NOT ONE STEP BACK!!!

@ckladman Yes, the game tends to favor the allies without objectives, and the axis with. To balance, you could trying giving a bid (additional starting units) to the side that is at a disadvantage, or play with objectives but reduce the payout. (3 ipcs vs 5.)

@Poptech said in A&A Anniversary 1941 Sea Lion Strategy:

I am aware of that and the Europe, Pacific and Global TripleA maps restrict that kind of movement.

No, also on those TripleA maps TripleA incorrectly allows Non Combat Moves during Combat Move Phase.

@Poptech said in A&A Anniversary 1941 Sea Lion Strategy:

I understand the idea behind restricting it but it is more for unit movement tracking in the board game.

One idea behind the rules only accepting combat moves during combat move phase is that some moves during Noncombat Move Phase are based on or enforced by results of the Conduct Combat Phase. You cannot know these results during Combat Move Phase.

For example:
As the (maybe unexpected) result of a combat a fighter needs a different than expected landing place on a carrier. Now in case you hadn’t moved a carrier in reach during Combat Move Phase (with a legal combat move) that carrier in the given situation must move during NCM to allow the fighter to land. If that carrier had been moved illegally during Combat Move Phase it would not be allowed to move again or would maybe be out of reach.

@Poptech said in A&A Anniversary 1941 Sea Lion Strategy:

When playing digitally it only makes it easier to forget to unload or reposition troops.

TripleA cleary indicates which units have not moved yet so usually you should not forget any movement action.

@domanmacgee said in Stopping the Allies?:

@thedesertfox Are you playing with NOs on or off? As @OLA mentioned, which side is favored in the 41 setup swings based on whether NOs are being used. Off = Allied-favored, On = Axis-favored. It boils down to the starting income gap being easier to mitigate when Axis have access to their NOs.

Not sure if German navy is the right way of going about things. In higher level games it’s usually Japan that ends up winning the game for the Axis while Germany/Italy hold the line.

I’ll add the following rule-of-thumb.

Assuming every other option is off,

no options on: slight Allies advantage interceptors on: balanced National Objectives on: marked Axis advantage

Using Low Luck (a popular house rule) possibly balances the game when played with no options on or else gives an additional slight advantage to the Axis.

@the-spaceman Seems like a good start. A few thoughts to throw into the mix:

I would say UK’s naval priorities should be first the Baltic fleet, then any stray transports, then any stray subs. The subs don’t do any convoy damage or anything like that, so they’re really just targets of opportunity; it’s not like you can safely leave British transports unattended anyway because of the German bomber, so the subs aren’t doing that much more harm. The Baltic fleet is top priority because it allows Germans to cheaply conquer Norway/Finland/Karelia, and because it’s too expensive for Germany to sanely replace.

The Australian transport can flee across Argentina to the Atlantic, but I would leave the destroyer behind to block a J2 attack on Australia – I think it does more good slowing down Japan and keeping some of the UK income than it does to get a destroyer added to your Atlantic fleet, like, 3 turns later. For similar reasons, I usually won’t move the starting US Pacific fleet to the Atlantic. If the Allies took unusually heavy naval losses, then maybe it’s worthwhile, but the Pacific fleet is earning you nothing the whole time it’s in transit through the Panama Canal. Having a few starting boats in the Pacific – even just CV, ftr, DD, tran – means that if you ever do need to upgrade the Pacific fleet into a formidable force because Japan is grabbing Alaska and Hawaii or whatever, then you can do so with one turn of purchases. If you can’t quickly reinforce the US Pacific fleet to the point where it can drive away the Japanese navy, then you might be forced to buy 10 infantry for the Western US instead or something similarly expensive and wasteful.

It doesn’t always make sense to build a huge Atlantic fleet at all as the Allies – sometimes you can sink the Italian fleet using primarily air power and subs, and/or build a pair of factories in Egypt, South Africa, India, or Australia. Some games you won’t have enough good safe factory sites, and some games you’ll need a big fleet because, e.g., Germany is heavy on air power (so you need protection for your transports) but short on infantry (so invading France is really attractive). On the other hand, if Germany trades its entire air force to wipe out your boats on G1, builds a factory in France on G1, and then drops 6 infantry there on G2, maybe just let the Atlantic navy go for several turns and rely on factories instead, or have the British build factories and let the Americans reinforce with a fleet into Morocco after they build up.

