Thoughts on Japan

Yea, I’ve been doing enhanced for a while, the destroyers are more expensive in revised.

So America buys 2 Carriers, Fighter then next round 3 destroyers, etc, etc, etc

Anyway, Canadian shield’s no real response.  Russia’s going to be all over Germany like flies on a hobo if they even attempt that maneuver while America’s massing ships, hell, even if Germany tries to go land and makes an attempt to roll over Moscow leaving Africa to the English.

The real question is, does Japan ignore America and lose all their islands and their entire fleet or does Japan build in response.  Since most players are going to build submarines in response (since they are cheaper than destroyers you can mass more of them faster) then America pulls out after just a few rounds (still more than enough time to rescue England if needed) leaving Japan with a bunch of useless submarines.

Meanwhile, America was building destroyers which, if you get the technology, and why shouldn’t you since you don’t need to build more destroyers at the moment, can bombard the Germans into the stone age with all but no expense to America. (Hell, given that arrangement, I’d recommend Bomber builds to just sink the Germans deeper in debt.  You only need 1 infantry a round to do your bombardments.)

Furthermore, now Japan’s building ground units like crazy, but Russia can divert 100% of it’s military power to defending against Japan and England can devote 100% of it’s air and ground power to attacking Japan.  Only England’s navy is tasked with ensuring that SZ 5 is cleared of enemy ships so that America is free to bombard each round.

@Bunnies:

(And why am I always beating my favorite dead horse “look at the board, look at the board, look at the board”?)

Because it’s so unrelevant? Or maybe your horse is to slow? ;)

So, you say, you specified that a country was deadzoned and was being traded.  Ask yourself if that’s enough to formulate a grand strategy.  Of course it’s not.

Not? ;)
Don’t get me wrong, I know that my game will only some dilettantish moving of plastic figures as long I have no planning above the next three moves. Know yourself, know your enemy … all that stuff from all that books.
But I also must take a look on the little decisions I have to make, like that example above. If I make such little things wrong, no strategy can help me. And I think, an strategy must pay attention to the overall board situation (as you said; not a dead horse in my eyes), my own weakenings in gameplay and the player that sits on the other side of the table. To judge that situation right and create the adequate strategy is a thing that I have to do by myself, and all the postings on this board can only help a little. But for that little tactical decisions and tiny precious moves which the game have in store these boards are an eye opener for me. And that’s why I’m looking for such little, delimited solutions for a special problem and hope, I’ ll remember that solution in my next game.

Conclusion:  Germany has superior trading ability.  Germany may leave defense forces of 2 infantry or more per territory, particularly in Belorussia and Ukraine early (since UK/US probably can’t drop units into those territories early, unlike Karelia and Archangel).  However, Russia should avoid leaving infantry in territories if it can help it.

I’ll try to remember that.

Note leaving infantry behind is sometimes good re: Tim’s post.

Known, but noted again. :)

And: thank you for your post.

@theace47:

[…]
Now to what I was wondering was what is the best way to keep Japan off of Russia’s back and how much is the right amount of british involvement in Asia.  The way I stall Japan usually is by spending about 10 ipcs on navy and airforce to make the Japanese build a navy or have me knocking on their back door.  I also build an IC in India for the British and crank out 3 tanks a turn.
[…]

The bristish player alone has several options to stall the japanese, but it depends from the overall situation before the british move: Have the russians fortified Buryatia with 6 INF? Has Germany attack EGY such heavy that a counterattack is suicidal? Has Germany set pressure by building many trannys, so that the british have to fortify the UK and have no money left for asia?

If EGY can be counterattacked, then maybe two INF from IND with the FIG there goes to EGY, perhaps assisted by the british BMR. In that situation a IC in India is not commendable.
If EGY can not counterattacked, than you have several options with the asian forces:

(1) First turn overall attack: attack SZ 59 tranny with DD; attack Borneo with two INF from India, supported by FIG (FIG can be landed on CV); attack New Guinea with two INF from Australia; attack SZ 45 with sub. Intention here is to give the japanese to much targets for the first turn attack and get some IPC for the first turns.

(2) Gather all british navy in SZ 30, including FIG, including several INF from India or Australia; options are a second turn attack of East Indies with four INF or moving to SZ 28 and unload troops in africa. The fleet can continue to atlantic theatre or stay in the area, combined with IC in SA, which produce INF/ARM for the first turns followed by naval units and counterattack the Japanese Imperial Navy.

(3) attack SZ 45 with sub and FIG and land FIG at US CV in SZ 52; attack SZ 59 with DD and CV; move australian tranny to SZ 42 and into the atlantic; use the indian tranny to bring two INF to africa via SZ 33

(4) British IC in India and US IC in Sianking. Both must be support by russian troops for some turns. You will not hold these ICs for long, but maby buys time for crushing Germany.

(5) Attack SZ 45 with sub. Attack SZ 59 with FIG only and land the FIG at BUR (only if the russian have stock INF there). Bring the BMR to NOV or EVK. If you can afford, bring the two FIG to WCA. Intention is to counterattack after Pearl Harbour and bring pressure to SZ 60/61, so that the japanese player need protection for his newly build trannys (Note also that both the FIG from hawai and the BMR from EUS can attack SZ 60 if there is a landing place in BUR).

The next options I have seen or use in games, but I would not recommend these against an experienced player:

(6) Attack FIC with INF from India and FIG, land FIG in CHI. Use navy to attack japanese tranny and sub and give the japanese many targets for the first turn. Perhaps the two FIGs survive the japanese attack.

(7) Build IC in Australia and save money, move all fleet to SZ 30, build FIG/BB there and meet with US fleet as SZ 45. The US player also must buy navy at pacific, game will be a KJF. Perhaps you can get some of the japanese island with the british to get more IPC. Problem here is that UK spend many IPC in pacific (and none in the first two rounds in europe), and Germany becomes a monster. Russia is under heavy pressure, and africa may be a problem too.

You also have the option to go pacific with US to stall the japanese, and handle Germany with UK/Russia only, but these is a complete different approach. You may buy two CV and one FIG or CV/BB, followed by heavy sub and/or trannys and FIG overbuild and start island hopping (have in mind that a rightly placed CV can bring 4 FIG to an attack). One milestone here could an american IC on East Indies, pushing the japanese back to homeland and switch to KGF.

Hope that helps …

You’d still want an IC in W. Europe for England so that you can move the British fleet into the Med to pincer the Japanese fleet then.

Anyway, most players will just surrender after Moscow or Berlin falls. (Assuming a normal situation, which is to say, massive Axis armies, pitiful Allied armies or badly positioned Allied armies.  (switch if axis falls not allies.))

If you want to call me an arrogant bastard, that’s fine, even accurate a fair amount of the time.  But call me an arrogant bastard because I’m an arrogant bastard, don’t misquote me!

i have no desire to call you that, nor was i offended by your post :mrgreen:

i apologise for poor emoticon use  :oops:

Yep… I had that argument with Tri in one of our earlier games…  I was using the box rules which implied somethign else, he was using LHTR, which are explicit.

GG are you there, so please answer my question. :-?

Variant 3 will make subs more or less useless against a Japanese fleet with at least one BB. So I think it is better to not mess up too much with the rules and vote for variant 2 or 1. In plain english, it is not worth fixing a rule that is supposed to fix another one. Things can get too complicated if one does! :wink: