceptable and that Moscow must be defended at all costs. What do you think? What are the chances of the Allies converting this board into a win?

[Caesar-Seriona]

@larrymarx:

@Ichabod:

Getting Moscow is not victory still when Japan is trashed by round 6.

Let’s say Germany and Italy overrun Moscow on turn 6, but the Allies are almost in control of the rest of Asia.

My thinking to this point has been that this scenario is unacceptable and that Moscow must be defended at all costs. What do you think? What are the chances of the Allies converting this board into a win?

Strangely enough with this situation, it would be interesting to see if China gets attacked or gets ignored.

[Ichabod]

@larrymarx:

@Ichabod:

Getting Moscow is not victory still when Japan is trashed by round 6.

Let’s say Germany and Italy overrun Moscow on turn 6, but the Allies are almost in control of the rest of Asia.

My thinking to this point has been that this scenario is unacceptable and that Moscow must be defended at all costs. What do you think? What are the chances of the Allies converting this board into a win?

Agreed. Only new players to G40 trying for a Kill Japan First will let Moscow fall on Round 6. UK Europe can keep Moscow alive for a lot longer.

It’s not acceptable to let Moscow fall on round 6 no matter what if the allies are going to win the game.

[larrymarx]

So the plan has to be to knock Japan back quickly and actually hold Moscow. I guess what you were saying earlier is that if the Allies eventually fail at this (say round 9-11), then the game isn’t over at that point because they have gained ground in all other areas of the board.

I still think the Allies have it at a worse than 50% chance to win if Moscow falls in that scenario.

[Ichabod]

UK Europe can usually manage to get about 9-10 fighters to Moscow. US bombers killing stuff in Japan can eventually land in Moscow too.

Axis are going to do well, or should on whichever side the US doesn’t go for. I just think it best that the allies trash Japan first.

[Cow]

Tip for Japan, against all out KJF, take UK pacific at any cost.  China can’t leave China. Unless USA has heavily invested into the pacific, the cash islands will be yours. If USA has invested heavily, well you survive / contest as long as you can to drain usa resources to make a run for union of south africa.

[Ichabod]

Cow,

I agree. I just wish I followed that mindset in a current game. I know my opponent is going to keep hammering Japan.

Next game, I’m going to go for India or break…at least that way Japan will have secured a good NO. Forget China, yeah!.

[Cow]

Take and hold shan state, from there you can blast india with everything. all air and transport. you can do this as early as j3.

[Arthur Bomber Harris]

Cow has the wise plan, as usual.  Let China get out of control since it can’t go anywhere.  India will fall if you focus on it.  That means that the US must keep spending in the Pacific or ANZAC will fall next.  Meanwhile Moscow collapses on G6.  There is no way that the UK is sufficiently strong at that point to prevent the Axis from slowly pushing their way into Egypt: that combined push of Japan from the East and the Germans from the North cannot be halted that early in the match against a competent  adversary.

If an opponent is overly defensive, I generally look for an economic victory.  Usually the Axis will win in the long run if their income exceeds that of the Allies.  There are some footnotes to that statement, but it generally runs true.  Get to the oilfields for the Germans and hold the money islands for the Japanese.  Moscow and India will inevitably fall unless the Allies have a sufficiently strong counterattack.

[larrymarx]

The problem there is on J1, you don’t know if the Allies are going to go full KJF or not. If the Allies do not go full KJF, then going all-in on Calcutta is not optimum play. It’s better to expand your income and choke them out slowly so that they fall on J5 or later as opposed to J3.

If you do J1 without taking Philippines, you are jumping the gun and folding to the pressure of the combined Allied assault before the pressure has even been applied. I would either do J1 as normal with a contingency for an all-in on Calcutta beginning on J2, or I would simply do a J2. At that point taking Philippines or not is an option that would depend on the all-in decision.

[Ichabod]

Larry, there is a particular person I play who I do know is going to do an all out KJF. Japan is trashed by rounds 5-6 every game. I have to win on the Europe board.

[larrymarx]

So if you already know the person is going to KJF, then the India crush becomes a good play for Japan, and you can consider bypassing the Philippines on J1. I’m not sure how much good it will do having those ships one space to the west, and I’d also like to point out that you can just send two subs and some planes to take out the Philippines fleet and then noncom the DD and CV wherever you want. Surviving subs can hit his convoys.

A better rationale for bypassing the Philippines is simply that you want to conserve your ground troops and concentrate your force where it matters.

Another strategy to consider is the G1/J4 where you throw everything at Moscow (Italy builds straight mechs and tanks too). You can build an airbase on Chahar on turn 2 and bomb Moscow with the Japanese on turn 3 if the Germans have a stack on Ukraine or W. Ukraine.

In either case you are giving up on the hope of Japan becoming an economic force and concentrating your beginning force where it can do some good.

[Cow]

The hard counter to J4 is nothing but bombers USA. Literally nothing Germany can do when 16 bombers are in Russia before you get to attack and those bombers literally attack into reinforcements. All you got to do is make sure Russia doesn’t all on Germany’s 5th turn. Because USA gets there on USA 5.

That is the best way to deal with the Russia cheese strategy, do the bomber cheese back. You will win 99% of the time as the allies.

[Cow]

Don’t believe me? Play against yourself and just buy bombers and a sub + dd here n there for the pacific. Yes even 10 bombers makes taking Russia really difficult.  Bomb nov, bomb ukraine, attack anything that tries to skip past Russia, attack  units built on nov or ukraine. Yeah you can make Russia hold out for a freaking long time.

[Cow]

In fact if you plan on sending Russia to take Ethiopia / iraq… I do recommend 8 bombers flying into Russia to make up for the forces Russia sends down there, that way you hold Russia G5-G7, that way Russia doesn’t fall before it can spend the income it generated from National Objectives down there. This is the most consistent strategy.

Everything that involves boats and oceans typically results in Germany  ignoring it and letting Italy ground troops reclaim / turtle while Germany blasts Russia. With the 2 bomber 1 sub G1 buy meta… You will need at least a stack of 10-12 units on Egypt (Germany has 14 air and can blast it so Italy can take egpyt… also Germany wants to kill UK air because it defends Russia against a G6 all in anyway).

So yeah there you go. if you need usa to have an immediate impact on Europe, bombers are the best. Everything else Germany can ignore / not care about. Germany literally doesn’t care about Norway if it can get Russia and west germany / France is really easy for Germany to take back, Germany can make 10 units, can build air off the minors it took from Russia,  USA needs how many boats to shuffle 10 units a round into west germany? UK can do it with 5 boats, but UK is the only one capable of making a minor in Iran to reinforce Russia so how are you making fighters to defend russia while dropping infantry? Exactly.

USA bombers are tried and true. Played a thousand games, seen it all. If I am sitting down and I don’t want to screw around, I am buying some bombers, 4-12 depending on my mood / what is going down.  I am holding Russia, I am making bank. GG

[larrymarx]

And yet no one seems to have figured out how to turn those strategies back on you and win as the Allies.

I have nowhere near the level of experience that you do, but I’ve analyzed and tested the board quite thoroughly and everything you keep tossing out here on the forums is clearly insightful. The fact that your ideas keep evolving shows me that you know what you’re talking about too. I wonder why your ideas haven’t taken hold more? I didn’t see any U.S. player at YG’s tournament this weekend cranking out U.S. bombers.

As to the suggestions I made, I know they’re sub-optimal, but I was trying to think what the best moves for Japan would be from the beginning if you knew 100% that the Allies were doing a full KJF. Egypt crush is another one to consider.