Axis SBR Campaign

[eumaies]

kudos on the thorough strategy, makes sense.

weak points would seem to be the reliance on successfully holding sinkiang (which russia may find it worth contesting if it keeps 3 jap bombers off their backs, and second a weakness in general against my preferred approach in the game of hitting japan quite hard with combined arms in asia, which again makes it hard to focus relevant #'s on sinkiang or any other square 2 away from russia.

but given the leeway many players give japan, i can see how it would often work.

[a44bigdog]

Its a shame you don’t play here with battlemap eumaies, as you do seem to back up your positions with in game experience.

As far as contesting Sinkiang, With what? Japan should have around 5 Infantry 4-6  fighters and 3 bombers for hitting it round 2. Even if Japan has to retreat that is still a plus as the infantry and fighters are in China to protect the bombers.

I think the combined arms approach you are talking about centers on US air power being flow to Buryatia and I really only see that happening if Japan allows it.

I am not saying there is no counter to this but so far in what limited testing against it I have done, the Allies wind up having to cover Russia’s losses by stationing troops in Moscow and hopping for the dice to really go there way. Hey  I would love to see a counter for this developed as since I have posted it some other players may adopt it.

Again I really wished you played here using battlemap.

[eumaies]

Yeah i would like to play with you guys but i just find gametableonline to be so much easier than posting and updating the map myself.  Is TripleA the same as battlemap and do both require manual map updates and emailing?  I get confused as to the various options.  If anyone ever plays on gametable my username is bmaster.

anyway,

so with a typical opening where players don’t do an IC in india and don’t push too hard in asia but instead focus on germany, i think the approach makes alot of sense.

With regards to counters, the sinkiang re-take is not something russia can gurantee but something japan has to invest all possible troops to avoid.  I would say the following counters would give japan headaches:

1. us (and russian) sinkiang infantry should retreat from sinkiang in the face of ~4-6 japanese infantry in china.  They are more useful on a counter attack with air support then defending against combined arms from japan.

2. India IC build on turn 1, take indo-china on turn 2, land fighters in manchuria on turn 2 to support russians. (in general, for anti-asia strategies, the 2 fighters and bomber from britain should not be used against german ships but instead fight safer battles and then move to asia ready to participate offensively or defensively on turn 2.  The bomber is critical to threatening french indo)

3. buryatia 6 infantry on turn 1 (and 2 more following) and move into manchuria on turn 2 if open (else mass 8 and the fighters).  US 2 fighters landed in buryatia on us turn 1, and a bomber there or in the area ready for action on US turn 2.

4. Russian builds should include 3+ tanks for flexibility, and 2 russian infantry should be adjacent to sinkiang on russia turn 2.  Unless japan moves in full force, ground forces + planes can re-take sinkiang.

Japan can take action against much of that, particularly with the extra transport you’re stipulating (which I agree is very important).

But buryatia, french indo (either taken or with 7-8 british ground units next door), and manchuria are all important considerations then, along with your need to take sinkiang with enough force to hold it against US and then USSR counter-attack.  In such a situation, sticking to your sinkiang plan and putting all your infantry there would probably be a mistake.  Instead, japan has to siphon off troops to deal with the russian/british pressure.

The reasons this is not a bridge too far for the allies are the following:
a) those 6 russians in buryatia need to be used, even if their job is to draw fire and die after taking manchuria (with fighter support).  better to slow japan with them than to walk them home and use them after japan has taken over all of asia.  So it’s not a waste to use them aggressively.
b) India IC + UK earning +$3 from indo china for as long as they can maintain a back and forth is not a bad situation.  Japan can change plans and try to just take india with force, but it’s probably still enough of a slow-down given germany and japan’s bomber builds.

I don’t know, in the end asian fights always come down to alot of details and it’s hard to scope out every contingency on a message board.  Also, bidding for the axis and giving japan an extra transport is a major game-changer that makes it hard for the allies.

While I agree that axis are a bit weaker than allies in AAR I personally think a bid of 8 may be too generous.  That extra transport with access to africa and india on turn 1 is a massive boost to the axis and would probably complement non-bomber strats quite well, too :)

[a44bigdog]

Ahh I see where some of the confusion comes from.

