DAK running out of fuel/Benghazi no supply

[Carterjon]

I am playing a multiplayer Torch to Tunisia scenario. One Axis turn one I pulled the entire African army back to Benghazi, in preparation for a further retreat next turn. But Benghazi received zero supplies and my entire army was stranded with movement points only in the single digits. The Allies had done nothing sneaky like interdict or bomb the port. Any tips on how to avoid that?

Jon

[Joel Billings]

What was the supply priority of the depot in Benghazi, relative to your other ports? I just loaded a game and advanced the game to turn 2 and got 3750 tons of supply received in Benghazi. BTW, you can use air transport to bring in a decent amount of supplies to Benghazi (or another airfield where you have units), IIRC. Air transport can be very useful in this scenario.

[Carterjon]

Benghazi was priority 4. I have flown in supply to that and other airports but often find the constraint that there is insufficient supply at the source airfield (Tripoli). I have tried the scenario multiple times since, and Benghazi did receive supply each time, so perhaps an odd combination of circumstances. Anyway, my opponent was slow chasing me so my stranded troops recovered and reached El Agheila safely, so all is good.

One more question: I assume that merely having aircraft sitting unused at an airbase doesn't consume significant supply. Im wondering whether to pull back bombers from Libya to Tunisia to save on limited shipping, or perhaps it makes no differences.

Great expansion game!

Jon

[Helpless]

One more question: I assume that merely having aircraft sitting unused at an airbase doesn't consume significant supply. Im wondering whether to pull back bombers from Libya to Tunisia to save on limited shipping, or perhaps it makes no differences.

If you don't fly, then you should only "feed" all the air support it will try to keep on the air base.

Btw, if you keep them on the front they might work as decoy for the air base recon, i.e. some of them will be seen as fighters (or transports) by enemy.

[Joel Billings]

Well I can't say why you didn't get freight without seeing a save. Given limited shipping, it's possible if you had a lot of priority 4 ports getting freight you ran out of cargo ships by the time it tried to ship to Benghazi. The key is to fly in supplies from bases in mainland Europe (or Crete) where you have freight available. You can fly from Athens to Derna and a few other airbases around it after moving units there. Great way to gas up. Then keep moving the units. Flying from Crete to Benghazi is possible, can't remember if I would move additional transports to Crete or not. This is a great way to bolster what you can get into North Africa, and do it in key locations at critical times (like turn 1).