UK1 Fig-attack on the Solomon sub

[Renove]

Lately - when playing Japan - I’ve been experiencing huge problems when confronted with the UK1 fighter assault on the solomon sub and the following landing on the SZ 52 AC. When it actually hits the sub - even when it doesn’t - the chances of an economic J1 sz 52 attack become very slim. My normal sz 52 assault consists of 1 AC 2 FIGS 1 Bom 1 Sub (if it survived UK1) 1 BS and 1 DST vs 1 AC 1 SUB 2 FIGS. With the SZ 37 AC - BS - FIG I attack the SZ 59 UK-DST (if alive), the other SZ 37 FIG supports the attack in China. The SZ 60 transport usually drops something off in Buryatia.

Now I am aware that most players here will probably use the UK FIG to counter the G1 Anglo-Egypt but when the German bid is placed in Libya and the G1 ANglo-Egypt isn’t desastrous that counterattack becomes very hard, thus the FIG is often used for other strategies. The SZ 52 stack (1AC 1SUB 2FIGS) has an above reasonable chance to really hurt the attacking Japanse fleet and there is always a chance for an American counterattack USA1 on the Japanese fleet - if things go horribly wrong for Japan. The dice don’t even have to be desastrous, a slight dice advantage for the Allies in SZ 52 can result in rather painful Japanese losses.
I don’t like moves where you really need a good twist of fate - definitly so early in the game, so my question is, how do you handle the SZ 52 stack - especially when the Solomon SUB was killed UK1? Do you send the transport in SZ 60 as fodder or do you divert FIGS from the SZ 37 fleet? I could use some help in this matter.

[Jennifer]

I prefer to use it hitting the SZ 45 submarine for that specific reason.  Germany’s Africa is easier to liberate if Japan’s navy has been hit hard.

However, I’ve had good success with Battleship, Destroyer, Carrier, 4 Fighters, Bomber, (submarine if it survived) in SZ 52.  I then send 7 infantry, 2 fighters to China.

BTW, I have been toying with sending the transport to SZ 52 as well and of course bringing the carrier, battleship from SZ 37 over to SZ 45 as well.  Sets me up nice for a hit on W. USA or Australia and doesn’t really slow me down much in Asia.  Also alleviates the need of building warships in SZ 60 to protect the transport.

[jsp4563]

If you get a 9 bid (more and more common these days) try placing a Japanese transport in SZ50, then attack sz52 with 1CV, 1BB, 1DD, 1SS (if it survived), 3fgts, 1bmb.  Attack Hawaii with 3inf, 1tnk or 1art, 1fgt.  The loss of the Hawaii fighter, plus the 2tp as fodder make a US counter-attack on your fleet unlikey.

[jsp4563]

I meant 8 bid, if you get 9 and extra 1 to Japan’s bank is good.  Given that Germany will be attacking Egypt with normal starting forces, it’s more likely the UK fighter will be used for a counter-attack in Egypt.  That makes Japan’s position in SZ52 even better.  Also that Transport in sz50 has other options besides Hawaii, Australia, and New Zealand are also open for a round 1 assault.

[Renove]

@Cmdr:

I prefer to use it hitting the SZ 45 submarine for that specific reason.  Germany’s Africa is easier to liberate if Japan’s navy has been hit hard.

However, I’ve had good success with Battleship, Destroyer, Carrier, 4 Fighters, Bomber, (submarine if it survived) in SZ 52.  I then send 7 infantry, 2 fighters to China.

BTW, I have been toying with sending the transport to SZ 52 as well and of course bringing the carrier, battleship from SZ 37 over to SZ 45 as well.  Sets me up nice for a hit on W. USA or Australia and doesn’t really slow me down much in Asia.  Also alleviates the need of building warships in SZ 60 to protect the transport.

I did a couple of runs incorporating the SZ 37 fighters when the Solomon Sub was killed and it worked out rather nice, it really gives you a very nice chance of cleaning the SZ52 stack in one roll. The allied fighters can be deadly if one of them - or even both - can roll twice, so having a high chance of a one roll sweep really puts some pressure off the dice. The attack on China - with two fighters - still is dominant enough to start pressuring the mainland.

@Emperor:

I meant 8 bid, if you get 9 and extra 1 to Japan’s bank is good.  Given that Germany will be attacking Egypt with normal starting forces, it’s more likely the UK fighter will be used for a counter-attack in Egypt.  That makes Japan’s position in SZ52 even better.  Also that Transport in sz50 has other options besides Hawaii, Australia, and New Zealand are also open for a round 1 assault.

I tried this last night and it worked out extremely well. I had a 9 bid, placed a J-transport in SZ 50 and opened with a 2 transport 1IC build for Japan. Germany did a conventional G1 Anglo-Egypt assault that was countered on UK1. G2 I broke the Anglo-Egypt defense with a new landing + the remaining forces present in Africa which still provided a good income bonus. The Solomon Sub was thus alive and participated in the J1 SZ 52 attack and landing in Hawaii (3inf 1arm 1 fighter). The good part was that the USA player got a bit jumpy and started with a rather conservative build because of the threat on the West Coast. I attacked Australia J2, New Zealand J3 and then used the fleet to support the southern prong.