The mass take of Sinkiang is only required if the original US forces or additional Russian forces are there. The only real interest Japan has in Sinkiang at this time is to not allow the Allies a potential avenue of attack on China which is the bomber base territory. With a pullout there is no reason to advance in force.

If you are Building an Indian IC are you hitting Japan’s transport in sea zone 59? If not, count on not having 6 Infantry in Buryatia when the US goes. And even if the US lands its fighters in Buryatia, Japan has the option of hitting that hard with the aviation that would have been allocated Sinkiang, but since that is vacant, is no longer needed there.

There is another point to raise as far as SBRs and the Indian IC. Just because you are conducting a SBR campaign you are not required to use the bombers every turn on strategic raids. There had better be a whole lot of Allied something in India if Japan decides to throw 4-6 fighters and 3-5 bombers into an attack. Don’t even mention the AA gun. If you are frightened away by AA guns you have no business conducting A SBR campaign in the first place.

I know it sounds absolutely insane, but the round 1 2 bomber purchase by Japan allows responses to many of the variable contingencies you point to in the Pacific. There are Infantry that can be grabbed off of islands for the mainlands so other than delaying transport purchases it is not a big setback.

TripleA is very similar to gametable online and quite a few of our members use it. It supports live face to face play and play by email as well. You would probably like it. Its biggest shortcoming to me is the same as game table online in that I can see such a limited portion of the map at once that I end up playing poorly. What we do on the forum is not true play by email as it is posted instead of emailed back and forth.

[Jennifer]

Let us pretend Russia DOES contest Sinkiang.

Why can’t the Japanese bombers land in India?  Persia?  E. Europe?  Hell, even Yakut would be safe for them and leave both complexes in range.

In other words, it’s flexible.  (Besides, the more realistic danger is catching Germany’s bombers in E. Europe driving them out of range before you get a chance at Japan’s.)

[Rhineland]

You could land the german bmbers on jap land as well. I think this is a great strat and I’m goign to do it in my next face to face game.

[eumaies]

yeah i was misunderstanding your initial commentary on sinkiang.  Sure, with just china needed to be in range that’s easier to secure. so by japan turn 3 you can start hitting russia’s economy with that initial build.

always take out the transport in sz 59, of course.  it’s still perfectly feasible to secure india on turn 1 while doing that.

yeah, bombers are certainly flexible units.  i’m a big fan.  and i was going to suggest german territory as the most secure landing zone as well :)

I still think, however the details play out, that putting pressure on japan is the right general response when they spend their first $30 on air power rather than transports or IC’s that will bring consistent amounts of troops to bear for the rest of the game.  but there’s also another potential option, which is that if the axis invest money in bombers, russia could feasibly afford to build 2 aa guns on round 2 (and/or UK move the indian aa gun back).  Then move them dynamically to try to make bombing russia by at least 1 axis power require 2 anti-aa rolls per run.  Particularly if japan’s chosen landing options are limited this could be a nasty countermove at a relatively low cost.

[Jennifer]

Hard for me to argue against America putting pressure on Japan considering my devote insistence that letting Japan run free is doom for the allies and that America should, in general, at least threaten Japan to keep them “honest.”  By honest, i mean keep their fleet in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, not the Atlantic Ocean!

[AxisOfEvil]

Could a few aa guns counter this strat pretty nicley? Us could bring 2 or more, Uk can bring 2 or more. And russia can buy at least 1 to save all the SBR damage. Now bobmers are dodging three aa guns firing for each raid.

And when this is countered, the axis powers are way behind with all those bombers, and few land units.

[Jennifer]

Perhaps.  If you play with the always active AA Gun then investing in guns would shrink the advantage or force the axis to take land adjacent to Russia.

However, you have to build the guns, you have to move the guns and you have to protect the guns.  Remember, AA Guns are double edged swords.  Germany and Japan can afford the extra units needed to take your territories without risking fighters if they want too.  Can Russia afford the same?

And if you don’t replace the guns, what’s protecting England from -16 IPC a round from bombers?

[AxisOfEvil]

@Cmdr:

Perhaps.  If you play with the always active AA Gun then investing in guns would shrink the advantage or force the axis to take land adjacent to Russia.

