GB Heavy Bombers

@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.)

@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.

They the key is having both sides of the map going at same time. This is no way any knock towards any guys games and such.
I know some have time limits to play a country but if you have battle boards on each end of map plus cut back on strategy talking when both players are discussing 1 country which is fine to a certain point then say Germany plays while Japan plays and other side is defending same time.

We also have a different House rule that has proven to be very interesting:

We use the Chinese Setup from 1942 but instead of Suiyuan having 2 Inf, we add an additional Inf in Yunnan (thous having 3 Inf 1 Fig)…

The Japanese player can still opt to got for it with 3 Inf 2 Fig, but it is an evenly and very costly battle.

Having more boots in China also makes the abundance of Japanese transports in 1941 less of a problem since the Japanese player has to send a bit more Infantry to China to counter them.

We found this setup to be way more interesting and also historically accurate because China was a pain in the ass for Japan and it shouldn’t be that easy for Japan to defeat them.

@DarthMaximus:

But I don’t know if that battle is all that relevant.  The bom placement may be overrated.  So what if you slow down Japan.  Sub bid of six kills 1 J trn and there is no risk of not hitting and you could still place 2 inf elsewhere.
Germany is the main early threat.  Assuming no Russian ground units bid.  Ger takes the 3 Russian territories on G1.  G2 have a shot at holding Kar.  Even if they only trade, they can still stack Bel on G3.  Russia now has to defend Mos.  G4 you move to Euk.  Now Cauc and Mos have to be defended.  G5 you take cauc.
Obviously this is a bit simplistic but I don’t think the loss of 2 trns and a J dd is that big of a deal if the Russian front is collapsing.

I don’t know Darth. Slowing Japan’s expansion to a crawl and allowing Russia to focus entirely on Germany for the first 5 rounds or so goes a long way.

I’m assuming an aggressive G1.  Taking out Sz 2 and Sz 9.  If we are playing the odds game, the odds for these G1 attacks will go further in deciding the game then the 56% odds the Russian bom has.

I don’t know about that either. taking out 2 TP’s and a DD before Japan even gets a chance to use them is pretty crippling. Even sinking just the sz62 TP limits japan a bit.

I’d much rather have 4 units on the Russian front, then the bom.

That’s a matter of personal preference, though. The bomber bid gives Russia multiple options while the infantry bid only has 1 option(defending against Germany). The bomber is essentially an opportunistic unit. It can provide support for Allied interdiction of Japan’s navy as well as supporting it’s ground troops in the area if you see an opening to be aggressive on the ground. And the bomber will start saving Russia units in trades against Germany once it returns from the Pacific.

@CdnRanger:

Russia would have to send a couple of Inf (needed desperately at the front without a Russian ground unit bid) by Rus2 to India to protect it, and perhaps Uk lands the Egypt Fighter there (if it has survived the attack from Germany)

The US can also provide air support to India on US2 if they landed aircraft in Australia on US1.

The India crush by Japan is nasty but it gives China an extra round or two of survival, as Japan needs to go light on Phi, and the 3 Inf in Fic that took Burma are needed to attack and hold India turn 2.

The India crush also draws away a lot of Japan’s navy which the US and Russia can sometimes exploit in the North(threatening sz62 with air and navy, Russian ground attacks into China from Bury, etc)

@Funcioneta:

You could do the same as Japan. They will have more income than USA pretty early

agreed, BUT as Japan I feel I need a navy much more to control my many islands when comparing to the USA.

In any case, going for HB and LRA seem to be the best options so far. I hope to be able to come up with other alternatives in my coming games however as the game otherwise seems too dull with an overpowered US airforce