Germany playbook: overall strategy guide

I played it safe with japan and just assaulted china and setup for a J2.  UK attacked in the med but didid not hit italy’s fleet, they attacked tobruk with heavy losses.   Usa setup to be viable in either theatre.

With italy I destroyed the UK fleet and landed in tobruk, lost the dd and sub plus a plane that I had bought leaving me a tipped bb and 2 ca’s.  Was having a hard time deciding what to lose therw but hopefully I did enough to keep the italian transports alive.  I really need them to be able to take advantage of the weak egypt.

For G2 I could declare on USSR, he pulled back leaving the first 3 territories exposed.  The thing is this though:  UK bought no troops for the capitol.  I’m going to post the triplea save in a sec to grt everyone’s thoughts.  But just off what I am seeing I think I need to sack UK.

–Edit–

Here is the game file if anyone wants to look at it.  UK has the 3 figs and the starting inf and aaguns on the capitol.  Since it has not been reinforced yet do I need to go with 10 tts?

email game.tsvg

Looks grim for the good guys.  Doesn’t look like Axis needs our help!

The most interesting strategic question for Axis is whether to declare on J2 or J3.

I almost never recommend waiting past J2 to declare, but in this context it’s worth a look.  If you don’t declare, Germany can take London on G3 and get your subs back from Canada before USA can do anything in the Atlantic, and USA won’t be able to to move forward in the Pacific either.  UK didn’t grab a Pacific island and isn’t in position to grab another.  And China is ripe to be stomped–you could destroy all but 3 of their units on J2.

On the other hand, the gains of waiting might not be worth the cost of Japan not expanding quickly enough.

All depends though.  If Germany isn’t going to Sea Lion, you should declare J2.

Exactly my thinking as well Zhukov, if Japan can continue to work china and not give free entry to the US I think I can take London and hold it.  Any thoughts on possible things to do with italy?  I’m thinking greece next turn followed by egypt?

I could grab gibraltar and flee the german fleet into the med instead of sealion.  Just go ahead and Barbarossa?  I leaning to sealion since it would seem a sure bet with the way the UK played.

An Axis victory!  Germany took London with 5 tanks and no air losses.  Russia almost got out of control but the plunder from London allowed me to be pushing back and taking novograd on G5.  The US couldn’t get enough fleet to retake London without losing it again next turn.  Japan was bogging down in China again but Anzac and Hawaii were going to fall in another turn.

After Russia failed in a big counterattack he conceded.  Thanks for the help zhukov, I feel a lot more confident on what to watch out for with the axis.  I’m still not very confident with japan or see how Italy can be kept from being neutered.  I think my next go as the Axis I’ll play a fortress Europe and try for a Pacific victory.

@Cow:

The super serious Egypt play: Do basic G1, instead buy 2 bombers and a sub. G2 buy more bombers. fly air to Alexandria on top of Italy stuff. Then attack Egypt on round 3 with mass bomber and all your air! Clear the way for Italy!

Didn’t realize this was in your playbook now  :wink:

As this is a valuable resource for new Global players (myself included), is there any chance we could get this stickied? And perhaps the Japanese playbook as well? I find myself hunting for it rather often.

bump… :-D

@Cow:

The super serious Egypt play: Do basic G1, instead buy 2 bombers and a sub. G2 buy more bombers. fly air to Alexandria on top of Italy stuff. Then attack Egypt on round 3 with mass bomber and all your air! Clear the way for Italy!

What’s to stop UK just killing Tobruk?

It depends on the bid. If the Allies place in Alexandria, then Germany should probably pursue a different strategy.

If you still want to do this despite such a bid, then you could land some German planes on Tobruk on G1 (WGR planes can hit France and land in Tobruk, if you use a non-conventional G1 CM, the planes on Poland/Slovakia can hit YUGO and land in Tobruk also). You would probably limit your naval CM to SZ106 and SZ110 though.

Yeah that’s what I’ve been doing lately (I thought I invented it  :-P).  I hit z111 and send air to France and Yugo, then I wind up with 2 tacs in Rome and 3 fighters and 3 tacs defending Tobruk, with the 2 fighters and 2 bombers that went to z111 landing in West Germany.

If Germany builds bombers on round 1, there is obviously no sealion potential and that frees up UK to max defend Egypt before round 2 (transport Malta units to Egypt, send London fighters to French West Africa, activate Persia with India transport, build a transport off South Africa, build an IC in Egypt, maybe Taranto or maybe no Taranto).

Wheatbeer do you think it would be feasible for Germany to build nothing at all on G1 so as to keep up a sealion threat? One could always fly the Tobruk planes back to West Germany and if UK did the above Egypt defense I might go for it.

You may have done the defend Tobruk trick before me then … I have only used German planes on Paris to land in Tobruk once and that wasn’t too long ago.

I always like buying nothing with Germany for just that reason. Probably been a year since my last G1 purchase.

I also like to take Southern France so that (if the situation is right) you get the option to mobilize a small German Med. fleet on G2 (which doesn’t break the bank since its not uncommon to spend the G1 money on fleet anyways).

Sometimes South France is also useful as a landing spot.  Next time I’ll build nothing and see what happens.
Thank you once again Wheatbeer!

@Cow:

Shameless bump

Common Cow, although there is nothing shameless about bumping your own thread once, there is definitely shame when you follow your own bump with another bump 8 months later. I have many large threads from years ago that I have seriously thought about resurrecting, but I would never double bump a thread that was already in the grave. How about some new topics around here eh?

I enjoy these threads because of the technicallity of which you guys view moves.  Very enlightening.

For what is it worth:

I typically hit the Soviet Union with everything I can to take them out of the game as quickly as possible.  This seems to be most effective.  The UK is so weak in the Atlantic that I do not concern myself with them early on, though after reading this thread it can be useful to do so.

I do not typically declare war on the US until turn 3.  It seems to make sense to keep them out of the game as long as possible, and allow Japan to focus on Asia.  The last game I played I made the mistake of forcing on China when most units should have been pursuing India.  I made some major mistakes with Japan, and they were reduced to defending Tokyo, and the UK reclaimed much of Asia.

I’m working from the sea lion/feign G1 and wondering about trying to save the German battleship in z110 for bombardment and added TT protection for a possible sea lion. What about an air base on holland end of G1 instead of buying an AC in z112? Then land some fighters and/or tacs there for scramble.

BTW, another vote to sticky these playbooks.