Cutting the Italian legs out from under the axis

The problem with balanced air/navy is two fold.

On the one hand you don’t have enough navy to really defend yourself against German air attacks.

On the other hand you don’t have enough air power to sink the Italian fleet.

Not saying I have the solution, just giving some perspective to think about.

the aircraft carrier solves this dilemma I think. It gives you a surface ship (although one with low stats) and a pair of fighters who have a rock hard defense and excellent striking range.

I agree, carriers are great in that regard.

IMHO, England would be well suited with 3 battleships, 5 cruisers, 4 transports though.  This gives you 8 bombardments, 8 ground assault units and locks the Italians in the Med where American can come in and sink them at their leisure.

On Turn 1 have the UK rally troops in persia from trans-jordan and India and purchase 3 cruisers and a trannie.  US 1 purchase an AC, trannie, and armor. (minimum).  UK2 hit algeria and trans-jordan with fleet, land fighters on US carrier.  US2 land in algeria and backup UK fleet, land fighters in algeria, bombers in UK if you desire.  UK3 crush Italy fleet, OR land in Italy if fleet is not in the way.  Push to egypt and lybia if possible.  US repeats.

This gives your fleet defense from german air, is large enough to take out Italian fleet, or you may get luck and grab Italy herself, or on UK3 buy more boats and hit france, or northwest europe and norway.  That small surge of US troops and boats gives you control of the atlantic and Africa.  All the US devoted was an AC and possibly some fighters.  You could also purchase 1 BB 2 destroyers on UK1, which I actually think I prefer but i’m not sure, I really like 3 bombards.

@Trisdin:

The fact is Cmdr Jennifer, instead of suddenly deciding to get back on topic, don’t you think you should admit you were wrong first?

don’t hold your breathe Trisdin

@axis_roll:

@Trisdin:

The fact is Cmdr Jennifer, instead of suddenly deciding to get back on topic, don’t you think you should admit you were wrong first?

don’t hold your breathe Trisdin

Why should he?  You and U-505 and the others never admit when they are wrong, and you guys are often wrong.

Yes, Page 11 does state it is an optional rule.  It is the very first time that tech has been optional.  It was a stupid move on the part of the game manufacturer.

As for demanding that a member admit their strategy was wrong because I “thought” it was impossible is a really stupid statement.  I proved it was impossible without the most stupid person playing Russia ever to grace the face of the earth.  Even then, all I did was force him to revise his stance and say it would take more than 3 rounds to achieve, in reality, closer to 5 or 6 if everything went well.

Honestly, Trisdin, you really should get your facts in a row before going off on a crusade.

As for insulting the intelligence of others, I have never done so.  I have only stated that certain strategies are stupid as in unwise and then demonstrated why.  Certain in-duh-viduals like to pretend that my attacks on their strategies are personal insults against them, when in reality they are just demonstrations on their statements being invalid, silly and/or unintelligent.  Not my fault some people think any disagreement at all is a personal attack against them. (I call these people “bleeding hearts” since they happen to have very similar political opinions and they generally are not the same as my political opinions.)

Yes, I can be hard on people’s ideas.  I will never call someone a bad person, but I might call their ideas uninformed or even stupid.  I’ll even say their posts demonstrate their inferior game play or strategy when I think it is true.  But none of that is a personal attack against the person.

Heck, when I first started playing Axis and Allies against players on the internet (back in the dark ages when we had 4800 BAUD modems, not even at the 14.4k technology mark yet!) I had some really stupid ideas of how to play the game (including America always buying 1 Battleship, 1 Submarine or Transport each round, this was classic of course.)

It took good players telling me my ideas were stupid and my game play inferior to help me develop better ideas and superior game play.  I’m hardly the best player, but I’m inconceivably better than I was! (Inconceivable because you really have to understand how bad I used to be to realize how much better I am now!)

@Trisdin:

I have a question about Italy…. I feel as though Italy has three options, supply and protect France, Attack Ukraine and Caucasus or invade Egypt and push into Africa. Is it possible for Italy to accomplish all 3 of these objectives and in what order of importance?

I don’t think Italy can do all three at once. Heck, sometimes doing one of them is a challenge.

The answer of which comes first depends a lot on what the Allies and Germany do. The first issue is whether the Italian Navy survived UK1. If they didn’t, you are pretty much stuck with reinforcing Europe until Germany and Japan can secure the Med.

If the Navy is alive, then Italy should almost always make an initial bid for Africa & TRJ to secure the Suez and gain an NO. What happens next depends on how strong the Allies press into Africa and how well the German assault on Russia is going. If the Russian front is going well for Germany, an Italian assault via the Black Sea can quicken the end. If the Allies are not putting up a big fight in Africa (which means they are probably pressing Germany and/or Japan), then feel free to pillage Africa for IPCs.

I beginning to think that Italy is one of the hardest countries to play well. It involves a little luck and a great deal of initial help from Germany and then Japan. The greatest challenge for the Italian player is to build a critical mass of units and IPCs so he/she can remain relevant for the rest of the game.

From the Allied perspective, I think pounding down Italy should be one of their primary objectives early in the game. If the Italian Navy is eliminated and Italy rolled back to 9 IPCs/turn, the battle for Europe can quickly turn against the Axis.

The big problem with Italy is you can’t do anything on your own.  But you are the Russian of the Axis.  Leave you alone and you can come back to bite them, and you can cost the Allies alot of time and money as they try to kill you.  And just like Russia, if your fellow Axis back you up, they can make you last alot longer.  Weather it is Japan’s navy protecting yours, or Germany pounding on egypt, without there help you are lost.

@Trisdin:

So you are saying that Germany should send a small force to Africa to help Italy and in turn Italy should help Germany in Europe?

