Uses of the Axis fleet against Human Allied if you don't buy new ships ?

[TaoJah]

What can you do with the Axis fleet against a human opponent if you don't buy new ships ?

I understand that you need to keep a ship in Denmark to block the Baltic Sea, but what about the rest ?

- What do you do with the sub in the Atlantic ?

- Where do you plave the three extra ships you get ?

- Do you keep all four ships that start around Denmark in the Baltic ?

- What about the Italian fleet ?

It seems... logical to keep the two subs and cruiser in the Baltic to prevent a landing from Sweden, use the one Atlantic sub to harrass the UK MPP as much as possible and defend the raiding sub with the three extra ships. I have not yet found a use for the ITalian fleet.

But I don't have experience versus humans, so I really have no idea if that's the optimal use.

[Bromley]

I'm not an expert, but with 1.04 the Axis always got Spain, so I'd save the Italians until GLR1 and then smash the British Med fleet. By that time Spain joined and Gibralter fell, so the Italians could police the Atlantic coast.

Now in 1.05a it seems to me that the Italian fleet is going to be less useful, as Spain is harder to get onboard. If you take Egypt, you could send some/all of the fleet via the Cape to suppliment your German fleet builds guarding western France.

[Terif]

First task of the fleets is to secure the entrance to Med and Baltic (= 1 ship in Gibraltar port after Spain joined or got conquered and 1 ship ready for Denmark port). Malta is another object to be surveiled so its garrison doesn´t wilder in your backyard later ).

Second task is usually to destroy the russian Baltic fleet when it enters the war so these waters are secured.

Aside from that the fleets have several possibilities:

- sink british merchant ships in the Atlantic

- unite italian and german fleet in the Atlantic (can be a deadly surprise if some UK cruisers want to hunt the raiding subs but instead get sunk by several axis battleships...)

- Gibraltar is always a nice place for a trap where some ships of the Royal Navy can be sunk that try to damage axis ground units sieging Gibraltar

- Same for the Suez loop: some Axis subs and/or surface ship awaiting the british evacuation fleet from Egypt can be a nasty surprise (just sunk Liam his tank and corps transport there in our game... ).

That are only a few examples - in the end each Axis player has to decide where and when to strike against the allied fleet or if the fleets are better kept as permanent threat. Logically you need to change time and place in every game against the same player, otherwise he will await you there sooner or later and make short process of your fleet .

[arado234]

Another thing is to keep all your axis ships away from the french as they will go suicide against your germans.The best way i found is to keep them in port untill france is gone.

[hellraiser]

Against a pro allied player I would recommend maximum care in managing the german and italian fleets especially with the new spotting rules regarding ships.

Against an average player, it's more than possible to play a bit more aggro - a lot of players split their RN into different task forces allowing gaps that can be exploited by axis fleets.

1. The sub into the Atlantic can be used either to raid (most common approach) or try to slip past allied ships in an attempt to link up with the baltic fleet; if it raids the convoy lanes, later( after France is down) it can try to make its way to Bordeaux port.

2. the extra ships you get can reinforce your Baltic task force or be placed in the Med. Given the fact that in 1.05a the most common approach is to DOW Vichy and Spain immediately after France, you can place your ships in Marseille or a spanish port, to assist the Italian Navy in the battle of the Med. Usually allies will try to benefit of the new spotting rule and infest the med with ships to try to catch axis transports and ships sailing for Tobruk or planning an amphib assault of Tunisia/Algeria.

3. The four starting ships in the Baltic should stay there at least for a while. The combined RN/French fleet is too much for them to handle in the beggining. If later, the allied players splits his ships into more taskforces - i.e. you see ships in the med, near gibraltar, near brest - perhaps you can try to do some damage.

4. The italian fleet - its first task is to protect transports for Africa/support the invasions of Tunisia/Algeria. If they, somehow, survive this - Yoda's tips are pretty comprehensive about their later use.

Note - you said something about defending the raiding sub with some surface vessels - generally it is a bad ideea especially if you do it in the first part of the war. British ships have the advantage of closer supply in the Atlantic while germans lose supply pretty quickly. As a rule, try to achieve some sort of superiority - rather try to link up the italians with germans and go for a 3-4 subs raiding job while your surface ships secure the perimeter - if the british interfere, they now have to face the combined strength of the axis navy rather than 4 ships. Remember to resupply your ships. Another rule would be: UK can afford to lose ships, because they have so many and because later they receive the US fleet while Axis, if they do not buy xtra pieces thus going for a full naval war, cannot afford to repair their ships - simply too much of a mpp drain, and any lost ship would never get replaced.

