Balance Europe

Well, have you tried SBR’s on Germany? You should be able to hold out with Russia until the US has been at war with Germany and Italy for a number of rounds. If you send a large force of strategic bombers to Britain (and possibly have a British airforce as well), you should be able to inflict a lot of damage on Germany. Of course the latter can station lots of fighters in Germany as well, but then they are likely to lose them as well in significant numbers and the Germans can less afford this than the Americans/British can.

There are two major factories in Germany. In total you could theoretically inflict 40 IPCs worth of damage on these two factories. Even if you solely focus on Western germany (within excort range), if you manage to make the Germans spend 15-20 IPC each turn on repairs, and/or not being able to place a great many new units there, I feel you should buy Russia enough time to turn the tide.

I agree that Pacific really favours the Axis 9at least with the OOB set up) but as far as Europe 4o is concerned, I find it a lot more balanced, especially using the Alpha 3.9 set up!

Just my 2 cents.

Umm…unless I’m missing something, bombers in UK can’t even hit Berlin.

@techroll42:

Umm…unless I’m missing something, bombers in UK can’t even hit Berlin.

Correct. I missed that. But even if you solely focus on Western Germany, you could still inflict quite a lot of damage. You could target Bordeaux/Normandy and/or France as well to make a landing easier. These will generally also be less heavily defended by fighters and AA guns. Of course they are less of a priority to Germany as well, but as i said, it WILL make an amphibious landing considerably easier (and faster) and largely prevent a full scale counter-attack from France if done consistently. If the germans want to place units anyway, of course they can, but that’ll cost them IPCs.

I used to do well with Italy before Alpha. Now it is hard to get any momentum going. Was Italy not messed up by UK on T1 and did the US not try to take Rome after retaking Gib and morocco? Italy is the weak link.

funny, I find that the Europe OBB slants towards the Allies overwhelmingly.  All the allies have to do is kill the Italian fleet round 1, then build up to crash into western Europe.  The only trick is you have to make sure you have Cairo when Moscow falls.  Usually by this time, the US is so strong that it can either take Italy or Western Germany, particularly if they have built a 10 factory in Southern France.

I think most Axis took Cairo. Was too easy OOB. What did for me as the Axis was my opponent discovering taking Korea and building a Major there  killed Japan.The factory build was my real OOB gripe. Now sorted of course.

[quote author=Karl7 link=topic=26948.msg969490#msg969490 date=1338908686]
funny, I find that the Europe OBB slants towards the Allies overwhelmingly.  All the allies have to do is kill the Italian fleet round 1, then build up to crash into western Europe.  The only trick is you have to make sure you have Cairo when Moscow falls.  Usually by this time, the US is so strong that it can either take Italy or Western Germany, particularly if they have built a 10 factory in Southern France.
[/quote]

Doesn’t Southern France het “liberated”. so it would be controlled by France rather than the US or would the territory of France (proper) have to be conquered to achieve that?

[quote author=Koningstiger link=topic=26948.msg969944#msg969944 date=1338973891]
[quote author=Karl7 link=topic=26948.msg969490#msg969490 date=1338908686]
funny, I find that the Europe OBB slants towards the Allies overwhelmingly.�  All the allies have to do is kill the Italian fleet round 1, then build up to crash into western Europe.�  The only trick is you have to make sure you have Cairo when Moscow falls.�  Usually by this time, the US is so strong that it can either take Italy or Western Germany, particularly if they have built a 10 factory in Southern France.
[/quote]

Doesn’t Southern France het “liberated”. so it would be controlled by France rather than the US or would the territory of France (proper) have to be conquered to achieve that?
[/quote]

Paris (France proper) would need to be liberated for Normandy or Southern France to flip back to French control.  Often this isn’t desired until the game is a guaranteed Allied win.

@theROCmonster:

