@krieghund yes, that is what I meant
Russian Fighters
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But what is the cost to Russia of over stacking Ukraine and losing the AA Gun. Now YOU have to deal with the gun, and Germany gets the benefit.
Hell, I’ll trade a tank to take back Ukraine with a small stack of infantry to force Russia to either let me keep it or risk fighters or their own armor taking it.
Germany earns 40 IPC
Russia earns 24 IPCWhich one do you think is going to bleed dry first?
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But what is the cost to Russia of over stacking Ukraine and losing the AA Gun. Now YOU have to deal with the gun, and Germany gets the benefit.
I didn’t say overstack it.
Hell, I’ll trade a tank to take back Ukraine with a small stack of infantry to force Russia to either let me keep it or risk fighters or their own armor taking it.
How about neither - use artillery.
Germany earns 40 IPC
Russia earns 24 IPCWhich one do you think is going to bleed dry first?
It’s too bad there are 2 other nations to consider against Germany…
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The other nations are not relevant. Only Russia. Bleed Russia as dry as possible as fast as possible, let Japan mop up the rest.
And, if Russia insists on trading Ukraine that hard, I’d put in tanks just to kill off his attacking infantry faster. Sure, I lose tanks, so does Russia then. (4 Infantry + 2 Armor almost necessitates you ignore it or attack with 4 infantry, armor, 2 fighters of your own, at the least, in ADS. At least in MY opinion.)
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And, if Russia insists on trading Ukraine that hard, I’d put in tanks just to kill off his attacking infantry faster. Sure, I lose tanks, so does Russia then. (4 Infantry + 2 Armor almost necessitates you ignore it or attack with 4 infantry, armor, 2 fighters of your own, at the least, in ADS. At least in MY opinion.)
Like I said, I’m not overstacking it. I’ll leave 1-3 inf + aa gun in Ukraine, and then it’s up to Germany to toss arm into there when I have immediate reinforcements from Caucasus. It’s not a war Germany wants to get engaged in because the other Allies will have a much easier time. I’ll be using cheaper artillery to trade out the arm.
And any time you throw in very significant forces like 4 inf 2 arm, I would seriously consider tossing everything at it. I would lose maybe 2 units but you wouldn’t be able to counterattack due to your loss of inf and arm.
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3 Infantry + AA Gun (upper limit you wanted)
3 Infantry, Artillery, Battleship attacking.
No AA Gun shots, no fighters present.
Attacker has 86% chance to win with most likely outcome of losing 2 infantry in the attack.
Russia has lost 3 infantry and an AA Gun which is now poised to attack Russia if they send fighters. If they do not send fighters, they now have to send some hard units (as in not flesh and bone) to recapture the land that will be open to attack.
I don’t think this is a winning proposition for the Russians. As Germany only needs to make sure that they force Russia into risking fighters to AA Guns or sending artillery/armor into Ukriane to be destroyed by the Germans.
Honestly, if I was left with Inf/Art in Ukraine, I might send in two more infantry for reinforcements. That would leave Russia facing 3 Infantry, Artillery and AA Gun. (Or I might just send an armor instead of the artillery in the original attack, even though it only increases the win percentage by 2%.) That would almost require Russia to send at least 4 ground units and/or planes. That’s generally most of their build per round.
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I think what is likely to happen is a possible German Lurch to Ukr pretty early.
You can realistically have Japan ftr support on round 2, round 3 might be a safer bet, but depending on Rus and Ger buys, I’d be looking to stack Ukr ASAP if Russia is going to try the middle of the road approach (3-4 inf maybe aa too).
Germany could even pull the inf/rt from Afr (or just use SE troops) as well on G2 to hammer Ukr, and while that may put the Med fleet in jeopardy it is worth it since you still gain a few Afr IPC for a few turns but can make bigger gains in Europe. And the Med fleet is only in jeopardy if UK didn’t attack Sz 5 on Rd 1, which means you don’t really need to buy on ships on G1 to keep the fleet alive until G2.
This all assume an Afr bid of 8 (1 inf, 1 arm).
