No discussion for a while now…
Any new conclusions about this strategy?
What’s about an airbase at Gibraltar and moving Egypt fleet west? Yet, I guess there was this topic deep down at forum’s splanchnic times ago but couldn’t find it…
@Private:
Being on the edge of losing to wittman, who had a 13 bid as allies, I wonder what allied bid you feel would effectively counter the strategy you lay out? My understanding is that experienced players believe axis to have a significant advantage without such a bid.
That’s my question as well. I don’t even know if an effective counter strategy can be pulled off by Allies without serious mistakes made by the Axis player. That’s one concern I have had about G40 for quite some time and it has yet to be demonstrated to me that the Allies are viable on this map. If someone does pull it off, I would very very much like to know how.
Took a look at the League board pp 1&2 - bids vary between 12 and 28, averaging 20.5. wittman is offering me 18. Mmm!
K, summary time. This is super quick and dirty as I stuff my face during my lunch break. I very well may have forgotten something.
I assume you’re familiar with the “standard” J1. The user here, Cow, may not have invented the concept (or maybe he did), but he definitely popularized it.
Further assumptions:
-All players are of equal skill, and that the game will take place at an advanced or higher level of play.
-Russia does not stack Amur. (If they do (they won’t), you should take this gift.)
-If Russia fully stacks Buryatia (and doesn’t send 6 inf to Yakut), you understand the slightly increased risk of doing J1.
America:
On the Philippines, you kill a US destroyer/submarine that could have escaped, as well as a fighter. You have a 99%++ chance to win the fight.
I don’t like the hard IPC metric, but in this instance it’s entirely accurate. You are killing 6+8+10 = 24 IPCs of very mobile units that would have otherwise survived and would have been directly and immediately involved in the Pacific theater. Instead of collecting 52, America collects 70, for an increase of +18. (72 if they take Brazil for +20).
The loss of a land unit on the Philippines can be taken from Paulau. Losing two ground units isn’t optimal, but is still fine. If you get very unlucky, and hit that less than 8% chance, and lose three ground units, then that’s not fun for J2.
In the instance of losing three ground units, you must choose 1: to lose a plane instead, or 2: You’ll likely be taking Malaya J2 and the (rest of) the money islands J3 in that instance, but it’s sometimes possible to still take all of the money islands.
Pros:
1: You have actually removed 4 IPCs from America’s Pacific effort by doing J1, not added anything to it.
Cons:
1: America now has a major factory to build with in the Pacific, so can place more than three boats in the water. This is not a major difference. America usually builds at least one expensive unit on A1 anyway. The only time this would matter much is if they build six destroyers or 8 submarines or something (which is likely non-optimal).
2: America could decide to mess with Europe a bit. This is great for Japan. This is not great for Germany, but by your own admission Germany is likely able to handle this, and we’re speaking entirely about Japan here.
3: ~8% chance to either lose a plane, or to potentially reduce J3 income by 9-16 (somewhat mitigated by ANZAC’s income going down by 5).
United Kingdom:
J1 trounces the p�ss out of the poor brits.
I would disagree that the BB is the least valuable unit in the game. Indeed, it’s not useful in most games the first couple of turns, but any decent British person, if they can keep it, will be using it effectively on or before UK 4. Whether that’s in the med, or doing a suicide ram into your fleet before ANZAC does the same, it’s a damn battleship, and it is very useful. Sending the cruiser down to hit the BB is a 66% chance to lose the cruiser. 33% chance to keep it. If you do keep it, the brits can decide to put planes and a destroyer out of place to kill it, which is great for Japan. Britain never does this. That cruiser can then potentially convoy Malaya. Losing the cruiser hurts, no doubt, especially since you’ll likely be doing some bombardments and gimungous naval battles later, but you still have three other bombarding units, and I’d argue it’s totally worth the cruiser to sink the battleship. The reduction of variables in the game helps the Axis. When you add in the 1/3 chance of the cruiser surviving (actually very slightly less but let’s not get too deep into probability), which is a god damned fantastic boon, the move is fully justified in my opinion.
