Just got the game

You’re asking good questions! Glad you’re having some fun with the game.

I think you’re right that the out-of-the-box rules tend to reward a game that happens mostly in the Atlantic/European theater. It’s not too hard to fix this with a bid or a house rule. For example, you can start Australia off with a factory and start with Wake Island under Japanese control. That means the Americans have to conquer a Pacific island somewhere in order to collect their national objective…which means that the Americans effectively have several juicy 5-IPC targets at the start of the game. Note that there’s no need to burn the Australian factory; even if the Japanese take it over, they would almost never want to use it.

Another way of looking at this problem is to just…play differently. Like, yes, the European strategy is probably optimal. But the Pacific strategy isn’t that much worse. If you’re having an easy time taking German territories and a hard time taking Japanese territories, then maybe you want to try something a bit different and focus on taking Japanese territories. What feels “easy” is often a matter of how many resources you’re devoting toward the task.

When I play Germany I usually transport at least one load of troops to Norway, two loads if I can get away with it, so that there are 8+ Axis infantry in Scandinavia. Once Germany has firm control of Leningrad, the British presence in Norway is not so bad, but early on Germany needs the income.

Building a German navy is fine within reason, but you have to know where to stop, because ultimately the UK + US together can outbuild you in the Atlantic and sink your navy at a profit. You can’t permanently win the Battle of the Atlantic against a competent opponent, so you shouldn’t try. But 1 carrier can be an excellent purchase because it keeps your Baltic navy alive for an extra two turns or so, which can be the margin of victory in taking Leningrad and holding Norway, so it sort of pays for itself even if the navy eventually winds up on the bottom of the sea. It’s also fine to build no German navy and just focus on blitzing Russia.

Huh, Argothair… no mention of the German Afrika Korps?  :mrgreen:

:wink:

You either defend the Scandinavian countries or bail as much as possible from them, using those units elsewhere.  There is more reward with less units in Africa, and Italy then gets help with her income if the two European Axis powers make a strong effort to get Africa as quickly as possible.

As Germany I like to give UK many opportunity costs, especially the first round or two.  With a limited initial navy (much should be sunk by Germany on turn 1), UK can’t venture too far from the home waters, at least turn 1.

A strong German play is many infantry in early buys.  Establish Fortress Europe while pushing into Africa for more IPCs.  This helps to stop the UK from taking whatever it will (at least not easily) while taking income from UK and putting that into German coffers.

Ha. :-)

The one time I cut myself off for the sake of brevity, somebody comes along and points out what I omitted. Typical.

But, yes, by all means – Germany can go help out in Africa if you like, even if you need to spend a little bit on a Mediterranean navy to make that happen. North Africa is worth more than it looks like, because Britain needs Egypt for an national objective, and Italy needs Algeria, Libya, and Egypt for 2 national objectives. So instead of 4 IPCs, the three territories at the top of Africa are effectively worth something closer to 10 IPCs – about the same as Norway + Finland + Karelia! That means either theater can be a good option. Usually you don’t go heavy into both Scandinavia and north Africa in the opening, because that leaves you short on troops to send east…but it can work, depending on what everyone else is doing and how the dice go.

I got the game last month and am playing my first game slowly with my GF. We are really enjoying the battle between Germany and Russia. I landed jet power on my first turn with Germany and so I have abandoned building any navy and have focused on using fighters to stop and naval presence in the Atlantic. Forcing the US or UK to have carriers or lots of warships to escort transports across. Also I have found the game to be quite balanced….our match is really up in the air right now. I had my first Barbarossa push and Russia was able to hold me off because I tried to push too far too fast, and they now pushed me out and I’m having to rebuild my eastern European front to push again. Japan is having a field day but my GF built an Indian factory and is churning out three UK tanks/infantry every turn which is slowing me down.

I really feel that the game is 50/50 at this point, because Japan is almost able to start pushing into Russia from the East, Germany is now having to deal with UK/US incursions from the West and Italy is still trying to push the UK out of Africa and take that money from them.

Really exciting for us both right now!

But to answer your questions, the dynamics do feel slanted to a KGF, it only takes a turn to transport units from US to Africa, while it is at least two turns to get troops into the fight from the US on the pacific coast. Plus Germany is a total of 13 spaces from all three allies capitals while Japan is wayyyy farther. It is just less time consuming to take Germany first…which allows less time for buildup for defense by the Germans.