(1st edition) Russian political situation

The Med is controlled by the USN with no real threat so the US can take its units in France and dump them to support UK.

@ShrimpBoatChef:

Earlier in the thread read that 42.2 plays in under 5 hours. That is cool to hear.  We play Global 40 2nd all the time. Fast games in 5 hours or all day for the win sometimes.  Might have to check out the smaller/faster board.

Ya… I’d put 1941 at about 3 hours playtime, and 4-to-5 sounds about right for 1942.2 (depending on the experience of the players).

@Arthur:

You might as well issue an R1 DoW against Japan; at our gaming group we generally assume that Russia is at war unless stated otherwise.  So far I haven’t seen any reason in non-BM games to not opt for immediate war.

This makes perfect sense with experienced players, but I do remember a game where I, playing Russia, managed to delay a Japanese attack for quite a few turns by claiming that we had always been on good terms and that I had never done anything at all to damage Japan’s interests.  :-D

Our group has played with India and UK as seperate parts of the Commonwealth (Global 39 has the FEC {Far East Command} and the uk seperate}).  The allies have to work together and nt compete against each other.  The ANZAC player already has to share the DEI with India if either of them are going to have any real income to work with.  India and UK can work together as seperate players.

AS for the thread, build destroyers in Canada to hunt subs to work on your NO (no German Uboats in the Atlantic).  Also, bomg Germany in West Germany, Paris, Normandy…where ever you can hit them.  You may not be able to ivade effectively by yourself but you can harrass the German player enough that he has to pay attention to the Uk as well as smash the Soviets.  Landings in Norway and fortifying it takes away from Germany and opens another route to aid the Soviets.  Securing the Northern flank can help Leningrad or if need be retake it for the Soviets.  Zhukov44 was right.  Don’t lose Cairo.  Trops build in South Africa of tanks and mechs can help hold Cairo and even destroy the North African Italian army.  A IC build in Cairo, once secured will help limmit Italy and secure a route for US troops the attack the soft underside of Europe (usually not that well defended by the axis).  One last thing is hold Gibraltor if possible.  Building and air base there and sending some fighters can make US entry into the med so much easier.  It also  allows allied ships into the med to keep the Italians from their Med naval NO if the British med navy didn’t fare so well.

It would be fun to import the Iron Blitz (PC version) Cold War scenario into the 1940 map: this time around instead of just having USSR-US-UK you could expand it to have France represent the rest of the NATO powers, Germany to represent the Warsaw Pact and China gets to be on its own (as PRC vs ROC, Taiwan can just be controlled by the US player along with Japan). Of course tech would be opened up.

@knp7765:

As Russia, you should definitely grab Norway. With the large US fleet there and London getting liberated, it’s very doubtful Germany will be putting any more boats in the water (…)

I agree completely. I want Norway out of the way first round after London is liberated, just to rid Germany of another 8 IPCs. If the Germans position themselves in Finland however, USA will take Norway instead. Otherwise Germany can enjoy those 8IPCs one more turn.

@knp7765:

(…)Do you plan to liberate Paris if US troops successfully land in Normandy or Holland? (…)

I usually wait to liberate Paris for the exact same reasons as you mentioned. It is a matter of being able to hold it or not. Trading it back and forth with Germany is often unacceptable (but not always), especially if the USA has to spend a lot in the Pacific (sometimes I am forced to invest near 100% in the Pacific with the USA from US7 and onwards because the Japs have taken Calcutta and are investing near 100% on also getting Hawai). For that reason I keep my men and TRS next to each other in Gibraltar, London, Normandy or wherever they are safe while being the most aggressive.

In this particular situation however, it remains to be seen. If taking Paris means the fall of Berlin in a series of falling dominoes then taking Paris it is!

@capnstak:

Is there a significant difference between the two or could I use the videos from Alpha 3.5 rules and apply the same way as with 2nd edition?

It should work.  The big difference is that the UK has 1 less Infantry in Egypt in 2e, and 2e has the rules about the Soviet-Mongolian defense treaty.

I finished a global game yesterday. I was Ge and It, a friend was Ja, another was UK, ANZAC and FR and another China, US and SU.

Even though my Italian fleet was left alone and a I1 where I lost nothing and gained 5 territories, followed by another couple of good turns for the Axis the Allies won.

The moment the US and SU were at war the megafleet of the US moved to the most eastern territory of the SU and landed 10 land units there, while their bombers took care of the transports and small ships at the Japanese coast (and after that landed next to the land forces in the Soviet Far East). Yes, US bombers can take of from San Francisco, attack the Japanese Sea and land in Soviet Union. Japan had to pull its navy back and with that the game was over. No more expansion for Japan, a couple of relatively bad rolls from Germany and Soviets pumping out hordes of infantry and it was all over.

To balance things a bit more we are going to use the Italian Fix (we thought up that rule and then read in on here too) and use the Japanese extra NO of 10 IPC while not at war (except with China). I don’t think it will be enough so maybe we will even consider super subs for Germany, Warbonds for Italy or Super Factories (what’s the name?)for Japan.

Mind you, we used the new set up as described in Canucks post (less aircraft in the Pacific). The naval base in NSW is logical, but extremely powerful for ANZAC. They get both NO’s on turn 1 and can reach almost everywhere that’s important for them.