Tourney Rd 1 Erik Axis vs Christian Allies

[christian brown]

Beginning next turn, screenshots will be taken, for now, a brief history of time: (well, the time Erik and I have spent trying to kill each other on the electronic battlefield anyway[:)])

Germany took Poland on turn one and (IIRC) also occupied Denmark, curiously enough, they did not rebase a fighter force to cover the Baltic Strait, so Britain's Navy was able to conduct a live-fire excercise with their torpedo bomber group from Scapa Flow; Germany's merchant service was the worse for wear, helping to prove the worthiness of the nascent Naval Air Arm. Göering must have been doing more drugs than usual since this state of affairs existed until Winter 1940, the torpedo bombers had an opportunity for more real-world training and were able to sink a mixed fleet of "small boys."

Troops and provisions were summoned from all over the Empire to defend the Maginot line and pose a credible threat if the Germans chose to advance into the territory of our erstwhile friends; the people of the Low Countries.

Predictably, the Western Allies were unable to halt the cautious but steady advance of the Wehrmacht and France fell in Spring of 1940.

Since then, a most vicious contest has erupted in the Mediterranean theatre, with the Italian Navy blocked for a season before being able to land men and supplies on the North African Coast. Mixed Axis forces now stand by in Cyraenica, massing up for an advance into the land of the pyramids. British Military Intelligence was tipped off to a disturbing diplomatic development in Spain - it seemed Generalissimo Franco was seriously considering joining the Pact of Steel. Though forewarned, the Garrison of the "Rock" and our new friends the Portuguese were unable to resist the fascist legions on their doorsteps...a terrible slaughter ensued, with both the fighting men of the Commonwealth and Britain as well as the Portuguese being either killed or captured. The Germans, seizing on the opportunity to stage air raids against shipping in the Atlantic, rebased a Heavy Bomber Group to Vigo. A daring plan was conceived whereby unescorted carrier-based aircraft would strike the Do-17s on the ground.....unfortunately, Spanish flak was highly effective, downing an elite CAG.............the partial destruction of the German HB group was small recompense for the loss of this powerful ASW asset.

On the other side of the world, Japan has engaged in a land campaign against China.....though the United States has been aroused, the Japanese advance is progressing too quickly for the Guomindang forces to cope with.

Note: Erik, you are welcome to post here.....there's 5 points in it for you [:D]

As for Russia, the bear slumbers along, content to build up "training camps" in the north and south of the Leningrad-Smolensk-Kharkov line.

[christian brown]

Arrrrrgh! Egypt has fallen! Moderate casualties are sustained by the Axis aggressors and the retreat from Suez is labeled "an advance in the opposite direction." Reinforcements are sent to the Transjordan (must protect the Holy Land) and the situation is stabilized at the Horn....there will be no breakout (fingers crossed!) An unguarded Italian merchant fleet is sunk in the Aegean sea by Blenheims and another is damaged in the Central Med by 2 Hurricane groups.

It is heartening to see that at this stage of the game, Germany still has very significant forces deployed in the med theatre, to include 2 HBs.....

On another note, the Italian sub group that tempted the Horn route to the Indian Ocean is ruthlessly hunted down by a large light fleet cluster, one of whose members becomes Veteran. All in all, the British authorites have much to crow about in this month's picture gazettes....(except the loss of Egypt, lol!)

[christian brown]

Erik,
Please do not read any of the following posts for security reasons....
Thanks in advance,
Christian

[christian brown]

Here are the incredible results of a combat in the Red Sea during the German turn, give that Captain a VC!

[christian brown]

Barbarossa is imminent but the Red Army is well prepared, we think the Eastern Front will be the grave of Germany's hegemonous ambitions.....

[christian brown]

Here is the status of units on the map and in production.........
Note the Russian superiority in armor, equality in Infantry and the overwhelming WA advantage in CVs/CAGs....
WA weakness in HBs will need correction, very soon, I'd like to see at least 5 operating out of Britain....research is already underway on the A-Bomb....speed and evasion are also being looked into: I think I will hold off the bombing campaign until I have my 5 HBs and the speed to carry them into the heart of the Reich (and with the EV to survive any flak encountered.) We are almost to fighter speed 3, so escorts will be on hand for strikes on the Rhineland.

Conclusion as of WA turn Fall 1941:
Erik's bid for the Med will cost him in the East and Japan's decision to invade mainland China may not have been a wise move. Japanese supply is very low (nothing stocked in Indochina) and he still only has 4 CVs. Transport fleets and militia appear to be lacking for the DEI sweep......The bulk of his ground forces will be tied down in occupation duties and the WA has survived basically unscathed in the Atlantic so production has never been less than 100% optimized......


These opinions remain to be tested, so we'll just have to see, but I'll admit that I am beginning to feel slightly optimistic about the outcome.

[christian brown]

TOTAL WAR!

