I have been playing this game for a while now and recently introduced this to a friend who played as Germany. The Axis lost that game and now my friend wants to play this again. However, because he lost because of strategic bombing with UK/Russia pushing in from both sides, he is convinced that Germany’s strategy should be to use all their money to simply build up and build up defenses without going on the offense.
Is this a valid strategy? How do I convince him that he is wrong?
I’d make the following two arguments, which don’t rely on any complex technicalities.
In order for your friend to buy units to implement his pure-defense strategy, Germany will need income. Income is generated from territories which are controlled and from the bonuses which are granted by attaining certain national national objectives. If your friend never goes on the offensive, it means he won’t be able to conquer new territories beyond the ones he already controls or attain any objectives beyond the ones he’s already fulfilled; therefore, his income will either remain static (if he successfully beats off all enemy attacks) or it will decrease (if he doesn’t successfully beat off all enemy attacks). It will never increase. Theoretically, no matter how powerful his defenses are in the territories he controls, the Allies could counter his unorthodox strategy by taking the equally unorthodox approach of concentrating everything thay have against a single German-held territory, overwhelming it, depriving Germany of the income from that territory, then repeating the process until the Allies win by sheer attrition.
Avoiding defeat isn’t the same thing as winning. The best your friend could achieve under his strategy would be a perpetual stalemate, not the fulfilment of the game’s winning conditions.
Playing this way is only valid if you’re being hyper-aggressive with Japan and Germany is facing a focused KGF from all 3 Allies, and even then Germany should still be doing at least some attacking.
Specifically, Germany should always be trying to accomplish at least the following:
Kill the UK Fleet G1. This is easily do-able if you use your starting Air/Naval Units properly. The only ones I would spare are the DD/TT off of Canada, but you can even argue for diverting some of your SUBs to deal with them.
Seize Egypt G1. This is easily do-able if you send the BOMB from Germany.
Trade Ukraine, Belorussia and/or Karelia with the Soviets (a “trade” is the act of sending the minimal required forces to take a territory, rather than your whole army. A “trade” is usually accomplished by sending 2-3 INF + Air Support, as the FTRs can retreat to safe areas after the battle is over, rather than staying in the conquered territory). Trading is important to keep your income above water and to force the Soviets to continuously commit to spending units on the constant re-taking of those territories (to keep their own income above water). As Germany has a greater income than Russia (40 Vs. 24 starting, usually evens out to 39-ish Vs. 29-ish after the first round), the Soviets will be feeling the strain of this constant trading more than the Nazis.
If the Soviets ever commit in-force to one of the three territories above early in the game, Germany should be able to pounce on them using all available units. Unless you’ve been playing extremely poorly, Germany should win the battle and Russia should be put on the back-foot, forced to relocate their main stack to Moscow-Caucasus (instead of West Russia). This allows Germany to permanently take the Karelia/Belorussia tiles and start trading Ukraine/West Russia/Archangel instead. This puts more money in Germany’s pocket every turn, which just makes the situation more dire for the Soviets.
Alternatively, you can play more aggressively with Germany, buying 2-4 TANKs per turn and following this basic outline:
G1: Prepare for battle. Trade Karelia/Ukraine/Belorussia as outlined above. Stack most of your stuff in East Europe.
G2: Roll Out. Send everything possible to Ukraine. Buy lots of TANKs here to re-attack the territory if the Soviets counterattack on R3.
G3: Take Ukraine for good.
G4/G5: Seize West Russia/Caucasus/Moscow. Game Over.
I don’t know your group’s skill level, but this type of strategy for Germany will crush most weak/new Allied Players. If you want to convince your friend that Germany shouldn’t just roll over and wait to die, try playing Axis yourself and using this sort of strategy on him.
Thanks for the responses. That makes sense and I’ll relay that info to my friend. Thanks!
