Yugoslavia and Egypt

[QBeam]

First off, let me say that I'm very happy with the game so far, so please don't take any of my complaints or concerns as a reflection of dissatisfaction. In fact, one of the single most important things I'm pleased by is the fact that, unlike so many of the strategic WWII games I've known and loved, Germany can't turn itself into an impregnable Festung Europa with a little extra early success and subsequent caution. (E.g. WiF, which was more of a WWI simulator with WWII politics.)

With that in mind, I've got two questions about the early war German capacity: Yugoslavia and Egypt.

Egypt is the bigger deal, I think. The manual says that a decent British player should be able to hold on to it, but I fail to see how! As the Germans (vs. the AI, on challenging/advanced), on the first turn I park an army of 10 units or so in Libia, and two turns later half of them are sitting in Egypt. I played a dozen games out to the invasion of the USSR, and sure enough, it worked every single time. So then it was time to try the Wallies, to see how a human player could respond to this opening move, and I found it wasn't much better than the AI. The Wallies just don't have that many ground units, and, barring good luck, their navy just isn't strong enough to drive the Italians from the central Med in two turns. (Aggessive surface raiding with the Germans can complicate things for the Brits, if need be, but generally it's just a matter of putting the CAP in the central Med.) After that, the damage is done--the massive army and all the supplies you need to get to Suez are already in Africa.

The second, and related issue is Yugoslavia. It seems too much like a no-brainer to me to violate their neutrality on Turn 1, and then run them over with the hoards of militia in the Axis minors. You loose four militia (barring good luck), but it frees up more than that in resources. Perhaps more importantly, it opens up a second rail line into the Med, to support that quick thrust into Egypt. I confess my chief complaint here is primarily a game design issue. No-brainers are bad, because its more fun to play a game than to just watch it happen. But it also offends my sense of history, because there were a several political reasons why Germany didn't (and wouldn't) overrun Yugoslavia right away--starting with the fact that it was an official member of the Axis Alliance, until the British incited a successful coup in March '41. WaW essentially requires the Germans to invade Yugoslavia, and the earlier the better, because it's the only way to activate the other Axis minor allies. (In fact, that seems very odd, since invading Yugoslavia before the facist government fell would have been a serious turn-off to the other Axis minor allies.)

So it seems to me desirable for both game play and political historical accuracy that this Turn 1 Yugoslavia strategy be discouraged (if not forbidden). My first cut effort would use two (hopefully) simple rules changes:

1. Yugoslavia starts as a frozen Axis minor, like Bulgaria, Hungary, and Rumania.

2. In Winter '41 (during British production phase) the Yugoslavian coup is resolved. 50-50 chance that it becomes British controlled. Either way, the other three Balkan Axis minors unfreeze.

I'm not sure how hard it would be to code this, but as game rules go, this seems pretty sleek to me. Comments or suggestions welcome...

[dobeln]

Regarding Yugoslavia: I generally attack it on turn 2, as I find 4 militia to be too high a price to pay for getting it on turn one. (The militia will be sorely needed for counter-insurcency duties) Also, The Yugoslav resources really won't be needed until your factory multipler hits 3.

[Oleg Mastruko]

Interesting discussion, but not entirely correct.

First, playing as WA I am usually able to defend Egypt, but it usually depends on two factors: level of cvommitment from the Axis player, and naval battles in the Med. Even if I lose Egypt I don't think it's tragic, because: a) Germans must commit significant forces there (and those forces cannot be elsewhere) and b) later on when you do Torch, German forces commited in NA and ME are easily cut off. Experienced GE players won't commit too much to Egypt and ME, but if they do I think it is valid strategy.

