German bomber strategy - How to play and How to counter

[ItIsILeClerc]

@TheMethuselah:

After reading through all the comments here and looking at several games, it seems to me that KJF is absolutely the correct response to German bomber spam. One of the great advantages of the German strategy is that your threat projection is just bonkers, so why not entirely concede the European naval game and rely on British factories in the Middle East / Africa? In other words, give the German bombers fewer things to threaten.

LeClerc, I know you feel strongly about “KJF or lose,” but would you agree that against this specific German strategy it is the right response?

I think a massive allied presence in the ME (some moving over into Russia), is a great idea, Mehtuselah. Just be careful not to let London fall cheaply. Allies could have a reassurance-force in Canada, to retake London instead of trying to defend it whilst constantly repairing the IC there. I think the latter is very, very inefficient for the allies (and will only lead to another lost game, I suppose).

KJF is always one of the right responses ;-). KGF almost never is; exceptions being mainly the axis try to rush, or make a mistake. Exactly my problem, so yeah, KJF against this strategy as well, sure.
KGF looks promising against this bomberstrategy as well: allies could build up a massive invasion force at Iceland/Suriname (with a NB). As soon as the bombers do anything against Russia, ‘Normandy’ can be invaded.

[Chrisx]

@ItIsILeClerc:

ChrisX, how about building lots of defending INF/ART instead?
Defending vs. 10STR (@4^40): 20ARM (@3^60) = 40INF (@2^80) = 9ART + 28INF (@2^74).
Attacking vs. 10STR (@1^10): 20ARM (@3^60) = 40INF (@1^40) = 9ART + 28INF (@1 or 2^55).

True for defence, but tanks are much better offensive units and you’re going to have to build them sooner or later in order to take the fight to Germany. All the talk of German economic victory starts to seem less credible when there’s a mass of tanks bearing down on poorly defended areas. The UK can join in the fun by churning tanks out of Egypt, South Africa, Persia and India etc. and move them up into Russia.

[Arthur Bomber Harris]

@ItIsILeClerc:

I don’t think the allies should be worried too much about the supposed German flexibility with a huge bomberstack.
For the simple fact that if Germany uses their bombers against any other target than SBR Moscow and/or London, the allies can win the game playing KGF. Let’s look at the German options with their airstack:

• Air Blitz Egypt.

  Germany would have two options with support for Egypt:
  1)  Blitz a stack of infantry/mech infantry with the bombers.  Let’s suppose there are 12 defending Brits and 18 attacking bombers.  The defenders are toast in one round, inflicting 4 casualties.  Net change is ~40 lost IPCs for the Allies and 48 lost IPCs for the Germans.  The added money of Italy controlling Africa could make this trade acceptable.
  2)  Support land troops that have made it down to Trans Jordan by rnd ~9.  Let’s say the Germans have 6 land units + 18 attacking bombers vs 15 defending brits.  The Germans would lose ~20 IPCs of land units vs ~55 IPCs for the Brits and additionally open up the rest of Africa for destruction.

  Obviously Britain could have more than this number of units stacked on Egypt by late game, but at a cost of not having units to support a European invasion or protect London from a late game Sea Lion.

  Mass SBR Moscow: The Germans could have a suitable place to takeoff and land from on G2 or G3.  I don’t know why you think that this is an issue.  If Russia tries to stand close to the German invasion forces on those early turns, they most assuredly will be crushed.  They really can’t make a significant stand until turn 5-6 when the retreating Russians meet up with the newly-build Russian forces near Moscow.  I don’t think that Russia truly can project their attack down to a territory more than two spaces away from their capitol.  With a range of 6, bombers have lots of options.  They only chance for Russia to stop the SBR of Moscow is to force the German bombers to be used elsewhere on the map.

  Stay in WGe: From Novgorod, the German bombers can still do bombing runs over Moscow.  They also can crush land units that are dropped ashore in Western Europe by Allied transports.  Additionally, they the option of destroying the fleet that dropped off Allied land units.  Let’s say the Germans are up to 18 bombers by the time the Allies have a significant fleet to support the transports.  The German bombers could smash 3 loaded aircraft carriers in a single turn (108 IPCs destroyed + transports vs 60 IPCs lost).  The allies would need to invest in 5 loaded aircraft carriers to truly protect the transports.  That is an investment of 130 IPCs, leaving less money for the transports and land units.  It would be four full turns of Atlantic spending to truly build up a force that could withstand the German bombers.  If the Allies spend the first three rounds in the Pacific to contain Japan, they would not be able to have a first wave of transports land in Europe until turn 8, with a follow-up wave around turn 10.  By that time the Germans and Italians should have a massive economy with sufficient money left to start building protection for Western Europe while simultaneously matching the production in the Russian theater.  With Russia only building 2-3 infantry a turn at that point, it isn’t too hard to keep up in that theater.