The struggle has begun in earnest; The US/USSR are now in play.....here is the situation Russia faces on the second half of the Barbarossa turn.

[christian brown]

Lucky Desert Rats!

[christian brown]

All for naught, these forces must unfortunately rush to the defense of India (image after.) The humiliation of retreat is balanced by the necessity of slowing the Japanese farther East.

[christian brown]

The front shrinks slightly after a few rather costly Russian counters......reinforcements arrive in the form of regular units, supplemented by a ton of militia. More supply will be required to parry the Germans, so a few unit builds are paused, research is left unhindered.......
The situation is not yet grim yet the Russian forces are still very much dispersed.......concentration needs to be achieved, preferably in the South - where Rumania can be threatened. Ultimately, it will be Erik who decides where we fight.

[christian brown]

For above, problem with image.

[christian brown]

Here is SEA at the end of the WA turn...

[christian brown]

Here is the real problem........
This needs to be brought under control quickly lest the Japanese get freed up for worse, like Australia....

Depending on how much force he brings to bear here, it may, after a few turns, need to be abandoned. With 8 CVs coming at them from the US, Japan may choose to deal with them instead. Again, Erik still has the initiative and will to a large measure dictate where we clash...

[christian brown]

A very tough turn: hugely successful German attacks on the EF and major world-wide TF losses, 2 damaged, 5 destroyed. 3 WA CAGs sortied past the straits of Molucca to hit a (seemingly anyway) defenseless group of surface warships where 2 of them were damaged (I sort of felt like MrQ this turn, lol!) and then destroyed because of the lack of a present TF chain, ouch! Oh yes, no losses to the enemy for this : (
The Russians make only one (unsuccesful) attack into the BS and then simply move forces forward: there is now a vast Red horde gathered in Kharkov, Germany is outnumbered all across the front in fact. The Portuguese and Gibraltar takeover thinned his ground forces somewhat and he is pretty undermanned vs the Russians now. Becaus of this (I think we are near the tipping point) I let loose the RAF and have begun the "smash the Luftwaffe then bomb the crap out of his resource centers" (that's the technical term, right?) campaign. The HBs are still on the spiral and will be there for a few turns, hopefully, he'll get worried about his airspace and start diverting pop points to air power (less for the Russians to deal with.) The WA were able to get the TF chain intact everywhere except right on the west coast of Africa and to our valiant holdouts in SEA. The ASW battle went fairly well, we messed up a total of 4 sub groups, both Japanese and German, again, I hope he puts more resources into subs rather than ground forces.The initial CV fleet is now mostly joined up off the West coast and will roll out next turn (I pity any Japanese seaman in the Central Pacific next turn.) I figure that barring outrageous mistakes/bad luck, I should be able to strangle Japan in about a year. Time will tell.

[christian brown]

Though I believe the worst to be over, it still irks me that I have so many forces tied down in, well............tying down his ground forces in India and the ME....
I think the Japanese will be hard pressed to move adequate reinforcements to sustain their southern offensive, especially with the carriers bearing down next turn.
This is probably going too far but I will make a comment at this point: this has become my game to lose, everything has gone fairly easily up to this point, I've been a bit lucky and WR increases were steady; avoiding a blunder and blowing the game is now the greatest challlenge. The other is to not get overzealous, Erik still has the initiative for now. It would probably be smarter not to make such observations, after all, I might well get badly surprised next turn!

[GKar]

An interesting report Christian, keep it coming! [:)]

[christian brown]

Thanks GKar.

This is exactly what I wanted to see happen......though I failed to take a screenshot, the results were far from impressive, he still has 2 CVs and an elite CAG, I lost a destroyed CV as well as some damaged CAGs. I'm a bit mad about this actually, I've been teching up the CAGS increses in EV, AA and Torp, but it doesn't really pay off this time. All is well, there are more CVs heading out from CONUS next turn.....
India and Sumatra are reinforced and the Oceans are swept virtually clean of enemy subs. The Luftwaffe (except for 2 HBs in W GE) no longer exists in the West, I'll proably start hitting his resources in a major way in a few turns.

[christian brown]

Russia at end of turn:
I decided I'd had enough of sitting around looking tough, I just had to strike back. Results were decent geographically but costly in casualties. This appears t be a greater gamble than it really is, I have HBs sitting on supply plus numerically superior fighter forces within range of where I may need airlifted supply. I sincerely doubt he will push us back from more than 1 region on his turn and I really don't think he can retake Kiev. It may be premature at this point but I believe this is the beginning of the end for the Axis. Erik has lost the initiative....There is no place on the map where he can dictate the course of events. I will now focus on playing conservatively and beating the end date by a few turns.

[christian brown]

Well, to heck with conservative......let's go for it:
The following are snapshots of Axis disasters all across the globe.........
The Horn is a No-Fascist Zone, approved by Oxfam.

[christian brown]

There goes the nieghborhood, along with the last Japanese CVs....