As for Yugoslavia, I thought about that during beta but I think game deals with this in correct manner. Yugo wasn't "minor Axis ally" in summer of 40. Yugoslavia was truely neutral, with Pro-Brit inclinations. Constaltly pressured by German diplomacy, and feeling left alone by Brits, Yugoslav govmn't finally signed the pact with Axis on 25th March 41. Immediatelly large scale protests occured, and coup, led by airforce officers (under strong Brit influence), was started couple days later, cancelling the pact signed few days earlier. Hitler lost his patience and ordered immediate attack on Yugoslavia which started on 6th April 41. He knew he had to "clear" his southern wing in time before launching Barbarossa. Game simulates this very well I think.

So if you attack on turn 1, that is Hitler attacking neutral Yugoslavia immediately (if German player wishes so) without even attempting any diplomatic pressure. I think it is a valid strategy. It would not alienate his minor allies.

The one thing I would like to see tweaked for Yugoslavia, is to raise partisan levels. But as it stands, it is linked to population number, so we have Yugo partisan activity on same level as West France, which is laughable. Usually it does not matter much gameplay-wise because Germans are forced to keep some units in West France anyway.

BTW I don't know why everyone calls minor Axis allies "Balkan countries"??? Technically, Hungary is not on Balkan, 95% of Romania os not on Balkan, so only Bulgaria is truely a "Balkan Axis minor" [8D] Just so we set this straight.

Oleg

[QBeam]

Hmmm...you're the first person I've encountered who has characterized Jugoslavia as "pro-Brit" prior to the coup. I've never bothered to do serious research on the subject, but the wisdom I've accumulated from decades around strategic WWII game boards (and a variety of designers notes to same) tells me that Jugoslavia was a facist, officially neutral, but essentially pro-Axis country in Sept. '39, and somewhere along the line they signed the official treaty. I've got no reason to doubt your dates, and they do seem to fit with your characterization, since it seems surprising to me that the Brits could have induced a coup so quickly in response to the treaty. Still, compared to what I've been told, this sounds rather like a revisionist history. I put that together with your quibble over the use of "Balkan," and I suspect you may have an axe to grind...

Incidentally, the term "Balkans" is ancient--it first came into use in the 15th Century, I believe. In any event, it developed during the period in which Turkey controlled the entire area. "Balkan" means "wooded mountain" in Turkish, or something like it, and originally was the name of one specific mountain, I think. But given the meaning, and the derivation, the term is aptly applied to any of the generally rough terrain of Eastern Europe that was once part of the Ottoman Empire. Even if it once was a mistake to refer to the entire region by the name, rather than that one mountain, 500 years of history is enough to have made it into the "real name" of the place. Heck, what is a name, other than a word that people associate with something? I bet most of what we call things now was once a mistake of some kind, given the way language is always changing.

[Oleg Mastruko]

Hmmm...you're the first person I've encountered who has characterized Jugoslavia as "pro-Brit" prior to the coup. I've never bothered to do serious research on the subject, but the wisdom I've accumulated from decades around strategic WWII game boards (and a variety of designers notes to same) tells me that Jugoslavia was a facist, officially neutral, but essentially pro-Axis country in Sept. '39, and somewhere along the line they signed the official treaty.

Fascist - no way. Some people in government were Axis sympathisers but royal house had long standing friendly relations with Britain (and France). It was more complicated than that (with various national elements etc. blah) but it's not that interesting for this board really.

Army was Serb controlled and *strongly* anti German. Croats and Slovenes were mildly pro German, but didn't have much power, and officially didn't support the Nazis (not until Pavelic returned from hiding abroad riding the coattails of the victorious Germans).

I've got no reason to doubt your dates, and they do seem to fit with your characterization, since it seems surprising to me that the Brits could have induced a coup so quickly in response to the treaty.

"characterization" => [:D] It has less to do with characterization, and more to do with beta testing.

Yes it was that fast. It wasn't "induced", we could say it was "prepared" in advance. Ethnic Serbs simply could not stand pro Axis pact. There were wide spread demostrations on the streets against the pact, and, perhaps, even if airforce officers didn't do their own coup, some form of national uprising would happen (at least in Serbia) and Hitler would have to intervene in some manner.

