When to fight for France?

[meterpaffay]

Hello there!

As an allied player my general strategy (for KGF) is usually this:
I whittle down German troops in many small battles using a combination of infantry and air support (in some rare cases I throw in an artillery piece) with the UK. At the same time I try to avoid fighting with landed US troops as much as I can in order to build up a big stack that actually can take on Germany for the final blow. Consequently it’s usually the UK that captures France since you can hardly hold ever hold it for even one turn in the early/mid game even with US support which would just give Germany the chance to destroy alot of allied troops with good odds and therefore delaying the US stack building in Scandinavia/Karelia. This of course assumes Germany has decided not to truly defend France (say 5 units or less) in the first place; which I found to be a prominent play among axis players (fyi, I’m silver tier right now).

My first question is: On a higher level is that even the “correct” play by Germany to allow trading of France rather than just commiting a full stack (eg. 8 troops+) basically denying any trading back and forth until the allies have build up their fleet enough (I’d say round 4 or 5 maybe). If Germany actually decides to keep a full stack in France early on it will definetely relieve some pressure off from Russia which can also be helpful to the allies.

The second question is: Can it still be a viable tactic to heavily trade France, accepting a better roi for Germany, with the aim to deter Germany from piling on the pressure on Russia? If Germany can’t fully retaliate and reclaim France, it’s probably in a really bad spot anyways (in this case in my experience the allies usually win the game, unless something went really awry in Russia).

Can you share your thought on how you approach this whole France situation?
What do you think about my general strategy of whittling down/stacking up?

Cheers!

[Dead Rabbits]

@meterpaffay What you are doing is totally viable and many players trade with UK but not US.

The US masses units in Finland then they try to take Karelia. From there US moves its large stack into Baltic states setting up for the capture of Berlin.

The Baltic stack might not be all US forces but combined forces of US, UK and Russia. So Allies may be able to hold Baltic but not have enough to attack Berlin from there alone.

This is ok. At this point you can have UK and US land in France together which puts Germany in a double bind. While it may have enough to recapture France, it may not have enough left in Berlin to defend vs forces UK and US can bring to Berlin and from Baltic if it does attack France.

While I think there are some strategies even stronger than this, this method is good and it works.

As to your question Germany should not commit too much of its forces to defend France in the early parts of the game because it wants to advance as many troops to Russia as it can instead.

There are times when Germany can defend France with few units, like 4 in the early game and you are right, it’s good for Germany to deny this income from Allies so they can’t get a IPC boost used to further build up expensive navy they need.

But other than that it’s kind of wasteful for Germany to commit 10 or more units it may need to defend France from Allies. Think of it this way, Germany can build 10 units in Berlin. So 10 or more units is basically a full turn worth of production being used to defend France instead of moving those units to the front lines.

Infantry are the most cost effective unit in the game. They should be the bulk of almost any Army. They are slow however. It takes 3 rounds for them to move adjacent to Moscow from Berlin. So if they are in France instead, it’s a lot of time wasted.

If the Axis is about to win by having 9 Victory Cities, then it makes sense to stack and hold France if it is one of those 9. But not really before then.

Attacking with massive number superiority is much more effective than fair attacks. So having 20 or more units in Berlin is actually better than having 10 in France 10 in Berlin. As now Germany can attack with better odds and take fewer casualties when it does take back France. If it can capture France with enough units surviving that Allies cannot take it back, then Allies land somewhere else and Germany attacks there with its large army. Then keep doing that instead of losing more units when trading. Some people call this pivot stacking. Because the same large core of units keeps attacking adjacent territories pivoting its position, but being strong enough to not be counter attacked.

[Dead Rabbits]

@meterpaffay To your 2nd question yes that can work but is it the best way to do it?

Think about why you are saving up your US infantry. Because they are better in larger stacks than smaller ones right?

If you put them in France yes Germany needs to attack with more units to take France back, but if they can do so profitably? Then they are losing less units than Allies are and it just makes it harder for you to ultimately beat them, and it takes more time.

So you don’t want to do that. You want profitable trades.

The more territories you can attack, the more Germany has to split its forces, leaving smaller stacks that you can more easily attack.

[aardvarkpepper]

@meterpaffay
Good questions, but I don’t know what you mean by

“Can it still be a viable tactic to heavily trade France, accepting a better roi for Germany, with the aim to deter Germany from piling on the pressure on Russia?”

What EXACTLY does this mean? Considering the rest of the post, I would say it’s probably a good question, it’s just I don’t know how to answer without understanding what exactly the question means.

Specifically, the Axis should never “heavily trade France” in most games.

Okay, so you already understand about stack building and bleeding; you’re preserving US units so you can build the US to be the major stack controller in Europe to challenge a combined Axis stack.

France is another different application of the same thinking. There, you mention Germany committing a full stack denying trading. This is a different application to stack building/bleeding at West Russia region, which is good tactical application.

But really applying stack building/bleeding requires strategic understanding. Let’s say round 6 or something I don’t know whatever, and UK has 3 transports, US has 4 transports alternating between East Canada and Finland/Norway/France/NW Europe and 4 empties returning. And this is really not too much to ask of Allies, in fact it’s understating the threat if anything, but whatever.

So the threats there are US takes the stuff it dropped in Norway/Finland last turn and the East Canada transports and uses all 8 transports to drop 16 units to France. And UK has perhaps a 10-12 dice attack into France in the first place, what with air. So if US has 4 fighters to spare, you’re looking at UK capture, then US reinforcement with 20 units. Well, probably you know all this, so you’re thinking maybe 20+ units on France instead of 8+ as described.

Anyways, that’s just to put things in scale.

