A Big Borshct Bonanza for my Bub

[Anthropoid]

This will be my AAR for my role as Russia in the PBEM 109 match.

The rest of you "PBEM 109" players keep OUT! of here!!












I mean it! Keep OUT!!












That means you too Mr. Nosy Face!! No other PBEM 109 Players allowed in here!!












Okay, now that we got rid of those losers, we can talk freely. So, see, here is the thing about Russia in this game that I've come to realize . . . had not played as Russia at all until I took over in the Another PBEM match.

Russia is INCREDIBLY rich with territory, large open-spaces, border, and resources. About the only resource that you really lack is wine, but then with enough farms and factories you can make up for that with increased spice, wine, and luxury production. We are quite strong in Wool, and Iron, reasonable with timber, and horse.

Number one priority as Russia must be to get started on building Courts because with starting out with 36 provinces you are already suffering some waste. The other thing is to start annexing Poland before Prussia or Austria have a chance to do so.

Already played my turn. Will post some screen shots and stuff when I play my next turn.

[Anthropoid]

Been a month since I started this and no posts, so I realize I need to post some updates. We're up to turn 19. Will see if I can get some time to do that later tonight.

[Harvey Birdman]

So when is Doctor Evil going to get off his big borscht butt and enlighten us on his plans for world domination?[:D]

Even the pasha of turkey has managed to pull himself away from his harem, to start posting on turkey pbem109

[Greyhunterlp]

Maybe theres been some sort of Social revolution, and he's no longer in control of the country.

[lenin]

"All Power to the Soviets!"

[Anthropoid]

There has definitely been a "REVOLUTION" and its called: Striving to Get Tenure! [:D]
 
As I feared when I set up this thread, I just have not had the time to post in here

[Randomizer]

Comrade Anthropoid, I have waited with baited breath to gain insights into the ruling of Mother Russia but will stoically wait as long as necessary.  Good Luck gaining tenure.

[Anthropoid]

The synopsis of Russian strategy to date:
 
1. Define top provinces (using Excel to sort the province variables file) by food, wool, textiles, horses, luxuries, labor. Those not at the top of any of these resource rankings, and not particularly vulnerable to insurrection or conquest are to be used as focii for administrative development (courts)
2. Get corruption down to zero by building up administrative provinces to 5 courts each.
3. Get Walls in border provinces up to min 3, ideally 4 per province (given how readily A Brit army charged my walls with 4 guns and 21K militia in Zhytomyr, maybe this was a wasted effort??
4. Manage economy by: setting as many units as possible to forage; delete all fourth rate ships; build some banks in top money making provinces; send Merchant to Adriatic; build some docks in Baltic and Black Sea; progressively up Econ to 29 or 30 Tax rate and Draft rate of 8 or 9
5. Maintain pace of road and farming production so that I am more or less consistently growing 1 pop factor but avoid growing 2.
6. Be friendly with France, Turkey, and Sweden
7. Try to take provinces from Prussia and Austria
 
As far as military strategy, concentration of force is my motto, along with: buy special abilities for divisions and not army wide (probably something like 75% of all my divisions have forager special ability, and the rest I try to divide among: organized, sustained volley, scout, and when possible shooter, oblique fire.
 
Tactics/operations: keep up production of filler units from which to transfer men in order to keep numbers in main armies topped up. Use forced march as needed to achieve surprise and concentrate overwhelming numbers.
 
So far this seems to be working for the most part. Britain took Zhytomyr province a turn or two ago, but otherwise, I would say Russia is holding her own in her war against Prussia and Britain and might even be able to force Prussia to surrender before too long. If that happens, then I may well be able to take back Zhytomyr. At present, I'm hovering in the high 900s National Morale, so they have a long way to go to force me to surrender and gain any real benefit from having taken Zhytomyr. Moreover, their earlier efforts to disrupt internal Russian operations (by sending 3 or 4 Cav and Hvy Cav wandering through Russia) pretty much resulted in nothing but losses to them, and gains for me (2 or 3 Cavs surrendered, and the one province they managed to catch unguarded Tver they eventually abandoned).
 
The last turn I played, I was trying to crush Prussian forces in the Istria-Novgorod area with a clever "Pincer-Clamp" maneuver among 2 different armies and 2 different corps. If successful, I just might have caused serious harm to Prussia yet again. If Prussia drops out, and I can force them to break their alliance with Britain, i just might be able to strand Britain on the continent without supply . . . maybe.