MWiF Global War Hot-Seat (AAR)

[Red Prince]

ORIGINAL: Centuur

If Gort is disorganised, he dies. Otherwise, you might embark him (since he is on a coastal hex) on the liner, therefore preserving him.
I really have trouble with those status indicators. I don't seem to get the hang of those small squares, indicating what's what. Now, when you are probably used to it, that might disappear.
Therefore, I have a question. If I sea a status indicator on top of the unit, can I then click on that indicator or on the unit and get the necessary information at that point? Could be helpful, IMHO.

When you hover the mouse over a unit, you get all the information about that unit on the Main Form:

[Red Prince]

Just been looking over the map, trying to decide what to do for the CW Action choice, and I can tell you that while Egypt may fall, Suez isn't dead yet, and the CW can keep on reinforcing it from India and S. Africa for a good part of the next turn. I'm almost sure I can get 2 more units there, and maybe even a 3rd. With Italy trying to get to Transjordan to activate Iraq, that means a small screening force of 1 unit is sitting in Cairo. Yes, HQ-I Balbo will be active again, soon, but the CW might still hold Suez itself for some time yet.

If Italy fails to plan for it (and so far, it has), Wavell might even be able to gain control of the 4 Canal hexes long enough to get back into the Med (if that seems wise).

For the moment, I am still trying to figure out what to do for the impulse.

[Red Prince]

I may be doing lousy with the CW, but since I decided to defend Sian instead of Lanchow, I think I'm doing okay with the Chinese Communists.

By moving the 5-1 GARR out of Sian, leaving the 4-1 GARR behind to defend against a mere 7 factors it faces (for now), I got the Lanchow MIL out of the mountains without having to disorganize any units. This builds a 9 factor stack, and though it might seem unwise, I moved the white print INF back out of the mountains so that Japan could only attack those 9 factors with a single stack. The best they could do with that is a 19:9 attack, which is not something they'd be willing to do, given the units required.

So, the 7-3 INF may be destroyed if the turn continues for another impulse, but Japan won't be able to get any closer to Sian from the west. And, if the turn ends after this impulse (40% chance) or the next (50%), then the 5-3 INF that is coming in S/O '40 can go directly into Sian. Given a few good-weather impulses or some risky attacks, the Communists probably won't last beyond S/O '40, but at least they should get that far.

[Red Prince]

Once again, I'm getting to the point in the turn which has the Allies with very little left to do.

The Soviets cleared some room in the German border cities for fresh meat . . . er, INF units and aircraft.
The CW went ahead with the Air impulse, failed a Strat Bombing raid, rebased the RSA fighter to Casablanca (still safe from direct assault) in preparation to rebase elsewhere, and reorganized the LND, also in Casablanca, using the Liner.

The turn didn't end, and the new weather roll is about what you'd expect:

[Klydon]

ORIGINAL: Centuur

Euhm... Do you really want me to comment on this? Personally I would have sacked Chamberlain by now, if you get my drift.
This is a lot of so called bullshit. I've stated previously that the longer the CW is continuing to run away from a good fight, the worse they are going to end up in the game. Sure, luck has something to do with it (and the CW is extremely unlucky). however: don't think you are doing so well with the Axis because of what you are writing here.
Unconventional thinking by the Axis? Sorry, but I don't buy this at all. It is all about not knowing how to defend. That in itself is to be expected from newbie players. "Old school" players? What are you thinking here? I would have kicked the Italian ass from the start, if I had been playing the Allies. No way I would have been conquered with the French.
"Old school" play, as you call it, is to get the Axis into the position where they are forced to create Vichy France, since Toulouse is a real French fortress, with a British presence in the Bordeaux-Bayonne area. "Old school" play is to throw cheap CW units in front of German and Italian troops. "Old school" play is to build the units the CW needs to survive. "Old school" play is to preserve the oh so precious CW sealift and kill the Italian sealift. Did we see "Old school" play by the Allies: Not at all.
So please, don't start saying that Axis play is "unconventional".
This "old school" player really wants to show you how to defend with the CW and France. At this point of the game, the Axis should have conquered Paris this turn and not Gibraltar/Suez. France should become Vichy end of this turn. Italians in Egypt? Perhaps some poor TERR, not the forces you've got now in Africa...
So please: refrain from writing these kind of things. You've never played against an "old school" player, so don't start these kind of nonsense...
I don't want to go back into all the mistakes you've made, since that's not the way I play any wargame. Mistakes happen and one should go and look how to exploit or to counter the mistakes that are made. However: I don't like people saying they are doing so good, when they really aren't.
By the way: keep up the work. I really like this AAR...

