Russia declaring war on Japan, can this happen?

@Marshmallow-of-War thank you Marsh

we only allow a redo for France on G1 given that you bring the usual attack. Our usual being as follows: 5 inf, 2 arty, 4 mechs, 6 tanks, and sometimes the tactical from Poland. That’s 98% success rate. The failed attack is actually called a “variance” in statistics. We call it “The Variance”. if you get it, basically we reset the game and change sides. It’s the dice gods way of telling you from the beginning that you will not win playing the Axis. It is counted as a win for the allied player tho when scoring victories in the series.

If you get a crappy roll and get destroyed, you kind of need to use your imagination. Maybe they infiltrated your headquarters with spies or broke your codes and knew your plan, like Midway.

Bad dice sucks but sometimes you’re the statue and sometimes you’re the bird.

Have fun dudes.

It may help with an all out KJF plan if Russia decides to ignore the German advance and become a thorn in Japan’s side.

It may allow for more US resources to be directed at Europe, but they may be too little too late if Moscow were to fall easily and/or earlier than it should to the Germans.

I’ve played it out a few times, with significant Russian intervention in China, but Russia gets zero economic benefit and places a lot of resources in China that have little impact mid-late game for a crippled or defeated Moscow.

As the highest quality play by Japan is minor IC on the mainland, Japan can send 3 Mech with aircraft flown over them to clear out small infringements of the Russians in China.

IF I were to create problems for Japan, on R1 I would:
Buy 1 Arm, 2 Mech, place them in Stalingrad.
Move 1 Arm, 1 Mech from Moscow to Stalingrad.
Keep the 1 Arm, 1 Mech that start in Stalingrad there.
Fly your 2 Ftr and 1 Tac to Stalingrad.
R2 move into China (Sikang)
UK2 DOW on Japan (if not already at war) move all ground units into Yunnan, which hopefully is a reinforcement, but it may be a liberation depending on how China does there.
R3, move those units from Sikang into Yunnan, reinforcing the Brits and probably halting a Japanese takeover of the Burma road there.

I’m not suggesting this strategy. But it WOULD create problems for a Japan player that does not build IC on the mainland.  Additionally, if UK has to DOW on Japan, this places the US out of the war for a while, which further hurts Moscow in the long run.

Of course, those fast moving units in Stalingrad can:
Be redirected to NW Persia on R2 if at war, and they are more than enough to claim Iraq and get some additional income for Moscow - so there IS flexibility.  
If Moscow is still waiting for war, those units can all move directly to Bryansk on R2 and be in position for a R3 Strafe anywhere in Russia that Germany ends up on G3.

Personally I’d suggest one of the two options directly above before intervening in China.  There is little economic benefit unless you are in a KJF Allied strategy where bogging the Japanese down in China creates immense economic problems.  In particular I wouldn’t want Russia playing a defensive strategy in China throwing its units to the wind.  I’d rather be able to blitz across Northern China, far away from any Japanese IC and/or reinforcements.

@Cow:

Get the African NOs for Russia as well. African NOs are very important for Russia.

Agreed wholeheartedly!
I must admit though, I’m still a little in doubt about when to take them and when not to.

For example, if Germany is doing SeaLion it seems better not to (correct me if I’m wrong)? If Russia goes there (early) in this situation, it has just too few units to start contesting Eastern Europe and/or Scandinavia RU3 (assuming GE did sortie into London). Contesting those area’s with Germany seems better than getting into Africa, since the Russian profit is the same or even higher but it also denies Germany valuable IPCs. Maybe in this case get the African NO’s at a later point?

In all the other situations I’d go for African NO’s (except perhaps a G1 DOW?).

You know I played two games that day! And it was over a week ago I suppose it was 1 sub 1 transport and 1 bomber and I pocketed the money. My mistake! Lol

@Cmdr:

Accept, you’re down 4 defense units making the sacking of NSW easier.

The American fleet will help things out

germany has more units on the front and will crush the smaller ussr stacks.

@Frank:

I just played a 20+ hour game to a draw although I might of lost if it was played to conclusion. I sent the Japan Navy to Africa and protected Italy.  Italy then was spending close to the points of Germany.  The USA fleet battled the Japan fleet in the Med Sea and the Japan fleet destroyed it along with 17 US transports.  At this point Europe was Fortress that the US could never crack because I built mostly inf and art with Italy and Germany all game.  The problem is I was only able to destroy India and the Russian Inf.  China and Australia got out of hand because I did not kill them.  The Australians boarded transports and took some islands and china had a stack of like 40 inf.  We were at a point of after 20+ of play that I was not in position to get 14 victory cities but that I had about 200 inf art in Europe and America had to start a new fleet to come over to attack.  It was called a draw.

The problem is that you would have lost if the game played out as a simple money thing. The allies have more to throw at the axis over time and they could have taken Japan out forcing Germany to attack with lots of 1’s  or sit back and watch Japan get killed and then over time wittle down Germany and Italy. It would have taken another 20 turns at least.