[Jennifer]

Renove:

I know.  I personally like having 3 aircraft in China, but it’s not hugely needed when you have 7 infantry, 2 fighters attacking there.  Anyway, the idea, in my mind, is to give the defender the least number of rolls possible and that means one round.

Now, I don’t know how the rest of the world does it, but I generally calculate the first round of any battle in LL before even trying to run a simulator on it.

That means in SZ 52 with Destroyer, Carrier, 4 Fighters, Bomber, Battleship the attacker should have 4 Hits which would be everything in SZ 52. (More certain if you have your submarine as well.)

It also means that China would have the attacker resulting in two hits in the first round of battle which is still pretty good all things considered.

[Crazy Ivan]

:roll:
Well this info is all good if UK1 doesn’t send the fighter, but he asked what to do when they do send the fighter.
Also, it seems that the Aussies love to invade New Guinea and the Indians like to hit Borneo. Both of these, and the DD off of Kwangtung must be dealt with. And some players sacrifice the carrier as a block off of French Indo China!
So, even if the UK1 was even half successful against Japan, Japan has some serious early expansion problems. In this case, I have forgone the 52, (Pearl) attack altogether on J1 without enducing immediate serious consequences. Of course those units in 52 will be a problem at some point, but at least the UK Royal pacific fleet won’t be around to compound the problem. Japan needs to destroy all they can, every turn, both at sea and on land, but avoid stretching yourself too thin, and too close to even a moderate strength counter-attack. :wink:
PS: Watch out for the UK bomber if it is landed in Russia or the Caucuses as it may be hunting unprotected Japanese transports next turn.  :wink:

[newpaintbrush]

@Renove:

Lately - when playing Japan - I’ve been experiencing huge problems when confronted with the UK1 fighter assault on the solomon sub and the following landing on the SZ 52 AC.

Well u better get used to these “huge problems” because that sorta stuff you mentioned is pretty standard.  Not THE standard, but standard enough that you should know how to respond right off the bat.  Sayin this is causing you HUGE PROBLEMS means you’re probably pretty inexperienced.

When it actually hits the sub - even when it doesn’t - the chances of an economic J1 sz 52 attack become very slim. My normal sz 52 assault consists of 1 AC 2 FIGS 1 Bom 1 Sub (if it survived UK1) 1 BS and 1 DST vs 1 AC 1 SUB 2 FIGS. With the SZ 37 AC - BS - FIG I attack the SZ 59 UK-DST (if alive), the other SZ 37 FIG supports the attack in China. The SZ 60 transport usually drops something off in Buryatia.

**FYI, the UK sub at Solomons usually attacks with the UK India fighter to try to kill the Jap sub at Solomons for a 2/3 overall shot of killing the Jap sub.

Another “standard” that I haven’t seen a lot (so is it really standard?  well it used to be) is UK transport block from Australia to New Guinea (or was that it, I forget).  The idea is that either you use a battleship to clear the transport, in which case any carriers you left at Solomons are more vulnerable to US attack, or you use a fighter at a time where you can hardly spare any fighters.

Blah blah, rest of ur stuff difficult to read.  I hate reading “SZ 52” blah blah reference.  Please write “Hawaii Island sea zone”.  I haven’t memorized the d*** map you know . . .

Anyways, you’re sending a battleship, bomber, destroyer, 2 fighter, destroyer.  That’s not “economical”.  That’s like saying “Hey US!  If you were planning on doing a KGF, here’s half my fleet giftwrapped!  Won’t you please smack my capital ships down by either strafing hard or if you’re lucky just smacking me dead on the spot?!”

Obviously you have some clue that this is the case due to comments in your post.  But I want to emphasize this is not the “economical” attack you may think it is.

You gotta figure first that you stand a good chance of losing a unit or two on the attack, then the Hawaii fighter, the W. US fighter, and the E. US bomber are in range, plus the US battleship and US transport. can hit.  If the US gets lucky they can clear Jap’s capital ships at Hawaii, if the US is moderately lucky, they can kill the destroyer and a couple of fighters then retreat back to W. US (where Japan can’t hit them after a US1 build plus US destroyer moving west from I think it’s around Panama).  Remember as Japan you didn’t take Hawaii, so you have to land fighters close by if your carrier gets blown up, and if you didn’t send your other AC to Solomons or close by, then when US attacks, you have to assign hits to your fighters before your carriers (if you don’t, US runs away and your fighters die for free).

