Wired Killers - failure again ...

[Westheim]

After completely failing in my last attempt in an island game, I'm back to a land map. Shroud is on, but I actually edited the map first. Good thing I did, since there was not a single river in the southern half of the map.

Chose my country by the name (as bad as it gets), but got a dumb starting place. Map loop is on, and this is one of two spots on the edge of the map, but am I one to complain? ... Well, actually yes.

This is round 6, nothing has happened yet. I researched SMG, Armoured Car, and Machine Gun I so far. And please note how cleverly I managed to maneuvre my engineer spearheads into rough terrain already. [8D] I have a vague recollection of where enemies should be, but not really, where settlements are. Well, I can't fail any more miserably than last game ...

[Westheim]

Round 8; now it's about to start. I met the Twisted Country in the southeast and just managed to capture a city away under their nose. The two villages in the northeast are evenly divided right now, the upper belongs to the TC as well. In the west there's nothing more than my engineers and mountains.

[Westheim]

Round 9; the battle lines around Potato (circled, and it IS actually called that way...) are beginning to shape up. No other fronts right now, but fall has struck, prohibiting my 1st Engineer Division in the western mountains from building a road through the area there to a village I discovered.

[Westheim]

Round 10; my 6th Infantry Division left Groundhawkfield and stormed into Ranger Hole on the same turn in an attack that completely surprised the Twilight Country defenders. At Potato I'm playing defensive and wait for the winter, since the terrain is so hard and some of my units there are motorized.

[Westheim]

Round 11; well, that's bad: the Twilight Country took Potato in an assault between turns! [X(] That was 30% of my production capacity, and it was the city where I intended to build artillery guns after researching them for 16 PP last turn. Damnit!! [:@]

I'm too weak right now to retake the city, plus it is winter, so I would suffer a 50% penalty on an attack. Without heavy weaponry, it will be impossible to take Potato back before spring comes. The best I could do would be flanking attacks to pocket the whole city, but chances are slim.

The pass road in the west was completed. There's another village there up for grabs. But my main focus is on the Potato front right now.

[Westheim]

Round 13; the Twilight Country is putting real pressure on me, and I had to conduct a few costly counterattacks, but I managed to pocket Potato. The other side of the coin is a flanking thread directed up north to the two villages.

I established the I Corps in Aardroad in the west, but it just has an engineer and an armoured division right now. In the southwest and south I'm bordering the Reformed Gang now, but haven't met any units until now.

Summer will start at round 17 - by then I would really like to have either tanks or airplanes, but right now I lack the production capacities for both the PPs and the actual units.

[Westheim]

Round 14; Twilight Country forces broke the ring around Potato and pushed north of the city. They left their left flank very weak, so I could actually take the city back this turn! On the other hand they can now walk right into the plains in my heartland, because I can't keep up with my forces.

Spring will come next turn, so this could give me some breathing time. I hope I can hold on to Potato, because I need the production value. Really badly.

[Westheim]

Round 16; still more battles at the same front. I was able to hold on to Potato, but both roads in the area are dangered or sometimes even cut.

I researched Light Tank I for 16 PP and will try to launch an attack with one or two Tank Divisions from Ranger Hole by mid summer. This however requires holding on to the road leading to Ranger Hole.

[Westheim]

Round 17; so much for my tank attack plan. Twilight Country troops took Groundhawkfield by surprise and cut off my force in Ranger Hole.

I also met with Reformed Gang units at Aardroad in the west and they are also moving around at my southern border.

[Westheim]

Round 17; western front...

[82ndtrooper]

ok this one looks like it shaping up nicely for some fun fights.

[Westheim]

Round 18; the eastern front saw the Twilight Country pierce my lines north of Potato, but I responded by cutting off their spearhead units. Luckily I have both artillery and tanks available - two things they don't. On the other hand I had to give up Ranger Hole though, since it was unholdable with the road west of it in TC hands.

My western borders auto expanded to win me Lovetimber, a city in the wooded northwest. It's actually so heavily wooded there, that I can't supply anything in the area before I get a road layed up there. Now, my engineers are busy, and I desperately need production value, so I used my hard earned PPs to establish the II Corps in the city to allow it to supply itself. 5,000 of production isn't so bad...

[Westheim]

Round 19; the battle around Potato rages on. I'm about to build a support road west of Potato since the direct road is being cut again and again. I also started to regroup the troops here in two new corps. The III in the north is already established, but the IV isn't yet, since that part of the line will see another fierce interturn and I don't want to take the readiness hit just now. Maybe I'll even wait for fall, although five turns are very long...

In the west, the I Corps crossed the river south of Aardroad to test the Reformed Gang defenses, which were found to be light. There is however no infrastructure that would allow me to actually advance to Eagles View, a town a few hexes further south.

[Westheim]

Round 20; it's becoming worse! The Twilight Country forces battered both of my flanks on the eastern front - I had actually losses ratio of 4:1 during the interturn, which is insanely high ... the III Corps moves back another hex, while I stretched the rest of the line further south to extend a little more to the right. I can't afford to lose Potato neither productionwise, nor from strategy's point of view, since it would isolate my southern VP locations. I tried to build a road between them and the Aardroad area during the winter, but never made it through, so they completely rely on the Potato road.

Better news in the west: a combined effort of my 1st Engineer Division and the II Corps HQ (with engineers) finished the road between Aardroad and Lovetimber faster than I expected, and the I Corps is pushing south in the direction of Eagles View, only to find out that it is heavily defended.

[Westheim]

Round 21;

I lost Potato.

Well, I took it back on my turn, but my losses are horrible on the eastern front. The left and right flank were terribly beaten and several of my divisions were completely annihilated. As very apparent in the screenshot, I no longer have a line there and my troops are too far spread out. I'm a bit puzzled about how to come out of this misery ...

In the west I abandoned the offensive actions against the Reformed Gang.

[Westheim]

Round 22; things get desperate. Both my flanks in the east were pushed back again, and in the north the Twilight Country troops are actually on the way to my capitol. I rushed two bled out infantry divisions back there, but of course they won't stop anybody's advance in their current state.

Further south the TC's advance isolated Purple Pinetree, my southernmost town. I'm too weak to defend there.

Dark times ahead.

[Joshuatree]

This AAR shows the capability of the AI to beat even a seasoned player, let alone a beginner.

[Westheim]

Well, there are two things about this post... first, this is the AI+ with 50% production bonus. Standard AI is just prey, no matter how bad the map is for the player.

And I do have a bad starting location. I only have 7 VPs right now (max was 9), and these are:
1 capitol (10,000 Prod. Points)
2 cities (10,000 PP)
1 town (2,000 PP)
3 (5) villages (1500 (2500) PP)

This adds up to a maximum of 24,500 PP, which is actually just barely more than an AI+ has from it's capitol.

But the main reason for me sucking so hard in this game may be that I am not a "seasoned" player. At best I'm a slightly-below-average player. I always play way too cautious and miss the best chances to beat an opponent, only to realize what I did three rounds later ...

At the moment I'm pretty puzzled about what to do, since ... well ... the Twilight Country is about to run over me ... [&:]

[Jeffrey H.]

Airpower. Get some dive bombers out there !

[Westheim]

ORIGINAL: Jeffrey H.

Airpower. Get some dive bombers out there !

Thought about that already, but I really hate to put up bombers without fighters. And I could barely afford one of them.