I am sorry, but I have to toss my two cents in here on this internet tough guy.

First off, you might be the world's best WiF player there is. I somehow doubt it, but who knows for sure. You sure come across that way and your "know it all" attitude comes out a lot at least to me.

From the way you talk, the Axis need not bother to show up since the Allies, especially the CW, are going to kick their butts. If that is the case, then why do an AAR or even publish the game since we all know, seemingly according to you, that the Axis are wasting their time.

Just because you think the game should be played a certain way doesn't mean it is the only way. While I think it a given that you are a terrific player and know what you are doing, there might be some things or tactics/strategies you/your circle of players has not thought of and you just might get surprised when this sucker goes live and you face fresh blood that also knows what they are doing. That is part of the point I think Aaron is making.

That mistakes were made is not in doubt. That things could have been done better IN HINDSIGHT is not in doubt either. Any player involved in a game of this size and magnitude is going to make mistakes. How well the opponent can take advantage and make them pay for those mistakes will go a long way to determining the outcome of a game.

Let me remind you of another "old skool" saying I like to mention from time to time.. "Better lucky than good.. "

You can have all the fancy strats and generally out play your opponent only to watch your best efforts go down as your opponent has red hot dice. It happens. If you don't think it has been happing in the sea war, then you need to go back and look at the die rolls. Somewhat the same can be said of the weather, which was one of the single biggest factors in the fall of France. My bet is if you went back and recreated the weather over that time is that you have never been involved in a game that had that run of weather so favorable to the Axis.

All I am saying is ease up a bit please.

[Red Prince]

I just want to announce officially:

I respect everyone who has offered advice here.

And Centuur knows that I respect him, I think. We don't always agree, and that's part of the fun. I also know that English isn't his first language, and I often write in a style that can easily be misinterpreted or mistranslated.

While I happen to agree with a lot of what Klydon says in the post above, concerning luck and my initial point, I certainly understand how my original post might have been seen as offensive to people who have been expert or near-expert WiF players for years or even decades. For that I apologize. It was not my intent.
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Edit: Concerning the weather, I'm keeping a spreadsheet of all weather rolls. That's what you're seeing at the end of each turn when I make my reports -- a clip from that spreadsheet. I'm very interested to see how the weather complicates or helps things for each side over the course of the game, particularly the average number of Fine impulses for each weather zone in each of the 6 game turns. So, as things get farthur along, I'll probably start posting the averages. Since we're just finishing the first year right now, there is nothing to average.

Also in this spreadsheet, you'll notice that I keep track of how many impulses each side gets. This will also show the number of double-impulses, as well as the overall advantage in the number of impulses over the course of the entire game.

[Red Prince]

A question: which option is better . . . Germany conquering Morocco? or Italy conquering Morocco?

I think I know the answer, but I can't be sure.

[Klydon]

My first thought would be the Italians from the standpoint that I assume you plan on using mostly Italian forces to try to defend Africa in the future. On the other hand, Morocco is a must have for the Allies if they want to pry open the Med at some point in the future and the Italians facing Patton alone is not a very enjoyable thought from the Axis side.

[Red Prince]

ORIGINAL: Klydon

My first thought would be the Italians from the standpoint that I assume you plan on using mostly Italian forces to try to defend Africa in the future. On the other hand, Morocco is a must have for the Allies if they want to pry open the Med at some point in the future and the Italians facing Patton alone is not a very enjoyable thought from the Axis side.

That's kind of what I was expecting for an answer . . . that Germany should take it, so that if the USA wants to land anywhere other than in Spanish Morocco, it has to DOW Germany first.

