@Red-Harvest Ah, yes, you wrote that, of course. Take out the z111 as well. Yes, that’s a valid option.
Revisiting G2 Barbarossa
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I have revisited a G2 Barbarossa, and have liked it better so far than Sealion, or a Sealion feint with a G3 Barbarossa.
The theory: Germany can leverage their significant material advantage against the U.S.S.R. and make steady gains through the Soviet Union, significantly limiting - if not outright eliminating -the potential for a counter attack. This relentless movement forces the Allies to rush D-day, or make difficult decisions about what city to defend, Calcutta (from Japan) or Moscow (from Germany), from the U.K.s position in the Middle East. If either one falls, the Axis almost certainly win.
The Pros: A strong, quite greedy, German expansion into the U.S.S.R., setting up a G5 attack on Moscow. This is early enough that the infantry in Buryatia cannot reach Moscow in time to defend. At best, they will be available for a counter from Samara or Vologda. The U.S.S.R. is prevented from collecting most, if not all bonuses, while Germany can potentially get quite a few early.
The Cons: This allows Taranto, and Middle Earth play by the U.K. leaving a weak Italy. Likely turtling on Southern Italy to prevent early capture by the U.S. It almost completely abandons the Mediterranean to the Allies by round 3. Not likely to have a German land unit in Egypt. This is the one German bonus that falls to the wayside, but is often irrelevant by G4/5 anyway.
How I do it:
G1: Purchase 6 mech, and 1 tank
Conduct obligatory naval combat with aircraft and navy in the Atlantic.
Take France, but leave Normandy and Southern France. I take France with as little force as possible. Only with the local units, as other units will be needed on the front lines for Barbarossa next turn (there are three tanks in Holland and four mech in West Germany that can be used in this attack, as they can catch up to the German lines in time for the G5 of Moscow). Take Yugoslavia. Non Combat Bulgaria and Finland. Non combat aircraft to Holland and West Germany. Non combat 11 German infantry to Poland with the bulk of your forces.G2: You have options here for the Purchase. You should have 68 IPCs from bonuses, income and the French. A super aggressive play would be a destroyer for West Germany (defend from U.S.S.R. Sub and allow air scramble to see and hit), and 10 tanks for Germany. There is also a case to be made for a destroyer, max mech infantry for the German factory, and fill out the rest of your purchase with Infantry for France and West Germany. Personally I like the tanks…
Combat: Remaining Infantry and Artillery forces in France can clean up Normandy. Italy can clean up Southern France. Declare war on the U.S.S.R. and attack Baltic States, East Poland and Bessarabia. If the U.S.S.R. has managed to make a dead zone out of any of these, skip it, and ensure that your own territory will hold. Just make sure the bulk of your units are together, ball of death style. It isn’t important which direction you go (north or south) as long as you make progress toward Moscow every turn. Non-Combat: get aircraft to safety and reinforce your lines as needed.The remaining turns playout similarly to these, with the exception of a major shift in purchasing. You can purchase addition mech infantry to join the German front on turn 3, however any purchase after G2 won’t reach Moscow for G5. These would be clean up units that can capture abandoned or weak territory, and can buff the German lines if the U.K. decides to save Moscow over Calcutta. The shift is largely to defensive infantry that slow down the early American attacks and allow you to potentially finish off Moscow. You can sprinkle in specific counter attack units as you see fit.
BUT what if the U.K. saves Moscow you might ask? Well, lucky for you, that serious material advantage you leveraged attacking Moscow early has also gutted its income and put it into your pockets. They should be quite weak economically by G5, and the U.K. defense won’t hold against some tanks from the captured factories in Ukraine and Novgorod. Additionally, Japan should be piling on some serious pressure in the Pacific by now, and Calcutta will look quite weak. The U.K. can’t save both, and the U.S. can’t punish Germany or Japan in time (outside of poor axis play) to stop either attack from continuing. The Axis really only need one of the cities to win the game, and will likely take both eventually.
Any obvious counters I’m missing? Questions? Does anyone else do this?
My group hasn’t beat this yet, but they can stop G3/J1s and the like with strong Middle Earth U.K. play and an American D-Day.
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@kyle47
I’m a member of the play group. I can confirm that this G2 & J1 combo seems unstoppable. It hits hard and fast before the allies can build up forces, and certainly before the Americans pose any threat. -
The initial problem that I see with this is that, unless you’re willing to commit planes to the attack on France, you have only a 93% chance of winning that battle. Basically, you’re losing one game out of every 18 you play just on dice there.
You may not even have planes to commit based on your necessary attacks on the UK fleet.
Any thoughts on this?
Marsh
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@MarshmallowofWar Hi! Great question! You are correct, I’m not bringing aircraft. I ran the math, and I’m getting closer to a 98% win rate. No matter, on the 2-7% chance I lose in France, it’s probably just not Germany’s day. I’m willing to accept that failure rate. Italy would have the option to clean up France if it were close. It’s a bummer to lose the French income as Germany, but I think this is manageable.
If you are concerned, you could bring a couple of tactical or strategic bombers and that pads the odds much closer to a sure thing. However, it may come at the cost of some additional losses in the sea battles. Given the strategy, France is definitely the priority, and Britain having a couple of extra ships probably isn’t a crisis
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@kyle47 Well, I’m using the Skelly calculator so I have to hit the run button multiple times to get an average of odds, but I’m consistently in the 93% range.
Marsh
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@MarshmallowofWar Oops. My mistake! I missed an artillery :flushed:
Again, bringing two aircraft @4 carries the odds into the 99% range. And in those edge cases, the Italians could clean up if they had too.
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Calculations aside, my next thoughts are twofold:
First, how do you deal with the average loss of at least two mechanized infrantry in France and the subsequent weakness of whatever mechanized forces you lost in France from the eventual attack on Moscow?
