Why would you attack on J2

[democratic leader]

As far as I can see, why would you ever have a J2 strike.

J1-Lets you hit allied units hard. You can wipe out both Brittish transports and the battleship; the Australian navy and the American transport, and NSW or Hawaii if you feel like it.
The downside is that you bring in the US war funds in real quick, and you will not be able to take the DEIs for a cupple of turns, so you need a quick win.

J3-It lets the allies set up their units, defend strongpoints, and capture the DEIs, but the USA will not get a big income. But you will have 2 bild turns. J1 transpot builds can be used aginst the DEI or Mayla, and J2 will be used aginst the Phillipans. You can also destory China before the war, and really gear up aginst a weak US.

J2 will just be the worst of both. The allies will move their units, and defend their units and capture some of the DEIs. But you will still have a weak transport fleet, and the US will get an extra 40 IPCs of units.

Mabey I wrong, I’m not saying the games broken or J2 attack people should be shot, but when I think about it J2 makes less and less sense. Could people plese give me their views. I’m probobly wrong anywhy.

[Bigtiti]

i actually agree with you
cause the troops you land at FIC you then use to capture DEI instead of china
and at J3 the starting transports can also pick up units at manchuria

[RJL518]

To me…J2 is the best time to attack…oh and we just played a game where the UK player decided to attack Japan on turn 1!!!.  now with that happening and the US didnt enter the war…Japan kicked some serious booty all through Asia…needless to say…Japan won this one…i played Japan by the way…and yes i did tell the Uk player what he was about to do…he didnt listen…pity :-(

[Uncle_Joe]

I think it 100% depends on what basic strategy you intend to employ and what the Allies are doing (assuming you dont go on J1 that is). I am generally an advocate of the J3 attack at this point, but the Allies might leave enough stuff vulnerable to make a J2 attack more attractive.

Our current Allied ‘counter’ to the J3 attack looks to be to have the Brits take the entire DEI and the Amis set up to head to Australia to threaten the DEI and PI after the Japanese attack (with the Aussies positioning to get their bonus on AZ2). This give the Brits 29 IPCs on UK1 and 37 on UK2. That is a lot of money to put into grunts for Japan to slog through. Sooo, the Japanese can pre-empt that 37 IPC windfall by attacking on J2 and killing both Brit TRs. It also allows the Japanese to take PI before any reinforcements can possibly get there.

Personally I’m starting to lean towards being unpredictable as the Japanese. That keeps the Allies guessing and prevents them from doing ‘optimal’ planning.

[oztea]

J2 is my favorite
position your fleet so that at UK 1s collect income phase they get convoy raided in kuangtung, and borneo and malya if you can get your units there, and have your 4 bombers in siam, so you can bomb india into the stone age on J2
Anzac wont do anything to hurt you and when it comes around to your turn take 3/4 dutch east indies and the phillipines by boat, take kuangtung and shan state, crush china, ignore anzac and US mostly (except for pearl)

[ksmckay]

I agree with you dem even though I think a J1 attack actually makes it easier to get to DEI as you dont have to worry about allied units on the ground in the DEI.

I think that a UK 2 attack could be a good counter to a planned J3 attack.  Not sure yet but if that is true than maybe its worth attacking J2 to get rid of the advantages of the UK2 attack which if Japan isnt planning on it can be a pain.

Kind of a nice thing about this game.  At least right now with more options available to everyone on the first few turns it makes it a little less cookie cutter than previous games where openings were almost always the same with just slight differences.

[Vareel]

I love a J2 attack personally.  I station bombers in Siam to strike any location the allied boats may try to hide.  I also put a few boats down in that are like the caroline fleet to SZ 42, or just a destroyer or a carrier.  It also lets you send a carrier or two to SZ 31 to threaten a Pearl strike on J2.

You have much better positioning on J2, with a proper J2 you can sink ALL UK boats and retake any DEI islands the UK takes.  Along with that you can start your convoy raids on the UK, and you still get to initial kick on China and positioning J1/2.  And you can threaten to hit Pearl with a large quantity of planes if you want, allowing you to either set the US back another turn or take Pearl heavy.  On J3 you have all of DEI, china is hurt, and the US is the only power with a boat in the sea other than yourself.

[democratic leader]

Thanks for the good replys. I think that if the Brittish leave themselves vunerable eg 2 lone transports and you move bombers down to Siam you can destroy the entire Brittish navy. You can also destory the ANZACs unless they hide of NZ with fighter cover.

You can use your 3 starting transports to attack Mayla or the DEIs and you 3 new ones aginst the Phillipans. You will probley be able to take out the american fleet at pearl if you go almost all out, but will loose some of your fleet.

By the way, I’ve always hated J1, so now thanks to you I have 2 good attack plans. My games are now twise as good. Thanks 8-) :-D

[tchenao]

I think J1 brings US to the war too early. I reckon it could be the most effective move in terms of the IPCs you can make your enemies lose in one single turn, and you can easily make up for the 10 IPCs that you will loose for being neutral with the US, but in all the games I played (not a lot yet), US war machine gets rolling and ends up making the Japanese player pay.

J2 lets you position yourself better on the board, as long as you have a clear strategy of what you want to do (go all in for Calcutta, or spread out to get Sydney later on, whatever floats your boat). The problem sometimes is the lack of that clear strategy, I tended to get dispersed and pick a little bit from here, a little bit from there and then get burned.

J3 will make it very difficult for you, because the Allies can stack up forces in Calcutta. In my personal opinion it should be either J1 or J2, max.