What to do with Italy

@all-encompassing-goose

Though if Japan could take India, they would’ve taken Yunnan already.

It’s virtually the only way to move from Europe to China.

Germany helping Italy in the Med all depends on if you are looking to knock Russia out with a quick punch or throttle them slowly to death. If you’re taking the long game approach, a German fleet in the Med is worth every IPC. It creates an incredible headache for the Allied player who expects to dominate the Med early. Then it becomes an arms race, and guess who is closer to their supply lines?

And once the Med becomes an arms race, the Allied player often stops buying as much with the US in the Pacific… and Japan can wear down Russia from the back.

Just general thoughts - game by game will obviously be variable.

I say Germany always because Germany is your powerhouse as far as income, and the more income you can bring in for Germany the better chance you have of taking Russia since you can spend more, while I do like to bring an Italian Force into Russia this force is there to support the German force, take the first hits in counter attacks and keep my German units around much longer, Southern France also allows the Germans to build their own fleet to transport units to africa which can give you a big boost and can usually bring an Axis victory in the Med.

@creeping-deth87 Italy needs no help if played correctly.

I jest, of course  :-D

If you try it out, you’ll see that the U.K. can’t sufficiently reinforce France, even with the additional 6 French troops, from having Germany crush it on round 2.  Even if every available plane is landed there, and the strafe leaves 2 tanks plus the fighter, it’s impossible to hold.  So all that landing planes accomplishes is wiping out the British airforce (and keeping France from falling to Italy).  The payoff isn’t worth it.

The biggest downsides I can imagine are that (1) it is much more difficult to hold off serious landings at Normandy by the US and/or UK.  Italy then has to protect Western Europe and the Med–although with Germany taking S France, they can dump ships in the Med as well if it comes to that (subs backed up by planes would be cheap).  And (2) delaying the war on the Pacific side until round 3 (which would make this work much better at times, depending on the US builds) means that UK Pacific can shuttle some troops over.

The really nice thing about this strategy is that it’s more efficient to have Italy be the 1 force in the Med, and not have to worry about building enough ships off the S France factory right away to protect them from UK planes.

I think it’s going to be the standard opening in our play group for the foreseeable future.

The counter someone mentioned above about making sure to buy troops in S Africa–either mechs, or infantry/artillery to go with transports, in combination with some shuttling from India, is probably the safe response.

Grover and I just started another game, with me being the Axis, and I’ve got to say I’m enjoying the big Italian boost.

Finally got most of everything posted (minus Germany) on Ebay. For whoever is interested!

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=290544985361&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

Thats ANZAC but if you search my sales the rest will follow. Any questions please ask!