Why is Taranto raid so popular?

@Wizard
Keeping in mind that I’m a low to intermediate type player, Taranto whacks the Italian fleet so they can’t threaten Egypt. I believe some players have started bypassing that and stacking UK navy in 92. I’m not real familiar with that strategy. As far as a con goes, I guess you use most of your air to do it.

The strategy threads for Japan https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/17005/the-japan-playbook and Germany are quite informative. Also, there’s a couple Allied strategy threads that have been active recently that make some good points. https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/32557/we-need-an-allied-playbook/451

https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/33451/another-attempt-at-an-allied-playbook/39

https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/33126/mechanized-russia/59

If you DL triplea https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/17147/gargantua-s-k-i-s-s-triplea-instructions/4 you can research “League Games” and gain a lot of info that way. There always looking for new players too. https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/category/29/league

@Wizard you can get the SB from the UK in the fight, and several planes and ships on SZ97, even if the italians and germans coordinate to get a full 3 plane scramble, it is still something like 55/45 UK win and you wipe out all those planes. Italy doesn’t have the ability to replace the battleship, and the cruiser likely won’t be replaced either. You severely hamper italy’s ability to branch out and get its income up, and if they can’t get the UK navy out of SZ 97 by the end of their turn, then all those ships get to roll convoy dice as well.

The end goal is to knock out the Italian fleet to the point where the British could in theory leave the med and Egypt will be fine.

Here are my thoughts on the Taranto Raid…

https://youtu.be/K2fRmafADzo

@Wizard Cheers, glad you enjoyed it.

The big boon to Taranto is that it’s just such a low risk, high reward play. If you win, you all but cripple Italy’s ability to threaten the Med without also tying up significant German resources. If you lose, your losses are mostly units you won’t really miss while each of Italy’s losses limits it’s options severely.

@Amalec Disagree, if you lose, you now lack an air force for UK that would of been way more useful shielding your fleets or reinforcing USSR.

A fine point, which I tested out in our last 40 game. Italy raged all over the UK’s money–while the UK had a bunch of planes that kept it nice and safe from Germany’s roaming 3 ship fleet. A few planes might have made it to Leningrad for a showdown but the Russia player didn’t garrision it properly anyway at that juncture.

Takeway? Do it every single time. It’s the difference between a 12 income Italy and a 40 income italy. And, if you lose, it doesn’t lose London.

@taamvan the only way I will ever do Taranto is if I can bid a submarine in the med and use that as a cover for the attack so that sub can take a hit which better protects the bomber.

@Caesar-Seriona
but even if the axis scramble 3 planes, it should still be something like 60/40 UKs favor?? and you likely snag 2 italian fighters if they scramble?? do you just think that is too close?

@Aaron_the_Warmonger Even with the Italian aircraft it’s doable. Usually the good to stop move is that Germany takes whatever air craft that hit France and moves them to Italy to stop the raid.

@Caesar-Seriona In the case you do poorly, you still shot down Axis air.

In the case you did well and there is still a UK AC with planes on it, then they have to sacrifice the rest of their air to kill it

If you did OK, there is usually a stack of planes that land on syria, or scatter to malta and points all over the eastern med but in either of those two latter scenarios, Italy has too many things to do on I1 to accomplish them all safely.

I’m a believer in a UK scramble out of London on G1, if it will kill 3+ German planes.

Taranto can include the bomber from London and the fighter from Scotland.

Benefits: the goal is to kill 2/3 of Italy’s fleet (along with destroyer/transport at Malta).

Best case scenario: It costs italy/Germany both ships and lots of planes and UK still has 1 fighter, 1 tactical, 1 bomber left, possibly a ship or 2.
Worst case: Italy/Germany scrambles 3, the dice go poorly, but you still win but only have a bomber left.

If you do this (Taranto and scramble sz 110) U.S. buy will be 100% Atlantic for US 1-3. Though I believe it should be no matter what.

I’m a believer in any strategy that costs the Axis both their opportunities (Italy with no transports has few opportunities) AND costs the Axis their planes, especially early when the effects will linger through out the game for longer.

Also, if you’re able to get rid of Germany and Italy’s navies their only threats to US/UK naval power is their planes. If you ALSO killed half their planes on G1/UK1, they are both weaker attacks against your navy, meaning buying fewer carriers, for instance, but also they have to make a choice whether those planes should be over in Russia or back home in Germany.

If you’re really lucky, Italy will keep buying ships for UK to sink instead of helping against Russia, and Germany will have to spend a fortune replacing planes or just not have any to harass you on the Atlantic side.

Often, after Taranto, UK can keep Italy in check with existing units once they’ve gathered at Cairo, and a little help on the Atlantic side from the U.S. to reach Gibraltor/Morroco.

Yeah the problem is that I don’t like to spend cost against Axis strategic resources if the end game is for Germany to rush to Moscow which 9/10, that’s going to be the plan. I’ve already spent too many games as UK liberating France and having a Dunkirk 2.0 in the hopes of stopping Germany from going one more territory east.

@Caesar-Seriona At least what dave does is keep all the US forces together without wasting even 1-2 guys on taking any of continential Europe—he takes Norway, builds a US factory there, takes Finland, builds a factory there, and then goes-back and forth liberating Karelia “over the top” with UK and US so that the Germans may at that point have Moscow but there is a huge wilburforce of UK stuff coming up from the south (and retaking those factories as UK while having 2 of UK’s own over there in Iraq and Persia).

That’s really the only KGF that works reliably, other plans like kill Italy or retake France seem to play into Germany’s strengths and especially after Moscow falls it gets a second huge burst of money it can use to stymy the Western Alliance.

@taamvan Sure but I wish I could of saved the game where I can show you an insane battle of France being liberated with US and Italy/Germany trading Rome with UK playing middle earth and Greece has a minor with US control on top of 80% of German units next to Moscow. The point is that Taranto works when it works but it can fail easy even if you want to chew up Axis aircraft.

Taranto is a viable option, but any odds below 90% are a bad idea. UK ships are more precious than Italian ships, IF UK wants to make an attack at the Italian fleet, it should be highly profitable for UK. Even trades between Italian fleet/planes vs UK are good for the Axis.

Also, the decision to make Taranto or not also depends on what Germany bought on G1 and how it went. I recently tend to keep my fleet in the game and prefer the sz92 move with a Gib AB but I might play Taranto again, soon.
The trade-off is: Taranto shuts down Italy quicker, sz92 stack keeps more UK planes on the board and allows the Allies to maintain a position in 110 (which is crucial) quicker.

Does anyone have a count of what the typical SZ92 stack count consists of at the EoT1 if you don’t do Taranto?