Diplomatic games to have Yugo govn't sign the pact took some months though (February-March at least). It wasn't an overnight decision.

Still, compared to what I've been told, this sounds rather like a revisionist history. I put that together with your quibble over the use of "Balkan," and I suspect you may have an axe to grind...

[X(][X(][X(] What axe to grind? What revisionism? Now you're talking BS pure and simple. I have no axe to grind. My own nation (Croats) was officially pro Axis during the war, led by criminal Nazi puppet government and I am not ashamed to admit it. On the other side there was strong partisan anti Axis movement led by Croat too (Tito himself was a Croat). No revisionist history here. But Yugoslavia was more complex than that, Serbs had most of power in their hands, and, as nation, they simply couldn't stand any pact with Germans.

My comments on Yugoslavia come mostly from beta testing, not revisionist history.

Incidentally, the term "Balkans" is ancient--it first came into use in the 15th Century, I believe. In any event, it developed during the period in which Turkey controlled the entire area. "Balkan" means "wooded mountain" in Turkish, or something like it, and originally was the name of one specific mountain, I think.

Balkan is alternative name for "Old Mountain" in Bulgaria.

Official geographic borders of the Balkan peninsula are (from west to east) river Kupa, river Sava, river Danube. So more than half of Yugoslavia, Greece, Albania, Bulgaria, and rather small part of Rumania are technically Balkans. Hungary is in no way "Balkan country" - not geographically, not historically, not culturally.

But given the meaning, and the derivation, the term is aptly applied to any of the generally rough terrain of Eastern Europe that was once part of the Ottoman Empire.

Hungary was never part of Ottoman empire.

O.

[aletoledo]

i think if germany is willing to commit 10 units to taking egypt, they deserve it! i think that the WA would still be able to defend if they were so commited, by sending all their carrir planes and producing militia in india. couple that with attacks on the german med fleet and it would turn into a huge production sink-hole for both sides (which obviously favors the WA).

I also thought it was wierd to do the turn 1 yugoslavia attack, but based upon what Oleg Mastruko has said, I think it makes it historically possible. a lot of people seem to be requesting alternate events from histroy, this could just be a good example of it. after all, we don't want a pure 100% recreation of history anyway.

national pride aside, I think the yugoslavian partisan level is just fine as it is currently.

[Dalwin]

On the matter of Yugoslavia, Taking it on turn one is a bit of a gamble. You have to do it with only militia and a bit of air/naval support. If it succeeds, you tend to lose 4 militia. I have also seen the turn one assault fail outright.

A more conservative approach is to move at least one infantry from Germany to Austria on turn one and use these to help in Yugoslavia on turn two. That being said, I still go for the turn one conquest, along with Denmark, Norway, Netherlands and France.

In North Africa, if the the Italians only reinforce with 3 or 4 units they get steamrolled and you tend to see the Allies in southern Italy on a more or less historical time frame. Sending 10 units pretty much guarantees at least a stalemate in NE africa and often leads to overunning Egypt and driving to Iraq.

Sending all of these units will weaken the Russian campaign somewhat, but I think it is a good tradeoff. I tend to use only Italian made militia for NE africa stiffend by perhaps one infantry, one artillery and two air units. You want at least the one artillery to hold Cairo against potential counter invasions.

I also like to send 7 or 8 units to NW africa once the allies invade there. If you stalememate them on both ends of Africa, the AI does not seem to know what to do. You will need to gradually increase your defense in NW Africa as they try to build up there. Couple that with a strong defense in western France an aggressive attrition against WA transports and you have pretty much taken them out of the game as a serious threat until at least '45.