But returning to the strategic view - Germany’s only putting out maybe 14 ground a turn, and that’s if it’s going almost pure infantry. And I’m not saying that’s right, but just for this hypothetical scenario. Well if you assume 4 get bled out to USSR with trades each turn, and say UK trades 6 more (matching its transport capacity) and US another 8, you can see where 18 > 14.

So strategically, Germany should NOT trade, doesn’t this just make sense? Because trading is a losing proposition. And one could say, well, if Germany has mass air then it can make better trades and even trade at an advantage, and mass air pressures Allies to build more escorts and pressures Allies to not drop through Mediterranean so rate of Germany’s bleed slows, and all that is true. But the expense of air on that level means a lot fewer boots on the ground, so if Allies are clever, they can still build pretty unpleasant counterpressure. That is, there really isn’t a way for Germany to get around it.

(continued)

[aardvarkpepper]

Germany Should Not Trade In The KGF

Okay, well really it should and it has to, but the difference between a really really sharp player and a blunt one is, a sharp player is going to be clawing for those small advantages, a blunt one misses opportunities and makes good short term decisions that come at the expense of long term positions.

So if opponent is sort of competent, what should Germany expect?

Early on, Germany shouldn’t give France up cheaply. But at some point, Germany just can’t maintain pressure in the east if it’s making these bit trades with UK/US in the west. So Germany shifts off France, trying to control Karelia to block off cheap UK/US ground reinforcements to Moscow.

German Pressure Vs Moscow

And this transition is very delicate, and subject to change. Like if Germany can get a credible threat against West Russia from Karelia, then maybe USSR retreats to Caucasus, then Germany captures West Russia in force, and if UK/US moves from Finland to Karelia, Germany shifts back and gets vastly favorable odds on a mid-stack battle, which basically means Axis have winning expectation. But if UK/US don’t move stack to Karelia, then if Axis stack West Russia, Allies must stack Moscow, giving Axis easy access to Caucasus; this makes sense, yes? Or there’s the “brute force” German stack on Caucasus or Japanese stack on Caucasus, and that’s tricky, but I won’t get into those here. Suffice to say, Germany can profit from pressure in the east.

And I’ll also mention, when Germany pushes its eastern stack towards Moscow, that can open up the Allied Triple, where UK, US, then USSR all attack Berlin. The major Allied stack in Europe simply heads for Berlin, lets Moscow fall, then Germany can’t reposition to defend Moscow in time. It can happen, so watch for it.

But we assume Axis don’t let that happen because Axis are watching for it, right?

France Transition

Right. So it’s understood, Germany can’t trade France, can hardly afford to stack France. But if Allies stack France then Germany’s denied France income and the Allies can bleed Germany out at NW Europe and Italy too. So that’s not great.

So how does Germany transition off France? Infantry stack on Paris shifts to Berlin; some Berlin infantry shift to Baltic States, other Berlin infantry shift to Poland (maybe, maybe not), Karelia is reinforced by whatever means - and German tanks are on Baltic States.

(maybe)

(continued)

[aardvarkpepper]

So the upshot is, Allies can dump a huge chunk on Paris, but then Germany can smash with Berlin infantry / Baltic tanks. US double-dropped its transports so can’t counter next turn at all. UK can drop 8+, and Germany needs to survive that, but without the US followthrough it’s a lot more survivable. It’s very very bad for the Axis still; even with the Allies having fought a losing mid-stack battle, Germany’s bled pretty dry; even with German tanks surviving, Germany doesn’t really have the unit count to maintain. But though even a FAVORABLE Axis mid-stack battle still LOSES strategically against Allies in Europe in the short term, the Axis do get that much more time for Japan to develop their threat against Moscow, which should be decisive. Well, in theory.

If you’re asking yourself, well, Karelia’s precarious in the first place, so how can Germany possibly put all those tanks on Baltic? Exactly. Germany is digging through the couch for loose change the entire game. So maybe the Karelia position collapses and Germany has a huge Baltic States and/or Belorussia stack, if the difference isn’t too great, Germany can maybe get something out of it.

Worst Case for Germany

Worst case is, Allies are building at Finland/Norway, if Germany doesn’t threaten to block off Allied pressure at Karelia, UK/US get a huge stack of cheap ground units reinforcing Moscow, and that’s just really bad. So let’s say Allies break through at Karelia (theoretically) and also trade France lightly, it’s win-win for Allies . . . .sort of.

But then, Germany only trades lightly at France; it’s definitely “losing” for Germany, but it was losing to begin with, so what more could Axis really get out of that position?

And if Germany retreated from Karelia, then Germany should probably have something at Belorussia and/or Baltic States. Imagine G8 retreats from Karelia, UK8/US8/USSR9 reinforces. Then? Belorussia infantry and Baltic States tanks push Ukraine and trade West Russia. Allies shift their combined stack to West Russia and double-drop to France. But both USSR and US may be out of position to counter Japan push to Caucasus, that’s the problem with the USSR9 (or whatever) reinforcement to Karelia. So that’s Japan’s way to maybe capture and hold Caucasus in the KGF, which solves a lot of Japan’s logistics issues.

And if Axis were losing everywhere to begin with? Well then they were losing, you know?

But you can see if the Allies go all-in, Axis have lines that can play out reasonably; if Allies don’t go all-in, Axis have lines that can play out reasonably, so long as Axis weren’t pretty much losing on all fronts to begin with.

But anyways remember. Stack building and bleeding, okay, tactically seems to me you have a pretty good grip on it, but strategically remember production limits. Germany simply cannot afford to trade on any sort of ongoing basis on western / European coastal fronts with UK/US in the KGF; even fairly advantaged trades can still be a losing proposition. Germany has to be very careful about planning for certain fronts to collapse so others can be maintained/strengthened, that’s the reasonable expectation.