Italy Painted Pieces

@squirecam said in Italy and Anzac Strategies?:

@barnee said in Italy and Anzac Strategies?:

@anzacguy said in Italy and Anzac Strategies?:

@surfer I have never heard of the Gibraltar Defense(I am a new player). Could you explain the strategy behind it?

it’s discussed here https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/33835/why-is-taranto-raid-so-popular/30?page=2

some top players talk about it

And it doesn’t work. Because Germany should always take Southern France and Italy should either attack with a German follow up or take Algeria and let the Germans attack first.

heh heh was just pointing out where it was discussed since he hadn’t heard of it. JDOW was League Champion or at least in the Finals. Oystello and Simon both Top Players. Sure I missed a few, but wouldn’t dismiss their opinions as unviable :)

This is an issue I wish the game by vanilla would just let you turn over control of territory to your allies as this happened a lot between Germany and Italy. I have allowed enemies forces to capture a territory just so I can turn it over to another.

Thanks for the feedback guys!  Very thought out reply TheMethuselah, that helps, thanks.  I was thinking that 8 Mechanized Infantry might be enough and that some might only use two, so I was surprised to see that 12 can be used by many of the major powers.  Are you sure that there could be 12 different Mechanized Infantry on 12 different territories?  I could see that if Russia was attacking Japanese forces in Asia by land or vice versa.  I was also surprised to see 6 additional fighters for Italy, which would make 8 total.  I had thought that 4 might do it, so I really appreciate your input.  If anyone has a different experience, I’d love to hear from a variety of people, since I never know who I might be playing with and what units might be realistically used with the various strategies out there.

I imagine my mental estimate for fighters and bombers of other countries is off as well.  Do you have an aircraft estimate for some (or all) of the other countries?

Right now I just have some sub par quality photos of the Europe pieces, but maybe I can post those some time; the IJN probably is my best work, but I don’t have any good photos right now.  If I have free time I should be painting rather than setting up a photo shoot.  I’ll plan to post a link here if I end up posting them.  Thanks for the interest.

Italy’s job is threefold:
1:  Keep the UK spending to crush Italy
2:  Assist in Russia
3:  Lure the US Fleet past Gib and into the Med

With that being said, the Italian Navy is important to protect, requiring a DD to be purchased in Round 1.  This will draw more UK attention to the Med, which gives Germany more breathing room to advance on Moscow.  Provided your fleet was not decimated in SZ97, ferry units into Yugo with the TT and at least 1 Armor, possibly 2.

Assisting with Russia being your second goal pretty much requires that Italy activates Bulgaria on Round 1 and Italy either reinforcing the German Flank in Romania on I2 or if there is no immediate threat, clearing out Greece before the Brits activate it.  If Italy purchases a Bomber on Round 2, it puts 2 Bombers and somewhere in the range of 6-8 Inf plus 2 Armor in range of Eastern Poland, or Bess.  You even have a shot to can open Western Ukraine at this point, or if Russia is really incompetent, Ukraine MAY be open via an Armor Blitz (provided 2 Armor went into Yugo on Round 1, and reinforced Romania on I2.)  In any case, Italy can stand to gain some IPC and really create problems on the German Southern Flank in Russia.

As for the last goal for Italy, you need to continue to engage the UK into the Med through the time the US enters the war.  Usually this requires naval investments, I prefer to try to get at least 1 DD in every round.  At some point you’ll need to redirect your Bombers back to Rome / Southern France.  You’re goal is to force the Allies to defend SZ91 and interrupt the US TT rotation.  You need to be very opportunistic here and wait for the Allies to expose TT as lightly defended.  This doesn’t always happen, but it is devastating when it does and you can fly 2-3 Bombers and a send a few SS to potentially sink the TT rotation and buy breathing room.  If this doesn’t look like it could happen, you just have to turtle up and encourage the US to land on Rome and not Normandy or S.France.  The whole goal being to keep the US fleet in the Med and out of reinforcement for multiple turns outside of the 3 units it can place on whatever complex it takes.

I jest, of course  :-D

Also, I always posture for a potential Sealion to force UK economy to stay home.

@LHoffman:

That’s pretty good for someone with little professed talent.

I do like the Stukas and US carriers especially.

Did you use decals for the stars on the carriers?

thanks mate… Yes, that is decals on the carriers… But on some units I paint the star… But thats a bit tricky :)

@deadbunny:

the USA can build a massive fleet and either take Rome or move into Africa(I have seen both done in a single turn).

Do you mean building the fleet and taking Rome and Africa in the same turn? I must be misunderstanding this post.

Well, if I had written it, I think I would have been referring to SZ 92 which is where the US may want to be at the end of turn 4. It can dump troops into both Italy and Egypt. Maybe as a turn to take away victory cities? Otherwise, I’d just go straight for Italy and reinforce it next turn.