Germany Strategy concept…

Utz, the nice thing about KGF in Revised is it can be deployed flexibly.  Some opponents will stack Western and won’t allow the Western stack tactics I’m talking about, forcing a long game.

The conventional winning strategy for Allies against an expert level Axis is UK shucks to Arch/4, USA shucks to Africa/12.  Russia first focuses on dead-zoning Karelia by getting as many units to Western Russia as it can, then it gets men to Persia in conjunction with UK air/armor that landed in Arch.  From there, the Americans reinforce Persia.  Hold Persia and Allies can win the economic war.

If Axis is skilled, this makes for a long game.  If at all possible, it’s nice to shake things up with more aggressive strategies, and that’s where mass landings on Western along with aggressive Russian attacks come in.  From SZ 4 or SZ 12, the Allies can hit Western, so there’s a lot of room for flexibility.

Re USA1 ACs, it’s not strictly necessary to buy one if UK will land in 12, but it can be useful if UK will drop stuff in Europe immediately.

I agree with the shield and sword statement. It is my experience that Germany on its first turn should buy a transport for Italy and all men. Regroup your tanks and all your infantry into Eastern Europe and plan to take Karelia on turn 3 if possible. Turn 2 can work but can be costly. Germany should buy mostly all men on turn two and three as well and move them into Eastern Europr so as to overwhelm Russia and get ahead of their infantry total. Once Germany has more infantry than Russia attack Karelia with men and tanks only, save your planes. From Italy send two full transports every turn into Egypt and Trans Jordan until you secure the Suez and subsiquently Africa.  Meanwhile Japan hits China, and India and then all out Russia, while still maintaining suppremacy in the Pacific by staying one step ahead of the US and as someone else mentioned take out as many US and UK ships as possible while not over commiting your fleet and only losing the cheap expendable replaceable pieces. An IC is a good idea if you are sure you can hold it: Manchuria is good to go after Russia, but can be reinforced by Japan transports anyway, FIC is safer but India is the best of both if you can capture and hold it, because it is two squares “a tank blitz” away from Caucauscus and Trans-Jordan and you can move fleet through the Suez if needed and assist Germany in conquering Africa as required. Not to mention taking precious money away from the UK. Japan would then purchase three tanks every round for India (or FIC) and keep that up until Russia falls. From India or FIC you can also launch a strike on Australia and New Zealand to further hurt UK. If UK buys an IC on India, Japan MUST capture it at all costs or UK will get the upper hand and its game over. If Germany and Japan hit fast and hard as a unit first at UK to bankrupt and “stall” them and get the valuable money they need and at US to “stall” them, then maintain that stall on both of them and go all out Russia so as to hit Moscow on the 5th or 6th turn from both sides, the Axis will have an IPC victory easily or if using victory cities (AA50 and new) or complete victory rules they will be on their way to world domination. :-)

@Granada:

oh well, i have just tried the strategy against an experienced player and i was destroyed terribly. SZ 12 IS NOT A SAFE PLACE R1. You would not have 2 UK trans in most cases. I played against bid 9 so there was one sub more from the start and an AC on G1. Any kind of convoying system is necessary for US but next time i am going to make sure that i control the atlantic solidly first. I made some childish mistakes too, but if the germans put an effort to contesting the atlantic you cannot just build trannies. You have to sink their ships first and you have to do it quick and as cheap as possible.

Btw if the convoying system is to work smoothly you need for US actually three sets of transport ships, two wount do.

Early allied shipping losses can really hamper your game plan. It is always vital to protect not only the transports, but that British battleship! If Germany invests 24 ipcs in the water, you will have to wait a round or two to be safe, however, thats all right, as Germany took away 24 ipcs from the Russian campaign, you have time to get going.

Oh dear - a little off-topic…

To my mind, a major key to the game (and thus a good player) is unit count and IPC value. The player with the most land units at the end of the game wins. Units give you options, and the ability to limit your opponents’ options, the ability to control territory, and thus build more units.

Units at the front are more important than other units. Don’t lose these unless you are making the other side lose more of them.

So to my mind the keys are:

Not letting your front-line units get killed without taking more down in return Get more units to the front more quickly Build more units - this means infantry Enable your units to exert their influence in the maximum number of places. This means Transports, tanks, and don’t lose your air units, maybe even build a few, but that will interfere with #3

#1 is tactics
#2 is logistics
#3 is economics
#4 is force multiplication, and allows you to do more of #1 and #2 with your existing units. You can evacuate, attack, create kill zones, shift fronts, etc.

Sea Zone 12, Sea Zone 5?  Did you not include them because you don’t want to factor in naval territories, or because they slipped your attention?

Egypt I would definately put in.

Let’s for go listing the Capitals of any nations, they’re a given.

1.  Ukraine
2.  Caucasus
3.  E. Europe
4.  Karelia
5.  SZ 5
6.  W. Europe
7.  SZ 12/13 (You’d be surprised how important it is to prevent America from going in here!)
8.  Egypt
9.  Balkans
10. S. Europe

I listed the last two last because if you are fighting to get either of those back, the game’s pretty much lost.

Yea, I was thinking of a Battleship/Aircraft Carrier R1 Build with Germany.  Maybe an 8 IPC bid for a second Transport in SZ 5.

As for invading England, really wasn’t thinking along those lines.  I was thinking of a fleet big enough to stop any Navy from building up by the allies so 100% of Germany can go for Russia leaving W. Europe and S. Europe and Africa mostly undefended.

@DarthMaximus:

Correction.

Just went back and read his US moves again, the US Pac Fleet is in the GOC sz, not the Wus sz.

Without looking at the map, I’ll have to assume that is the Sz right below Mex on the Pacific side of the board.

So that rules out a strike on his fleet on J2, he has 1 trn, 1 dd, 1 ac, 1 bb, 2 ftrs there, but it opens the door for me to unify my fleet at HI and get two BB shots and take relatively easily, while getting as many as 7 more units to Asia, to continue gaining IPC.

But As long as I can keep his fleet pinned near Mex, that is fine by me, and once again comes down to Germany just getting through the first few rds.

Fighters can fly 4 moves, as long as a carrier can pick them up (if they die, the carrier does not have to move).

That SZ is 2 from HI and you have 2 carriers and the bomber. Why cant you attack ??

Squirecam

Edit - I see 2 fighters are on Japan… So they wont reach, correct?

For Revised…
Western:  2 INF, 2 ARM, 1 FIG, 1 AA
Southern:  2 INF, 1 ART, 1 ARM, 1 AA, 1 IC
Germany:  3 INF, 2 ARM, 1 FIG, 1 BOM, 1 AA, 1 IC
Norway:  3 INF, 1 FIG
Eastern:  2 INF, 1 ARM, 1 FIG
Balkans:  2 INF, 1 ARM, 1 FIG
Belorussia:  3 INF
West Russia:  3 INF, 1 ART, 1 ARM
Ukraine:  3 INF, 1 ART, 1 ARM, 1 FIG
Algeria:  1 INF, 1 ART
Libya:  1 INF, 1 ARM
SZ5:  1 TRn, 2 SUB, 1 DST
SZ14:  1 BB, 1 TRN
SZ8:  1 SUB