The Kwangtung fight is the most painful one, because there is the 11% chance to lose both of your ground units. In this case, I’d argue it’s better to lose a plane (which can be replaced quickly at any point later on since it’s flying in) because that also robs UK Pac of 8 IPCS (3 + NO). Either way, you can stand the loss of one plane at this stage of the game, especially if it’s only an 11% chance.
You can still lightly threaten Calcutta on J3, forcing a destroyer block (which you kill with a great ratio), or forcing them to reduce aid to China. You can have a serious J4 threat against Calcutta, which then adds enough pressure to turtle them up.
There are a lot of variables about the UK’s pacific transport. Do they go for Sumatra? Dutch New Guinea? Stack on Java? Persia? Iraq? Something else weird? All I can say about this is, is see my comments on the ANZAC transport below. Your arguments for J2 being better at handling this transport are flawed.
Pros:
-UK Pac’s economy is immediately reduced to only 10 + a money island if they choose to lose the transport to take one (which I’d argue is non-optimal). There’s also a 16.6% chance that you convoy them in SZ 37.
-A BB is destroyed, reducing the UK Pac’s navy’s effectiveness by half, and saving the Med. Axis or Japan grief later on.
Cons:
-Japan has a ~2/3 chance to lose a cruiser.
-Japan has a 11% chance to lose a fighter in Kwangtung.
ANZAC:
Anzac has the most to gain from this. They will make their 10 + 5 from the Malaya NO + another 4 or 5 more, depending on what they want to do, for 19 or 20 IPCs. (Britain could have also gotten Dutch New Guinea for them, meaning 24 IPCs, but that’s at a loss of a british transport).
J1 is definitely worse than J2/J3 if your goal is to take Sydney, but let’s be honest, nobody really ever guns for an early Sydney against non-stupid Allied players. There’s too much wealth to be had in China/the money islands. Easily shutting down Calcutta’s income to 5 - convoys helps both sides of the map immediately. These things are easily argued to be more advantageous than a very complex J4/J5 Sydney.
ANZAC is very possibly going to lose that transport to annoy you whether you do J1 or J2. If you do J1 and they don’t move it out to claim anything, it’s also not doing anything useful. Your claiming you get to kill the ANZAC transport where you otherwise may not and that this is a completely positive thing exclusive to J2 is a fallacious statement.
China:
China is in a stronger position than it might otherwise be, but not by a great amount. You mention them stacking Yunan, which is a major fear of yours. Yeah, that kinda sucks, but that’s not that bad. You can bring up a couple of infantry to defend your plane stack on Kwangsi. They won’t attack it, and if they do: good. Wasting 80% of the Chinese land units at this stage in the game is a dozen nails in their coffin. Is your progress in China slowed for a couple of turns? Potentially yes. When the Japanese ground forces move south a bit more, by J4/J5, China is in full retreat, having never made any real progress. Without Russian aid, China is dead or crippled, with only a momentary hiccup in the process coming when Japan must fight an American fleet or take Calcutta. Also see my comments below in Japan’s section.
Japan:
You now own FIC. You can place a mIC there one turn earlier. You now own Kwangsi, where you can also optionally place a mIC there one turn earlier. These can produce 6 land units (mechs, likely) to nail China, or to refill your transports on their way to wherever.
You now own the Philippines, which is a fantastic staging point for J2.
Instead of gaining +14 over your original income (Trading with America NO + 4 in China), you gain +14 or +15 (3 or 4 in China, +FIC, +Borneo, +Philippines, +Kwangtugn) so either it’s the same or better.
You are still in position to take the money islands on J2 unless ANZAC/UK has done something screwy with their planes/transports. However, if they do that, then you’re now able to kill their planes/transports. It’s a win/win situation. They could have done something equally as screwy whether you did J2 or J1, mind you, so this doesn’t really even matter.
You have an 11% chance and an 8% chance to lose a plane. You have a lot of planes. Come on. And while losing both would kinda suck, there’s only a ~1% chance of that.
