UK fleet unification in Sz 30 in Rd 1

Very interesting/creative idea! I honestly hadn’t seen the SZ 30 unification option, and I spent a while looking, too.

It sounds like a lot of fun, but I think the strategy can be countered. I don’t think forcing Japan to attack SZ 30 is as bad for Japan as you suggest – Japan can bring 5 units to Pearl Harbor if they want (including the Caroline islands carrier), which should be plenty, and the Japanese battleship isn’t all that out of position in SZ 30. It can still reach SZ 61 by J3, which is the earliest it’s really going to be needed in a KJF, and if the BB is going to assist with bombardments in India, then it can get back to SZ 35 by J2. Similarly, the lack of air is not a huge problem for Japan – Japan can buy, e.g., 1 ftr, 1 bmbr, 1 transport on J1, take 3 fighters as casualties, and still wind up with an air force of 4 fighters + 2 bombers, which is enough to make progress in China, Burma, and Siberia all at the same time.

Also, if you bring both British fighters to SZ 30, then you’re not attacking the Japanese starting transport off the coast of China, so the Japanese will get a head start on shipping troops onto the mainland. Japan should seriously consider stacking Burma on J1. India can be in big trouble very quickly if Britain doesn’t rapidly compensate for its no-defense purchase of 1 sub, 2 bombers. Even assuming you evacuate Egypt, Jordan, and Persia, Britain could wind up with something like 6 inf, 1 art, 1 tnk, 2 ftr, 2 bmbr defending India on J2, which is not necessarily enough to hold the factory. You would probably need to reinforce with Russian tanks and/or the Flying Tiger. Doable, but scary.

Japan can also send one transport with 1 inf, 1 art with excellent odds to take both halves of a weakened Australia, probably followed by Madagascar and South Africa. It’s a minor concern, but those 5 ipc / turn can add up in a long game.

If your main goal as the UK is to kill and divert Japanese assets, I’m not sure this strategy is more effective than just attacking SZ 37 outright. If you win in SZ 37, you kill off a BB, CV, and 2 fighters. If you win by defending SZ 30, you kill off a CV and 3-4 fighters, and divert a BB for 1-2 turns. Stacking in SZ 30 also offers the Japanese the option of ignoring your gambit and consolidating the Japanese fleets off the coast of Burma. That forces the British to either build boats on B2 (which almost certainly concedes the Indian factory), retreat the fleet back to the coast of Africa (which almost certainly concedes the Indian factory, because the Japanese can bombard with 2 BB and 1 CA), or allow the Japanese to annihilate the unified British fleet with minimal losses (which is probably more profitable for the Japanese than Pearl Harbor anyway).

That said, I think this could be an excellent opening if you support it with an appropriate bid, or if you’re playing against a weak or overly cautious Japanese player. Thanks for sharing!

I feel like I covered this option in a few different threads a while back, though I’m struggling to find them.

sz61 is stronger in my view, but this sz 30 defense is possible as an alternative UK1 opener.

Generally the sz30 play involves transporting at least two infantry units to sz30, either both from Australia, or 1 from Australia and 1 from India, with plans to pick up a 3rd or 4th infantry unit on UK2 from Australia if running an attack. These infantry are "the floaters."The point of the floaters is to bait a Japanese attack.

There can be a reason NOT to fully load the transports, if you wish to present less incentive for a Japanese attack. On the other hand fully loading may draw a full attack, but the results could perhaps swing your way too, at least in dice.

The Average attack for Japan is only 65% odds, if they go all out vs the full defensive UK fleet, with an average of 2 units remaining. But this also leaves many Japanese units out of position and hamstrings the Zeros airforce on J1.

If the UK fleet survives into the second round, then you have two options…

A. Retreat to South Africa and head for the Atlantic or…
B.  Attack Dutch East Indies. If attacking Dutch East Indies, then you pick up another dude in W. Australia on the way to take the territory with 3/4 inf and 2 fighters.