[Red Prince]

Axis attacks for the impulse:



And the results:

Attack on China [75, 135]: Blitz, Fractional Odds .388 (Yes), Roll = 10 = */2B
Attack on Rabat: Assault, Fractional Odds .332 (No), Roll = 4 = */2S

Well, if you don't believe the Axis is getting the benefit of luck, I don't know which AAR you're watching.[;)] I chose the Blitz in China because there was a 30% chance of the INF surviving (vs. no chance on the Assault CRT), and the same 30% chance to disorganize the Japanese (vs. 50% on the Assault CRT). This late in the turn, I figured I might as well try to preserve the unit. Earlier in the turn I might have gone for the better odds of halting the Japanese advance. Well, a roll of '10' is overkill for this particular attack, but it's another "lucky" roll that might have shown up at some other more crucial moment.

As for the attack on Rabat, well, the roll was just high enough to keep the attackers organized, but at 7:1 odds (8:1 really) the only choice was the Assault CRT. Gort was going to find his coffin one way or another, and only the Assault CRT offered the chance to disorganize the enemy, costing precious Oil, at the least . . . and stopping them in their tracks if the turn keeps on going for 2 more impulses.

I chose Germany as the new Overlords of Morocco, since I can also claim the hex the Canadian MIL is in for Germany. That means there is only 1 hex (Tangier) that the USA can get to by way of the Atlantic that is owned by Italy. You can be sure it will be almost as well fortified as Gibraltar, and so the USA will either have to take the long way around if it wants to go to war with Italy before Germany, or it will have to suck it up and DOW Germany first (or at the same time).

[Red Prince]

Other things that happened this impulse?

Well, Italy made its way into both Amman and Jerusalem, and is in position to claim Iraq in a few more impulses. Then they have to take Syria away from France, so that they can get that Oil to the homeland (Italy). They'll be a little vulnerable for a while in Egypt, but should be able to keep things pretty secure even if 2-3 more units join Wavell next turn. Also, since the Germans are already in N. Africa with some fast units, the Italians can use their TRS to reinforce Egypt with their own units. HQ-A Guderian has at least 3 fast Corps with him to finish the job in Morocco and still be able to traverse the Northern Sahara in time to be useful in a campaign against the Caucasus.

[Red Prince]

And, to nobody's surprise I'm sure, I used HQ-I Terauchi to reorganize 2 of the units sitting on the Sian doorstep.

[Red Prince]

Kind of a waste of Oil for Japan, as it turns out. With a 50% chance of turn ending, the die roll was a '4' making it a shorter turn in the end than the M/J '40 turn, by 3 impulses. Since it ended after an Axis impulse, the Allies gain +1 on the Initiative track, which is now at +1 in favor of the Allies. It was a risk the Axis was willing to take to start this turn off right, and I think it paid off fairly well for them.

But will they ever manage to get the initiative back again? Or will the Allies keep them on the wrong end of that particular stick?

Stay tuned . . .

And now, the weather. [:)]

[Red Prince]

Next up is the form showing the units destroyed in J/A '40 (Turn #6):
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It doesn't show destroyed Convoy Points, because they are generic units, but if I remember correctly, France lost 2 and the CW lost another.

[Red Prince]

So, here's another good question for you . . . which is more important? Freezing Japanese assets . . . or Repairing Western Allied ships?

I'd probably go with the repairs, since I can always choose to freeze the assets if the roll fails, but some might disagree. I'm actually going to pause in playing the game for a bit, so feel free to toss your thoughts into the mix.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Red Prince

ORIGINAL: Centuur

ORIGINAL: Red Prince

Just want to answer a question someone asked ealier in the thread. I'll paraphrase it and expand it . . . the original was something like: "How can the Allies manage to lose both Gibraltar and Suez in the same turn?" . . . and I'll add Morocco to it, too.

Well, one answer is poor play by the CW player (me). Another answer is unconventional thinking. I don't mean this to sound too rude, but I think when MWiF is released to the public, many "old-school" players are going to have to get away from their conservative ideas about how this game is supposed to be played. There are going to be a lot more people like me out there, who are willing to try anything once.

For example, raise your hand if you would have thought to rail all of your HQs to Gibraltar at the time that I did it . . . well, maybe that wasn't too surprising . . . but how about using the O-chit anyway, even though I didn't need it for Gibraltar, to reorganize the units needed to finish off the Allies in Morocco, thus securing that front in one summer? Personally, I think people rely way too much on the "intimidation" factor of an O-chit. Yes, it's a nice thing to have around, but if you need to get a job done, then by all means use the O-chit! It's kind of like keeping a bunch of pilots in your reserve pool with a bunch of fighters they could be flying, but not the fighters you really want them in. You paid for them in BP, but neither the Pilots nor the fighters do you any good if they don't get used.