I also kill the Italy fleet R1. Problem is that Italy just builds all infantry. Germany finishes off UK’s fleet. UK now only has 2 dd’s and a cruiser (if it survives the battle against the dd when cruiser and fighter attack it off malta). UK looses all fleet surrounding UK, except the dd. Looses the fleet of canada 50% of the time. Germany even after killing off UK’s fleet that hit Italy will have 10 planes left on average. UK now has to continue to build up a fleet, which will take a while. Italy is still making somewhere in the 20 range for 4 turns. This is because Uk’s fleet is dead in Med and he has no fleet left to challenge with. Italy still has her DD and Sub left more than likely. I also like to build a sub infantry R1 with italy. UK can build a factory in Egypt and Slaughter Italy in a couple rounds and keep his money down, but then Germany is a Juggernaut up north. Russia dies 100% of the time. There is no stopping it, and if you want an exibition I can show you. If played with Low Luck Germany takes Russia on round 7-9 depending with 40+ units left. Probably 15 tanks 20 Mechs and 5 Artillery… And Germany would loose 2 planes. Leaving germany with 8 planes and a ton of two move units to take the rest of Russia and then the oil fields and then Egypt, and that is game over. When the allies finally get to land in Europe. Not till Turn 5 at earliest. UK needs US support so much I have never been able to land with just UK alone. T5 is probably a landing force of around 16 for US in Italy, Normandy, Western Germany (if opponet is foolish), or Norway. With UK now being able to drop 8-10 men as well. This seems like a bunch, but if they go north, and UK hasn’t built a factory in Egypt, then Italy has already overun Africa and is making 30, as well as Germany having no pressure from UK in Russia. This 26 Ground unit force seems like overwhelming power, until you see that Italy has 40+ infantry with tanks, mechs, arty, and planes to attack and defend Germany with. Germany can literally spend 5 rounds strait against Russia. I normally build a Sub, Carrier, Transport with Germany first round, but after that 4 strait rounds of buy vs Russia. Then on the 5th turn on I just build in the factories I have conquered in Russia. This is usually 3 tanks (18) and 3 infantry or arty (9-12 depending). Lets say that is 30 spent against Russia. Russia at this point in time has at best 20 dollars. You are building 6 and he is building 6. While yours are greatly supperier, as well as your initial ground force after turn 5 is twice as large as russias and you have 10 planes to her 3… So 30 dollars is built against Germany. This leaves 30-40 to be built in western Germany and Germany. With the 50 Units Italy has, and 10 planes from Germany (8 being fighters/tacs) As well as Germany probably has 10 infantry+ of her own defending. The allies have a rough rough time on turn 5 Landing in Mainland Europe. They can grab a foothold in Normandy, or Norway really easily. This then leaves US’s transports 2 turns from home. Meaning they will probably only be able to bring 6 infantry and 3 tanks a turn to mainland Europe at best. This means that Around T6 US will have 29 Units in normandy if she choose to land there, or 26 if she choose to land in norway. Then she has to make the trip home. 3 transports cost 21+6 at 18 infantry equals 39. Leaving her inital 55 at 16. If in normandy that is 2 tanks and an arty. If in Norway that is another transport artillery and infantry. Meaning either 8 or 9 landing a turn, roughly, in Europe. Once the Initial transport force of 8 transports return home, she will have that turn, hopefully, 30 units to pick up and be in Europe in 2 turns. This will be on turn 9 as it takes 4 turns to return home to fill up and then bring them back to Europe again. UK, at this time, should have built a factory in Egypt on T2 or I don’t see how the allies win at all… Will be building 3 infantry in Egypt, and 10 infantry (probably less until turn 7 because of the initial infantry buy to protect london), hopefully for her 5 transports if she could afford it earlier on. This means UK will be from T5 onwards building, at max if she is lucky, 10 infantry for Europe a turn. So with US’s 8-9 infantry and UK’s 10 they have 18 or 19 combined. If Italy played it smart, and wasn’t convoyed to death from T5 on by US/UK then she should be making around 10 dollars or more. If not and she was convoyed, she still should be making 3-5 a turn. Meaning 1-2 Infantry everyturn, plus the Initial all infantry buy after T1. She will have roughly 50 units to defend or attack with at the end of her 5th turn. She does all the attrition battles, leaving Germany the ability to stack 20 units a turn after R 7-9, depending on when Russia was killed. Then if Egypt has lets say 20 units she just brings her stack of 35 2 move units down and takes the oilfields and Egypt and Game over from there because Germany will be making 100+. How do the allies ever win this? I’d love to play anyone in a game playing as the axis. I’d like to play Low Luck just to show you how the dominance works. Dice can get crazy dice, and when you thought you would win a battle 99% of the time you actually loose. So to have a fair argument play Low Luck and see just how impossibly hard it is to defeat the axis in Europe… If you need an outline for every turns buy with Italy and Germany it isn’t very hard.