The main downside to the sz30 option is that it leaves Japan with a second transport in sz61. It also ties down two British fighters, which might otherwise be used for attacks on UK1 or key defenses in the second round. This can have an effect on the Szech battle, unless Russia sent strong support, it puts the flying tiger at risk.

The upside is that you might be able to preserve the entire UK pacific naval TUV, if Japan elects not to attack.

I think this join in sz30 move by UK, invites the Burma push (with the second transport) and the Pearl Harbor attack, or Szech to kill the tiger. Japan is under more pressure to trade TUV, and the sz30 attack is rather unfavorable when compared to pearl, or a mainland crush, so they might just push harder in the other direction to make up the ground…

If you are the UK and attempting the sz30 play, you might want to consider bringing your bomber as far East as possible on UK1 towards Japan, it can reach Sudan or Kazakh or Yakut for example, to present a stronger UK2 threat against the IJN if, they give you the J1 pass.

As always, any play like this works much better if you nabbed an Allied bid. Though almost nobody uses their UK bids on defense I find. Another sub in sz30, rather than attacking say in sz37, can push the odds off the J1 attack here, and bring it just razors edge shy of 50%. Which could be enough to deter a Japanese attack altogether.

Finally, remember to be careful with your casualty selection as UK in sz30. Your fighters have nowhere to land if the carrier goes down, which means the carrier deck cannot be taken as a hit until last, without risking a Japanese strafe. Nothing more depressing than watching your heavy hitting fighters crashing into the sea.
:-D

You make some good points, and I admire your determination to find a strong KJF opening.

The only thing I want to point out in response is that if, as you propose, you move the UK bomber to South Africa and the 2 London fighters to West Russia and then India, and you build 2 bmbr / 1 sub in India on B1, then you are leaving the English Channel completely unguarded, meaning that Germany can build 5 transports on G2 for a surprise Sea Lion (even if you wiped out the Baltic fleet on B1!) and you have nothing in place to kill them with. You could counter by moving some American planes to London on A1, but that reduces the strength of America’s attack on Japan, and Germany could still build something like 3 transports, 1 carrier on G2. London is going to be extremely weak with no air force and a mandatory infantry build in India on B2 – even with only 3 transports (and the Luftwaffe), Germany might be able to take London on G3, especially if Germany built a plane or two on G1.

The only KJFs I’ve pulled off in 1942.2 against competent opponents involved the air wall to the center. Anything else and Russia just gets screwed too quickly by Germany. If going this route with UK, I think 1 bomber 1 figher in UK, and 3 infantry in India can be entertaining. This takes a little pressure off your early med positioning, since it gives you a way to deal with the Battleship on UK2 if needed (with double bombers). And the second bomber can fly a defensive pip 2 spaces farther each round than a fighter can, so you have a little more reach both on attack and defense. I just think its hard to manage Japan on the water, and unless you can keep India and Moscow effective for as long as possible (which requires aircraft for the defensive bounce around) then the KJF is pretty hard to maintain.

One interesting approach is just to conserve naval TUV as a way of pinning Japan on the home island, cat and mousing it rather than trying to actually draw out the IJN for battle. This is a containment strategy and not a KJF proper, since you can’t take Tokyo unless you can crush Japan’s fleet. But taking Tokyo isn’t always necessary, to me Suez is the early priority and keeping Japanese carriers away from the Indian Ocean and Africa. If you can do that with UK/USA, then its a lot easier to prop up Russia, since Japan won’t be collecting as much money. And then if you can snag one of the money islands with an opportune transport sacrifice that’s great. Expanding production on a money island, even better, but sometimes you don’t even need to move out to force Japan into a naval race. USA can just park it and wait.

Another move to consider in conjunction with the Air wall to the center, is just the rapid bounce from Atlantic to Pacific. The simplest redirects are from sz 22 (Brazil) to sz 41 (south pacific) or sz 23 (West Africa) to sz 27 (South Africa.)