You can probably tell that I don't play conservatively with my O-chits. If I see an opportunity to make it work for me, I don't bother to count BP and calculate the "actual" value of using it. I jump right in and do it. Sometimes that's going to get me into trouble, but a lot of the time it's going to take the enemy by surprise . . . which is what the "intimidation factor" is all about, isn't it? If your enemy knows you like to hold onto an O-chit just to scare him, he's not going to be scared.

But I digress. That's just an example of the kind of thinking that can cause all of these horrid things to happen to the Allies all at once. Another example is that overkill is sometimes useful. I know you're only supposed to commit "what you need to get the job done", but this early in the game, there isn't a threat in sight from anywhere else. With Amphibious rules, even if I had all 6 CW transports that I was "supposed" to have, what can they do behind the lines? Nothing, really -- no Marine units to invade with. So I went into Spain with all the forces I could spare that weren't required for Garrisson duty. That's overkill, but it certainly did the job.

Of course, luck doesn't hurt either, if you want to take Gibraltar and Suez in the same turn. I like to think I planned it well, but luck was probably more in control of things than I was, when it comes right down to it.

Euhm... Do you really want me to comment on this? Personally I would have sacked Chamberlain by now, if you get my drift.
This is a lot of so called bullshit. I've stated previously that the longer the CW is continuing to run away from a good fight, the worse they are going to end up in the game. Sure, luck has something to do with it (and the CW is extremely unlucky). however: don't think you are doing so well with the Axis because of what you are writing here.
Unconventional thinking by the Axis? Sorry, but I don't buy this at all. It is all about not knowing how to defend. That in itself is to be expected from newbie players. "Old school" players? What are you thinking here? I would have kicked the Italian ass from the start, if I had been playing the Allies. No way I would have been conquered with the French.
"Old school" play, as you call it, is to get the Axis into the position where they are forced to create Vichy France, since Toulouse is a real French fortress, with a British presence in the Bordeaux-Bayonne area. "Old school" play is to throw cheap CW units in front of German and Italian troops. "Old school" play is to build the units the CW needs to survive. "Old school" play is to preserve the oh so precious CW sealift and kill the Italian sealift. Did we see "Old school" play by the Allies: Not at all.
So please, don't start saying that Axis play is "unconventional".
This "old school" player really wants to show you how to defend with the CW and France. At this point of the game, the Axis should have conquered Paris this turn and not Gibraltar/Suez. France should become Vichy end of this turn. Italians in Egypt? Perhaps some poor TERR, not the forces you've got now in Africa...
So please: refrain from writing these kind of things. You've never played against an "old school" player, so don't start these kind of nonsense...
I don't want to go back into all the mistakes you've made, since that's not the way I play any wargame. Mistakes happen and one should go and look how to exploit or to counter the mistakes that are made. However: I don't like people saying they are doing so good, when they really aren't.
By the way: keep up the work. I really like this AAR...

I'm sorry I irritated you with this post. I don't mean to say that "old school" play is obsolete. I just mean that there are going to be a lot of players out there who, like me, don't know how to play one side or the other.

I will come to my own defense on one count: I took the defense of France directly from the suggestions of the forum members. I planned very little of it for myself.

Two counts, actually: If you played with the initial setup I made, I doubt you could have done as well as you state above, though you would no doubt have done better than I did. [:)]

I do have one question, though. And I'm very serious about this, and not the least bit sarcastic. If you had to "take over" the CW from another player . . . let's say after the first 2 turns . . . and got similarly bad rolls on whatever attacks you decided to make after that, how would you have created the defense for the Allies? That means, starting with the mistakes I made in all areas before the J/F '40 turn began, what would you have done that would have changed things so completely?

I ask this because there is always a snowball effect in these games. The earlier you screw things up (as I did), the more damage is going to be done. This leads me back to the point I was initially trying to make: when MWiF is released, there are going to be just as many greenhorns playing the Allied side as there are playing the Axis side. That's going to create a lot of opportunities for "unconventional" activity.

