Someone needs to kick our Axis

I had an unusual game where the Axis captured Egypt early. The Americans focused heavily on the European operations and the Allies were steadily making progress on that side of the map. I built up the Japanese air force and sent it on a suicide attack into Moscow around turn 8. Stripping off 15 infantry Allied units in Moscow can change a battle from a 95% chance of losing into a 95% chance of winning when the Germans get their turn. It also means that Germany will keep their air force intact, allowing them to reclaim any European victory cities if necessary.

The best part of this strategy is that the extra Japanese planes can hold the Allies at bay for several turns, forcing India to cower and Anzac + USA to be more conservative with their fleets. All of the planes can raid Moscow from a base in Sichuan, meaning that only one turn is required to setup the pivot from Pacific to Europe.

Of course the Russian AA’s shot down half of my Japanese raiders and the German tanks had their turrets pointed backwards, leading to an abrupt and unhappy end to a genius strategy.

@Cmdr:

Other that that, I am wondering what the point is on taking India with Germany.  Other than the “cool…” factor of course.

I didn’t see the time frame that Germany intends to take India, but I would surmise that its a ploy to allow Japan to fry other fish in the Pacific for an Axis win in the Pacific?

Although if the German Air Force is anywhere other than in Europe I’d presume the US would make full investments into the Pacific to prevent the Axis win in the Pacific.

That is why I prefer to incorporate the “no more than one unit per territory or seazone” rule.

I think the great variation that bids provide allow for great replayability. Who wants a game that always depends on what kind of dice Germany got G1? Pick sides, set up the board, roll a couple dice, quit. Blech.

To your point about a 12 being too much, though - only 1 game has been finished in the league this year with a bid over 11, and the axis(-15) won.

Most good players are not going to give their opponent more than 10, is what we’ve been seeing in the league results. And among what appear to be opponents of close skill level, the Allies have won at +9, +10, +8, +10, +9, and +8. And the Axis have won at -9, -15, -7, -9, and -11. Yes, that’s a small sample size, but it seems to be pretty even.

I think the best judges of when a game is fair and balanced are the players. As you can see, over half the games have been run at an 8 or 9. And 2/3 of those games have been won by the Allies. You have people that don’t want to give bids too big, people that acknowledge the Axis has an advantage, people that don’t really want to play the Allies - it’s an interesting and fluid dynamic that always seems to find its own level.

It is an interesting idea, but your explanation points to why your solution may not work.

Here is the jist of your suggestion, I think.

The USA has lots of CVs and BBs because they can afford it.  They are using them to soak hits because they have so many, so lets add a modest repair cost to stop that.

Here are my thoughts:

The problem is that the USA is the only power in the game (most of the time) that will shrug off the repair costs.  So you may actually make things worse for Japan in particular who would be much more affected by paying those costs.

Also your suggestion that a 1 IPC will deter a player from willingly taking hits from their capital ships right away is a bit confusing.  The next cheapest option is to lose a 6 IPC sub.  So a 1 IPC cost isn’t really going to change things.  But as was pointed out earlier, Naval bases are quite pricey as is and the need to pull back a damaged fleet is still a bit of a deterrent.  I think I’m OK with the rules as is.

Thoughts: If the US conquer Caroline Island, they can’t land with planes on it. Perhaps they will be supported by British / Anzac ships. But the whole Japanese fleet can attack them in Sz33. And note: Some of the planes from Kiangsi can reach Sz33 and land on AC, because the planes from Sz35 can land in Palau Island or Marianas. If they move to Sz6, please. The Japanese whole fleet with ALL of their planes will destroy them at J4!

Just wanted to point out an error in logic in this step.  Primarily, the United States of America does not need to land planes on the Carolines, Australia has 3 fighters and I highly recommend using those planes.  That way you instantly get 3 scrambles if you are ever attacked.

Yes, here:

http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=20043.0

@RedHunter:

I have a few problems with all of this as follows…

1. As pointed out the Uk has no reason to declare on Japan…the USA player would kill the brit player if they did that. This would be a case of the allied players not talking to each other. In which case they are going to lose anyway.

2. The USA player can’t be so stupid as to disreguard threats near them, you can’t suprise them really. Again if the USA player is that stupid you don’t need weird tactics to beat them, you can beat them straight up through tactics.

1: You no longer need UK to declare war on Japan. See reply number 32 for explanation. Japan is free to fly over UK territories while neutral. This does not cause a declaration of war, per Krieghund.

2: You no longer need to surprise the US. In fact, it appears that keeping US neutral 3 turns prohibits them from being able to stop this air force move.

Finally, the only player able to stop/impact this, is USSR. They need to shove 12 units to Siberia turn 1, to threaten a take back of Soviet far East. Japan should lose 2 air units and 2 ground units destroying this force on J2. This is not likely, as Japan hasn’t started the game yet, so they would have to “guess” that Japan is going this route and expose a large portion of their starting Eastern forces to a Japanese invasion.

This post is regarding moving the starting Japanese air force to German occupied Alberta. It is not an argument for just America first. It is a discussion for how to always be able to get the air force to the Atlantic. America first may have a lot of problems yet to be resolved. This is one less problem.