You hurt the allies more or no less by doing J1 instead of J2. Inarguable. Your situation as Japan is either stronger doing J1 than J2, or the same, unless you get truly terrible probability. J2 reduces this probabilistic self-fucking, but a very tiny amount made even less isn’t really all that noticable. It’s like being stranded in the middle of, then drowning in, Lake Superior vs. the Indian Ocean. Apart from the saltwater stinging your eyes a bit as you gulp in your final, deadly breath (drink?), what’s the damn difference?
_edit-
And finally, there’s one more thing I like about J1 that has no place in a mechanical discussion, but I feel is worth mentioning as a footnote. When playing at a table of real people, getting the guy playing America into the fight sooner is a bit more fun for him._
Yea, this is a solid strategy. I use a variation of it myself lately, and it’s working out pretty well for me. I feel like the most important part is deciding what to buy as Germany. I tend to forgo the carrier in round 1, building only 6 Art, 2 Inf instead. Realistically, no one takes the sealion threat seriously anyway, so why bother?
Another fun side effect of this is that I often see my opponents leave Britain nearly undefended. And I let them think that’s safe, until I pull a round 6-8 sealion out of my hat. Fun stuff. But situational.
So I continue building mostly Art and Inf in rounds 2, 3, and 4. Then build fast movers for rounds 5 and 6. Of course, you’re also building in the Russian factories during all this, but that’s pretty intuitive.
By round 7, you’re building mostly bombers. At this point, you’re almost unstoppable.
@teslas - I really view the Japanese cruiser as a more valuable unit than the UK battleship - in my experience the BB is usually hanging out in the Indian Ocean for the first half of the game or just a non-vital part of a mixed Allied Pac stack in the Pacific acting like a turtled unit. At best it maybe gets an amphibious shot in Africa around UK4 or so, but it’s never really in the thick of things and takes a long time to be put to use. Meanwhile that cruiser is making bombard shots every turn and is a vital part of the keeping the IJN southern fleet safe from counters, from the very first move.
Also all these scenarios where Japan is taking plane casualties instead of land casualties are bad ones, IMO - very costly, and Japan has a lot of demands on its income in the early game. I regularly go whole games without losing a single Japanese air unit, and the size of the Japanese air force is an important part of its threat/counter-threat projection as well as fleet protection.
I’m less concerned with where Japan stands after J1 or J2 as where it stands in on J4 or J5, is it robust enough to continue offensive operations when the US has a real naval threat in play?
What would be really helpful are screenshots or a saved game of a J1 scenario that I can compare to where things usually stand for me with the J2.
In other notes, some playtesting is showing that Allies can throw a wrench in the works by going all-out KJF including using Russian air and mobile units with a specific focus on Yunnan, and full-Pac US builds or nearly so aimed at SZ6 to draw Japanese ships and air from South Asia, but of course that comes at the price of giving Germany and even sometimes Italy terrific game opportunities.
Either way, the balance mod seems to be an absolute requirement for Allies to have a viable game, without the extra income especially for Russia it just can’t put enough units on the board where it needs them.
I might also have a hard time understanding you based on your word choices and grammar as I have in some other posts, so forgive me there. (I’m not making fun of you by any means, I can barely speak just this one language, so anyone who can piddle about in two or more deserves respect.)
I’ll try to improve my grammar.
You are right. It is only a 2PU value territory.
What I meant is:
Adding Greece to Germany on G2 is saving the Italians the NO Bonus for I3.
Sometimes, Italy ends up having only 3 Ipc’s on I2.
I agree with you teslas, that in the run for moscow, the attack on Greece by Germany might not be much of a help if you need all available Units in Russia as SubmersedElk suggested in this Topic.
I was also interested in SubmersedElk view of an Russian Player who is going after Finnland, but this question is allready answered now.
I have two games on these boards where I’ve J1’d. Sadly, neither is a great example because in one, the opponent wasn’t super good, and in the other, he went heavy Atlantic.
