What AARe boils down to: Convoy raids?

[Trusty Sapper]

Convoy raids seem to heavily tip Enhanced A and A into the Axis hands.

With wolfpack, and even without, if the Germans build subs solidly for three turns, then investing in supersubs, and the Japanese simultaneously builds its fleet further, the US has to abandon either abandon the Pacific or Atlantic naval arms race. That done, the appropriate Axis power parks a load of subs off one of the US shores, from which they simply cant be budged .If it’s the Atlantic the same subs raid US and GB for 20IPCs, if it’s the Pacific, the Japanese can use its BBs to bombard L.A forcing an infantry trade at a loss for the US.

A German sub build effort lets the Ruskies into Europe of course, but a sudden infantry switch by Germany easily starts pushing them back as their lines get extended. And Germany only has to build subs until the Allies have lost one or other ocean.

The only allied defence I can see against this threat is for GB to immediately start building ships and with some US assistance, choke any sub entry to the Atlantic. Stretched by this investment the best the Pacific US fleet can do is sit off Washington- even a retake of Hawaii will be difficult. Meanwhile the existing Japanese island troops are used by the Axis player to acquire territory in Asia…

I’m thinking of bidding less than zero to play Axis… Anyoen see any counters to this strategy?

Trusty

[Jennifer]

If you are letting the axis get that many submarines in the water, then you are probably making serious strategic mistakes.

Just my experience though.

[axis_roll]

@Trusty:

Convoy raids seem to heavily tip Enhanced A and A into the Axis hands.

With wolfpack, and even without, if the Germans build subs solidly for three turns, then investing in supersubs, and the Japanese simultaneously builds its fleet further, the US has to abandon either abandon the Pacific or Atlantic naval arms race. That done, the appropriate Axis power parks a load of subs off one of the US shores, from which they simply cant be budged .If it’s the Atlantic the same subs raid US and GB for 20IPCs, if it’s the Pacific, the Japanese can use its BBs to bombard L.A forcing an infantry trade at a loss for the US.

A German sub build effort lets the Ruskies into Europe of course, but a sudden infantry switch by Germany easily starts pushing them back as their lines get extended. And Germany only has to build subs until the Allies have lost one or other ocean.

The only allied defence I can see against this threat is for GB to immediately start building ships and with some US assistance, choke any sub entry to the Atlantic. Stretched by this investment the best the Pacific US fleet can do is sit off Washington- even a retake of Hawaii will be difficult. Meanwhile the existing Japanese island troops are used by the Axis player to acquire territory in Asia…

I’m thinking of bidding less than zero to play Axis… Anyoen see any counters to this strategy?

Trusty

A sub strategy can be a good one for the axis, but like everything else in Enhanced, there are appropriate counters.  Yes, as you mention, UK getting a bunch of DD’s is necessary.  This can bite the Germans in the long run, especially if UK turns those into Combined arms offshores via Radar or USA also acquiring CA tech to make it cheaper for UK.

Even USA can help out with the sub fight in the atlantic.  Subs are good sub hunters.  Give USA Naval Advantage and they match the cheap German subs.

Japan can be a handful in the pacific with alot of subs.  2 Hit carriers are a good counter for USA if they want to go toe-to-toe with the IJN.

BTW, a sub heavy USA strategy can be just a PITA to Japan as well.

Keep on playing, Enhanced is still the best rules set out there for pure game balance (IMHO)
For every action/strategy, there is a counter.  Identifying the moves and the proper counter is the key.

[Trusty Sapper]

“Subs are good sub hunters”

That was well said. We had a great deal of sub on sub battles in our last game.

Though the dire need to dominate the oceans to prevent convoy raids remains a millstone around the allies neck because it leaves Russia on its own.

Incidentally, we roll NAs randomly at the start to keep the game fresh and force ourselves to think anew, If Germany gets wolfpack and the US and GB fail to get naval NAs they are in trouble…

Trusty

[axis_roll]

@Trusty:

“Subs are good sub hunters”

That was well said. We had a great deal of sub on sub battles in our last game.

Though the dire need to dominate the oceans to prevent convoy raids remains a millstone around the allies neck because it leaves Russia on its own.

Have you tried the mega offshore move yet with the allies?

Let Germany get those subs, take Radar or Royal Navy for UK, have USA get combined arms in conjunction with Naval advantage and spend a boatload on DDs.

Offshore the hell out of Germany.  She’ll never own Western Europe…. hard to win the game when UK/USA can always take away Paris.

@Trusty:

Incidentally, we roll NAs randomly at the start to keep the game fresh and force ourselves to think anew, If Germany gets wolfpack and the US and GB fail to get naval NAs they are in trouble…

Trusty

That can work round one only because of the premise that the NA’s are as closely balanced as is possible.

[Guest]

@axis_roll:

@Trusty:

“Subs are good sub hunters”

That was well said. We had a great deal of sub on sub battles in our last game.

Though the dire need to dominate the oceans to prevent convoy raids remains a millstone around the allies neck because it leaves Russia on its own.

Have you tried the mega offshore move yet with the allies?

Let Germany get those subs, take Radar or Royal Navy for UK, have USA get combined arms in conjunction with Naval advantage and spend a boatload on DDs.

Offshore the hell out of Germany.  She’ll never own Western Europe…. hard to win the game when UK/USA can always take away Paris.

@Trusty:

Incidentally, we roll NAs randomly at the start to keep the game fresh and force ourselves to think anew, If Germany gets wolfpack and the US and GB fail to get naval NAs they are in trouble…

Trusty

That can work round one only because of the premise that the NA’s are as closely balanced as is possible.

That offshore tactic sounds a tad bit overpowered…  :-(

Why does random NAs only work for round one?

[BadSpeller]

@Rakeman:

That offshore tactic sounds a tad bit overpowered…  :-(

Try play testing the “UK will dominate with Offshore Bombardment destroyers”.

When resources for the UK go all to building destroyers, then other areas suffer for the Allies.

Germany changes its plans too.

Those that try this begin to understand it is not a
strategy, but rather something that can help your strategy!

[BadSpeller]

@Trusty:

Incidentally, we roll NAs randomly at the start to keep the game fresh and force ourselves to think anew, If Germany gets wolfpack and the US and GB fail to get naval NAs they are in trouble…

A large part of AARe is the ability to pick a NA as the game progress.

This is to compliment your strategy, or help soften the opposition’s strategy.

This helps to reduce some of the randomness, and be able to be more strategic.

Example- One can buy Tech, instead of just rolling for it and never getting it.

[axis_roll]

BadSpeller is spot on.

I would not like the fact that Colonial Garrison would be perfect for me as UK on turn 1 and I end up getting Royal Navy due to some random roll.

However, as a change of pace, it could work in round one of a game.
Round two random NA’s could turn into a disaster if you get an NA(s) that in no way helps your side but the opponent gets NA(s) that totally help them.

Why introduce MORE randomness into the game?

AARe strives for less, resulting in more strategy.

[Trusty Sapper]

The mega offshore strategy:

Its definitely do-able though it seems to become a race. If Japan is not delayed with an UK Indian build or a significant amount of US Pacific naval build up, she quickly gets to a point where she can threaten Caucasus. Now with both St. Petersburg and Caucasus threatened, Russia is in a pickle and Germany may just have to hang on to France for one go to win on VCs no matter how grim the offshore scene.