  I’m not saying that there is no option for the Allies, but it is much harder to properly respond to the German bomber mobility combined with the possibility of economic victory.  One small mistake can be extremely costly for the Allies.  Germany, by contrast, can more easily avoid fatal blunders since the Allies do not have many fast moving units.

  If the Japanese player is good, Allies must do a KJF and at least deny the Japanese of the money islands.  Otherwise Japan will outproduce the Allies in the Pacific.  That gives Germany a good number of rounds to build up their bomber forces and increase their economy by grabbing the bonus territories.

[ItIsILeClerc]

Thanks for sharing, Arthur Bomber Harris!

You’re right about some points, I can see. But not all. KGF is still a possible counter, although I admit you decreased at least my conviction about it. Mainly because of your ‘Novgorod point’. STR from there cannot reach SZ105 however, if the allies invade from there and the allies can put ~40 units into Normandy Turn 5. That’s enough to kill even 28 German aircraft, so the question would be how much land units does Germany have in reserve in western Europe (and thus, weakening the eastern front even further)?

Britain can easily have more units in Egypt. Much more. Without too much pain for the late game in Europe. UK_London has ~150IPCs to spend untill Germany can have ~18STR to attack, and if they spend 39IPCs on units directly in Africa (for example: IC in Egypt Uk2, 3INF/turn from there), they can have ~35units in Egypt and still have 111IPCs left to spend in the Atlantic, or wherever they want. I’m not looking too much into the details here as to where the breakpoint is for the UK to spend too much into Africa, but obviously, the Brits could suffice with a little less units in Egypt. Even more units probably wouldn’t hurt, but finding that breakpoint is looking much more into details ;-).

In general, if Germany rushes, or its strategy leaves it too weak on land against Russia OR the Wallies after its commitment somewhere, it’s OK for the allies to start off with 'K’GF.
This bomberstrategy still looks weak on land units (on the defense) versus Russia, so i’m thinking what would the Wehrmacht do if they cannot stack themselves adjacent to the Russian stack?
On the other side, I think Russia actually can stack themselves adjacent to the German stack, later in the game.

But I may have gotten it all wrong, since I still need to playtetst this particular strategy  :-D.
I am absolutely positive however, that against a true axis economic strategy 'K’GF definately does not work at all. I just (still) doubt this ‘dark skies’ strategy has the potention to fall into this category.

[Arthur Bomber Harris]

ItIsILeClerc,

If there is a major landing force that is approaching the French shores, I would pull the German bombers back a bit closer for the counter strike.  I’m curious how you are proposing 40 units going to Normandy Turn 5.  That would mean that the US and the UK spends all of it’s money on troops and transports for the first three turns, correct?  There would be negligible protection of the transports for a counterstrike.  Additionally that means that there had been no money spent in the Pacific for the first three turns.  I always do a J1, as suggested by Cow.  If there is zero dollars spent for three turns, Japan has seven turns to run wild.  They have a good chance of victory in that time.  If I saw the Allies go KGF, I would definitely not try the German bomber strategy.  Instead, I would hunker down with cheap/defensive builds to slow down the invasion forces.  I would gleefully watch Japan grab the money islands, smash India, and head towards Australia.  Not much that those countries could do without American money.

Britain sure can have 35 units in Egypt.  In that case, Sea Lion should be a piece of cake on turn 6-8ish.

Please bring on your KGF!  That is the best way to guarantee Axis victory.

[ItIsILeClerc]

@Arthur:

ItIsILeClerc,

If there is a major landing force that is approaching the French shores, I would pull the German bombers back a bit closer for the counter strike.  I’m curious how you are proposing 40 units going to Normandy Turn 5.  That would mean that the US and the UK spends all of it’s money on troops and transports for the first three turns, correct?  There would be negligible protection of the transports for a counterstrike.  Additionally that means that there had been no money spent in the Pacific for the first three turns.  I always do a J1, as suggested by Cow.  If there is zero dollars spent for three turns, Japan has seven turns to run wild.  They have a good chance of victory in that time.  If I saw the Allies go KGF, I would definitely not try the German bomber strategy.  Instead, I would hunker down with cheap/defensive builds to slow down the invasion forces.  I would gleefully watch Japan grab the money islands, smash India, and head towards Australia.  Not much that those countries could do without American money.

Britain sure can have 35 units in Egypt.  In that case, Sea Lion should be a piece of cake on turn 6-8ish.Â

Please bring on your KGF!  That is the best way to guarantee Axis victory.

