The Afrika Korps

@arthur-bomber-harris said in The Afrika Korps:

@squirecam There is a big range of skill levels in G40. I used to be in the upper half of the League players and now I have fallen to the lower half of the talent as I haven’t been active for the last four years. I can only beat players like Axis Dominion with incredible luck of the dice. Players like Adam wouldn’t even put themselves in a situation where I can have variance make up for the talent gap. It is what it is.

Crocket is way, way below me currently. Perhaps he will catch up in skill if he plays a bunch of games, or perhaps he will enjoy his current casual level of gameplay. Nothing wrong with either option. It is what it is.

My point is that the strategies need to be tested against a decent opponent to find flaws. Almost everything works against players that make a ton of mistakes. Heck, Japan could have attacked Amur on J1 in your game and essentially ended the match on the first turn in your game. Hard to come back after having the entire Siberian army destroyed, leaving the entire Soviet Far East open for rapid conquest.

You aren’t listening to what I am saying. This wasnt a game and it wasnt the point to attack the Russians. Crockett was saying that he could go “one on one” with the us fleet (using subs) and destroy the Japanese fleet with a KJF. I told him that Japan was not going to lose its fleet and instead would crush the US fleet if it wanted to. There were others in that thread who insisted that Japan could be blocked from destroying the US fleet. Obviously they weren’t considering that Japan can wait until J3 to attack and can ignore any blocking by going to hawaii.

Attacking Amur was not the point. The point was to show Crockett that his KJF idea was not going to work. That he wasn’t going to destroy the Japanese fleet as he thought.

This was never meant as anything but that. Because I was staying within the test parameters of moving everything towards caroline’s i was not going to attack Amur.

@squirecam matches against Crockett unfortunately don’t mean too much in proving strategies as there are so many flaws in his tactics, with him having so much to progress in his experience level. It should have been a very easy victory for the Allies if they executed better.

I will be interested to see a more experienced player tried the early neutral crush in a play-by-forum match and had success. It seems to open up so many holes in the European defenses as the Allies now can attack both Turkey and Spain while simultaneously pushing back on the Eastern Front with Russian forces. Too many critical territories while Germany hasn’t yet had time to create a huge air force.

I am fascinated by this strategy, but I am running into the problem some people mentioned earlier in the thread: as Germany, I simply cannot be successful in diverting the resources I need to in the Middle East at the same time as staging a whalloping Barbarossa. In my (albeit limited so far) playtesting against myself (sub-optimal, but it’s what I have), Germany may get Leningrad, but by the end of round 5 or maybe 6 the eastern front looks like a stalemate if not Russians in Romania. If the German land units are sent south and investments are put into the navy, Russia is difficult not even to capture but to hold back. Anyone found a good way to handle this?

@tamer-of-beasts said in The Afrika Korps:

I am fascinated by this strategy, but I am running into the problem some people mentioned earlier in the thread: as Germany, I simply cannot be successful in diverting the resources I need to in the Middle East at the same time as staging a whalloping Barbarossa. In my (albeit limited so far) playtesting against myself (sub-optimal, but it’s what I have), Germany may get Leningrad, but by the end of round 5 or maybe 6 the eastern front looks like a stalemate if not Russians in Romania. If the German land units are sent south and investments are put into the navy, Russia is difficult not even to capture but to hold back. Anyone found a good way to handle this?

So what are your purchases and the moves for the first three or four turns with Germany? What are you doing with the allies in response?

G1 I buy a CV and 2 transports and follow the plan Afrika Korps laid out in his posts: taking France and Normandy, strafing (or just outright taking) Yugoslavia, and sinking UK ships in 110 and 111. For the noncombat I take the two pro-Axis neutrals and send 4 inf. from S. Germany to N. Italy for eventual pickup. Italy’s turn is just a toss up as they usually only have the one transport left, two if the UK rolled poorly in Taranto. But I try to take Greece on I1 and sink the French ships while doing the standard moves in N. Africa.

G2 I buy inf., mech., and armor for Barbarossa, and for combat I take Gib. and Morocco with 3 inf., an art., and 2 tanks, and I take S. France. In the noncombat phase set I up for Barbarossa with the land units I have in the east as well as send the 4 infantry in N. Italy to S. France for a G3 shuttle. I2 I take Algeria and Egypt if the UK is struggling to maintain a strong presence (bad rolls and spread out units).

From there it is less scripted. Germany will buy a destroyer in the Med, likely a bomber or two here and there to keep pressure on the UK factories and any navy, and a steady stream of mech and tanks for the Eastern Front. Finally on G4 I can land my units in Syria or TJ, and push for Iraq and beyond. Italy rebuilds a navy with transports to ferry infantry and art. to Egypt to retain the VC and support Germany where it can. Some games I buy a MIC on Egypt as a supply chain investment.

