Leadership Variant AAR or how to shovel noodles uphill

[Jeffrey H.]

So your variant uses a manual "pen and paper" layer over the standard AT ? Is that how you're playing this out ?
 
Sorry for being a bit dense but I have been wondering how you were doing this.
 

[lancer]

Goodaye,

So your variant uses a manual "pen and paper" layer over the standard AT ? Is that how you're playing this out ?

Yep. The only pieces of paper involved are the tracking sheet I've shown above and a note of which generals I have sitting in my pool.

The game actually does most of the heavy lifting by allowing me to give each HQ a long name, eg. 'Rommel_M6S3_Blitzkrieg'.

Every time I click on a unit I get all the info I need to know from this so I don't have to keep tabs on which general is where, their activation rolls, their traits etc. as the game does it for me.

Or to be a little more precise it presents the information to me so I can then do what I need to do.

Cheers,
Plugger

[Joshuatree]

"Normally I’d attack immediately trusting that my three-side concentric assault backed up by a couple of armoured cars would do the job. Problem solved.

Not so with my variant. I have three units surrounding the Italians. All three units come from separate commands – Arbuthnott (Military skill 3), Ritchie (‘2’) & Cunningham (‘3’).

Now in order to make a simultaneous attack with all three units I need them all activated. So here I’m faced with rolling a 3 or less twice and a 2 or less once guaranteeing that I’ll probably need to burn up a bunch of command points to make it happen. "
 
Right, so this could be a problem. I think we are used to the fluid gameplay of AT, and we are used to the penalties you get when attacking with different HQ's, but to not be able to make the attack ... unless you spend command points ofcourse, could make the game ... frustrating. I know situations like this happened during WWII, Italians/ Romanians went that way while the Germans went the other, or maybe there was some miscommunication, whatever. So this concept, this idea has its strong points and surely could enrich the game, but it shouldn't make fluid gameplay difficult to achieve. Maybe the human player should get more command points?

[Jeffrey H.]

ORIGINAL: lancer

Goodaye,

So your variant uses a manual "pen and paper" layer over the standard AT ? Is that how you're playing this out ?

Yep. The only pieces of paper involved are the tracking sheet I've shown above and a note of which generals I have sitting in my pool.

The game actually does most of the heavy lifting by allowing me to give each HQ a long name, eg. 'Rommel_M6S3_Blitzkrieg'.

Every time I click on a unit I get all the info I need to know from this so I don't have to keep tabs on which general is where, their activation rolls, their traits etc. as the game does it for me.

Or to be a little more precise it presents the information to me so I can then do what I need to do.

Cheers,
Plugger

Neat idea.

[lancer]

Turn 20

The Italians keep hitting the Apennine Mountains hard. Slim calls for machineguns to bolster defences. I instigate a crash production program.

Alanbrooke calls up to tell me that every Soviet soldier this side of the Volga is massing for an attack on Porpouch’s outer defences. I order him to hold the line at all costs. Nobody is to retreat.

With only two understrength rifle divisions dug in behind a river Alanbrooke didn’t sound confident. Die like a man, I insisted. Remember the Alamo.

Over two hundred Soviet SFT’s put him to the test, hurling themselves across the river in human wave assaults. Outnumbered seven to one and with loss tolerances set to maximum, Alanbrooke breathlessly told me that the line had held. Barely.

More Soviets were streaming in for a further attack, bolstered by Medium Tank II’s! Reinforcements, he insists in a hoarse voice, are needed yesterday.





I found myself faced with a cruel dilemma. A decision point. Do I pour more troops into the black hole of Porpouch in view of it’s imminent demise or do I cut my loses, abandon Alanbrooke and his boys, and send the reinforcements to Slim who is also in dire straits in the Sicilian theatre?

Logically I should never have bothered with Porpouch and the Iberian theatre in the first place. To far away and too risky. A third, unnecessary front when I’m stretching to cover two.

Emotionally, however, there was no way I’m going to desert the heroes of Popourch! The local DoopCastle newspapers are full of stories of the gallant defenders of Iberia. I order all the machineguns earmarked for Slim to be shipped forthwith to Alanbrooke.

I choose to stand by my man.


To be continued...

Lancer

[Jeffrey H.]

Too bad your commanders can't have their traits modified as the game goes along.

[lancer]

Goodaye,

Too bad your commanders can't have their traits modified as the game goes along.

Well their Military and Administrative skills plus their seniority can be modified via random events or as a result of capturing / losing a city, but their traits, once given, stay as they are.

When I knocked up the rules for the variant I thought I'd better not get any more detailed than it already is as otherwise I'd end up getting bogged down.

Traits are probably something that take a long while to learn anyway.

Cheers,
Lancer

[lancer]

Turn 26

Both the Italians and Soviets keep ratcheting up the pressure. We’re forced to give ground in the Apennine Mountains but Slim assures me we can still hold.

To add to my joy two (that’s a TWO) rebellions have broken out on Heard Island. DoopCastle, my capital, is surrounded by gun-toting nutters. Perhaps I’d better let the workers go home to their wives once in a blue moon.

