Italy strategy question

[DCWhat]

Hey everyone. A quick question on what to do with Italy on turn 1 when left with its sz 95 and sz 97 fleets. Honestly, in the minimal amount of times I’ve played this has never happened to me in a face to face game. My opponent who comes to visit once a year is playing the Allies and I’m the Axis. Straight OOB rules, zero house rules. Every time we have played and he is the Allies he hits the Taranto Raid, I never scramble and I end up hitting his remaining sz 97 fleet with my remaining navy from sz 95 as an amphibious to take Greece. Only this time he did the Tobruk thing.

It might be partly due to the fact that as Germany I threw a sub pod shot at his cruiser in 91 and sunk it. He debated for a while on going Taranto minus the destroyer that would hit Italy’s sz 96 DD and TT. And instead sunk 96 with a DD and bomber and moved his carrier and cruiser off the coast of Gibraltar inside the med. He flew his London and Scotland fighters there and put an airbase up pretty much ex-ing out me hitting that on I1. Perhaps costly on my part by going G1 DoW and putting a factory in Romania, relieving him of a “SeaLion threat” I never would’ve done anyways.

So my question is, what is the optimal route to take here? Germany has captured Southern France and straffed Yugo only taking out 1 of the standing army there. UK has a destroyer in 96 and their fleet with a 3 fighter scramble off the coast of Gibraltar and theres the French boats that I don’t want merging with the UK fleet. Egypt has only 1 UK Infantry on it as well as the 2 Anzac Infantry. UK can counter there with a mech, artillary and tank as well as a fighter, tax bomber and strat bomber that could possibly reach. I planned on leaving Normandy for I2 but maybe that can’t happen now. There’s also Yugo and Greece I left for the Italians. Any suggestions?

[taamvan]

1 BB 2 CA 1 DD 1 SUB 2 TT isn’t a huge navy. Even if Italy gets as much money as possible, and invests it in more navy, it still won’t be much more than a roadblock in the US’ way, if he’s headed to the Med.

Still, that $$ is better than nothing. Ideally, all of the extra non-NO money would go to Germany, but in most games, Germany is really busy in the early game and Italy can snatch alot of the extra money from territory income.

If its not building a can-opener force of tanks, and its not building a navy, what good is it (see below)???

During a KJF, you can just go wild on the $. Take all the oil. Take the 3/4 bonus by grabbing Egypt. If America isn’t coming, then taking Gibraltar or knocking that fleet down may give you more turns of clear med, but one of the most effective things to do (besides the can opener) is to prevent the Iraq/Persia complexes from being built early and making Cairo an easy VC. Or, build a sweet can opener (2 tanks to start, 1 rescued from Africa, 10 more mechs and tanks built on the first 3 turns). Or heck, try to do both but you dont have the $$ to fuel extra transports, the can opener, and a garrison force.

In a KGF game, North africa is lost and the fleet is usually trapped. Navy is not a good move, USA will demolish it. In these games, I buy a mix of infantry and fighters, to protect germany, the atlantik wall, and counterattack. Italy takes over a garrison role.

Don’t bother with the French North Africa bonus. Its a trap.
In the KGF, may want to evacuate Africa more or less completely, because, well…its a trap. Income you take from the french ends up become USA income so that’s not a good use of your efforts.
Break the UK bonus early, and if you do it by taking (Cyprus best, Malta next, then Alex, Cairo, Gib, Trans) a territory they can’t retake, thats even better.
All things being equal, UK can easily hold Africa (if you dont threaten London and you only kept 1 TT) Keeping a navy makes this less certain, though you will face 3xTanks each round coming up from Africa in the absence of a SL threat

GL HF

[rydbirkjr]

There’s a lot of interesting possibilities here. I assume that sz110 and sz111 was cleared out?

I would advocate limiting the British possibilities. Just a few clarifying questions:

I assume that the strat bomber landed on Malta?
Where is the fighter from Malta?
Where is the tac from sz98?
I assume that there is a CV with 1 fighter, 1 cruiser and 3 fighter scramble from Gibraltar in sz92?
Is there still a german sub in sz91?

If we assume that the fighter, tac and strat is on Malta, that is indeed a juicy target. However, I would probably do someting like clearing the french, send the sub against the cv + carrier and clear the destroyer in 96. Not sure what to do with the transports, but weakening the british fleet before the germans hit it (maybe taking Algeria with 1 trans to allow a place for the planes to land) could remove units worth of an entire british buy round, which makes the US spend more money on navy.

I would probably still build mech + tank for the russian front, kill Yugo and wait with Greece. I think you would be stretched too thin elsewise. Maybe use the second transport to get more units in position for greece round 2. This however requires some plane cover, so I would probably send the transport with the other ships to kill the French fleet. You should beware of british planes from Gib, that can hit that zone though. Auch…

It’s actually a tough one, however, Germany could build some supportive navy from S France, but given a G1 DoW, it’s not really likely.

[DCWhat]

Thank you guys for responding. Especially with such fantastic, detailed responses. Very appreciated.

As for the questions, sz’s 110 & 111 are cleared and the tac bomber from 98 is in Malta along with the strat bomber, Inf and AAA. The Malta fighter is on the CV in sz 92 along with the fighter from Gibraltar plus the 3 fighters ready to scramble if need be. The German sub in 91 that sunk the CA was sunk by the UK DD from 106. The DD survived and is paired with the TT from 106 while the 109 TT moved to pick up the two remaining Canadian ground troops. Or at least I think unless he plans on building a UK navy there in 106.

Germany could use their airforce to help as I have 4 fighters, 3 tacs and 3 strats in western Germany as well as another fighter in southern Italy ready to hit almost anywhere in the med. And I thought about a navy from Southern France as well and that was partly the reason why I took it and not Normandy as Germany. But mostly my reasoning was for end game tactics to try and get Egypt as the final Europe victory city after getting Moscow. Purchasing more units in the sea is going to hurt though, especially since Germany got diced on the eastern front on G1. And if my opponent plays smart with Russia I don’t think I can even hold Bessarabia after R2 which is discouraging considering I did a G1 DoW.

The game will unfortunately have to wait until tomorrow morning so it gives me at least the night to sleep on it. I think your guy’s advice is probably the better route. I wanted to be really aggressive with what navy I had but hitting the smart spots and not spreading myself too thin is better.

[taamvan]

smashing his planes is an easy kill, good tuv trade…unless he can wreck your fleet on his turn

[simon33]

The traditional move if none of Taranto/Tobruk/SZ92 stack are done is to take Trans-Jordan, Greece and Sudan, then take Egypt I2 with a combined overland/amphibious assault.

If the Tobruk crush succeeds, this may be off the table, particularly if the UK’s mobile troops can withstand an assault from the 2 units left in Libya.

Not sure of the exact circumstances of this battle but I thought I’d post that possibility.

[DCWhat]

Thanks again for the input.

We ended up getting through 5 rounds, the game is still set up. We are hoping for a Saturday/Sunday finale…

As for what I did, I opted the can-opener route with Italy and purchased mech and tanks for the first 3 rounds. Had to switch to Infantry for rounds 4/5 as the US hasn’t hit land yet but have 12 TT’s and planes and bombers ready to hit anywhere now that Germany’s last DD blocker has been wiped out. Italy did well opening for Germany and I am at the gates of Moscow ready to go for it on G6 although I am not 100% it can be taken thanks to a UK stack of fighters. If I don’t attempt it Russia is gonna get 12 more Inf, 2 AAA from the Soviet Far East plus 3 more UK fighters. And, as I said, the US is going to hit hard.