Either location, 41 or 27 will put you 2 moves off East Indies. I think 27 offers a bit more since it covers the canal and is closer to the Center Air wall, but I’ve seen 41 work as well.

Its often easier to press Atlantic/Africa first, so as not to show your hand too early and force a reaction. The Japanese player will assume you are trying to set up for a normal Kill Germany game,expecting you to get all up on France, but then you launch towards Japan directly with your Atlantic fleet, and build in sz56 on the same turn!

This puts Japan in a bind, if they move to counter the fleet coming over from the Atlantic they leave themselves open to a rush across the Pac from W. coast USA, but if they stay in place for the Tokyo shuck, it risks losing one of the islands from the Solomons convergence or the sz 29 sneak (depending on which way you went out of the Atlantic.)

I think sometimes plays like, where you keep the Japan option open, without overcompensating, make more sense on this board than the balls out slam into Japan right from the outset.

The main advantage to the air wall over ships, is that aircraft can help you hold critical territories. India or Caucasus or Moscow, can hold for a few rounds longer, while at the same time threatening the Japanese fleet (or forcing them to expand their ships, to overcome the air threat.)

For me the real risk with sz30, is that the Tiger and the sz53 figher might die on J1. I hate losing US fighters on J1, and will almost always risk a UK fighter or ships to try and keep them alive. Frequently I will send my UK carrier deck along with the fighter to sz61, its expensive as hell for fodder, but worth it in my view to smoke that Japanese transport right out the gate. I’ll save the cruiser to protect the transport, or perhaps just sacrifice the transport to reinforce one way or the other (canal to India, or India to the canal.)

For the Aussie sub I usually back out around S. America, or go to sz37 on non combat (if the Japanese destroyer in sz61 was handled properly.) Going to sz30 requires putting a lot of UK equipment out of position. From sz30 its 4 turns to London, so if the plan in the Pac falls apart and your plan is to pull back Atlantic, you’re looking at a UK5 Europe expansion. If staying put near India, I’d be careful not to take all the production spawns for UK, since USA really needs one of the money islands to get anything going. Optimal KJF conditions are a USA factory on a money island, and the shuck into sz36, so if UK takes all the production away, sometimes USA gets stuck. Just something to keep in mind when considering how to use those UK transports (should they survive the sz30 play.)
:-D

I think you’re right that the Flying Tiger survives if Japan chooses (as it should) to use J1 to both crush the combined British fleet in SZ 30 and destroy half the American Pacific fleet in Pearl Harbor on J1. If Japan wanted to carry out all three attacks (SZ 30, Szechuan, Pearl Harbor) on J1, then the most Japan would be able to responsibly bring to Szechuan is 1 inf, 1 art, 1 ftr, which just isn’t enough against 3 inf, 1 ftr (assuming 1 Russian inf from Kazakh reinforces Szech).

I think you’re wrong that this is a problem for Japan, no matter how many fighters Japan trades for (more expensive) boats on J1. Japan can very easily get away with buying 3 new fighters on J1. Japan’s only real disadvantage in the OOB opening is that Japan has to invest in factories or transports in order to make effective use of its purchasing power – ground troops aren’t a good buy at first because the starting 2 transports aren’t enough to ship 30 IPCs worth of ground troops from Tokyo, and planes aren’t a good buy at first because the starting 6 ftr, 1 bmbr is more than enough to support the ground troops that are already in mainland Asia. If the Allies give Japan an opportunity to trade fighters for enemy ships, the Allies are essentially volunteering to solve Japan’s problem for it – now Japan can profitably build more fighters and fly them to the mainland, without the need to make an early investment in transports or factories. Delaying this investment until J2 both accelerates Japan’s offensive and gives Japan more strategic flexibility, so that Japan can drop the transports or factories exactly where they will be most useful in light of the Allies’ initial deployment.

