Ukraine bid

What would an IC in Norway do for Germany?
It would basically force Germany to build 3 Units in Norway each turn sucking away resources and eventually UK and USA will overpower it anyway IMO.

Sorry, I meant the only safe place for ANYONE to build an IC in Europe. Although the Allies can build one in WE once they have a solid beachhead. But that’s a game-finishing move.

@Frood:

Sorry, I meant the only safe place for ANYONE to build an IC in Europe. Although the Allies can build one in WE once they have a solid beachhead. But that’s a game-finishing move.

Ooh yes in that case I agree!
I can’t imagine any other place to build one under any circumstances I’ve seen.

@Jennifer:

Honestly, if you are going to put 5 IPC in Ukraine, a better use of that money would be a tank.  Punch = 3 vs AA Gun against 2 fighters having a punch of 2.  The tank is also an offensive weapon.

I have to agree 100% with Jen on this.  INF, 1 ARM is a FAR superior bid for Ukraine than 1 INF, 1 AA.

And to add to her analysis above…
1.  The AA Fires only once, so you roll the 2 ones only in round 1, then they are silent
2.  The ARM will likely fire TWICE before it is killed, possibly more.
3.  There will NOT be an AA gun to deter Germany using their FIGs and BOM for the counter-attack.

Just FYI:

With a 1 INF, 1 ARM bid, Russia on average FAILS TO TAKE UKRAINE, only 2 FIG remaining.
With 1 INF, 1 AA bid, Russia on average takes with 3 ARM, 1 FIG.

$5 IPC more dead Russians with the ARM over the AA, plus the loss of $3 of income, and no need for Germany to spend ARM on a Ukraine 1 Counter…

Used to be you could deter me from using fighters just by having an AA Gun present.  Anyone who has played me since knows that is no longer the case.  The only way you are going to deter me with an AA Gun is if Russia ONLY has her two fighters for offense left.  And if that’s the case, Russia’s probably lost anyway.

And, for the record, I’d rather put an infantry in W. Russia and an Armor in Ukraine.  Make Russia pay heavily for both pieces of land.

Now for me the opposite is true… My Axis AA guns are fine to ignore if you want to run an SBR campaign against me.  I can;t hit a BOM with an AA to save my life.

But send Fighters over my AA guns, and I will probably shoot down all of them (or maybe leave 1 to fly home as a warning).

I use that psychological tactic all the time. I didn’t know it had a name until now.

@ncscswitch:

@Jennifer:

Honestly, if you are going to put 5 IPC in Ukraine, a better use of that money would be a tank.  Punch = 3 vs AA Gun against 2 fighters having a punch of 2.  The tank is also an offensive weapon.

I have to agree 100% with Jen on this.  INF, 1 ARM is a FAR superior bid for Ukraine than 1 INF, 1 AA.

And to add to her analysis above…
1.  The AA Fires only once, so you roll the 2 ones only in round 1, then they are silent
2.  The ARM will likely fire TWICE before it is killed, possibly more.
3.  There will NOT be an AA gun to deter Germany using their FIGs and BOM for the counter-attack.

Hey you, the one posting as Switch – who are you and what have you done to the REAL Switch?  I know for a FACT that the REAL Switch NEVER agrees with Jenn on anything!

:wink:

Switch and I are very alike when it comes to tactics. :P  All I have to do is convert him for politics and he’ll be a better man! :)

Anyway, AA Guns are not scary anymore.  If you put an AA in Ukraine, I’ll probably still attack it because the odds of success are not drastically different.  You have less then a 3% chance to shoot down both Russian planes and only a 17% chance to get one of them.  Meanwhile, I have good odds of taking Ukraine and getting an AA Gun to shoot at your planes, which means, you’ll have to use tanks or divert an extra plane from somewhere else.

First few rounds, Germany cannot afford a mistake or bad dice.  Well, no one can in the first three rounds, but especially Germany and Japan.  IMHO, 90% or more of the games are decided by the dice in the first three rounds of play.

Again I have to agree with Jen…

The risk of an AA being used against 2 FIGs of Russia’s, while not the best thing in the world, is offset by the fact that Germany starts off with 7 aircraft, and that a captured AA gun is more likely to inflict harm to Germany than it is to inflict harm to Russia’s paltry Air Force.

Adding an AA gun to Russia is a GOOD thing, which is why so many people work their India AA to somewhere in Russia.

A Ukraine AA fires at 2 Russian FIGs.  If played well by both players, it will probably fire at them again in a take-liberate-retake sequence in Ukraine.  But the CAPTURED AA Gun will fire at any of those 7 German aircraft (well six after Ukraine falls the first time) for most of the game if Germany uses their Air Force against Russia.  And in a few rounds that AA can also come into play against the 7 aircraft of Japan.

The Axis start as aerial powers (14 total aircraft to the Allies 12).  Russia is exclusively a land power (2 FIGs).  Do NOT give Russia extra AA guns if you are an aerial power!

@Jennifer:

You have less then a 3% chance to shoot down both Russian planes and only a 17% chance to get one of them.

To find the odds of two independant events, when occuring at the same time, you add the chances

1/6 of a chance of hitting a single plane + 1/6 of a chance of hitting a single plane = 2/6 chance of getting 1 plane with 2 dice.  33% of the time you will get one of the russian fighters.

