TAIFUN (Allies) vs DimitryN (Axis) Full game 1939

[Taifun]

August 27 - September 10 1943
Ankara was captured by US paras, the Turkish government moving to Istanbul. Stalin surrendered. Without hope of holding Perm and with the last reserves exhausted the USSR is a defeated Nation. Congratulations Dimitry!

[Taifun]

The USSR moral was at 56%, USA 90%, Germany 103%, Japan 104%, England 73%, Italy 26% (around this number).
The USSR received 2409 MPPs from convoys 388 MPPs being sunk by the Axis.

[Taifun]

Unit count

[Taifun]

Detailed losses:

[Taifun]

The Germans were starting to feel the pressure but it was already too late for the USSR

[Taifun]

Churchill receiving the telegram: THE WAR IS LOST.

[Marcinos1985]

Well played, both of you.

@Taifun, I'd still argue you were in good spot in 1941, before USSR was attacked. Though that late IW2 was a disaster, I never saw it that late. How do you think, what mistakes did you make afterwards?

Personally, after quick scan, I'd point 2. 1st was letting KM to intercept convoys, you should never let them there. Even though he lost that many ships, this sacrifice was probably worth it. I believe RN was preoccupied elsewhere for too long.
2nd, more important probably were those landings in the Med. As tempting as it was, your forces were dispersed and fighting in peripheries. Late 1942/early 1943 US alone is able to land a hammer, just don't pull the trigger too early. If you take Paris, game is on. As your opponent pointed out, Italy was tempting too.

Finally, pace at what USSR crumbled in 1942 was astonishing, typical (in-game) China syndrome. Devs should really take a look at this matter, it's another AAR where it's such a beatdown.

These were quick 2 cents, I am very interested in your post mortem. And judging by this game, Axis suits your playstyle way more. [8D]

[EarlyDoors]

https://youtu.be/EDS3TxtGaQ0

[Shilka]

Great to read this, thanks a lot for making the AAR. The axis diplovestment in Turkey was massive (700 mpp [X(] ) and even then it wasn't guaranteed and could've missed the mark as well. Italy was apparently pretty near of getting knocked out. Always fun to see that sort of action in the middle east. And Japan going heavily in India and ME can leave the home islands vulnerable to USA and things seemed to have going well in the pacific... but it's so easy just to plow everything into Europe, and that's where the money really is, any way. Although in this case Japan attacking Russia could still relieve some pressure as well if the home islands were threatened.

[redrum68]

Great AAR! Interested in your post mortem

[Taifun]

DimitryN played superbly in general pushing always his units to the limit, many times using them in 0 supply. The all for Russia is the winning strategy for the Axis.

What were my mayor errors and what would I have done differently?

I wanted the Axis to get involved in Africa from the beginning of the game, to give the USSR time and a weaker invading Army. It worked well, the Germans eventually sending many assets including 4 panzerkorps, 2 armies, 3 bombers a HQ etc to Egypt and beyond. Those troops were not available for Barbarossa. I did a good job, eliminating all but the last veteran panzerkorps… Sending General O’Connor with the strategic bombers to Massawa was an error, should have stayed at Cairo.


I was very happy when Barbarossa got delayed for many months… I felt that I could easily hold Leningrad, Smolensk and Rostov into 1942. But then TURKEY JOINED THE AXIS. This is when I lost the game. I was very very frustrated as I countered in full with diplomacy chits, and getting two 21% hits in a very short time (I think it was within 3 turns with 2 hits) with only a 10% chance is hitting the Jackpot. If only the US had joined the war 1-2 turns earlier… (Here I was also unlucky as the US got low mobilization hits, and should have joined in Dec-Jan 1942 not Feb 42). With Turkey in the war, and a panzerkorps entering Iran I had to divert 4 infantry corps and 3 garrisons to cover the southern flank. The main front got thinner…

The other game changing unfortunate event was the late development of infantry warfare 2 for the USSR. I usually get it July-August 1941 or October 41 at the latest… but this game it did not happen until MAY 1942!!! [&:]My troops were fighting less effectively and I was surprised by the odds I was getting in battle. I couldn’t believe how effective were the Germans fighting in the winter weather.

The fact that the KM was operating in the North was troublesome but I did not want to lose 1-2 CVs for an extra 300-400 MPPs for the Soviets. I don’t think that the KM affected the war in the USSR.

With the USSR in trouble the Allies could have attacked France, Italy or the Middle East late 1942. As all of my previous games in WAW and WiE ended in 1941-42 and only a couple lasted until early 1943 I had no experience at all with Allied Naval invasions. I never tried before a large scale invasion of France or Italy. I thought that I needed the oil MMPs and that getting Turkey would greatly help the USSR. I knew the Japanese were coming and needed the Suez Canal. I did a good job holding the Japanese invasion of Egypt as I was ready for the fight. I agree that I somehow mismanaged the 2 US marine landings in Europe but getting Konigsberg greatly boosted the Soviet morale by 10000 points.


But with the USSR about to lose Moscow it didn’t matter as I new that the game was over in November 1942. Even if I could have taken Italy in late 1942 - early 1943 the USSR was a defeated Nation in Dec 1942.

China was overrun fast. It is a problem for the developers and I still don’t know if any player will be able to hold the country against elite Axis players.

I was happy with the Germans pouring troops into Turkey as many were destroyed in low supply and for the last 4-5 turns the Axis lost many MMPs. The Germans barely replacing their losses. But with the USSR gone it was a lost war!!

[Taifun]

What to change from the game?