I am intrigued by your suggested Siberian attack plan for Russia with the bid bomber, but I feel compelled to point out that for this opening to work, Russia has to score a hit with the bomber before the destroyer scores a hit, so that the Japanese transport is also eliminated. The odds of this occurring are only 57%. (2/9 no hits, 4/9 clean Russian kill, 2/9 trade, 1/9 clean Japanese kill). It might make more sense to just send the bomber to Yakut along with one of the Russian fighters, so that the two Russian planes are in a position to make a decisive kill on R2 if Japan leaves any transports lightly guarded. You could also send one Russian tank to Evenki to assist with retaking Buryatia – if you’re going to send that much of a force to the east, you need to make sure it’s capable of sustained effective attacks, and one extra tank won’t stop you from holding West Russia on R2.

I’m fairly consistent on J1, and like to expand transport capacity first. On the other hand, if the destroyer and transport survive in sz61, the need isn’t as pressing, since Japan can’t really use more than 3 transports effectively on J2 for shucking anyway (you got the dudes on the home island, and the dudes in the Philippines usually, but beyond that you have to start buying ground to set up your shuckd). If Japan gets a pass in sz61, that’s 15 ipcs they don’t have to spend on a transport and destroyer fodder for the IJN in the first round. This might have me considering the J1 factory spam, or some kind of fleet expansion to shore things up.

Trading Japanese fighters for Allied ships in the first round can be rather dicey sometimes. But once you’ve seen the sz53 play, and figured out how the carrier rules works, many people like to hit pearl. It’s a bit gamey, and does put your bomber and surviving fighter somewhat out of position for a round, but the payoff is solid.

I think the dilemma with Japan is that, if you work the Allies too hard at the outset, and just totally crush them, this has a way of cementing the KGF in the opponents mind, and the KGF endgame is more dangerous for the Axis overall than the KJF endgame. So its a bit of a balancing act. Considered purely from the perspective of a self-interested Japan, you should do everything you can to beat back the Allies and sink their ships at every opportunity, but from the perspective of the Axis team as a whole, it might be better to draw the Allies into to a protracted Pacific war that it’s fairly easy for Japan to manage defensively. If the Allies are spending the majority of their money vs the Pacific, as opposed to Atlantic, the likelihood of a rapid German conquest of Moscow increases. This is really the only reason I can think of for letting the Americans escape at Pearl, otherwise picking off that fighter in sz53 just seems like sound strategy for the trade.

Some of this probably comes down to knowing your opponent, whether they are likely to concede at the fall of Moscow, or if they’re the sort who will play on into the deep endgame. If its just a matter of Japan holding out until G cracks the center, a dramatic pacific game can be enjoyable. Its really up to Japan whether they want to allow this as a possibility. The ball is in their court, whether they want to slam into the other guy’s nose as soon as the whistle blows, or just dribble and look fancy with it, like a GlobeTrotter, to taunt them into a long brawl! haha

The pressure of destroying the combined UK fleet in sz30 is pretty intense. All the targets right there, in reach on J1, primed for the slaughter! haha I think most players would be hard pressed not to take the bait. But the problem is whether you can actually spring enough of a trap out of thing to make the UK sacrifice worth it?

I like a Russian bomber on balance, and the sz61 strike is a pretty wild gambit (risks the whole bid in one attack, but could be very decisive if it works). Usually I see it used against Germany on the eastern front instead of Japan, but at least you got an option if you go for the Red Bomber. OOB and its pretty hard for Russia to have much of an impact on any potential KJF. The set up seems all UK oriented OOB.
:-D

The best plays I’ve seen KJF-wise, (just like the best KGFs), usually involve a UK bid of some sort. The Brits are balancing on the razors edge in 1942.2, and there are a lot of ways to screw the Axis openings if you’ve got another UK sub at the ready. Which is one of the reasons I like to give the bid to the Russians instead.