England's Capitals

[Dion]

Where are they? I know one is in London, but the rule book says England has two. Do they have just one, or is one of them not marked?

[targul]

I have heard Canada is another.

[Dave Ferguson]

The second capital is Ottawa? in Canada. This means capture of London will not force the surrender of the commonwealth player, even occupation of the whole island wont do that. Of course there is a enormous drop in industrail capacity but I believe the convoys get diverted to Canada?
 
Dave

[Dion]

You guys are right. I just checked. It is Ottawa. Seems unrealistic, but after thinking about it for awhile it seems like a good rule.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but after taking London, England's production gets tranferred to Canada if the Axis keeps a unit in every city and surrounding hex, or is it just city hexes that have to be occupied?

[targul]

I dont think you have to occupy the cities just own them.

[Dave Ferguson]

The germans will have to capture each UK city to stop it producing, but once you own it there is no need for a garrison. I presume partisans will keep appearing until you occupy Ottawa.

[Happycat]

ORIGINAL: Dion

You guys are right. I just checked. It is Ottawa. Seems unrealistic, but after thinking about it for awhile it seems like a good rule.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but after taking London, England's production gets tranferred to Canada if the Axis keeps a unit in every city and surrounding hex, or is it just city hexes that have to be occupied?

Ottawa is an excellent and realistic choice as the second capital. Firstly, this is of course an abstraction to reflect the enormous resources available from the British Empire. Churchill himself, in a speech before Parliament (and in the context of contemplating the defeat and occupation of the UK) made reference to "the new world coming to the rescue of the old". Secondly, in the event, British gold reserves were shipped to Canada for safekeeping, so it would not be unrealistic, in game terms, for the British Empire to continue to have high production despite the British Isles themselves being occupied.

I presume (although haven't seen or tried it) that Canada (and, I suppose, for that matter too the USA) can be invaded? If so, this seems grossly unrealistic. Germany could not have mounted an invasion of North America that had any hope of success.

[SMK-at-work]

The Royal family was set to be evacuated to Canada - ironically at one point they weer going to use a Fw-200 to do it - a Danish civil one that was in England at the time Denmark was invaded - it was the only plane they had with sufficient range to get from Englad to Canada in 1 hop with decent fuel reserves.

[PDiFolco]

It'll seem more logical to set up the 2nd capital in Egypt : it was the key for keeping contact with India .
Happycat, why do you think Germany could not have invaded Canada or USA ? Sure they couldnt without total naval superiority, but it's the same in game...

[SMK-at-work]

The capital was never going ot go to Egypt - it was politically impossible - Egypt did hot have hte British King as head of state for example, and keeping contact with India was not all that important as a reason for moving a capital there.

[PDiFolco]

Im' not talking about where a "real" political capitol would have been put, but where it would make more sense in the game to give a "fallback" critical city for the UK.
 

[Dave Ferguson]

In CEAW the AI will attempt to capture the primary capital first, followed by the secondary one. The primary capital is always the furthest south so Egypt is a non starter.
I think replacing the southmost test with the following would give more flexibility:
 
1. East/West distance form Berlin is checked with the nearest being the primary capital
 
this would give the same results with existing capitals but would allow a mod to have the second russian capital as say Astrakan or even Baku!. you could even have two capials for France, say Paris and Bordeaux. just to make the germans occupy the country.
 
Dave

[PDiFolco]

I didn't know about that funny "southward" rule ! I was thinking of putting Stalingrad as a secondary USSR capital, with that it won't work correctly neither [:(]
The rule should be that secondary capital be ...secondary as a target also [:'(]

[Happycat]

ORIGINAL: PDiFolco

Happycat, why do you think Germany could not have invaded Canada or USA ? Sure they couldnt without total naval superiority, but it's the same in game...

Sorry, I don't come on this forum as much as the Slitherine one, so I missed your question.