This also means that you have no real chance to conquer Russia. Just push as far east as you can. Getting Leningrad to free up the Finns is easy. Do not attack Moscow. Just try to stall with the line within a zone or two of Moscow as long as you can. If you avoid suffering a huge defeat in any one spot, you still still be in Russia in '44. This does not give them a lot of time to take Germany all by themsleves, once they do have overwhelming force.

If you have taken Egypt, wait until the Russians take Persia and pull back out of it before you push to Iraq. This makes for an easy drive into the Caucuses. You will not hold it for long, but taking those 6 resources even briefly throws a nice monkey wrench into the Russian war machine.

I think the biggest key to Axis victory is to never miss a chance to kill a lone transport. The best tool for doing this is aircraft, though fleets do nicely as long as you are able to put them back in port afterward. The fleets burn up a lot more supplies doing the job than the aircraft do, however. I think that subs, in the long run, are a bad investment. You often trade a sub for a transport where aircraft and surface fleets almost always get a free kill.

[Willy Liao]

Regarding the subs, I found that increasing their evasion to 3 helps, as does upping their torpedo to 3 or 4. You will still get whacked badly if you do "one sub vs 5 transports" but it's good for bushwhacking single transports. Agreed also that trading sub for transport is a bad deal--you need to damage two transports to match your investment in the sub.

I agree on the part about never failing to trash undefended transports, whether it's air, surface fleet or subs. I eventually trashed enough in one game that the WA quit sending transports to Iraq, and I left it completely undefended (of course I kept a garrison in Egypt). Of course, I may be overestimating my skill and he probably just withdrew them for the SR requirements of Operation Torch, but I like to think the Kriegsmarine's sub program was partly responsible.

Edit: wanted to add--i have never lost a sub when attacking a single transport, AFTER upgrading the sub. Probably the evasion 3 is more critical than the torpedo bump to 3 initially.

[Dalwin]

ORIGINAL: Willy Liao

Regarding the subs, I found that increasing their evasion to 3 helps, as does upping their torpedo to 3 or 4. You will still get whacked badly if you do "one sub vs 5 transports" but it's good for bushwhacking single transports. Agreed also that trading sub for transport is a bad deal--you need to damage two transports to match your investment in the sub.

I agree on the part about never failing to trash undefended transports, whether it's air, surface fleet or subs. I eventually trashed enough in one game that the WA quit sending transports to Iraq, and I left it completely undefended (of course I kept a garrison in Egypt). Of course, I may be overestimating my skill and he probably just withdrew them for the SR requirements of Operation Torch, but I like to think the Kriegsmarine's sub program was partly responsible.

I think investing in research to improve subs only makes sense if you are planning to build several more beyond the 5 you start with and the few more that the Italians are likely to build. Sadly this is easily countered by one notch of research by the WA in ASW tech. Once they get to roll 2 dice instead of 1 it is pretty much an auto kill on any sub they manage to catch.

Now, having a few subs based in France who dash out to half their range to sink a transport and then scoot imediately back to port are probably a good investment. I pretty much assume that any German sub in any zone outside of the Med will be sunk.

[Willy Liao]

The rules are pretty confusing about combat at times, but the 2 dice you'd get from an ASW of 2 would not be enough on average to destroy a sub with an evasion of 3, because you get some bonuses to your Evasion, if you damaged or destroyed the transport and it's your only target. After studying the combat reports, it looks like the sub had better kill with its torpedo. If you have a single target transport, you appear to get the +1/+2 bonus to your sub's evasion rating vs the transport's ASW fire if you damage/destroy the transport with during the first round (when only the torpedo attack occurs). So if you nail the transport, your survival is assured. However, if you have more than one transport you're fighting, the second transport seems to get to penalize the sub's evasion by -1 when it fires, which looks like the penalty due to the sub having been fired on by a different unit (the first transport's failed ASW attack).

In view of this, I'm starting to think that subs aren't such a great deal afterall, and I'll just have to eat the supply expense of fueling those surface fleets....

