Say Russia holds a German territory at the beginning of a turn, and then Germany take back the territory, and then U.K. take that again. In this case, a single territory contributes to the world economy three times of its product capability. It is anti-intuitive for an area being frequently hand-changed during war.

@Antholin:

You should probably stick with the approach that Field Marshall Rommel wanted, to have a strong defense network to break the Allies on the beach heads of France. If you don’t have enough units in Western Europe to repel the initial invasion, then you will have a hard time of throwing the US and UK back out of Europe. I had to deal with a strong UK/US invasion on Western Europe and I was able to hold the line, as I had been stacking units there since turn one, it was a phenominal difference.

Yes. But I think putting overly strong defense on France has two shortcomings. 1) You will have less force on the east line, so it will be more difficult to conquer Soviet. 2) The U.S. and U.K. will give up to attack France, but turn to Africa-Cacaus and Norway, and because of 1) that will make Germany on the east more difficult.

I think it is important to make France an IPC consumer of the allies, rather than simply an unbreakable fort. To put units the same as the number of TRAs U.K. or U.S. have in total might be a sweet point. That will make the allies never hold France one round.

One dangerous thing is that U.S. may land fighter and units after a successful U.K. attack. But I think it does not occur early or often because U.S. need two rounds to move their units to France and a pure fighter units is just a poor idea for defense. And when U.S. is ready to do so, put a little more units their. The key is to avoid unncessary unit increase in France. When the allies do not buy TRA or the U.S. do not stack a lot aircrafts on U.K., don’t make more German IPC idle on the France.

Just some though, maybe need more game to practice.  :-)

@Romulus:

I think it is not possible to leave few units in France in order to save units and at the same time inflict heavy losses to UK and USA when they land there.

IMHO there are only two solutions: defend france in force having there enough units to defeat the landing of UK and USA or leave totally empty France with strong army in Germany and Southern Europe.

When U.S. or U.K. have four TRA or less, to leave 5-6 units (3 INF, 2 ARM) at France might work for consuming their effort of landing with reasonable cost. So that’s enforce the allies to accumelate TRA and slow down their speed. And during their accumelate TRA, try to use aircraft or sub to slow them further.

Per several games, I believe the key to defence France is not to put great deal of units in France, but instead to remain plenty units at Germany and Sorthern Euroup, and put just enough units in France. The art is to make the allies, British or U.S., could just barely land on France, with losing pretty much units in the amphibious attack, and remaining pretty little units after landing to allow Germany take back France by the units at Germany and France. And not putting units at France gives Germany another flexibility, that is, if allies does not attack France, the units at Germany and S.E can move east to attack Soviet.

@Bunnies:

…

It isn’t really a “sound” strategy, though.  It isn’t necessarily UNsound, but it is very risky.

…

For a formal tournament, it is risky to lose an important game. But for a home entertainment, without LHTR or something similar, no one would resist to play such a strategy over and over again. You just try it and if failed, OK, admit lost and try another war and you waste less than 10 minutes. Eventually everyone just get tired and simply inhibit this strategy, just like what LHTR does or just inhibit attack to a capitical in the first turn.

This is absolutely right and not new discovery. In the very beginning several chapters of On War, Carl von Clausewitz has concluded the defense is stronger than attack in general. That’s why a war, although its nature is to use violence unlimitedly, can last for a long while and sometimes shows a medium-to-long-term stable status. The point is the defense itself can’t win a war. The purpose of defense is to dwarf off enemy’s force and to choose correct opportunity to launch counter attack.

@Craig:

LHTR v2.0:

http://www.daak.de/indexe.php?sprache=e
http://www.axisandallies.org/LHTR

Craig

Is only LHTR make the game balance enough, or still need it together with some bids?

Recently I became aware that retreat is not merely a rescure from bad luck. A good planned retreat in the first place could be a tactical intent for various purposes:

1. To avoid your defence units leave their territory but still consume the enemy’s force, which might become the attack force in the next turn.

2. To allow your infantry and artillery units move 2 territory effectively in one turn. Since a unit can retreat to a different territory than where it start attack, there an amazing effect that an infantry or artillery can move 2 in one turn, and you may even pass through an enemy’s territory. Although you would lost some unit in the fight, but the benifit is worthy. This is a very useful way to concentrate troops for the next turn attack while consume some defence force in this turn.

I have been playing the game for months but very new to the LHTR. I just downloaded the rule and it seems mostly the same as the OOB rule and I can not see the difference at a glance.

Could you kindly point me out what difference delays the implementation of operation “sealion”?

Scenario 1 (Probability 16.67%):

In G1, Germany rolls 1 dice for tech “long distance aircraft” and get 4 (succeed to breakthrough)!

Scenario 2 (Probability 66.5%):

In G1, Germany rolls 6 dice for tech “long distance aircraft” and get 1 dice 4!

In either scenario, the following action German will take shoud definitely be launch an amphibious landing on British, with 2 land units, 1 bomber and 6 fighters! And will more than likely to win.

So for scenario 1, the allies will for sure get no chance. So the game should simply forbide Germany to roll less than 3 dices for LDA in G1, because it will result in either a waste of German money or the allies will concede immediately. Or if Germany insist in strict OOB rule and his or her right to roll tech, just let him or her go and if he or she happen to succeed, it is not very difficult to reset the game. :-)

But scenario 2 is a strategy need more serious treating, because it is a scenario not based on exceesive luck, but on reasonable probability. It amounts Germany gets the tech for free (because it gets all British money), at the cost that Germany has only 10 IPC to this turns purchase. And in B1 and U1, the British and U.S. (if British fails) must try their best to liberate London. By this the German will be released from the western line for one or two turns, though Soviet will be relative aggresive for one more turn than German does not adopt this strategy.