I think that it would be unrealistic for Germany to invade N America in any wargame that ends in 1945. The German and Italian navies were no match for the combined strength of the Royal Navy, Royal Canadian Navy and US Navy. As you commented, it would not be possible to invade without naval superiority.

Let's assume that the USSR is conquered. The Russian Navy of 1941 was pathetic. So even if the Germans captured the entire Red Navy, it would be of no help.

If Britain was conquered, there is no chance that the Royal Navy would have been part of the deal. The centuries old traditions of that force would ensure that those ships would be scuttled before ever being surrendered to an enemy. More likely, they'd just sail for North America.

So we are left with a small, and not so modern Italian Navy, and a bit larger, and more modern German Navy. The top four navies in the world in 1945 were USN, RN, IJN and RCN. No matter how you crunch the numbers, the Axis would be faced with crossing a hostile Atlantic, landing forces against a determined bunch of defenders, and then having to keep them supplied.

In order to achieve anything close to naval parity with the western Allies, Germany would have had to embark on a huge naval building program in order to be ready by 1945. Such a program would be at the expense of other things; say like tanks and airplanes, without which Russia and the UK would never fall. So, a "Catch 22" situation...

If the Axis had defeated the UK and USSR, I don't believe that an invasion of North America would have been possible before the early 1950's (in terms of logistics). And by then, it would be a whole new ball game (think nukes).

Of course, since making my earlier remark about it being "unrealistic", I had not played the game much. Now, after playing it for many, many hours, I see that the distance of North America from Berlin would trigger distance penalties for supply which would render this whole topic somewhat moot.

Now watch what happens next---a dozen or more players are going to post about their experiences conquering Canada and the USA . [:D]

[SMK-at-work]

Invading Con America (or Europe from America) requires considerable seagoing merchant fleet.......the US did launch Torch from Con USA (in part) in 1942, so it's certainly not outside the capabilities of 1940's shipping. 
 
The problem for the Axis would be resupply....it's at least a 10 day journey across the Atlantic, and they didn't have THAT much ocean going mercantile navy - much of hte conquered contries merchant fleets escaped to the UK in 1940 - vast amounts of shipping was outside their home waters when each successive country surrendered (that's where shipping mostly is of course - somewhere else!!) and almost certainly most of the UK's fleet would also have escaped any German conquest.

[Vypuero]

I agree, but its also very very difficult in the game.  North America is there more for an area where you have to build and send units from than anything else.

[SMK-at-work]

Supplying the shipping is trivially easy in teh game - embarking a unit costs 2 PP's - end of story.....

[Vypuero]

4 PP not 2, and 1 supply is very bad.

[PDiFolco]

ORIGINAL: Vypuero

4 PP not 2, and 1 supply is very bad.

It's still quite cheap - a railroad transport is 7 ! This makes impossible to make landings as much difficult to mount in game as they were in reality.
There should be a rather cheap "transport" cost *to a controlled port* and a much more expensive "invasion transport" for beach landings.

[Major Victory]

ORIGINAL: SMK-at-work

Invading Con America (or Europe from America) requires considerable seagoing merchant fleet.......the US did launch Torch from Con USA (in part) in 1942, so it's certainly not outside the capabilities of 1940's shipping. 

The problem for the Axis would be resupply....it's at least a 10 day journey across the Atlantic, and they didn't have THAT much ocean going mercantile navy - much of hte conquered contries merchant fleets escaped to the UK in 1940 - vast amounts of shipping was outside their home waters when each successive country surrendered (that's where shipping mostly is of course - somewhere else!!) and almost certainly most of the UK's fleet would also have escaped any German conquest.

The thought of the Axis invading North America makes me laugh, If memory serves me correct, the US only based their obsolute battleships and no modern carriers on the East Coast, I'm quite sure if any real threat was taken seriously, The Enterprise and a couple of her friends would have been transferred to greet the "grand invasion armada" and promptly send them on there way to the bottom of the sea!