T1 Germany
Carrier
Sub
Transport
Save 1 dollar
T2 you should have 69-70, Depending on whether you decided to take normandy (personally I don’t take normandy and send every Ground unit that can reach to France plus a tac bomber. I have done the math and tac bomber nets you .75 TUV’s over not sending her in, in a Low Luck scenario, even more in regular dice). This means that you should have 6 tanks 4 mechs (I think that is what you start with) and 0-1 artillery left in france. Kill Fleets in 110 and 111 with your 10 planes that can reach 2 subs in each sector, and your BB in sectory 110. Put enough planes in each sector so as to make a scramble suicide. Most of the time you will come out with a damaged BB in 110, and 0 subs in 111. No loss in planes nearly ever in LL on first turn. The odds are around 20%, with 16.3% coming from France’s AA gun. So you are left with 12 planes. 9 in Wester Germany, 2 on your carrier in sea zone 112, and 1 in southern Italy. The southern Italy fighter should come from Romania and kill yugaslavia with every other ground unit that can’t attack france, except for 1 infantry that will activate Bulgaria’s 4 infantry. This is Germanys first turn.

Italy somewhat depends on what UK does, but most of the time I build:

1 sub
1 Infantry
save 1 dollar

Kill french fleet with all fleet, depending once again on what UK does, or with 1 sub and 3 planes. Either way in LL you only loose sub at worst. Move all your ground forces in Africa to get in range of Egypt. Take southern Europe, and hold off on taking Greece, unless your fleet was kept alive. This is T1 with Italy.

T2 Germany buy:

With 69
11 Infantry
9 Artillery (1 move more expensive units always in Germany)

T2 Germany is simple. Kill any fleet that UK has left that you can, and move all ground forces over towards russia. Take Normandy and holland back from france. Possibly move your fleet down and take Gilbralter, and after this is done, I would advise sending one transport with and infantry over to Africa, so if Egypt falls from Italy Germany gets her 5 NO. Then just send the fleet back to 112 for saftey and then keep her there for as long as possible, until you are forced to retreat to baltic.

T2 Italy buy:

Have at minimum 14 IPC’s, and sometimes more.

2 infantry
2 artillery

Italy’s turn here really depends on what UK did. Sometimes I’d buy just 2 transports if UK did something funky so I could take Egypt on T3. Move into Alexandria if you can hold it from a counter attack. This puts enormous pressure on UK. Take Greece this turn. You should have 2 tanks 3 infantry and 1 arty or just 2 tanks 4 infantry plus your 2 fighters bomber and bombard. Ethiopian men just depends on the situation.

Germany T3:

Buy with  51

9 artillery (Germany)
1 infantry
1 Mech infantry (Western)
1 DD (to kill Russian sub off convoy zone)

This turn you finally get all your forces together for a T4 attack. That is pretty much all you do. Very easy turn.

Italy T3:

Buy with 25 (SF, Greece, original territories, hopefully, and 10 for NO’s. No ships in med, and holding Gib, Greece, and SF).

7 infantry 1 Artillery.

Moves depend on UK too much for me to speculate at this point.

Germany T4

Buy with 51

8 mechs
3 tanks
Save 1

Attack The whole border of russia, and Stack everything, that you didn’t use to attack besarabia and Eastern poland, in Eastern Europe. This gives your opponet no idea what your motives are. You can take lenningrad in two turns automatically. You can walk right into Moscow, or you can go south (this is what I almost always do). South is where the real money is at. If my opponet leaves Lenningrad heavily defended I just walk right into moscow and auto take on T7 because the units in Lenningrad cant make it back to Moscow in time. Either way I push south. You should have 10 units in finland at this time. I would stack all of these on the border of lenningrad, if not heavily defended.

Italy T4:

25 Dollars max at this point

7 infantry
1 arty

Just try and defend your capital, northern Italy, and western Germany. If you don’t think you can defend all three, normally you can block by putting a DD of Gilbralter buying you 1 more turn to bolster you defense. This should leave you with a grand total of 1+4+7+7 in buys=19 at minimum, plus your 6 infantry origianly in Southern Italy, plus 2 infantry from plus probably 2 arty from northern italy, plus 2 tanks from albania and northern italy. Plus, most of the time I evacuate all the men I can from Africa if I can’t take Egypt. This leaves me with 6 extra men. 2 tanks, 1 arty, and 3 inf. Plus your 2 fighter and bomber. In all we have 19+6+2+2+2+2+1+3+2+1=40 units. Sometimes more sometimes less. This is at the end of your 4th turn buy. Turn 5 could see you making another 15-20 if you were able to block US’s fleet. So hard to crack that much defensive and offensive firepower.