This is the more recent one, still ongoing:
Houserule: +14 IPCs/turn (including initial 52->66) for USA
http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=36657.0
I’ll J1 some more and post them here in the future, I promise :p
That’s a little hard to follow, but I have a quick related question: If you were playing Allies and had the option to alter the setup, removing the UK BB in SZ37 in exchange for an extra US cruiser in SZ10 or SZ101, would you do it?
SZ 101 doesn’t need it, and if I had it, it would often just sail right on through the panama canal on US 1 anyway, so it may just as well go to SZ 10 or nowhere at all. (A destroyer might be a different story since that could be used to kill a German sub US1 if on a J1 DoW.)
SZ 10, that’s somewhat tempting. I don’t know for certain, actually.
In chess, pieces are considered to have relative values in the general case: Queen 9 (or 10), Rook 5, Knight/Bishop 3, Pawn 1.
However, any given piece can have a value much more or less than its nominal value; a passed pawn is worth far more than the average pawn, a knight posted in the center is worth much more than one posted on the edge of the board, a queen exposed to attack is worth less than one not so exposed, and so on. Also reflected in the relative values is the value of time; a piece that requires two moves to get into an effective position is worth less than one that is one move away, which is worth less than one already posted optimally.
Likewise, units in A&A have nominal values, reflected in the purchase price; but they also have relative value based on position as well.
In the case of the UK BB in SZ37, it has nearly as low a positional value as a BB can possibly have. BBs are most effective as part of a defensible fleet in a location where threat can be projected or the enemy is projecting threat. The UK BB in question cannot easily join with such a fleet and cannot project any serious threat, so its positional value is negligible; and because it is so far from joining with the rest of the UK fleet it scores very poorly on the time value as well. It can actually have negative real value if the UK spends cash or other units to protect its nominal value while it is not in a position to be actually useful in combat.
Contrast this to the hypothetical US cruiser tradeoff. The cruiser is nominally worth only 60% of the BB, but positioned in SZ10 it is already combined with the US fleet and is one move away from projecting threat from an important location. So even though the nominal value is much less, I’d assert the positional value makes it more valuable.
Likewise this is my view of the Japanese cruiser vs. the UK BB. I can use that cruiser to great effect from the beginning of the game until the end. It is immediately useful, it is immediately firing its bombards or improving odds in sea battles, it is immediately protecting other assets of value. Same goes for Japanese air, they are projecting threat from the very first move and barring a mistake they are always in good position.
I would argue that taking out a cruiser in J1 is close to the maximum value that particular BB can provide, barring a very long 15+ round game where it is constantly protecting a valuable fleet and/or firing bombard shots for most of that time. Even the Atlantic BBs get shots at useful German units right away, something that cannot be said for the SZ37 one.
This leads me to the conclusion that the ability to kill off that BB in J1 should be assigned a very low overall value, one much less than its nominal 20 cost - and that trading it for 20 US income on turn 1 is a good trade for Allies and bad for Axis. 20 US income is two extra fighters which can be far more useful than that UK BB can ever be, especially when those fighters can be used to project threat into SZ6 as early as US2. That is a nearly immediate downside to J1 that doesn’t occur in the J2.
Can’t the British BB sail to Queensland Rd1, becoming an important backbone of the Allied navy when trying to advance on Japan? It’s only out of position Rd1, which is why killing it is such a boon. Not to mention you already kill more that 20 IPCs of immediate US units that can’t be back in the fight until Rd 3/4 (collect extra Rd1, spend it Rd2, planes can reach SZ6 Rd3 [although you might not have extra carrier space for them], ships can do something Rd4)
Also, you talk a lot about the bombard value of Battleships/Cruisers. How often do you find yourself actually using these? You can’t bombard in island trades because they’ll just die to air counterattacks, which is what most of the transports in the Pac are used for.
All of the value calculation aside (which isn’t news), my main apprehension about trading a UK BB for a US CR is the fact that it’s editing the setup of the board. Whether or not it’s more useful is pretty clear: In most every situation, the US cruiser would probably be the better unit on the board for the Allies. (An example situation where it would likely not be would be one of those weird games where the UK does not do Taranto, for instance.) I am loathe to discuss specific houserules on this board.
