The Japan Playbook

Any war against the USA will get nowhere fast without the Money Islands. Therefore, attacking UK/ANZAC is an absolute must, so that you can rake in that badly needed +20 IPCs.

Well, the name of the game is Axis, and Allies Don’t Get to Make Moves

Going through the med is just impossible in pretty much any game. Either Italy or Germany is going to sink that transport with planes.

So with that reasoning, you must hope for a J1 declaration of war on the US, and then you could do this:

US 1: Buy 5 fighters. Sail your single atlantic transport 1/4th toward Saudi (SZ 87)
US 2: Buy 5-6 bombers. Sail transport 2/4ths to Saudi (SZ 82 or 69). US 1 fighters to French West Africa.
US 3: Transport now 3/4ths to saudi (SZ 71). US 1 fighters to Egypt. US 2 bombers to French Equatorial Africa.
US 4: Go time.

Hit Saudi with your transport. Send in 5 fighters and 5-6 bombers from Africa, taking bomber losses.

US 5: Build factory (and an air base couldn’t hurt), land your planes on it or near it. If Iraq/Persia are still available, take those if possible.
US 6: First turn you can purchase units in Saudi Arabia. Buy factories in other middle east countries, if available.

This is about the time Moscow has gone to hell or the Germans are coming into the middle east. Not enough time to really get any ground units over there. But you could build fighters on US 3 and 4 that would arrive US 5 and 6 for a respectable plane stack. With a bit of UK help, probably enough to shut down any hope of Moscow or the middle east being seriously threatened. A huge problem with this is that you’d have +8 Germans or Italians coming from Turkey.

This is a 100% Atlantic buy for the first 2 turns turns and a significant drain for US 3, 4, and 5 as well. Very dangerous. Japan is going to go nuts because, remember, they J1’d you.

Seems like a crazy damn idea–one that is too crazy to work well, probably. Not only that, but it’s completely obvious what you’re up to. However, I think it’d be pretty easy to have UK prevent Japan from killing/blocking your transport J3. And if Japan invested too much in the Indian ocean to stop you for sure, then they’re ruining some of their J1 momentum, so maybe that’s not entirely awful.

edit-
I guess you could also send your pacific transports through the panama canal, building a naval base there. This would give you four more units in the middle east shortly after your first transport arrived.

Better alternative, with nearly the same effect:
Don’t do Saudi, just have UK save you Persia/Iraq. This saves you from having to violate neutrality, and both are reachable on the same turn as Saudi. If you do hit Saudi, do it the next turn, saving the neutrality violation for one round later.

Who ever is the defender when the pact is broken gets +1 defense to all their units on the first round of combat, in combats launched by that opposing power.

So that encourages players to keep some units on the border….because they will defend as if they were tanks on the first round.
Or an AAA would defend at ‘2’ on the first round.

Think trench warfare…both those powers were expecting an attack on that front (defensive posture) but didn’t have the initiative, or reason, to launch an attack.

Wow, 4 battleships for Germany.  That sounds so cool, but I agree with Young Grasshopper, it sounds like you have left yourself very weak in other areas.  Still, I would love to see Germany with 4 battleships.  Of course, I have always been partial to the Bismarck.

As for attacking England, how much of your Luftwaffe do you still have.  With 6 transports you could hit England with 12 land units against Britains 15 infantry.  If you still have a lot of Luftwaffe to counter the 6 RAF planes, you could probably take England.  However, Captainhook is also right, Russia is probably getting ready to invade you.  Hope you got enough men to repel them.

It is a moot point, and I stand by it.

By your situational irony scenario’s, lets say Japan declares war on Russia the turn Germany takes Moscow.  After Germany takes Moscow lets say USA takes Germany/Berlin on the same turn!!  Uh oh!  The allies just wasted a good chance to collect the IPC’s Russia had, BUT, by YOUR method, the bonus totally goes down the crapper and is a MOOT POINT.  Because if you’re talking about taking capitals with ease to a point of if Moscow falls so easily than Berlin can just as easily get taking by USA/UK to get that bonus back.

Pelanderfunk, it doesn’t matter in your game.  It could actually work against Germany.  He see’s that 12 IPC go to you, and Germany could make a risk that he shouldn’t.  Either way there is no reason not to give the bonus right away.  Played enough games of global to forget many things, and waiting to give Russia money would be one of them for sure!

These are awesome!  You mentioned that it had been awhile since you painted?  Whew - coulda fooled me.  :-D

I was thinking (if players agree) to have Russia & Japan put 1-2 ipc’s in a NAP fund. Let it grow, and the player that breaks the agreement (with an actual attack) forfeits the NAP fund to the other player. Allow Russia to declare war in name only (no attack) so it can invade neutrals (which is a silly loop hole anyway, Russia should just be allowed to invade neutrals from the get go).

Make a list of things that would be a deal breaker, like Russia in China or UK Pac tt’s, or allied attacks on Jap from Russian land ect…