Germany T5

Buy 50

This depends a great deal on how many units can hit western Europe, and how many units Italy can put to help you defend. If Italy succefully blocked US’s fleet from entering med in combat, which happens almost everygame, Italy will probably give you 20 units. This means you have your 8 planes +2 bombers at min. 30 units plus 3 aa Guns. US will have at max 20 units to attack, but this will mean their fleet is incredibly weak and very succeptable to planes, and my Germany buy the turn before would have been more fighters, as I can hit any fleet that goes to 112 with 2 subs, 1 DD, 1 cruiser, 1 carrier, and 10 planes minimum. That is 15 units UK/US will have to contend with having no scramble support… So back to Western have 33 minimum guys almost every game. This means your buy can look something like this.

8 mechs (Germany)
6 Infantry (western)

Leaving you 39 units in Western Germany, and 8 more ground units going towards russia. You can even loose 2-4 infantry for a tank or two. Just push up to Just outside Ukraine. Russia has no possible way to stop you no matter what he built. The main problem you are faced with now is that your initial 10 infantry placed in western Germany are 1 turn behind as well as your turn 3 purchase of 9 arty 1 infantry, also your t4 is 1 turn behind. I just wait till T6 to take Ukraine by consolidating my 31 new units that are pushing up that can attack with (11 Infantry, 9 arty, 8 mechs, and 3 tanks. Plus with your origianl starting units of 6 tanks in france, 4 mechs, 3 tanks in yugo, 5 inf from bulgaria, average of 6 infantry from yugo, 2 arty from yugo, 3 arty from Germany. 10 infantry from Germany, and 3 infantry from poland =73 ground, and if needed 10 more planes). 83 total units can hit Ukraine on T6. On T7 you can stack just outside russia with the 73 units, if he didn’t defend Ukraine. Also I like to have 2 infantry with Italy on the front lines with Germany allowing Germany, if they need to, to put their 8 fig/tac to help defend.  On T8 you can attack with your 3 new tanks purchased in Ukraine, plus your 8 mechs purchased on T5 in Germany and your 10 planes. This would be 94 attacking russia. If russia is too heavily defended, I recommend just pushing south and take the oilfields and possibly Egypt, don’t forget to leave enough units so that russia can’t roll over you and Conquer all their territory back.

Please someone explain how to beat this. Seems impossible to me…

play dice.

i’l still used to alpha 2, so i might be incorrect.
but in our games it seems the opposite: when US is at war, at US5 they can take something and keep it. keep italy small (which UK should do). try to take as much of western europe, certainly take norway (worth 8 for axis so to much) and greece (it’s very hard to reconquer and from there a threshold can be formed). it’s still possible russia falls (axis need a chance to win) but most of the time it’s the same round berlin is either very thretened or taken.

Following Idea:
-France is after the fall of Paris still able to collect income and may use the UK-London Industrial complex as if it was a minor, French, Industrial complex.
NO for taking Paris for Germany (+5 IPC/Turn) and even an NO for Germany for taking London (much harder if French could build in London +5 IPC/Turn).

Why: Historically, almoust every european country, occipied by Germany, had an exile gouvernment in London and lots of volunteers fougth against Germany from their new homebase London/UK (people from Poland, Norway, France, Danmark, the Netherlands). I think it would be nice to reflect this by those small forces the French player could build.

With the French income (~9-13 turn 1, ~6-7 every turn thereafter), the allied player would a) be able to build a defense for the UK, b) British money wolud be freed up to produce something more useful, c) French units such as transports, Bomber, Crusier, destroyer, submarines etc. could get used, d) a little more action in the atlantic even without major intervention of the US possible.

Last but not Least: The French pieces in the game are useless. France is almoust never able to build something, in the rare cases it can, it will build at best Infanterie, Artillery, Armor, Fighter.

Alternative:
Remove all the French from the game and replace them with British troops. Add a +5 NO for France for Germany and change the turn-order to: Germany, USSR, Italy, UK, ANZAC, USA. That would be fine as well.

Sorry I didn’t write this, but thats the idea. Germany sacks the 19 starting IPC from France, but France may still collect income turn 1 and following, and then build in the UK, starting turn 2.

Letting Italy play before UK means they can destroy the fleet in SZ98 and take Egypt in turn 1. That’s pretty brutal IMO.

Italy has to follow UK, with the Alpha3 set up. It starts strong and has to be neutered by UK.
You are all right out France though. Is really only in it for show. Is eliminated on G1 and if it is reactivated, the European Axis have lost!