We need an allied playbook.

@squirecam My friends and i play OOB, so without the bid. it’s 85% i think but that means in 15% you’ll get diced which is not a whole lot and it should probably be done, but if possible battles like these should be avoided.

@cornwallis

My partner has the same issue in AA50. I think the UK battleship must be taken out G1 but the odds are only 80% or so. Certain round one attacks are unavoidable in my opinion. You just have to live with the consequences or bid a unit to change the odds.

@squirecam Losing a fighter to the BB has less far reaching consequences than losing your UK fleet and thus the Med.
Yes off course going for Taranto can be the best choice, but you have to be prepared for a failure. And in the case of 10% diced battle (loss) the game is practicly over before it even begun.

@cornwallis

A bid sub makes the odds 94%. That’s a very rational attack. Even in the worst case, you wipe out the IT fleet and 2 axis fighters. There are no guarantees in life but that attack has really really good odds.

Bring over 2 fighters from UK and the odds are 99%.

If you lose the fighter and bomber to the UK BB, it’s very painful. If that BB survives on top of that, Germany is probably going to lose.

@crockett36 do you have the links to these strategy videos?

@squirecam @crockett36 @Argothair

Lately we do this:

Asume the lose of the cruiser at Gibraltar and DD and tpt at Canada by subs.

Don´’t scramble G1 unless he really gives you the chance to kill fighters.

Attack the sub at Canada with the DD and Bomber land bomber on iceland.

Kill tpt and DD at tobruk. With fighter from Gibr and TacBomb and cruiser

Tobruk strafe is possible without the tpt (and add the tac bomb).

In NCM take persia.
All fighters from UK go to Africa (territory under Sahara).

Take Persia. With Med Tpt .withdraw all what can to Egypt. Put the DD as blokker under Greece. Evac Czrrier to Red Sea and add fighter/tacBomb from India. Now Egypt is Safe from landings. On UK you can have all your fighters there.
Buy 1 Bomb, fighter and 2 men.

Pacific: buy men and take Java.

US needs to prepare for the London Calling to desuade Ger from Sealion.

@cornwallis Some interesting ideas in there. I appreciate in particular bombing the sub off Quebec and then landing in Iceland; I hadn’t thought of that, and it’s good to return the bomber as far east as you can as quickly as you can.

I think against your proposed opening I would do a Sea Lion most games, regardless of whether the US looked prepared. Once the British fighters land in west Africa, they can’t make it back to defend London, because there is no airbase there. Likewise the fighter from Gibraltar appears committed to the Tobruk strafe and then presumably lands in Egypt, where it can’t reach London. The new bomber in London is not going to contribute much to defense, so the proposed defensive buy for London is really only 3 units, which in my opinion is not enough after you’ve permanently sent all the fighters away to Africa. Also we’re assuming the Canadian transport was sunk, so no reinforcements arrive from Canada.

Egypt is relatively well-defended for now, but if Britain loses the capital or even if just Britain has to spend its UK2 income on max defense for London, then Italy will have a chance to catch up.

Can you say more about the purpose of strafing Tobruk? What are you trying to accomplish there, exactly?

@argothair sea Lion is idd a treath. But when US is full prepared to retake it, the long term effect for Ger is negatieve. I´ve done sea lion before against the London calling and in the long run you can hold it but overinvest so USSR becomes a monster.

@Argothair
Of course you can keep your fighters on London and buy 6inf plus fighter. The goal is to send fighters asap to Egypt to A) fight of the italians and B) move on to Moscow. We generaly built an Airbase on Egypt UK2 and draw the carrier plus the Pacific fleet in the Med. Depriving Italy from its Egypt ambitions.
We tried Gibastion a few times but it requies two Tpt to secure Algeria and in the long run it´’s not worth it bc italy can on I1 land in Middle East or take and reinforce Alexandria.

Tobruk strafe is an option but without the tpt it´s unlikely to take it wirh UK but you can strafe it.
You have somthinh like 55% of really winning.

@cornwallis said in We need an allied playbook.:

We tried Gibastion a few times but it requies two Tpt to secure Algeria and in the long run it´’s not worth it bc italy can on I1 land in Middle East or take and reinforce Alexandria.

Yes it does but do you need to secure Algeria? If Germany wants to send it’s entire Luftwaffe to SZ92 to attack the Brits, they can expect to lose 7 out of their 12 planes. Not a good start for them. Now I am assuming the SZ91 Cruiser has survived but if they have not sent subs to SZ110 then the option to scramble to SZ110 becomes a lot more attractive. If they do land in Alexandria, can’t you then smash the fleet? Even an air strike would work.

@simon33 idd you don´’t have to Defend algeria but take the fight . he can take you out in 2 rounds of combat if you stack: 2 cruisers, carrier with in totaal 5 fighters. Let´’s say the DD is blocking the italian fleet.
Losing all that for 7 fighters. I don´’t know if that is worth it giving the Italians free reign in the Med. The few times he did attack me the axis won bc it toon forever containing Italy.

If he does not attack then he will probably stick around mainland italy slowly building up fleet. If he goes to Egypt/transjordan then your ships in the Red sea can´t join the fight but idd you can attack him with pure air bc he will Block you with a DD at Malta.