And speaking of killing the UK BB not being worth the US making +20 income, have you forgotten the part where you also kill 24 IPCs of mobile American units on the Philippines, one of which is a fighter?
I clearly assign more practical value to the British BB than you do, and maybe that’s wrong, but here’s some words on that:
It can suicide into something of Japan’s with ANZAC coming in for a second hit as early as the second round (but usually the 3rd or 4th). If they’re a bit lucky (and they don’t really need to be depending on what you do), this can damage a carrier, putting two planes out of place (or destroy them outright), or kill a transport and strand some ground units, or whatever else. The threat of doing this is enough to alter the aggression level of Japan throughout play. I probably don’t need to mention “fleet in being” to you. I also agree that it’s worth destroying the hell out of that British battleship at horrible UK nominal value:JP nominal value ratios if it means damaging carriers or otherwise weakening the Japanese fleet in a timely fashion when America is showing up. As Japan, removing this variable is, to me, worth the 2/3 chance of losing my cruiser.
The main problem I’d have of convincing you of the BB’s worth, I think, is the fact that after the first one or two rounds of the game, naming every situation that could arise where the BB (or any other unit for that mater) could possibly be useful is nearly impossible, and nobody would want to write or read a ten page forum post of nested if statements anyway. One example is if your Indian cruiser heads west to hit Ethiopia, then doesn’t immediately turn around (say, to hit Iraq, or to go into the med, or whatever else), the BB can also be necessary on UK 3 to block a J4 hit on Calcutta if you’ve slightly overextended your ground forces in southeast Asia (for what is presumably a good reason).
As far as the cruiser’s worth to Japan:
Japan begins play with four boats, and will likely never build another, that can bombard. I rarely, rarely find myself needing more than two of those bombardments in a game, possible exceptions being hitting Calcutta or a US Korea full of slavic meat shields. Or hell, maybe Cairo. Yes, it is a slightly souped up destroyer in addition to this bombardment, I’ll give you that, but I don’t really feel like the loss of this 50% chance to kill one unit on the first round of combat, only when I’m landing 4+ units, to be a big loss. Additionally, and especially because of, Japan’s having enough air power to seal the deal in the first round of the majority of its fights where the bombardment would be most useful is nearly always enough. (One exception is taking two territories 3 spaces off a naval base where planes can’t follow, then you might be able to use all four of your bombarding ships. This is definitely not a common occurrence.)
I will be convinced of the value of the UK battleship (or the US dd/sub, for that matter) when I see it used effectively against me. (I’m still not convinced that Allies have reasonable win chances at all.) The only thing I see the J2 giving up in terms of kills is the US fighter. The suicide-the-BB thing seems to me even less effective than it getting a 2/3rds chance to destroy a cruiser. Suiciding ANZAC fleet doesn’t sound like a great idea either… my IJN defensive fleet is always parked at a harbor, so whatever damage they do gets absorbed by bb/ac and repaired (with air replaced onto the carriers as needed) before the US gets to follow up. So between them both suicide attacks will generally need to add up to 5 hits or more before even a sub or destroyer gets removed from the board, and that would require a big sacrifice of material.
As far as the cruiser goes, I know that as Japan I use that thing every single turn to do something important. It’s not always bombarding, but it does get a lot of shots and it does project a lot of threat. On the topic of bombarding, repeated bombard shots are a great way to whittle down a large stack against an opponent with low income when you can’t take on the whole stack at once. Japan has several situations where this happens - against India, against the Russians if they come, and later on when assaulting Australia for the win. It’s another option I’d rather not forego if I don’t have to, and I don’t perceive that necessity.
Typical scenario: India with 25ish units on it but only 6 income, throw 2inf 2art at it with 4 amphib shots, on average you’ll score 3 2/3rds hits - just under an even return - with a decent chance to get more, and you don’t risk any more than four units for that roll of the dice. Rolls of the dice that could go very bad for the opponent where it doesn’t really hurt you if it goes bad for you and the odds are reasonable to get the good outcome, those are pure money in a game like this. It’s basically a small strafe with a capped risk, get completely diced and your cost is 14 tops, and you don’t need make stack in Burma to try. Take those chances every time you see them, I say - the bombards give you more of those chances.