[Bromley]

Given the fact that in 1.05a the most common approach is to DOW Vichy and Spain immediately after France

Nice idea! Does that make D-Day much tougher? Or is the idea to get enough plunder and MMPs early so as to hurt the USSR so much that it doesn't matter?

Do you get a decent amount of plunder from Spain because of it's starting units? I don't know how it's calculated, but I think initial unit strength feeds into it.

Anything I'm missing (or just lain got wrong) on the pros & cons?

Pros:

* Training

* No operation for that training

* Unlikely to get bogged down and don't have to transport as well as operate to get into place for Barby

* 40MMPs/turn

* XXX plunder

* Gibralter -> Med & S. Atlantic pretty safe

* Algeria

Cons:

* Is Egypt possible before Barby? UK 20 MMPs/turn

* 20-30% US activation (something like US 40-60 MMPs/turn)

* US tranfers Pacific fleet

[hellraiser]

Well...the basic ideea is that as of 1.05, dowing spain is probably the only way to get it as Axis

Diplo effects were nerfed thus you won't be seeing Spain willingly joining Axis

Common Axis practice is now to buy romania and hungary (leaning is way too high towards axis for the allies to react diplomatically) and this way, you don't really care if Spain is under 40% - you plan to kill her anyway.

This is one way to play - ultra aggro i.e. LC/Denmark turn 2, Poland, buy romania, hungary and kill Vichy (to have a broad front for Spain) and spain immediately after France. Get the mid east(with gibraltar axis it is easier) +west africa and get some remaining minors post barbarossa. Indeed majors will join faster, have a lot of cash but under this strategy, axis have probably bought all corps, all tanks and 2 xtra HQs before barbarossa - quite powerful I may say.

The other way is to slowplay your Axis - limiting DOWs only to necessary countries and use the time in your favour.

[TaoJah]

The problem with all this minor-taking is that I don't have enough units left to keep Russia garrisoned against PArtisans.

I keep

- 1 unit in Copenhagen

- 1 in Brussels

- 2 in NW Germany

- 4 in France (guess I could use 1 less)

- 2 in Spain's mainland (leaving the capital open, but it's far from the coast, so...)

- 1 in Portugal

- 1 in Gibraltar

- 1 in Casablanca

- 2 in Egypt

- 1 in Algeria

- 1 in Tunis

- 1 in Syria

- 2 in Iraq (guess I could use 1 less)

- 1 in Roemania.

- 1 in Hungary.

- 1 in Bulgary.

That doesn't leave alot of corps for garrison duty, does it ?

[hellraiser]

"2 in Spain's mainland (leaving the capital open, but it's far from the coast, so...)"

well LR 4-5 paras come from the sky they don't disembark on the coast

You don't need troops in Tunis, Algiers, Syria, Hungary. You need some units in Yugoslavia to prevent partisans - they can be used to protect the hungarian capital as well as bulgarian and Yugoslavian ones (place them so they cover the Yugo mountains and Belgrade and don't worry about Sofia and Budapest).

In Iraq you need to keep something in the city and if you have enough of them on the oilwell but most important is to secure the iranian mountains bordering Caucasus - you don't want reds to flood the mid east

Use italian, romanian and hungarian troops to cover less exposed sites and use some high tech german corps in key places on the map.

You should be ok. But, you have to understand that this 'protection' is in fact only against raiding not against a full scale invasion.

[Jollyguy]

IMO you don't need to garrison everywhere, it's a cost/benefit and risk/reward analysis. (Remember, I'm a CPA...can you tell?)

Taking minors is an investment, and what your hoping for in the long run is that you can build a broad economic base that can eventually swamp your opponent.

In the broadest sense it's like what Terif and Hellraiser have said, you have two major strategies. One is all Russia, in which you keep readiness low and try to overrun the Russian Bear quickly, which if done right will mean a shorter game. The other is minor grabbing, which will generally result in a longer game, but eventually see the Axis apply the weight of their economy in delayed fashion. And as I write, there is a third, which is somewhere inbetween, which I think is actually the most used, in which only select minors are grabbed in a calculating manner, with the thought that the benefits of doing so outweigh increased readiness for the Allies.

Playing as the Allies I have been beaten by all three strategies, and also prevailed over all three.

I will say this, though. Studying the theory of H to H play only goes so far. Experience is the best teacher, which can only be obtained making plenty of mistakes.

Bob