Playing Allies for the 1st time?

[rmcbride]

Well guys, I bought my 1st A&A game over 20years ago & have, I believe, every version that they’ve made.  I have 4-boys & when I started playing the 2-oldest were 4 & 8. So I started off teaching & playing to loose to keep it fun for them. & of-course I always took the Axis.

My oldest boys are now 28 & 32, with one 23 & one still in the house @ 15 & were still playing.  But I’ve always been the Axis player, ALWAYS.  & I keep explaining to my 28 yr old, that by now always wins as the USA/UK player,  that its hard being the Axis player & winning, because he’s a good Allies player by now!

I tell him its because, & it should be obvious to him, that the Allies simply have more IPC’s & better economics & the Allies pretty much have to make some mistakes for the Axis to win against a good Allies player.  & I never mind loosing because I LOVE playing the game & I get a “kick” out of watching them do good!

But now my 28yr old wants to play the Axis this weekend, because to him–-it doesn’t look that hard, especially with the great set up the Axis start with.  But now I get to play the Allies for the 1st time in over 20+ years & I haven’t got a clue what to do with them???

I want my son to finally experience the difficulties of playing the Axis player, but also have a good game.  But @ the same time—I want to win this one with the Allies not only to prove my point of the Axis difficulties but to play a good game with the Allies & not give my son the satisfaction of thinking that “if I loose as the Allies player to him, that he’s just the better player”.

So with that said—since I’ve only watched what unfolds on the Allies side from the Axis players perspective for the last 20+ yrs,  I’m looking for some good input & strategies from you guys to get off to a good start & win with the Allies, especially as the USA, UK & China player—as I will be this weekend.  Thanx in advance.  :-D

[elzario]

I am no expert but Allies generally have to be mostly reactive.  Generally speaking against a decent player it is harder to acheive victory.

The keys for Global come down to which cities the Axis player is pushing for.  Normally in Europe this would be Cairo and the Russian cities.  If you can hold Russia, Europe is safe.  If you lose Russia you need to hold London and Cairo - Cairo being the harder city to protect.

USA needs to assist in Europe if it is threatened, generally speaking I try to at least get USA to help in the Mediterranean (and Convoy Italy).  If you can control the Med, keeping Cairo becomes a lot easier.

As far as the Pacific goes, the points of impact are generally India/Australia (and sometimes Hawaii).  I usually try to get USA to protect Australia/Eastern Pacific where possible and the ANZACs to build subs and try to break the line of naval supply for Japan while India tries to hold ground.

If you can stop Japan getting Hawaii and Sydney (and ideally India) you are looking good.  Try and be disruptive as possible as the Allies because in the long run your economy will win out.

I would like to reiterate I am not as good as a lot of the players here, so some better strategies will likely come up… just putting in my 2 cents :)

[Spendo02]

http://www.mailsbroadcast.com/the.artofwar.6.htm

I’d like to emphasize that with the Allies, the goal is to remove Axis initiative, so think about some of the things Sun Tzu wrote about with the ultimate goal of forcing the Axis into defensive buys instead of aggressive ones.  From that point forward you can starve them of resources and ultimately force them to concede.

With that being said, some things to remember:

Japan can only win the game if the US does nothing in the Pacific.  So while you are waiting to join the war, get ships in the Pacific with a general outline of matching Japan’s fleet size and never splitting your own fleet.  This basically means 1 Battleship and 2 Carriers in the Pacific.  You have enough planes to fill those carriers.  Consolidate on Hawaii and follow Sun Tzu’s strategy to beat your enemy to the position of strength.  Japan has a much harder time replacing her ships than the US does - so trading ships with Japan is not a bad thing, particularly early.

The US can assist in Europe by establishing a Convoy against Italy.  Make sure your US2 and US3 purchases include subs.  This is the fastest way the US can assist with the European War Effort.  Placing 2-3 SS off of Italy really hurts their income.

The US strategy of getting the SS into the Med goes hand in hand with the UK plan - which is two fold:
First is to defend London. Purchase a large amount of Inf on UK1 and possibly a Ftr (depending if you elected to scramble on the G1 attack).

Second is to neuter the Italian Navy.  Trading ships with Italy is fine, as Italy finds it much harder to place a fleet once she loses it.  Even if it costs the UK most of her naval presence in the Med, slowing down Italy’s expansion takes pressure off of Cairo which is generally the lynchpin of a European winning strategy.

Further, this strategy opens the door for the US to stage off of Gibraltar and follow another of Sun Tzu’s writings: Strategic Positioning.  The ability for the Allies to mass their fleets at Gibraltar through UK purchases in Canada and the US purchases allows you to consolidate into a single place of power (another Sun Tzu strategy).  This coincides with another Sun Tzu writing: Confuse the Opponent.  By staging in Gibraltar the Allies threaten every major IC in Europe:
-N.Italy
-S.Italy
-W.Germany
-In a 1-2 punch you can take Denmark and then land on Berlin

Above all, remember this when playing as the Allies: Be ever ready to change strategy according
to the changing conditions of the opponent.

[Cow]

The allies strategy can be summed up by one word: rotation.

[ghr2]

@rmcbride:

My oldest boys are now 28 & 32, with one 23 & one still in the house @ 15 & were still playing.  But I’ve always been the Axis player, ALWAYS.  & I keep explaining to my 28 yr old, that by now always wins as the USA/UK player,  that its hard being the Axis player & winning, because he’s a good Allies player by now!

I tell him its because, & it should be obvious to him, that the Allies simply have more IPC’s & better economics & the Allies pretty much have to make some mistakes for the Axis to win against a good Allies player.   & I never mind loosing because I LOVE playing the game & I get a “kick” out of watching them do good!

For the 2nd edition of global 1940, most people agree that it is balanced or a bit axis favored.  The game usually turns to be a race, contain Japan/Italy before russia falls, then the US can focus on the atlantic.  In an average game, Germany would be in position to take Moscow by turn 6, maybe turn 7 if they take their time.  The allies have the difficult task of defending both London and Cairo.  So Japan needs to be contained relatively quickly.  If US builds a strong invasion force in the Atlantic turn 6, then it is not until turn 8 they reach London, or turn 9 to Cairo.  Germany can send the Moscow survivors to pressure Cairo, while they might be able to build a giant Navy with their 100+ income and threaten London.

It gets very close, it is just relatively hard to keep italy down if US goes all out on Japan, and dividing in both theaters buy’s Japan more time.

[Eqqman]

Whatever your strategy against Japan, be sure you literally keep an eye on every one of their planes every turn.  As a long standing Axis player you should appreciate the ungodly amount of air power Japan gets to start with.  As the Allies you have to be very careful of the Japanese massing all their aircraft into one territory to wipe out a fleet or stack of ground units at almost no loss to themselves.  If you’re going with the one massive fleet doctrine for the US, be doubly careful.  It takes numerous rounds of 100% Pacific buys to be able to handle getting hit with the entire Japanese navy & air force and not having the outcome be a disaster.

[Cow]

axis advantage boardgame, just like the new 41 and 42.

Just be desperate, hope for the best.