I’m forced to divert much needed reinforcements to defend my home island. I’m enforcing martial law and anything on two legs outside of DoopCastle is a candidate for a lead injection. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Alanbrooke informs me that the Iberian theatre is looking even more diabolical than before. I was hoping for a reprieve as I’ve been shovelling every spare man and gun into Porpouch for the last three turns.

Not to be. Alanbrooke tells me that they are surrounded by Soviets, Ottomans, Italians and Plebs. Nobody has seen a German yet but they’re making an extra cup of coffee just in case.

I promise every man a house, Swedish au pair and Volkswagen provided they can hang on.

Alanbrooke asks if he scores a Volkswagen to? I tell him he can even choose the colour. Damn I’m a decent fellow.

Morale. It’s important to look after your troops. If it all pans out for the best I may even write a book on ‘Inspiring your team in difficult times’. Hit the speakers circuit. Volkswagens, huh? Who else would have thought of that?

Realistically I don’t hold out much hope for Porpouch but that hasn’t stopped me committing all my reserves to aid in its defence. You may have heard of the ‘Rats of Trobruk’. Well the ‘Pugs of Porpouch’ are going down a treat in DoopCastle.




Victory points wise I’m now running last apart from the Plebs and they don’t count.

Ottoman Empire 23 VP
Germans 16 VP
Italians 16 VP
Soviets 14 VP
Commonwealth 10 VP
Plebs 8 VP

This was always going to be the case. My strategy has been an initial expansion phase to grab the key land followed by a consolidation phase of factory building.

Once I have ramped up my production capacity sufficiently I move to phase three which is a further outwards expansion, this time aimed at taking the Italians out.

Problem being that I’m so stretched fighting a three front war that I haven’t been able to get my factory construction program underway.

I know that I should concede the Iberian theatre and leave Alanbrooke and his boys to swing in the breeze but I’m loathe to do so.


To be continued...

Lancer

[lancer]

Turn 26 continued...

Here’s my how my current pool of command talent stands.



Have a look at some of these characters. Morrison of Dunrossil. All dressed up ready to entertain your kids at their next party. And what’s with the name? Why does he have to be Morrison of Dunrossil instead of plain Fred Morris?

I’m sure they’re laws against naming yourself after cigarette packets. Perhaps he’s a knight of the realm and gets special naming privileges.

And Wigglesworth. How can you go wrong with a general Wiggles? He looks old in his photo and is logistically challenged but I’m going to use him anyway for the sheer enjoyment of having General Wigglesworth on my team.

Percival and Alexander are still hanging around like bad smells. No way are they getting a job in this man’s army. A right pair of dills.

I’d better reiterate my total ignorance of WW2 British Commanders. I may well be doing some of these gentlemen an injustice. Who knows, Morrison of Dunrossil may have won the war singlehandedly, I just didn’t hear about it.

Neither did anyone else I suspect.

If you’re reading this and you’re British I probably should apologise. Yep. Should, but won’t. I keep looking at the picture of Morrison of Dunrossil and the three dead pigeons stacked up on his noggin and all I can do is shake my head and wonder how the British Empire lasted as long as it did.

No, no, no. I can do better. I apologise, damn it.

Some explanation of how I’ve come across the cigar-smoking pigeon fancier might be in order.

I’ve got another game on my hard drive which has a database of hundreds of WW2 commanders with associated photo’s (public domain) for each. What I’ve done is scanned through the list and picked out names that I recognised (that accounts for four of them) and names – in no particular order - that I liked (Wigglesworth) or couldn’t get my head around (Morrison…).

The photo’s are in a separate folder so I chose the names without knowing what they looked like. Names, I’ve found, don’t necessarily correlate with pictures.

Ironside. I was expecting a rough and tumble street fighter here and instead got a bus conductor with the worst possible stats.

McCulloch. An unassuming superstar. Welcome aboard.

As soon as things calm down (?) I’m going to fire one of my low seniority plodders and put McCulloch into play. His country needs him.



To be continued...

Lancer

[lancer]

Turn 40

Time has passed. So has the Commonwealth. I’ve informed my nation that I’ll be suing for peace at the end of this month.

The Italians have broken through on the Sicilian Front and I’ve nothing left in the cupboard to stop them. General Slim has fought the good fight but is currently lying flat as a tack on a hospital bed receiving a blood transfusion.

On the Crimean front Auchinleck informs me the Soviets have busted open our fortress defence and it’s only a matter of time before an evacuation will be a necessary.

Only Alanbrooke on the Iberian front is standing firm despite heavy casualties and ever larger numbers massing against him.

What happened?

The Italians hit Slim’s command hard with level 3 Medium tanks and sliced through his Apennine Mountain defensive positions after a couple of turns of preparatory artillery bombardment.

Slim reformed his shattered divisions in a secondary line anchored around several hastily constructed fortifications. They met a similar fate and Slim himself went down to a nasty shrapnel wound outside his headquarters as Arion was hit by the unstoppable Italian armour columns.

Back at Doopcastle I was deafened by the cacophony of calls from my front line generals for better AT-guns. Sadly it was all I could do to keep replacing the dead and dying grunts with new recruits.

