Neutral Italy

I like the historical perspective, but I don’t think it would be a good idea from a viewpoint of game balance. Consensus has it that Global 1940 already favors the Axis and needs a bid for the Allies, and this change would make the UK’s standard “Taranto” move impossible. With Italy’s navy united and having three transports, Egypt would surely fall.

@Herr:

I like the historical perspective, but I don’t think it would be a good idea from a viewpoint of game balance. Consensus has it that Global 1940 already favors the Axis and needs a bid for the Allies, and this change would make the UK’s standard “Taranto” move impossible. With Italy’s navy united and having three transports, Egypt would surely fall.

Agreed, letting so much of italy’s navy live way too strong.  Maybe have UK start with an IC in egypt to build ships in the med to preserve his fleet, and maybe an airbase too.  Then it might be ok to keep italy neutral.  Giving italy easy naval dominance with a fancy fleet it bad news bears for cairo.

I think Italy has to start at war, for the reasons mentioned. And remember France has fallen (usually), when UK has its go.
Italy cannot be any stronger and giving then another turn of peace ensures it is.

I love the thought process here, make one simple little rule for big changes… but I agree with all the above comments, Taranto is the only thing the Allies got going for them these days.

@Young:

I love the thought process here, make one simple little rule for big changes… but I agree with all the above comments, Taranto is the only thing the Allies got going for them these days.

And Torburk!  Don’t forget!

@ghr2:

@Young:

I love the thought process here, make one simple little rule for big changes… but I agree with all the above comments, Taranto is the only thing the Allies got going for them these days.

And Torburk!  Don’t forget!

So the standard is now Taranto and Torburk UK1?

If you get a bid of 9, then I say do both.
Sub helps and so does an Inf (Art better) in Alex.
Can always retreat for. Tobruk if it goes badly. I would use the Tac in Tobruk, not Taranto.

@wittmann:

If you get a bid of 9, then I say do both.
Sub helps and so does an Inf (Art better) in Alex.
Can always retreat for. Tobruk if it goes badly. I would use the Tac in Tobruk, not Taranto.

OH, OK… forgot people use bids, so probably wouldn’t be wise to do both attacks without one.

@Young:

@ghr2:

@Young:

I love the thought process here, make one simple little rule for big changes… but I agree with all the above comments, Taranto is the only thing the Allies got going for them these days.

And Torburk!�  Don’t forget!

So the standard is now Taranto and Torburk UK1?

With no bid, its 1 or the other.

@Young:

@wittmann:

If you get a bid of 9, then I say do both.
Sub helps and so does an Inf (Art better) in Alex.
Can always retreat for. Tobruk if it goes badly. I would use the Tac in Tobruk, not Taranto.

OH, OK… forgot people use bids, so probably wouldn’t be wise to do both attacks without one.

It’s worked out in a live game before. I was UK at the time, saw that SeaLion was a go and decided to go balls-to-the-walls offense.  It actually worked really well, as Germany took the bait and cleaned up the Med for Italy, while Russia just built a giant army.  I think when we finally called it a game, Germany had moved 2 whole territories into Russia while US/UK were about to invade France.

It was probably the dice.

I totally dislike the Medi and North Africa fight in G40.
It’s too straightforward, there’s no battles, no attrition, it’s either Allies dominate (more than often) or Italy dominates.

I mean: if Italy dominates it becomes a production monster, if Allies dominate Italy is completely neutered.
There’s no middleground!

I believe the reason is the geography of the G40 map. Having Southern Italy hittable from Gibraltar and Egypt hittable from Southern Italy makes everything a 1-move action. Even if you stay at port you’re still in danger. There’s no positioning etc…

I really like how they made Italy in the custom map “New World Order”. It’s very hard there for either Italy or UK to get an advantage in the seas prior to US intervention, and that’s historical. Before 1942 neither side had really major victories, the war was a war of convoy sinking and attrition. Italians advancing and retreating in North Africa. And when USA started attacking the medi Italy basically surrendered easily the islands and then the southern territories. Yet there was a very very long war (also a civil war) between the southern allied occupied territories and the northern “puppet states under germany” territories.