Italy generally needs Germany’s help in Africa early, and Germany needs Italy’s help in Europe later. It’s mainly a timing issue.

IMHO:

Italy needs to look out for itself early in the game.  Primary goals in the beginning should be getting the national objectives and taking out Africa.

After that has been accomplished, Italy needs to decide if Germany needs them to take Ukraine in the East or Stack France with defenders and free up Germans to move east.

That really depends on how the game has progressed.  Sometimes Italy needs to take Ukraine so Germany can follow up with fighters to defend it and then can stack France.  Sometimes Italy just cannot even get Africa established and thus can’t do much of anything.  Sometimes, Germany’s doing well and could use the extra troops to finish off Russia faster so Italy can just dump 6 units a round into the defense of France.

Other things I’ve seen Italy do:

Take Australia
Take Brazil
Sink the British Navy
Take China (1942 game with A44bigdog, see link in my signature.)

@shifty:

It seems that each time I’ve played that the Axis have won, Italy has played SOME sort of role during the course of the battle.  Whether it’s taking Africa, pounding Cauc, help against UK navy, taking islands, or just providing extra defense in EU, Italy always plays its part.

I know that this is an IF situation and probably not original, but i haven’t seen it here in the forum so I figured i’d throw it out here.  Anyways, If Germany doesn’t attack SZ12 and the Egyptian fighter survives, I’ve found attacking the Italian fleet with the UK Cruiser, Bomber, Fighter, Destroyer severely inhibits Italy from doing much of anything the rest of the game.  I realize that the chances of success (Italy losing all units) is only about 60%, but putting them down 51 ipcs when they are only making 10 is worth the loss in units and UK makes enough early game to easily replace that loss.

I’ve manage to try it twice and it worked both times.  After that, the other players in my group caught on and began attacking SZ12 w/subs (thus letting my battleship survive) or fighters/bomber which at least took out some of the Germany air and kept them distracted.

i just take gibraltar and leave tranny where it started
know, i’m no fan of egypt attack
saw it a few times go horribly wrong

@Cmdr:

As for insulting the intelligence of others, I have never done so…
…Certain in-duh-viduals…

:lol: It takes some serious gall to put those two statements in the same paragraph and even attempt to sound serious about it. :lol:

in-duh-viduals is not an insult of the intelligence of others.  It’s a loving homage to the valiant and graceful works of Scott Adams, Tim!

Egypt can go badly, Frontovik, but you can retreat part of the German forces if you have too. (Anything that did not come by transport can retreat.)

However, if you leave the transport in SZ 14, you can use it with Italy saving you some Italian cash!

@Cmdr:

However, if you leave the transport in SZ 14, you can use it with Italy saving you some Italian cash!

Thats a good idea however, it takes a special kind of axis player to pull off the German transport with Italian troops convoy to Africa (round after round) as the order of play in 41 makes it tricky.

@Cmdr:

Why should he?  You and U-505 and the others never admit when they are wrong, and you guys are often wrong.

How exactly did I get dragged into this?

But, just to be clear. Monotonously repeating the same faulty logic doesn’t make you right any more the last time you post it than it does the first time you post it. I have no reason to admit I’m wrong when you use that garbage tactic.

Yes, Page 11 does state it is an optional rule.  It is the very first time that tech has been optional.  It was a stupid move on the part of the game manufacturer.

No. It was a smart move by the manufacturer because it allows the real strategists to keep the yachtzee style gambling aspect out of the game. The dice in combat is gambling enough without having to worry about your opponent rolling one die and getting heavy bombers or any of the other techs that unbalance the game.

As for insulting the intelligence of others, I have never done so.

I can say from personal experience that this is a bald faced lie.

@ogrebait:

The answer of which comes first depends a lot on what the Allies and Germany do. The first issue is whether the Italian Navy survived UK1. If they didn’t, you are pretty much stuck with reinforcing Europe until Germany and Japan can secure the Med.

If the Navy is alive, then Italy should almost always make an initial bid for Africa & TRJ to secure the Suez and gain an NO. What happens next depends on how strong the Allies press into Africa and how well the German assault on Russia is going. If the Russian front is going well for Germany, an Italian assault via the Black Sea can quicken the end. If the Allies are not putting up a big fight in Africa (which means they are probably pressing Germany and/or Japan), then feel free to pillage Africa for IPCs.

I beginning to think that Italy is one of the hardest countries to play well. It involves a little luck and a great deal of initial help from Germany and then Japan. The greatest challenge for the Italian player is to build a critical mass of units and IPCs so he/she can remain relevant for the rest of the game.

From the Allied perspective, I think pounding down Italy should be one of their primary objectives early in the game. If the Italian Navy is eliminated and Italy rolled back to 9 IPCs/turn, the battle for Europe can quickly turn against the Axis.

This has been my general policy from the beginning and I find it hard to add anything relevant except:

If Italy can manage to control the majority of Africa for long enough to consistently make 20+ IPC per turn then depending on the defensive infantry needs for France, it becomes possible for Italy to make a purchase of 1 or 2 aircraft every turn for a couple of reasons(UK or Rus SBR’s, threatening a 1-2 punch on Allied fleets). Usually this is improbable because either the Allies are challenging them for Africa or Europe is under heavy pressure and the Axis needs every ground unit it can muster for defense, but it is never out of the realm of possibility.

@U-505:

@Cmdr:

As for insulting the intelligence of others, I have never done so.

I can say from personal experience that this is a bald faced lie.

LOL.  Yes, Jenn has NEVER insulted anyones intelligence in those 29,000 posts.

NEVER

I agree with U-505:
I can say from personal experience that this is a bald faced lie.

And I guess I need not say a word, just read the above post. Little do I post but it seems like I’m obliged.