Is the circle around Caen, Cherbourg & St Lo, just a "victory" city designation?

@The_Good_Captain Also, from page 9:

Axis & Allies: D-Day is played in a series of turns. A turn consists of one pass through the sixteen order cards, and then a check for victory.

Since victory is checked at the end of each turn, the Allies must hold the required zones until the end of turn 10.

It’s often that St. Lo gets left till the end, and I find the “works” are indeed heavily gummed up by that point. That’s why I proposed the KSF (Kill St. Lo First) Strategy.

I’m also surprised that you send a “small” force to Cherbourg.  I’ve done the same and ended up not having the force needed to take it (with the 1 round of combat deal).  With a full zone (Eight Units) plus a few extra units, it’s a tough crawl. I like to gamble on my landings at least once and land upwards of Utah Beach. I’ve posted previously posted about avoiding Omaha by gambling on the “Allies Land” card.

To Cherbourg:  I like to engage my bombers for at least 3 rounds, and make sure the “Onshore Bombardment” hits when the time is right in the Peninsula. It’s easy enough to take (IMHO) if you eliminate 65% of the defenders before you get there.  Keep Axis Re-Enforcements in mind as Germany can send tonnes of units Upwards to Cherbourg up until Turn 5 before they become redundant. When attacking that “Must Have” city of Cherbourg, employ my “Great Wall of Planes”  (see D-Day Post) to stem the tide of Axis Forces.

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Cheers,
Starlight Sniper

I’ve got two great strats. that I discovered while playing a game of D-Day late one Saturday night.

The Great Wall Of Planes -
This uses three zones to block off axis reinforcements to Cherbourg. Starting with the zone containing Catz/Carentan, moves left to St Jores/LaPuits and ends in Portbail. You can stack two planes per zone (or variations) and slow any help to the top city. It gives you a buffer of 2 zones at least to help out with the north.
And now for . . . …

The Cherbourg lure  - 
If the germans pull out of the city and group in Valognes for defense/attack positioning, they’ve made the fatal error. Quickly fly in a few planes to the city and another wave to wherever you want to move your (probably) US troops.  Now the Germans can’t deke back to the city and attacking your position would be tough too. You can now destroy those Cherbourg blockhouses before they’re ever defended or put to use. The Germans are now scrambling for options up top. Good luck !:  Those planes’ll getcha in the end.

PS - Gambling on the “Allies Land” card would allow US troops to land in Montebourg, only two spots away from Cherbourg.
    - Gambling on the “Allies Land” card would allow US troops to avoid Omaha Beach (1 defender or 9 defenders)
    - Consider landing planes in Montebourg and gambling your “Allies Land” card. You’d have a great defensive spot.
    - Gambling results may vary.

Welcome, Sarge85!

In that situation, the Allies would win.  They need to control all three cities at the end of two consecutive turns.

Our little group has played four games of D-Day so far and the axis won the first three by holding St. Lo. the fourth game was a narrow allied victory only because we added two more rounds to the game. At the end of ten rounds the axis still held St. Lo as usual. It took the two extra rounds for the allies to get it. We are now looking for ways to vary the game so that it does not play out the same every time. One idea I like is to increase the attack value of the allied airborne units to two. I am even thinking of having the two sides place their own units where they will for the starting setup. I would like to vary the unit types as well. We now have added many new types of units since this game was printed. This might require setting up a D-12 system.

plz vote :mrgreen:

Yes, you do.  You control a zone only if you have at least one land unit in it and the enemy has no land units in it.  A zone that has no land units in it is controlled by no one (bottom of page 10).

What I like to do with Cherbourg is to have the units in the area defend off the invasion for as long as possible and even pull back the units that i have left into the city.  For reinforcments I dont bother sending up much because of the air cover and also teh long treck that the units would have to go.  On avarage I might send up 3-4 tanks if im doing well on the other fronts and a handfull of Inf.  But when things get sketchy down south I cut off all the units that would be headed that way.  As said before its like  a distraction for the allies to help burn time, and maby even weaken the allies.