Just because one side is playing poorly, that doesn't negate the fact that the other side is playing well. And, please take note, that I didn't claim to be "doing so good". What I said was that I came up with a few ideas that are unconventional, and I was lucky to have them work out.

Maybe you will throttle me when we first take each other on. Only time will tell. And if it happens, I'll have to adapt.

Aaron,

Bear in mind that some of the people (e.g., like me) posting to this thread have played WIF for 10+ years over-the-board. While most often it has been against the same opponent(s), these forum members have moved very far up the learning curve on how to play WIF well. They have seen good die rolls and bad under all kinds of situations. Given that mass of scar tissue and personal (oftentimes agonizing) experience, their comments should not be dismissed as simply "old school".

As for taking over poor positions and remedying them into fair positions, that happens all the time in every game. Typically it occurs when the die rolls go against you. World in Flames is not like chess where a well known response to every attack/defense exists and can be relied upon to meet your enemy's best efforts. Instead, you do the best you can with what you have and adjust to to vagaries of war that follow. As you yourself have commented on many times, it is very difficult to 'see' all the possible actions that your opponent might take. And when you miss one, there you are with a poor position that you need to remedy into a fair one.

And yes, recovering the Commonwealth position after two turns, was doable. But, and this is a very big but, it depends on the opponent's play. Usually when I had such a poor position it was because my opponent was a much better player than I was at that time. He had crushed me for the first two turns and he would undoubtedly crush me for the rest of the game.

I will follow up on what Peter said. At this point you are a much better player when you attack than you are when you defend. You are much better with land units than you are with naval units. Neither of those comments should be surprising to you. In fact, this is almost always true for players new to WIF. They have played a lot of war games involving land units and know what to do with them. The WIF naval system is unique and new players have trouble learning how to position and move naval units.

Your AAR is engrossing, but it undoubtedly is driving experienced players nuts (I include myself here), with comments like "You did what!!!!"[X(]

[Red Prince]

Your AAR is engrossing, but it undoubtedly is driving experienced players nuts (I include myself here), with comments like "You did what!!!!"

[:D]

[Orm]

I would go with freezing the Japanese assets. It is more important because you want to do Oil Embargo as soon as you have passed War Appropriations Bill. And because an option that requires a pre-requisite to be picked first, it must have been picked in a prior turn.

[Red Prince]

Given that mass of scar tissue and personal (oftentimes agonizing) experience, their comments should not be dismissed as simply "old school".

Apparently I wasn't able to clear up what I meant by "old school" in my later post. I had no intention of "dismissing" those comments.

All I wanted to say was that MWiF will offer players who know the game, but have never had a chance to play vs. a live opponent, the opportunity to do so, and I think that's going to force players of all skill and knowledge levels to adjust to a variety of styles of play they may not be used to . . . precisely because they know how to play the game well.

Maybe I'm wrong about it all, but the larger the pool of available opponents becomes, the more the standards will be tested. That's what I believe. I'm not dismissing those opinions on how to play the game. I'm trying to learn from them. As you say, though, there is no perfect way to play, and I expect a lot of imperfect play to generate a few new standards.
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Back in the mid-90s, I used to play Axis & Allies with the same 3 or 4 people every night for an entire summer. (No, I am not comparing the games in terms of complexity, though this was the "revised" edition, which was more complex than the original). It got to the point that we each knew how to play the game almost perfectly with each major power, so the game became a little boring . . . the die rolls determined the winner, rather than strategy.

One night, in our second game -- a game we were playing more out of habit than for fun -- I decided to open up with an insane move. It worked, and eventually the maneuver was named after me among our friends, because we discovered that it was crazy, but almost indefensible. Over time, we each started trying things like this. Some worked brilliantly, and some failed.
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So, my point is simply this: there might be a fairly standard way to play successfully, and I respect that and want to learn it myself, but with an expanding supply of opponents soon to be available through MWiF, even the world's greatest player is going to get into trouble now and then because he/she hasn't anticipated some action -- because it's not part of what is usually thought to be a sensible way to play.

[Centuur]

ORIGINAL: Orm

I would go with freezing the Japanese assets. It is more important because you want to do Oil Embargo as soon as you have passed War Appropriations Bill. And because an option that requires a pre-requisite to be picked first, it must have been picked in a prior turn.

I agree.