Slightly silly strategies

[GUNNM]

Sometimes you just want to do something less than optimal in a game just for fun. So you think of a strategy or objective and go for that. I would like to hear what you've done and share what I've done. Maybe one of us will find an interesting way to play our next game?


As Soviet Union:
-Disband all divisions that are not Infantry. Then proceed to fill up the divisions to all be INF-INF-INF-INF. This massive army have very little chance against tanks... so I built over 20 CAS to hunt down the German tanks. Was funny to see the tanks being destroyed without ever seeing the frontline.

-Have over 100 tank divisions (200 brigades) before Germany declares war. I've done this twice and it is silly how fast the war is over...


As USA:
-Join the Allies early Build as many planes as possible. This was back in Vanilla, and after 2 years of bombing everything within range of Britain I was seen as the biggest threat in the world. Australia feared me so much that they joined the Axis!

-Try to have 20 Carriers and 40 Light Carriers before Japan declares war. Was close to having 20 Carriers and 25 Light Carriers but failed

-Heavy tanks! Heavy tanks everywhere!


As Germany:
-Focus on Battlecruisers to try and take on the British and later, American navies. - Worked well when close to air cover. The fast Battlecruisers could close with the Carriers and open fire. But it took a couple of tries.

-Try to get as many allies as possible by using diplomatic influence to get them to join me willingly. Was actually quite fun!

-Have no alliances! Conquer Italy, Hungrary, Romania, Bulgaria, and in the end even Japan! This was awesome!

-My next game I will never research Medium Armour. Light tanks all the way! Will need AT-brigades on the infantry to compensate though.


As Canada:
-Win in North Africa and invade Italy alone!


Just a few thoughts. I would love to hear anything you've done. Maybe I'll try something myself

 

[Kovax]

Ran a game as Hungary with the intention of taking over Palestine and creating an Axis Israel, managed to take the Suez Canal and half the Middle East ("amusing" with a navy consisting of 2xTP and a license-built sub), only to find out that it's not possible for the Axis to release countries.

Played another game as Germany, and guaranteed the independence of Nationalist China as protection against possible Soviet intervention on behalf of ComChi, which of course put me at war against Japan in 1937. GREAT game of "cat and mouse" in the Pacific between the weak pre-war German navy (plus a few submarines to spot) and the Japanese carrier fleets. I landed a Corps of troops in China and sent air support, and they shifted the balance drastically. The normal diplomatic course of events in Europe went right down the toilet, though, which led to a weird set of alliances.

 

[yanmagnus]

Your Canada wish is not far from the AI capabilities! I swear i didn't mess with the Allies after France, but oh well.... They invaded North Africa with their navy guess what, they also had escorts. They managed to land some 10 divisions and were entering Algeria when i noticed them. Was too busy taking my last VP inside Russia.

Tagged as Canada to see if those were Expd. but only 2 of the ~10 divisions were from SA. By pure lazyness had Italy annex Vichy so they would stop those silly Canadians from reaching Tunis! Now i should probably starve them with XXIs

Fun game was when i picked Brazil and went to take North Africa and save the Brits, they were almost losing Egypt. Later on that game i did try to invade Greece (AI invaded Italy :blink got stuck on Macedonia :/

 

[marxianTJ]

1. I was reading Nikolai Kuznetsov's memoirs, and he mentioned briefly that he wished that Soviets had looked more into air craft carriers in the prewar years (Stalin liked big battleships and cruisers a lot, and Soviet naval strategists preferred submarines, but they'd discussed building CVs). So, I decided to live Kuznetsov's dream and built 2 carrier fleets - one in the Baltic and one in the black sea. Instead of building any IC I just built a massive defensive line a la the Maginot, and hoped the Germans didn't figure out that they could invade through the Baltic states. Then I sent my beautiful soviet CTFs out into the Baltic and the Med... I had naval supremacy, along with the British, that's for sure... but I couldn't really do much with it lol. Perhaps if resources were more important Germany would've at least starved itself of metal (since roughly 40% of Germany's Iron needs were filled by trade with Sweden irl).

2. Budyenny's army. Buddyenny was a big Soviet general of the old type - a friend of Stalin's from the civil war years, he also created a horse breed which is still widely used in Russia and elsewhere to this day. He was a major proponent of cavalry warfare - over and against tanks in particular. So, I built exactly 0 tanks as the USSR. Light tanks and tankettes were ok, but no medium tanks. Only hordes and hordes of cavalry - any role not filled by infantry was filled by cavalry. It was pretty interesting, and very bloody.