By now I had two factories in working condition on Heard Island (and the rebellions had been finally crushed), both pumping out PP’s but it wasn’t nearly enough.

On a minor happy note I found a use for the pair of total nongs that had been clogging up my command pool by putting Percival and Alexander in charge of my factory HQ’s. Oil the machinery, empty the rubbish, clock the workers in and out.

Serve the buggers right.





To be continued...

Lancer

[TheArchduke]

Hmm, without any rough terrain those tank divisions will be unstopable.. No Airforce handy?

[lancer]

Goodaye,

Hmm, without any rough terrain those tank divisions will be unstopable.. No Airforce handy?

Yep, I'm toast.

Cheers,

Lancer

[lancer]

Analysis

I failed. Overwhelmed by superior technology and numbers.

Without a doubt I had the worst start position of anyone.

I compounded my bad start by making a bad strategic decision to initiate a third front at Porpouch. Like a frog in a slow boiling pot of water I found myself pouring more and more much needed resources into a desperate defence of my Iberian foothold.

The reason I opened up the Iberian theatre in the first place was to prevent Soviet sea access to the Adriatic. In hindsight I think I over-rated the threat of a Soviet Adriatic incursion against my holdings.

By the time the Soviets and whoever else had finished contesting the Iberian area I would have been well down the track with my industrialisation program and probably in a position to counter any Adriatic threat.

Thinking further along the same lines was it even worth my while establishing a foothold in the Crimea? I was lucky here in that I was able to fortify my positions before the Soviets got serious. As a result my loss/kill ratios versus the Soviets continual assaults were excellent.

Probably more than adequate to justify my Crimean campaign as a means of crimping a neighbour.

In the Sicilian theatre I probably got it about right. Rapid early expansion, secure the natural defensive line of the Apennine Mountains and then hang tough. Where I came undone was my inability to establish a defence in depth.

I should have had a line of fortifications immediately behind the Mountains as a fall back position. Once the Italian armour columns broke through my brittle defence line I was history. Open country, vulnerable supply lines, sketchy localised defences.

The demands of the other two theatres were such that I was unable to establish a proper defensive line and once the Italians tech’d up to Medium Tank III it was a forgone outcome.

I deliberately minimised my technology expenditure. At the end I was level 1 in rifle, smg, mortar, machinegun, armoured car, dive bombers and AT-guns. That’s it.

I funnelled all my spare Political Points into my Factory building program (I managed only two) reasoning that once I’ve got enough factories up and running – kicking out 4 PP’s apiece – I’ll pole vault up the tech tree and free up my Capital for unit production.

My three theatre approach meant that I was burning up large amounts of PP’s purely in unit formation and failed to generate sufficient free PP’s to shovel into my factories.

Confronted by Level 3 Medium tanks my level 1 AT-guns and dive bombers proved woefully ineffective.

I’m sorely tempted to start again with the same map and this time confine myself to the Sicilian theatre only. I’m willing to bet that I can get enough factories built in time to hold the peninsular and eventually expand outwards. I’ll use the same generals but I’ll reroll their characteristics.

Who knows, Monty might prove useful next time around...

I’m keen to see how my Leadership variant holds up as I marched outwards over the map.

Extended supply lines with Corps and Theatre commanders.

Could be fun.


Cheer,

Lancer

[Appren]

I vote you start a new game, and provide us with yet another entertaining AAR

[springer]

Yes, try it again! Yes, the first go wasn't exactly successful. But wasn't it only a wargame test by the DoopCastle command staff of Morrison of Dunrossil's invasion strategy?

[TheArchduke]

Whilst restarting on the same map sounds like a good idea, I disagree.

It makes for a less interesting read and you will win too easily, knowing a bit better what to expect.

My vote goes for another great AAR on a new map, I throughly enjoyed this one!

[springer]

A new game would be good too.  But, I'm not sure a repeat on the same map would lead to same results. (Think of all the Barbarossa games). What I think what would be interesting here is that I'm not sure the "Italian First" strategy won't lead to new complications with the "Russians" to the north.  Also, it would allow the factories to kick in enough so that we could really see the issues with the commanders more clearly.  The first stages of the Sicily campaign may be similar, but I think things will get strange with the officers once there is relative consolidation of a position.
 
Either way, same or different map, the fun is to get more of a sense of this variant with the officers.

[british exil]

Maybe using a map with less water might make for a better play.
You can then concentrate on building and deploying land units, rather than having to build fleets to protect your overseas supply.

Might be a little easier on your commanders knowing that they can always walk home when the going gets tough rather than having to swim, heard the sharks can be a bit of a pain down under in Aussi-land.[;)]

Or even try using the Axis army, where the generals are well known.

Whatever you decide upon, we will follow your AAR here.

[Jeffrey H.]

It seems to me that his leadership layer/meta game actually inhibits his ability to defeat the AI.

[Appren]

ORIGINAL: Jeffrey H.

It seems to me that his leadership layer/meta game actually inhibits his ability to defeat the AI.

I don't think anyone thought otherwise