Its not viable unless you want a static battlefield condition. This means your slowly driven back by combined Allied powers. A dynamic battlefield where you can push back requires all the other types of units including Air and Naval. Planes and Subs are best to drive away the Allies from landing and that’s all you can do if you never build an established navy in the Baltic ( not Medd). If your pigeonholed on land you need tanks ( artillery are too slow). Many of your attacks will be hit and run.
what scenario are you playing ? OOB or Larry Harris Gen Con setup?
@Imperious-Leader I think they’re playing 42 1st Edition. The one that’s basically the Revised map with AA50 units (Cruisers exist, old AA Gun rules, new SBR rules)/costs (Tanks still cost 5).
No wonder why they made a 2nd edition so quickly, Revised is broken and 42.2 was made to fix the issues in Revised…
The bid for Revised in league is like 7 lol. If that’s broken what are G40 and 42SE?
42 1st Edition isn’t a mess because of Revised. It’s a mess because slapping the AA50 rules into Revised’s map and setup messes with the balance. Specifically, Transports having no combat value and Destroyers attacking/defending on 2 instead of 3 makes the opening moves go extremely screwy, to say the least.
I guess making the game broken with all $5 tank buys and shuck to Moscow is out then? I don’t know that different units broke 1st ed 42, but those tanks surely broke Revised. Not to mention the sub interaction rules. Ha
@Imperious-Leader We are playing 1942 Second Edition, out of the box.
@noblerare said in Germany bunker/loading-up strategy:
@Imperious-Leader We are playing 1942 Second Edition, out of the box.
This is the forum for Spring 1942, AKA 1942 First Edition. There is a separate board for 1942 2nd Edition: https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/category/47/axis-allies-1942-2nd-edition
As your thread was actually about 1942 2nd Edition, you should ignore basically everything I said in my first reply. All of it only applies to 1942 1st Edition.
In 1942 2nd Edition, Germany is overpowered and your friend is playing Germany completely incorrectly if they think they should be passive with them. Germany should be building 2+ Tanks every turn and steamrolling the Russians before they can do anything. Follow this general plan:
G1: Take Karelia.
G2: Stack Karelia/Ukraine SSR
G3: Take either Caucasus or West Russia.
G4: Take whichever of the above two territories you failed to take last turn.
G5: Take Moscow.
It’s that easy. If anything the Soviets should be the ones contemplating a strategy where they “do nothing and build nothing but Infantry”, not the Germans.
@Imperious-Leader said in Germany bunker/loading-up strategy:
I guess making the game broken with all $5 tank buys and shuck to Moscow is out then? I don’t know that different units broke 1st ed 42, but those tanks surely broke Revised. Not to mention the sub interaction rules. Ha
Mathematically speaking, buying mass INF is still superior to TANKs (3 Tanks (15 IPC) will lose to 5 INF (IPC)). Not to mention USSR/UK’s starting forces are actually strong enough to check Germany. Germany can’t kill the UK BB if the Soviet Sub NCMs to SZ2 R1, this snowballs into the UK Fleet being unsinkable after B1, after they reinforce it appropriately. This snowballs again B2-onward, since UK can kill the German SZ5 fleet and immediately threaten Karelia/Norway/East Europe/Germany/West Europe, which slows down and “German Tank Moscow drive” considerably. For USSR, there’s no Karelia factory to babysit in Revised, so Soviets only have to worry about stacking West Russia and strafing/trading Ukraine until either help arrives from US/UK or Japan overwhelms China/the eastern Soviet territories (Novosibirsk/Kazakh/etc.). The entire game is a race between the Allies breaking Germany and Japan overrunning Moscow. In that sense, the Japan strategy of “build 2 ICs -> Tank Drive to Moscow” is a bit over-centralizing when playing online/to the OOB victory conditions.
@DoManMacgee My bad. I saw 1942 and got confused. Mods can feel free to move this thread to the right forum. Thanks all for your help thought!
@noblerare Moved from “Spring 1942” to the correct category.