You can verify that with a dice simm

+1 to axis_roll for his math skillz. Considering a smite for Jen but can’t QUITE justify it. But the next math infraction will cost you!

I like to take it further though - that 33% chance of hitting a fighter = 33% of 10 IPCs = avg. damage on the enemy of 3.3 IPCs

Then compared to a tank which each round has a 50% chance of killing an attacking Inf: 2 x 50% x 3 IPCs = 3 IPCs. So yes the AA would do slightly more damage to Russia, and in addition if it hits will reduce Russia to 1 or 0 fighters which will really affect Russia’s play. But on the other hand if Russia captures the AA that’s bad for you long-term.

I agree in the end that the AA to Russia is probably worse for the axis than the missed opportunity to hit a ftr.

Especially since a player like me probably wouldn’t hit Ukraine anyway on R1. Then I might capture Ukraine on R2 or R3, w/o air support, and if you retreat the AA to avoid its capture it will be pretty much where it would have been if you built an extra one in G1.

Again, I don’t think Russia should attack Ukraine. It’s nice to kill a Ftr but you can only do it at the expense of losing a number of tanks, which are more important to Russia. And I think Russia is less able to afford a slug-fest back and forth in the Ukraine - it can’t replace its units as easily as Germany.

So I WANT Russia to attack Ukraine when I’m Germany, so for me an AA gun there totally plays against that.

No, I was saying to shoot down BOTH Russian fighters.  That means you’d have to roll a 1 and then roll a 1 again immediately thereafter.  That has a less then 3% chance. 2.77777777777-% to be closer to exact.  Of course, this is stats, not math.

In the next part, I said you only had a 17% chance to get one of them because it is assumed you are missing the second one.  1/6 is 16.66666666-% so I rounded up.

It’s like the old joke, how do you get $0.30 from two coins if one is NOT a nickel?  The other one is a nickel!

Now, Russia can bring only the following, if my memory serves (I don’t have the map in front of me, getting my office ready for the fall atm.):

Attackers: 3 Infantry, Artillery, 3 Armor, 2 Fighters

• 3 Infantry, Artillery, Armor from Caucasus
• 2 Armor, Fighter from Russia
• Fighter from Karelia

If Germany bid an armor in Ukraine and an infantry elsewhere, then Germany has:

Defenders: 3 Infantry, Artillery, 2 Armor, Fighter

Then Russia goes from 90% chance to win with 3 tanks (rounded) to 85% chance to win with 2 tanks.

With this bid you most likely trade 5 IPC for 5 IPC but you, Germany, have a much better position to make that trade then Russia does.

Furthermore, how often do you see Russia actually take Ukraine with more like 1 or 2 tanks in a “normal” game?  Now imagine if you had that extra armor unit there.  Heck, it might wipe out his ground forces making him chose to use his fighters against yours a trade I know darn near everyone would go for.

Now, let’s see what happens if you put an infantry and an armor in Ukraine (since 8 bids are pretty normal):

Attacker: 3 Infantry, Artillery, 3 Armor, 2 Fighters
Defender: 4 Infantry, Artillery, 2 Armor, Fighter
Result: A. survives: 66.8%  D. survives: 29.9%

Better yet, though, is that the most likely results are the attackers surviving with only fighters.  They traded most of their offensive power and did not get the land.  Germany, meanwhile, has lost next to nothing.

Now, let’s see what happens if you put an infantry and an aa gun in Ukraine.

Attacker: 3 Infantry, Artillery, 3 Armor, 2 Fighters
Defender: 4 Infantry, Artillery, Armor, Fighter, AA Gun
Result: A. survives: 80.5%  D. survives: 17.2%

Worse still, the surviving Attackers include most, or all, of their Armor and Fighters.  You lost an AA Gun you now have to face and your entire bid of starting units.  You are now not only out of position against Russia but also against Egypt, England’s Navy and you have to retake what you lost with larger stacks then if he only won with an armor instead of three armor.

Sloppy sloppy sloppy, Jennifer…

Here’s how it works:

A) Chance of hitting Fighter A and not B: 1/6 * 5/6 = 13.888%
B) Ditto for the other Ftr: 13.888%
C) Chance of missing BOTH Ftrs: 5/6 * 5/6 = 69.444%
D) Chance of hitting BOTH Ftrs: 1/6 * 1/6 = 2.777%

The chance of hitting one fighter total then is A + B, or 27.776%

Avg. damage you could expect to inflict with the AA then is
Hitting one fighter only: 27.777 % * 10 IPCs = 2.77 IPCs
Hitting both fighters: 2.77% * 20 IPCs = 0.555 IPCs

That adds up to 3.33 IPCs, as I noted above. However, the actual total chance of hitting any fighters is actually 30.55%, not 33.33%

Ah the miracle of math…

Oops we both edited our posts simultaneously…

As I was saying, the chance of hitting one fighter is 17%.  I’m assuming the second shot is a miss, so it’s extra non-important information.  If you attack with 40 aircraft and only look at one aircraft, the chance of hitting that one aircraft is 17%, not 100%.

But who cares about hitting one aircraft? There are two to hit, and I want to know the full probability of damage. If the first one hits, the 2nd one still has a full 17% chance.