I invite all new players to read this great threat:

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.a ... 2&#5086603


The last entry by hansondavid4 is exactly what happened in this game:

"The game heavily favors an Axis player who knows what they are doing.
If the axis player focuses on knocking out the Soviets and not be distracted by ancillary activity, the Soviets will fall. If the Soviets are gone, the western allies just cannot compete. If need be, Italy can pull out of North Africa and turtle, freeing up more more resource (Italian HQ's to lead minor allied armies) for the east front and avoid moral hits for lost units there.

The European Axis can try some different gambits just to make the game interesting.

Japan is too powerful. They basically get all the units they need for free. They really only need to build some garrisons to free up the armies and corps in Manchuria; build the minor units for additional garrison duty; and artillery units to dig out the Chinese fortification and moral before attacking. Maybe an extra bomber. Once these are all in place, Japan pretty much can roll over the Chinese.

Japan get all the units they need for the Pacific for free to establish the historical defensive parameter. You need to set asside several turns worth of production to get them all on landing craft. This frees up MP's for research, replacements, and a few extra units".


As Alcibiades73 said:

"Contrary to the wishes of most of the posters on this thread, I am going to stress that there is a great danger in niche games being balanced toward both elite, hardcore players and multi-player (MP) experience. The simple reason is that the vast majority of gamers will not play a particular game long enough to become "expert" players - nor will they explore MP game modes. Hence, tuning games toward both expert and MP segment of the player base may alienate the majority of the customer base. Yet, the majority of the most vocal posters and especially beta testers in many turn-based strategy/tactics games also tend to be hardcore and MP players. So the devs have a tendency to only get the feedback from a very small segment of the player base and implement changes that will only cater to that minority. I have seen many games, for instance, where the game was virtually unplayable for casuals at release, because the beta testers were in a race to ratchet up the difficulty in an e-peen measuring contest, and the devs obliged, because they had no other feedback source."

Thanks for following and good gaming!!

[DmitryN]

My notes about the game.

1. In my opinion the main really decisive thing was Japan fast progress in China, which surrendered August 1942 (!). I never did such progress in China before. It was also my first time of investing so much in motorizing Japanese units and moving some SNLF from islands to inland theater. Axis went “all in China” and won it.
After defeat of China vast part of Japanese troops went to USSR. As the game went in reality Japan killed/forced to move from German front about 15 soviet units, which also affect things. BUT even if the war went more successful for Allies on Soviet-German front, or if American dismembarkment forced Germans to move troops west in both this cases on summer 1943 it would be 15-20 Japanese experienced motorized land units plus 7 different very experienced 3 level Japanese bombers near Ural. (in real game observing good German progress I recalled a lot of Japanese units and aviation initially send to USSR). Axis had even more and better Japanese bombers than German.
So I am sure that even if other things went worse for Germany anyway USSR could not survive full force Japanese attack on Ural.
By the way: if Allied did not declare war on Italy I am not sure that I would go such “all in” in China, as such strategy does not left you money for fleet and amphibious transport. Only late American entrance the war let Japan to have such success in China without weakening first strike on US.

2. Second important thing affecting the game was Taifun decision to land anglo-americans in different places with small forces. It was obviously a big mistake. As I said before my garrison of Italy was quite weak, but Italy had more than 30 units worldwide. East and North Africa and Persia were Italian. Italian forces served as garrisons Russia and France, etc. If Taifun waited couple of turns and landed full force in Itally it probably could change the game.
Even if he landed all the forces in France/North Germany it anyway would affect Axis play much more than a lot of weak force attacks + middle east.

3. I disagree that Turkey entrance the war changed the game. Turkish units were to weak even against Russians (they always had bigger loses costing the same MPPs as germans) Americans killed them much easier. Turkey helped Axis but I don’t consider it very important. It anyway does not worth so much diplo investments. Will not do it again.
And anyway if Allied don’t declare war on Italy US would enter war earlier and keep Turkey out of war. So the situation was caused by Allied policy.

4. My main mistake was unprepared late Barbarossa. As I said before I overestimated the effect of Allied declaration of war to Italy on soviet mobilization.

5. Small thing, but I guess that Taifun invested too much in Russian tanks. They are too expensive and when the war goes as it went in my opinion it is better to buy more cheap troops in Russia just to win time. But it is the last important factor.


Anyway many thanks for taifun making this excellent AAR

[petedalby]

Thanks for another great AAR Taifun. I thought you had this but congratulations to DimitryN for a great win over a very tough opponent. Italy appears to have been the pivotal factor in this game, both at the start and at the end. Who knew?!!

[LoneRunner]

Thank you for the excellent AAR Taifun and Dimitry. Your closing comments were right on.

[Elessar2]

Scorched Earth needs to be dialed up to ensure a newly captured enemy city can't be above 4 supply. Yes, I am aware of the time constraints in rebuilding them given the meager number of turns per year, but that alone would help both the Soviets and Chinese. The suggestion in the other thread to increase SE east of Moscow would also be a good idea (tho only doable via events). Both countries need a LOT more partisan hexes; the amount of garrisons needed is pretty meager, esp. since the Axis can often not worry too much about supply partisans if they are off their axis of advance.

[Marcinos1985]

@Elessar2 Good point on supply. I'd add to this - don't allow an occupied resource to reach level more than 5. HQ placed in 5HP spot will grant 8 supply, still ok. But many places in China/Russia rise to level 6 - I believe it concerns cities. HQ placed in 6 HP spot grants 10 supply. So in the middle of occupied territory Axis troops are able to reach supply levels as in Munchen or other big, homeland city. How possible it was IRL, we all know the answear.

Main offenders are golden trio of Changsha/Kiev/Smolensk. As soon as they get conquered and are back to 6 HP (sometimes even in 2-3 turns), Axis may launch an offensive as if they were fighting in their homeland. This means attack on Chonqing really doesn't require logistical effort, 2 HQs are more than enough. Similarly Moscow/SW Russia are under similar threat.