As an aside, this conversation gave me an idea I’m going to try. My expeditionary fleet with Japan is usually bb/cruiser/2ac and escorts. I’m going to try swapping out the 2nd AC for the other bb/cruiser pair to have four amphibious shots in the one group and see if that magnifies the threat even further. Perhaps there is not a lot of fear of two bombard shots from a fleet, but four shots might be a different story.
@Private:
Took a look at the League board pp 1&2 - bids vary between 12 and 28, averaging 20.5. wittman is offering me 18. Mmm!
I know I’m a broken record, but 28 is just insane to me.
Just off the top of my head:
Ftr in Matla, inf in Alexandria, tank in Egypt, sub in 98, inf in Yunan. So now Sealion is on without taking any fighters off of London and Libya is gone. Italy is effectively out of the game before they’ve even had a turn and UK doesn’t have to worry about the Med
The 1 inf in Yunan isn’t a game changer, but it increases the chance of a bad J1.
Just because I enjoy coming up with bid scenarios here are a few more for 28:
3 new Russian art, 1 in each of the far east territories (really pushing for that Japan attack), 1 sub 1 ftr in the Med
1 BB 111, 1 DD 110
1 BB 106, 1 DD 91
7 art spread across the Russian territories, or a ftr and 6 inf
CV in 101, British subs in 91 and 96
There’s no shortage of fun ideas, but I stand by what I’ve said before: no idea how the Allies lose more than the occasional game with a bid like that.
I’m a tier 2 player generally, and against players of similar ability, I’ve been winning as Axis against bids approaching 30.
Honestly, if we wanted to see parity - meaning the top tiers had an equal number of wins as the Axis and the Allies - then we’d see bids in the 40+ range. Bids are much too low at present, as the records show.
When I get Allies I always put 3 of the bid towards an ANZAC inf in New Guinea. The long term payoff on that one is many times the investment.
@Private:
Took a look at the League board pp 1&2 - bids vary between 12 and 28, averaging 20.5. wittman is offering me 18. Mmm!
28 IPCs?!?!?!?!? Someone is smoking some serious dope.
28 IPCs is enough to deprive both Germany and Japan of an entire turn of progress, or to win the Med outright simply by placing the bid.
Marsh
When I get Allies I always put 3 of the bid towards an ANZAC inf in New Guinea. The long term payoff on that one is many times the investment.
My understanding is that typical bidding rules do not allow placement of units where none currently exist. Are you using non-standard bidding rules?
Marsh
1 BB 111, 1 DD 110
1 BB 106, 1 DD 91
Can you say massive UK landings on the continent on UK3? I knew you could. Why waste time going after the Med when you can be landing on the continent before Germany is even halfway to Moscow?
There’s no shortage of fun ideas, but I stand by what I’ve said before: no idea how the Allies lose more than the occasional game with a bid like that.
IMO, it would take either phenomenal mismanagement or several consecutive bad rolls on key battles for the Allies to lose with a bid like that.
Marsh
@Marshmallow:
When I get Allies I always put 3 of the bid towards an ANZAC inf in New Guinea. The long term payoff on that one is many times the investment.
My understanding is that typical bidding rules do not allow placement of units where none currently exist. Are you using non-standard bidding rules?
Marsh
My understanding of bidding restrictions is that the country getting the bid has to own the territory, or in the case of sea units has to have a unit present in the SZ, and that no more than one bid unit may be placed per territory. I’ve not had anyone object to the inf in New Guinea.
@Marshmallow:
There’s no shortage of fun ideas, but I stand by what I’ve said before: no idea how the Allies lose more than the occasional game with a bid like that.Â
IMO, it would take either phenomenal mismanagement or several consecutive bad rolls on key battles for the Allies to lose with a bid like that.
Marsh
Don’t worry - I am sure I could do it!