I could try to explain how the Uk can have ~35 units in Egypt without compromising their defenses in London but that would be so much detail (writing a lot of text) to such a little point… Isn’t it enough to know that it takes only 39IPCs off the investments the UK can make to protect London, out of a total of 150IPCs (over 5 turns)? I don’t think a 111IPC investment from the UK protecting London will make a Sea Lion a cake-walk. Ever. If using the FTR from London in Egypt is too dangerous for London later on, fine, then don’t use them in Egypt and Caïro will still have more-than-enough-31 defenders. Easy. Those FTR can base in Gibraltar and you can decide where they go. With an AB in Gibraltar they can go either Egypt or London… No. No, no, no, getting 30 to 35 defenders in Egypt does NOT compromise London defeses. It does however, take air units away from India. This is Always the dilemma for the UK (and is very closely related to what overall strategy the allies want follow).

We’re discussing a German bomber strategy, not a German turtle-offensive. If you change strategy, Allies can do that as well, ha-HA!
I agree that with a J1 there can never be a KGF. If you tell me that you’re preaching to the choir! USA only has ~100 early IPCs to spare for the Euro-front in this case. But I read J4 somewhere in this thread so, that’s what I am elaborating on…
If you throw a German turtle-offensive combined with a J1 at me, than I’d  respond with a KJF one way or the other no doubt. Best you keep in mind a German bomberstrategy is set in this thread, and the allies are supposed to react to that (who reacts to whom). If you change the axis strategy during the argument, it’s not a German bomberstrategy anymore…

Once again, and I’ll keep saying this, KJF is the standard for the allies that will give them best chance of winning. KGF almost never is. But… if the axis are rushing or making another strategical mistake, KGF will win the game for allies the quickest way. Right now I think the axis bomberstrategy falls under the category ‘rushing’. Why? Because the German ground defenses are seriously lacking. ALL the luftwaffe is required to assist in defending Western Europe AND the Eastfront, but they cannot be everywhere at the same time. Only if they position smartly (like in Novgorod) can they keep all their offensive windows open, but not defend everywhere.

[axis-dominion]

Here’s an XDAP team game currently going on at round 4 that seems to be a ‘KGF’ strategy against the all-bomber plan (bmnielsen is germany of course):

http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=35184.60

Seems to me the allies are holding their own here, and with fewer carriers in the pac than usual at this point in the game. As expected, with that many war ships and planes in the atlantic, there are significantly fewer transports…but I guess the transports can follow gradually once the allies dominate the seas. What’ll be interesting is to see how the allies can land anywhere without getting vaporized by all the bombers. It’ll require quite the patience no doubt.

On the other side, I don’t think India will last much longer. But hey, that’s usually the case anyway. Once India falls of course, the allies will have to be on their toes the rest of the game just to protect against a pac VC loss.

I’ll be paying attention to this one to see how it pans out for the allies.

[captainwalker]

I think Japan’s DOW on round 2 actually helped the allies in that game. If they had waited then the US wouldn’t have been able to have such a large fleet in the Atlantic so soon. And that may cause problems for Germany now.

[Arthur Bomber Harris]

It’s hard to follow this game without seeing a map of the board.  It seems that the Japanese player is quite inexperienced to let America keep the Philippines on J4…  I normally crush that territory on J1 to deprive the US 50 PUs over the course of the next ten turns.  Regardless, the United States has to start putting massive money into the Pacific ASAP because Japan has a 2:1 economic advantage over India + ANZAC.

[barney]

DL triplea and put it in your saved games. You’ll get the full visual effect then. :)

[Arthur Bomber Harris]

Thanks!  After seeing the map, I definitely can conclude that Japan is not a strong player.  They should have a much better economy at this point.  I don’t get the purchase of 2 more factories on turn 4 when there are few land units to oppose them…

[Young Grasshopper]

Been trying to keep up on this hot topic, and from what I’ve learned so far I think it’s important for Germany to have anywhere from 15-20 bombers (and that’s a new perception for me based on this thread) however… I don’t believe it’s necessary to have 20+ and ignore purchasing land units to that degree. On a different note , our group devalues strategic bombers slightly with our house rule which states “Strategic bombers conducting SBR only receive a +2 damage bonus if they have departed from an operational airbase”.

[Adam514]

You may want to consider reducing the effectiveness (damage) of bombing runs if there are interceptors that are launched as a house rule instead.

[barney]

@Young:

“Strategic bombers conducting SBR only receive a +2 damage bonus if they have departed from an operational airbase”.

A small but worthy change. I like it!

[Young Grasshopper]

@Adam514:

You may want to consider reducing the effectiveness (damage) of bombing runs if there are interceptors that are launched as a house rule instead.

