THE LAST KINGDOM: Sillyflower v sveint. SVEINT WELCOME

[sillyflower]

UK area was more interesting. The cowardly Hitlerites abandoned Ireland while the UK paras there rush south to be the first to reach the famous bars of Dublin.

[sillyflower]

Scotland was more fun. Taking advantage of the last clear turn, I upgrade both tanks to elite, the US mech to heavy arty and go for the panzer xxx that had been bravely hiding in the forest for a while.





Eisenhower's command destroys Rommel's best unit at the cost of 26 allied points. Air losses during the fighting were 2 allied and 5 G.
US 1st armour is a bit exposed but it has a retreat path, unless the Italian mtn xxxs dislodge the Brits first and there is only a 10% chance of clear weather next turn. In any event, I'm always happy to swap an allied tk xxx for a german one, and a fresh US tank xx formed this turn and is on its way to Scotland.

For the 1st time in the game, a good turn for the Good Guys everywhere

[sillyflower]

9 October

A single reserve army finally deigned to appear

No fisticuffs on either side as there was bad weather everywhere apart from Africa where I simply start preparations for an assault on the Gabes line.the LW appears in N Africa for the first time and there are more in England now too.

A table that I found interesting



Germans look rather under-strength to me for this time of the war. The Axis is already outnumbered 2:1 in the air, and on the ground in Russia, I expect that the Russians outnumber the Germans by 5 to 3, though I have ignored the other axis forces.

I did do a screenshot of casualties as well, but it appears that I saved a blank page. Sorry, but I am useless with modern tech. Will try to remember next turn.

[sillyflower]

This may explain why AGC didn't continue its attack in last turn's snow.



That famous discipline seems to be breaking down

[sillyflower]

23 October

Nothing happening in Russia except the arrival of yet another reserve army. I promptly disbanded it to help pay for a new inf army which will have '43 tech and exp. of 46.I already have enough weaker units. With the LW diaspora from Russia, I disband my 3 weakest fighters. I still have 10 left and they are slowly converting to '43 model and getting stronger.

[sillyflower]

The only fighting was in the South Atlantic. The whole axis fleet had run down there, followed buy a carrier task force. Unfortunately, I had not spotted the move until after I had moved a convoy transporting Yanks to the Middle East within about 12 hexes way from it[X(]

Luckily sveint didn't see them but just stayed put on the convoy route. He didn't get any merchants, but he did get this:

[sillyflower]

I finally managed to get the losses screen

[sillyflower]

And a reminder of the losses only 9 months earlier

[sillyflower]

6 November

The axis fleet runs away. No other action except that I buy my 1st new Russian tank xxx

[sillyflower]

20 Nov

Nothing to see here, gentlemen. Move away to another AAR please

[sillyflower]

4 December

UK armour starts to turn the Gabes line by kicking some Italians off the hills. Not that exciting I admit, but the only combat in town.

[sillyflower]

18 Dec

We push the Germans off the mountain, but more nazis seem to be in the area.

[sillyflower]

1 January 1943

Sneaked this turn in last night before the expired beta problem resurfaced.

The snivelling cur who is my opponent was clearly terrified by my advances in Africa so moved enormous amounts of extra troops there including 2 panzer xxx. The WDF tank xxx was destroyed in a cowardly attack so it's yo-yo time in North Africa again.

His Russian set-up looks very defensive with few LW or armoured units visible. Soviet forces start the transition to becoming more offensive in nature, but that takes time and money. More tanks and bombers of both types, though mainly sturmovics.

[Flaviusx]

Keep stretching him. Honestly wonder if you should land in France early. He's pretty heavily committed in Britain and North Africa plus the Eastern Front. Something has to give here if you open up another front. Iberia is another possibility, but cannot be easily supported, whereas a French landing might just help loosen his grip on the UK.

Some tactical advice: don't leave all those mech corps defending along the Dvina. You have a perfectly good killing ground without a river defense along Rzhev. Swap those mech units with infantry armies and start grinding him up in the center. Indeed, he's hiding behind rivers in much of the eastern front so this is the most obvious place to begin an offensive. I advise building a paratroop unit or two. Those might help crack the river lines or in the alternative, can help deny him retreat routes in the center and create opportunities to shatter on retreat.

[sillyflower]

You have been reading my mind Flavius

In Russia, apart from the builds, the other part of my prep for my summer O is to replace the armour currently on the Dvina. They did their job perfectly, as sveint did not even take Riga.I have already replaced the 13 CV Siberian xxx in L'town with a 7 pointer.

By May I will have enormous quantities of landing ships + trucks and lots of units to fill them.I had been thinking of another op. in the med but that might depend on how far sveint chases me back towards Egypt. I have a completely open/vacant mind at the moment.

In the USSR, my interceptors are almost all full strength '43 models, as are all the ground units apart from a few remaining inf xxx and I've just even started to upgrade the tac bombers. They've been flying pretty much every turn so their experience levels are between 45-50, tho' that will come down again because air force experience is stuck on 40% at the moment. Russia is getting 120 PPs of LL every turn so its economy is nearly 500 PP/turn and it should go up again soon when the factories evacuated to the Urals start producing properly. The other advantage that I have is that Germany is not very far away............

[sillyflower]

17 January

Running in N Africa. Being attacked in Scotland which may make life difficult due to lack of supplies up there

[sillyflower]

February turns
Scotland v. difficult because only have 2 ports each worth only 2. Trying to hang on by rotating units in and out. Advancing backwards in the desert and prepping the Russians for an O when the weather is good.

[sillyflower]

March 12 '43



Looks like sveint is going to hold here. Nothing else happening

[sillyflower]

March 26




This is as close as I can get to what sveint can see. The tac bombers (some are now '40 tech!) continue to pound some small and hapless Finnish unit. V. good to get experience up. If ground units got exp. for being bombed, it would probably be the most powerful on the map.

[sillyflower]

April 9

Just 1 small bit of excitement.




I think that this was the last of the Italian surface navy, and probably the 1st time my battleship fleet has managed to do anything vs raiders. Typically, it happened just after I started a thread bemoaning how hard it was to damage surface raiders.