The Allied strategy is relatively basic in the grand scheme of things. UK does Taranto, takes Persia, and sets up a few units to deal with the Ethiopian units while not leaving Egypt completely undefended (leave the inf. and ANZAC inf.). From there push units west from Persia and north from S. Africa and wait for American pressure in the east. My main issue as the Axis is not with the UK but dealing with the Russian wall. Most traditional Barbarossa campaigns get to Leningrad by G4, and have the units to push past that with limited risk of losing major stacks or armor and mech. For these games though, the money I put into reinforcements for the Med (the inf. from S. Germany, the units in the transports in G2, and the planes) really make the Leningrad battle more dicey with more losses. The Russians can easily have over 20 inf. with supporting planes and armor by G4, and if Germany gets past that, it is only because Romania is stripped and poorly defended. Maybe I am just doing Barbarossa wrong, but I find that the game will usually end with Germany and Italy doing well in the Med, but with the Americans taking Gibraltar (though not breaking through the Axis navy I station in 92) and the Russians pushing into the Balkans and maybe the Nordic territories. Germany simply doesn’t have the resources to back up its Med investment and take Moscow, and Italy has little say in how Barbarossa goes if it too is focused on Egypt/Iran.

I am not a top-tier player by any means, and would love to get some feedback on how to improve the maneuvers here. Thoughts?

@tamer-of-beasts said in The Afrika Korps:

G1 I buy a CV and 2 transports and follow the plan Afrika Korps laid out in his posts: taking France and Normandy, strafing (or just outright taking) Yugoslavia, and sinking UK ships in 110 and 111. For the noncombat I take the two pro-Axis neutrals and send 4 inf. from S. Germany to N. Italy for eventual pickup. Italy’s turn is just a toss up as they usually only have the one transport left, two if the UK rolled poorly in Taranto. But I try to take Greece on I1 and sink the French ships while doing the standard moves in N. Africa.

I would take Southern France on G1. This allows units direct into the med on G2, and helps if there is no Taranto. I would also have Germany take Greece G2 rather than Italy.

G2 I buy inf., mech., and armor for Barbarossa, and for combat I take Gib. and Morocco with 3 inf., an art., and 2 tanks, and I take S. France. In the noncombat phase set I up for Barbarossa with the land units I have in the east as well as send the 4 infantry in N. Italy to S. France for a G3 shuttle. I2 I take Algeria and Egypt if the UK is struggling to maintain a strong presence (bad rolls and spread out units).

I think this is where you may be going wrong. You may need units in the med on G2. Try a german AC + 2 transports and then infantry. You are not rushing moscow, you a playing a med strategy so dont switch up so early.

From there it is less scripted. Germany will buy a destroyer in the Med, likely a bomber or two here and there to keep pressure on the UK factories and any navy, and a steady stream of mech and tanks for the Eastern Front. Finally on G4 I can land my units in Syria or TJ, and push for Iraq and beyond. Italy rebuilds a navy with transports to ferry infantry and art. to Egypt to retain the VC and support Germany where it can. Some games I buy a MIC on Egypt as a supply chain investment.

On G3 you have options as to whether to take the fleet back to the Baltics depending on how the allies are doing, or really have a solid med fleet with a merge. The important territories are Gibraltar and north africa. You want Italy to get 3 bonuses as soon as possible.

The Allied strategy is relatively basic in the grand scheme of things. UK does Taranto, takes Persia, and sets up a few units to deal with the Ethiopian units while not leaving Egypt completely undefended (leave the inf. and ANZAC inf.). From there push units west from Persia and north from S. Africa and wait for American pressure in the east. My main issue as the Axis is not with the UK but dealing with the Russian wall. Most traditional Barbarossa campaigns get to Leningrad by G4, and have the units to push past that with limited risk of losing major stacks or armor and mech. For these games though, the money I put into reinforcements for the Med (the inf. from S. Germany, the units in the transports in G2, and the planes) really make the Leningrad battle more dicey with more losses. The Russians can easily have over 20 inf. with supporting planes and armor by G4, and if Germany gets past that, it is only because Romania is stripped and poorly defended. Maybe I am just doing Barbarossa wrong, but I find that the game will usually end with Germany and Italy doing well in the Med, but with the Americans taking Gibraltar (though not breaking through the Axis navy I station in 92) and the Russians pushing into the Balkans and maybe the Nordic territories. Germany simply doesn’t have the resources to back up its Med investment and take Moscow, and Italy has little say in how Barbarossa goes if it too is focused on Egypt/Iran.

Germany does not have the resources to do everything so that is why I have Japan move to Caroline Islands J1. You are being attacked by USA and they are getting Gibraltar which is a must hold. Force the USA to build in the pacific and you will find it easier. If US wont build in the pacific then wipe out their fleet and take hawaii and australia. Then just wait as Germany while Japan gets the other VC needed.

Also dont be tied to a med strategy. Sometimes it better to have 3 transports attacking Lenningrad each turn. You can have a small fleet in the med if you merge germany and italian fleets if u take SF G1 and build G2.

If the allies are determined to get into the med, then the only way to stop them is by building units and shipping them each turn into Gibraltar or going through spain. It is more important to not lose Gibratar than it is trying to speed rush Egypt, especially if the UK has multiple middle east factories.

@squirecam Good points, thank you. I think my next tries will have a more aggressive Japan and a better shuttling system of German units. I’ll see how that goes.