3. Any game as COM CHI where you try to be aggressive and balance being the very largest threat to the world. As Com CHI you can turn yourself into public enemy #1 simply by declaring 2 wars - I looked at the USA, and I was by far their largest threat (I had like 70 threat points against them). Guess FDR never did like Mao... If you take Nat China, Xibei San Ma, and Sinkiang, and the allies still haven't declared war on you, the USA almost always joins the Allies before France even falls.

 

[GUNNM]

The Canada thingy was not a wish. It is what I actually did

9 Motorised divisions and 4 Medium Tank divisions rolled up the boot, facing the majority of Italy's, Hungrary's, Romania's and Bulgaria's armies. It was a tough fight and it took me 2 years to take Rome. The tanks might not have been optimal for Italy, but the low casualties they took against no AT-brigades was absolutely necessary to keep going. After almost 3 years over 300,000 troops had been encircled and destroyed (in 4 encirclements). But by then I was at -30 MP (would take me 6 months to get) and both USA and UK was utterly useless. So I called it an "Operational Victory".

If I'd taken the task seriously I would have built fewer Mountain divisions... But I wanted to see if Canada could get an elite armoured army.

 

[Pacius Ferox]

In time of Barbarossa, liberate Estonia as Finland.

 

[cdub8d]

Play as France and invade northern Germany.

 

[Pugmak]

As Ger in GC '36 campaign:

Attack France, of course, but only by first conquering Switzerland. All France attacky forces have to get to France by going through Switz.

'nother one:

Ger again, '36 GC.
Hold off on everything. Don't do Danzig or War. Start things off by invading England first in '41. Oh, and forget to research paratroopers, as well as add to your naval forces. Don't remember you were supposed to do those two things until after you start the invasion.

 

[Yearzero]

Fired Danzig or War before the First Vienna Award.

Needless to say i got more than just an angry letter from Mr Chamberlain,eventually after hunting down and sinking the Royal Navy,i launched Sea Lion just to have Japan get a large chunk of UK...

 

[TDT25]

To OP: if you think those are crazy numbers....

Try an MP game or check a MP save sometime. As Japan it's pretty standard to have 30+ Carriers by late 39 or early 40. It's pretty standard for both the Soviet Union and Germany to have over 100 tank divisions each or 100 armor brigades, or for the UK to have 100 air wings etc. etc. depending on players build strategies.

 

[magitsu]

I've done few of these:
Build only IC for ROM, as much as you can. Romanian oil buys 99999+ energy, metal and rares easy. Give up Bessarabia. Join Axis. Immediately when you see Königstigers researched buy a license from Germany. I usually make 5xHARMxMOTxTDxSPART. That is a ridiculously hungry but effective (slow) force that will enable you to open your own front next to the Germans. Enjoy 100% pierce/armor bonus for the whole duration of Barbarossa. Germany can obviously still fail you, but I usually manage to get to Stalingrad on my own front.
You start by landing next to Sevastopol or the city itself if the SOV ai is moving its troops like a dumbass.

Supply consumption kind of requires you to have your own front because those divs will eat the majority of supply if you put them on to strain the German supply lines.
It's fun to see how much you can do with few militia as port guards, 5xHARM divs and maybe 3x of int or tac or mr. Basically this is a way to stretch the average amount of MP Romania gets as far as possible.

With CGM it's easier to make happen.

 

[halby]

as albania, join the axis, then declare puppet wars on everyone in all of europe simultaniously. die, then as germany wins wars, get more and more IC to spend on your corpse.

 

[ivain]

To OP: if you think those are crazy numbers....

Try an MP game or check a MP save sometime. As Japan it's pretty standard to have 30+ Carriers by late 39 or early 40. It's pretty standard for both the Soviet Union and Germany to have over 100 tank divisions each or 100 armor brigades, or for the UK to have 100 air wings etc. etc. depending on players build strategies.

I may be doing something wrong then. I usually end with around 30 Armored divisions.

 

[Steelers1990]

I am with you. I usually have the same amount of Armoured being split up between Light (more) and Medium.

 

[wdj2131]

Y plan all the way, German Marine Corps, 6 cvs, 3bb, 3bc, a shit pile of subs and dds. No dow, british dowd in early 40. No battle of britian, battle of the med.Save the italian bacon, then sealion after the gibs cooked. Soviet dow= german amhibs assualt of Vipuri and Leningrad. Plenty of time to build nukes, jets and rockets to fuck amerika! good times