@argothair It depends on which battles failed.

Typically, if any battle is going to go sideways, it’s the SZ12 one (DD/CR off of Gibraltar). I don’t mind losing/drawing this one too much, as all does is gives UK an opportunity to either go all-in against the Italian fleet or consolidate their Atlantic Fleet (which Germany really has no means of stopping even if you kill everything).

In the extremely unlikely event that SZ2 or SZ6 (where the actual transports are) go badly, you’re probably in really horrible shape. Only real recourse at that point is to turtle up, by tons of INF, and pray for better luck on Japan’s side of the board.

@xlome_00 Sea Lion is one of those attacks where the threat is mightier than the execution. If you buy a carrier for the Baltic Fleet on G1, that’s a reasonable purchase anyway to protect your supply lines to Norway/Finland/Leningrad/Baltics. If you move the German Med transport to the central Med, it is protected by the Italian fleet and can reinforce Libya, which is a reasonable move anyway. If you then bring the Italian fleet to take Gibraltar and retake Morocco, that helps score your NOs, so that’s a normal attack. So all of these preparatory moves can be done with minimal cost to the standard Axis war effort.

But then the American bomber cannot sink the German transport without landing in either Egypt (where it will die on a G2 Egypt attack) or Caucasus (where it spoils the Russian NO.)

If they leave your Med transport alive, you move it to Western Med on G2 where Italian fleet protects it again, build a second transport in Baltic on G2 plus an extra plane, and now you are threatening UK with 3 inf, 3 tank, 1 CA, 4 ftr, 1 bmr on a hypothetical G3 sea lion.

UK can of course defend against this, but they will have to build a fat infantry stack in London instead of factories, ships, or air power. This could cost them the Atlantic fleet or at least force them to retreat it back to Canada; if they built a factory in Africa / India, they might lose it because they cannot afford to build units there on a critical turn. Meanwhile those infantry in London will just sit there inefficiently for several turns because there are not enough transports to ship them anywhere, and not enough warships to protect the Atlantic fleet in a forward position.

Your second Baltic transport is reasonably useful for shipping inf/art to Leningrad, and the extra fighter can of course be used for trading on the eastern front, defending France, etc. as usual.

So you never actually attack London in an AA50 game – you just quietly threaten to attack it, thereby forcing the Allies to waste much more money on defense than you spent on creating the threat.

@Subotai:

Another fact is that with a global war game which takes 3-9 hours to finish, it can never be even semi-realistic, or else it would be a very boring game which no one would want to play, and then only the balance could be realistic. The other option is to do this in a sophisticated computer game.

I think we should rather complain about the gameplay issues, rather than AA50 being to a-historical.

But there are some exceptions, as some rule changes are both easy and historical, as closing of the Dardanelles, but then all the other straits should have the same rules, as according to history.

I think you may be referring to the scope of the realism of the game.  All the AA games are semi-realistic to begin with as they ‘abstractions’ of the war.

What is complained about though is how so many people seem to go after Europe first as the Allies.  The fact that they did this historically is true.  But when it happens in the game, it’s what is derided.  That’s all I was saying.  We don’t like how the Axis win by a-historically sandwiching Russia but we also don’t like how the Allies historically win by surrounding Germany/Italy.  We live in a funky world of ideas, and possibly not sure which side is up.

What’s strange is that it is considered that the Axis have the advantage in '41 and it takes the Allies working together to win so when we ask, ‘why has the game turned into KGIF?’ it’s possibly because it’s the only way to win, it’s desperation.  KGIF is more viable because of the proximity of the Allied powers to the Euro theater of the game.  If Germany/Italy had the ability to stalemate the Allies on their income alone the game is way out of whack, but generally speaking in my experience, they don’t and have to use their advantage early to win before the Allies get into full swing.

I remember that trick, but as you know it was also a refuted line of play. I remember the Germans took it lite and brought that tank to EE and took back Ukraine and Caucasus.

I think that’s impossible in 1941. The Soviets can build 6 tanks with 30 IPC, but Germany would have at least that many defending to make it a mutual death going slightly against the Soviets and they cant afford to trade a turns worth of builds.

I think it may work in 1942, as long as the Soviets take the southern territories ( UKraine, Belo, East Ukraine), because they at least have air units and a lot more tanks.

I remember the leave Karelia tactic in MB required a 3 tank, 3 Infantry buy with 24 IPC