I wouldn’t waste a dd on a blocker. Attacking the sz stack with the Italians is suicide for them. Yes survivors can be picked off by the Luftwaffe but in that scenario you can skip the scramble on Germany’s turn and keep the planes intact.

@simon33 ok good argument. So you would search the fight with Germany and sandbagging Egypt against italy.

@simon33 ok good argument. So you would search the fight with Germany and sandbagging Egypt against italy.

@argothair @crockett36 @simon33

For years we have been switching between KGF and KJF as Allies. Building on East or West as US side gives away your initial plans off course.
Building in S-Francisco is giving Japan a heads up to start preparing for a naval clash with US.

This is a brainfart:

As US you built for three turns 100% on the East coast (carriers, DD, tpt,…) as if you were preparing for a KGF, forcing italy and Ger to prepare and makingJapan believe they free reign. The Pacific fleet shucks troops to Hawaii as normal. On US3 you send everything (Eur and Pac) to Samoa. It can be reached from New York, Hawaii and S-Fr. UK Pacific builts a Naval base there UK3 (they need to save their income).

From there you are one turn away from Queensland and thus the money islands are in reach. All reinforcements can come via a built on the East via Samoa to Queensland coast so your supply lines are safe from SZ6. And you can switch to a KGF easily.

Did it once and it surprised the Axis player like hell. Unfortunately systematic bad dice shred allied play so no matter the strategy, it was a lost game so no valid after action review possible.

@cornwallis couldn’t you do the same with a naval base in Panama? Built by the rich Americans, not the poor ukp!? Not at a map rn, but I seem to remember that.

@crockett36 Think it was the Line Islands

@barnee @crockett36
No Line is not within 3 spaces of the East Coast.
What do you think of the general idea? Surprising the axis and still being able to switch to europe

@cornwallis said in We need an allied playbook.:

@barnee @crockett36
No Line is not within 3 spaces of the East Coast.
What do you think of the general idea? Surprising the axis and still being able to switch to europe

Yea I like it. That 15 bucks for UKP pretty spendy though

@cornwallis Samoa is a clever place to build a naval base; I did not see that it connects to both New York and Queensland. That’s really interesting that you are able to redirect forces that quickly. For me, though, the question is whether the tactical surprise is really worth the investment. On the one hand you’ve got the $15 for the naval base in Samoa, which is expensive. On the other hand, by committing to travel through Samoa, you take pressure off of many of the potential Japanese targets.

As you move boats from San Francisco to Hawaii to Queensland, you are incidentally threatening Tokyo, Korea, Iwo Jima, Wake, Midway, and the Caroline Islands.

As you move boats from New York to Samoa to Queensland, you do not threaten any of those targets – so unless you want to slow down your attack on Japanese hot spots by a full turn, you are kind of broadcasting to Japan exactly where you are going to attack.

Meanwhile, unless Japan panics and commits an unforced error, it’s usually not that hard for Japan to reorient from a land-based strategy to a naval strategy. They start with a massive air force that can be used on land in China, Burma, Siberia, etc., and then that same air force can be flown away and placed on newly built carriers to defend the Pacific islands. Even in a worst-case scenario, where Japan built 3 minor factories on the mainland, they can still pivot to building something like like 3 carriers, 1 destroyer, 5 infantry, and 1 artillery for $75. The carriers accommodate the existing Japanese air force, and the infantry/artillery continue the fight in mainland Asia. The US has to build its own planes, and defender has the advantage anyway, so matching that defending Japanese force would require something like 3 carriers, 2 subs, 3 fighters, 3 tacs for $123. Throw in a couple of loaded transports for $30 so that you can actually retake some of the money islands, and the total bill is $153…basically two full turns of American income just to match one turn of Japanese spending, even when Japan is caught totally by surprise.

Similarly, the European Axis might think that they have to do a lot of defense against an incoming American invasion of Italy or whatever, but as long as they planned that defense intelligently, without panicking, they can still take Moscow on schedule. Right, like so you have a couple extra Italian infantry in Rome instead of a tank, or you have a couple of German subs in the Baltic and it turns out you don’t need them because the whole Allied fleet sailed through the Panama Canal. OK, no big deal. The infantry in Italy can eventually go by transport to Morocco or Syria or wherever they can be useful for harassing the British; the extra subs can go to the Irish Sea for convoy damage. Meanwhile, hopefully the Germans mostly did their defense by buying air power, which can both threaten to shoot down Allied ships, or, if those ships never show up, can fly to the eastern front and support an attack on Moscow.

So while I do like the Samoa naval base for the sheer amusement value and for the chance to break a psychologically weak opponent, I think it’s probably not a valid element of top-tier competitive play. I’m stumped to see how you could recover enough value from the naval base to justify the cost.

One idea I have been playing around with recently is a naval base in Wake Island. It probably only works in Balanced Mod or Path to Victory, because without the extra national objectives for the smaller islands the extra range just isn’t very important, but it’s always bothered me that ships are only moving 2 spaces from San Francisco to Hawaii – it seems inefficient. If you move them 3 spaces from San Francisco to Wake, then another 3 spaces can threaten the widest possible range of Japanese targets, as well as making it harder for Japan to protect Tokyo by interposing a single blocking destroyer.