However, you have to build the guns, you have to move the guns and you have to protect the guns.  Remember, AA Guns are double edged swords.  Germany and Japan can afford the extra units needed to take your territories without risking fighters if they want too.  Can Russia afford the same?

And if you don’t replace the guns, what’s protecting England from -16 IPC a round from bombers?

Uk normally ships it Indian aa gun to russia anyway. The US usually ships on of its aa guns to europe or Africa. The US can afford many AA guns. Russia can even afford 1 or 2. I mean you are talking about reducing Russia down to no income, i think a 5 or 10 ipc investment by russia to prevent that is quite worth it. The Uk would never leave London without an aa gun obviously. if they sent an extra on top of the indian aa gun, they would replace for 5 ipc.

Lets assume after germany and japan buy bombers r1, the allies see whats coming. Russia can build aa gun r2 and/or r3 once seeing the amount of bombers being purchased by the axis player. UK will have one aa gun  in caucus r2, shifting the caucus gun to an adjacent terrirory. Also r2, uk can purchase an aa gun and ship its gun to arch r2. If US normally ships an a gun north, it can have a gun in arch by r3, shifting guns east thru moscow. Else, for sure by r4.  Thats 7 aa guns, 3 extra buys, (2 by russia, 1by UK) by r3 or r4. So for a total of 15 ipcs, bombers now have to face 3 aa shot to do an SBR, which I doubt any sane player would.

As far as trading territoy now, on the east side, you wont have to worry about the japs for awhile r6 maybe? Then if you cant defend the eastern swapping areas, you pull the gun back. But at this point, you are far ahead on land units, as japan has invested heavy into bombers, so you might be able to hold those eastern territory for some time. In the West, well those territories aren’t being swapped normally anyway. And they especially arent if germany bought 2 bombers in the first 2 rounds. Kareila is usually held by allied landings, caucus + W Russia held by russia.

[AxisOfEvil]

@Cmdr:

Perhaps.  If you play with the always active AA Gun then investing in guns would shrink the advantage or force the axis to take land adjacent to Russia.

Always active means they fire at any planes that fly over? This is an OOB rule right? Another rule set eliminates this for revised? I know the AA50 version wont allow firing at planes flying by.

[Jennifer]

Lots of players say bombers are immune to AA Guns they are flying over.

OOB says you take AA Damage flying over a territory, attacking a territory and flying back.

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UK +1 AA, USA +1 AA that’s only +2 AA.  There are 6 avenues of approach to Moscow and 3 avenues of approach to Caucasus.  You’re going to need a total of 9 AA Guns to force the axis to fly over two guns to each target (and even then, they can go by SZ 16 to hit Caucasus if stationed in the right place.)

Assuming 3 AA guns for India, Caucasus and Russia (the 3 that almost always end up in Russia anyway.)  This means you’ll need to buy 6 more.  AA Guns coming from America are going to take forever to get there or such a large investment their worth will be utterly mitigated in the grand scheme of things. (AA Gun from E. USA to Algeria walk it to Caucasus or build two big fleets one for the med and one for the Atlantic to ship it there or the same up north.)

That means your guns are almost certainly coming from England/Russia.  That means 9 guns, -3 starting, purchase 6 guns, 5 IPC each cost 30 IPC.  Seems low until Russia starts losing fighters trying to liberate land from the Axis after they lose it.  Remember, Germany and Japan can easily trade Inf/Arm for a territory.  Can Russia do the same?  Over 6 territories??? (That would be 3 each for Germany/Japan, but at least 4 for Russia with America/England trying for the other two.)  Remember, there’s now an AA Gun on all of them.  And if you don’t liberate them ALL, the axis are just going to pull that AA Gun back out of the way forcing you to buy another one.

And don’t forget, the axis are not locked into attacking your AA Guns.  They can do something else like obliterate England’s IC for a turn instead while they steal a gun and open a hole.  You, on the other hand, are now locked into all these AA Guns that cannot attack anything and are now a huge liability because of the increased threat to your (Russia’s) fighters.

[AxisOfEvil]

@Cmdr:

Lots of players say bombers are immune to AA Guns they are flying over.

OOB says you take AA Damage flying over a territory, attacking a territory and flying back.