[Dalwin]

It is not so much the sub's ability to defeat the tranport itself that concerns me (though other units seem to do better).

It is that any sub left out at sea for future turns seems to be a sitting duck.

If I am dashing out from port and then back in, light fleets have longer range and better attack values. The fleets do of course use up a lot more supply.

I think the ideal unit to use against enemy tranports is aircraft. This alone may make researching the extra range on a heavy bomber worthwhile.

This is all from a German point of view, of course. The situation is much different in the Pacific. U.S. subs seem like a great investment. I have not looked closely enough at Japan to decide how I feel about them building subs.

[Grotius]

Well, the AI put a lot of research in subs into its current game against me, and I was slow to counter with ASW research. The AI sends 'em out and scoots back to port, or leaves them at see in a wolfpack that's tough for me to beat. So if nothing else, subs force the WA to invest research into ASW when he'd probably rather be researching something more offensive. Still not sure if subs are worth all that investment, though.

One question: why does everyone take Norway? It's just one resource, and it'll require an investment of materiel and supply to defend -- an artillery to deter invasion, maybe an infantry or two. Why not Spain instead?

[Barthheart]

Norway makes a great northern "sub pen" for shoot and scoot missions against the WA lend Lease transports. Also a good place to bases the German Fleet for the same missions.

[Grotius]

So how much do you put in Norway to defend it? An artillery, an infantry, a flak?

[dulsin2]

As with anything to do with Balkin's politics it was far more complex. There was a very strong Facist movement in Yugoslavia which felt betrayed by the Brits after WWI. (Yugoslavia was a British invention). There were many who hated the Facists and supported the Brits. There was also a strong communist movement. If you add all that up and stir in all the ethnic and national rivalries in Yugoslavia you get a very confusing mess.

Yes Yugoslavia probably should have more partisan activity than the population indicates but since much of the time the different factions were fighting each other as much as the Germans there is no point in changing it.

[Barthheart]

Yep that's it. If the WA really wants it they can have it. It's not worth more than that. And don't get distracted trying to keep it. Sooner or later you'll lose it and it's only one resource.

[Dalwin]

ORIGINAL: Grotius

Well, the AI put a lot of research in subs into its current game against me, and I was slow to counter with ASW research. The AI sends 'em out and scoots back to port, or leaves them at see in a wolfpack that's tough for me to beat. So if nothing else, subs force the WA to invest research into ASW when he'd probably rather be researching something more offensive. Still not sure if subs are worth all that investment, though.

One question: why does everyone take Norway? It's just one resource, and it'll require an investment of materiel and supply to defend -- an artillery to deter invasion, maybe an infantry or two. Why not Spain instead?

I definitely favor taking Norway. I have a number of reasons for this.

One resource is a pretty big thing. Collecting this resource will be free since you are likely to already have transports in the Baltic to trade with Sweden. I have found that with 2 infantry and one air unit in Norway, the AI never bothers to invade. The air can pick off tranports that are linking to Russia. I also like to put one surface fleet in Norway to kill more transports on the Northern route.

Do not ever bother repairing the rail in Norway. This would not make collecting the resource any better and would only allow you to rail units between Norway and Finland.

[Grotius]

Well, I'm playing a human in PBEM, and I don't trust him to leave it alone if I capture it. Yes, the AI leaves you alone for a while; but when I play as the WA, I pound on Norway pretty early.

[Dalwin]

ORIGINAL: Grotius

Well, I'm playing a human in PBEM, and I don't trust him to leave it alone if I capture it. Yes, the AI leaves you alone for a while; but when I play as the WA, I pound on Norway pretty early.

I have to agree with that. If I were playing the WA, I would certainly not let the Germans keep Norway with only 2 or 3 units defending it.

Then again, since Russia often determines the fate of the war overall, I'd be likely as WA to take a more direct approach to lend lease and take Norway whether neutral or not and then push through Finland so I could attack leningrad if the Germans were holding it.