THEN

For the rest, you totally ignored the UK air and Anglo-Egypt situation, which is what you have to consider on Japan’s first move.  Either there’s a UK bomber in range to hit your transports east of Japan or there isn’t.  If there is, leaving your transports unescorted is real risky, making your battleship-carrier attack on the UK destroyer at Kwangtung a bad idea.  Probably in most cases you should just ignore the UK dispersed fleet, leave the Jap battleship east of Japan to battleship bombard Burytia and escort transports there.  If the UK sticks around on UK2, you hunt, if UK flees, ignore - they make it to Germany, but in a KGF they get there too late to make a huge difference, and in a KJF, Germany should have enough air to mess with the Allied fleet anyways.**

Now I am aware that most players here will probably use the UK FIG to counter the G1 Anglo-Egypt but when the German bid is placed in Libya and the G1 ANglo-Egypt isn’t desastrous that counterattack becomes very hard, thus the FIG is often used for other strategies.

Yeah, like grabbing Borneo - I think it is.  Anyways, it’s a 4 IPC island.  Japan makes an early play for it, Japan pulls itself out of position in Asia.  Japan doesn’t make a play for it, UK’s up 4 IPCs for a while compensating for loss of Africa.

The SZ 52 stack (1AC 1SUB 2FIGS) has an above reasonable chance to really hurt the attacking Japanse fleet and there is always a chance for an American counterattack USA1 on the Japanese fleet - if things go horribly wrong for Japan. The dice don’t even have to be desastrous, a slight dice advantage for the Allies in SZ 52 can result in rather painful Japanese losses.

Yeah, that’s why you see Japan hitting Pearl with 1 sub (optional), 4 fighters 1 bomber in Pearl Light (nothing for Allies to counter), or if Allies reinforced Pearl like you describe, Pearl heavy with ALL units able to reach with rest of Jap fleet dispersing so UK can’t hunt it down.

I don’t like moves where you really need a good twist of fate - definitly so early in the game, so my question is, how do you handle the SZ 52 stack - especially when the Solomon SUB was killed UK1? Do you send the transport in SZ 60 as fodder or do you divert FIGS from the SZ 37 fleet? I could use some help in this matter.

What I would do as Japan totally depends on the board situation.  I’m not gonna be a dumbass and say BLA BLA BLA U SHOULD ALWAYS DO THE KUNNING BLA BLA PLAN, because obviously that’s fulla crap.

If the UK flew its bomber east, if the UK split its fleet, if the UK hit Borneo, if the UK retook Anglo-Egypt, if the UK flew its India fighter to Hawaii’s carrier, if the UK bought 3 fighters, if the UK bought an industrial complex in India, if Russia put 6 infantry in Burytia, if Russia put 1 infantry in Burytia, if Russia put 4 infantry in Sinkiang, if the UK Australia fleet split or stayed together east or west - all these are things you need to think about when you’re doing your move!  Saying you lost the Solomon sub is NOT sufficient information to offer an informed opinion on what you ought to do!

Usually I see the UK dispersing its Indian fleet.  Either UK retakes Anglo-Egypt and sends its Indian destroyer and carrier to hunt the Japanese transport at Kwangtung and attacks the Solomon sub with the UK sub and picks up 1 inf Aus and 1 inf New Zealand and sails east with the UK transport, in which case I leave Jap battleship east of Japan to protect transport plus 3 newly built transports (although I might switch this if UK bomber is in range of east of Japan - otherwise I don’t care if an usupported UK carrier and destroyer attack my Japanese fleet), and I hit Pearl with 1 sub (if it survived), 1 destroyer, 4-5 fighter, 1 bomber (saving 1 fighter for China), noncom battleship and two carriers to Solomons (leaving battleship, 2 carriers, 3+ fighters at Solomons, a hard target).

Or UK takes Borneo; I still build 3 transports 1 tank (retake Borneo next round), follow with standard as above.  Sometimes UK just sends 2 infantry to take Borneo and attacks the Solomon sub with UK sub and fighter, which can be inconvenient for the Japs given the extra fighter on Japan, in which case I might go Pearl heavy as described below.

If UK put a fighter on the US carrier, depending on the Asia situation, I might send EVERYTHING in range to Pearl.  (You NEED more than 2 fighters; if I remember right only 1 carrier can reach Pearl, and the US has a pretty good counterattack, so you need a loaded carrier on defense).  If you drop units, you can drop fighters, so your fleet is battleship, carrier, destroyer, 2 fighters (not bad), although you lose the fodder transport.  Drawback is, obviously, progress in Asia is slowed, which is why I really don’t like this option particularly if you see an infantry in Russian Burytia and an infantry in British India ready to take an underdefended Manchuria and French Indochina respectively.  You can typically respond by leaving 1 inf at Burytia and landing a fighter there (landing Jap fighter at French Indochina is better positionally, but usually due to UK transport in area threatening offload of troops plus UK bomber in range you lose the Jap fighter if you do this)

THERE!  If you wanted a simple answer, too bad!  Hahahahha.  Better give some more details if u want help.