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UK +1 AA, USA +1 AA that’s only +2 AA.  There are 6 avenues of approach to Moscow and 3 avenues of approach to Caucasus.  You’re going to need a total of 9 AA Guns to force the axis to fly over two guns to each target (and even then, they can go by SZ 16 to hit Caucasus if stationed in the right place.)

Assuming 3 AA guns for India, Caucasus and Russia (the 3 that almost always end up in Russia anyway.)  This means you’ll need to buy 6 more.  AA Guns coming from America are going to take forever to get there or such a large investment their worth will be utterly mitigated in the grand scheme of things. (AA Gun from E. USA to Algeria walk it to Caucasus or build two big fleets one for the med and one for the Atlantic to ship it there or the same up north.)

That means your guns are almost certainly coming from England/Russia.  That means 9 guns, -3 starting, purchase 6 guns, 5 IPC each cost 30 IPC.  Seems low until Russia starts losing fighters trying to liberate land from the Axis after they lose it.  Remember, Germany and Japan can easily trade Inf/Arm for a territory.  Can Russia do the same?  Over 6 territories??? (That would be 3 each for Germany/Japan, but at least 4 for Russia with America/England trying for the other two.)  Remember, there’s now an AA Gun on all of them.  And if you don’t liberate them ALL, the axis are just going to pull that AA Gun back out of the way forcing you to buy another one.

And don’t forget, the axis are not locked into attacking your AA Guns.  They can do something else like obliterate England’s IC for a turn instead while they steal a gun and open a hole.  You, on the other hand, are now locked into all these AA Guns that cannot attack anything and are now a huge liability because of the increased threat to your (Russia’s) fighters.

lol, dont know where u got 9 guns from. But i guess if it helps your theory, mgiht as well throw it out there.

Caucasus, due to the sea zone, will only have 1 aa. The risk/reward for bombing caucasus is in russia favor, as it still has a 1/6 chance to kill the bomber, however, the damage is capped at 4. I did not suggest to place a gun in persia and/or india. allies wont be able to hold them normally. U need 7 guns to surround moscow. russia gets three in normal play, (1 from india). Uk can send another 1 in one turn to Arch. for a 5 ipc cost. USA can get one to arch by 3 or 4, for no cost. This leaves russia to buy 2. or you could have uk buy 2, and have russia buy 1. With Arch/W Russia/Caucasus/Kazakh/Novo/Evenki/moscow covered by 7 guns, at a cost of 5-10 ipc for russia, 5-10 ipc for uk.

This makes bombing moscow unfeasible. Sure you can do other things with those bombers. And you might as well, since you spent all that money on them. However, Russia is not being threatened signifcantly more by them, and now russia has an advantage in ground units, as germany and japan put mucho bucks into the air. Trading the territories that surround moscow is very managable, especially when japan is much slower in bringing enough stuff to threaten eastern moscow in the early game.

[AxisOfEvil]

@Cmdr:

Lots of players say bombers are immune to AA Guns they are flying over.

OOB says you take AA Damage flying over a territory, attacking a territory and flying back.

Didnt realize lots of players “say” that. Does that mean it isnt a rule set like LHTR, but simply house rules? Im not aware of many house rules, so its hard to respond to a strategy based on the house rules if they arent specified.

[AxisOfEvil]

@AxisOfEvil:

@Cmdr:

Lots of players say bombers are immune to AA Guns they are flying over.

OOB says you take AA Damage flying over a territory, attacking a territory and flying back.

Didnt realize lots of players “say” that. Does that mean it isnt a rule set like LHTR, but simply house rules? Im not aware of many house rules, so its hard to respond to a strategy based on the house rules if they arent specified.

More on this, why have players made this a rule? I think rules that restricts an approach that simply buys bombers to win should be encouraged, not changed!!

[eumaies]

yes, and as you point out you don’t even need anywhere near 7 guns.  this isn’t picking and choosing routes for the japanese – they’ve landed their bombers on a given turn, then russia needs only to move 2 aa guns to block the available eastern route.  and as previous poster pointed out, caucusus bombing is far inferior.

Really though, I would just buy 2 aa guns as russia and be done with it.  cover the eastern route, then if japan moves its bombers to europe, consider covering the western route instead.  stalling even half of such a bombing strategy is sufficient.