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Japanese fighters to Ukraine is annoying, but they are not likely to be used in trading any territories right after that due to having to fly over the Caucasus AA gun. Plus, Ukraine immediately borders any build in Caucasus, and Russia should have plenty of units. And it’s very unlikely to be able to go to Ukraine until round 3, because round 1 sees the fighters in Kwang to counterattack Yakut, China, and India for maximum flexibility. And only 4 fighters, since 2 are being used in Hawaii.
Also if you go to Ukraine hard early, and you would have to go very hard, that means ignoring Karelia/Belorussia. If you send even 1 inf to each of those that could very well mean the difference between keeping Ukraine since Russia builds immediately on Caucasus and can have arm builds in Russia reach it.
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@Bean:
Japanese fighters to Ukraine is annoying, but they are not likely to be used in trading any territories right after that due to having to fly over the Caucasus AA gun. Plus, Ukraine immediately borders any build in Caucasus, and Russia should have plenty of units. And it’s very unlikely to be able to go to Ukraine until round 3, because round 1 sees the fighters in Kwang to counterattack Yakut, China, and India for maximum flexibility. And only 4 fighters, since 2 are being used in Hawaii.
I typically won’t land my ftrs in Kwa on J1, it is Fic barring some KJF strat. 7 inf to Chi on J1. I really don’t care about Yak/Ind. You’ll see that resistance disapear quite fast with 6 inf standing in China and 4 ftrs/bom in range on Sin. The Allies can have those if I get Sin with a decent sized stack on Rd 2 and Germany in Ukr.
And with a mix of inf/arm buys by Ger, Russia can’t push Ger out of Ukr (which is the key thing), now I just have to wait for Japan. And that really isn’t an issue with Germany on the boarder of Cauc.
So, if Ukr is left open to a big move by Ger in Rd 2, I’ll do it, knowing I have 2 ftrs for back up.
@Bean:
Also if you go to Ukraine hard early, and you would have to go very hard, that means ignoring Karelia/Belorussia. If you send even 1 inf to each of those that could very well mean the difference between keeping Ukraine since Russia builds immediately on Caucasus and can have arm builds in Russia reach it.
You can afford to ignore Kar/Belo if it means Ukr on G2/3. As long as you have the numbers to hold Ukr (or make the Russian counter so costly that even if they do it you can clean up the remnants and essentially take them out of the game as an offensive threat). You’ll get Kar/Belo the next turn but now have the option of landing G ftrs in Ukr, I’ll trade those 4 ipc (or 1 rt) for a strong position in Ukr.
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Sounds like a plan to me, Darth.
However, I typically have 2 Fighters in FIC and 2 in Manchuria on J1. However, depending what Ukraine looks like, I think I’ll now be looking much closer at putting 4 fighters in FIC on J 1 and building a couple replacements over the next couple of rounds. :)
(2 Fig, Bmb, BB, AC, DD, SS is enough to kill SZ 52, in case anyone was wondering how I killed SZ 52 and had 4 fighters left. I’d rather use those fighters in China. Tired of having 2 pissant little Infantrymen and a fighter obliterate my 7 infantry, 2 fighters.)
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The J ftr movement is really dependent on what the UK did with their ships and bom. If you can get away with an unprotected Fic sz or Sz 60 then you might have the freedom to have 4 in Fic. I think I try to end up with 2 on Fic and 2 in Fic Sz on an AC (if the ftrs are needed) and the other 2 in Hi Sz.
But assuming you don’t trade Fic in Round 2 and can land there, you can usually have 3-4 available for Europe in Round 3 in pretty much any game. That still leaves 2-3 and a bom for advancement in Asia, plus your starting rt/arm.
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The Battleship/Carrier should be plenty for SZ 36 if you need protection there. Honestly, I don’t ever have anything in SZ 36 on Japan 1 anyway, so why protect it?
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And with a mix of inf/arm buys by Ger, Russia can’t push Ger out of Ukr (which is the key thing), now I just have to wait for Japan. And that really isn’t an issue with Germany on the boarder of Cauc.
