Using Germany's Mediterranean Navy

I seem to remember that on Don’s old site when they were playing on a ladder, they were bidding as high as $30 to give to the Allies to even the game.

In all actuality it was almost pure luck that Russia did survive the war. If Hitler had not split his massive Barbarossa force to attack South, Moscow would have surely fallen. I think the best way to make the game a little more fair is have it start in 1940 or 39 like the new AAE40 will do. Starting at the beginning of 41 like AAE does highlights the ineptitude that Stalin had by not strengthening his front lines and purging his army in the 30’s by killing I believe 70% of his officers. If we are given control in 1939 the German force would be smaller than the Soviets (had the largest army in the world: equaled all other armies tanks put together and had more planes than all others combined), but the Germans have a stronger economy. So the Russian player is given time to move his forces (albeit outclassed forces) into position for a massive offensive by Germany. We could right Stalin’s mistakes and Hitler’s as well (he attacked Yugoslavia right before Barbarossa, killing 6 precious weeks of good weather that would be needed for the Russian offensive). But at the current state the game is pretty accurate, if there is a determined German player and a non-cohesive allied force then Germany will win 90% of the time. But if the allies work together (UK helping out Russia while the US does its thing to invade Europe) then the game swings to a very balanced game where dice rolls and a little luck is what usually wins the day, or a little mistake by either side, which is how the game should be IMO.

You can prevent the Allies from strongly reinforcing Russia with fighters by threatening Vyborg and Leningrad early.  The only efficient way for the Allies to get fighters to Russia is through Leningrad, a distance of 4 from UK.  Fighters built in the US on turn 1 land in UK on turn 2 and Leningrad in turn 3.  They then join the Russian stack in Belorussia on turn 4.  You have until then to make sure you have enough forces forward to ensure that the Russians can’t stand in Belorussia even with all the extra fighters.  Further, funnelling fighters through Leningrad means the Allies have to divert ground units from Belorussia to prevent everything from being lost.  If so, the German player gets to choose which battle to fight, Leningrad or Belorussia.

The other thing you can do is try to get the Allied player to divert fighters to the Battle of the Atlantic by using you subs in sea zones where it disrupts the flow of fighters to Leningrad.

If the Allied player has been able to get 7 or 8 extra fighters to Russia by turn 3 or 4, Germany is probably doomed, so a combination of pressure and diversion usually prevents the fighter build up.

SS

In the first round take 1 artillery + 1 infantry on the transport and amphibious assault libya and move your battleship and destroyer in for offshore support while attacking from Tunisia as well (all ships should be in the Central Mediterranean sea zone). If Britain attacks your battleship, destroyer & transport on their turn with their fighter, destroyer and transport, you have the edge in defense numbers (4, 3, 1 vs. 3, 3 & NA) + the fact that it takes 2 shots to take down a battleship, so in essence its 4 vs. 2 and you should win this battle almost every time. On the 2nd turn, if Britain does not attack, pick up an artillery or infantry from Greece as well as the infantry from Crete for an amphibious assault on Egypt. You will have to use your battleship and destroyer to take out the British destroyer and transport, but again you have the attack numbers advantage (4, 3 vs. 3, 1) as well as the 2-shot battleship, so it is 3 vs. 2. Bring all of your forces from Libya to bear on Egypt along with the aforementioned amphibious assault. In subsequent rounds use your remaining forces to push through the middle east to Russia. This middle-east strategy does not seem very popular on the forum, but moving the German battleship, destroyer and transport to the Atlantic and leaving the British with all of their naval and ground units in tact will allow them to take Germany out of Africa rather quickly and force Germany to leave defensive forces in Greece and Southern Italy that could be used on the Russian front. You can move the German naval units to the Atlantic once the British navy is gone or continue to use them in supporting amphibious attacks on Palestine and Syria (if the British have not already vacated these areas). Taking Britain out of Africa has 3 benefits: it allows Germany to leave places like Greece and Southern Italy completely undefended and to shift those units to bear on Russia, it takes money directly out of the allies pockets and lasts longer than attacking the convoys and it will eventually expose the Russian southern flank and force Russia to shift valuable units to Caucasus for defense. I will admit, it does take time to get through the Middle-East to Russia, but I’ve used this many times and I’ve always gotten to Caucasus without fail.

Focus on Russia. They’re your main problem. Tip with that- get Russia to not see you as a threat and see Japan as a major enemy. Get them to move some troops to fight Japan. that will give you a better chance of quickly taking Russia. (Send everything to Leningrad, then smash through to Moskva)
Use your fighters and fleet to keep the Channel clear for a later invasion of Britain. Once you have Moskva, it shouldn’t be too hard to take Britain.

I would say at first that Germany was much stronger because of the amount of tanks and the lack of UK and USA support for the Soviets :cry: . Now I think is it even :D . Last two times I played the Allies I invoked the “Shell Germany back to the stone age method”. All the Allies (USA and UK) need to do is build all destroyers and a few transports that will carry one tank each. I would just beach land on Germany with one just one transport carrying just one tank and bombard with as many destroyers as possible. By round 5 I had UK shelling the Germans with 7 destroyers and just one tank. I did the same with the USA. The reason why this works is in a bombard your destroyers will shoot only once at a 2 for cover support and the one tank that costs only 5 ipcs will fire at a 3. Now this is where Germany gets screwed :D because they can only kill the tank. So in that battle the Allies will only loose one tank while the Germans will lose more (simple economics). This is a good tactic for two reasons one being the simple number losses for the Germans and two and equally as important is that is forces Germany to buy infantry to defend Germany rather then the speedy tanks that attack at a 3 and can be used to aid the down fall of the Soviets. Keep doing this and keep adding destroyers to the attacking group. USA will need at least 3 transports and the UK will need two transports to provide a constant stream of one transport carrying one tank to the German coast.

Now the Soviets can’t run and hide they must attack the German tanks at the right time. Which is when they are defending at a 2 and don’t have allot of infantry that can used for fodder. This is a common tactic with A&A. So the battle between the Soviets and the Germans boils down to who can kill whose tank force first.

The only thing else I can think of is use your 12 ipc at the beginning to match what ever the Germans do. Just to play it safe.

Ultimately its the random rolls of the dice that decides who wins the battle. All you can do is play the percentages.

Hope this helps :D

SEI

if the allies don’t start building transports then germany has no pressure on the fatherland and can build a 10 turn stack if he wants. Transports are needed even if you never invade france so that germany stops building men and builds tanks. at that point you know how many turns it is to moscow, and you can transport into leningrad, convert, and be ready for the belocounter

sorry for runons I hope this helps

way to much fun for me :D