[Jennifer]

@AxisOfEvil:

lol, dont know where u got 9 guns from. But i guess if it helps your theory, mgiht as well throw it out there.

Well my dear Watson, that was easy.

1 - AA Gun in Evenki
2 - AA Gun in Novosibirsk
3 - AA Gun in Kazakh
4 - AA Gun in Persia
5 - AA Gun in W. Russia
6 - AA Gun in Arkhangelsk
7 - AA Gun in Russia
8 - AA Gun in Caucasus
9 - AA Gun in Ukraine

It’s the only way to cover every possible avenue to Russia’s industrials with at least two AA Guns, but as I had mentioned, SZ 16 is a blind spot you just cannot fill (short of playing AARe and getting Combined Arms for a battleship you build there.)

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@eumaies:

yes, and as you point out you don’t even need anywhere near 7 guns.  this isn’t picking and choosing routes for the japanese – they’ve landed their bombers on a given turn, then russia needs only to move 2 aa guns to block the available eastern route.  and as previous poster pointed out, caucusus bombing is far inferior.

Really though, I would just buy 2 aa guns as russia and be done with it.  cover the eastern route, then if japan moves its bombers to europe, consider covering the western route instead.  stalling even half of such a bombing strategy is sufficient.

You could certainly risk it with only 5 AA Guns, but as I just showed above, you would NOT be covering all avenues.  Besides, any player worth even setting up the board for, would never be locked into a single or pair of flight paths if engaging in this strategy.  It would be ever so easy to put a bomber in the north, one in the south and a couple in the middle or put a couple in the north and one in the middle and a couple in the south, or whatever.  The idea is, force them to cover ALL avenues or leave avenues open and thus waste the extra AA Guns they bought as you fly around them.

[eumaies]

nah.

japan doesn’t have unlimited options, certainly not early.  and russia’s initial 2-aa gun build and move of it’s starting two aa-guns to create the necessary buffer can be completely reactionary to japan’s build and placement.

japan’s not going to securely take both buryatia and china in time to land it’s first 2 bombers.  instead, it might first take and secure china, and land it’s first two bombers there.  then when russia responds by spending $10 and setting up the aa’s, japan gets an extremely risky bombing option on japan’s turn 3.  so next turn they might expand a little, secure either india or buryatia (again, has to be reliably hold-able), and try to position to bomb from multiple directions at once.  sitting back further with bombers (manchuria, kwangtung) telegraphs a landing in europe, which is problematic in other ways because the allies can see it coming and make that dangerous.

so by japan turn 4 50% of the bombers purchased can make a reasonable bombing run against moscow facing just typical AA-gun resistance, while the other half face 2 AA’s (again, assuming it’s not worth $5 of russia’s money to prevent, which it probably isn’t at that point).

delaying and minimizing the damage of a bombing strategy in this way should be sufficient to allow the rest of the allies time to punish the axis for the expenditure.   A KGF will have more time to work as japan’s initial conquests were delayed, or a CJF will do a better than average job of containing japanese expansion and limiting their bombing routes for an even longer period.

and as axisofevil pointed out, his argument (and mine) is that bombing caucusus is an inferior option for the allies and shouldn’t be considered in aa gun defense options.

[Jennifer]

Russia’s not even going to think about needing any built AA Guns for at least the first few rounds.  This isn’t like Russia on turn one says “Hey, the Axis are going to build 6-8 bombers and bomb me into the stone age, I’m going to build 3 Infantry, 3 AA Guns on Round 1!”

This is more like on Round 3 Russia starts getting hit by 4-6 bombers.  It is then and only then that Russia would even start building AA Guns and that’s assuming they can afford it. (BTW that would be Russia Round 4 they would start building AA Guns.)  But at that point, they’ve already gone almost a full turn without income (definitely a full turn if they spent 10+ IPC on AA Guns after being bombed for 24 IPC!) so the Axis have already accomplished their goal and can now use their bombers to trade territories and ignore your AA Guns.

So if Russia does blow 10 IPC or more on AA Guns, as you suggest, you just gave the Axis a gift.  Now they can steal your guns or force you to stack them (negating them in either event) and it cost the Axis nothing because their bombers are exceptionally useful in long range territory trading.