There is another way to win…

Good analysis, I am fortunate to have played global quite a few times due to different groups and gaming buddys. I have seen the Allies win many times, however, I have never seen Berlin or Rome captured, and I have only see Tokyo fall once. Kinda proves your point right there. Congrats on reaching 5000 posts.

Gargantua,

I completely agree with your analysis of Axis and Allies being an ECONOMIC game, as well as Strategic, and Tactical.

I think the MOST USEFUL and often overlooked gaming unit is the INFANTRY.  You referred to it as a “Pawn”, and I concur in the conclusion of losing only the the pawns if you can manuever this to happen.  And you do that, of course, by surrounding your more expensive and important pieces with them.

This tends to lead to longer games,…but VICTORIOUS games!

This is also a great way to help “even” the disparity of incomes between the Axis and Allies.  If you force the Allies to put more of their (IPV value) in units back in the box as loses than you suffer, while at the same time attacking and encreasing your ECONOMIC base(IPC income) you could come to a “parity”, or even “superiority” of income.

Also, another point to consider is that(in a 1940-global game) the TOTAL income of the Allied powers is dispersed between several countries in several areas,…while the Axis powers can more easily concentrate their individual power.

I’ve found that one of our players who enjoys playing Germany or Russia seems to be enthralled with buying as many Tanks as he can(without a coresponding amount of Infantry).  This leads to what I call “The Balloon Theory”.  The player “blows up” his power with the Tanks and after several succeding battles, through attrition has lost all of his Infantry, and then I counter-attack and kill all of his expensive and powerful Tanks and “pop his balloon”.

Russia can be really interesting.  If not attacked, and she build numerous Infantry(almost exclusively), she transforms herself from a country with weak defenses to one that can attack.  With numerous Infantry combined with her “power” units, you will get some hits and be able to suffer losses without diluting your strength.

This is a wonderful game with many differrent ways to win.  And although flawed to a certain degree, it’s still the BEST and MOST FUN I’ve had in any game.  And it only get’s better with time.  Many new maps/games are being introduced and FMG and HBG are about to release an avalanche of new, well detailed units that will deeply enrich our gameplay.  I CAN’T WAIT !!!

“Tall Paul”

Garagantua - you are dead on. You captured several key point very well - the importance of keeping a close eye on relative IPC production, the importance of keeping flexibility in your game plan (and not falling prey to scripted moves), and the awareness of how economy leads to a feeling of inevitability in a game. The economy most often dictates who the winner will be.

My only addition would be the importance of a concept that goes hand-in-hand with a successful assault on the other player’s economy - initiative. A&A is a game in which forcing your opponent to react to you can take primacy over economy… but only for a time. Initiative, and tempo, will eventually fail when your opponent is simply outspending you (assuming decent to good purchases) over time.

Tell Paul - yes to Infantry! For example, as Germany, after G1’s naval build (to gain the initiative in the Atlantic!), I can’t help myself but build a healthy dose of Infantry, 10 per round when possible, as long as humanly possible. On land Armor, Mech, Artillery, even air power are secondary to stacks of neverending Infantry protecting your capital units… and in this case I consider an Armor or Fighter etc. to be a capital investment. They aren’t to be used in a trifling way.

Anyhow, good stuff Gargantua.

Stalingradski,

I’m putting you in for a PROMOTION, haha.  Keep it up and we may even be talking about a “Hero of the Soviet Union” for you, too.

You both have a very good grasp on the game and ALL of it’s intricacies. 
I completely agree with practically every word both of you have said.  I would be proud if I could ever have YOU, or GARGANTUA as partners in an A&A 1940-global game.  Or any other A&A game for that matter.

“Healthy Doses” of Infantry, as you say, are a excellent addition to the DOZENS of Aircraft and Tanks that the Japanese and Germans start the game with.  And CHEAP, too!  Not to mention they’re great guaranteers of holding onto your higher-priced, more powerful units.

I hope we get the EXPANDED A&A-The Naval Series; Coral Sea & The Solomons Campaign done before too long.  And who knows, maybe made into a computer version to be played on here.  Ya’ll both would be great partners(I’m from the South, and Ya’ll is a contraction for you all).  All I have to say is:  Attack!, repeat, Attack!

“Tall Paul”

We are talking about gaining a long term advantage here. This has been the philosophy I’ve always aimed for (I never cared about the victory cities, just getting the overall edge).

Do you really think the Axis can win in this manner (without victory cities at all) against an equally highly competent allied player who plays with the same approach?

The Axis do start with a unit / position edge, but it’s kind of slim compared to the initial allied industrial advantage (at least that’s what the math I’m doing shows here)

Omega,

I would say YES,…it’s p o s s i b l e.  And a valid “strategy” to have(along with all the others just mentioned, here).