If you check the war prior to the US joining it, Italy even had a momentum in 1942. It was a year in wich due to the attack on Alexandria’s battleship and other lucky engagement Italy had almost a year of naval dominance (and thus was able to efficently support their troops in Africa).

What I mean? I’d like to see something like that in a ww2 game: Italy and UK struggles eachother for medi dominance. There’s no winner, just attrition and small gains. The only way for one side to gain terrain is if there’s another player investing huge resources in aiding them, either being Germany for Italy or US for UK.

Nice post Noll.
Will have to try and look at the NWO map. Every time I have, I get a headache the map is so full and tight.

@Noll:

I totally dislike the Medi and North Africa fight in G40.
It’s too straightforward, there’s no battles, no attrition, it’s either Allies dominate (more than often) or Italy dominates.

I mean: if Italy dominates it becomes a production monster, if Allies dominate Italy is completely neutered.
There’s no middleground!

I believe the reason is the geography of the G40 map. Having Southern Italy hittable from Gibraltar and Egypt hittable from Southern Italy makes everything a 1-move action. Even if you stay at port you’re still in danger. There’s no positioning etc…

I really like how they made Italy in the custom map “New World Order”. It’s very hard there for either Italy or UK to get an advantage in the seas prior to US intervention, and that’s historical. Before 1942 neither side had really major victories, the war was a war of convoy sinking and attrition. Italians advancing and retreating in North Africa. And when USA started attacking the medi Italy basically surrendered easily the islands and then the southern territories. Yet there was a very very long war (also a civil war) between the southern allied occupied territories and the northern “puppet states under germany” territories.

If you check the war prior to the US joining it, Italy even had a momentum in 1942. It was a year in wich due to the attack on Alexandria’s battleship and other lucky engagement Italy had almost a year of naval dominance (and thus was able to efficently support their troops in Africa).

What I mean? I’d like to see something like that in a ww2 game: Italy and UK struggles eachother for medi dominance. There’s no winner, just attrition and small gains. The only way for one side to gain terrain is if there’s another player investing huge resources in aiding them, either being Germany for Italy or US for UK.

I think they should have separate the Med.sea a little more as well as the channel!
Give it a few more sz, like upper and lower medi. Or north and south channel, it would have been more of a challenge then.

Or in other terms for G40: split sz 110 into 110 /1 and 110/2 and 95 into 95/1 and 95/2.

I think one of the big issues is how easy air can reach different parts of the med in global.

@ghr2:

I think one of the big issues is how easy air can reach different parts of the med in global.

100% agree.

This is a very interesting discussion.  Correct me if I’m wrong on history but didn’t Italy start WW2?  They took Ethiopia first and gave Hitler the idea and courage to move into the Rheinland first. From what I was watching in a documentary Hitler was shy to begin war but after seeing Mussolini get away with it he figured he could as well and that’s what happened when he moved into the Rheinland.  The allies did nothing to resist.

@cyanight:

This is a very interesting discussion.  Correct me if I’m wrong on history but didn’t Italy start WW2?  They took Ethiopia first and gave Hitler the idea and courage to move into the Rheinland first. From what I was watching in a documentary Hitler was shy to begin war but after seeing Mussolini get away with it he figured he could as well and that’s what happened when he moved into the Rheinland.  The allies did nothing to resist.

I think historians debate the causes all of the time.  One can argue Japan started the war back in 31-33 when it invaded Manchuria.

Good Point ghr2, I was watching a documentary last weekend on the History channel called World Wars.  They went through the timeline and started with Italy taking Ethiopia.  It seems like all the losers of the “Treaty of Versailles” became the Axis.

BTW, I’m really looking forward to that movie coming out called “Fury”