I guess it also comes down to the Russian purchases and if stacking 3 inf to Ukraine versus 1-2 inf makes the difference between a successful German push or not. I can easily imagine if I overstack Ukraine that the Germans could do it, but is there enough difference between a stack of 1 versus 3 inf that suddenly gives Germany the green flag to go there?
On a random tangent I have to say if you fight Jen it’s really easy to push into Ukraine with Germany solo lol.
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Yeah, it might not make a difference between 1 inf and 3 whether Ger can stack, but it is still something to look for, esp if Russia sent an inf or 2 to Kar to reclaim that on R2. Now those guys are unavailble to attack Ukr on R3 (if Ger stacked).
This is why I’m not a big fan of the early ftr buy by Russia. It may help in trading 3 ter but what if Ger moves in masse to only one? You might end up wishing you had a few more inf, rt, or arm instead.
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I would like to point out that in the game I referenced the Russian fighters sank the German navy on round 4 and the subs and Jap trans on the following round. No other Allied AC were available for such. Also at the only German AC at that point were 2 on a carrier in the Baltic. The Germans had U-boat interdiction so the UK and US were not exactly spawning massive air fleets.
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I’m not invalidating your experience, but I have to ask how good could the Japanese player have been to expose transports like that? They have 2 carriers 2 btls 1 destroyer to spare for defense of transports. And even if KJF were going on, the Japanese player should have enough foresight to at least avoid sending in 1 tp by itself if there’s no active protection available.
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Bean I don’t think they even figured on my sending my AC after their 2 transports. Japan saw it as a quick smash into Africa. Also their fleets were rather shot up early on. The East Indies fleet was sank on Japan 2. And I don’t play KJF or KGF. I like to spread the joy around.
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Well I even said, even if there’s not enough fleet protection to go around, there’s still the 100% protection of not getting into range. My question stands - how good could the Japanese player have been to throw lonesome transports into fig range?
Good job on capitalizing on mistakes, and believe it or not I like the idea of tossing the AC at 2 tps if it’s an AC that’s not going to do much anyways, but that doesn’t mean you can always count on the enemy exposing tps like that to make your Russian figs so useful.
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The player in question is my regular F-T-F opponent and we have been playing at least 2 rounds a night for over a year or so. I just don’t think she saw the fighters being able to range SZ34. Also since we play each other all the time we have got prone to some rather un-orthodox moves at times to throw the other off balance.
All that said I think why fighters are such a high value to Russia is that they can kill repeatedly and never really ever be in jeopardy unless you so choose. I think it was you earlier that said they like to use ART for the trade territories. Look at it this way the ART kills on the attack then kills on the defense and is gone. The fighters just keep killing and unlike ARM they can easily flip back and forth from attacking Germany to Japan. I have also found them able to be able to dissuade Japan from some attacks on defense. My Russian fighter strat is NOT based on hypothesis but results and so far it is the best I have found for Russia.
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I don’t think an extra Russian fighter is bad, and I’m not saying that you’re not grounded in experience. Just a few months ago I was all for buying a Russian fig immediately as well. I’m just saying you’re exaggerating if you expect them to beat up that much navy against somewhat watchful opponents, it really does not take rocket science to know if there’s a fig in range of your lonely transport.
I know figs increase the efficiency of infantry in trading zones and save you from using art, but there’s definitely a point at which buying too many of them costs you by not even having enough infantry. That point for me is 1 more Russian fig, and I don’t even really do it unless the Germans continue to up the blinds in Belo/Kar/Ukraine.
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Also, as Germany I tend to relax if I see Russia build fighters. Although that means Russia can trade increasingly efficiently, it still never exceeds the efficiency of the mass Luftwaffe I have, and every fighter built means a significantly less chance of Russia being able to actually move in to areas like Ukraine with enough defense to hold it. 1 fighter cannot even land immediately in a territory it just took, which is in very large contrast to 2 inf 1 art helping to hold the land it just took.
If Russia builds more than 1 fighter, Germany might be able to move in and Russia unable to dislodge a large force since they’re so busy increasing the efficiency of trading territories at the cost of land forces.
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