Eastern US to sea zone 9 = 1 move?

with Russia invested in China (IC in Szechwan and raised territory value to 3) and getting the IPCs, pluss the turn order allowing to consolidate, made a KJF more viable. My friend tried it one game but made a couple mistakes with positioning

@xlome_00 Sea Lion is one of those attacks where the threat is mightier than the execution. If you buy a carrier for the Baltic Fleet on G1, that’s a reasonable purchase anyway to protect your supply lines to Norway/Finland/Leningrad/Baltics. If you move the German Med transport to the central Med, it is protected by the Italian fleet and can reinforce Libya, which is a reasonable move anyway. If you then bring the Italian fleet to take Gibraltar and retake Morocco, that helps score your NOs, so that’s a normal attack. So all of these preparatory moves can be done with minimal cost to the standard Axis war effort.

But then the American bomber cannot sink the German transport without landing in either Egypt (where it will die on a G2 Egypt attack) or Caucasus (where it spoils the Russian NO.)

If they leave your Med transport alive, you move it to Western Med on G2 where Italian fleet protects it again, build a second transport in Baltic on G2 plus an extra plane, and now you are threatening UK with 3 inf, 3 tank, 1 CA, 4 ftr, 1 bmr on a hypothetical G3 sea lion.

UK can of course defend against this, but they will have to build a fat infantry stack in London instead of factories, ships, or air power. This could cost them the Atlantic fleet or at least force them to retreat it back to Canada; if they built a factory in Africa / India, they might lose it because they cannot afford to build units there on a critical turn. Meanwhile those infantry in London will just sit there inefficiently for several turns because there are not enough transports to ship them anywhere, and not enough warships to protect the Atlantic fleet in a forward position.

Your second Baltic transport is reasonably useful for shipping inf/art to Leningrad, and the extra fighter can of course be used for trading on the eastern front, defending France, etc. as usual.

So you never actually attack London in an AA50 game – you just quietly threaten to attack it, thereby forcing the Allies to waste much more money on defense than you spent on creating the threat.

I’ve changed my strategy!I hit egypt first round with germany.take out sz12 with 2 fighters and sub.sz2with fighter ,bomber suband now leave canadian trans alone.don’t want to spread out too much.lower all the risk a little and save a fighter hopefully.
I had a game yesterday where italy landed in london unopposed.how did this happen?when you bring in the jap navy into the mediterainan ?(2 carriers battlship 4 fighters)and combine this with the itallian fleet you can now almost destroy the allied convoy system and or make there purchases of navel units skyrocket.I’m planning next game to nip that in the bud.have the usa hold the jap fleet back in the pacific and destroy the itallian fleet round one or 2 befroe the japs get therewith british or american bombers and or navel units.I now play germany very defenceively,buying time for the the japs to come in.Seems like the allies should always win ,they should be able to counter anything with there vast resourses.It just a matter of catching the off guard.Do not do a german tank blits.Russians can just build infantry to soak them up and then you losse france to americans coming over from canada.
SIDEPOINT      ATTENTION hardcore  players.Something is bugging me……should not french madagascar be in german control because it was in december 1941 the british had to invade so it wasn’t in german control anylonger…what about french west africa too and also Italian east africa I think they all should be under axis control…what are your thoughts?

Reason I like buying subs for my japan is cheep fodder.  Usually if US goes pacific i’m stalling to hold on to my money islands just long enough to crush russia, not to actually fight the US.  Because of that, cost is everything to me.

If I wanted an actual show down i’ll focus on fighters (as my 3 carriers can typically allow 12 to attack if based properly) and bombers with a sprinkling of DDs.

@Octopus:

Interesting topic (for it goes beyond the obvious).

I just finished a long game as the Axis and the potential to sink the Allied fleet was always on my mind. At one point I did pull it off and sink the British fleet after entering SZ 8. The kicker was the cost benefit of attacking the fleet that made it a no brainer. Fighters are worth 10 while cruisers are worth 12. Going 1 for 1 is a cost benefit. The Allied fleet’s cheapest unit defends the strongest (a fighter at a 4) meaning they will lose their cheapest units last and sacrafice their most expensive units early.

Keep in mind that bombers cost the same as a cruiser while having a higher attack value. The advantage goes to the airforce.

Having a fleet with 2 Cruisers, a battleship, and a carrier (with 2 fighters) is looking to get popped by an airforce that consists of fighters and bombers (assume comparable combat values). Economics demands it (especially if there are 4 juicy transports in tow).

To this end, I think the destroyer (cost of 8) is fantastic as a fighter/bomber eater as it will clearly take the fall for the more expensive ships that need to stay in the fight.

Good Luck!

Right.  Regardless of Capital ships the UK (or US) needs some DDs to shift the cost differential.  With 1 BB and maybe 2 DDs, you are only losing 16 ipcs for 3 hits while Germany would be losing 10 for each ftr.  I typically like to have just enough DDs + intial BB hits for the first wave of a potential G attack.  So 6 ftrs require 3 Allied DDs.  The good thing is you can split the cost of DDs between UK and US, meaning each could supply 1-2.  If you buy 1 AC, 1 CA, 1 DD on UK 1 and US follows with 1 AC, 1 DD on US 1, you probably won’t need another DD unless Germany makes a significant investment in more air.  In Rd 3 you can have a stacked Sz 6 fleet (additional UK3 buy if needed) and also enough to protect Sz 12 with the US ships.

It is beneficial to have a few US ships with firepower in Sz 6 (prior to moving to sz 5) if the Ita ftr is lingering around Fra.  A loaded US AC also gives the US some fighting power up north, even if you only get 1-2 trns up there it still helps and gives you some punch, but it is not enough of an investment to cripple you if you need to start spending in tha Pac or Afr.

@Lynxes:

I think DM is on the right track here, you need to have a core of your fleet in place early and then add DDs as fodder during the game. Getting caught having to buy expensive ships in mid-game when you should be pumping out land units that land in Europe is a bad idea. Also, you need a mix of high and low strength units. 1 CV+2 fig, 2 CA, 2-3 DDs is a nice fleet to have as UK and not too hard to reach. A CV is, as many have said, mandatory, having your fighters parked in UK is useless. And if you send fighters to Karelia, you should STILL buy a CV and put US or UK fighters on it.

Yes, it is a lot easier to find an extra 8 ipcs to buy a dd mid game then to worry about an AC buy.  Plus, if you have enough Capital ships early Germany usually won’t even bother contesting the Atlantic.