Remember, I also said that Axis & Allies was slightly(?) flawed.  And by that I meant it’s slant towards an Allied Victory.  I think everyone would agree with this.  I mean everyones on what,…Alpha-3 now.

“Tall Paul”

I agree on the fact that most games are won by unconditional surrender.  Games are too long to finish and can take FOREVER if you KNOW you are losing to get your opponent to actually win the game.  Not because he is delaying (or she in my case) but because the board is so large that you have to really stage up.

I also agree that there is no ONE WAY to win.  Many thought Sea Lion was THE way to win, until Russia ended up taking half of Europe and becomming a behemoth.  Others think Barbarossa is THE WAY to win, but you cannot just IGNORE the board.

Axis and Allies is about TWO things:  Money and Pieces on the Board.  If you have 500 IPC and no units, you will lose.  If you have only one territory and a 5000 IPC army, you probably already lost (and how did you get a 5000 IPC army with only one territory anyway?)  Position and finances are what win.  Granted, America is such a pain in the arse because it earns a double nation’s salary, but as we found in KAF games, if you hit them really early, they crumple.  And that was THE WAY to win for a while too. (Then the Larry-meister killed the whole tactic, so we’ll never really know the true power or failure of it.)

I disagree that the first round is scripted.  Germany 1 is scripted, everything else is a reaction to the board.  You want your opponent to react MORE to what you do than what you have to react for what he does, but it is all reaction.  Russia buys 6 armor and nothing else, you have to react.  England puts carriers in the water, you have to react.  Germany buys 10 armor, you have to react.  Your reaction might be along what you want to do, but it is still a reaction.

I feel, there are two reasons to attack.

1)  To deny the enemy it’s territory, and give you an economic boost.  Generally this ends up “trading” but could work out in your benefit through casualties, which is the real hope of trading in my opinion.

2)  To get you closer to your goals.

Two is more important than one, but there are times where you want to use one over two.  Example:  8 Fighters, 5 Tactical Bombers, 2 Strategic Bombers vs 3 Infantry, Fighter in China (all Chinese.)  You will probably lose more  in units than China will, but it is still a victory since you killed their only fighter and they will never get it back.

That said, I am still going to destroy you in our game, Gargantua.  Not because there is only one strategy, but because you underestimate me and that is the most deadly thing you can do in this game. mwuhahahaha.

I might have forgot to move the piece…it should be in SZ 115.

I wish my infantry could procreate on the battlefield like must be happening when some of my detractors attempt, in vain, to derail my argument. The absolute BEST was when Switch started sending his German Fighters to three different territories to block the upcoming American turn in his discussions!  In retrospect that was the funniest damn thing ever!  Had to play him a game of Kill Japan First to prove to him I wasn’t full of hot air. (And I beat the snot out of him too!)

Just because my strategies do not seem “main stream” does not mean they are “bad”.  A lot of alternate stream strategies work out just fine against new opponents that have not seen them yet or against certain opponents who have less skill dealing with those kinds of attacks.  More games are won through emotion than through dice!  Make your opponent FEEL like he is losing, and he’ll quit.

Gargantua I could not agree more! Cost analysis is a key component to any successful game. Many a time I have tried to argue against the more far reaching ideas, like back during A&A pacific 1940’s initial release people were saying that you could lose planes when taking territories from China, which is just ridiclious! I have always argued that any attack should be made where it will make you the most money be it in actual territory value or NO money, or if it positions you in a nesscary space.

I have seen some very far flung and very difficult to follow stratgies posted by a number of people here and most of them tend to ignore this principle. I can not take seriously a stratgey that dosnt not take this into consideration, or has a country ignore its own objectives to further some other less valuable goal. If playing as the Axis, you should do all in your power to make each Axis nation as strong economically as possible. It helps reduce the gap between you and the Allies, espically America. As the allies, do everything in your power to blunt or block their economic groth. The UK placing an IC in egypt and doing the taranto raid on UK1 is a great way to both block Italys economic groth and bulnt their relative economic strenght. The Germans wiping out the royal navy while convoy raiding the UK and sending troops to back the Italians in North Africa is a great way to blunt the Uk ecnomically while expanding both Germanys and Italys economy.

Thank you for posting this

@Clyde85:

Gargantua I could not agree more! Cost analysis is a key component to any successful game. Many a time I have tried to argue against the more far reaching ideas, like back during A&A pacific 1940’s initial release people were saying that you could lose planes when taking territories from China, which is just ridiclious! I have always argued that any attack should be made where it will make you the most money be it in actual territory value or NO money, or if it positions you in a nesscary space.

I disagree with this for one attack and one attack only.