Or maybe the +2 damage bonus during SBRs should be removed altogether.

[ItIsILeClerc]

Thanks for notice on this game, ADominion :).

Intercepted bombers should even SBR at reduced effectiveness. I’m okay with the +2 if not intercepted, but why not give them no bonus if intercepted and even a -2 per intercepted bomber that does not have an escort after interception and AAA-fire if there are interceptors left (not counting FTR that are on the ground that decided not to intercept).

For example, lets say 4STR and 3FTR SBR Moscow after interception combat and AAA-fire. There are  interceptors left, so 3STR (escorted by 3 FTR) roll @ no bonus, 1STR rolls @ -2. In effect, that’s rolling 4 dice and subtract 2 from the result.
Likewise, if after AAA-fire 13 surviving bombers (without escorts left) are intercepted (by whatever number of intercepting FTR still alive), they roll 13 dice and subtract 26 from the result. They will likely cause still cause 19 to 20 damage….

That would make intercepting much more a consideration. As does escorting. It is more effective to raid with 5STR + 5FTR than it is with 10STR unescorted…

[ChocolatePancake]

Honestly, if you’re resorting to a house rule then you’re admitting that the game is broken as is. I’m much more interested in discussing possible strategies for countering the bomber strategy using OOB rules.

[axis-dominion]

I would like to do some play testing as allies against anyone wanting or willing to try out this axis strategy. The stronger the player the better (e.g., a tier E, 1, or 2 preferred). We can make it a non-league game so there’s no competitive pressure there, and we’d be free to explore options. I now feel I’m losing my second game against this strategy, and let me tell you, I don’t lose a lot of games, but I do feel helpless against this one. I take some comfort at least in that I’m not the only one who’s struggling against it…as far as I can tell, NO ONE has yet to beat this strategy (Dizzknee said he hasn’t lost in 5 games using it, and I know bmnielsen is something like 10-0 between last season and this one so far). Sure there was that Allweneed game a while back, but unfortunately it never finished so it’s still hard to conclude anything out of that one.

Anyway, I’d like the game to be under similar conditions to the ones i’ve played already vs bmnielsen, which are:

1. allies get 20 bid
2. germany builds mostly bombers, but sometimes a fighter or two as needed, and mechs as needed (an occasional ss or dd of course)
3. J2 DOW (he seems to emphasize transports over factories)

He’s very good at using the Italians to gain a landing spot for the german bombers who can then air blitz the hell out of any unsuspecting stack. This forces allies to either really unstack and spread thin, or really stack up in just one or two critical places (in the middle east e.g.).

I can usually play at a pretty fast pace too. PM if interested.

[Young Grasshopper]

I am currently in the middle of a table top game with a friend and I am playing the Axis. I’ve got a very strong game going and I’m expecting to win eventually, it’s round 5 and I’ve only got 3 bombers for Germany, but I’ve also got 9 transports with naval support in the Baltic shucking to Leningrad. Is it too late to turn and do this bomber strat which should help me crack Egypt if I want to go there, and the Allied fleet which he will now build because my sealion fake is weak, or should I continue to use my transports and drive land units and SBR Moscow with the few bombers I have? In other words… is it too late to apply this strategy if you only have a few bombers and lots of transports for Germany on round 5?

[Young Grasshopper]

@axis-dominion:

I would like to do some play testing as allies against anyone wanting or willing to try out this axis strategy. The stronger the player the better (e.g., a tier E, 1, or 2 preferred). We can make it a non-league game so there’s no competitive pressure there, and we’d be free to explore options. I now feel I’m losing my second game against this strategy, and let me tell you, I don’t lose a lot of games, but I do feel helpless against this one. I take some comfort at least in that I’m not the only one who’s struggling against it…as far as I can tell, NO ONE has yet to beat this strategy (Dizzknee said he hasn’t lost in 5 games using it, and I know bmnielsen is something like 10-0 between last season and this one so far). Sure there was that Allweneed game a while back, but unfortunately it never finished so it’s still hard to conclude anything out of that one.

Anyway, I’d like the game to be under similar conditions to the ones i’ve played already vs bmnielsen, which are:

1. allies get 20 bid
2. germany builds mostly bombers, but sometimes a fighter or two as needed, and mechs as needed (an occasional ss or dd of course)
3. J2 DOW (he seems to emphasize transports over factories)

He’s very good at using the Italians to gain a landing spot for the german bombers who can then air blitz the hell out of any unsuspecting stack. This forces allies to either really unstack and spread thin, or really stack up in just one or two critical places (in the middle east e.g.).

I can usually play at a pretty fast pace too. PM if interested.

I’m bumping this for the new page.