LHTR: Larry Harris Tournament Rules

Only avoid it if you need that bomber badly.  Otherwise, I use it on whatever nation I happen to be targetting for destruction. (Usually little point in SBRing a nation you are not trying to subdue actively.  Why SBR England if you are trying to get Moscow?)

It’s my belief that you should SBR Russia with at the very least the Japanese bomber, if not also the German bomber.

On mathematical average they will deal 15.5 IPCs before going down, which is about 5 infantry’s worth. After those first few battles in which you do absolutely need your bomber to do things, it’s unlikely that your bomber will cause that much IPC damage. Think, in a normal battle, in order for a bomber to kill 5 infantry on average it has to survive about eight rounds of attacks. Even the biggest capital battles don’t last more than maybe 5-6 rounds. It’s very unlikely that you will get 8 rounds of true bomber usage (your fighters should be more than enough for the small engagements prior to capital assault), and 8 rounds is simply to break even.

As for the other bombers, there is more gray when thinking about them. Germany might need every bit of strafing power available, and UK/US might need every bit of dice to overpower W. Europe, so you might not want to risk them doing SBR. Generally I would still be in favor of them SBRing, but there is a little more to think about.

And get Rockets!

I’ve had many games where bombers survive through the whole game without being shot down.  I have no problem using my bombers for SBR, however I rarely purchase additional bombers.

Oh, I dunno.  I’ll buy a Russian bomber or 5 to really drive the point home that it’s game over, can we please pack up now and go home???

Sure, it is possible for a bomber to go over several SBR mission.
But from a statistical point of view it is not a good move.

Bomber do on average: 3.5 damage.
Bomber ma ybe shot down: 1/6 * 15 = 2,5 damage to the attacker.
If I have not done mistake the average gain of SBR is 1 IPC.

However in the real game, it may happens that bomber is shot down on first attempt. A loss of 15 IPc.
Or it is never hit and continue to destroy enemy IPC. A great drain of IPC from the enemy.

IMHO, SBR is one of the area of A&A where statistic is less useful. There are too few dices involved and the result is totally umpredictable.
Sometime gambling is awarded with a big prize!

It’s actually worse than it looks for SBR.

Because a bomber does not do on average 3.5 IPCs. When it gets shot down, it does not do its damage at all. So the average is 5/6 of 3.5 = 2.91, then -2.5 = 0.41 IPC gain.

But from a statistical point of view it is not a good move.

Statistically it’s fine as long as you don’t buy a bomber =P

I heard all the statistical arguments against SBR, and while mathmatically sound, it rarely holds up in game play.

Anyone care to put it to the test?

Good precisation Trihero! I made an optimistic evaluation!
Buying bomber will be a confortable thing when they will be sold with delayed payment!  :lol:

Emperor Mollari, the statistical analysis made by Trihero is mathematically unexceptionable.
However as you say the reality is very far from the statistical analysis.

The problem is that real SBR run works in different ways because there are too few dices involved and so the Law of the Great Numbers is not applicable at all. Even an experimentation will give useless results.
So a Bomber may bomb an enemy IC for all the game without even being scratched.  :-D
Or the bomber may go down in flame during its first mission.  :-o

And that’s my point, SBR’s don’t conform to statistical analysis, so they remain a viable strategy.

I agree.
No one may say that SBR is not an option.

However you must have the willingness to risk. I usually prefer not to take this risk. But this not means that SBR is not worthy to be used.

If you hate SBR, use the Low Luck version where you can do 3 damage to the attacker but take 4 damage in return for every SBR. (Best you can hope for is to break even at 3 and 3.  Worst is 2 damage to enemy, 3 damage to self.)

LL SBR is most broken thing in the game.  Should be reversed.  You can do 1 IPC more dmg then you take.  IMHO.

Other then that, SBR becomes an attack of convenience.  If it’s convenient for me to buy a new bomber, I attack.

Low luck does not apply to SBR. At least not in the tripleA version of low luck.

Low Luck Rules for SBR:

Bomber does 2 damage on a roll of 1, 2, 3 and 3 damage on a roll of 4, 5, 6
Bomber takes 3 damage on a roll of 1, 2, 3 and 4 damage on a roll of 4, 5, 6

That’s the way FoE and DAAK (and probably AAMC) diceys run it.

I never used those rules, atm I play only the triplea version of A&A.

Me and my friends used low luck when playing the classic boardgame.
Had to use calculator manually to figure out the hits.
I favoured attacking with 2 tanks and defending with 3 inf, that was the simple way of playing A&A  :-P

Only two tanks attacking?!?!?!
But if your friend defends with three inf you are almost doomed!
:roll:

Can someone just explain what the difference is between the 1.3 Stukas and the 2.0 Stukas? Was there any change at all? If so, what kind?

They are pretty much the same with one great diffrence in LHTR 2.0 the rule applies only to land-based attacks.

“…the fighters hit on a roll of 5 or less in land battles only.”

Could some one point out to me where in LHTR 2.0 it states that existing fighters at an IC territory can be placed on a new carrier?