I am perfectly willing to send 8 fighters, 5 tactical bombers and 2 strategic bombers to kill 3-5 Chinese Infantry and the Chinese fighter because it ends, permanently, the Chinese from having a high value attack and defense unit.  It will most likely cost me 2 or 3 planes.

@Cmdr:

I am perfectly willing to send 8 fighters, 5 tactical bombers and 2 strategic bombers to kill 3-5 Chinese Infantry and the Chinese fighter because it ends, permanently, the Chinese from having a high value attack and defense unit.  It will most likely cost me 2 or 3 planes.

If you are in a position where you would need to do that then you have placed yourself in a very bad position. There are 3 territories in China you need to worry about as Japan, Kiangsu, Kwangtung and Yunnan. For economic, victory, and positioning reasons they are they only territories worth worrying about(yes Shangtung and Manchuria are important, but I have never seen China realisticly threaten any of these). You should never have to worry about taking planes as casualties espically against China. Concentrate your troops in anhui and Hunan, bring reinforcments into Kwangsi, and Hit Yunan on another turn.

@Clyde85:

@Cmdr:

I am perfectly willing to send 8 fighters, 5 tactical bombers and 2 strategic bombers to kill 3-5 Chinese Infantry and the Chinese fighter because it ends, permanently, the Chinese from having a high value attack and defense unit.  It will most likely cost me 2 or 3 planes.

If you are in a position where you would need to do that then you have placed yourself in a very bad position. There are 3 territories in China you need to worry about as Japan, Kiangsu, Kwangtung and Yunnan. For economic, victory, and positioning reasons they are they only territories worth worrying about(yes Shangtung and Manchuria are important, but I have never seen China realisticly threaten any of these). You should never have to worry about taking planes as casualties espically against China. Concentrate your troops in anhui and Hunan, bring reinforcments into Kwangsi, and Hit Yunan on another turn.

Not necessarily.  I used to never attack Russia with Japan, in which case, killing the Chinese fighter only made tactical sense.  Without it, you are no longer limited to where you have your equipment, as you will never face anything but infantry and the occasional artillery unit.  Losing 3 of 15 aircraft to kill the fighter makes sense in that equation.  Also, trading 6 or 7 more to take India early on makes sense to me, as now you can start threating (maybe not doing, but threatening) Russia’s underbelly with Japan and Italy instead of just Italy.

@Stalingradski:

Tell Paul - yes to Infantry! For example, as Germany, after G1’s naval build (to gain the initiative in the Atlantic!), I can’t help myself but build a healthy dose of Infantry, 10 per round when possible, as long as humanly possible. On land Armor, Mech, Artillery, even air power are secondary to stacks of neverending Infantry protecting your capital units… and in this case I consider an Armor or Fighter etc. to be a capital investment. They aren’t to be used in a trifling way.

Of course we are in the realm of personal play style, but when I am going Barbarrossa I prefer to build arty on G2.  Considering the large numbers of German inf already at the front, adding some slow oomph to the stack seems to be a priority.  Also when I take forward IC’s they end up pumping out inf to rebuild my stack of defensive units.  Still I try and have enough inf/art to keep my tanks alive in the moscow battle.

@Cmdr:

Not necessarily.  I used to never attack Russia with Japan, in which case, killing the Chinese fighter only made tactical sense.  Without it, you are no longer limited to where you have your equipment, as you will never face anything but infantry and the occasional artillery unit.  Losing 3 of 15 aircraft to kill the fighter makes sense in that equation.  Also, trading 6 or 7 more to take India early on makes sense to me, as now you can start threating (maybe not doing, but threatening) Russia’s underbelly with Japan and Italy instead of just Italy.

China is not a priority and will never be able to threaten the areas of importance once you have reinforced yourself there. Losing planes to take India does make sense because you will have all of Indias income if you succeed, gain a 5IPC NO for Japan, and take a territory that is worth 3IPC, plus have knocked out a major producing power that was against you. You cant really knock out the Chinese, not like you can with India, so its a wasted effort. Take down their economy, take Yunnan, but sacrficing 30IPCs to gain 1IPC, deny your opponent 7IPC(provided your even fighting over Yunnan), to destroy a single 10IPC unit (the infantry are irrelevent as your main declared target if the fighter) is not an equal exchange.

In a conversation based on economic advantage, I haven’t seen any mention of National Objectives. Of course we can assume that it goes without saying, but because they have the power to draw units in places that may be vulnerable, No’s can not be ignored in a war of economic attrition. With Italy in particular, NO’s (once achieved) can become difficult to pry away, thus preventing their objectives becomes a huge priority for the Allies, even if position and odds aren’t on their side.

NO’s are probably the only thing keeping things balanced.  IMHO.