Second, given your deep weakness in Europe, if the US goes Europe first after J1 I don’t see how you’re going to overcome Russia and keep Germany defended properly. To overcome Moscow, you’ll need every plane available to you and you’ll still suffer very bad losses to your ground forces.
With respects, it appears to me that this depends very heavily on you achieving good luck on G1 (not just in France, but also in not suffering heavy losses against the UK navy).
Finally, it actually appears to me that you might not be able to conquer Moscow on G5 if Russia fully stacks the territory and the UK is able to send fighter support.
Marsh
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@kyle47 said in Revisiting G2 Barbarossa:
@MarshmallowofWar Oops. My mistake! I missed an artillery :flushed:
Again, bringing two aircraft @4 carries the odds into the 99% range. And in those edge cases, the Italians could clean up if they had too.
No worries at all. It’s quite easy to do!
Marsh
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@MarshmallowofWar Good thoughts. I have run this attack quite a bit now. I disagree with the “profound weakness in Europe”. I’m certainly much stronger in Europe than I would be on a G3 Sealion (and on optimal lines, those odds are ok at best). The sealion feint benefits from a stronger Italy, and a German Navy presence in the Med. However, on the G2, I am pouring resources into Infantry quite early on. The Americans often contend with 30+ German infantry and a similar count of Italians. It has been exceptionally difficult for them to make serious gains in time to be worth it.
As for the potential infantry losses, yes. At some point, unit trades can get inefficient. If the odds, and trades, are bad on the G5 Moscow (more likely due to British support rather than bad rolls), don’t do it. The Germans can simply consolidate their position, bomb the factory, reinforce from recently captured factories (a small investment), and watch as Japan ramps up pressure on Calcutta.
Between the two, Britain can’t stop both. The benefit of the early pressure is that the Allies don’t have enough time to build a sufficient defense, and the tradeoffs of units don’t wither the German forces enough to be any issue. Your IPC counts for Germany will be pushing 75 (if not 80) by this point, and Japan should be hot on their heels.
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@kyle47
Do you use bids in the play group? -
@MarshmallowofWar I actually started conducting this attack because the Allies were more able to slow a G3. We found it was often petering out, falling victim to Soviet counter attack. The G2 slimmed some of that early Soviet income and material enough, that the opportunities for counter attack got cut down to almost nothing. My concerns were much like your own, but after trying it (and I am not known for being lucky with the dice), the U.S.S.R. crumbled, and the income swing gave me the resources to grind down every U.S. landing.
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@mainah we do not, and this could swing some key odds in key battles. I would re-evaluate depending on where the Allies use the bid. Is 18-22 still the average bid size?
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@kyle47
BM4 is 16-22. I think. Some one mentioned it’s been creeping up a bit, might be a bit higher.OOB - 45-60.
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@mainah Yes, that could totally change the map. My group can’t beat me when I play the Allies without one, so I don’t get bids. :)
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@kyle47 said in Revisiting G2 Barbarossa:
@MarshmallowofWar Good thoughts. I have run this attack quite a bit now. I disagree with the “profound weakness in Europe”.
By “profound weakness”, I’m making a couple of assumptions. First, that every available ground force that can make Bransk by G5 is there (including the Romanian infantry) and second, that all your builds for G2, G3, and G4 (probably strat bombers) have first priority of eliminating Russia as opposition. That doesn’t leave a lot of ground forces in Europe proper, hence the phrasing. While it’s true that your air force and limited ground forces can hold off the US/UK for a bit, on G4 it’ll be ground forces by itself but most of that has been shipped off to Russia at that point.
You might ask why the US would go Europe-first. The answer is because your G1 build telegraphs your intentions.
It would be interesting to see this in play.
Marsh
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@MarshmallowofWar ah I see, that would make a weak Europe. However my G3, G4, and G5 purchases are almost entirely infantry in order to defend Europe. Depending on the amount of reinforcement Moscow gets from the British, Germany may opt for a few tanks out of Ukraine/Novgorod. Ukraine is preferable because of it’s position, but mech units of any kind can be helpful out of Novgorod at this point.
I am also assuming a Middle Earth style British player (factory in Persia, naval base, 2-1 alternating transport shuck from South Africa) and haven’t play tested this against a U.S./U.K. D-day. That would be an interesting stress test, since you are committed to the G2 post purchase. I think the U.S.S.R. and Calcutta would ultimately be more vulnerable in the D-day scenario… but I’m biased.
Appreciate the feedback!
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@kyle47 if you are spending most of your G3-G5 income on defending Western Europe, the Allies should be able to hold Moscow and the Middle East as you don’t have enough forces to overcome the final defense lines. Get a few bombers during G3 and G4 as they are so versatile. You can buy units at the front lines from G4 and onwards.
I like having a dozen or more German bombers by the mid-game. That makes it challenging to simultaneously protect Moscow, Middle East / Egypt, a Western European foothold, and the Atlantic fleet. Dark Skies is unfair!
Axis should be able to win 90% of the time for an OOB game with no bid when the players have experience. Join the League so you can go against stronger opponents and find flaws in your game plans for matches which are more balanced.
The evolving strategies have allowed the Allied bid to creep up to the 50-ish range. One key evolution I saw recently was leaving Normandy in French control. That prevents the Allies from using that territory as a pivotal foothold. Very annoying.
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@Arthur-Bomber-Harris said in Revisiting G2 Barbarossa:
One key evolution I saw recently was leaving Normandy in French control. That prevents the Allies from using that territory as a pivotal foothold. Very annoying.
You’re welcome :-) I take full credit for this.
Marsh
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The aircraft in Poland and Slovakia Hungary cannot reach any ships, so they’ll have to attack Paris.
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