Extreme Example Rolls/Battles Changing Strategy

@the-captain exactly. It’s good to have your goals ( strategic ) and then be opportunistic ( tactical ) in trying to achieve them. Unfortunately, for me anyway :) , I can get side tracked sometimes with the opportunistic part lol.

I have to remind myself of my goals. Usually during Purchase is a good time for that lol

Yea, triplea is an excellent tool. Playing FtF is best, but those that don’t have a group or the time/space and even if they do, it’s nice to have. Probably has promoted the game more than “almost” anything else :)

I see both sides. Depends upon who you are playing with. While it wasn’t france….the best victory I ever had was one in which I got diced trying to sink the American fleet at Gilbraltor. Had 98 percent odds of winning. Lost my whole airforce and  the American transports were still alive. Desperate measures followed. I relentlessly attacked Moscow the next 2 turns even though I couldn’t take it…then bought all bombers for the final push with my stragglers getting into range. The bombers were my hail Mary prayer because pressure was building on the western front. Moscow fell…allies conceded due to my income and the fact it was a one front war. Had I not been desperate who knows if I would have slow played Russia to long. I had just enough defense in Europe to turtle and hold. Had the bombers failed it was game over for me…but the fact I had a chance to pull a rabbit out of the hat is what  are the game fun.

@IKE:

@farmboy:

I didn’t think the of the fighters coming from UK (in my limited experience so far, they get used for scramble, defense of UK, and supporting the destroyer in taking out subs or the German battleship. So I’ve only simulated the combat with the UK bomber, the Egypt fleet and the Malta fighter. That obviously makes a difference and makes it much safer. I’d guess with 80% (1 UK fighter) to 95% 2 (UK fighter) odds, most Italy players aren’t going to try to scramble either. The British will lose the carrier and the two fighters after from a German counter but that will take some of the German air out of the game too.

thanks all for taking the time to walk me through this.

If the Germans make smart attacks turn 1 on the RN it doesn’t make sense to scramble.  Now if they get cute and try to do too much then a scramble may be worth it.

Yeah. I wouldn’t use them for a scramble in turn 1 (depending as you say, on the German attacks) but in turn 2.

I have only had a chance to play this a couple of times (and a couple of more times playing around in triplea), but so far I’ve used the fighters to hit surviving subs and/or the battleship near UK in turn 1 and (assuming no sea lion) I have tried to put 3 allied fighters in UK and 3 in Scotland (this means building 1 and moving the Gibraltar fighter up) so that I can rebuild a UK fleet in 109. I figured the German air force could still probably take it out but if they are going barbarossa it was worth it to pull the German airforce West and to take out half of it on turn 2.

Hi Wittman,  That does help and thank you.

@Degrasse:

I just copied Young Grasshopper’s moves for the Pacific side, I haven’t studied that side much.  I’ve been intrigued by the Sea Lion puzzle and thus mostly have been thinking of moves and counter moves.

I played it yesterday, and I realized that UK India needs at least 1 destroyer left on the Pacific side to block the whole Japanese fleet for 1 round.

Oh, and the cruiser is left in SZ 97, so if you also drop Inf.Arm in Greece, the Italians don’t have the power to kill them!

I admit to leaving Paris in German hands. Makes me feel almost as evil as Stalin when he left Warsaw in German hands for a little longer.

At least Paris isnt mission critical for getting into Germany or Italy. Sometimes retaking London is the same poison pill.

SHARED THIS ON LARRY’S SITE ALREADY, JUST WANTED TO SHARE THOUGHTS HERE ALSO:

Ok Larry,

Me and an official playtester of yours here in Michigan (his name is mentioned in the rulebook for Europe 40) played Global with the new setup given with all the aircraft taken away and such. Here was a short summary of what happened:

On the Europe side:

Germany played pretty predictably, sinking most of the UK navy, taking France and the Eastern European pro-allied and pro-axis neutrals with Italy. They continued to build on their air force to keep the UK from building ships right away. Began to stack some ground units as well. Italy expanded into Africa and shored the Middle East slowly controlling the Med.

UK responded by NOT attcking the Italian navy and pulling back the rest of the navy it had left until it could come back to England with a strong navy that included the US. UK took the Pro-allied Brazil and shucked the troops to Africa to help the SAfrican force which slowly pushed the Italians back up to Egypt turning the tide in Africa.

Russia stedily built a force consisting of infantry spiced with some tanks, artillery, tacs and mechs. Stacking behind some dead zones and waiting for the declaration of war.

US spent about 70-80% of its cash in the Pacific since it could not even approach Africa/Europe before a state of war.

Now for the Pacific side:

India with little cash built mostly infantry and stacked. Combined navy near India and activated the Persian troops to bring back and help defend India. In Global, India has a little more help from some extra troops west and a few ships, including one French destroyer to help defend. Also, it can fall back with its stack to West India if needed.

ANZAC naval base is much needed and I am glad it is there- balances nicely.

China was stonger, but does what it normally does and stacks at Yunnan to wait to wear down Japs. China units are really used as a delaying tactic for the India crush.

Japan didn’t see an advantage to the India crush in J1 but felt that the initiative came to them in J2. They didn’t want to wait until J3 because they felt the Allies would have established a long-term defense of India. So with that the Japs declared war on J2 taking back the Dutch East Indies and unleashing the fury. Japan built transports J1 and J2 and built more planes to replace the ones missing from the new setup in J2.

Now even though both Japs and Allies have the same amount of planes removed, Japan can build them faster and move them closer to the action (India). US could also build their planes back but it takes them longer to get them to the battle scene (India). Brit India and ANZAC can’t build much of an airforce because of the typhoon of Jap units coming fast, so India stacks and ANZAC tries to distract and/or try to send some units.

Japan can make the US wait longer to send ships and planes down to ANZAC by using its navy as a shield. I as Allies, I made tactical blunder ruining my chance to meet the Jap onslaught of India from behind through Australia. However, if not for this the setup seems very balanced and gave some options to both sides.

A hot topic question will be “what to do with the Russian inf on the Pacific side??”
It is very frustrating for the Russians, if you attack immediately, Japan will bring the heat to wipe them out with now China and Russia give large concessions to Japan $$$. If you stack and sit. Japan has to garrison Manchu with a small force but continues to spearhead to India. I figure as the Russians, you have to attack with the 18 inf at some point. The hard part is when. Timing is everything in this decision.

With US entering the war at turn 2, the US began to throw a good amount of cash to the European side, mainly because of the blunder in the Pacific- India would not last long now- 2-3 more rounds. I recovered nicely putting pressure on the French coast quickly until I made another tactical error involving Gibraltar- arrggh!!!- new rules and new map takes a little while getting used to.  :-(

Besides these 2 blunders, I thought the Global game was pretty fair and balanced with a slight edge to the Allies. I definitely think the Allies are a little easier to play because that sides is spilt into 6 sub parts (countries) that are easy to prepare while you are waiting for the Axis to finish. The Axis with so many more units in the beginning, take longer and you have to be very efficient both in the short-term and the long-term planning.

Anyway that was are anaylsis so I hope it helps.  :-)